267 replies to this topic

[E1pix]

I can only hope even JYS could be in err on that… partly as all bets are off once that visor's snapped.

Edited by E1pix, 20 November 2015 - 22:53.

[Henri Greuter]

About Hurtubise, I think it's fair to say that the roadsters "he built" were more or less the work of his brother, Pete.

Henri, are you trying to tell us about a possible Mallard/Novi?

 

Michael,

 

You're right on Pete being the prime builder of the Mallard.

 

It is not certain that it was the actual Mallard as we know it was the car that was involved but there has been a publication in a local newspaper at Indy about Jim Hurtubise trying to obtain a Novi from the Granatelli Brothers for a front engined car he was building.

Granatelli was not unwilling to cooperate according the sources.

But there were so many rumors and all kind of projects going on with the Granatellis at that time. It is downright dazzling to know what might have been in addition to the things that did come off under the STP banner.....

But indeed, there is a decent chance that the Mallard could have been the last ever of the Novis. Not that this does mean so much to racing Indy fans nowadays but for a number of deceased race fans that would have been quite a story had it ever happened,

 

Henri

[E1pix]

Wonderful, Henri! Wish I could have been there.

[jrv_t644e]

Let's look at it from another angle.

GV was active 4 full years. 1978-1979-180-1981.
Of these he was crushed in qualifying by Reutemann in 1978. It was, at best, a draw with Scheckter in 1979. He crushed Scheckter in 1980 and won the qualifying battle 10-5 vs. Pironi in 1981.

Is that body of work really enough to proclaim GV fastest during the years 1966-1986? I think it would take more.

 

 

The trouble with this is the same trouble one always finds when relying solely on statistics. They do not take into account circumstances.

I am also extremely sceptical of the use of the word 'crushed' as it almost always indicates some kind of attempt to use emotive words to support bias.

 

1978

Let us address the question of 1978...What many people do not consider is that Villeneuve was up against a significantly faster and more accomplished driver than most of the other driver's mentioned, in his essentially 'rookie' season and that he was within a hair's breadth of winning only the 7th Grand Prix of his career but for inexperience showing in the lapping of a backmarker. What is also unmentioned is that throughout the season Villeneuve got systematically closer to Reutemann in terms of pace as his experience and confidence grew and by the end of the season was outqualifying him.

 

Let us also remember that this is the notoriously mercurial Reutemann who on his day could outpace Jones, Andretti, Lauda, almost anybody you care to name, and who is on record as saying that the year with Villeneuve was the happiest of his career, and yet was outqualified 2-1 in the last three races of the year by as much as 1.1 (Italy)  or 1.2sec (Canada). This is another point which the statistics do not indicate, the margin by which team mates are sometimes outqualified, although of course this can be masked by issues affecting qualifying running.

 

Was Villeneuve the fastest in 78? His rookie season?

That would be pretty much impossible to argue, but he was learning and adapting.

 

In 79 as soon as one starts to arbitrarily abandon including races because they dont fit the pattern one wishes to show,  one is on somewhat shaky ground. Especially if one later choses also to dismiss a season as merely Scheckter being over the hill or dismiss Pironi as less than stellar based on,seemingly, nothing more than being out paced by Villeneuve.

 

Shall i also dismiss Scheckter's 1979 outqualification of Villeneuve in South Africa due to cracked suspension causing him to miss the final session?Or his fuel issue in Argentina?  Or oil issues in Britain? The engine blow up in the final session in Germany? A down on power engine in Italy? It is always possible to cherry-pick to suit one's agenda. One can choose also to overlook the number of times Villeneuve lapped Scheckter in races, France (taking his fragile tyres the whole distance, which one would not expect of a 'circus act'), Canada and Watkin's Glen springing to mind. Something which also occurred a few times with Pironi.

 

 

 

Fastest Laps

One can also look at the number of fastest laps he achieved in an era when different tyre strategies were uncommon... and set with cars which were never adequate ground effect cars in an era when ground effect was king. It has already been mentioned how the Flat 12 due to it's width made it almost impossible for Ferrari to build a true ground effects car, and yet in the T4 Villeneuve achieved 6 FLs.

 

1978 - Q 4-12   FL 7-8    W1-4     (At the start Villeneuve 3GP... Reutemann 84GPs 5Wins)

1979 - Q 8-7     FL 13-1  W3-3     (At the start Villeneuve 19GPs 1Win... Scheckter 84GPs 7Wins) 

1980 - Q 13-1   FL 8-5  

1981 - Q 10-5   FL 9-4    W2-0     (At the start Villeneuve 48GPs 4Wins... 45GPs 1Win)

1982 - Q 4-1     FL 1-3    W0-1*    (Q gap - 1.2s, 1.5s, 0.2s,1.3s and -0.1s and in the races, ZA - Villeneuve only lasted 6 laps before engine failed, BRA - Villeneuve led, Pironi nowhere (late stop for tires), USA - VIllenueve Podium, Pironi Nowhere, SM* - well the story has been told many times)

 

[editted to correct two typos in the numbers and add:

Of course number of FL =/= number of Q, as there were races in which one or more of the drivers did not complete a lap... if one wanted to be more fair one could remove also races in which very few laps were completed, but i have not done this so as not to massage the statistics in case anyone thought i was deliberately omitting FLs]

 

We might also consider moveing forward to 1980, that even in the appalling 312T5, Villeneuve ran solidly in podium positions in several races and even led ... on merit.. in Brazil. He also lapped several seconds faster than the field on a damp track at the end of the Monaco race, which by dint of not being at the 'pointy end' of the results merits none of the attention given to the events of '84.

 

In the 126C of 1981, let us remind ourselves that Gordon Murray considered that Villeneuve's Spanish GP win was the greatest drive he had ever seen and asserted that he 'KNEW how bad that car was'. I hesitate to mention that Pironi  finished 17th multi lapped as his race was ruined by a lengthy pitstop.. he was however 7 places and MANY seconds adrift of Villeneuve when it happened. What is perhaps fairer is to mention that Villeneuve had lapped him a little over halfway through the Monaco GP earlier in the year. This is the same Pironi that many experts had considered the stand out of the 1980 season. It's easy to forget sometimes too that in addition to being 8.5sec faster than anyone else in the wet Qualifying session at Watkins Glen in '79 he and Jones had lapped the entire field by lap 29 of that race.

 

It's also worth pointing out that despite his reputation as a crasher, he had no more in his career than many of the other drivers considered all time greats had in their first 4 and a half seasons.

 

 

In the nearly 40 years i have been watching racing, Villeneuve stands out... with others, yes including Senna, as something special.

 

Based on statistics Schumacher and Prost should, but i cannot avoid that my own eyes showed me that Senna was faster than Prost, and that I believe Schumacher never really faced truly high quality opposition in the same equipment except for Piquet's last 5 races

 

 

Quality of Opposition

Let us then return to the question of the quality of teammates. Not Reutemann, Scheckter nor Pironi can be considered insignificant talents. Who else in the modern era has teamed with such a strong line up throughout their career?.

 

I think it would be very hard to compare for example Johnny Cecotto, Elio De Angelis (2wins) and Johnny Dumfries (especially since Senna vetoed Warwick), or Brundle, Patrese(6 wins) and Jos Verstappen to Reutemann, Scheckter and Pironi. Nor did Villeneuve have a team built around him in the way Lotus and Benetton were... even recommending Prost as his team mate for '81... how many drivers would have done that?

 

It is common also for people to claim that Prost was dominant at the start of his career and certainly he outqualified the mercurial Watson  (himself no slouch and regular outqualifier of Lauda) frequently, the question of how his performance compared to Arnoux is not clear, though i think most would suggest  Prost was faster.

 

1981  Q 10-5  FL 8-4   W3-0    Certainly succesful vs Arnoux

1982  Q 8-8    FL 9-6   W2-2    Huh? Where's the domination of Arnoux?

I DO believe Prost was better than Arnoux, though Rene drove wonderfully many times throughout his career and certainly does not deserve to be remembered for Hunt's words about him.

 

I would certainly suggest that Watson and Arnoux (well maybe not Cheever)... or Reutemann, Scheckter and Pironi... constitute a sterner test than Cecotto/De Angelis/Dumfries or Brundle/Patrese/Verstappen

 

 

 

Finally though i am sure people will suggest this was tl:dr territory.  

 

Statistics never tell the whole story, especially when they are massaged

Anecdotal evidence is useful too as it can tell the story and give a background that raw statistics cannot.

 

Many of us SAW what a remarkable talent Villeneuve had, and to rely solely on statistics or to dismiss him as a 'circus act' is to do both him and the sport a grave disservice.

Edited by jrv_t644e, 10 December 2015 - 23:31.

[E1pix]

Welcome, JRV, and I'd say that regardless of your post -- which is awesome.

That 'circus act' crap got to me as well, but was on par for that source.

[JacnGille]

[jrv_t644e]

Welcome, JRV, and I'd say that regardless of your post -- which is awesome.

That 'circus act' crap got to me as well, but was on par for that source.

 

Hi, thank you and thank you for the welcome.

[E1pix]

[jcbc3]

...

Most certainly NOT tl:dr . And since you quoted me, I was obliged to read it anyway ;-)

I think it was a good an informative post. But reading it, I also got the feeling that you are validating the point I made in my post. Not if GV was, or was not, the fastest driver but the simple fact that his career was too short to give a definitive answer.

[jrv_t644e]

I don't mean to direct this solely to you there were several posters who piled on after your post, so i do apologise if it seems very directed only to you, its not meant to be and perhaps you're catching some that should be directed as much to those that piled on,i know that you didn't make the Circus Act comment.

 

Anyway... onwards to the post...

 

Actually I do kind of agree that definitive answers are very difficult to obtain, particularly if one only considers statistics, which by their nature do not take into account circumstances... particularly if those statistics are then massaged.

I believe there was certainly enough in those years to compare with any of the drivers considered fastest, under significantly sterner test than many of them faced.

 

 

GV was active 4 full years. 1978-1979-180-1981.
Of these he was crushed in qualifying by Reutemann in 1978. It was, at best, a draw with Scheckter in 1979. He crushed Scheckter in 1980 and won the qualifying battle 10-5 vs. Pironi in 1981.

We already addressed 1978, yes, if you only choose to look at Q there was a substantial difference, whether the relative performances throughout the season warrant the use of the word crushed is an entirely different matter, especially as the FLs show nowhere near the difference. It should also be remembered that Villeneuve was inexperienced and Reutemann was an extremely accomplished driver. The statistics also do not show that but for his misjudgement in only his 7th GP, and yes i think it was his misjudgement, it is likely the Wins in 1978 would read 2-3 instead of 1-4 unless team orders had come into play.

 

 

For fun I compared Scheckter and GV in 1979. GV outqualified JS 8-7. I then calculated their average gridposition which turned out to be 6.07 for JS and 5.07 for GV.

    That surprised me, but I then noticed that if we leave out the last two GP's of the year (Canada and USA) which were held after Scheckter had clinched the championship (he qualified 9 and 16 as opposed to GV's 2 and 3) it turned out that until then Scheckters average gridposition was 5.08 and GV's 5.46.

 

You go on to say 'at best a draw' for 1979 only by arbitraily removing qualifying sessions based on the unsupported assumption that Scheckter didnt care in the last few races, and yet a look at the history reveals technical problems in almost all the cases in which Villeneuve was outqualified that season, should those also be removed? Furthermore, a comparison of the Fastest laps is 13-1 in Villeneuve's favour.. but this is somehow  'at best a draw'.

 

 

The next point is then to denigrate his teammates

 

 

    Now, what is the distinguishing feature of GV's career was his unstinting commitment during the years his Ferraris were less than good. 1980 and 1981. However his team mates were in those years a disillusioned Jody Scheckter and a less than stellar Didier Pironi.

 

Based on essentially no evidence that Scheckter immediately gave up trying and that Pironi was in someway a no-mark or certainly not a star driver. MANY experts considered him the second fastest driver in the world at the time, and yet, presumably because he was outpaced by Villenueve and the point of the posts was to ...

 

 

 puncture the myth surrounding him.

 

Perhaps because we've all been brainwashed instead of having seen it for ourselves and formed our own opinions?... if Pironi was slower, then he can't have ever been quick after all?

 

 

 

 

 

I DO believe that there was enough evidence in those 4 years to show that there was something exceptional about him. He did things and achieved things with those cars, on many occassions which it is hard to believe others could have achieved. A man who, yes admittedly, before his first race, and in the knowledge that it would be likely his only chance to impress span many times in learning the car and track. Yet when the qualifying and race weekend arrived outqualified one of the team regulars (who was in a newer car), ran with the leaders in the early laps AND after the unneccessary stop due to a faulty gauge setting the 5th Fastest Lap overall.

 

I'm not going to say there was something magical, i'm also not going to denigrate Prost or Schumacher or Senna to raise him up. All i will do is restate that I maintain that Villeneuve's teammates in Reutemann, Scheckter and Pironi constitute a considerably stronger pool of talent than Cecotto/De Angelis/Dumfries/Nakajima, or Brundle/Patrese/Verstappen and that the case of Watson/Arnoux is maybe more arguable though perhaps not Cheever.

 

 

Gilles Villeneuve was no 'Circus Act', he was the real deal.

Edited by jrv_t644e, 11 December 2015 - 11:09.

[PlatenGlass]

I'm not going to say there was something magical, i'm also not going to denigrate Prost or Schumacher or Senna to raise him up. All i will do is restate that I maintain that Villeneuve's teammates in Reutemann, Scheckter and Pironi constitute a considerably stronger pool of talent than Cecotto/De Angelis/Dumfries/Nakajima, or Brundle/Patrese/Verstappen and that the case of Watson/Arnoux is maybe more arguable though perhaps not Cheever.
 
 
Gilles Villeneuve was no 'Circus Act', he was the real deal.

De Angelis was a pretty strong driver, so I don't know why you're lumping him with the weaker drivers, and Senna then went on to have Prost as his team-mate too and was faster. Yes, that was his fifth year, but Villeneuve made it into year five at the start of 1982 (even ignoring Villeneuve's 1977), so Senna's qualifying efforts at the start of 1988 should count. And also Prost's clear speed advantage over Lauda. Not that we should only be able to compare drivers in the exact same time frame from the start of their career anyway.

[plutoman]

Here's some qualifying statistics:

 

1984 Lotus: De Angelis 11-5 Mansell

1986 Brabham: Patrese 4-0 De Angelis

1988 Williams: Mansell 13-1 Patrese

 

Who's fastest?

[jrv_t644e]

De Angelis was a pretty strong driver, so I don't know why you're lumping him with the weaker drivers, and Senna then went on to have Prost as his team-mate too and was faster. Yes, that was his fifth year, but Villeneuve made it into year five at the start of 1982 (even ignoring Villeneuve's 1977), so Senna's qualifying efforts at the start of 1988 should count. And also Prost's clear speed advantage over Lauda. Not that we should only be able to compare drivers in the exact same time frame from the start of their career anyway.

 

The drivers are lumped together in the order they were faced. It's a s simple as that. Those are the drivers they faced, not saying De Angelis = Dumfries or anything like that.

Are you sggesting that those bodies of drivers... even including Patrese and De Angelis are better?

 

De Angelis CERTAINLY was a strong driver , i wouldn't disagree with that for a moment and Patrese was no slouch either, i would just suggest they didnt constitute as strong or consistent a challenge as Reutemann/Scheckter and Pironi,

 

Reutemann (5)/Scheckter (7)/Pironi (1) i consider to be stronger than Cecotto(0)/De Angelis (1)/Dumfries(0)/Nakajima(0)  or Brundle(0)/Patrese(6)/Verstappen(0)/Lehto(0)/Herbert(0) etc.

 

 

Editted to add:

I REALLY should have included Piquet in Schumacher's teammates for those few races at the end of 91. In which case that strongly increases the quality of the drivers he faced at the start of his career.

 

 

Yes Prost was faster than Lauda in 84-85.. not denying it, as indeed was Watson in 82-83.

I actually think that in Watson/Arnoux/Cheever and yes the first few races with Lauda if you like, that Prost faced sterner opposition than Senna or Schumacher at the start of his career.

 

 

If you want to go into their fifth years i'm very happy to...

In Villeneuve's 5th year he outqualified Pironi 4-1 THREE times by >1s.

 

Since we're taking into account he did three races in 77 should i include the last three races of 81 as 82?

 

Italy           Pironi        0.03s  (Pironi  used his own and Villeneuve's spare so with engine failure Villeneuve couldnt use his last set of qualifiers as he had no car to put them on)

Canada     Villeneuve 0.2s

Las Vegas Villeneuve 1.9s

Edited by jrv_t644e, 11 December 2015 - 13:48.

[jrv_t644e]

Here's some qualifying statistics:

 

1984 Lotus: De Angelis 11-5 Mansell

1986 Brabham: Patrese 4-0 De Angelis

1988 Williams: Mansell 13-1 Patrese

 

Who's fastest?

 

 

Fun one

 

What the statistics dont tell of course is that there was practically a feud between Warr and Mansell, so it's not inconceivable that Mansell was disadvantaged relative to de Angelis.

 

My personal feeling is that Mansell was the fastest of the three, and that de Angelis was probably the next. 1986 was difficult to judge as the BT55 was frankly a bit of a mess and poor Elio's loss a terrible tragedy.

It does rather illustrate the point though that statistics, particularly as limited a set as Q can paint a very incomplete picture.

[PlatenGlass]

The drivers are lumped together in the order they were faced. It's a s simple as that. Those are the drivers they faced, not saying De Angelis = Dumfries or anything like that.
Are you sggesting that those bodies of drivers... even including Patrese and De Angelis are better?

Well, it was more that you explicitly separated Arnoux and Watson from Cheever, but didn't do the same for De Angelis when compared against Senna's other early team-mates. So it looked to me as if you were dismissing him. Probably just a misunderstanding then.

Edited by PlatenGlass, 11 December 2015 - 15:25.

[jrv_t644e]

Well, it was more that you explicitly separated Arnoux and Watson from Cheever, but didn't do the same for De Angelis when compared against Senna's other early team-mates. So it looked to me as if you were dismissing him. Probably just a misunderstanding then.

 

 

Hi

 

Thats absolutely fair

 

I probably should have separated De Angelis and Patrese from their groups as i believe both were fine drivers and it was not my intention to suggest otherwise, or I should have not separated Cheever, who i also thought had talent.. just not as much as Watson or Arnoux.

 

I really am sorry if it gave the impression i was dismissing de Angelis, or Patrese for that matter. Or Herbert.

Edited by jrv_t644e, 11 December 2015 - 15:59.

[E1pix]

The new poster strikes me as a nice guy who knows racing. Just what we need here. All it takes is looking at an older thread and saying, "Oh yeah, forgot about this guy, and this guy, I miss that guy, why did they all leave???

[Charlieman]

An old anecdote about a fan or journalist approaching Denis Jenkinson at an F1 race.

 

Fan/journo: "Who's quick?"

DSJ: "They're all quick."

 

Follow the argument further and recognise that all we ever see is the fastest driver and car combination on a particular day. Rarely did we see a "foreign" driver in a "foreign" car (eg loan car after team car breaks down in practice), and it is unlikely that we'll see it in the immediate future.

 

Our perceptions of who was quickest are built on respect for drivers. We underestimate some and overrate others. We use scientific and statistical methods to support our arguments, and others pick holes in our arguments. Even if we use the stats methods used by epidemiologists, we couldn't determine a "fastest" F1 driver for any era.

---

Apart from Fangio in the front engined F1 era, of course. Fangio borrowed F1 cars to start a season, so he was a "foreign" driver on occasions. Mostly, he had a quick and reliable car.

 

If you want to play with stats, start with Fangio's results as baseline data. Assume that Fangio was the quickest F1 driver of the era -- and that he had an intellectual edge by getting into a top team. Experiment with reliability over the years and practice results (if you must) and race times. After that, you have some numbers about drivers who were quicker than average. And those stats will never show up the really quick driver who only drove rubbish cars.