Will Hamilton ever have another superstar teammate?
- This topic has 12 replies, 9 voices, and was last updated 13 years, 2 months ago by
.
- Posts
Recently, there were a lot of speculations about Vettel, or maybe Kubica, joining Ferrari in 2012. As much as Fernando doesn’t like having another superstar teammate driving the same machinery, he seems open to the idea of having Vettel join him at Ferrari in the near future.
But what about Lewis? He didn’t seem very kicked about the fact that Mclaren were considering Rosberg for the 2nd seat in 2010. I also have my doubts that he would ever want to have Kubica or Vettel as teammates. Jenson seemed to worked out pretty fine for him. A 2009 champ, but not a driver with the raw pace and aggressiveness to really upset Lewis. A lot of you might argue that Jenson is a serious threat based on his 2010 performance, but more people would agree that Rosberg, Kubica and Vettel would push Hamilton much harder than the 2009 champ.
So do you think Lewis would ever have another teammate of Alonso’s caliber? OR would he just be happy having no serious threat within the team? Would Mclaren honestly want the 2 best drivers on the grid within their team? Or would they just keep that as a fake philosophy to avoid another 2007 situation?
I think when Jenson joined the team McLaren knew he wouldn’t have the match for Hamilton. They are never going to bring in someone like Kubica or Rosberg, because they know a situation like 2007 may arise again when Hamilton is losing points.
I think they know as well that if Alonso and Hamilton were partnered again Alonso would come out on top, 2007 was a strange season with all the emphasis going to Hamilton in the 2nd half and Alonso’s confidence practically 0% after the team focussed on Lewis.
Nope, I think McLaren are always going to go for drivers that can’t match/beat Lewis. Which is a shame since I would love to see him beaten.
2007 was chance, Mclaren got their class A driver from Renault, brought in to Woking with one goal – unfortunately he missed said goal by one point.
However, the chance was that Hamilton turned out to be a supreme talent, rattled Alonso, and Mclaren thought it would be better if they made a rookie win the title, he also lost out by one point (and a stupid tyre decision in China to be honest).
Hamilton will probably only get another Class A team mate by accident if Mclaren bring in a new guy that takes to F1 like a duck to water…
They don’t need a better driver to win the driver’s title, Hamilton is good enough, and they just need a fairly quick and consistant team mate who will chip in with the odd win if they want the constructors – that’s why they have the perfect team right now.
Just make the -26 the best car guys, and the team will be fine! ;)
I think alonso was the worst and still is the worst person to partner Hamilton. He wants no.1 status in a team. He had that with Renault and expected it from Mclaren. He now has it from Ferrari (Massa not the same since his crash)
As i remember his father was the one who seemed to not be happy with that prospect. Hamilton said he didn’t care.
Anyway i don’t see Rosberg much different than Button. Button isn’t exactly a little push boy. I think the title is a little insulting to him. The guy is a very dangerous driver and especially now that refueling is gone. Hamilton would constantly feel his pressure. His the kind of guy that could get infrond of you in the championship if you make a mistake or two no matter if you are more talented or win more races.
His a very Prost like driver that benefits from managing tyres, strategy and the non refueling rules that don’t force you to push every second of every lap but make you going a little bit easy on the car and rubber.
Lewis is a push to the limit driver. What i like to call a true racer. He tries to go as fast as possible as he can every lap and that works a little better with refueling were the race is split in quick little parts.
Senna was clearly faster than Prost but Prost was always there like a thorn on his side. I have a feeling that wouldn’t be the case if they had refueling. Prost was making-up what he was losing in speed by other ways and that’s what Button does too.
Button may not be exactly what you call a “superstar” but his a top-driver make no mistake about it. His no Kovalanien or Coulthard. His definitely at-least one level more than those guys.
As about Alonso and Vettel. Well i say i can drive faster than both.
See how easy it is when you know it’s not gonna happen? You can say anything and look so cool too.
@Solo. I really do not know how you can compare the likes of Prost to someone like Button. Prost was great at manging his tyres/strategy, but was still amongst the 3 quickest drivers on the grid. Button just doesn’t have the speed and talent, sure he looks after his tyres, but he I would barely think that Australia and China are proof enough to call him a master strategist. Maybe his Korea strategy is proof enough that he just takes strategic risks to make up for his poor race and qualifying performances. I do not know how you could call Button a top driver when he didn’t look capable of taking a single pole position or race win on his pace during the entire 2010 season.
We would all have different opinions on Button’s ability, but to say that he is as much as a threat to Hamilton as Alonso, Vettel and Kubica are.. is just a joke.
Solo is correct – Anthony Hamilton and Keke Rosberg had a bad relationship when their boys were coming through the rank, so it’s no surprise. Maybe it was part of the reason Lewis sacked him as his manager.
To answer the question, I don’t see any superstar partnering another superstar for a while. If Mercedes get their act together there will be no expense spared in acquiring Vettel, that’s if he ever leaves Red Bull, the team that has pledged to built itself around him. Either way that’ll leave a slot for Kubica to fall into, I really don’t see him going to Ferrari with Alonso unless there aren’t any other competitive drives except McLaren. Alonso also won’t be around forever and I think it will just be the remaining young three who dominate Formula One, with the occasional Button-style champion, someone like Rosberg or di Resta or Hulkenburg perhaps.
Well RIISE that’s some very tilted opinion on Hamilton vs Alonso. I’m sorry but I’ve seen nothing to suggest that Alonso drawing with Hamilton was anything less that Alonso not being particularly more talented overall than a rookie Lewis and Hamilton’s extreme bad luck in the last two races. It sounds fairly !!!!”””BIASED””””!!!!! (can we still use that word?) in fact, expecially as you say you’d like to see Hamilton beaten.
On the grid, Hamilton and Button look’s stable, the only chance to disturb it was Hulkenburg but that was always a non-starter. Beside’s McLaren is pitching to it’s home market and brand with a lot of success at the mo so why change a winning Formula. Merc is interesting, Rosberg looks set for the long haul, hopefully he gets his chance to challenge but he won’t get a lift to any other top team. Vettle is hot hot hot, despite his car winning a championship he did his best to loose, but I doubt he’ll want to challenge Alonso, ditto Hamilton ditto Kubica. Schumacher is’t going to last as long at Merc and Ros so that’s where the first opening appears. Renault’s fortunes are vital to the movement of Kubica, so him mooving might spark the next big superstar verses superstar in one car battle.
Basically, Hamilton static unless things really go wrong at Macca partnered by Button.
Alonso, a fit at Ferrari who are aware of his unstable toy’s to pram ratio an will not want to rock his boat.
Kubica, probably the big moover and shaker, his movement may well trigger the biggest teamate fight with seen since 07.
Vettle, why he’d move from RB at the moment I don’t know, Reckon he’d be found out if any of Kub Alo or Ham where his teamate. COuld probably take Button. Hope he teamates Di Resta at some point. That little Scot’s got the magic and no mistake.
@Todfod – First i didn’t compare Prost and Button in terms of who is best and all that. I just talked about their style.
But anyway what so wrong in comparing them if you wanted? The rate of success and popularity doesn’t always tell the full story. Prost had cars capable of fighting for championships for most of his career. About 70%-80% of his years he had a car that could win races. His the second most lucky driver in term of having a good car after Schumacher.
We all know that without a good car, no driver can do anything. Button only got a good car the last two years and the Mclaren wasn’t really that good since Red Bull even had more had a second over it at times. So tell me if he had another 4-5 good cars during his previews years will it have been so strange that he could have been lets say a 3-4 time champion and have a lot higher image that what he has now? That’s a little how Prost did it, because anyone who saw him drive knows that he never was an exciting driver. Hell half the times he was winning because the cars of the other guys broke. But the resolds still kept coming and that made him a legend. And btw Prost screwed-up quite a few strategies himself too. What made him the “proffesor” is that in the end his strategy games and car management gain him more that what he lost when he was getting it wrong. If you count the numbers you will see that even if you take out Button’s two wins he gained quite a few positions by going long in the first stint and things like that in many races this year.
You just have to remove those glasses that make the past always seem more awesome.
Today’s grid is a lot more competitive that those times. My opinion is that drivers today can’t distinguish there self as much because the teams are close and there are quite a few top level awesome drivers. I would say in terms of talent we have two Senna’s (Alonso.Hamilon), three Prost’s (Webber,Button,Rosberg), a Clark(Vettel), a G.Hill(Kubica) and oh! yeah Schumacher. Although i still don’t know if his still a Schumacher.
As about pace. Sure if you are simply slow, no strategy or tyre/car management can get you a win but Button isn’t slow as you think at all. He may not always have Hamilton’s pace but his close enough to be a thread if Hamilton slips even a little. Take the year with the Brawn. Everyone says Barichello is a decent driver, if we exclude who won what and all that and just take their race pace when they didn’t had cars in-frond of them you will see that Button always had a few tenths over Barichello in race pace. And in F1 a few tenths is all that separates the good from the better. Schumacher wasn’t putting seconds per lap from Barichello ether. So it’s obvious that Button has pace and that’s why he can become dangerous with a little more careful strategy.
I think Button will surprise quite a few in 2011.
I wonder what McLaren do when Button retires, as he’ll probably go along the same time as Alonso.
Of course then there is Red Bull. This will probably be Mark’s last season (something I’m a little surprised isn’t being discussed more), imagine if Alguersuari turns out to be a little like Button, enters very early but turns out to be champion material?
The only person I can think of joining Lewis if he stays with Mclaren is Roseberg or Hulkenberg as both have the backing of Mercedes power & if they decides to end their term with their respective team then this is one place any driver would love to go.
Riise, your post mentions strangeness but neglects the fact that it was a double world champion with several years of experience going against a rookie. Hamilton is from the school where he will fight with whomever whereas Alonso needs to be mollycoddled and told constantly “You’re the best”. An example being after Lewis first four races of the 07 season where he started brillianty, Alonso banned Hamilton from going to the test in Spain. Hamilton will do everything to beat his opponent on track (including pushing the envelope too far from time to time e.g. Monza 2010) whereas Alonso will try to beat his opponent off the track (e.g. Spygate, favouritism rumours, “F1 is no longer a sport” et cetera). Now that Hamilton is more experienced, I would expect him to beat Alonso again.
@Kodongo. Its hard to predict that Hamilton would beat Alonso and vice versa. Alonso brings a lot to the team in terms of technical expertise and how to develop a car and find the ideal base setup for both drivers. Hamilton’s stellar 2007 entry had a lot to do with Alonso’s contribution to the team. You think that Hamilton has gotten stronger over the last couple of years, and I think Alonso has as well. So its kind of hard to argue who would beat who, and it looks like we will never get to figure this one out.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.