ernos5 wrote:Geez a couple of you just can't put the bat down... =D> SectorOne is right with regards to Vergne, and everyone knows that F1 is not the best 20 or-so drivers in the world because there are so many variables (money) in who gets a seat. It's early days for Verstappen, you can't judge him on the one session he's done so far.
I'm from Australia and i've met and raced a guy that raced Ricciardo in go-karts and beat him a number of times. He said there were many guys in karting that were
easily quicker than Ricciardo but for whatever reason, never made it to F1 and are now racing in Australian series such as V8 Supercars or other international lower-tier series relative to F1. It's all down to chance, timing, money and more money
It's hard to have driver comparison arguments these days in F1, it isn't a sport anymore, hasn't been for a few years. Just a circus now with plastic soldiers for drivers.
Yet both Ricciardo and Vergne were both selected on talent in the first place so I don't know how you can say those other variables such as money is involved. I'm not sure how you even manage to bring into the argument that money matters between Vergne and Ricciardo.
Also whoopee do, having a guy beat somehow in karting does not always translate to making it to F1 or even being the best in F1. We've seen multiple times that regardless of how you do in junior series it does not always mean you will be successful in F1 and vice versa. Just like di Resta kept going on about how he beat Vettel in F3, that matters naught once you get into F1, even more so going all the way back to karting.
Drivers develop and hone their skills over time (or regress) so I don't see what relevance some guy beating Ricciardo in karts when they were young makes him such a worse off driver. If you think it isn't a sport, go watch something else. I would have said Vergne was the one more likely to have beaten Ricciardo when they both joined TR but it hasn't turned out that way.
How can you call that being smashed in qualifying impressive? why would you promote a guy that is always up to half a second slower to a top team? Regardless of race results, the guy that is always quicker will inherently have a higher ceiling for going faster in races.
Concept of you would rather a bloody quick car that is unreliable because you can always make it reliable as opposed to having a slow car that reaches the end of the races all the time because that speed is hard to come by.
I've yet to see anyone come up with any races where JEV has had consistent great race weekends where he is good enough to be noticed. I've given plenty from Ricciardo and even JEV's best races.
Verstappen's pre F1 races are extremely impressive, the question is whether he will translate that when he moves to F1.
