Martin Brundle: "Jenson Button is the most complete driver"

[bjpower]

i suppose what im talking about is someone who fights to the finish. someone who doest go " this will do"
sure mass and kimi arnt doing alot cos there season is over its pointless.
they have nothing to louse but allos nothing to gain and you can see it there hunger is gone.

button finishing 6 was disapointing chello finished 4th. sure the redbull showed up with 2 class cars.
but the brawns outclasses everything else.
he settled he did have problems passing, that can also be put down to good defending.
but how many times the shui hassle a car around the track till they make a mistake.
and alot of the racers take risks.
how many times used we see wheel to wheel racing one car having to back off because other wise they would run out of road.

maybe f1 has just become too calculated. too much of a busness

[JimClarkFan]

Sorry for the bump, but I really want to know what the general consensus for Jenson is these days, 4 years on, and don't wish to make another thread.

[radosav]

for me he is as good/bad as vettel. just he had bad luck not being in great car from his early twenties , but in rather mediocre cars, so people think he is mediocre driver. but when he was in dominant car in 2009. he did better job than vettel in 2010 and more or less the same job like vettel in 2011. just my 2 cents.

[JimClarkFan]

for me he is as good/bad as vettel. just he had bad luck not being in great car from his early twenties , but in rather mediocre cars, so people think he is mediocre driver. but when he was in dominant car in 2009. he did better job than vettel in 2010 and more or less the same job like vettel in 2011. just my 2 cents.

certainly an interesting way of putting it, thanks

[krisfx]

Personally, I think he sometimes struggles.

I've heard him continually talk about how he "Can't find the balance" over the last few years at McLaren, when barring failures, Ham has been doing well. It seems like Jenson needs to have the car just how he likes it to really get the best out of it, where we see other drivers making the difference behind the wheel, even when their team mates struggle.

This doesn't mean I don't like him, his in car radio is remarkable, as though he isn't even driving, and on a good day he can beat anyone. As for the most complete, though. I would probably put this to Alonso (Inb4 fanboy/general consensus etc).

[adrianjordan]

Personally, I think he sometimes struggles.

I've heard him continually talk about how he "Can't find the balance" over the last few years at McLaren, when barring failures, Ham has been doing well. It seems like Jenson needs to have the car just how he likes it to really get the best out of it, where we see other drivers making the difference behind the wheel, even when their team mates struggle.

This doesn't mean I don't like him, his in car radio is remarkable, as though he isn't even driving, and on a good day he can beat anyone. As for the most complete, though. I would probably put this to Alonso (Inb4 fanboy/general consensus etc).

+1

I've heard it said from a number of people who are far better placed than I am to know, that on his day, when the car is set up just how he likes it, he is the match for anyone out there.

The frustrating thing as a Button fan is that "his day" when the car is "just how he likes it" seem to be few and far between...

Most complete? No, I agree that goes to Alonso at the moment.

[GrizzleBoy]

I don't get this "he struggles a lot but on his day, he can beat anyone and that's what makes him a (complementary word) driver" thing.

Anybody on their day, in the right car, can beat anyone. That isn't an attribute you can just give to one driver to make up for the fact that he struggles more than he doesn't.

Surely what makes a driver good (especially in todays F1) is how you perform when odds are stacked against you, not when everything is laid out on a platter?

[LionKing]

for me he is as good/bad as vettel. just he had bad luck not being in great car from his early twenties , but in rather mediocre cars, so people think he is mediocre driver. but when he was in dominant car in 2009. he did better job than vettel in 2010 and more or less the same job like vettel in 2011. just my 2 cents.

Same job like Vettel in 2011 Vettel was almost perfect in 2011. Button was very mediocre in the second half of the 2009 when other cars caught Brawn; his teammate Barrichello had the upper hand and won 2 races with Brawn.

Button's has a few major weaknesses like qualifying speed and too many episodes of struggles when things are not perfect. The only bright sight is he beat Lewis on points when they were at McLaren and was overall a very well match for him...

[Holm86]

for me he is as good/bad as vettel. just he had bad luck not being in great car from his early twenties , but in rather mediocre cars, so people think he is mediocre driver. but when he was in dominant car in 2009. he did better job than vettel in 2010 and more or less the same job like vettel in 2011. just my 2 cents.

Same job like Vettel in 2011 Vettel was almost perfect in 2011. Button was very mediocre in the second half of the 2009 when other cars caught Brawn; his teammate Barrichello had the upper hand and won 2 races with Brawn.

Button's has a few major weaknesses like qualifying speed and too many episodes of struggles when things are not perfect. The only bright sight is he beat Lewis on points when they were at McLaren and was overall a very well match for him...

The reason Jenson could beat Hamilton on points was because of Hamiltons combination of bad luck and big mistakes. But Hamiltons mistakes was often caused by him pushing too much. But i would rather have a driver that pushes to be the best. Instead of a driver like Jenson who is a garantee to get points but just is'nt fast enough to be the best.

[Sevach]

The most complete discussion restricts itself to Alonso and Vettel imo.

How can you call a driver that struggles so often the most complete?
And while natural speed isn't the deciding factor here, it's still a factor when judging the complete package, meaning, even if you are not the hands down fastest driver you have to be in the ballpark... again, you can't call someone who clearly, evidently, falls short in terms of pure speed the most complete driver, imo it has to be someone who can keep up with the best then beat him on strategy, setup, racecraft or whatever...

My final words, Brundle was high on coolaid.

[SectorOne]

Nobody on the grid is even remotely close to being as complete as Alonso.
And that´s from a Hamilton fan.

[marcush.]

I think Jenso is a most complete driver in the sense of Schumacher .
You ever hear him bitching about his team it only goes as far as his teammate in really tough situatios..compare with the likes of Hamilton ,alonso,Vettel etc who really don´t even bother grapping the first opportunity to present the world with a heavy dose of egomania.
I think this is what Marty wanted to express back then -Jenson is quick AND a teamplayer he will not leave his team with a fallout or something ...
compare with Hamilton twittering telemetry plots and alonso blackmailing Ron Dennis....or Vettel blatantly ignoring team orders .These are definetely NOT team players in bad times ..and as it happens there is not always the sun shining on you ..
Pure driving talent it may well be Alonso,Hamilton or Vettel have an edge ,it may even go as far as these three are dragging the team forward more forcefull ,but i guess it is soon a wearing out of recourcces,human recources to deal with them.

[krisfx]

I think Jenso is a most complete driver in the sense of Schumacher .
You ever hear him bitching about his team it only goes as far as his teammate in really tough situatios..compare with the likes of Hamilton ,alonso,Vettel etc who really don´t even bother grapping the first opportunity to present the world with a heavy dose of egomania.
I think this is what Marty wanted to express back then -Jenson is quick AND a teamplayer he will not leave his team with a fallout or something ...
compare with Hamilton twittering telemetry plots and alonso blackmailing Ron Dennis....or Vettel blatantly ignoring team orders .These are definetely NOT team players in bad times ..and as it happens there is not always the sun shining on you ..
Pure driving talent it may well be Alonso,Hamilton or Vettel have an edge ,it may even go as far as these three are dragging the team forward more forcefull ,but i guess it is soon a wearing out of recourcces,human recources to deal with them.

What Vettel did was wrong, but being conservative doesn't win you multiple world championships and constructors championships, so it's a toss up between the two. I personally think Jenson is a little too laid back in how he collects points, I definitely don't think he would be a world champion without the exceptional design from Brawn

[PlatinumZealot]

The complete driver is being smashed by Perez right now.

[marcush.]

Jenson is not smashed up by perez ,in the same ways as he was not smashed up by hamilton,you are dreaming if you claim otherwise.
Holy Hamilton finds himself in a similar situation at MGP now with Britney .No sign of his bag of completeness going to gain the upper hand in the team duel.As was the case with alonso and Button ...the single guy he had in the bag was Kovalainen .

reality is: not Alonso ,not Hamilton, not Button and not Vettel will win aything without competitive and reliable machinery it´s as simple as that .Vettel does owe his row of titles Neweys genius and RBs ability to produce reliability combined with genius.Alonso is constantly performing and rarely drops the ball ,Ferraris just don´t break but this is not enough to win a single title....Hamilton could not win the silverware mainly due to Mclarens inability to bring the car home constanly without hickups.