Who is the least talented F1 champion?

There is no such thing as an undeserving F1 champion, but who would you say is the least talented of all the F1 champions. I would say Mike Hawthorn. He won only 3 races in his F1 career, and only 1 of them in his title year.

true but I bet he could drink you under the table and most marshals for that matter now thats real talent!

Yoong Montoya: I would venture to suggest that Mike Hawthorn had more talent in his little finger than you can possibly aspire to. He became a Formula 1 driver on merit (as all champions do) - he was not a pay driver, although I'll grant that he came from a privileged background: you didn't drive for Ferrari in the 50s without being talented.

I would agree Hawthorn was very talented as are all the world champions, I really dont think you could call any of them untalented except maybe at singing ?????

Do my eyes deceive me? Did he say he wasn't talented?

Who was the least talented? Eddie Irvine came within a Gnat's whisker of the biggest coup since sliced bread...

Thingmabob the Finnish drive drove for williams in the 80's/90/s Gawd he was so talented I can't recall his name
:bag: :rolleyes:

Eh, I dunno... _Maybe_ Phil Hill. Von Trips was running away with the title when he died, and the '61 Ferrari was simply and unbeatable car. It's the only year he was really a factor.

Alan Jones was a late bloomer, but certainly not untalented... Overall, though, it might be him.

The list of F1 champions is really pretty elite, when you look at it.

Thingmabob! Keke Rosberg? Who drove for Williams in '82-'85 and McClaren in '86 (and some Fittipaldi's, Wolfs and other similar machinery before that).

A great driver. Not a Senna or Prost, but extrememly quick. I might be being a tad unfair to him, but perhaps he didn't have the race craft (in terms of looking after his car not overtaking), but that was only because he knew one speed - flat out.

1982 was an odd championship (and year overall). Lots of bad things happened. Driver's killed. Bad politics. Even Colin Chapman died at year end. Almost would have been better if they had just forgot about the championship, but Keke won it and he had some great drives that year.

It is a dificult question, because all have a lot of talent. The single title people are going to figure well in this. I'll suggest Farina. I understand he was a bit of a dirty driver too (?).

Not dirty in the modern sense of the word, but forceful. Farina had a reputation for not backing off in a fight for a corner, and wasn't averse to giving your car a little tweak to remind you he was right behind. But that is small beer compared to the antics that seem to be fostered in every modern series from Formula Ford upwards.

I have trouble with these topics, because unless there is a blatant example of - say - a hot-rod driver landing a World Championship, one is effectively asking "who is the least talented of these recognised virtuosos"!

Keke Rosberg was extremely quick,he raced Formula Atlantics down here in '77 and '78,he wiped the floor both years,he was streets ahead of the rest.He also suffered from driving dodgy cars so he had to flog them to the limit to get something out of them.He gave Theodore its one and only F1 win,and until he went to Williams he really didn't have a competitive drive.The turbo/wing cars didn't really suit his balls to wall driving style though.He was very much like Jochen Rindt in driving styles.Alan Jones also was a hard charging driver,he had to flog those uncompetitive Surtees round before he went to drive the first Saudia/Williams,he put up some great drives in that.Again probably another driver whos driving style wasn't suited to the Turbo point and squirt wing cars of the day.

I see no-one's mentioned Damon Hill yet. :)





Sneaks away grinning mischievously.

Y'know, I was _so_ tempted to say Damon... But he _did_ have that amazing drive at the Hungaroring in '97.

Suzuka '94.

TimD I think you are probably right about Farina.

It is also interesting that you say "Formula Ford upwards" when describing, er, undesirable driving. Do you think in some ways it could be from modern "F1 downwards". Setting an example!

And you are right: They are all great!

TimD - I agree that the title here is a recipe for disaster! I mean it is like: "Who is the least talented cellist? Pablo Cassals or Yo Yo Ma?" Yikes! The amount of talent needed to become WDC is outrageous. When you include all the other factors: car, weather, safety, politics etc and throw in the differences in eras as far as type of car, how can you say with any certainty that Driver A is better/worse than Driver B?

I think I will watch "In Car 956" (again!).

Originally posted by DAVID PATERSON
I see no-one's mentioned Damon Hill yet. :)

Sneaks away grinning mischievously.

Damon Hill would be the least talented F1 champ of all. He has done nothing before or since F1 and only won by being in the best car.

I have seen Jones race touring cars and seen the races he had wheel to wheel with Gilles. An quite honestly those of you have said Jones obviously haven't seen him race. Anyway who is still Patrick Head and Frank Williams favorite drive???? That would be Alan Jones

Originally posted by Yoong Montoya
There is no such thing as an undeserving F1 champion, but who would you say is the least talented of all the F1 champions. I would say Mike Hawthorn. He won only 3 races in his F1 career, and only 1 of them in his title year.

The only thing I'd say there is that there were also a lot less Grands Prix back then as well. I make no call on driver talent.

Surely Damon Hill contributed a huge amount to the Williams being the best car, he was the test driver after all!

Rosberg was awesome.. my first motor racing memory is watching him on Sunday afternoons..

Tempted to suggest Hill.. Suzaka 1994.. he was the best.. but only one race.. but then who else has taken on M. Sch??

Was Mansell that talented? But he made up for it with true grit and determination.

Perhaps best to ask who was the most talented chap to ever miss out on a championship - but that would be too easy!

Every champion had something better than the others, whether it was pure talent (Fangio, Clark, Senna...) or the best out there in terms of setting up a car (Prost, Lauda...) or the ones who fought very very hard and never surrendered (Graham and Damon, I'd say...)

Yes, It'd be easier to ask which talented drivers never won... (Gilles, Moss, Reutemann, Ickx, Berger, von Trips... and a long etc...)

Being a Damon fan I will still try to be "neutral" in this question by stating that Damon was not the most talented but also not the least talented. Considering that he started very late with race cars (24, I believe he was?), it is amazing that he could go all the way to the championship after all. But, dont forget that he was a test driver for a couple of years and was even denoted "the best test driver ever" by someone in the know-how. And lets face it, you can not become an F1 World Champion without talent, best car or not.

However, there is a full scale of drivers who qualify in the "talented driver" range and of course, Schumi and Mika H are on top of the list. I can not say that I know enough of previous years of F1 Racing to name the "least talented" driver, but I am very sure Damon is not the one.

Like someone else said earlier, "Hawthorn was very talented as are all the world champions, I really dont think you could call any of them untalented except maybe at singing?????" Very true!

Welcome to the forum, Damonist.

I'm always impressed by Damon's dad. Graham, I believe, didn't actually drive a car of any kind at all, let alone race it, before he was 24 years of age, and in a decade he was winning Grands Prix. Now that's an achievement in my book.

Thanks, TimD!

Graham was a mechanic or something, wasnt he? And for some reason he got the chance to drive and did pretty good.

In F1Racing, the magazine, Murray Walker was picking his favourite dreamteam in F1 and chose Schumi and Fangio as race drivers and Damon&Graham as test drivers because they were the best testers of all time or something like that. And Murray should know what he is talking about! :)

By the way, just as a reflection:

People say that Damon only won because he was in the best car, but is there any F1 World Champion during the last, say, twenty years, who has won the title w-i-t-h-o-u-t being in the best car??? ;)

Ayrton Senna and Michael Schumacher?

No, dont agree on Schumi, because the B194 and B195 were really good cars, equally (B194) good compared with the Williams car and better (B195) than all the other cars. Remember that 94 was a turbulent year and one where the cars of Williams and Benetton were practically equal, and that Ross Brawn were involved with Benetton.

Dont know which title you have in mind for Senna, but then again, does it matter? Senna and Schumi are just sooo much better as drivers that they can equal out any defficiencies (is that the word?) in their cars. However, I seriously doubt that Senna was in a "bad" car in that year?

Originally posted by colinbond
Damon Hill would be the least talented F1 champ of all. He has done nothing before or since F1 and only won by being in the best car.



His lack of results before F1 owed an awful lot to lack of money and bad luck though- funnily enough, at the weekend I happened across an old programme for the Brands Hatch F3000 round in 1990- the preview in that programme describes his performances as being one of the revelations of that season-that Brands race was about round 8 or 9 of the championship, by which time Hill had led 3 or 4 races and had a similar number of pole positions behind him that year, but didn't have a single point to show for it, largely due to the car letting him down.....

I'd never claim him to be one of the greatest drivers ever, but do think he's always been very much underrated

OK, I've no intentions of hijacking the topic, but just to respond to Damonist:

The title which I have in mind for Senna is the 91 WDC. The Williams of that year (IMO) was a better car, and the Williams team mates Mansell and Patrese both finished higher (2nd and 3rd) than Berger (4th) in the other McLaren in the final standings. And we know how unbeatable the Williams was in 92 - they were clearly on the up already in 91, and McLaren on the down.

TGF's 94 and 95 titles were IMO also won in inferior cars. I've learnt to trust John Watson's judgement ;), and he said that the better machinery was in the hands of Damon Hill. Besides, the Benetton, driven by Alesi and Berger (both very good drivers, but not in the same league as the greats) didn't manage to win a single race in 96. Admittedly, some of that was down to bad luck, but it was still a steep downhill from the 9 races won by TGF in 95. I don't think the team deteriorated that much in such a short time. The driver made the difference.

Actually, funny you should mention it, because I read an interview (by Damon Hill! :D) with Schumi and MS then said "The Benetton was so tricky on the limit, it had to be balanced very carefully. Alesi and Berger couldnt do that and that was why they crashed!" So yes, in one respect you have right, the Benetton was not t-h-a-t good. On the other hand, I read a book by Steve Matchett who used to be a Benetton Mechanic and his inside view from 94 gives the picture that the Benetton actually was equal to the Williams.

Lets put it this way: Schumi (and Senna -91, as you mentioned) were maybe not in THE best car in their respective years (91 and 94) but their cars were at least second best, and combined with the awsome talents of Senna and Schumi, I am not sure I would count that as "winning without being in the best car"... ;) ;)

Obviously it is really difficult to find such a situation, which probably means Damon, like the other F1 World Champions, was in the best car, like the other F1 World Champions. Proved my point yet? :D :D :D

Damon Hill was a very fast, smart man. All the cars he drove were potential race winners, because he made them so, even the Arrows. But, apart from the odd great race, such a Suzuka '94 & Hungaroring '97, he couldn't race for toffee.

On his day he was talented, a charger, an overtaker and looked like a true champion. But on his bad days he was the moaningest, whingeingest worst of the bunch ... and definitely would never had won the WDC without what amounted to one of the biggest gaps ever between best car and second best. You all forgot Nigel Mansell.

Ow, my foot's sore.

Originally posted by Rutle
... and definitely would never had won the WDC without what amounted to one of the biggest gaps ever between best car and second best. You all forgot Nigel Mansell.

I'm not totally sure I agree with you there- don't forget how close he'd come to the championship in '86- The sheer dominance of the '92 Williams does devalue his championship to some extent, but at his best, Mansell in any car that was capable of winning would always be in with a chance......

I was never impressed with Nelson Piquet, even after becoming WDC.

All 3 times????

Piquet won three times??? :confused: :confused: I did not know that!

Originally posted by Damonist
Piquet won three times??? :confused: :confused: I did not know that!

1981 & 83 with Brabham, 1987 with Williams

Michael Schumacher. It's amazing he can get in and out of his car without hurting himself. He wins races because it's in his contract.

Originally posted by cybersdorf
Michael Schumacher. It's amazing he can get in and out of his car without hurting himself.

I did not quite follow you on that one.... :confused:

Most World Champions have been as fast as their competitors of the time, even if they weren't always as consistently fast, or as quick from the first lap or over one qualifying lap.

The ones who weren't would have to be:

Farina (1950) - not as quick as Fangio or Ascari
Brabham & Phil Hill (1959-1961) - outpaced by Moss

Piquet was fast but lazy, and all of his 3 WDC's owed something to other drivers' misfortune (Williams unreliability in 1981, Renault complacency in 1983, Mansell's crash at Suzuka 1987).

The least impressive multiple champion has to be Piquet. Few would place him in the same bracket as Senna, Prost or Mansell. If Reutemann hadn't've had that dramatic loss of form in the final race in 1981 (the equivalent of Ronaldo in the football World Cup 1998 final), he wouldn't've won that despite a reliability advantage and having no frontline team-mate to challenge him, he was lucky in 1983, and if he had worked as a team player at Williams, Mansell would've wiped the floor with him.

The problem with Piquet is exactly as Macca put it- fast but lazy. When he had undisputed no1 status and a competitive car, for example when he was with Brabham, he was fine, but really couldn't deal with the lack of either of those things- remember the failure to qualify at Spa '89 with Lotus? For a three-time world champion, that was frankly embarrassing.....

In terms of talent, there's no doubt about his ability. In terms of attitude- he's not even close to Prost or Senna....

I remember one team was sick of his half arsed eforts and decided to put him on an incentive scheme, where his salary was replaced by $x per point scored. I can't remember the team or the year, but i remeber the transformation in his performance was amazing.

It was Benetton, 1990-91.

Schumi did win the title in what was not the best car - 95. The Benetton was not the equal of the Williams of Hill or Coulthard to begin with. However, neither made the most of their advantage. Schumacher made damn sure that by mid-season the Benetton was sorted and then thrashed the lot of 'em.

Just a thought. Brazil, '94. Before Senna, in his first drive for Williams, spun out near the end, he was over a lap up on team-mate Hill.