Lewis Hamilton or Felipe Massa: Who Deserves the Title Most? Part Two

If you haven't read Part One of this article, click HERE

Avoiding Errors

A very important part of winning a championship is being consistent, and avoiding costly errors. Lewis Hamilton lost the championship last season thanks to a couple of catastrophic bloomers. Massa has been known to make too many silly errors throughout his F1 career so far.

However this season Massa has made fewer silly errors than Lewis Hamilton. Lewis Hamilton, despite all his talent, has made some very basic mistakes this season. In fact he made a few of the errors that we were expecting last season.

His clanger in the pit lane at Montreal was simply very poor. Forgetting about the red light is one of the worst errors a driver can possibly make in F1 (perhaps, apart from driving into their team mate). This error was very costly, as he could have easily won that race.

In Bahrain he messed up the start procedure, and then as he fought back through the field rushed a bit and hit Fernando Alonso. He got no points from this race.

In Fuji, which was a race he just needed to get solid result from, he decided to fight Kimi (who got the jump at the start) and completely misjudged the move and earned himself a penalty.

He has made other small errors such as skipping the chicane at Magny-Cours whilst overtaking Vettel, and spinning at La Source in the opening stage of the Belgium GP.

Massa has made less errors. His main error was spinning in second place at Sepang when he was unchallenged. This was eight points lost in a silly and avoidable error. His five spins at Silverstone was perhaps the most embarrassing moment in the season for him. His move on Hamilton at Fuji was also very poorly judged but it didn’t cost him too dearly.

Overall in driver errors Lewis Hamilton has lost 8-10 points more than Massa has.

So in conclusion both drivers have made errors, but Hamilton has thrown more points away and his errors have been a bit more amateurish than Massa’s.

Lewis Hamilton: 4.5/10
Felipe Massa: 6/10

Pressure Handling

Championship contenders are always under the media spotlight and receive a huge amount of attention. They have a lot of responsibility and pressure on their shoulders. They also know that they can’t afford to throw away opportunities, and make silly mistakes that could lose them the WDC.

Competing in a championship battle takes over a driver’s life. It’s in their thoughts whilst they sleep, when they get up and when they get to bed again.

At times, Lewis Hamilton has handled pressure really poorly this season. He came into this season as team leader, which was completely new territory for him. The team were relying on him for car setup and to go out there and get the big results for them.

It was clear in the first half of the season that he found this new added pressure very difficult. He had a demanding weekend in Sepang as he, and Mclaren, never got the MP4-23's setup to their liking. In Bahrain, Hamilton had his feathers ruffled and lost focus at the start and never came back after hitting Alonso.

After his embarrassing incident in Montreal he faced a lot of criticism and this very clearly got to him. During the French GP the pressure this error created had a big effect on how he drove. He was only a shadow of himself that weekend.

In the title run-in it’s been clear to see the pressure he has put on himself to not throw the title away as he did last season. There was the wrong tyre choice in Q2 at Monza. He was lucky not to get knocked out of Q2 in Singapore. He completely cracked under pressure at Fuji when he made the move on Raikkonen that just wasn’t necessary.

At times Hamilton has let the importance of the situation get to him. He has also taken media comments to heart far too often, and has regularly been his own worst enemy as far as his media comments are concerned.

Massa has coped quite well in the pressure stakes throughout the 2008 season. After his performances in the Australia and Malaysia opener, and a poor performance pace-wise at Hockenheim he received savage comments from the press.

He went to Bahrain and Hungary with big angry storm clouds above his head. However, under the pressure he hit back brilliantly at the critics in both those races. He dominated in Bahrain and should have won in Hungary, except for a devastating engine failure at the end of the race.

In contrast, at China, many observers felt he was more under pressure than Hamilton was. This may be due to the fact that this is the first championship that Felipe Massa has contested. Importantly, this wasn’t a good race to choose to be feeling the pressure in a season, where Massa has resisted the pressures on him to good effect in recent times.

Lewis Hamilton: 5/10
Felipe Massa: 7/10

Comeback Ability

Whilst contesting a championship there will always be races where things will go wrong. However the ability to fight back and steal a point or two in these kinds of races, can be the difference between being a champion or not making the cut. Even more crucial is the ability is to bounce straight back from a race where it all went completely wrong and no points were scored.

Both Hamilton and Massa have achieved this with varying levels of success. At times when something goes wrong for Felipe Massa in a race, he can never get back into his stride and all the wheels come off. Once Massa had that first spin at Silverstone it got worse and worse and he never settled himself down.

When he lost out to Raikkonen after the first round of pit stops in Sepang his lap times start to drop, and he lost the superb consistency, which he had when he was in the lead in the first stint. He got himself a bit flustered and then he span out of the race. In Singapore he was leading until the pit stop incident and driving brilliantly.

However when he had to come back through the pack he looked as if he was still affected by the whole incident and the loss of an easy lead. The end result is, that he didn’t get anywhere so he stole no points.

However, as mentioned in the pressure section he fought back from his poor races in Sepang, and Germany with much better performances in the following races. In Montreal and Fuji he fought back effectively through the field, and when you add the points together from those two races it comes to six points. Those six points he fought back to get, could win him the championship.

Hamilton’s comebacks have also been very varied too. In Bahrain after he hit Fernando Alonso he struggled for the rest of the race, and even set a slower fastest lap than Anthony Davidson in the Super Aguri. France was also a very telling event for Hamilton. The French Grand-Prix was the weekend after the Montreal pit lane mishap.

After the press reaction he was extremely annoyed and this affected his race performance. His overtaking moves lacked conviction and this was one of the few weeks were Heikki Kovalainen was quicker than him in the race.

On a plus point, one week after his disastrous Japanese GP he dominated the Chinese from Friday morning to Sunday afternoon. To get Fuji out of his mind so quickly and dominate in China was a great fightback from such a young driver.

In conclusion both Massa and Hamilton have shown the ability to come back from a complete disaster. On the other side of the coin, both have shown that once they have sunk in the mud they continue to sink further into it. I think both of them have been about even in this category.

Lewis Hamilton: 6/10
Felipe Massa: 6/10

Team Work and Car Setup

Working well with your team and creating good relationships is vital towards your own championship success. If you can work well with your team then that can only be good news for the setup of your race car.

Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa both have great relationships with their team. In the Ferrari camp, Massa is very popular and they enjoy his friendly nature. He also works very hard, and is desperate for success and will do everything he can to improve his ability. His close relationship with driver engineer, Rob Smedley, has acclerated Massa’s progress no end. The success of this partnership is reflected in Massa’s recent performances.

Lewis Hamilton is loved by his Mclaren team in the same way. He will do anything he can to improve his performance, and will spend a lot of time with the mechanics at the technology centre in Woking.

Setup-wise, Hamilton has been a bit patchy. Last season he relied a lot on Fernando Alonso for the perfect setup. This season as the new team leader, the responsibility has been mainly on his shoulders. The fact that Heikki Kovalainen likes the car setup differently, means it has been even more vital he gets the feel for his Mclaren, and makes the right tweaks.

In the first half of the season it was a definite struggle. There were races where Mclaren certainly didn’t reach their potential. Malaysia and Bahrain were examples of this. As the season has gone on, Hamilton has definitely improved, and this has been a fundamental of Mclaren’s better performances in the second half of this season.

During Massa’s time at Ferrari he has become very good at car setup. He learnt a lot about car setup during his testing year at Ferrari in 2003. He has also learnt a lot from being around Michael Schumacher.

In fact, in the second half of 2006 he even started setting up his car more effectively than Schumacher at times. There has perhaps only been the odd occcassion where Massa hasn’t hit the sweet spot this year. This occurred in Germany but perhaps more importantly China.

Lewis Hamilton: 7/10
Felipe Massa: 9/10

Final Result

Lewis Hamilton: 72.5/100
Felipe Massa: 68/100

Number of Categories Won by Each Driver

Lewis Hamilton: 3
Felipe Massa: 2
Draw: 3

Final Conclusion

In closing, this analysis shows that both drivers have done a great job this season, but on the reverse side, bother have encounted quite a number of flaws as well. Neither have had a clean season. However, when summing it all up, Lewis Hamilton does just about have the edge over Massa.

What gives him the edge, are races like his wins in Monte-Carlo and Silverstone, which were brilliantly executed. These are the sort of races that Massa still isn’t quite capable of driving. Despite the number of faults Lewis has, these are the kind of performances that show the great talent that he is. When Hamilton and Massa are at their absolute best in even cars, I believe Hamilton does have that extra something over Massa.

Despite faults and driver errors, in my opinion both drivers would deserve this championship. If Massa won it he would have fully earnt it. He has driven some brilliant races this season, and has been quick at nearly every race weekend.

Every weekend he has been in contention, unlike last season when he was quick some weekends and not so quick in others. He has turned into a much more rounded race driver.

He is no longer erratic. He has proved a lot of his fiercest critics wrong this season, and he has completely left highly rated team mate, Kimi Raikkonen, in the sand.  That takes some doing even if Kimi has had an average season by his previous standards.

To be able to continue to challenge for titles in his career he desperately needs to improve his driving in tough conditions, and learn to drive from a lower grid position more effectively. More importantly, he needs to have a bit more confidence and belief in himself. If he can do this he can stay as a top line driver.

Lewis Hamilton, I don’t think, has made full use of his huge talent. He has made more errors than he should have done, and let matters outside of the car (mainly the press) get to him far too much.

The fact he goes into the championship finale seven points ahead, regardless of all this is a huge testament to him. When Hamilton wipes out all the errors he is going to become a mighty hard driver to beat over the next five to ten years. At the moment, he still has an awful lot of maturing to do.

If he loses this title to Massa then he would only have himself to blame. He has made some extreme novice errors this season. If Massa were to sneak the title on Sunday, Hamilton should kick himself for those silly errors, rather than some of the odd decisions the stewards made.

So, in the final conclusion both drivers have done enough to win this championship. They have been in their own class this season, however both have a lot of work to do in certain areas of their game. Both deserve this championship but, in my opinion, Hamilton would be the most deserving of the pair.

One must wonder though how Kubica and Alonso would have fared, had they been given a Mclaren or a Ferrari. They could have given Massa and Hamilton a very tough time, and made them pay more for some of the flaws they have displayed in this championship amongst their brilliance.