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Who'd of thought what this little scally wag would achieve....
And that's very much how Motorhead sees Sebastian Vettel's achievement in winning four consecutive world titles. Sure, he's won another marathon. He did so in incredibly impressive fashion. But we need to look closely at the race he was actually running - because when considered objectively, there's no doubt that Vettel had so many advantages that he might as well have been driving downhill...
It's always seems very bad taste to use the occasion of a sportsman celebrating their greatest glory to point out that their achievement isn't all it's cracked up to be....
Everybody is loudly declaring him a genius of unimpeachable historical significance, without stopping to consider properly what it is that he's done....
How many more titles would Fangio have won had he got started aged 19, as Vettel did, instead of age 39? The answer is unthinkable, but double figures seems certain.
How many consecutive titles might Prost have won had he had more reliable cars in those near-misses in the early years of his career? Or if a driver less talented than Senna had been alongside him at McLaren? Or if that late 1980s technical dominance McLaren enjoyed had lasted the best part of a decade rather than a couple of years?
For that matter, how many titles would Ayrton Senna have won had he not been tragically killed?
And how many titles would Alonso have by now if he'd been driving that Red Bull car for the last four or five years? How many titles would Jenson Button have by now if the Brawn F1's vast advantage over the field in 2009 had lasted five years instead of 12 months?....
Or, to put it another way, the marathon he's been running has been downhill all the way, while Alonso - to pick just one example - has been running uphill, and doing himself immeasurable credit even keeping Vettel in sight.
So pat Sebastian Vettel on the back, or buy him a drink. Just don't kid yourself that he's fit to be mentioned in the same breath as the likes of Fangio or Prost among the legends of the sport.
Maybe he will be one day. But not yet.
Yes great article. Sums up how I feel about him. What really rankled was him putting himself in the 'greats' bracket with Fanio and Prost, during his podium speech....I believe he missed out Ayrton. How odd. Perhaps he feels he's already surpassed senna.
Seb you don't put yourself in the 'great' bracket, other people do.
After the agony of defeat, success will be sweet!Yes great article. Sums up how I feel about him. What really rankled was him putting himself in the 'greats' bracket with Fanio and Prost, during his podium speech....I believe he missed out Ayrton. How odd. Perhaps he feels he's already surpassed senna.
Seb you don't put yourself in the 'great' bracket, other people do.
More than likely he purposely did not mention Senna, since he has been linked with Hamilton so often!!
Yes great article. Sums up how I feel about him. What really rankled was him putting himself in the 'greats' bracket with Fanio and Prost, during his podium speech....I believe he missed out Ayrton. How odd. Perhaps he feels he's already surpassed senna.
Seb you don't put yourself in the 'great' bracket, other people do.
More than likely he purposely did not mention Senna, since he has been linked with Hamilton so often!!
No I doubt he even considered that. I think he just thought I've got four! I'm better than Senna, I've joined Porst, Schumacher and fangio. Well he can dream on . He's not in Senna league!
Frankly I blame Red Bull more than Vettel. I think he's a fine driver, excellent qualifyer, has the tenacity to win and has a great personality off the track.
Red Bull's failing is simply to have tried to keep up the facade of equality between their drivers and not make a clear distinction between a number one which Vettel clearly was (and deserved after 2010) and their number two driver. Ferrari makes no qualms about it, Red Bull chose to pretend.
So clearly when Vettel decided to override team orders in Malaysia and failed to the line of "Bull" they've been feeding everyone was exposed.
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