Earlier this week, I wrote an article for Keith Collantine's F1 Fanatic entitled "Why Lewis Hamilton Should Be Champion". At one point I did claim that Hamilton deserves to be champion through his almost faultless driving this year and that sparked the inevitable debate about whether any driver can be said to "deserve" the championship.
Lewis Hamilton
In one sense, they all deserve it. They have worked extremely hard to be able to compete in F1, given of their best, mostly in cars that stood no chance of winning, and some have done all this for far less money than Hamilton has received even in his rookie year. Some would say that Ralf Schumacher, for instance, does not deserve to be a champion but I would disagree; Ralf has had incredibly bad luck this season but, when his luck holds, he is quite capable of finishing as well as Trulli. He may have lost his edge over the last few years but he remains competitive and works as hard as any of them.
To say that one driver deserves the championship any more than the rest is like saying that only one employee of a company deserves to be paid at the end of the month. All have worked hard for their wage packet and it may just be luck that decides one person's sales figures are better than another's.
So yes, in a way, all F1 drivers deserve to be champion. But that is not quite the way we are using the term in this context. In considering the three drivers left with a chance of the title this year, it is inevitable that we should compare their performances and decide that perhaps one has made more errors than another, whereas the third has personality flaws that suggest he would not be as worthy as the next guy.
What we are trying to do, in fact, is to form an opinion based as fairly as we can on the facts as we know them. Personal preference is bound to have an influence, however, so that some will say that Kimi's deadpan personality means that he would be an almost invisible champion, mumbling the required corporatespeak and not allowing us to see the real man underneath. Others might think that his monosyllabic responses would actually be an asset if he is declared champion, enabling him to avoid the controversies so easily sparked by a chance remark in the pressurized world of F1.
Ultimately, it may be best to ignore the matter of personality altogether and limit ourselves to a consideration of the drivers' performances on the track. Many would deem the one who wins the most races as being the most deserving but I think this is simplistic and dismissive of too many other factors. As an example, how about the driver who habitually drives at or beyond the limit, entertaining us with spectacular stuff and winning sometimes but otherwise finishing his races in the tire barriers? Does such a driver deserve to be champion purely because his steadier and more sensible rivals split the remaining races between them? I think not and must insist that consistency and race craft should have as much influence on our assessment of a driver's performance as pure speed.
And on their performances this season, Hamilton stands out as being as fast as either of the other two and a good deal more consistent. I don't like that any more than you do. I would much rather say that Kimi is twice the entertainment on track than Hamilton will ever be; but the truth is he was lacklustre in the first half of the year and we were all wondering where the old Kimi that we knew had gone. I thought, too, until fairly recently, that Alonso was a better driver than his team mate, in spite of his errors when under pressure at times; but then I watched Hamilton's qualifying lap in China and realized that he has produced similarly perfect laps in race after race, and this in his first F1 season. He is at least on a par with Fernando and will get better with experience.
Today both Bernie Ecclestone and Jackie Stewart have said that, in their opinion, Hamilton deserves the title more than the other two. Although I'd rather have Kimi win it, I have to admit that they are right.
Lewis Hamilton
In one sense, they all deserve it. They have worked extremely hard to be able to compete in F1, given of their best, mostly in cars that stood no chance of winning, and some have done all this for far less money than Hamilton has received even in his rookie year. Some would say that Ralf Schumacher, for instance, does not deserve to be a champion but I would disagree; Ralf has had incredibly bad luck this season but, when his luck holds, he is quite capable of finishing as well as Trulli. He may have lost his edge over the last few years but he remains competitive and works as hard as any of them.
To say that one driver deserves the championship any more than the rest is like saying that only one employee of a company deserves to be paid at the end of the month. All have worked hard for their wage packet and it may just be luck that decides one person's sales figures are better than another's.
So yes, in a way, all F1 drivers deserve to be champion. But that is not quite the way we are using the term in this context. In considering the three drivers left with a chance of the title this year, it is inevitable that we should compare their performances and decide that perhaps one has made more errors than another, whereas the third has personality flaws that suggest he would not be as worthy as the next guy.
What we are trying to do, in fact, is to form an opinion based as fairly as we can on the facts as we know them. Personal preference is bound to have an influence, however, so that some will say that Kimi's deadpan personality means that he would be an almost invisible champion, mumbling the required corporatespeak and not allowing us to see the real man underneath. Others might think that his monosyllabic responses would actually be an asset if he is declared champion, enabling him to avoid the controversies so easily sparked by a chance remark in the pressurized world of F1.
Ultimately, it may be best to ignore the matter of personality altogether and limit ourselves to a consideration of the drivers' performances on the track. Many would deem the one who wins the most races as being the most deserving but I think this is simplistic and dismissive of too many other factors. As an example, how about the driver who habitually drives at or beyond the limit, entertaining us with spectacular stuff and winning sometimes but otherwise finishing his races in the tire barriers? Does such a driver deserve to be champion purely because his steadier and more sensible rivals split the remaining races between them? I think not and must insist that consistency and race craft should have as much influence on our assessment of a driver's performance as pure speed.
And on their performances this season, Hamilton stands out as being as fast as either of the other two and a good deal more consistent. I don't like that any more than you do. I would much rather say that Kimi is twice the entertainment on track than Hamilton will ever be; but the truth is he was lacklustre in the first half of the year and we were all wondering where the old Kimi that we knew had gone. I thought, too, until fairly recently, that Alonso was a better driver than his team mate, in spite of his errors when under pressure at times; but then I watched Hamilton's qualifying lap in China and realized that he has produced similarly perfect laps in race after race, and this in his first F1 season. He is at least on a par with Fernando and will get better with experience.
Today both Bernie Ecclestone and Jackie Stewart have said that, in their opinion, Hamilton deserves the title more than the other two. Although I'd rather have Kimi win it, I have to admit that they are right.