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Post by Deleted on Aug 8, 2018 3:32:50 GMT
Thanks, Carl. Totally undeserved. You know, sometimes I get these extemporaneous poetic licences.
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Post by Carl on Aug 8, 2018 4:43:19 GMT
We should create a popular demand relentless enough to unnerve David Croft into stepping down. Taking his place will be alternating Round Table members in an enlarged and luxurious commentator booth, replete at every Grand Prix with several grid girls.
To begin and end every race weekend, the entire Round Table will convene on television to astonish the world with our collective knowledge. Fan clubs will arise...and petty jealousies. Our hospitality area will encompass half of the paddock and Team Stroll will be restricted to Canadian army tents.
Late at night, with champagne flowing and grid girls all atwitter in our dormitory, someone will crash to the floor from a top bunk and this lovely dream become a rude awakening... Sic transit gloria et malum sit!
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Post by robmarsh on Aug 8, 2018 6:31:17 GMT
Carl you beauty.
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Post by chrisb on Aug 8, 2018 15:01:33 GMT
Carl, you really are a star!
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Post by Deleted on Aug 14, 2018 10:36:02 GMT
Lucio, I actually agree with everything you say. I don't know where I argued with this but if I did I obviously didn't make myself clear. Gilles was my childhood hero but I was too young to actually analyze his career then. I just thought he was "awesome". But I've read enough about him later to be fully aware of the fact that his (F1) career could have ended so easily after Silverstone or at best ended in a backmarker team. All athletes, no matter how talented, need a brake at some point in their early career. A moment when someone gives you a chance to show what you can do in the big league. Niki got his when Maranello called in 1973 and he grabbed it with both hands. He made perfect use of the situation, a Ferrari team that was 'resetting' itself which obviously created the space and possibilities for Niki to establish himself and have influence on the direction the team was going. Niki not only used his racecraft and technical ability but also his very clever way of thinking to reshape the team. Gilles was another matter. He was never a team leader like Niki, he was just a fearless boy from Canada who knew how to drive really fast. But he was also very wild, destroying a lot of Ferraris and making a lot of mistakes! Why Enzo kept believing in him, even calling him 'my little prince of destruction' with affection remains a mystery in a way. But Enzo did and Gilles eventually came good. 1979, only Gilles's second full F1 season, was very mature (most of the time ) and he could have won the championship if some early races like Zolder or Monaco had gone more favourable for him. It was all very close. But yes, both Niki and Gilles made their career with Ferrari and because Enzo believed in them. Some good points, Rene', I have been mulling over a while.
RE Enzo and Gilles. It is possible Villeneuve’s attitude was for the Old Man a throwback at racing in the Thirties, when racing had less sophistication and drivers raced with much more instinct and apparent bravery. Deep down he must have find it enthralling to watch him, even if the results - except 1979 - at the end were perhaps quite a bit meagre.
Someone with Gilles’ attitude would have struggled to carve out a career with the British teams for two reasons, at least as far as I can see at the moment. One, the Brits usually didn’t have patience with those who “broke” cars (to simplify in the extreme) because it cost them money, they were all garagisti (independents, no road cars revenue sales and no Fiat covering the bills). Two, for cultural reasons: those people hadn’t gone through the experience Enzo went, primarily for age reasons (they were all younger), for example they didn’t have a clue who Guy Moll was and why it was important to him, as well as for their different character traits. The Brits, as naturally most others, avoided those who they thought wouldn’t share in their views. Chapman debuted and promptly dispatched legions of drivers who weren’t up to speed to his standards. Williams, when he was looking for his first driver after Patrick Neve, in 1978, assessed Jones and Mass, safe middle level pair of hands, not fire starters. Likewise, when he hired the second driver, he took old hands like Regazzoni then Reutemann. As further example, Keke struggled the whole season at McLaren with Barnard, as he struggled initially to be accepted by Frank Williams and Patrick Head (this is well documented).
The fate of someone like De Cesaris, so close in attitude to the first Villeneuve, at Mclaren as a deb gives a clear clue of how much “1977-78 Gilles” would have lasted with, say, exactly Ron Dennis and John Barnard. Gilles came good at the beginning of 1979 – Long Beach and Kyalami – almost one year and a half since Ferrari hired him. We don’t really know (I would have to dig it) how much Scheckter was instrumental in setting up the new car, the T4, in that circumstance. You are right he was no team leader like Scheckter and Lauda were, and like Pironi was (some of the final issues generated from this overlooked aspect). Regardless, at the moment I can’t see or recollect any British teams waiting for so long for anybody to come good unless they came up together (team and driver) from the lower formulae (say Tyrrell and Stewart, who of course in many, if not all, ways was the exact opposite of Gilles).
What would have happened if Gilles had to find a drive at the end of 1978, is a big “what if”. However, tentatively, one could say Williams wouldn’t have been interested, seen where they were in their parabola to become a top team, they already had their number one and wanted only a safe water carrier beside. Chapman had an experienced line up of top drivers to keep their newly established competitive advantage (they were about to lose). McLaren was a dead end, as was Tyrrell.
The least that I could venture to say is that there would have been no “Villeneuve legend”, whatever he may have done and achieved. Villeneuve is a legend because he did all he did on a red car. And I am not a Villeneuve or red car fan, to say that.
One of the very reasons Ferrari became central to the sport is that it used to make reputations like Villeneuve’s – from scratch - all the time. It is a shame that the “sport” has changed so much that Ferrari cannot afford to do that anymore: they take already established multiple world champions, paired with second drives who will never be aces exactly because they don’t challenge, like instead for example exactly Hamilton could do in his first F1 season.
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Post by René on Aug 14, 2018 18:22:37 GMT
Lucio, I can follow your way of thinking even if there are a lot of 'what ifs' in there.
Gilles was hugely talented but there is certainly an argument to make that he 'needed' the Ferrari environment to develop into the race winner he was. An environment where he was given the time and enough equipment to polish his skills going round Fiorano zillions of times. Destroying a few Ferraris a long the way was not really an issue. This was something most of the smaller teams (mostly British but also Ligier) could never offer and probably didn't want to as Gilles was not a proven winner yet in F1. But Enzo obviously saw something in him and we may all be glad he did!
I do not entirely agree that the results after 1979 were meagre. Yes, they were when you look at the cold stats; only two victories after 1979 but that was more to do with the cars Ferrari gave him than Gilles's quality of driving. He drove some sublime races in the uncompetitive T5 and was brilliant at times in the difficult 126CK, outperforming Pironi most of the time.
I do agree with you though that a big part of Villeneuve's legend had to do with him driving for Ferrari but also don't underestimate how popular Gilles was at the time. He was a very popular driver and his death was world news back then.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 14, 2018 18:47:44 GMT
Of course, the quality of cars he had after 1979 shouldn’t be discounted, I agree. Sometimes I think that most of his legend rests on those two consecutive wins in 1981 out of nowhere. Even if I wasn’t a fan at the time, I always thought that overtake over Jones before St Devote was the clear showing of the superior driver.
The above in my previous post, more than just “ifs”, are “what ifs”, namely I tried to justify them with possible scenarios from what actually went on. I am an agnostic and flee equally blind faith and adoration. I am honest enough to say that in time I have come to appreciate Villeneuve much more than I did in period, but I still don't consider him one of the all time greats.
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Post by René on Aug 14, 2018 19:14:15 GMT
Yes, those two 1981 victories were legendary by themselves. Both brilliant drives and the Spanish GP victory is still unique. That race made a lasting impression on everyone who has seen it live back then.
If Gilles is one of the all time greats is a personal view. I think he was one of the most naturally talented racers the sport has ever seen. But Gilles himself said a race win was always more on his mind than racing for a championship. He sometimes took too many risks to compensate for an uncompetitive car or bad starting position but his race skill was always phenomenal.
For me personally he was my favourite driver when I was a kid. I was also a fan of Scheckter and Lauda but Gilles was special. That feeling and the memories will never fade for me and I have never experienced that again. But I guess that's what a childhood memory does.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 14, 2018 19:54:26 GMT
Amen to that, Rene'.
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Post by Carl on Aug 14, 2018 21:00:25 GMT
I too am agnostic and sometimes offer an insurance "amen" when higher powers may be eavesdropping.
When famously nonreligious W.C. Fields was on his death bed, a visiting friend was surprised to see him reading the Bible. Fields explained that he was only looking for loopholes.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 14, 2018 21:40:32 GMT
Carl, I only wanted to express that I am not trying to change Rene' opinion and even less his own sentiments towards a sportsman he admired so much. I question and speculate to understand, first myself.
Loopholes. Mmm. I'm afraid there aren't any...
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Post by Carl on Aug 15, 2018 0:36:05 GMT
Carl, I only wanted to express that I am not trying to change Rene' opinion and even less his own sentiments towards a sportsman he admired so much. I question and speculate to understand, first myself.
Loopholes. Mmm. I'm afraid there aren't any...
Lucio,
I know that 'amen' also has secular meaning and understood your response as supportive of Rene.
An unawareness of loopholes demonstrates good character. The devious know hundreds of ways to avoid just outcomes.
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Post by robmarsh on Aug 15, 2018 7:11:26 GMT
I too am agnostic and sometimes offer an insurance "amen" when higher powers may be eavesdropping.
When famously nonreligious W.C. Fields was on his death bed, a visiting friend was surprised to see him reading the Bible. Fields explained that he was only looking for loopholes.
Maybe W C Fields wasn't man enough to admit the truth. I am a practising Christian and proud of it. I think the discussion of religion on this forum will be a huge negative to the cohesiveness of the group. I will not preach and we all have our own views. Time will tell.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 15, 2018 10:06:40 GMT
Rob, I can't preach either way and needless to say I fully respect believers, as I come from a family of believers, my wife and son are practising Catholics, while I am one only occasionally. But I can tell you I was born a Catholic and will die as one. What's afterwards, I don't have a clue, I have studied too much science to make myself a lot of doubts. But it's entirely a personal view, which I don't share even with my son, he will have to make his own thinking and choice. I only give him the basic principle: Love your neighbour as yourself. (Mt, 22:39)
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Post by robmarsh on Aug 15, 2018 14:19:59 GMT
That is the best principle of all Lucio. Very nice response, thank you. However, before anyone thinks I am holier than thou, I am not. I have a long long long way to go and every time I learn more I seem to be further behind.
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