McLaren Engineers perspective.

[zenvision]

I found this article from the Autosport magazine.

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This year promises to offer us further perspective on how the pre-eminent talents of Raikkonen and Alonso stack up to each other - and as of Melbourne, even taking into account the performance advantage of Raikkonen's car, Kimi's driving looked on a higher level than Alonso's.

Interestingly, there are engineers at McLaren, with the data in front of them, adamant that they still haven't seen from Alonso the sort of devastating high-speed precision that they used to routinely get from Raikkonen.

You get the feeling that they're still waiting for that 'wow' moment, when they realise their man really is something special, whereas the Ferrari guys probably got to see it for the first time with Raikkonen last weekend.
---

Also some engineers who worked with both Senna and Raikkonen reckon that Raikkonen may even be faster than the great Ayrton.

[RH1300S]

Interesting - quite possibly they will never see it from Alonso (maybe from Hamilton one day?).

Either way - I just don't believe you can read much into this. Alonso is plenty fast enough and over course of a race & season his ability to come out fighting for every inch will stand him in good stead.

Other side of that coin - does this confirm what has been said for a long time now - Kimi is stunningly fast

[manchild]

Also some engineers who worked with both Senna and Raikkonen reckon that Raikkonen may even be faster than the great Ayrton.

If I'm not mistaken Senna's Mclaren from 1993 was the only Mclaren with sequential paddle shifters on steering wheel he ever drove.

To compare Senna and Kimi you'd have to put them in same car. Senna changed gears manually most of his career, pressed the clutch too. Unlike him Kimi never drove such F1 car so it is no surprise that he seams to be quicker dozing in the seat while tip of his fingers do the shifting.

[sennafan]

Really, look at Senna's long record of polls, with manual gearchange

[Schumi Il Maestro]

Surely you mean 'poles'


I agree with the remark about Hamilton-Hope he lives up to the (rather high!!) expectations of the Macca boys....

P.S:You cannot even imagine how wide a grin lit my face up as i read the part about Alonso!!!
Looks like Lewis is going to put him in his rightful place-finally...!!

[DaveKillens]

There are a few gifted drivers who can crank the car into the corner and achieve the near-perfect combination of slip angle, turn rate, and all the other data to make the tires truly work at 100% of their efficiency. This can only be seen in the telemetry and in graphs. But to an engineer, it brings a smile to their faces when they read graphs like that.
I first learned about this when a magazine compared Mario Andretti and Ronnie Peterson's telemetry. Mario was smooth and consistent, while Ronnie threw the car around the track, but somehow got the tires to work at wild slip angles. External observes can comment on how talented a driver is (and most agree Ronnie had all the ingredients to eventually become WDC), but it can also be verified by telemetry and other data the engineers view.

[zenvision]

I think what engineers were talking about is that sometimes during simulation they set a target and these drivers are able to better it or drive in a way they didn't think it was possible due to car factors like lack of grip.

[mep]

That hits exactly my opinion on Alonso.
I think his driving abilitys are overestimated because he won two
times the championship.

Kimi is a much greater fighter in the race.
He is always good for really great overtaking moves or for
defending his position.
And we have seen many of this moves.

Alonso is more taktikal oriented.
He tries to overtake in the pits.
If this dont work than he says no problem I start driving relaxed
and follow him like you follow a truck on a road.
I get second and get a few points and maybe I have luck
(unfortunatelly he gets the luck) and the faster driver in front of me has
a little problem with his car and I get a win witouth deseving it.


But times have changed, now he sits in the car who is weak and breaks
often.

McLaren has a unreliable car since maybe 1997.
Why should this change now, only because Alonso is driving there.

I was a great fan of McLaren since 1997 and I started to like
Kimi when I saw his great driving stile.

My dream was to see Kimi winning the Championship in a McLaren.
And he had the chance two times.

But the team messed it up, always.
It was never Kimis fault. Most of the time he had to suffer from the
mistakes of the team, had to start from P11 or got a little technical
defect after leading the hole field.
And then comes Alonso and is cheering for a win he does not deserfe.

So now I have changed with Kimi the team I liked sooo much.
And now they notice that they have had a really great talent,
the best driver in the field and didn't manage to win once.

[mahesh248]

Well KIMI is now in a ferrari so dont worry their is a good chance for him to win WDC this time ..There has bein lots of comparisons with telemetry with different drivers ...it really matters when u compare the statistics and thats where alonso is better now ...I agree KIMI is way quicker .. I remember the quali in Mosza 05 ..Took pole in a full fuel load car ..was amazed ...had to drop 10 pos sadly ...

[Tp]

Over a lap, Kimi is no doubt the quicker driver, but I still think Alonso is the more complete driver.

For me I can imagine Kimi turning up to a race, qualy, practice, test whatever, be given the car then set a mind-blowing lap, then going home.

Whereas with Alonso, he's more the team player. He'll build a team around him, how he wants it. So he can get the maximum out of the car (Very much like MS, but to a slightly lesser extent). He's also more consistent than Kimi, I can remember reading an article saying how astonished the Renault Engineers were that Alonso could maintain lap times one after the other to a degree of 1/100 of a second, but if told to turn the speed up, he would respond with a fastest lap.

Alonso is more taktikal oriented.
He tries to overtake in the pits.
If this dont work than he says no problem I start driving relaxed
and follow him like you follow a truck on a road.
I get second and get a few points and maybe I have luck
(unfortunatelly he gets the luck) and the faster driver in front of me has
a little problem with his car and I get a win witouth deseving it.

I recommend you watch Hungary '06.

[boban-mk]

Whereas with Alonso, he's more the team player. He'll build a team around him, how he wants it. So he can get the maximum out of the car (Very much like MS, but to a slightly lesser extent). He's also more consistent than Kimi, I can remember reading an article saying how astonished the Renault Engineers were that Alonso could maintain lap times one after the other to a degree of 1/100 of a second, but if told to turn the speed up, he would respond with a fastest lap.

I recommend you watch Hungary '06.

Dont forget this one:
And Hope that the one in front is not reliable and we win. You can hear this prayings every race in last two seasons from him, even the first race in this season. He would probably be a champion if ferrari engine didn't blow up in Japan, or if wings and engines of mercedes didn't cracked in 2005. True champions were Renault and they were very lucky that others were not reliable enough, because he didn't become a champion with the good or best drivings.

I recommend to watch Hungary again. Maybe you can see who was the best driver with the equipment he had.

[waynes]

I recommend to watch Hungary again. Maybe you can see who was the best driver with the equipment he had.

the great man himself

[whiplash]

Waynes quote
I recommend to watch Hungary again. Maybe you can see who was the best driver with the equipment he had.

Try Senna Donington

[bizadfar]

Waynes quote
I recommend to watch Hungary again. Maybe you can see who was the best driver with the equipment he had.

Try Senna Donington

A car that had TC compared to the others.

[teecof1fan]

i think its interesting to hear the mclaren mechanics say that, and it reminds me of recently hearing norbert haug speak very highly of kimi, before and after the 07 australian gp, almost like he missed him a little bit compared to alonso. i totally agree that kimi is probably the faster driver, while fernando is the more complete. it is quite a shame that kimi didnt receive the drivers crown he deserved in 2005 (and that michael didnt receive the title he deserved after that awesome 2nd half comeback last year) and talking about the telemetry, i remember seeing something comparing michael to his teammate at the time, johnny herbert. the difference was astonishing. MS had the car at the limit all the time, and even in the interview when asked what separates him from other drivers MS responded by saying as much; that he simply was able to keep the car on the edge all the time. i also agree that its hard to compare kimi and ayrton senna unless they are in the same machine, but obviously its fair to say that each is the class of their respective fields, because the guys theyre racing against [i]do[/i] have similar cars.