10. Timo Glock
9. Rubens Barrichello
8. Jarno Trulli
7. Kimi Raikkonen
6. Mark Webber
5. Sebastian Vettel
4. Felipe Massa
3. Fernando Alonso
2. Lewis Hamilton
1. Robert Kubica

How come people are only just picking up on this now? It was published well over a week ago?

Ummm - because I don't have a Autosport subscription and it hasn't even got a dedicated thread on the forum?

I still wouldn't know about it if I didn't read something about it in the paper.

Thanks for posting the list though - I agree with Sanjiro, Hamilton and Massa did make way too many errors but I guess that they are high in the list because on their good days they were both imperious, and they did finish one and two afterall.

It's probably the first time I actually agree with any such list. Amazing

I happened to go on a tour of the Red Bull factory today in Milton Keynes. First time I've been around an F1 factory and I came away astounded by the sheer amount of effort and detail those boys and girls go into when making a car. What you see on a Sunday afternoon really is just the tip of the iceberg. As much as a cliché as that sounds.

A real eye-opener. Anyway, a brief overview on my blog for those interested.

http://www.itv-f1.com/Feature.aspx?Type=Mark_Hughes&id=44682

Mark Hughes, courtesy of ITV, on the challenges facing Webber next year

From that article:



Except Webber finished the season on 36 points to Heidfeld's 28?

Nick missed the last 5 races, due to an injury(iirc). He was leading comfortably before that point.

It doesnt matter.He still outscored him.

Is 4 points really all that comfortable?

ahh the results of 05 MW NH, got to love it.

Just a couple of points.

1. If you are going to make excuses for NH getting injured and missing 3 races then opting out of the last 2 you have to allow for the 2 very big points scores he was gifted by MWs misfortune (none of which was MWs doing).
If you do this (make excuses for both drivers then MW still comes out ahead of NH)

2. If you chose not to look deeper then you have to go by the points for the year and NH gets no free pass for failing to compete in the last 5 races. Again MW comes out on top.

3. If you are fair minded about driver performance and want to get the best impression of who was better than who, 05 was a mess and almost impossible to pick apart. Best you can say is NH was the closest team mate MW has ever had. He was not as fast as Mark, but he took fewer risks and that payed off for him.

btw at the time NH was injured he was only 4 points ahead of mark.
hardly "comfortable" and given the smooth finish to the season Mark had and the fact that NH was rarely ahead of Mark on merit, it was very unlikely he would have held onto that 4 point lead.

PS I am a fan of MW SV and NH, just to clear that up (cant stand LH AT ALL)

Did they given solid reasons for this list?

They did indeed. In particular Webber scored quite high as he got the most out of the RB4:

One other thing - Webber vastly upgraded his performance in '06. And that was said by many, including Sir Frank Williams, when Williams announced that Webber was leaving for RBR.

Funny how Webber has become a "benchmark", and yet is not rated by most team leaders.

Dunno, I was (and am) a 'fan' of Nick. Young Seb is so good I've changed my name by Deed Poll to Sebastian Armchair Expert. It's okay to support someone and not despise the opposition.

Says who? This always gets trotted out by those who have negative things to say about Webber, and it invariably gets shot down. It gets shot down because the quotes you'll find from recent years don't support this viewpoint. Examples:

* Williams made it clear why they didn't re-sign Webber, and it had nothing to do with not rating him. In fact, it sounded like they rated him higher when he left than when they signed him up. Remember - they weere race winners when they signed him.

* RBR made it clear they re-signed him as early as they did for next year in order to prevent Renault poaching him.

* It's well known that RBR was not the deal Webber had a chance at when he left Williams. RBR was second choice.

* Renault wanted Webber when Webber chose to sign for Williams.

* Schumi has made it clear he rated Webber as top 5 in the past.

Webber's a benchmark because he's never been beaten by a team mate, and he's known to be a super fast qualifier. If Vettel beats Webber then we know Vettel is the real deal, and the top teams will start hunting him because they know that a kid who can beat Webber over a full season is a potential future champion. If Vettel can't beat Webber over a full season, then the Vettel bubble bursts.

Since it looks like all the advantages for next year are lining up with Vettel (Webber injured for the winter; KERS being an advantage to lighter drivers) then Vettel absolutely must beat Webber next year.

Fact remains though that since 2004 when both Williams and Renault pursued him for his services, no other tier one team has shown any level of interest in him.

I agree, but as jez33 says, two (then) top teams pursued him once, but nothing since. I don't understand it myself, I think he would have done an outstanding job at Mclaren this year and would have pushed Alonso harder than Piquet Jr.
There were rumours about another team when he chose RBR, but I didn't read anything substantial, what was first choice and why did he reject it?

It was McLaren
He didnt reject it they rejected him

all this is unsubstantiated but frequently reported

MW was on the top of the McLaren short list.
During the year however he made a few negative comments to reporters about McLarens ability to produce good cars year after year.
This and some other hinted but not reported incidents made McLaren change position on MW.

Any report you look at made it apparent the dropping of MW as an option had nothing to do with his driving and was all to do with him as a fit for the team.

The ONLY top team never to have made noises about MW is Ferrari.

All is moot now as he will see out his time at RBR

He was destroyed by Heidfeld in 2005 in the races.

The guy is a terrific qualifier, no doubt. Unfortunately this is motor racing, not motor 'one lap wonders'.

That is a gross exagerration.
Sure, Nick probably shaded Mark in the races, but there was not a huge amount between them. For example, Nick's second at Monaco was determined from the pit wall.

just 2 incidents led to NH being able to pull ahead of MW in the points

1. GFs kamikaze run up the inside taking MW out and handing NH 2nd place
2. The incomprehensible decision of Williams to pull NH in before MW gifting him track position, despite MWs radio requests to come in and very vocal protests when he saw NH being called in.

Other than this NH was out matched by MW in most races.
The only reason NH was close to MW in many races was the un-passable JT, who was qualifying very well that year but race pace was dismal.

I forgot about Fisi's divebomb; yet another instance of Webber losing a podium position due to circumstances outside his control. He couldn't have given Fisi much more space and still he got punted.

All ancient history now.
Like allot of MWs time in F1 its so much spilt milk.

Dont forget Monaco the year after.

FM KR and MW all head to toe come up to lap GF.
GF pulls over for FA but holds up KR for several laps.
Ignoring blue flags and getting now penalty.
He then lets KR pass, now almost 15s behind FA
GF then proceeds to block MW for 5 laps.
For the first 2 blue flags were flapping but after that they put them away.
Still GF didnt pull over and received no penalty.

When MW finally gets through he is over 30s behind the leaders.
He was faster than FA and KR that day but the Williams had heat trouble and so many laps trapped behind a slow GF was more than the Cossworth could take.

just off the top of my head I can think of 4 podium finishes MW was in position for that were lost due to faults out of his control

1. GF dive bomb loosing p2
2. Williams pit strat loosing p2
3. GF ignoring blue flags for 4 laps and getting none for another 3 laps loosing a solid 3rd posible 1st
( he was 0.3 faster than KR and FA in that race )
4. SV running into the back of MW loosing p2 possible p1 as he had more pace and better set up than LH at that time.

All drivers have misfortunes thats part of racing.
When you are driving midfield cars the last thing you need are mishaps on the few occasions when you are able to put your car in a top position.
Mark has robbed himself of plenty of opportunities over the years so its not all down to bad luck.

One big factor in all of this is that AT NO TIME has MW had a car with significant power.
Every year of his time in F1 has been driving an underpowered car.
Its very hard to pass and "look racy" in modern F1 cars when they guys around you all have more horse power.
Just look at the difference it made to FA from the beginning of the year to the end
FA in an underpowered Renault was looking very shabby.
When Renault pulled their finger out,sorted out their software and made some engine changes FA started to look like the champion he is.

that last point is a very good one

but i think MW will finally be overcome by bad luck in 2009: the broken leg and KERS introduction look like the perfect storm

I also can't help but wonder how often Mercedes would have liked to be reminded that they are rejoined with the driver whom they almost killed at LeMans, twice.

I was reading through the Autosport archives not that long ago and apparently those Monaco failures were traced to some parts that hadnt been reliably tested yet, and just rushed onto the car. Both Webber and Rosberg retired from the same issue afterall.

IIRC the only failures related to the engine were Rosberg's Sepang failure (where the engine had been endlessly stressed in Bahrain) and the 2 precautionary changes made for Nurburgring, where Webber didnt do any Friday running as Cosworth needed to bring in a newer specification of engine.

Yes, those were the official reasons given. Depending on the deal, however, sometimes the truth will likely be massaged when things like, for example, Cosworth's future are concerned.

Something to remember about '05, it was the year when the tyres had to last the whole race. I think if the current and prior tyres rules had applied in '05, it would have been a different result. You wouldn't have seen NH gaining on MW during the races as MW tended to push harder and NH stayed smoother and kept his tyres in better condition for later in the race.

Mark

NH only gained on MW during races when MW caught up to the JT train
with one exception, Monaco, where it was FA

However the pace difference between MW and NH in a race was less than any other team mate MW has had.
I expect SV to be a significant challenge.

no matter what i think us MW fans will be satisfied by the end of 2009. If Mark beats Vettel its vindication for him, if they are even we are going to have a really entertaining battle. And if Vettel dusts Mark i guess we can rest easy that Mark probably did not take the opportunities available to him and that he created his own bad luck.

well, he created some of his bad luck but certainly other aspects of it were thrust upon him!

This makes me smile ... because it's so ludicrous. Heidfeld outscored Webber (but was not faster than him) during the first half of the season, a period that is acknowledged by everyone (including MW himself) to have been Webber's worst in F1. He far from destroyed Webber, though.

Once Webber ironed out his errors and came to terms with the fact he was driving a car that wasn't up to what he'd expected when he signed for Williams, he was the better of the two and I have no doubt would have ended the season ahead of Heidfeld on points even without Heidfeld's injury. Heidfeld pushed Webber harder than any other teammate he's had, but there's no way anyone can support a claim that Heidfeld destroyed him.

Any Ps3 fans who are trying the "Home" Beta might be interested to know that Red Bull has pulled off a minor coup in that they are the first Brand signed up to have an island in Playstation Home.

It would appear that it focus's on the Air Race element, but we might just get to see some F1 tie-ins too.

http://www.brandrepublic.com/Revolution/Ne...ayStation-Home/

Red Bull have a new Team Partner: Trust. Trust were the title sponsor for Christian Horner's GP2 team this season so there is already links between the two. Part of the deal includes both Webber and Vettel sporting the Trust name on the chin bars of their helmet.

I believe Trust are European based at the moment, so this can be seen as an attempt to promote their name further afield.

Trust is Dutch.

Guessed they were.

Has anyone ever bought anything with their name on it? To me, their name conjures up thoughts of PC accessories which you would only find in a pound-shop.

Last I saw they've started producing higher end stuff. Not actually used any of it or seen anyone using it. Too happy with my Razer mouse and Logitech keyboard .

They were heavily involved in Minardi at one stage.

This is kind of off topic, but I thought it was the most relevant place to put it. I'm 95% sure I ate on the same table as Christian Horner in a restaurant in Soho last night. I was there on a date, so wasn't paying attention to his conversations, but I did overhear him talking about his reaction to hearing the Max Mosely prostitute story. Pretty amusing. Seems like a nice guy.

Good news on the Renault units for RBR next season:

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/72457

------

Renault have been given a boost to their championship chances for 2009 after the FIA confirmed that French squad will be allowed to make changes to their engine.

With a freeze on engine development coming into play this year, Renault believed they had lost out to their rivals during 2008.

However, the 2005 and 2006 world champions will be allowed to make changes to their power unit in 2009 after unanimous agreement was reached between the teams.

"Unanimous agreement was reached on a list of proposed changes to the Renault engine for 2009; all other engines will remain unchanged.

"Comparative testing will not be necessary," said the FIA in a statement on Friday, after the World Motor Sport Council ratified all the rules changes for 2009 and the cost-cutting measures for the future.

The news will also be a boost for Red Bull Racing, who use the French power units.

I don't understand that. If the changes are unanimous they must not affect performance much.

Or if they do affect performance, why did the teams agree when earlier in the season they didn't? Was it feel sorry and try to help Renault day or something?

It's because Briatore agreed to further restrict testing, he would only do that if he was allowed to increase performance of his engine.

I guess the only engine that will now requires upgrade permission is the Toyota. I haven't heard that they have been permitted to upgrade that unit yet. They also have complained about other teams developing their engines.

Coulthard: ''We won’t be getting the car until February; in January we’ll be running some test items, but we won’t have KERS or the final wing package. If necessary I can do some testing.''

I smell a "Renault engine is too strong. We need to upgrade ours" talk coming in 2009.

Christian Horner discussing 2009. Not really anything new to report, but er, he err, errrs a lot

Somehow sounds as if he was giving this interview while he was busy doing something totally unrelated.

Also, about KERS, he's saying that they're relying on Renault there. Gives the impression Renault is basically doing the entire system. I wonder what they were doing with the battery testing back in summer then (ya know, when the accident in the factory happened). Sadly the guy interviewing him didn't go into detailed questions much.

And Renault are in turn semi-relying on Ferrari for their KERS, as theyre both getting it from Magnetti Marelli which is a subsidy of FIAT.

Fact remains the other two 'tier one' teams had drivers.