I know it's a hard time with everyone with some 130 days until first practice...and the news is a little slow, but I will continue to plough my contacts for news! So, the annual Yahoo! and Crash.net Top driver of the year poll has just been published with some interesting results.
Now bearing in mind that this is a UK based poll the winner is surprising although it is very close, with only 10 votes between first and second.
So, here we go:
1) Fernando Alonso. In my view, thoroughly deserved!
2) Lewis Hamilton. Surprising in view of his nationality, but was very close. These two drivers are the only two with over 1000 points in the poll. The next three were also very close, and I was surprised that Massa was not higher...
3) Felipe Massa. Great season, nice bloke. Fantastic in defeat.
4) Robert Kubica. Shame BMW stopped developing the car.
5) Sebastien Vettel. King of the lot in a couple of years? Next up, and perhaps he should have been lower...
6) Kimi Räikkönen. The less said the better...
7) Nick Heidfeld.Don't really see why Nick is so high up. Overshadowed by Kubica all season.
8) Timo Glock. Massive improvement all season. Not mentioning Brazil...
9) Jarno Trulli. Interestingly behind Tim O'Glock. Should have been higher than Nick...
10) Mark Webber.Thank heavens people see that the car got worse, not Webbo!
So that's the top 10.
Some interesting placings there, I think that "not so quick Nick" should have been lower, and Kimi certainly should have been. I may be biased but Webber drove the wheels off the RB4 and deserved to be higher than NH!
Other than those few, can't really argue that much. The minor placings don't show many surprises, although perhaps Bourdais should have been higher? I still can't make up my mind about him.
Some of the drivers don't even feature in the poll, so I can only list the drivers that are shown, so here goes with 11-17th places:
11) Nico Rosberg. Perhaps a bit low, although a big talent hampered by poor car.
12) Heikki Kovalainen. Definitely should have done more with that car. Deservedly low.
13) Rubens Barrichello and Sebastien Bourdais. Bye bye Rubens. It's time.
15) Jenson Button. His stock dropped a lot this year. Still has it in him I think.
16) David Coulthard. End of the road. Body repair shops will go out of business!
17) Kazuki Nakajima. Seemed to reach a plateau of talent. Toyota keeping him in F1.
It seems that the others didn't get any votes at all!
So, an interesting poll, showing that the Brits can be objective, and I have added some of my own very brief thoughts. Now, bring on testing, especially with Loeb and Rossi having tests. Now wouldn't that be tasty? The greatest rally driver and the greatest Bike rider in F1?
10 comments Last one added 7 months ago — Leave a Comment
Michael Griffin 7 months ago
Best in F1, no doubt, but this season? Not a chance, he was great since Spa, that is it. Hamilton and Massa have made far too many mistakes, its Kubica for me.
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Mike Wilkins 7 months ago
It surprised me too Mike, and it was a British Survey!
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Isuru Wakishta Arachchi 7 months ago
brits are ...
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Duncan Scott 7 months ago
... superb?
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Isuru Wakishta Arachchi 7 months ago
sensible :) except the stupidest of 'em all who picked nakajima over rosberg :lol
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Duncan Scott 7 months ago
Can't argue with that!
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Duncan Scott 7 months ago
Mike, I removed the horrid MS Word HTML because it was showing as a tiny blue font in my browser, you know you can revert if you don't like what I've done.
Very interesting article, and I've given it a pick. F1 articles don't make the front page because people here are so mean with picks, but I'm bucking the trend.
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Mike Wilkins 7 months ago
Thanks Duncan. I wrote it and had all sorts of problems whilst doing it! It wouldn't give me options and other stuff.... So sorry for the look! I had hoped it would look ok!
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Billy Sexton 7 months ago
Interesting results.
I think I agree with Michael Griffin, Kubica deserves the crown, no mistakes all year and bad results was the car and not him.
Alonso is the best at the moment, no doubt but if he hadn't scored those two wins by luck (Massa should have won in Singapore, Raikkonen or Hamilton in Japan) would he be so high up?
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Saraswathi Siriginia 7 months ago
wow, what results!
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