He brings £29Million to the team, is that not a wealthy paid driver
Pastor Maldonado
- Thread starter Ejike Wodu
- Start date
that´s great but Maldo is the most succesful GP2 driver of all time in terms of wins and not only that he has a title from there as well beating Perez etc.
Senna is average relatively speaking to the rest of the mid-top field in F1.
Maldonado spent 4 years in GP2. If you compare 2007 and 2008, Senna did better.
Which shows he probably made a mistake trying to get in F1 in 2009, instead of staying in GP2.
As for Maldonado, he's clearly fast enough not to be considered a pay driver, but he needs a mentality change if he wants to fight for the championship at any point in his career.
Which shows he probably made a mistake trying to get in F1 in 2009, instead of staying in GP2.
As for Maldonado, he's clearly fast enough not to be considered a pay driver, but he needs a mentality change if he wants to fight for the championship at any point in his career.
Did you even read what I wrote? I acknowledged he has big sponsors, but a lot of talent too!
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You're blind/biased/delusional if you think Bruno Senna is anywhere near as good as Maldonado, never mind Kimi...
Yes Pastor made mistakes but the Point is to learn from them and from the 2nd part it is Proved. He barely made mistake. Leaving other drivers enough space and fighting for Podiums, Getting higher grid position as much as he can.
Because Senna is obviously is as good as Maldo because where are they in the points, very close!Did you even read what I wrote? I acknowledged he has big sponsors, but a lot of talent too!
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You're blind/biased/delusional if you think Bruno Senna is anywhere near as good as Maldonado, never mind Kimi...
he´s only remotely close because Maldonado had problems. Something like 8 grid place drops.
If Maldonado had played it straight we would have to find some words similar to "utter domination"
If Maldonado had played it straight we would have to find some words similar to "utter domination"
This. It doesn't take a genius to realise that Maldonado cost himself a ton of points with some silly errors and collisions with other people. P6 in Aus, good points in Monaco due to grid drop, top 10 in Canada due to hitting WOC in Q2 where he was something like 0.3s up, P3 in Valencia, possible top 6 in Silverstone, ran over debris in Germany costing him top 10, possible podium/probable top 5 in Spa if he hadn't held up Hulk and then went crazy at the start etc
, then consequent grid drop for potential points in Monza, safety car then hydraulics problem cost him top 5 in Singapore...Add it up mate - Senna was nowhere close to that
oh yeah and who was at fault for his grid drops; 90% of the time he has commited the crime that led to the penalty
As we have said, you can fix those things (like Wurz is helping him with) but you can't fix raw pace.
He was learning from the Mistakes he made. Vettel also did lot of mistakes in the past Lewis did horrible mistakes in '11 can you say the same for those
Pastor was a Good Driver and he was much quicker than Senna. He has Raw pace and he was finding the extra tenth to go high up the order all the time.His Maturity comes from his experience. Lets wait and see how he Drives in 2013
My opinion on the matter:
First of all, I fully agree with Hampus' argument that it's alright for a rookie driver to make mistakes as long as he's extremely fast, but not the other way around. In this regard, Maldonado is light years ahead of Senna. Apparently, sometimes even the Williams engineers don't understand how his qualifying laps were even possible... Add to that the fact that Senna is not even a young driver anymore, he's already 29. Also, Maldonado is always accused of crashing all the time, but frankly, Senna crashes just as much if not even more, the only difference is that his maneuvers are usually not as incredibly dumb as Maldonado's, so he only gets a penalty or loses a frontwing etc.
Considering this, I fully understand the decision of Williams.
However, in Senna's defense:
First of all, Maldonado's win at Spain was definitely extremely lucky. Williams just happened to understand the tyres very well during that race, and that's all that mattered during that part of the season. Second, McLaren screwed up. Third, Ferrari screwed up Alonso's strategy (if they hadn't he'd be WDC too now, btw.). Without that win, Maldonado would only have 20 points, as opposed to Senna's 31.
Second, as stated above, there's the argument that rookies are allowed to make mistakes and that Maldonado can and will improve. If he's just immature, that's fine. However, if he's got an IQ of 90, which I suppose is equally possible, then there's just not much more going to come from him.
Third, the fact that Senna never got to participate in FP1. I know there are drivers for whom this doesn't matter one bit, but I think Senna is not one of them. In Hungary, he had his best race of the season, easily beating Maldonado, which, as he later said, was because that was the only race where he really understood the car (but he didn't really know why). If Senna was always this fast, I think there might be a future for him in F1. In a new team, with a different car and the possibility to participate in the FP1 sessions, who knows, maybe he's going to get that better understanding of the car.
First of all, I fully agree with Hampus' argument that it's alright for a rookie driver to make mistakes as long as he's extremely fast, but not the other way around. In this regard, Maldonado is light years ahead of Senna. Apparently, sometimes even the Williams engineers don't understand how his qualifying laps were even possible... Add to that the fact that Senna is not even a young driver anymore, he's already 29. Also, Maldonado is always accused of crashing all the time, but frankly, Senna crashes just as much if not even more, the only difference is that his maneuvers are usually not as incredibly dumb as Maldonado's, so he only gets a penalty or loses a frontwing etc.
Considering this, I fully understand the decision of Williams.
However, in Senna's defense:
First of all, Maldonado's win at Spain was definitely extremely lucky. Williams just happened to understand the tyres very well during that race, and that's all that mattered during that part of the season. Second, McLaren screwed up. Third, Ferrari screwed up Alonso's strategy (if they hadn't he'd be WDC too now, btw.
). Without that win, Maldonado would only have 20 points, as opposed to Senna's 31.Second, as stated above, there's the argument that rookies are allowed to make mistakes and that Maldonado can and will improve. If he's just immature, that's fine. However, if he's got an IQ of 90, which I suppose is equally possible, then there's just not much more going to come from him.
Third, the fact that Senna never got to participate in FP1. I know there are drivers for whom this doesn't matter one bit, but I think Senna is not one of them. In Hungary, he had his best race of the season, easily beating Maldonado, which, as he later said, was because that was the only race where he really understood the car (but he didn't really know why). If Senna was always this fast, I think there might be a future for him in F1. In a new team, with a different car and the possibility to participate in the FP1 sessions, who knows, maybe he's going to get that better understanding of the car.
Couple of things,
1. Maldonado is not a rookie. It´s his second year now. First year was with Barrichello (who he would have beaten if Hamilton had not wrecked him in Monaco when he was running 4th or 6th can´t remember)
2. I disagree about the luck of his win, maybe Williams lucked into having a top running car but Maldonado took this one chance and made it stick, he was hounded by Alonso for all of the race and generally put in a solid performance.
Sure Hamilton wasn´t at the front but even if he took 2nd place it would have been a ridiculously good performance.
Better then Perez running the wrong strategy and then catching people like they are sitting ducks.
3. Not sure i agree either on the Senna missing FP1. Fact is that Bottas pretty much match Maldonado in FP1 for 90% of the sessions.
And he only runs FP1.
1. Maldonado is not a rookie. It´s his second year now. First year was with Barrichello (who he would have beaten if Hamilton had not wrecked him in Monaco when he was running 4th or 6th can´t remember)
2. I disagree about the luck of his win, maybe Williams lucked into having a top running car but Maldonado took this one chance and made it stick, he was hounded by Alonso for all of the race and generally put in a solid performance.
Sure Hamilton wasn´t at the front but even if he took 2nd place it would have been a ridiculously good performance.
Better then Perez running the wrong strategy and then catching people like they are sitting ducks.
3. Not sure i agree either on the Senna missing FP1. Fact is that Bottas pretty much match Maldonado in FP1 for 90% of the sessions.
And he only runs FP1.
Third drivers are usually fast in FP1 because it's their only chance to impress. But for a regular driver, a good FP1 session isn't necessarily measured by the time he manages to record, but rather by the experience he gathers regarding his setup for Saturday.
I agree that you can see these things one way or another. I am not entirely sure what to think of both Maldonado and Senna.
Maldonado on the one hand really does have incredible raw pace in qualifying, perhaps even more than Hamilton. And I suppose Hamilton and Raikkonen are proof that you don't need to be the most intelligent person to be a great F1 driver, as long as you have tons of talent. But still, the fact remains that Maldonado regularly gets into the kind dumb situations nobody else does, and I haven't really seen any kind of learning process.
Senna - well, he just disappoints a lot. Tends to have many small crashes, is very slow in qualifying and many of the times he scored points he only managed to do so because Maldonado crashed out. Biggest drawback is that for F1 driver standards, he's already pretty old. However, he seems to be a smart guy and if he could drive like he did in Hungary for every race, he'd probably be better than Maldonado. Unfortunately, he doesn't.
Maldonado in the Simulator!
Maldonado in the Simulator!
Hahahaha! I'm sure I've raced against him and Grosjean online already
Maldonado is one of the few drivers on the grid who can win in a midfield car. Others are: Alonso (2003 Renault), Vettel (2008 Toro Rosso), Hamilton (2009 McLaren). Needless to say, they are all world champions.
Williams is, by now, sadly not longer a midfield team. I guess if he could get into a Toro Rosso that'd be huge for him.
