Rather than a "Best" discussion, I thought it would be interesting to know who the forum members would have liked to have seen make it to Formula One but who never did.
Or even those that the members thought would make it, but who, for whatever reason, didn't.
So, Gentlemen - and Ladies - if you would care to share?
Mauricio Gugelmin. Had some outstanding drives for the Leyton House March outfit including an excellent 3rd in the 89 Brazilian GP, but after that could only scrape a solitary sixth place finish in Belgium 1990. A victim of a good driver in a poor car, it's a crying shame that he wasn't picked up by one of the bigger teams
Mauricio Gugelmin. Had some outstanding drives for the Leyton House March outfit including an excellent 3rd in the 89 Brazilian GP, but after that could only scrape a solitary sixth place finish in Belgium 1990. A victim of a good driver in a poor car, it's a crying shame that he wasn't picked up by one of the bigger teams.
Plus he had an awesome crash hat design
http://img59.exs.cx/img59/353/mauriciogugelmin911kq.png
Mike Thackwell from a NZ perspective. Won the last ever Formula 2 title in a Ralt RT4 (after finishing runner-up to team mate Johnathon Palmer the previous year). He had 1 race for Arrows (DNQ) and two for Tyrrell (ret and DNQ) as a stand in driver before returning to F2 where he had a massive accident in pre-season testing. Eventually rejoining the works Ralt team in 1983 (winning 1 race, with 5 seconds and 3 thirds) In 1984 after Plamer had moved on to F1 with RAM. Thackwell was nearly unbeatable (7 wins and 1 second from 11 races).
Other drivers including Thackwell's team mate Roberto Morano ( and drivers like Nannini, Strieff, Danner, Pirro and even the hopeless Pascal Fabre) were given a chance in F1, Thackwell strangely wasn't and F1 missed out on a talented driver
Johnny Dumfries was Ayrton Senna's team-mate at Lotus in 1986, having been Ferrari test driver the previous year. He had some reasonable results and was well-liked by the team, but was replaced by Satoru Nakajima when Lotus changed to Honda engines for 1987. He won Le Mans with Jaguar in 1987, before driving for Toyota in 1988 and '89.
Now by no means am I suggesting that these two were the best drivers never too, but it always surprised me that, in an era when you couldn't walk down the street without falling over a French Formula One driver, neither Alain or Michel Ferte ever made it to F1.
I know that, for a while, Michel had Marlboro backing in F3 and F2, and Alain scored several good F2 results, even if neither of them were dominating in that category. To be fair, though, if you didn't drive a works Ralt you were never going to do that in that era.
They were not out-classed in F2, and compared well in comparison to the likes of Alliot, Streiff and Grouillard.
I assume it is the age-old lack-of-funds story that stopped their progression. Especially as, at one point in the 1980's, half the male population of France seemed to have a Super-Licence.
I do know that Alain ended up in Truck racing. No idea what happened to his younger sibling.
Big Mo - I don't see the fuss. He was a midfielder. LH were great given the circumstances and the genius of Newey so by the same token Ivan Cappelli was rated at the time only to become the nadir of Ferrari's barren two decades of WDC near misses and underachievement.
Tommy Byrne - a truly gifted driver though he had a stint with Theodore he had a legendary McLaren/Silverstone test which ended up destroying his F1 career.
Craig Lowndes - highly rated and sensational in the junior Aussi ranks. A brief stint as Peter Brock's protege with Holden in Aussie V8s before managing a single season in F3000 as he quickly ran out of money.
Gil De Ferran - F3000 whi couldn't land a drive in F1 but forged a successful career in Indycar.
Dario Franchitti - one of the top drivers in DTM. Used his Merc connection to land a drive in Champcar and went on to become one of the best drivers of his generation. He turned down Jaguar which even in hinsight is still debatable.
I don't know if they would have cut it or been anything above average, but back then I was wondering whether Jörg Müller or Björn Wirdheim could have been given a chance. Müller was with in a shot of the 1998 TWR Arrows drive before Diniz outbid him with $10M.
TOMMY BYRNE....Read the book CRASH or BYRNE if you can find it....great read !!! and a hell of a Driver
What surprises me is that when you look at the winners of the F1 feeder series: European F2 Championship, Formula 3000, GP2, nearly all of them did get Formula 1 drives, but only Hamilton has become a World Champion. Some secured a couple of wins but were essentially midfield runners and never championship contenders while the majority scarcely made it past the rear half of the grid.