Formula 1 | What allows Hamilton to be one head ahead of Senna and Schumacher in F1
Who is the best Formula 1 driver in history? Everyone will have their own opinion on the matter, but one astute sports watcher reckons that Lewis Hamilton is ahead of Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna when it comes to track battles.
Peter Windsor, once manager of the Ferrari and Williams F1 teams, believes the two seven-time world champions are close in terms of driving style, even if he once again puts the Briton slightly ahead of the German.
“I would say Lewis is closer to Michael. In terms of how he uses the gas, the brakes and the steering, I think he is closer to Michael.” Windsor said.
“I actually think he’s ahead of Michael in a few key areas and he’s a bit more nimble than Michael in all his moves, especially when braking. I think Lewis has better pedal feel. He brakes better than any other driver in the history of the sport. The way he presses and releases it.”
“The speed of movement or the agility is just amazing about the Lewis. I think that’s probably its greatest quality. And of course it gives you a stable platform that you can do things around. With throttle and steering.”
“I think Ayrton was quite linear in his driving style. He was very close to Lewis, but his corner notes weren’t as early as Alain Prost’s in my opinion. If you look at 1988, it’s a good year to compare. Alain always took the corner a bit earlier than Ayrton and his turns were therefore a bit short. And Ayrton always had a habit of hitting the gas pedal to feel the moment to give power, whereas Lewis and Michael never had to find that moment. .”
“So you can say to yourself: What made Ayrton so great? Well, it was his incredible precision. half a centimeter almost a hundred times. Apart from the Mirabeau corner in Monaco in 1988, we have to consider his lack of concentration at that time. “
“Of course Lewis, Michael, Nigel Mansell, Alain Prost and Niki Lauda all had phenomenal judgement, but I think Ayrton took it to the next level.”
Unlike Senna and Schumacher, Hamilton never does dirty work
If the greatness of Senna and Schumacher is not disputed in Formula 1, it would be fair to remember that their careers were also marred by certain incidents.
For example, the Brazilian took out Alain Prost at the first corner of the 1990 Japanese Grand Prix, and the German also connected with Damon Hill and Jacques Villeneuve in the final race of the season in 1994 and 1997. . In Monaco in 2006, Schumacher even stopped Ferrari in the middle of the track and deprived Fernando Alonso of the pole position.
For Peter Windsor, these controversies affecting the two legends lead him to say that Lewis Hamilton is ahead in the all-time hierarchy thanks to his consistently clean driving despite clashing with Max Verstappen at Silverstone in 2021.
“I think if you’re just talking about behavior on the road, Lewis is head and shoulders above those two because he doesn’t really do anything dirty. Everything Lewis does is tough, awesome, sometimes it ends in tears, like with Nico. Rosberg was at Barcelona in 2016, but generally he never does anything dirty.”
“I know a lot of you are going to say, ‘What about Max Verstappen and Silverstone 2021? But then we’re talking about two guys who have spent half of Silverstone next to each other, inches apart. They come out of Luffield. And Max slows down a bit. What’s Lewis going to do, get behind him?’ No, it will go right.”
“And yes, it was an ambitious move by Lewis, but Max, who raced him from wheel to wheel, was sure ‘Lewis’s going to get through’ because I messed something up. It’s coming out of Luffield a bit.”
“And that’s why I always say 50-50, because Niki Lauda and Alain Prost’s philosophy of not being hit by another driver is as important as ‘go, take the smallest place.’
“Generally speaking, Lewis is a pure driving model, while Ayrton and Michael were nothing but models of that level. You could say that Michael probably fed off Ayrton a bit, but Ayrton was already ‘breaking in’ in Formula 3 with Martin Brundle. He did it to Nigel at Spa in 1987. Of course, talk to Alain Prost from Suzuka, he was knocked out twice by Ayrton there.”
“So Ayrton did a lot of things, but Michael was still different because he also did some things, but he did what Ayrton would never do, which was to deliberately crash the car to prevent Fernando Alonso from taking pole.”
“I don’t think Ayrton would have ever done something like that, I think it would have crossed his mind to do it. There aren’t many drivers where that would happen, but Michael l’ did. He later said, ‘You know, you’ve seen a lot of that in football, and I’ve seen it in other sports. I did what I saw.”
“In terms of driving style, I compared Lewis to Michael more than Ayrton. But in terms of technique, I preferred Lewis to both of them, that’s for sure.”
