163 replies to this topic

[Rasputin]

When Mario Andretti retired his Alfa Romeo for the umptenth time in 1981;

 

Journo: "Oil leak again?"

 

Mario; "Yeah, it poured out from that hole in the block"

 

 

[Nemo1965]

Oh, nice thread.

 

Chris Amon about his team-mate Pedro Rodriguez: 'Why doesn't anyone tell Pedro it is raining?'

 

Mario Andretti to Chris Amon about his apprehension about driving at Indianapolis: 'You worry about walls? In Europe you race past trees all the time!'

 

A mentor to Jim Clark after one of his first races: 'No, they are not all driving slow, you are driving that fast.'

 

Juan Manuel Fangio after trying someone else's car and being much faster than the original driver: 'The car needs a little more throttle and a little less braking.'

 

Innes Ireland: ''Oh yeah, Monaco 1961. The year I came out the f*ing tunnel without the f*ing car.'

 

James Hunt to Patrick Depailler: 'Oy, Depailler. Where did you get your driving-license, with a box of chocolates?'

 

James Hunt about Niki Lauda: 'The Rat is the only person in the world who looks better with burn injuries to the face than before the injuries.'

 

David Coulthard about JP Montoya's injury after tennis: 'That's what you get when fat people exercise.'

 

'Where?' Everytime when Vittorio Brambilla had an accident.

 

DISCLAIMER: All these quotes are summoned up completely from memory. Correct me if I am wrong, but don't throw a hissy-fit, please.

Edited by Nemo1965, 08 May 2015 - 19:34.

[Rasputin]

Dan Gurney to a heap of drivers saying that Le Mans was too dangerous in 1967, when he himself was driving the 7-litre GT40 with AJ Foyt;

 

"If you think it's dangerous, perhaps you're driving too fast?"

[DampMongoose]

"If Chris Amon became an undertaker, people would stop dying." Mario Andretti

[Collombin]

"Don't worry Chris, it looks exactly the same from the rear" - Jim Clark to Chris Amon in 1968, seeing Chris' aghast expression at the newly Gold Leaf liveried Lotuses.

"Neither" - Niki Lauda, on being asked whether he thought of Reutemann as a team mate or a rival.


"I'd be upset if he was human" - Jack Brabham, 1961, in reference to Stirling Moss lapping him and the entire field within just 30 laps in the rain at Silverstone (a field that included Clark, Hill, Surtees, Brooks, Bandini etc).

[DampMongoose]

Niki Lauda's "looking for my other ear" answer.

[chrisPB15]

"My Dad would have said Well done"

 

Damon Hill to Ayrton Senna after the Brazilian broke Graham's Monaco GP record 5 wins in 1993 (Damon finished 2nd)

Edited by chrisPB15, 08 May 2015 - 19:52.

[Rasputin]

"Nice little engine that, for Le Mans"

 

Alan Jones on the 1986 under-boosted Ford Cosworth V6 turbo.

[427MkIV]

Richard Petty when asked if Danica Patrick will ever win a NASCAR race: "If everybody else stays home."

 

Anything Smokey Yunick said.

 

Dan Gurney, responding to Foyt's comments about the IRL and CART and that Indianapolis made the drivers, not the other way around: "A.J. ... his modus operandi is to put words in other people's mouths and then tell them why they're wrong."

Edited by 427MkIV, 08 May 2015 - 20:05.

[Dan333SP]

Jean-Pierre Sarti: Before you leave I want to tell you something. Not about the others, but about myself. I used to go to pieces. I'd see an accident like that and be so weak inside that I wanted to quit - stop the car and walk away. I could hardly make myself go past it. But I'm older now. When I see something really horrible, I put my foot down. Hard! Because I know that everyone else is lifting his.

Louise Frederickson: What a terrible way to win.

Jean-Pierre Sarti: No, there is no terrible way to win. There is only winning.

[Dan333SP]

Real quote:

 

By being a racing driver you are under risk all the time. By being a racing driver means you are racing with other people. And if you no longer go for a gap that exists, you are no longer a racing driver because we are competing, we are competing to win. And the main motivation to all of us is to compete for victory, it's not to come 3rd, 4th, 5th or 6th. I race to win as long as I feel it's possible. Sometimes you get it wrong? Sure, it's impossible to get it right all the time. But I race designed to win, as long as I feel I'm doing it right.

 

-Senna

[wrcva]

Colin Chapman - "You won't catch me driving a race care that I have built"

 

Murray Walker "IF... is a very long word in Formula 1... In fact IF is F1 spelt backwards!"

 

Keke Rosberg - "He (Gilles Villeneuve) was the hardest bastard I ever knew, but absolutely fair"

 

Kimi - “My life would be much more easier had I been a f1-driver in the 70’s with the guys. I was definitely born in the wrong era.”

[Henri Greuter]

Eddie Sachs(?)  "If you can't win, then be spectacular!"

 

 

Duke Nalon in 1948 about the Front wheel driven Novi: "There is one inch left on the trottle of that Novi I don't want anything to do with."

 

Despite that they were of a different kind and only shared the same engine: a number of drivers didn't mind which car you drove that was powered by a Novi engine, that car was `the` Novi.

Paul Russo, who drove the brand-new rear wheel driven Novi, crashed out of the lead in the 500 of 1956 and was classified dead last 33rd. He had abandoned the car after the crash when it started to smoke a bit.

Safely away from the car he declared about his hasty departure of the car; "I saw that thing bite two of my friends and try to fry another so I has no intention to see what it had in mind for me."

 

(Ralph Hepburn and Chet Miller were killed in 1948 and 1953 driving a front wheel driven Novi, Duke Nalon almost burned up in another one when he crashed it in 1949.)

 

 

 

 

Henri

Edited by Henri Greuter, 08 May 2015 - 20:23.

[RStock]

Sir Frank Williams - "Formula One drivers are ruthless bastards because they have to be".

[YoungGun]

I will drive flat out all the time. I love racing. - Gilles Villeneuve

[jimjimjeroo]

Leave me alone I know what I'm doing

[Rasputin]

AJ Foyt when one of his drivers complained of "bad air" when failing to overtake at Indionapolis;

 

"Hell, when I won four times here, we didn't have air!"

[Amphicar]

(see below)

[whitewaterMkII]

" Nice pass, Hiro" 

My brother to  'king Hiro on the elevator after the Long Beach Grand Prix when he had passed only stopped or broken cars after a Dracone inspired day at beach.

[ensign14]

Legendary NASCAR back-marker, Delma Cowart, whose ambitions can be gauged by his claiming of the number 0 for most of his career, and who in two decades of tilting at NASCAR never finished higher than 17th:

 

"I ain't never won a race, but I ain't never lost a party."

[scumbarma]

The Flav's reaction on the pit wall when NPJ crashed in the Singapore GP

Ducking hell , My every Ducking  disgrace, Ducking he's not a drive.

 

Ahh , miss him he had such a way with words..

[Afterburner]

Most of these are going to be more modern-day... the only good ones from the past that I've seen, I've likely seen on here. Not all are exact quotes (and may not be properly attributed, for that matter).

 

"They all like preaching safe racing and everything, but when you try to pass them, they're just douchebags." - JPM about Ed Carpenter taking him out in Iowa

 

"Kids... that's how it is, isn't it? They do a great job and then f#%k it all up." - Mark Webber after being rear-ended by Sebastian Vettel in Japan, behind the safety car

 

"Understeer is when you see the tree you're about to hit. Oversteer is when you only hear it." - Walter Rohrl

 

"Nobody is unbeatable, and there will always be a time when you will find someone kicking your ass." - Sebastian Vettel in Spain 2011

 

"Le Mans cars are all right, but the steering is quite sh*t and the windscreens are really strange." - Kimi Raikkonen after testing a Peugeot LMP1

 

"Aerodynamics are for people who cannot build engines." - Enzo Ferrari

 

"Every second spent looking in the mirror is a second you aren't spending preparing for the next corner." - Gil de Ferran

 

"It's better to go into a corner slow and come out fast than go into a corner fast and come out dead." - Sir Stirling Moss

 

"If I wasn't racing, I probably would've stolen cars--it would've given me the same adrenaline rush." - Valentino Rossi

 

And lastly, perhaps my most-favourite:

 

"There are only three real sports: mountain climbing, bull fighting, and motor racing. All the rest are merely games." - Ernest Hemingway

 

Maybe more later.

[NoSanityClause]

Murray: "A lot of people here are really debating whether Ricardo Rosset is Formula 1 material."

Brundle: "Well it's a fairly short debate Murray."

[Ducks]

"A shark? No, I like to think I'm more like a panther. A shark attacks from behind without you knowing. A panther, you know it's coming - but he still gets you.."

 

Lewis Hamilton, Brazil 2014

[Spillage]

'It protects my head.' - Kimi Raikkonen on what his helmet means to him.

 

'I scared myself rigid that day. I thought I had to be quickest. Then I saw Gilles's time and — I still don't really understand how it was possible. Eleven seconds!' - Jody Scheckter on Gilles Villeneuve's performance in practise at Watkins Glen in 1979.

 

'And if you no longer go for a gap that exists, you are no longer a racing driver.' - Ayrton Senna

 

'I have yet to meet anyone quite so stubborn as myself and animated by this overpowering passion that leaves me no time for thought or anything else. I have, in fact, no interest in life outside racing cars.' - Enzo Ferrari

 

I've tried everything other than jumping out of a plane, but nothing gives you an adrenaline rush like racing a car.' - Nigel Mansell.

[Spillage]

"A shark? No, I like to think I'm more like a panther. A shark attacks from behind without you knowing. A panther, you know it's coming - but he still gets you.."

 

Lewis Hamilton, Brazil 2014

He also memorably said that being hunted down by Alonso was 'like being chased by a bull' - a quote which has stuck with me, because I imagine that's exactly what it's like.

[scheivlak]

I remember I was there when Villeneuve first drove the Ferrari at Fiorano. He spun wildly about three times and, with everything wreathed in smoke, he came into the pits. Forghieri looked at him, shaking his head, and said, 'Gilles, this is a Formula One Ferrari, it is not a Formula Atlantic car. You cannot stop it like an Atlantic car. You cannot use the brakes like that!'

"'Brakes?' Villeneuve said. 'What do you mean, brakes? I haven't even touched them yet...'

"You should have seen Forghieri's face!"

 

 http://www.autosport...icle.php/id/314

[scumbarma]

 

"I had to do something at the time that upset me. I had to give her away. I’d rather have sold her," he said, per the Daily Mail's Jonathan McEvoy.

Our Bernie,talking about his daughters wedding.

 

Or these 3 from Eddie Irvine

 

Irvine was asked why he's so popular in Australia: "Because it's full of Irish convicts"


Asked which driver he liked the most apart of Michael Schumacher: "Hmmm...ammm...well we're all a bunch of tossers really!"


Giving his opinion on Ralf Schumacher: "Ralf Schumacher had something missing from his head."

[ensign14]

Charles Cooper - patriarch of the double world championship winning team and part-time pig farmer - once tried to pay a compliment to Stirling Moss' girlfriend.  "Ere, Sally, I've named my best sow after you..."

[ensign14]

Irvine at the Japan 1993 when asked about his helmet colours (orange with green stripes): "I dunno...this might be a bit political...but the orange is cos I'm a Protestant...and the green is to stop the IRA from shooting me..."

 

Even Eddie Jordan was almost speechless.  "Jaysus, Eddie!  A bit political?"

[Lotus53B]

Vettel being interviewed after his first GP win

 

"This must be the best day of your life"

 

"You obviously weren't there when I lost my virginity"

[ensign14]

As an aside, in a plus ca change moment...

 

"The sport had gradually developed into a commercial business, and as a business it had no charms for me."  -Charles Jarrott, 1906

[ensign14]

"You obviously weren't there when I lost my virginity"

 

There was a press conference once (early 1990s) when one journalist asked the three drivers there when they lost their virginity.  Rubens Barrichello went in great detail how he bent a girl over a snooker table when he was 14 before sinking the pink, so to speak.  And got very miffed when the other drivers simply said "no comment".

[ensign14]

Oh, and given the recent passing of polkadot-helmeted racer-journalist Denise McCluggage, who traded her way through a creditable sportscar career...

 

"Denise, if you had kept all the cars you had raced, you'd be a millionaire."

 

"No, if I'd been a millionaire, I'd've kept all the cars I had raced."

[showtime]

Real quote:

 

By being a racing driver you are under risk all the time. By being a racing driver means you are racing with other people. And if you no longer go for a gap that exists, you are no longer a racing driver because we are competing, we are competing to win. And the main motivation to all of us is to compete for victory, it's not to come 3rd, 4th, 5th or 6th. I race to win as long as I feel it's possible. Sometimes you get it wrong? Sure, it's impossible to get it right all the time. But I race designed to win, as long as I feel I'm doing it right.

 

-Senna

 

Hate this one. I hate how is used trying to justify a lot of dumb moves.

[NoSanityClause]

"She needs more of ze punishment!" - M.M.

[scheivlak]

 

"Aerodynamics are for people who cannot build engines." - Enzo Ferrari

 

"I build engines and attach wheels to them" - Enzo Ferrari

 

"I don't sell cars; I sell engines. The cars I throw in for free since something has to hold the engines in.” - Enzo Ferrari

 

"It's true that I have never met any man whom I thought altogether resembled me - but only because my faults are so enormous." - Enzo Ferrari

 

"I want to build a car that’s faster than all of them, and then I want to die."- Enzo Ferrari

Edited by scheivlak, 08 May 2015 - 23:07.

[ANF]

"We'll just take it one race at a time."

[Dan333SP]

Hate this one. I hate how is used trying to justify a lot of dumb moves.

 

He ended up apologizing to Jackie and becoming quite close with him. I think it's interesting because it shows how absolutely ruthless he was, and how that made him the driver everyone reveres now.

[R Soul]

Canadian journalist: "In qualifying all the drivers go out at the end when there's a lot of traffic. Would anyone ever take a risk and go out earlier when there are just one or two cars on track?"

Damon Hill: "Racing drivers are a bit like journalists, they all stick together in case they miss something."

[REDalert]

Reporter to Kimi:  "Lewis Hamilton said that winning his first GP felt better than having sex?"  Kimi to that,  "maybe he never had sex".

 

Kimi again- Q: "So what there is to do in Finland?" " Well, in summertime there's fishing and shagging. And in winter... the fishing is bad."

 

 

Matti kyllönen(The commentator) :  Oh no, now there’s smoke coming from nozzles in the back of JJ’s car!! (JJ= Jyrki Järvilehto).

Keke Rosberg(Guest commentator) : Yes Matti, we professionals call these nozzles exhaust pipes..

Edited by REDalert, 09 May 2015 - 01:49.

[AustinF1]

"A lot of people go through life doing things badly. Racing is important to men who do it well. In racing it's....it's life. Anything that happens before, or after ... is just waiting."

 

-Steve McQueen, Le Mans

[Lemans]

"Goggles Paesano is driving like someone coming home from work on the freeway..."

[Ricciardo2014]

Brundle at Monza I think it was ? "His tyres are absolutely rooted !"

 

Walker "........................................................................................................"

[mangeliiito]

I will drive flat out all the time. I love racing. - Gilles Villeneuve

Wasn't that Ronnie? Or at least a similiar one.
I love quotes and I got about like a 10 page document on my computer (what a nerd I am) but I can't get to it now. This one I think I saw a clip with, sometime, long ago.
Reporter - "Nelson Piquet, running for a win today?"
Piquet -"No. Today I want to be eleventh"

[Wuzak]

"When the flag drops, the bullshit stop.

 

Sir Jack Brabham?

 

http://www.ftw.com.a...ort_Quotes.html

[Nemo1965]

Real quote:

 

By being a racing driver you are under risk all the time. By being a racing driver means you are racing with other people. And if you no longer go for a gap that exists, you are no longer a racing driver because we are competing, we are competing to win. And the main motivation to all of us is to compete for victory, it's not to come 3rd, 4th, 5th or 6th. I race to win as long as I feel it's possible. Sometimes you get it wrong? Sure, it's impossible to get it right all the time. But I race designed to win, as long as I feel I'm doing it right.

 

-Senna

 

Hate this one. I hate how is used trying to justify a lot of dumb moves.

 

 

EDIT: Dan333Sp, sorry, I did not see your post. I don't think that all of the posters know of the connection between the Stewart-interview and the above mentioned quote. The whole interview is here, and as you will see (I had forgotten it), Stewart did not bluntly 'accuse' Senna of dangerous driving, (as many of his apologists state) he really tried a constructive dialogue with Senna:

 

https://www.youtube....h?v=pdCWDSpwv9U

 

The 'moment suprême' is at 1 min 55.

Edited by Nemo1965, 09 May 2015 - 08:20.

[Collombin]

And lastly, perhaps my most-favourite:

"There are only three real sports: mountain climbing, bull fighting, and motor racing. All the rest are merely games." - Ernest Hemingway

Why do people like Hemingway and Wilde often get credit for things that they never actually said or did?

[Jackmancer]

Chanoch Nissany: "Guys, I'm coming in, I'm having too much grip!"

[Nemo1965]

Why do people like Hemingway and Wilde often get credit for things that they never actually said or did?

 

Is that a rhetorical question?

Edited by Nemo1965, 09 May 2015 - 08:27.