Belegur wrote:Gilles Villeneuve was overrated. Before you criticise me for that, just think about how many mistakes he made.
Bruno Giacomelli:
“You have to make the distinction between early in his career and later. Those who talk about Gilles as crazy, I think they got it wrong. You must remember that he had no real experience when he first came into F1. I mean, he didn’t even have international experience, just Formula Atlantic in Canada & North America. He had to learn so much more than the rest of us brought up on racing in Europe. If you think, he came to F1 without any international experience, he had to learn the tracks as well as all about F1 – and with all the pressure of being a Ferrari driver.
Of course he made mistakes! There were only two possible outcomes in that situation, no matter how talented you were. You would either not have been quick enough or you would have accidents. And if you’re not quick enough, you’re not going to get to stay in F1. So there was only one option. I think he did incredibly well. Jesus, he almost won one of his first races! (Long Beach 1978)”
Source: Motor Sport Magazine, April 2002, page 27.
I’ll try & keep this short & sweet, since I’ve written a few posts in the past in response to similar concerns about Gilles. But I’ll quote an previous post of mine;
ibsey wrote:And here’s a few quotes from the people who really matter (i.e. those in F1) on how they saw, for example GV;
"Gilles was the last great driver. The rest of us are just a bunch of good professionals."
- Alain Prost, 1982
"I have just been defeated by this Villeneuve. He is really extraordinary, you should employ him"
James Hunt, to the Marlboro racing manager
"He is a bit strange but he surely is a phenomenon."
- Nelson Piquet
"I think Ferrari has a great driver".
- Enzo Ferrari after battle with Arnoux
"He was the craziest devil I ever came across in Formula 1... The fact that, for all this, he was a sensitive and lovable character rather than an out-and-out hell-raiser made him such a unique human being".
- Niki Lauda
"This is typical of Gilles. We are to recognize that he never surrenders."
- Alan Jones after the Canadian GP
"I will miss Gilles for two reasons. First, he was the fastest driver in the history of motor racing. Second, he was the most genuine man I have ever known. But he has not gone. The memory of what he has done, what he achieved, will always be there."
- Jody Scheckter's eulogy
"He will remain as a member of the family of the truly great drivers in auto racing history. He did not race to finish. He did not race for points. He raced to win. He was small in stature, but he was a giant."
- Juan Manuel Fangio
"I know no human being can do miracles but Gilles could really surprise us sometimes."
- Jacques Laffite
Like I say they are all from people in F1, therefore those whose opinion really matters. The thing is during Gilles time in F1 he & along with most F1 insiders knew he was the quickest & most talented driver around. As stated in my earlier post that was all that really mattered to him.
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3559&hilit=gilles&start=1240So did all these people (most of whom don’t usually give out compliments easily) all overrate Gilles as well?
mario wrote:A quick look at StatsF1 shows that Gilles was listed as retiring due to driver error 9 times in his career, or about 13.2% of the time - fairly high, but on the other hand Jody Scheckter, his team mate at Ferrari, retired from 14 of his 114 races due to driver error, so his error rate of 12.3% is only marginally better (and, as a young man, Scheckter was considered the more dangerous driver of the two - the GPDA wanted him banned from F1 at one point and he was nicknamed "Sideways Scheckter" because of his wild and ragged driving style early in his career).
Alan Jones , Clay Regazzoni and Nelson Piquet were other fairly competitive drivers at or near the front of the field at about the same time with fairly high accident rates too - Jones on 12.0% (14 from 117 races), 13.6% for Regazzoni (19 from 140 races) and 13.9% for Piquet Sr. (29 from 208). So, even despite his reasonably high accident rate, with a competitive enough car he could also have stood a fairly decent chance of taking the title too given that quite a few other drivers either took the title or came quite close despite having similarly high, or even marginally higher, accident rates across their careers too.
In regards to the above interesting stats kindly provided by Mario, it is worth remembering that out of all those drivers mentioned Gilles is the only one amongst them to have his career cut short early. When he was relatively young. IIRC Gilles was 32 years old when he was killed. Clay was what 40 years old when he had his career ending crash? And the others drove until they were around 40 years old (ish).
Therefore since one would expect a driver in his earlier years to make more mistakes, than in comparison to his latter years. Not least because of the lack of experience. Schetcker & Alesi being prime examples of this (i.e. on the face of it they seemed much less mistake prone in their latter years). Therefore I would suggest that above comparison is not quite a fair one.
Since the statistic of Gilles’ retirement rate due to driver error of 13.2% is likely to be abnormally higher than it would have been, had Gilles driven in F1 until he was around 40 years old (like all those other drivers in the above comparison). In other words, Gilles is the only one amongst them never to have got to his ‘latter’ (more experienced thus less mistake prone) years. Also worth remembering that Gilles had less than 5 years F1 experience when he was killed. Whereas all those other drivers in the comparison had much greater of experience F1 than Gilles.
As we have considered Gilles’ mistakes, now let’s consider this; Watkins Glen 1979; wet qualifying as Wikipedia states; ‘Villeneuve was fastest by over nine seconds! Scheckter, second fastest, thought he was mad, but was also quite in awe of the Canadian's performance in the conditions (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1979_Unite ... Grand_Prix). Not aware of another qualifying session where one driver is 9 seconds quicker than anyone else on a 3.37 mile circuit?
Monaco 1980; a late race downpour. Villenuve was faster than anyone else by 5 seconds – in the hopeless 312T5. He also got the T5 up to 3rd place at Zandvoort 1980 (in a field of FW07s, BT49s, Ligiers & Renualts) and led with it at Brazil 1980 setting the second fastest lap. Remember the reigning WDC Jody Schecker failed to qualify the T5 at Canada 1980, that’s how bad that car was.
In 1981 Gilles outqualified Pironi by an average of 0.62 seconds. Five times that year he put more than a second between himself and Pironi in the acid test of quali. At Monaco it was 2.48 seconds!. Gilles also finished a lap ahead of his teammate, on his way to victory at Monte Carlo in 1981. Recently got the 1983, 84 & 85 F1 mods for rFactor (not sure if any 1980 / 1981 / 1982 F1 mods exist?).
But anyway driving those 1980’s F1 turbo beasts, only then does it becomes apparent just how massive an achievement Gilles 1981 Monte Carlo victory was. As the turbo lag means throttle response is massively reduced. IIRC according to GV’s biography the 126CK turbo lag was in the region of 1 second. Which is not what you want on a track like Monte Carlo where instance throttle response is absolutely vital. I cannot even begin to describe the level of concentration that must of been required in Monaco 1981.
Also worth remembering that in 1981 Pironi never once made it onto the front row or achieved a podium. Villeneuve’s respective tallies were twice & thrice among them perhaps F1’s most improbably back to back victories. In my experience, driving a good car to victory is not nearly as difficult as dragging out a performance from a poor car (hence why I have focused on 1980 & 1981 above).
So perhaps its best I stop!
