Promising Mid-90s drivers

[wedge]

Ignorantly I've always regarded Christian Fittipaldi as a great F1 reject ie. he was average at best.

Nor did he convince me much in CART. I'd always thought he should have gotten more out his car considering he drove for Newman Haas for much of time.

[rjbetty]

But I think he compared well with Michael Andretti, especially in 1999-2000. He was a race winner and one of the best qualifiers. But then I wonder if Andretti was getting slow due to not being as young as he used to be. Michael always easily beat him in the points.

It seemed the other way round in F1 as Christian always seemed to get good points finishes considering his qualifying. He was also an F3000 champion.

[Don Capps]

But this is history being discussed here.

It is an expression of opinion and perceptions, which is not the same as history.

[wedge]

But I think he compared well with Michael Andretti, especially in 1999-2000. He was a race winner and one of the best qualifiers. But then I wonder if Andretti was getting slow due to not being as young as he used to be. Michael always easily beat him in the points.

It seemed the other way round in F1 as Christian always seemed to get good points finishes considering his qualifying. He was also an F3000 champion.

He was a bit of a 1990's Piquet Jr and F3000 champion wasn't a great accolade.

Newman Haas were like McLaren and Penske. They exist to win and Christian lacked a killer instinct when Michael took all the plaudits.

It is an expression of opinion and perceptions, which is not the same as history.

Examining driver history is generally subjective.

[Don Capps]

Examining driver history is generally subjective.

Actually, examining a driver's record or past -- history -- can be quite objective. Discussing that record and/or the driver, however, is generally quite subjective.

[D-Type]

Come on folks! let's not get into semantic arguments!

[Don Capps]

Come on folks! let's not get into semantic arguments!

What argument?

[Bruce D]

It's always hard to judge how good someone was, particularly in Formula 1 because of how much certain situations make a difference, be it engines, tyres, car, etc. Brundle and Herbert can both point at injuries and not getting the breaks as a lack of success. People handle situations better than others, an example being the Schumacher / Rosberg combination at Mercedes now. Before Rosberg was beating Schumacher, now it's the other way around because of whatever situation that car on those tyres is doing.

As for Wendgliner, yes I think he was good, did seem to make a few mistakes from time to time and the accident definately made a difference to him. The late Sid Watkins used to always say it took 2 years to recover from a brain injury. Karl was great in GT cars later.

As for Fittipaldi, well I think he was disappointing and never got the best out of his cars. Certainly in Indycars / CART he failed to deliver for sure. Honestly there has only been one great Fittipaldi and it was Emerson.

I would suggest, if you have the cash, buying the Motorsport Magazine archive DVDs as they are good race reports and let you in on the behind the scenes stuff. The Autocourse annuals are always great as well. Autocourse themselves are starting to make DVD archives of them so that's worth getting. I'm really into the history of F1 and I recently managed to get hold of the 1986 to 1989 Autocourse books and I'm learning stuff that I never knew! One particularly amusing point was that the March's designed in 1988 by a certain Adrian Newey were the quickest things through fast corners but struggled with low speed corner understeer - exactly the same complaint was leveled at the 2009/10 Red Bull!

[steveaki13]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxwH7kTwwoU

Rjbetty

I have a copy of the 1994 race and might watch it again thanks to your interest in Fittipaldi's race.

I also found this copy on You Tube. Have a look for yourself and watch christian have a great race.

Its fun if you have a free evening to watch some of these old races and see it first hand.

Albeit coverage back then was not very widespread. No graphics of further down the field and often dont see much of tailenders but there you go

[rjbetty]

Oh that is fantastic! Thank you aki13!