Grand Prix Rejects

Debaser wrote:Shame this season Legard has been even worse, Brundle probably can't believe he's working with that fool.

My only problem with Legard is that he's in the habit of talking when he should be letting Brundle get a word in edgeways. I think he's got a great voice for a commentator - or maybe a newscaster - and even when he gets excited, he doesn't forget where he is the way James Allen did.

Osiris13 wrote:*For those not familiar with English league football, Coventry City FC hung about in the top division for millions of years only ever winning one trophy.

That's one more than Toyota!

Captain Hammer wrote:My only problem with Legard is that he's in the habit of talking when he should be letting Brundle get a word in edgeways. I think he's got a great voice for a commentator - or maybe a newscaster - and even when he gets excited, he doesn't forget where he is the way James Allen did.

I'll admit, I didn't think it could be true, but this season I am missing James Allen. I think he is better than Legard. Knows more about the sport too. Sure he gets over excited but I can live with that. He commentary of Jenson's first win in Hungary was actually excellent.

JDOD wrote:

Captain Hammer wrote:My only problem with Legard is that he's in the habit of talking when he should be letting Brundle get a word in edgeways. I think he's got a great voice for a commentator - or maybe a newscaster - and even when he gets excited, he doesn't forget where he is the way James Allen did.

I'll admit, I didn't think it could be true, but this season I am missing James Allen. I think he is better than Legard. Knows more about the sport too. Sure he gets over excited but I can live with that. He commentary of Jenson's first win in Hungary was actually excellent.

Legard seems to know a fair bit about sport in general, but in a bad way. Why did he start talking about the Ashes in the middle of the German GP?

shinji wrote:

JDOD wrote:

Captain Hammer wrote:My only problem with Legard is that he's in the habit of talking when he should be letting Brundle get a word in edgeways. I think he's got a great voice for a commentator - or maybe a newscaster - and even when he gets excited, he doesn't forget where he is the way James Allen did.

I'll admit, I didn't think it could be true, but this season I am missing James Allen. I think he is better than Legard. Knows more about the sport too. Sure he gets over excited but I can live with that. He commentary of Jenson's first win in Hungary was actually excellent.

Legard seems to know a fair bit about sport in general, but in a bad way. Why did he start talking about the Ashes in the middle of the German GP?

Because Mark Webber started it?

I don't remember him doing it. Must have only been brief and during a commercial break.

OK......

The 2002 Season......2004 was dull but had a few good races (Monaco, Belgium). 2002 had nothing of interest after Australia.

Interefering F1 Officialdom - Just regulate the wing heights and engine capacity and then LET THEM RACE!!!

Midland - Treated F1 as a money-making exercise with no real interest in the sport. Force India might not be much more successful, but at least there's some team spirit there.

Shanghai Circuit - Flat in the middle of a swamp in a country with passion for drawing attention to itself but little for F1

But the winner by miles is........

Toyota - How many billion spent? A lot. How many wins? Nought. Everytime they look like improving, they just slide right back down again. Wasted a lot of time with largely dull race-winner-but-will-never-win-title drivers like Ralf Schumacher, Olivier Panis and Jarno Trulli and never-were characters like Zonta and da Matta (remember him?). Also bland and corporate - The least interesting team in F1 history.

Toyota the dullest team in history? BMW give them a run for their money, everything from their livery to Theissen's glasses scream "Dull". On the thread as a whole, I'd say the FIA are the reject of the decade. With all these regulation changes Cars can't overtake, the rules on and off the track are rather gimmicky and artificial. I'm thinking of KERS, the safety car rules for 07 and 08, the tyre rules, the qualifying systems, along with all the off track stuff like spygate, NTSMSW5PG (hope that's right), Spa 08, all the stupid penalties by the stewards, they deserve rejects of the decade.

Having been there to see it in person, the 2005 USGP is my Reject of the Decade by miles.

Re Coventry City er I mean Toyota, I agree with an above entry. The drivers they've employed speaks volumes for their lack of ambition on a budget lower teams who've gone to the wall would have given anything for a tenth of. Why oh why oh why didn't they empty their collective piggy banks and make Schuey an offer of two years work when he retired? Maybe they have made approaches to quality drivers - can anyone enlighten us?

Interestingly, no driver has driven in F1 race after leaving (or being sacked by) Toyota.

Bleu wrote:Interestingly, no driver has driven in F1 race after leaving (or being sacked by) Toyota.

Toyota, that's where Formula One careers go to die.

Hadn't thought of/realized that, but now that you mentioned it, that's an interesting point.

FW08 wrote:

Bleu wrote:Interestingly, no driver has driven in F1 race after leaving (or being sacked by) Toyota.

Toyota, that's where Formula One careers go to die.

Hadn't thought of/realized that, but now that you mentioned it, that's an interesting point.

Glock will probably break this phenomenon.

The Schumacher Era - it made F1 almost unwatachable for half a decade. No fault of either Schumacher or Ferrari, but possibly the dullest F1 has ever been was 2000-2004. Spending race after race willing the Ferrari to break down, just so someone else could have a go.

fjackdaw wrote:The Schumacher Era - it made F1 almost unwatachable for half a decade. No fault of either Schumacher or Ferrari, but possibly the dullest F1 has ever been was 2000-2004. Spending race after race willing the Ferrari to break down, just so someone else could have a go.

Yep, agreed. So I nominate Jean Todt, because it was all his fault. And also for the too frequent team order fiasco's that made the boring races even more ridiculous. And for blowing spygate up into a major crisis. And for messing up on keeping Brawn at Ferrari, and hiring Raikonnen rather than Alonso, just ensuring that Ferrari stayed in the doldrums. And also for the upcoming bout of nasty FIA politics that will see the decade out.

I also think Jean might be odds on favorite for the next decade as well.

Super reliability is making the racing boring. Button, Webber, Heidfeld and Rosberg have finished every race this season. 1988-1994 was good as only about 13 or 14 out of 26 would normally finish. In a low attrition race, about 18 drivers would finish. We need the one-race engine rule.

Toyota, I've got nothing against the drivers (Trulli is my 3rd favourite driver), but they are the most boring team to ever grace Formula 1. They have been partially responsible for forcing teams like Jordan, Sauber and Minardi out of the sport and have done absolutely nothing. I hope the team leaves Formula 1 and just stay as engine suppliers for Williams.

Clearly it's Ralf Schumacher.

In terms of points/$Million "earned"/"written off" he represents the worst value for the WHOLE DECADE!

His overbearing arrogance and lack of ability are eclipsed only by his crashability factor which is off the scale............

I'm bumping this thread because we may have a contender who could beat Bernie and Max.

You saw this one coming, of course: it's The Piquets! (sounds like the title of a sitcom)

After opening Pandora's box on Renault out of spite and accusations of them blackmailing the team to extend Piquet's contract, Big Nelson (Nelson Snr.) has come out and said that Alonso had to know about the plan to crash all along. It seems that now Little Nelson (Nelson Jnr.) has gone and made himself unemployable - as if he ever was to begin with - The Piquets! have decided to take as many people down with them as they can.

And so ends one of racing's dynasties. Not with a bang, but with a pathetic whine, like a mouse that has just been trodden on by someone far more able.

My nominations:

1 - The Driving Aids: Killed amost decade, boring seasons like 2001, 2002, 2004 and 2006 and a lot of boring races, like 70% of 2007 races.

2 - 2002 Season: The one of most borings season of all times! Austria 2002 is a shame! Only melbourne race saved this year.

3 - Williams: 90s Hero to 00s Zero.

4 - Barcelona: All races of this decade in this circuit were boring.

5 - 2005 early qualify system: A epic fail!

6 - Yuje Ide : The poorest driver of this decade.

oh, i forget! and...

7 - Herman Tilke circuits - The Uwe Boll of circuit designers.

Whoever decided to put a halt to racing at the A1 ring. FAIL

How about Spanish Grands Prix?

Sorry but I struggle to think of an exiting race in Spain this decade. Plus if we are counting 1999 in this we have the 1999 race at Catalunya which could win the award on its own.

Honorable mentions include:
Eddie Jordan's driver lineups - At one point it was a return to the pay drivers of the early-mid 1990's
Toyota - For reasons already mentionned. All that money into a black hole.
Williams - Dropped off the pace slowly over the decade to the point where they are just also rans now.
Ferrari Dominance - Not their fault but the early part of the decade was so boring watching them win constantly. Which brings us to ....
The 2002 season - Again its been mentionned but it was such an awful season. Very few good drivers in competitive cars meant Schumacher just ran away with the title.
Penalties - Not so much a feature of the decade but of the last 2-3 years. Some decisions were stupid and others unbielievable (Bourdais getting punished at Fuji when Massa tripped over him)
Tilke - He's getting better at designing tracks now but he still has more stinkers than classics. I could live without his circuits in F1, but not without Spa, Monza, Monaco etc.
The 2005 US GP - Best forgotten
ITV - Stupidly timed adverts, ridiculous scheduling (Bumping the Qualy onto ITV 4 so Corination Street didnt go out 30 mins late, and at a time before I had digital TV!), awful presenters and commentators (Goodman and Brundle were the exceptions here) and that god awful song and dance crap before their last race in Brazil last year.

I have 2 nominations.

2005 USGP (was there, but still had a good time)

Constant technical reg changes. We had many different engine reliability rules, and NUMEROUS wing changes both front and rear. Keeping costs low would have happened if the regs wouldn't have been changed yearly.

I suspect, after today's events, the book is closed on this one!

I'm going to throw something slightly odd into the ring here, and say, that for me, Toyotas Colour Scheme is a massive reject.

Now, Exhibit A - the TF101 Test car


Which, IMO, has a beautiful colour scheme.

Exhibit B - The TF102 (and 103, 104, etc)


Which just looks slower, and less attractive. I personally Toyota made a massive cock up, as if they were going to pick a a colour scheme, and stick with it for the foreseeable future, they should have used their test livery.

Valrys wrote:I personally Toyota made a massive cock up, as if they were going to pick a a colour scheme, and stick with it for the foreseeable future, they should have used their test livery.

I agree.

Juan Pablo Montoya.

2005 US GP has to be the Reject of the Decade. Followed by Jordan and the teams that followed them up such as Midlands and Spyker (I won't say Force India yet). I have to admit Toyota would be up there because of the money they invested even though I support them. Constant rule changes and the 2005 Qualification system used in the start of the season.

If he doesn't win the drivers championship this season, I'd be tempted to say Rubens Barrichello, for playing second fiddle to a team mate for the past 10 years.

I'm going to nominate The Posters on the Yahoo Sport/Eurosport Boards, who are some of the most unpleasant people on the internet, 75% of whom seem to have some kind of genuine mental unstability.

NP Jr.?

I actually think the Toyotas are pretty cars, but the test car's livery does look faster.

3) Toyota - For wasting time and money on a car that was never going to win a race.
2) Austrian GP 2002 - Absolute farce. Seriously. It's not like it made a difference to the championship either, since the Schumacher was so dominant anyway!


1) US GP 2005 - I need not say more.

Undoubtedly, the 2005 US GP. It should have been rescheduled, but no, there had to be the stubborness of Ferrari...

I agree with the general opinion about the 2005 US GP.

Phoenix wrote:Undoubtedly, the 2005 US GP. It should have been rescheduled, but no, there had to be the stubborness of Ferrari...

If I was Ferrari I would have done the same tbh. Its one of those things that you disagree with, but if you were in their position you would do it yourself

As for rejects, I wouldnt nominate just Toyota as opposed to ALL manufacture teams (except maybe Renault). BMW won just 1 race. Honda won just 1 race.
However I would also agree with the ultra reliability nowadays, along with race venues that are poorly attended and have samey track layout (i.e Tilke-dromes)

Collieafc wrote:

Phoenix wrote:Undoubtedly, the 2005 US GP. It should have been rescheduled, but no, there had to be the stubborness of Ferrari...

If I was Ferrari I would have done the same tbh. Its one of those things that you disagree with, but if you were in their position you would do it yourself

I don't think I'd had had stomach enough to do that.

Phoenix wrote:

Collieafc wrote:

Phoenix wrote:Undoubtedly, the 2005 US GP. It should have been rescheduled, but no, there had to be the stubborness of Ferrari...

If I was Ferrari I would have done the same tbh. Its one of those things that you disagree with, but if you were in their position you would do it yourself

I don't think I'd had had stomach enough to do that.

Me too. There's little point in winning at any cost - that's not what real racers do. Might as well just go into a room, toss a coin and decide on the winner that way.

fjackdaw wrote:Me too. There's little point in winning at any cost - that's not what real racers do.

I would disagree, but I know that I appear to be in a minorty there (I think the points system in races should be changed as right now imo it dulls the need to try to win, whereas I get the feeling that a lot of people seem to disagree and that consistentcy should be rewarded. But either way, the medal system was retarded) Its all a matter of opinion really. But we digress...

fjackdaw wrote:

Me too. There's little point in winning at any cost - that's not what real racers do. Might as well just go into a room, toss a coin and decide on the winner that way.

It's not about winning at any cost, but to win in normal conditions (full grid).

I'm going to vote for Manufacturer Teams.

For a start they all seem to be rejecting themselves anyway.

But the manufacturers started an economic arms race in F1 that squeezed the smaller teams to no benefit for the sport.

Ferrari started the decade by giving us the the most boring seasons in living memory. And were responsible for GP fiascos in the USA (twice), Austria and Monaco.

Honda, Toyota and Ford (Jaguar) all effectively demonstrated that large companies can't run F1 teams. BMW and Renault started well but have both disgraced themselves.

And most of them have pulled out at the end of the decade.

My two rejects of the decade:

Honda Had the potential to be really great, horrible chassis and engines down on power didn't help.

F1 Seasons 2000 to 2005 Ferrari and Schumi winning a majority of the races. Nuff said.

2002 Austrian GP Do I have to really explain this one.

I wont put Toyota for ROTD as they are (were at this point since they don't exist as a F1 team anymore) my favorite team even though they didn't win a race.