Vettel vs Ricciardo 2014

[rayden]

Why is anyone discussing Webber? Ricciardo is currently demonstrating that the poor guy was over the hill. At best the guy only beat Coulthard in his latter years, and coulthard while good, was never a great. Sorry, but Webber was not a WDC class driver, he was a mediocre driver with enough tallent to develop a car.

He was the bookies favourite for the WDC going into the final race of the season in '10. No mediocre driver can do that, I don't care how competitive the car is. He also comprehensively out paced Rosberg and Heidfeld & put a Jaguar on the front row twice(!) in the dry.

He may not be in Vettel or Ricciardo's league for raw talent, but to call him mediocre is a bit on the silly side imo.

[Cam]

Yep, Webber was so mediocre that Ferrari wanted him for 2014. Their second choice was a former F1 WDC. Go figure eh?

[djos]

Yep, Webber was so mediocre that Ferrari wanted him for 2014. Their second choice was a former F1 WDC. Go figure eh?

Who also happened to be a known quantity to them....

As a side note, Porsche seem to be thrilled to have grabbed Webber to head up their WEC return!

[NathanOlder]

2 seasons next to an aging DC, while Webber was in his prime. 1 season each if I remember. He was never great. Just a solid driver like Rubens. But Rubens was more consistent. IMO rubens was better and he was never really a title contender.
Ricciardo is already better than Webber , and Vettel must now realise how slow Webber was overall. Webber did suffer some nasty luck though. And yes as juzh pointed out the race ending luck wasnt much different but Webber would have had atleast triple the amount of Kers and Overheating problems than vettel. Thats why everyone in the business called webber unlucky and it appears Vettel has inherited webber luck. Boots on the other foot now, and Ricciardo is certainly sticking it to him.

[FoxHound]

Webber also happens to be chums with Alonso.

[djos]

Webber also happens to be chums with Alonso.

Well that phrase is relative, I don't think they go skiing together.

[FoxHound]

Webber also happens to be chums with Alonso.

Well that phrase is relative, I don't think they go skiing together.

No. They cycle instead.

[mnmracer]

I think the whole Webber v's Vettel "luck" discussion is sometimes misunderstood.

If you look simply at the amount of race ending, or even terminal failures at any point of a weekend, for sure they are very similar.
It's when you take into account the intermittent failures that the figures change.

Mark had far more issues that didn't end his race or quali, but definitely hindered his weekend to the point of making a good result harder to achieve.

I think that's why Seb is being referred to as having inherited Mark's luck.

Nailed it!

Actually still not. The list has been posted before, and it includes all those.
Webber made a bigger deal out of every single thing, but being informed on a subject should not be the result of a shouting match.

[mnmracer]

Webber also happens to be chums with Alonso.

Well that phrase is relative, I don't think they go skiing together.

No. They cycle instead.

If either's interested, I thought this was an interesting piece.

[PlatinumZealot]

Car problems not withstanding, Cananda is gonna give us a clue, which will tell if Danny is really making his time up on Vettel with the braking.

[SpecialCircumstances]

Looking at the onboard shots in Monaco, it was amazing to me how smoothly and effortlessly Ricciardo could rotate and point the car in the corner undr breaking. It was almost floating.

On the other hand Vettel looked like he was fighting the car and almost overdriving. IMO Vettel will beat Ricciardo once he's as comfortable with the car. But that's just a prediction.

[raymondu999]

I have to say as a Vettel fan I don't think he's slower than Ricciardo - it's just that he has very particular requirements from the way a car handles. In the last several years he's used a tail-happy style of driving - induce oversteer, sort it out somehow, and get on the power. Which suited the EBDs perfectly as any EBD would be more oversteery on entry anyways, with the exhaust-generated downforce nailing the throttle on exits. Ricciardo has a smoother, less acrobatic Button-type driving to keep the car on rails.

Unfortunately in an era of turbo - you need to keep the car on rails in order to exploit that additional torque.

Quoted from an Autosport some time back (don't remember when)

As ever, it all depends upon circumstance and conditions. Back in the turbo days, the oversteering Keke Rosberg could not hold a candle at McLaren to the understeering Alain Prost – and for John Barnard, the team's technical director of the time, the reason was very simple: "Alain would set the car up in a way that to any other driver would feel like it had massive understeer, but he had a way of getting the car into the corner early [with his overlapping of braking and cornering], which for a turbo was fantastic, because it meant he could get early on the power and we could give him some traction. Keke, by contrast, was last of the late brakers and really liked to turn the car very quickly. To do that you need a set-up that's a bit light on rear grip – and that just wasn't the way with these cars because it meant you didn't have the traction to use all that huge power."

[SpecialCircumstances]

I think Vettel is also unfairly bashed for being not very adaptable or a one trick EBD pony because they are working to get the car to behave a certain way.

Now, anyone who understand anything about racing knows that's bollocks however it's worth pointing out here that if you KNOW for a fact that getting the car to behave a certain way has a massive speed potential for a driver you would be stupid not to try to make that happen.

It's also a mistake to assume that if Vettel has to eventually adapt to a different style that would make him slower than Ricciardo.

[Phil]

The car can only be as good as the driver is. Or, with the WCC in mind, as good as the sum of both of your drivers. If you have a driver under contract who represents a long term investment and isn't exactly cheap (Vettel), it makes sense to optimize the strengths of each of your assets to get the maximum. This would also include in finding ways to get the car to work in a certain way, I would think. This makes at least sense to the degree where it doesn't necessarely hamper your other driver who might be performing better. I don't think the team means that Vettel will not have to work on himself at all. He's got a good yardstick in Ricciardo, his teammate, to see how close he is getting out of the same car.

[FoxHound]

The car can only be as good as the driver is. Or, with the WCC in mind, as good as the sum of both of your drivers. If you have a driver under contract who represents a long term investment and isn't exactly cheap (Vettel), it makes sense to optimize the strengths of each of your assets to get the maximum.

Remember Eddie Irivine at Ferrari? Largely forgettable in no small part to Schumacher. But what happened in 1999?
Schumacher breaks his leg, and Irvine becomes the focus of Ferrari's spearhead and he pushed Hakkinen to final race that year, narrowly missing the title by 3 points.

As a driver, he did not suddenly gain 0.5 seconds speed.

His team made him the focal point, the reference on baseline performance. Those results speak for themselves.

The car was now changed and developed to suit him at a time when testing was unlimited.
Quite telling.