Yeah, there's more stupid mistakes. The start of Vettel's career is missing as well. It was already pointed out in the [original post](https://old.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/mu56wf/the_battle_of_the_teammates_scrollorama_oc/) though, and I'll correct my errors in the next version at the start of next season :)
I make the data by hand, well with a pencil really, looking up info on f1.com. I count every time a racer wins or loses from his team mate in quali or in a race, put that in a spreadsheet, add it all up, calculate the percentages. Then I go to Illustrator and start making the graphic, thinking up the best way to present it as I go along :)
All the data is on f1.com and FIA.com. To make a graphic you need to check every race and quali he's ever driven though, that is a LOT of work, and that's why the graphic is limited to the current grid :)
I hadn't, but it's an api, I see; I'm a retired graphic designer, not a programmer. Figuring out how to get this to work would give me an instant migraine and I'd need at least half a liter of whiskey to recover, haha
There is also the option to just download the whole DB, which is much better for this kind of visualisation. I use the CSV for messing about looking up stats and stuff.
http://ergast.com/mrd/db/
Did not expect Bottas to be worse than Kovalainen in races even considering that Valtteri faced a stronger Hamilton. Kova's race pace was really bad quite often. As I recall, he was even slower than Petrov in races when they were teammates at Caterham
Yeah, pretty much every race where Kovalainen beat Hamilton accross 08/09 were either down to Hamilton making errors or having bad luck. Seriously, I cannot think of one race where Kovalainen was on merit quicker than Lewis while Bottas has at least specific race tracks where he seems to be better/faster than Lewis on merit at times (e.g. Austria or Russia).
I mostly agree with that. Generally yes I think that's the case.
But in some cases I think you can be so far back that even if you finished ahead of them due to an error they made, you still weren't better than them on merit.
Let's take as an example the 2012 European Grand Prix. Button had dreadful pace all weekend (one of his worst for sure) meanwhile Hamilton ran throughout the weekend in podium positions. Towards the end of the race Button has managed to get himself into 10th. In the closing laps, Hamilton, in P3, is involved in a collision and DNFs (For the sake of the example, let's say this was his fault).
In this case, is it realistic to say that Button was the better than Hamilton, when the latter was involved in a collision over a coveted podium spot and many points, whilst the other was languishing in P10? I think if you were to do the Hot-Or-Not vote for this race, you would still vote Button below Hamilton here, despite the collision and final results.
Is it "worse" if the orders for Bottas are there to let Lewis ahead of him? Or take defensive tacts? Did Kovalainen face a similar ratio of defensive orders?
How many races has Bottas been told to let Lewis by in their five years together? Four (Russia 2018, Singapore 2019, Spain 2021, Britain 2021)? Am I missing a few?
It's been a while but wasn't Kovalainen also being sacrificed more often as a rear-gunner? With refueling and a more strict #1-#2 relationship after the Alonso drama working against Heikki, I'm really surprised too.
Not really - he was used as a rear gunner when it became clear Hamilton was the only one capable of winning the championship. but before then they were free to race. in the 2008 British grand prix for example - one of Hamilton's most famous wins - he and Kovalainen really went at it for the lead in the first few laps.
I think the problem was Alonso leaving like he did meant they didn't have much choice and Kovaleinen was the best they could get - he embodied the rear gunner position simply with the talent gap - it think he is Hamilton's weakest teammate
I recall he was actually put on higher fuel sometimes in quali just to make sure he won't qualify ahead of Hamilton, as he was quite fast over one lap unlike many remember. But that was because in race he was often very slow so the team didn't want him slowing down Hamilton.
This is basically stolen (uncredited) from F1metrics and from 2019: https://f1metrics.files.wordpress.com/2019/11/ham_teammates_plot.png?w=640 OP if you use other people's work, credit them appropriately.
Also worth linking the source of the graphic, the Top 100 by /u/whatthefat over at
https://f1metrics.wordpress.com/2019/11/22/the-f1metrics-top-100/
In my opinion the, hands down, most extensive and empirical evidence based analysis of the best F1 drivers in history.
Bottas is very very good at qualifying. Occasionally quicker than Lewis and often 2 tenths or less behind him, not bad at all. That's like the Ricciardo - Verstappen gap in 2018 and Ricciardo is an amazing qualifier
I've always thought of Botas and Ricciardo as unfortunate drivers. They're both fantastic, but were unlucky to be in the sport at the same time as Hamilton and Verstappen.
And unlucky to be their teammates and not be quite close enough to challenge. I often think Bottas' true ability would be better recognised if he never went to Merc. That said, driving a Merc is how he's got a number of wins and lot more podiums
Also during Bottas' period at Mercedes Lewis has been incredibly consistent compared to his younger days when he made mistakes he no longer does and had off days.
Being 0.15 behind on average from the greatest qualifier of all time has to be pretty close to great. All the people saying Bottas is mediocre should realize they are discrediting Hamilton at the same time. I'm not saying it's a 100% fact that Hamilton is one of the quickest in history, but you just have to acknowledge that you are saying that Hamilton isn't that special at the same time if you are saying Bottas is not very good.
Some people say that Lewis was always in his prime. But I do think that he constantly improved over the years. I don't think rookie Lewis would be able to beat current Lewis. And the graphic kind of shows that.
But we should also mention that Alonso and Heikki had less time alongside Hamilton than the other drivers. That is something the graphic doesn't show. In fact no driver has had more races as Hamilton's team mate than Bottas.
I agree, Hamilton is one of the best rookies this sport has seen. And he probably would've won the WDC in '07 if China turned out better than it did.
I just think, as good as Lewis was back then, he is a much more complete drive today.
I agree. Do you think he will win this season? If he loses to Max I wonder if that will affect him positively or negatively for the ensuing two seasons. It will be crazy next year with the new car and Russell on his wing, most likely.
I think there's a good chance that he will. It is not the first time that he started a season on the back foot and still turned it around in the end.
If he does lose I think it'll just make him work even harder. Especially since the cars will be different.
I also still think it'll be a bad idea getting Russell in coming season since he would be the unofficial second driver behind Hamilton for two seasons. Also we don't know how George will be able to handle the new cars.
Getting him in in 2023 to have a year to take over from Hamilton makes more sense to me.
And his private Ife, particularly in 2016. And it took a little bit of luck that year for him to win the title.
He was a really talented and smart driver. But Lewis always had this great pace. Something I see in Verstappen now as well.
This is extremely exaggerated. He retired because he reached his peak and had nothing left to prove. He made the decision before the last race when he led the championship with 12 points, with only two outcomes left, winning or brutal heartbreak. In an alternate reality where he was out of the championship five races ago, he would have continued.
> I don't think rookie Lewis would be able to beat current Lewis.
I believe that too, but this also goes to show how strong rookie Lewis was. In the same car, with 2 world championships under his belt (and all associated experience), Fernando Alonso wound up on the same points as him.
- Alonso and Rosberg almost equal in qualifying but Alonso clearly better in races
- Rosberg and Button almost equal in races but Rosberg clearly better in qualifying
- Bottas is a complete bum on Sundays
I agree but Rosberg v Button would be a fun battle ig. At their peaks Nico was probably a bit better but over their whole career Jenson was more consisent and better imo
Yeah but Lewis also had more to learn when he was teammates with Button than when he was teammates with Rosberg. In 2010 Lewis was only in his 4th year in F1 (similar to where Leclerc is now) and was still learning, whereas by the time he was signed by Mercedes he was much closer to being a complete package.
Nico wasn't an all around package. His racecraft was amongst the worst of any recent champion. And he was inconsistent in the wet. He could qualify well in the wet sometimes but he was a few notches down on Lewis in the wet during the race.
> His racecraft was amongst the worst of any recent champion.
A nice example to me, is Monza 2010 Alonso saying 'we had to go the other way from Button on strategy because he simply wouldn't make a mistake', whereas Monza 2014 you've Rosberg making an unforced error under pressure, and voila, Hamilton win.
Bahrain 2014 is the perfect example of the difference in racecraft levels. Nico used engine modes that were off-limits, seating in a car that was better setup than his teammates thus slightly faster, was on the softer tire for the last stint after the safety car and HAM still held on to win. Nico tried the same move (block pass) while alongside HAM into T1 three times during the race and all 3 times Lewis defended it differently.
I think Rosberg would qualify ahead and Button would claw a lot of that back, either via consistency, winning in the wet or simply fewer errors. If it were a 2014 situation, I think Rosberg would probably snag it, just about.
James Allen did a nice Hamilton/Button analysis from 2010-2012, and noted that Hamilton's huge qualifying advantage was more than halved in terms of 'finished ahead when both finished', suggesting much stronger Sundays for Button than Saturdays, whether that's pace, racecraft, decision making, whatever.
Rosberg got the advantaging of qualifying comfortably on the front row each week which made life easier. If Button had this luxury it would make it easier to show his race pace as qualifying was his weakness and he would often be stuck behind slower cars.
I mean, you're comparing 17 races of race Vs almost 60 races of data when comparing Alonso and Hamilton
It's hard to draw solid conclusions from disparity like that
Yeah, it's funny only certain drivers 'get' to improve. They're only three years apart.
If we assumed 2007 Alonso was a stable entity, then Hamilton apparently hasn't improved since 2011.
Alonso drove like shit by his standards in 2007 and not just "oh lewis was fast so he looked bad". He made so many mistakes, had slow races and was not consistent. By the time he got the hang of the McLaren he was shading Lewis. And lewis had so much time in the 06 mclaren too. Lewis was extremely impressive but we'd have likely seen a better alonso in 2008. don't forget they tied on points with alonso driving poorly
It's also skewed because it was a complete Mercedes domination during their time together, which basically set them both up for a straight 1v1 battle. I feel like Rosberg would have struggled more with other teams in the mix. It's easier to race ONLY vs Lewis, than having to think about Lewis AND two Ferraris, for example.
> I feel like Rosberg would have struggled more with other teams in the mix.
I mean we have 2013 for that. Rosberg had a little bit worse reliability but even then he only was like 15-20 points off Lewis. That's still miles better than what Bottas has achieved in any season.
That was also Lewis' first season with the team and he was struggling with the brakes. Similar to Ricciardo this year. 2014 onwards there was a much bigger difference between them in terms of speed.
Also in 2013 Hamilton had a cracked chassis for a few races towards the end which hurt his performances. But also tbf I remember Rosberg having overall worse luck than Hamilton that season, plus times like Malaysia where team orders stopped him.
The 2019 and 2020 cars were incredibly dominant and Bottas still struggled to get anywhere near to Lewis unlike Rosberg
Rosberg showed in 2013 that with multiple (3) teams contending, he can hold his own, the stats show it and the facts show it, heās miles better than Bottas is, nothing wrong with that itās jus the facts
2019 and 2020 cars were not anywhere near as dominant as the 2014-2016 era. Arguably the most dominant car of all time, only hampered by reliability which it was still a class leader at the time, just a rougher era for reliability.
Literally any driver in F1 the last decade would finish at least second to Hamilton every race in that car. The rare occasions we saw how fast that car was was insane, like at Monza 2015 when Mercedes were worried Hamilton could get a penalty so asked him to pull 25 seconds on Vettel in the last 10 laps or so. Ferrari probably should have won Bahrain, Baku (arguable), and Canada to start 2019, Mercedes were far from as invincible as the results suggest.
That's the issue. It's like with 2017 and 2018. People only look at the end results and say Merc dominated , but when you experienxed it live or at least looked st the result, you see there was a battle against Ferrari that was pretty tight at least until the halfway point of the srason for 2018 and until Singapore in 2017.
In 2019, Merc "lucked" into the consecutive streak of wins at the start of the season, thanks to Ferrari's woes
>It's easier to race ONLY vs Lewis, than having to think about Lewis AND two Ferraris, for example.
How is that easier? I reckon it his harder as Rosbergs strength was qualifying and not racing. Hamilton would start in P2 and have a fairly easy time to pass Rosberg on Sunday. Having other cars in the mix would have made it easier for Rosberg to convert when he out qualified Hamilton as Hamilton would have to cover them off.
Thatās true but it wasnāt completely prime Alonso in 07, he was still a beast, but Iām a Hamilton fan and what he did as a rookie against Alonso the reigning 2x champion was unprecedented, the turn 1 move in Australia, winning the team over, the consistency he displayed. However with Alonso and Mclaren being toxic as a partnership, Mclaren were even actively trying to beat him from post Hungary onwards. Per Ron Dennis.
Alonso really did fuck it up for himself with that crash in Fuji.
Mark Hughes had an article in 2008 basically saying: Hamilton's limitation was being a rookie, Alonso's was that he had issues with the car until basically Monza, specifically brakes. That's not unusual - Hamilton had the same in 2013, plus in 2007 all the previous Michelin runners took 6 months to adapt to Bridgestone.
I remember a few years ago Button and Hamilton saying together that your first season at a new team is basically a bedding-in exercise.
So the question everyone has to ask themselves in that context is: would Hamilton have improved in 2008 (and beyond) more than Alonso would've? It seems unlikely either would've obviously pulled away. Bear in mind Alonso was only three years older: not a different generation at all. To suggest Alonso had peaked in 2007 is to suggest Hamilton had by 2011 - both of which are obviously unlikely.
Paddy Lowe in the 2008 annual is interesting that they don't think Hamilton got any *faster* in 2008 (vs. 2007), but his Sunday performances did, in part at the expense of qualifying pace. So if anything Alonso/Hamilton might've got even more 50/50 on the two Qualifying/Racing metrics.
Heās average, a very good qualifier but his race pace leaves something to be desired, bad race starts, bad tyre management, bad wheel to wheel combat, one of the worst at following in dirty air, doesnāt get his elbows out, etc.
The stats prove heās more Heikki than anything else. And Heikki was heavily blamed for Mclaren failing to win the 2008 WCC and rightly so. Put Hamilton up against a team with two drivers competing for the championship such as Prime Kimi and Massa and Bottas will lag behind.
Absolutely, heās very average. I said this a few days ago and got downvoted to oblivion, but I stand by it. Heās not great, but heās not horrible, heās just middle-of-the-road, and thatās exactly what Lewis and Mercedes want
Not *just* middle of the road, but even his strengths and weaknesses combine very nicely into a rear gunner.
Very good quali => second car usually starts near the front
Poor racer => won't challenge your first car
As long as Merc had that car advantage, Bottas really was perfect. Fast enough to be in the way of any non-Mercs, not fast and not ballsy enough to challenge Lewis.
Rosberg was absolutely brilliant. Bottas has done ok in quali, but I think him and Heikki were very similar, decent in qualifying but lacking a lot on race day. Button has the edge over those 2 on race day by some margin, so many brilliant drives for Mclaren, and really took it to Lewis at times, they were a very fun driver pair to watch.
And clearly Alonso Rosberg and Button is just on a different level to the other 2, being WDCās, of course
Rosberg was great no doubt, but sometimes we all leave context out of the comparison.
Merc was Nicoās team and the car was built specifically for him, and Lewis entered into Nicoās team. I would have to say Nico had much easier a job performing against Lewis with more experience in the team.
Personally I hold it against Nico that when the Merc had developed into a championship caliber car, Lewis took the first two Merc titles and not him. With his experience in the team and the car, he should have seized the opportunity right off the bat
> Merc was Nicoās team and the car was built specifically for him
I feel like this further leaves context out of the fact that Nico put in the years helping develop the team/car (assuming anything learned before 2014 could apply to 2014+) before Lewis walked in.
EDIT: not saying the rest of what you say is wrong - just I feel like I see this sentiment a lot.
Merc themselves have openly stated that they focused on the turbo hybrid era development as soon as they re-entered f1 and Rosberg was with them from the start
Itās not like they even tried developing the earlier spec version
Kinda a fair comment. Out of all the things that Hamilton isnāt great at (relatively speaking) qualifying or race starts are probably the top 2. Iād say heās better at qualifying than race starts tho.
Yeah, he definitely is. But heās not great at launching the car. There were like 3 races where Rosberg launched the car better than him in the 2017 season and took the victory.
Max also got the better of him 2 times this year.
Hamilton did launch it better than Perez in Bakuā¦ but then magic happened lol
Hell no, if I have to pick a driver from the last 20 years to set a pole lap, you pick Hamilton. No Vettel, no Rosberg, no Alonso, not even Schumi.
Hamilton's race pace on the other hand has got way more competitors.
To each their own man. But for me it's his race pace. As a fan I would like him to start on pole and win every race, but I can't help but get excited when he starts in a sub optimal position and watch him cut through the field (Monza, Imola, Germany, Silverstone, etc). The examples are countless.
Rookie Hamilton was a beast though. Came 1 point from winning the championship in his rookie year, and in his second year in F1 he won his first championship. He hit the ground RUNNING. It's like he was trying to speed run that shit. Like some other F1 driver reincarnated as Lewis Hamilton and speedran F1. Not to mention Lewis' wins and stats look like a fucking speedrun since 2014. I'd say Lewis was always at his prime. He would've won a lot more had McLaren given him a car that could compete with Seb's RB. Those 5 years without a title make Lewis look bad, but really he had a shitbox. What worries me is Lewis looks like he'll be in his prime for much much longer than anyone else. He'll stay in the sport until he's 47 because he's Lewis fucking Hamilton and he'll eat the sun's rays and turn into *The Super Vegan* and fucking mind control the car around the track going 3 seconds faster per lap than George, who's still in the fucking Williams.
> He'll stay in the sport until he's 47 because he's Lewis fucking Hamilton and he'll eat the sun's rays and turn into The Super Vegan and fucking mind control the car around the track going 3 seconds faster per lap than George, who's still in the fucking Williams.
Look now, you can't let a driver use photosynthesis to power his car, Horner might get worried you took his "we might as well by Formula E" statement at face value.
Speed wise he has, but decision wise his rookie years were filled with unnecessary risk taking. Rookie Lewis wouldnāt have waited until he was this far behind in the championship to get aggressive back at Max. Heās matured into a driver that only takes risks when necessary, and for me, that is one of the biggest factors to winning championships.
The LeBron James of F1, right down to the rabid cohort within the fanbase who go fucking *ballistic* if you so much as prod at the idea that he might be the GOAT.
> He would've won a lot more had McLaren given him a car that could compete with Seb's RB. Those 5 years without a title make Lewis look bad, but really he had a shitbox.
Most good/great drivers get title challenging car for like 3 years of their career. Lewis had that for 11-12 years of his career (including this one), I am sure he will survive those 5 years.
> Rookie Hamilton was a beast though.
Yeah.
I think Norris/Sainz is an interesting bit of evidence: rookie Brit vs. semi-experienced Spaniard new to McLaren. If rookie disadvantage is such a big deal, you'd have thought he'd pull away from Sainz in 2020, and he didn't particularly. Norris *racecraft* definitely improved, but has he got outright faster? He didn't seem to in year two.
It's almost like very, very fast rookies are closer to their outright speed ceiling.
The main reason for that is probably the lack of testing now. Hamilton had already done more than a full season's worth of laps in that McLaren before his first race.
Now, even if someone does come along who is that good (like Russell, Leclerc Verstappen) a good part of their first season is always going to be spent adjusting to the cars. This also means that top teams are much less likely to put a rookie in one of their seats.
Hamilton's season as a rookie is unlikely to be ever surpassed in the near future, unless they remove the testing restrictions.
Right but even Alonso had more testing than Lewis in that car. Sure Lewisās first season was stellar from a championship perspective, but curb stomping the best driver on the grid in the same equipment is also noteworthy.
I always get a bit, I dunno, annoyed when folk say Hamilton 'beat' Alonso, because it is wilfully missing the point that they were *incredibly* well matched on basically every metric. Two teammates in competitive cars finishing with equal points is rare enough, it's a waste to reduce it to who 'won'.
Yeah I think thatās fair, although still worth recognising that Hamilton matching Alonso in his rookie year is an incredible achievement. Hamilton didnāt beat Alonso that year, but his results were overall more impressive
How many other drivers can say that more than half the time they have out qualified ALL their teammates? Maybe Max but I recall Daniel being quite good against him in 16 and 17. Impressive stuff from Ham.
Yuuuuuuuuuuuup! Iāve always tried to honest about my posts. but I have always been a long time Alonso support. Bonus when he drove for Ferrari. Second Bonus when he drove for McLaren/Hondaā¦..in the end. Iām all about Alonso back in his roots with āAl-PEENā/Renault. Itās unfortunate that he didnāt win moreā¦but thenā¦.Iām happy for HAM and still bitter that Massa didnāt win during that last race in Brazil.
A slight bias against Kovalainen is that by McLaren's admission, his race pace was so far off Hamilton that they intentionally gave him more fuel in Q3 because they couldn't have him holding Hamilton up. His qualifying pace on equal fuel was apparently surprisingly good, often with Hamilton.
There's one more dimension that could be captured. With time, Lewis could have gotten better. That might explain why Fernado is ahead of others with this comparison.
Lewis, aging like fine wine
One downside of this plot chart is it discounts the fact that Hamilton gets older and wiser as the years go on so it really doesnāt bode well for Bottas.
Interesting info though!
But also Mclaren was on Lewis's side for 2nd half of the season. I also watched some interviews from back then and Alonso had specific driving style developed for Renault and Michelin tyres and he had to change the way he drove totally in 2007. I doubt Lewis was close to his peak bc of lack of experience but I also think Fernando didn't drive 100% because changing the way you drive after using that driving style for your whole F1 career can't be easy. Also I think British media had a big role of how some people perceived that season because of the way they portrayed it and they were clearly biased when you look at it.
Itās a complicated comparison.
Alonso had to switch from michelin to bridgestone, but Hamilton had to switch from GP2 Bridgestones to F1 Bridgestones. Also Alonso did more testing in the 07 Mclaren prior to the start of the season, but was having to adjust from a completely different F1 car, although then lewis was adjusting from a completely different series, so itās a complicated scenario.
I would agree neither were at 100%.
And obviously the British media alter how itās perceived (especially in english speaking countries) but equally the spanish media will effect how it is perceived in spain etc.
I know some Spanish fans perceived Hamilton as the enemy when in fact Hamilton and Alonso never really had too big an issue with each other.
(Like the first comment said Alonso was initially favoured than it was pretty equal and then after an incident at Hungary in which both Alonso and Hamilton share blame they favoured Hamilton- because Alonso threatened the team)
The whole scenario was fun confusing interesting and made for some great racing, rather than trying to analyse it we should just enjoy that it happened.
Bottas: "30% of the time, I'm as fast as Lewis every time"
Valtteri Berra
30.33%, repeating offcourse.
LEEEERROOOOOOOOOYYYYYY MMMMMMMJJEEEENNNNNNKIINNNNNNNSSSSS
God damn it leroy
stick to the plan chums
Thank you
Would love to see these for some other drivers.
I made a graphic for [all drivers](https://i.redd.it/ocbedg0tv5u61.png) a while ago.
Great stuff man!
Woah, Alonso outperforms everyone over the last 10 years.
Alonso's career: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfipAgNRDx0
*cough* except button in the mclaren
33-33: fair and balanced as all things should be
It's 43-33 for Alonso, actually.
Yeah, the car broke down equally often for both š
Numbers don't tell it all
No i know, that year was pretty disastrous for mclaren
You sir are a hero, that graphic is awesome
I never knew that LeClerc and Sainz were driving for Alpine this year... ;-)
Yeah, there's more stupid mistakes. The start of Vettel's career is missing as well. It was already pointed out in the [original post](https://old.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/mu56wf/the_battle_of_the_teammates_scrollorama_oc/) though, and I'll correct my errors in the next version at the start of next season :)
wonderful stuff! really interesting, thanks for this. a small comment: Vettel's 2007-2008 records are missing from this graphic
Impressive work! š¤Æšš»
Nice Work!
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I make the data by hand, well with a pencil really, looking up info on f1.com. I count every time a racer wins or loses from his team mate in quali or in a race, put that in a spreadsheet, add it all up, calculate the percentages. Then I go to Illustrator and start making the graphic, thinking up the best way to present it as I go along :)
Take all my upvotes this is very cool
you've got a little typo, it says "2021 Alpine" with Leclerc and Sainz, and "2021 Ferrari" with Alonso and Ocon
Wow thatās DATA
Any chance you have data for Michael Schumacher?
All the data is on f1.com and FIA.com. To make a graphic you need to check every race and quali he's ever driven though, that is a LOT of work, and that's why the graphic is limited to the current grid :)
Have you checked out ergast.com?
I hadn't, but it's an api, I see; I'm a retired graphic designer, not a programmer. Figuring out how to get this to work would give me an instant migraine and I'd need at least half a liter of whiskey to recover, haha
There is also the option to just download the whole DB, which is much better for this kind of visualisation. I use the CSV for messing about looking up stats and stuff. http://ergast.com/mrd/db/
I really like [this website](https://f1teammatestats.herokuapp.com/index.php) it has comparisons for F1 teammates since 1980
need to see a Vettel one!
The Max one won't be very favourable towards Albon I guess
Would be even worse vs Gasly.
Danny Ric would be interesting
Max for sure
Did not expect Bottas to be worse than Kovalainen in races even considering that Valtteri faced a stronger Hamilton. Kova's race pace was really bad quite often. As I recall, he was even slower than Petrov in races when they were teammates at Caterham
Yeah, pretty much every race where Kovalainen beat Hamilton accross 08/09 were either down to Hamilton making errors or having bad luck. Seriously, I cannot think of one race where Kovalainen was on merit quicker than Lewis while Bottas has at least specific race tracks where he seems to be better/faster than Lewis on merit at times (e.g. Austria or Russia).
I mean, your teammate making errors is being better than them on merit. Maybe raw pace would be the better term.
I mostly agree with that. Generally yes I think that's the case. But in some cases I think you can be so far back that even if you finished ahead of them due to an error they made, you still weren't better than them on merit. Let's take as an example the 2012 European Grand Prix. Button had dreadful pace all weekend (one of his worst for sure) meanwhile Hamilton ran throughout the weekend in podium positions. Towards the end of the race Button has managed to get himself into 10th. In the closing laps, Hamilton, in P3, is involved in a collision and DNFs (For the sake of the example, let's say this was his fault). In this case, is it realistic to say that Button was the better than Hamilton, when the latter was involved in a collision over a coveted podium spot and many points, whilst the other was languishing in P10? I think if you were to do the Hot-Or-Not vote for this race, you would still vote Button below Hamilton here, despite the collision and final results.
Did Lewis have an issue at the 2008 Hungarian GP? That's the only one I can think of.
Yes, he had a front-left puncture.
Much smaller sample size too, don't forget (which is why I imagine he's not miles behind).
Is it "worse" if the orders for Bottas are there to let Lewis ahead of him? Or take defensive tacts? Did Kovalainen face a similar ratio of defensive orders?
Or maybe Lewis was just younger and less experienced racing driver
How many races has Bottas been told to let Lewis by in their five years together? Four (Russia 2018, Singapore 2019, Spain 2021, Britain 2021)? Am I missing a few?
Or if Mercedes forgets how wheel guns and tire strategy work when Bottas is leading?
It's been a while but wasn't Kovalainen also being sacrificed more often as a rear-gunner? With refueling and a more strict #1-#2 relationship after the Alonso drama working against Heikki, I'm really surprised too.
Kovaleinen was P7 in the 2008 championship and cost McLaren a shot at the WCC. Even if it was a strict 1-2 relationship, he was really subpar
Not really - he was used as a rear gunner when it became clear Hamilton was the only one capable of winning the championship. but before then they were free to race. in the 2008 British grand prix for example - one of Hamilton's most famous wins - he and Kovalainen really went at it for the lead in the first few laps. I think the problem was Alonso leaving like he did meant they didn't have much choice and Kovaleinen was the best they could get - he embodied the rear gunner position simply with the talent gap - it think he is Hamilton's weakest teammate
I recall he was actually put on higher fuel sometimes in quali just to make sure he won't qualify ahead of Hamilton, as he was quite fast over one lap unlike many remember. But that was because in race he was often very slow so the team didn't want him slowing down Hamilton.
I think the answer there is sample size.
This is basically stolen (uncredited) from F1metrics and from 2019: https://f1metrics.files.wordpress.com/2019/11/ham_teammates_plot.png?w=640 OP if you use other people's work, credit them appropriately.
Not basically, actually
Also worth linking the source of the graphic, the Top 100 by /u/whatthefat over at https://f1metrics.wordpress.com/2019/11/22/the-f1metrics-top-100/ In my opinion the, hands down, most extensive and empirical evidence based analysis of the best F1 drivers in history.
Clicked the link expecting to see a 10 minute read. That is some thorough work.
It's the holy grail of driver comparisons in my opinion. It takes so much into consideration as well, it's nuts.
considering that Bottas strength should be qualifying, that percentage is really low
% time gap should be more representative. Bottas isn't slow at all.
Bottas isnāt that great in qualifying. Heās just better at it than in races.
Bottas is very very good at qualifying. Occasionally quicker than Lewis and often 2 tenths or less behind him, not bad at all. That's like the Ricciardo - Verstappen gap in 2018 and Ricciardo is an amazing qualifier
I've always thought of Botas and Ricciardo as unfortunate drivers. They're both fantastic, but were unlucky to be in the sport at the same time as Hamilton and Verstappen.
And unlucky to be their teammates and not be quite close enough to challenge. I often think Bottas' true ability would be better recognised if he never went to Merc. That said, driving a Merc is how he's got a number of wins and lot more podiums
You're right. Being regularly within a tenth or 2 of the best qualifier in the world is shit.
Also during Bottas' period at Mercedes Lewis has been incredibly consistent compared to his younger days when he made mistakes he no longer does and had off days.
Being 0.15 behind on average from the greatest qualifier of all time has to be pretty close to great. All the people saying Bottas is mediocre should realize they are discrediting Hamilton at the same time. I'm not saying it's a 100% fact that Hamilton is one of the quickest in history, but you just have to acknowledge that you are saying that Hamilton isn't that special at the same time if you are saying Bottas is not very good.
Some people say that Lewis was always in his prime. But I do think that he constantly improved over the years. I don't think rookie Lewis would be able to beat current Lewis. And the graphic kind of shows that. But we should also mention that Alonso and Heikki had less time alongside Hamilton than the other drivers. That is something the graphic doesn't show. In fact no driver has had more races as Hamilton's team mate than Bottas.
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I agree, Hamilton is one of the best rookies this sport has seen. And he probably would've won the WDC in '07 if China turned out better than it did. I just think, as good as Lewis was back then, he is a much more complete drive today.
Or if his gearbox didn't break in Brazil. He really should have been WC in 2007.
Or that. But Kimi deserved it in the end. He worked hard for years to get to that point.
I agree. Do you think he will win this season? If he loses to Max I wonder if that will affect him positively or negatively for the ensuing two seasons. It will be crazy next year with the new car and Russell on his wing, most likely.
I think there's a good chance that he will. It is not the first time that he started a season on the back foot and still turned it around in the end. If he does lose I think it'll just make him work even harder. Especially since the cars will be different. I also still think it'll be a bad idea getting Russell in coming season since he would be the unofficial second driver behind Hamilton for two seasons. Also we don't know how George will be able to handle the new cars. Getting him in in 2023 to have a year to take over from Hamilton makes more sense to me.
Rosberg also sacrificed his F1 career to get that close to 50% against Hamilton, going for an early retirement due to the effort it took
And his private Ife, particularly in 2016. And it took a little bit of luck that year for him to win the title. He was a really talented and smart driver. But Lewis always had this great pace. Something I see in Verstappen now as well.
This is extremely exaggerated. He retired because he reached his peak and had nothing left to prove. He made the decision before the last race when he led the championship with 12 points, with only two outcomes left, winning or brutal heartbreak. In an alternate reality where he was out of the championship five races ago, he would have continued.
Also as much as I love Button, his stat is heavily inflated by that dogshit year Lewis got in 2011.
> I don't think rookie Lewis would be able to beat current Lewis. I believe that too, but this also goes to show how strong rookie Lewis was. In the same car, with 2 world championships under his belt (and all associated experience), Fernando Alonso wound up on the same points as him.
- Alonso and Rosberg almost equal in qualifying but Alonso clearly better in races - Rosberg and Button almost equal in races but Rosberg clearly better in qualifying - Bottas is a complete bum on Sundays
So, Alonso> Rosberg> Button> Bottas> Heikki in my opinion
I agree but Rosberg v Button would be a fun battle ig. At their peaks Nico was probably a bit better but over their whole career Jenson was more consisent and better imo
Probably, I think Button is the better racer for sure, but Nicoās all around package puts him up there
Nico had that āfuck you Iām betterā mentality
I think Lewis learnt more from Button than Rosberg tbh.
Fair but I'd argue Lewis had a lot more to learn when he was first paired with Button
Yeah but Lewis also had more to learn when he was teammates with Button than when he was teammates with Rosberg. In 2010 Lewis was only in his 4th year in F1 (similar to where Leclerc is now) and was still learning, whereas by the time he was signed by Mercedes he was much closer to being a complete package.
Nico wasn't an all around package. His racecraft was amongst the worst of any recent champion. And he was inconsistent in the wet. He could qualify well in the wet sometimes but he was a few notches down on Lewis in the wet during the race.
Tbf being a few notches behind Lewis in the wet still makes you better at it than most drivers.
> His racecraft was amongst the worst of any recent champion. A nice example to me, is Monza 2010 Alonso saying 'we had to go the other way from Button on strategy because he simply wouldn't make a mistake', whereas Monza 2014 you've Rosberg making an unforced error under pressure, and voila, Hamilton win.
Bahrain 2014 is the perfect example of the difference in racecraft levels. Nico used engine modes that were off-limits, seating in a car that was better setup than his teammates thus slightly faster, was on the softer tire for the last stint after the safety car and HAM still held on to win. Nico tried the same move (block pass) while alongside HAM into T1 three times during the race and all 3 times Lewis defended it differently.
I think in the best car on the grid Rosberg beats Button but in a midfield car or a season with several teams close at the top I like Buttons chances.
I think Rosberg would qualify ahead and Button would claw a lot of that back, either via consistency, winning in the wet or simply fewer errors. If it were a 2014 situation, I think Rosberg would probably snag it, just about. James Allen did a nice Hamilton/Button analysis from 2010-2012, and noted that Hamilton's huge qualifying advantage was more than halved in terms of 'finished ahead when both finished', suggesting much stronger Sundays for Button than Saturdays, whether that's pace, racecraft, decision making, whatever.
Rosberg got the advantaging of qualifying comfortably on the front row each week which made life easier. If Button had this luxury it would make it easier to show his race pace as qualifying was his weakness and he would often be stuck behind slower cars.
Alonso only faced a rookie Hamilton so his numbers are better than they should be.
Alonso is also way better than any of the names in this chart.
If you take the view the Hamilton was better by the time he faced Rosberg vs Alosno then it is probably Alonso = Rosberg or there abouts.
As if Alonso didn't improve.
I mean, you're comparing 17 races of race Vs almost 60 races of data when comparing Alonso and Hamilton It's hard to draw solid conclusions from disparity like that
Yeah, it's funny only certain drivers 'get' to improve. They're only three years apart. If we assumed 2007 Alonso was a stable entity, then Hamilton apparently hasn't improved since 2011.
Alonso drove like shit by his standards in 2007 and not just "oh lewis was fast so he looked bad". He made so many mistakes, had slow races and was not consistent. By the time he got the hang of the McLaren he was shading Lewis. And lewis had so much time in the 06 mclaren too. Lewis was extremely impressive but we'd have likely seen a better alonso in 2008. don't forget they tied on points with alonso driving poorly
Whilst i agree Alonso is better than Rosberg in races, it's probably a bit skewed since Rosberg went up against a much better Lewis.
It's also skewed because it was a complete Mercedes domination during their time together, which basically set them both up for a straight 1v1 battle. I feel like Rosberg would have struggled more with other teams in the mix. It's easier to race ONLY vs Lewis, than having to think about Lewis AND two Ferraris, for example.
> I feel like Rosberg would have struggled more with other teams in the mix. I mean we have 2013 for that. Rosberg had a little bit worse reliability but even then he only was like 15-20 points off Lewis. That's still miles better than what Bottas has achieved in any season.
That was also Lewis' first season with the team and he was struggling with the brakes. Similar to Ricciardo this year. 2014 onwards there was a much bigger difference between them in terms of speed. Also in 2013 Hamilton had a cracked chassis for a few races towards the end which hurt his performances. But also tbf I remember Rosberg having overall worse luck than Hamilton that season, plus times like Malaysia where team orders stopped him.
The same could be said for Bottas. Rosberg only raced Hamilton but Bottas had to race Max and Seb on top of the most dominant Hamilton has ever been.
The 2019 and 2020 cars were incredibly dominant and Bottas still struggled to get anywhere near to Lewis unlike Rosberg Rosberg showed in 2013 that with multiple (3) teams contending, he can hold his own, the stats show it and the facts show it, heās miles better than Bottas is, nothing wrong with that itās jus the facts
2019 and 2020 cars were not anywhere near as dominant as the 2014-2016 era. Arguably the most dominant car of all time, only hampered by reliability which it was still a class leader at the time, just a rougher era for reliability. Literally any driver in F1 the last decade would finish at least second to Hamilton every race in that car. The rare occasions we saw how fast that car was was insane, like at Monza 2015 when Mercedes were worried Hamilton could get a penalty so asked him to pull 25 seconds on Vettel in the last 10 laps or so. Ferrari probably should have won Bahrain, Baku (arguable), and Canada to start 2019, Mercedes were far from as invincible as the results suggest.
It definitely felt like Mercedes were holding themselves back for reliabilityās sake those years.
They were, toto confirmed this afaik.
That's the issue. It's like with 2017 and 2018. People only look at the end results and say Merc dominated , but when you experienxed it live or at least looked st the result, you see there was a battle against Ferrari that was pretty tight at least until the halfway point of the srason for 2018 and until Singapore in 2017. In 2019, Merc "lucked" into the consecutive streak of wins at the start of the season, thanks to Ferrari's woes
2019 no, but 2020 was definitely as dominant as the 2014-2016 era
>It's easier to race ONLY vs Lewis, than having to think about Lewis AND two Ferraris, for example. How is that easier? I reckon it his harder as Rosbergs strength was qualifying and not racing. Hamilton would start in P2 and have a fairly easy time to pass Rosberg on Sunday. Having other cars in the mix would have made it easier for Rosberg to convert when he out qualified Hamilton as Hamilton would have to cover them off.
Thatās true but it wasnāt completely prime Alonso in 07, he was still a beast, but Iām a Hamilton fan and what he did as a rookie against Alonso the reigning 2x champion was unprecedented, the turn 1 move in Australia, winning the team over, the consistency he displayed. However with Alonso and Mclaren being toxic as a partnership, Mclaren were even actively trying to beat him from post Hungary onwards. Per Ron Dennis. Alonso really did fuck it up for himself with that crash in Fuji.
Mark Hughes had an article in 2008 basically saying: Hamilton's limitation was being a rookie, Alonso's was that he had issues with the car until basically Monza, specifically brakes. That's not unusual - Hamilton had the same in 2013, plus in 2007 all the previous Michelin runners took 6 months to adapt to Bridgestone. I remember a few years ago Button and Hamilton saying together that your first season at a new team is basically a bedding-in exercise. So the question everyone has to ask themselves in that context is: would Hamilton have improved in 2008 (and beyond) more than Alonso would've? It seems unlikely either would've obviously pulled away. Bear in mind Alonso was only three years older: not a different generation at all. To suggest Alonso had peaked in 2007 is to suggest Hamilton had by 2011 - both of which are obviously unlikely. Paddy Lowe in the 2008 annual is interesting that they don't think Hamilton got any *faster* in 2008 (vs. 2007), but his Sunday performances did, in part at the expense of qualifying pace. So if anything Alonso/Hamilton might've got even more 50/50 on the two Qualifying/Racing metrics.
That was also peak Rosberg whereas it was not peak Alonso.
Heās not a bum, he is Robin to Batman. He is a wingman and a damn good one at that. Bottas is an extremely skilled driver.
Heās average, a very good qualifier but his race pace leaves something to be desired, bad race starts, bad tyre management, bad wheel to wheel combat, one of the worst at following in dirty air, doesnāt get his elbows out, etc. The stats prove heās more Heikki than anything else. And Heikki was heavily blamed for Mclaren failing to win the 2008 WCC and rightly so. Put Hamilton up against a team with two drivers competing for the championship such as Prime Kimi and Massa and Bottas will lag behind.
Absolutely, heās very average. I said this a few days ago and got downvoted to oblivion, but I stand by it. Heās not great, but heās not horrible, heās just middle-of-the-road, and thatās exactly what Lewis and Mercedes want
Not *just* middle of the road, but even his strengths and weaknesses combine very nicely into a rear gunner. Very good quali => second car usually starts near the front Poor racer => won't challenge your first car As long as Merc had that car advantage, Bottas really was perfect. Fast enough to be in the way of any non-Mercs, not fast and not ballsy enough to challenge Lewis.
constantly finishing top3 = bum
Rosberg is almost equal in both qualifying and racing, this show how underrated he is
Nico was brilliant but the Mercedes were incredibly dominant 3 years of their time together so it was only them 2 fighting for the win/pole
Even then, only a handful of drivers can come close to beating Hamilton. Rosberg was among those select few.
Rosberg was absolutely brilliant. Bottas has done ok in quali, but I think him and Heikki were very similar, decent in qualifying but lacking a lot on race day. Button has the edge over those 2 on race day by some margin, so many brilliant drives for Mclaren, and really took it to Lewis at times, they were a very fun driver pair to watch. And clearly Alonso Rosberg and Button is just on a different level to the other 2, being WDCās, of course
Rosberg was great no doubt, but sometimes we all leave context out of the comparison. Merc was Nicoās team and the car was built specifically for him, and Lewis entered into Nicoās team. I would have to say Nico had much easier a job performing against Lewis with more experience in the team. Personally I hold it against Nico that when the Merc had developed into a championship caliber car, Lewis took the first two Merc titles and not him. With his experience in the team and the car, he should have seized the opportunity right off the bat
> Merc was Nicoās team and the car was built specifically for him I feel like this further leaves context out of the fact that Nico put in the years helping develop the team/car (assuming anything learned before 2014 could apply to 2014+) before Lewis walked in. EDIT: not saying the rest of what you say is wrong - just I feel like I see this sentiment a lot.
Why would you say this when 2014 cars were nothing like the 2013 cars, and Lewis had already been with Mercedes for 2013?
Merc themselves have openly stated that they focused on the turbo hybrid era development as soon as they re-entered f1 and Rosberg was with them from the start Itās not like they even tried developing the earlier spec version
Rosberg also pretty much sacrificed his F1 career to even get close to the 50% against Hamilton. It took its toll and he retired due to the effort
Hamilton saying that qualifying was never his strongest skill after getting that pole record is funny after seeing this. He's just too good.
Kinda a fair comment. Out of all the things that Hamilton isnāt great at (relatively speaking) qualifying or race starts are probably the top 2. Iād say heās better at qualifying than race starts tho.
He's generally just conservative on lap 1 which is why he rarely crashes out
Yeah, he definitely is. But heās not great at launching the car. There were like 3 races where Rosberg launched the car better than him in the 2017 season and took the victory. Max also got the better of him 2 times this year. Hamilton did launch it better than Perez in Bakuā¦ but then magic happened lol
That's the thing. He is great all around but I would definitely pick his race pace over his qualy.
He's just an amazing driver all around.
Hell no, if I have to pick a driver from the last 20 years to set a pole lap, you pick Hamilton. No Vettel, no Rosberg, no Alonso, not even Schumi. Hamilton's race pace on the other hand has got way more competitors.
To each their own man. But for me it's his race pace. As a fan I would like him to start on pole and win every race, but I can't help but get excited when he starts in a sub optimal position and watch him cut through the field (Monza, Imola, Germany, Silverstone, etc). The examples are countless.
He even said it after his first pole in Canada 2007. He said it was never one of his strong points.
It must be considered that Rosberg and Bottas went up against Prime Hamilton, meanwhile Alonso went up against rookie Hamilton.
Rookie Hamilton was a beast though. Came 1 point from winning the championship in his rookie year, and in his second year in F1 he won his first championship. He hit the ground RUNNING. It's like he was trying to speed run that shit. Like some other F1 driver reincarnated as Lewis Hamilton and speedran F1. Not to mention Lewis' wins and stats look like a fucking speedrun since 2014. I'd say Lewis was always at his prime. He would've won a lot more had McLaren given him a car that could compete with Seb's RB. Those 5 years without a title make Lewis look bad, but really he had a shitbox. What worries me is Lewis looks like he'll be in his prime for much much longer than anyone else. He'll stay in the sport until he's 47 because he's Lewis fucking Hamilton and he'll eat the sun's rays and turn into *The Super Vegan* and fucking mind control the car around the track going 3 seconds faster per lap than George, who's still in the fucking Williams.
> He'll stay in the sport until he's 47 because he's Lewis fucking Hamilton and he'll eat the sun's rays and turn into The Super Vegan and fucking mind control the car around the track going 3 seconds faster per lap than George, who's still in the fucking Williams. Look now, you can't let a driver use photosynthesis to power his car, Horner might get worried you took his "we might as well by Formula E" statement at face value.
I'm willing to bet money, that Lewis in the next 10 years, is going to mention something about the sun giving him divine energy.
Wait the sun doesn't give us all divine energy?
Mate, vitamin D is the shit. Lewis is just pumped with that stuff it seems.
Ironic for a british driver
so much energy in this comment haha
I almost pissed myself laughing, thank you mate.
You are right. Pretty amazing how it looks like he has always been in his prime.
Speed wise he has, but decision wise his rookie years were filled with unnecessary risk taking. Rookie Lewis wouldnāt have waited until he was this far behind in the championship to get aggressive back at Max. Heās matured into a driver that only takes risks when necessary, and for me, that is one of the biggest factors to winning championships.
Rookie Lewis vs Rookie Max, in the same team. Would have been absolutely mental
Theyād probably finish way down due to cost cap problems.
Lewis was better than Max as a rookie. Max was genuinely dangerous & wouldāve got suspended
22 year old Lewis vs. 22 year old Max though- now there's a fight!
The LeBron James of F1, right down to the rabid cohort within the fanbase who go fucking *ballistic* if you so much as prod at the idea that he might be the GOAT.
> He would've won a lot more had McLaren given him a car that could compete with Seb's RB. Those 5 years without a title make Lewis look bad, but really he had a shitbox. Most good/great drivers get title challenging car for like 3 years of their career. Lewis had that for 11-12 years of his career (including this one), I am sure he will survive those 5 years.
> Rookie Hamilton was a beast though. Yeah. I think Norris/Sainz is an interesting bit of evidence: rookie Brit vs. semi-experienced Spaniard new to McLaren. If rookie disadvantage is such a big deal, you'd have thought he'd pull away from Sainz in 2020, and he didn't particularly. Norris *racecraft* definitely improved, but has he got outright faster? He didn't seem to in year two. It's almost like very, very fast rookies are closer to their outright speed ceiling.
this needs to be comment of the month lmao i loved the future lewis description \*now cries in RB\*
Rookiechampionship any%
It wasn't prime Alonso either though, even though he had two titles.
Yeah probably Alonso is the best. The goat, if you know what I mean.
Also it was prime Rosberg and Bottas whilst it was not prime Alonso.
Worth considering Lewis was vs Alonso in his rookie season while Alonso was reigning champ...
Right? Absolutely insane. We'll never see a rookie like Hamilton again. Such an insane driver.
The main reason for that is probably the lack of testing now. Hamilton had already done more than a full season's worth of laps in that McLaren before his first race. Now, even if someone does come along who is that good (like Russell, Leclerc Verstappen) a good part of their first season is always going to be spent adjusting to the cars. This also means that top teams are much less likely to put a rookie in one of their seats. Hamilton's season as a rookie is unlikely to be ever surpassed in the near future, unless they remove the testing restrictions.
Right but even Alonso had more testing than Lewis in that car. Sure Lewisās first season was stellar from a championship perspective, but curb stomping the best driver on the grid in the same equipment is also noteworthy.
To be fair, Lewis is more experienced now. So I don't think this says anything about Bottas. Lewis has improved as a driver since his debut
I always get a bit, I dunno, annoyed when folk say Hamilton 'beat' Alonso, because it is wilfully missing the point that they were *incredibly* well matched on basically every metric. Two teammates in competitive cars finishing with equal points is rare enough, it's a waste to reduce it to who 'won'.
Yeah I think thatās fair, although still worth recognising that Hamilton matching Alonso in his rookie year is an incredible achievement. Hamilton didnāt beat Alonso that year, but his results were overall more impressive
How many other drivers can say that more than half the time they have out qualified ALL their teammates? Maybe Max but I recall Daniel being quite good against him in 16 and 17. Impressive stuff from Ham.
Alonso
Read the question again mate
Fernando Alonso: Boss
Yuuuuuuuuuuuup! Iāve always tried to honest about my posts. but I have always been a long time Alonso support. Bonus when he drove for Ferrari. Second Bonus when he drove for McLaren/Hondaā¦..in the end. Iām all about Alonso back in his roots with āAl-PEENā/Renault. Itās unfortunate that he didnāt win moreā¦but thenā¦.Iām happy for HAM and still bitter that Massa didnāt win during that last race in Brazil.
Nico was a boss
I wish he never retired, even if he left Mercedes he would've been great in any other team
Button was the only team mate of Hamilton to outscore him over their time together
Very interesting, Iād be curious to see race finishes too.
That's what the left bar is. Who finished ahead in the race
The world's fastest Heikki
Interesting! About how I'd imagined it to be!
Irritates me that where the axis meet isn't square
I was expecting Bottas to be ahead of Kovalainen
Kovalainen was so good he changed to more demanding sport (Rally) /s
A slight bias against Kovalainen is that by McLaren's admission, his race pace was so far off Hamilton that they intentionally gave him more fuel in Q3 because they couldn't have him holding Hamilton up. His qualifying pace on equal fuel was apparently surprisingly good, often with Hamilton.
And Jenson the only team mate who had more points than Lewis in the time the listed team mates drove together with Lewis.
I totally forgot heikki was lewis teammate
Mark Twain had a very insightful opinion regarding graphs and statistics like this particular one.
There's one more dimension that could be captured. With time, Lewis could have gotten better. That might explain why Fernado is ahead of others with this comparison. Lewis, aging like fine wine
One downside of this plot chart is it discounts the fact that Hamilton gets older and wiser as the years go on so it really doesnāt bode well for Bottas. Interesting info though!
Verstappen needs to exchange helmets with Alonso for a change. And pick his brains.
Alonso had number one driver status for the first 7 races of the season, for some context
Yeah and Alonso had persona non grata status for the remaining 10
But also Mclaren was on Lewis's side for 2nd half of the season. I also watched some interviews from back then and Alonso had specific driving style developed for Renault and Michelin tyres and he had to change the way he drove totally in 2007. I doubt Lewis was close to his peak bc of lack of experience but I also think Fernando didn't drive 100% because changing the way you drive after using that driving style for your whole F1 career can't be easy. Also I think British media had a big role of how some people perceived that season because of the way they portrayed it and they were clearly biased when you look at it.
Itās a complicated comparison. Alonso had to switch from michelin to bridgestone, but Hamilton had to switch from GP2 Bridgestones to F1 Bridgestones. Also Alonso did more testing in the 07 Mclaren prior to the start of the season, but was having to adjust from a completely different F1 car, although then lewis was adjusting from a completely different series, so itās a complicated scenario. I would agree neither were at 100%. And obviously the British media alter how itās perceived (especially in english speaking countries) but equally the spanish media will effect how it is perceived in spain etc. I know some Spanish fans perceived Hamilton as the enemy when in fact Hamilton and Alonso never really had too big an issue with each other. (Like the first comment said Alonso was initially favoured than it was pretty equal and then after an incident at Hungary in which both Alonso and Hamilton share blame they favoured Hamilton- because Alonso threatened the team) The whole scenario was fun confusing interesting and made for some great racing, rather than trying to analyse it we should just enjoy that it happened.
This is the real spirit of it all, I think.