Grand Prix Rejects

F1000X wrote:

thehemogoblin wrote:Johnson has Schumachered his way to all five of those titles. He definitely has some talent, but he's also in far and away the best equipment and has the best crew chief and team around him.

If by best crew chief you mean guy who has been caught cheating enough times he should have been banned from the sport a long time ago. bathplug Chad Knaus, he's a scumbag, he and Jimmie Johnson. Truth be told, there aren't many drivers in Nascar I'm not disgusted by, Tony Stewart, Johnson, Kurt and Kyle Busch, all classless Nelson Piquet style trash.

Mark Martin. There's a good dude. Why hasn't he won a cup championship?

I think that you'll find that drivers like Johnson take advantage of the fact that the nicer drivers ultimately are less likely to want to push them around, either on or off the track, and are generally more eager to push the boundaries of what is and is not acceptable to gain whatever advantage they can get for themselves.

rdbextreme wrote:I'm sorry to have mentioned Jimmie Johnson!! LOL I can see the passion fuming from many posters here. I just thought he needed an honorable mention. As for Justin Wilson, Minardi was far below sub-par when he was there for his short stint... so I really don't even count that as F1 experience.

He drove for Jaguar as well.

Regarding NASCAR - Mark Martin is probably the most deserving cup-champion on the track, but he will never win, sadly.

Myrvold wrote:Regarding NASCAR - Mark Martin is probably the most deserving cup-champion on the track, but he will never win, sadly.

The Stirling Moss of NASCAR?

Travis Pastrana. He never did well in RoC but given a few tests who knows?

And while I'm at it why not Ken Block? He can crash into things with style. We need that in F1!

DanielPT wrote:Travis Pastrana. He never did well in RoC but given a few tests who knows?

And while I'm at it why not Ken Block? He can crash into things with style. We need that in F1!

Is there anything that Travis Pastrana hasn't driven?

watka wrote:

DanielPT wrote:Travis Pastrana. He never did well in RoC but given a few tests who knows?

And while I'm at it why not Ken Block? He can crash into things with style. We need that in F1!

Is there anything that Travis Pastrana hasn't driven?

Yes, a Formula 1. And an open-wheeler for that matter. He will drive Nascar next year, but I would prefer him to race Indycar.

Since the introduction of F1 championship and leaving all the tin-top speciallists aside it has to be Jean-Pierre Wimille who could have been the one denying Fangio at least one of his titles...

watka wrote:

DanielPT wrote:Travis Pastrana. He never did well in RoC but given a few tests who knows?

And while I'm at it why not Ken Block? He can crash into things with style. We need that in F1!

Is there anything that Travis Pastrana hasn't crashed?

Fixed.

DanielPT wrote:

watka wrote:

DanielPT wrote:Travis Pastrana. He never did well in RoC but given a few tests who knows?

And while I'm at it why not Ken Block? He can crash into things with style. We need that in F1!

Is there anything that Travis Pastrana hasn't driven?

Yes, a Formula 1. And an open-wheeler for that matter. He will drive Nascar next year, but I would prefer him to race Indycar.

Dayle Coyne with Milka and Travis.....hmmmmmmmmmmm

Me?


Does Sebastian Loeb count?

JeremyMcClean wrote:The most idiotic name on the face of the earth:

Will Power

I totally disagree... and he CLEARLY deserves an F1 slot. Have you ever seen this guy dominate a race? Plus, it's not just due to his good equipment , back in Champ Car he was amazing in the Aussie Vineyards car.

Just for the lulz...

Jari-Matti Latvala.

Maybe Terry Fullerton, the guy who was once referred to by Ayrton Senna as "the toughest opponent he ever had".

tommykl wrote:Just for the lulz...

Jari-Matti Latvala.

Continuing that thought...

Henri Toivonen.

The Delta S4 was an absolute monster of a car to drive yet somehow he was able to deal with it better than anyone else; I'm sure he could have adapted to a Formula One car quite well as a result and he had the natural talent to do well with it...

As an aside, what are the fitness requirements to drive WRC like by comparison to the fitness needed to drive in Formula 1?

F1000X wrote:

watka wrote:

DanielPT wrote:Travis Pastrana. He never did well in RoC but given a few tests who knows?

And while I'm at it why not Ken Block? He can crash into things with style. We need that in F1!

Is there anything that Travis Pastrana hasn't crashed?

Fixed.

Are we talking about the things Pastrana crashed on his own or things he crashed because he was told to crash them. *coughXGamescough*

kostas22 wrote:

tommykl wrote:Just for the lulz...

Jari-Matti Latvala.

Continuing that thought...

Henri Toivonen.

The Delta S4 was an absolute monster of a car to drive yet somehow he was able to deal with it better than anyone else; I'm sure he could have adapted to a Formula One car quite well as a result and he had the natural talent to do well with it...

From a post 1st January "Henri Toivonen tested a March in 1982. He was 1.4 seconds faster than Raul Boesel."

Cynon wrote: Are we talking about the things Pastrana crashed on his own or things he crashed because he was told to crash them. *coughXGamescough*

Pastrana threw the X Games?

CONSPIRACY THEORISTS; YOU KNOW WHAT TO DO!

F1000X wrote:

Cynon wrote: Are we talking about the things Pastrana crashed on his own or things he crashed because he was told to crash them. *coughXGamescough*

Pastrana threw the X Games?

Ford sponsored the event.
They marketed the Fiesta.
Pastrana drove the car off the track basically on his own so the Fiestas could win.

Based on how good they were in UK karting I'd go for Dan Wheldon. However, he got too settled in the US to bother with F1. A shame - he was better than JB and as good as Lewis in British Championship 100cc karting.

I still believe Ken Block crashes more. In the last two years he did 22 races. Retired in twelve. Anyway, we have this quote from Pastrana: “I don’t remember most of the injuries, there have been too many.”

F1000X wrote:As an aside, what are the fitness requirements to drive WRC like by comparison to the fitness needed to drive in Formula 1?

From the Group B era, pretty much none apart from working the neck muscles harder. OK, so the G-Forces were higher but those cars were so unbelieveably hard to drive the drivers had to be pretty fit...

Now though it's not so hard on the drivers physically, but the lack of aircon in the cars means at rallies like Cyprus or Greece the drivers get dehydrated really easily and start to struggle. They would need more work down at the gym to reach F1 standards.

And Toivonen being 1.4s faster than Raul Boesel does not surprise me at all!!

kostas22 wrote:

tommykl wrote:Just for the lulz...

Jari-Matti Latvala.

Continuing that thought...

Henri Toivonen.

The Delta S4 was an absolute monster of a car to drive yet somehow he was able to deal with it better than anyone else; I'm sure he could have adapted to a Formula One car quite well as a result and he had the natural talent to do well with it...

May I suggest Walter Röhrl then? The Audi Quattro S1 was even harder to drive, after all.

And now he's... IIRC, Porsche's official test driver?

Phoenix wrote:

kostas22 wrote:

tommykl wrote:Just for the lulz...

Jari-Matti Latvala.

Continuing that thought...

Henri Toivonen.

The Delta S4 was an absolute monster of a car to drive yet somehow he was able to deal with it better than anyone else; I'm sure he could have adapted to a Formula One car quite well as a result and he had the natural talent to do well with it...

May I suggest Walter Röhrl then? The Audi Quattro S1 was even harder to drive, after all.

He also drove one of the last successful rear wheel rally cars, the Lancia 037, for 1983, before switching to Audi in 1984 - so in terms of driving prowess, he was certainly up there with his contemporary drivers. He's also done some circuit racing, in the 24h Nurburgring races in the early 1990's, and was supposed to have driven in the 2010 event for Porsche's 911 GT3 RS entry (but was forced to withdraw due to a back injury).