Formula 1: Senna and Schumacher: Lucky to Get There or Was It Their Abilities?

When anyone mentions the names Senna and Schumacher nearly everyone begins to talk about the amazing achievements done by Ayrton and Michael.

That is logical of course, they won 10 world championships between them and are two of the finest drivers ever to grace the sport of Formula 1.

However, this piece is not about those two men. This piece is about the other Senna and Schumacher that have graced Formula 1.

I am referring to Bruno Senna and Ralf Schumacher.

These two men will almost certainly not be remembered by as many people as their relatives. We will begin with the man who has now retired from Formula 1, Ralf Schumacher.

Unlike his brother, he failed too win any world championships and never really ever came close. His career in Formula 1 lasted 11 seasons, and in those 11 seasons he picked up six Grand Prix victories. He drove for Jordan, BMW Williams and finished his time at Toyota.

He made his debut in the 1997 season with a lot of hype and expectations. However, his career never seemed to take off.

After having promising seasons in fairly uncompetitive cars at Jordan and his first season at Williams. During the early seasons he picked up some podiums and other points taking cars to places they didn't really deserve to be. 

The 2000 season saw Williams returning to having a full works engine provided by BMW. The BMW motor was a good one, if slightly unreliable, and the Williams cars of that era were good. However, over the next 5 seasons he couldn't push himself to that next level.

He won the occasional race but never managed to make himself a serious threat for a world championship. The 2003 season was possibly the biggest indicator that he wasn't ever going to be a champion.

The 2003 season was won by Michael Schumacher but not with the same ease that he won many of his other titles.

Kimi Raikkonen in the McLaren came second that season, just two points behind Michael with Juan Pablo Montoya, Ralf's team mate, in third a little further back.

The Williams of that season was competitive and in the hands of Montoya it was shown that it could be right at the front. Ralf wasn't ever in the hunt really for the title and finished 24 points behind Montoya and 35 behind Michael.

He then had another year at Williams but he missed 6 races of the season due to a crash during the race at Indianapolis.

During his final two seasons at Williams he was paid a huge amount, and only Michael Schumacher at the time was earning more.

From 2005 he took over at Toyota and his first season at Toyota looked promising when he scored two podiums. Again this was a false dawn and his next two seasons were not good. His final two seasons saw people once again looking at the amount he was paid.

Toyota were paying him a huge amount of money, but he wasn't doing anything heroic so people were questioning his worth.

He did beat his teammate, Jarno Trulli, in his first two seasons at Toyota and lost to Trulli in his last season.

Ralf Schumacher was talented, but by the end of his tenure in Formula 1 people were starting to view him as an overpaid, under-talented driver.

This isn't fair to Ralf because he was talented. His main problem was the fact he didn't have the super human abilities like his brother Michael had, which is what people were expecting.

He was a strong driver but no world beater. There was no way, on talent, that he deserved the amounts of money he was earning.

Ralf was talented, but not as talented as people originally thought and it ended with people going to the other extreme and viewing him as someone with not much talent. Truth was he was a mid field Formula 1 driver. He was good enough to be in the sport and was far too good to be in the cars at the back but he wasn't good enough to take himself to the world champion level.

Bruno Senna is slightly more difficult to judge. He has only had one racing season in Formula 1 and that was at Hispania, who produced a very poor car. 

A lot of people were very negative about Bruno's performance over the 2010 season. I feel this to be very harsh on Bruno as he was coming under massive pressure. He was also was in a very poor car meaning he had no chance of being anywhere at the back.

The Schumacher name may be revered in Formula 1 but the Senna name is worshipped to a huge extent. Ayrton Senna has an extra level of respect that Michael has never achieved. Having the Senna name and being related to Ayrton meant that the pressure on him was huge.

I think this pressure and Bruno's massive frustration with having a car that meant he had no chance of any real success lead to Bruno over driving a lot.

Bruno did show glimpses of his talent. In Korea in the pouring rain he got his car to the finish successfully in one piece finishing 14th. The Hispania which was a poor handling car at the best of times must have been nearly undriveable in those conditions. To have done that he showed a good level of skill.

In many ways I suspect Bruno was glad to be out of Hispania and he has joined the Renault-Lotus team for the 2011 season as a reserve driver and he did have a small audition for Robert Kubica's seat after Kubica's horror accident.

I hope that Bruno gets a full race drive to really show whether his is really up to being a full Formula 1 driver. Those who have already written off Bruno I feel are being very tough on him. I am 50:50 on whether he is worth it. His pedigree is good but he needs to show his talent.

Both Ralf and Bruno have slightly strange relationships with Formula 1. Some people claim that neither driver are Formula 1 standard and both of them only got to the top because of their surname. It is probably true both of them got into Formula 1 easier than others.

It was probably easier for them to find sponsors to help them. However, they both have some talent.

Ralf was a good driver who could never live up to expectation and Bruno, I have a horrible feeling, could end up going the same way.