Comments on 'Nelson Piquet Revisited' on F1 Insight

Comment by Becken

29/05/2008 19:07:07

Clive, After the GPs, Nelson doesn’t talk to the Brazilians press; In a TV show here in Brazil, before his first GP, he said that he could beat Lewis with the same equipment; His father, one of my heroes in F1, is the major Rubens critique and say that JR wouldn’t be the second driver to none… There’s a kind of arrogance on it.. Here in Brazil there´s a strange feeling around Nelson JR. He is not seen as a completely “Brazilian” driver (he was born in German), he seems to be away of the same mood in what we see Felipe or Rubens. This patriotic feeling here is something important to the he fans to support a driver. So, the fans are really hard on him too! I always read some opinions about Lewis be spoiled, but any driver in the grid has the support that Nelson SR gave to his child since the Kart days until GP2. Even Nico has the same support, but look what a driver he is. JR never needed to compete and challenge his team mate or challenge himself in a team without his father´s backing. Now, in Renault, is the first time. What I saw about Lewis is that he needed to delivery results to be backed by McLaren. I think this is one of the differences between both of them: the professional commitment! Obviously I hope that he improves himself, but looking back this 6 races it will be very tough…

Comment by verasaki

29/05/2008 19:11:51

i have to admit to doubts about piquet-lite (i'm not as pc as some people) but reading this made me rethink it. last year i really wasn't impressed by kovalainen, though anyone who has to live under flav's influence gets my sympathy. i was really quite surprised to find myself warming up to him this year. i have to wonder if piquet, jr might have something, too. or does flavio bashing you just mean you've got something but aren't playing his game the way he wants it and flavio not bashing mean you're playing his game and are really just average? either way, i'm really ready for alonso to be topping the charts again. but, yeah, too bad for anyone who's his teammate.

Comment by Steven Roy

29/05/2008 21:55:36

Clive, How can you say ALonso is the best all rounder when Lewis blew him out of the door with no experience whatever. For me it is absolutely clear that Lewis is the best on the grid. The number 2 seat at Renault is starting to look like the number 2 seat at Lotus in times gone by. Becken makes a good point about how Nelsinho and Lewis progressed through their careers. Piquet's father entered teams in every formula for him and the team was run for his benefit. There was no real threat of ever losing the backing. On the other hand Lewis had to hit his targets every year or he would have lost his backing and maybe his career. Yet there are still people saying he had the McLaren silver spoon treatment. Of course Red Bull, Renault and others have been dishing out silver spoons for years with no real benefit. So what does it say about Ron Dennis that he only needed one young driver in his program. I think Piquet senior should have had more sense than place his son at Renault.

Comment by Clive

29/05/2008 22:20:02

Becken: Thank you for the insight into how Nelson Jr is viewed in Brazil. Now that you mention it, I can understand how he is seen differently from the other Brazilian drivers. For the sake of his father, I still hope that Nelsinho can somehow succeed but he really does have everything stacked against him this time!

Comment by Clive

29/05/2008 22:23:51

Verasaki: LOL at "Piquet-lite! :D It's a good point you make about Briatore too - who could possibly be adequate in the second Renault seat as long as the Flav and Alonso are together? Makes me feel sorry for Piquet-lite!

Comment by Clive

29/05/2008 22:31:21

Steven: How can I say that Alonso is still the best? Well, I guess it has to be thanks to the lingering doubt remaining over Lewis - there is that small matter of Alonso's settings, after all. I think there has to be some truth in the story that Hamilton had the benefit of Alonso's data (standard McLaren policy) and this season is the test of just how much that helped him. So jury close to decision but still out, I think. It's an interesting point that Ron Dennis assisted only one driver through the lower formulae while Renault and Red Bull have helped many. Is it possible that Ron has a much better eye for really talented young drivers than the others have? Something to muse upon, at least...

Comment by Pink Peril

30/05/2008 00:43:19

I could be wrong here, but I do think that Nelsinho does lack a bit of confidence, after a comment he made to us fans at the Oz GP after qualifying. I can't remember exactly what he said now, and it kind of endeared me to him that he would share a vulnerable part of his personality with his fans. That, and the fact that when I thanked him for his autograph he replied "No worries Mate" which is about as Australian as you can get, and I was really chuffed that he made the effort to learn the local vernacular ! I didn't really see too much of Nelsinho prior to F1 - I saw him in a couple of A1GP races and that was about it, so was never witness to the braggart you speak of. But I have some idea of the character of his father, and given how Snr has assisted Jnrs career all along, maybe Nelsinho is now realising that he does have feet of clay afterall, and that his name does not win races on it's own. Hopefully he can deal with the adversity.

Comment by Steven Roy

30/05/2008 01:13:14

Clive, I will convert you to seeing Lewis as the best driver on the grid. I will. I doubt Lewis and Fernando could drive a car with the same settings. They are polar opposites in set up. Fernando likes the back end to be solid and the front to slide around where Lewis likes a solid front and the rear can go pretty much anywhere it likes. I think if Lewis got into a car with Alonso's setting he would be slow or crash out. Similarly Fernando would struggle in a Hamilton car for the same reasons. You are clearly softening your position but there are some people I read who give the impression that Fernando drove Lewis's car for him and any team mate would have similarly benefitted. This despite the fact that since he established himself no-one has been able to live with Alonso. Why hasn't Trulli or Fisi or Piquet scored the same number of points as him if he makes life so easy for his team mates?

Comment by Clive

30/05/2008 13:04:56

Pink Peril: Personal contact always alters one's perspective on someone, doesn't it? I am sure you are quite right in saying that Nelsinho appears to be a nice person - my comments on his apparent over-confidence are entirely based upon his public statements before the season began. In the end, we have to judge each driver by their performance on track, however, and Nelsinho is not doing too well on that score. I recall the old saying that nice guys finish last, as well as reflecting on the fact that nicest driver of them all, Takuma Sato, no longer has his seat...

Comment by Clive

30/05/2008 13:15:23

Steven: Lewis will convert me. ;) I said that I was coming round to the opinion that he is the best but there is a little way to go yet. It was only a race or so ago that everyone was writing Lewis off, remember, and I continue to watch as the season progresses. The matter of settings is obviously over-exaggerated by the Hamilton hate brigade - Lewis would not have used Alonso's settings exactly for the reasons you state. But having the data would help him (in conjunction with his engineer) to avoid wrong directions for his own driving style and result in a faster arrival at a decent compromise. If that were not so, I fail to see why Alonso should have made such a fuss about sharing data. But whatever help the data-sharing issue is to a second driver, it can only be a minor factor on his performance on track - Lewis still had to get the job done on race day. So yes, I think he is very close to Alonso in ability, may even be ahead (and that with years of experience ahead of him to hone his talent even further), but it is still too early to declare him the best.

Comment by Number 38

30/05/2008 15:03:48

Piquet Jr. should never have been awarded the Renault seat. I've said it a 1000 times and I've never been proven wrong .... we've got too many rookies who have been given a chance they haven't EARNED. They come with a name or they've won a minor series or they've brought some money, or maybe they are the 'team nationality' and management "rolls the dice". F1 doesn't need MORE regs but ........... two years testing or 25000kms in the logbook would save us from a lot of this disappoinment. Everyone has to be a rookie once but the threshold to the F1 grid ought to be higher. We need a full field of racers not a field of trainees.

Comment by Clive

30/05/2008 15:45:06

To be fair, Number 38, you must admit that many of last year's rookies are now proving their worth. Kubica and Kovalainen are looking especially good and Hamilton is leading the championship. While I agree that some do not really earn their entry into the sport, F1 will soon weed them out.

Comment by Alianora La Canta

30/05/2008 19:47:25

Also, lengthy testing seems to dull rather than sharpen a racer's ability in F1. Piquet Jr is an example of this (I think he was a better racer before he tested for Renault in 2007), Kovalainen didn't seem to be helped any by it and Glock tested for Toyota quite a bit before racing for them. None of them appeared to find the first year any easier for doing so. What we really need is for team owners to be sensible when dealing with rookies, give them decent cars and hire for sporting rather than political or financial reasons. Hint, hint, Flavio...

Comment by Clive

30/05/2008 20:23:28

Hear, hear, Alianora. And you thought process has been along much the same track as mine, it seems - as witnessed by my next article!

Comment by chunter

31/05/2008 01:24:33

Only a few more wet races and soon I think that we'll know that Lewis Hamilton is the greatest driver in the world. Kubica proved himself by substituting for an underperforming driver, although my memory is failing to recall that driver's name. He started to race regularly just as I was starting to really and truly watch things in F1. Kovalainen surprises me too, though there seems to have been very little adjustment made to the new car, either a testament to his skill or McLaren's engineering. Probably a little of both. I have the impression that Piquet, Jr. is being chosen because his parent was in the sport, and I feel the same way as I do for all the racing families in the US. They're largely unproven and may hinder new talent from rising. Didn't stop BMW from finding Kubica, though.

Comment by Alianora La Canta

31/05/2008 12:28:23

Villenueve, chunter, it was Jacques Villenueve. ;)

Comment by Nik Cubrilovic

31/05/2008 14:37:55

I have left this same comment on other blogs when the issue of Piquet Jnr comes up, and I will say it here again. It is very difficult to justify his performance by saying that Kovalainen also had a bad start last year. Just compare the numbers: Heiikki: 10, 8, 9, 7, 13, 4 Piquet: DNF, 11, DNF, DNF, 15, DNF In those first 6 races, Heikki out-qualified Fisi 3 times, and beat him twice. Heikki had 3 points finishes by this point in the season and had 8 points. Heikki went on to score 30 of Renaults 51 points to help them along to finishing 3rd (in a bad season). To place well in a constructors championship requires both drivers to capitalize on race weekends and bag as many points as possible. At this pace, Renault have half a team and there is nothing in Piquets performance that suggests an immediate improvement. I hate to say it but I picked Nelson being a poor driver after Malaysia. He simply isn't comfortable or confident in the car and can't stand the pressure of a race weekend. With added pressure on him now, he is more likely to buckle further rather than improve. He has never ever had pressure applied to him in his entire racing career (the off-track type of pressure). Sponsorships will keep him in his seat though, which is a shame (making him essentially a pay-driver), as there are easily a half dozen good drivers who could do a much better job and bring the second Renault up into the midfield challenging for points. I have no problems with saying that Piquet is the worst driver on the grid at the moment, and not by just a little bit either.

Comment by Clive

31/05/2008 16:32:13

I was hardly using Heikki's F1 start as an excuse for Piquet's performance, Nik. In fact, I agree with you that he is unlikely to improve to the point where he becomes worth Renault hanging on to. The point I was making was the difference in treatment meted out to the two rookies over their first few races - Heikki was criticized in public but Piquet has been excused the bad races. The only reason I can think of for this is the fact that the money Piquet brings in more or less pays Alonso's salary. I'm just a little less hard on the guy, however. Let him have his three-race deadline and then we'll see...

Comment by chunter

01/06/2008 03:43:45

Alianora: Ironically, another "family" racer... I suppose they don't hold back talent after all... Then again, by then Jacques was calling it a career, he was not a young prospect anymore.

Comment by Nik Cubrilovic

02/06/2008 23:09:15

Sorry Clive, I was referring to other posts, new stories and quotes that all referenced Heikki in 2007, not so much your own post. I know Briatore made the same comparison to the press at Monaco, and it just isn't right. It would be interesting to do a post about family lines in F1 racing and if they have been succesful or not. It just seems that at any time around 30% of the drivers on the grid are there not based on merit, but based on sponsorhip or family connections etc. I do recall that there wasn't a lot of confidence in Damon Hill when he first came out, nor for Jacques. There is no doubt that the skills required for racing (co-ordination etc.) can be inherited, but slotting Nelson Jnr into an F1 seat seems like a square peg fitting a round hole.

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