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Engineers, not racers, are the true drivers of success in motor sport

economist.com

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Re: Engineers, not racers, are the true drivers of success in motor sport

#3

Post by jkuria »

choeger wrote: post #2

Interesting analysis, but the main point remains: You can not compare drivers across different eras. Is Lewis the GOAT? Yes. Is Michael the GOAT? Yes.

Hmmh, I took away the exact opposite point. They developed a model to do exactly this and Fangio from the 1950s came out on top. He raced for four different teams and the driver's contribution (versus the car's and the team's) was 58% compared to 19% today.

Re: Engineers, not racers, are the true drivers of success in motor sport

#4

Post by giobox »

jkuria wrote: post #3
choeger wrote: post #2

Interesting analysis, but the main point remains: You can not compare drivers across different eras. Is Lewis the GOAT? Yes. Is Michael the GOAT? Yes.

Hmmh, I took away the exact opposite point. They developed a model to do exactly this and Fangio from the 1950s came out on top. He raced for four different teams and the driver's contribution (versus the car's and the team's) was 58% compared to 19% today.

There is no way for Lewis to assume that much responsibility even if he wanted to though, to continue this example. I'd go as far as to argue with constant rule changes it's not even the same sport anymore, especially the gap between Fangio and Lewis etc.

I agree, cross-generation driver comparisons are really hard.

Re: Engineers, not racers, are the true drivers of success in motor sport

#6

Post by segmondy »

This entire argument is simply because Hamilton is black. He sets records and all of a sudden he can't shine by himself. Of course the team is important and very good but also so is Hamilton as is evident by his teammate who has the same car unless you truly believe Mercedes is giving his teammate a handicapped car.

Re: Engineers, not racers, are the true drivers of success in motor sport

#7

Post by focom »

segmondy wrote: post #6

This entire argument is simply because Hamilton is black. He sets records and all of a sudden he can't shine by himself. Of course the team is important and very good but also so is Hamilton as is evident by his teammate who has the same car unless you truly believe Mercedes is giving his teammate a handicapped car.

Reading the first line:

> Our statistical model finds that neither Lewis Hamilton nor Michael Schumacher is Formula 1’s greatest driver

So its lame to play the racist card here.

Re: Engineers, not racers, are the true drivers of success in motor sport

#9

Post by olivermarks »

Depends on the motorsport. Take drag racing. top fuel driver after reaction time is mostly along for the ride, depends on quality of engineering to win/lose. Alcohol FC is immensely complicated to drive, also pro stock which is pure driving skill.

MotoGP motor cycle racing is highly skilled and is IMO far, far more exciting than Formula One which used to be the fastest/most expensive formula amongst multiple divisions and is now largely an inventors/engineers domain.

As others have noted different eras of racing cars (late 60's early 70's formula one for example) required very different skills and bravery levels.

David Coulthard drives Jim Clark's Lotus 25 https://youtu.be/_L1tHavnd9w lovely bit of informative film

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