I think it's quite fair to say that Lewis most certainly was not the victim in most peoples mind when he had his various moments. In fact some people called for further sanctions for his actions. There are many parallels that can be drawn between both drivers having a moment... But both have faced criticism either rightly or wrongly. They are highly competitive and stand a chance of erupting when things go wrong, regardless of blame or fault. In fairness to Lewis, when he did act like a dick when it was his fault, he did man up and apologize after the event.
True it would be more obvious to me with the negativity directed at Seb than Lewis, so maybe I'm being a bit too fussy in this case.
Personally etc... Since I read up about Seb far more than Lewis it's very likely my perspective of the situation in "camp seb" will be far more accurate in detail than "camp lewis" as I'm not going to read in great detail about Lewis' grand crusade in F1. Lewis fans could clearly point out to me negatives in F1 on their driver and I would laugh, the same would be with me pointing out negatives towards Seb that will get the same reaction of "omg dont be so paranoid" etc. I'm not trying to make this a game of "My driver is worse off in the public eye because because because..." as both sides would give some damning evidence of crap being flung in their direction.
Crap will always get flung one way or another when things go spectacularly wrong for any of the top drivers. Look at the flack Button took in '09 when things looked like they were going south, let's not even mention Alonso and the various incidents. Really though... we should probably enjoy these moments. There's too much of the usual BS from drivers after a race. Maybe we should relish these outbursts and the color that they give the sport.
Funnily enough, I've been thinking that for the past couple of months. What the fk has happend to the diehard F1 fan over the last 5 years? I used to remember a united fanbase that had their driver but for the love of the race and season itself, first and formost. We would all clap and cheer the racers in these machines and not give 10 flying ****s if he couldnt overtake, was crap at qualifying, **** at managing tyres or was just plain slow. I remember my first live F1 race with my father at Silverstone, cheering with 80,00 other people with Jenson almost getting pole, I was a Schumacher fan and it was great fun. Ferrari fans and McLaren fans could get smashed and still have a good laugh, hoping rain would come and give us a classic after we finished the BBQ. The traffic might of been a nightmare but it was always worth it in the end because it was a great event, not because our driver won. Now that F1 has increased in popularity across the world, factions have been built and everybody seems to have an agenda or a vendetta to pass on to the other side. Everybody seems more intent on pissing off people, other than just plain getting pissed on a hot summers day with other f1 fans. We used to not give a **** how they won the WDC, they won the WDC because the driver and the team were the best in the world and this "deserving" bollox that has come up recently would be spat on in the past. What have we become my brothers and sisters? What have we become?
Some may disagree, but I love that post, Silver. Fan rivalry is something we should enjoy, but not to football levels! The reason we all come together is our love of the sport.... We are bothers and sisters (insert sappy music) and the Motorsport community is the best in the world when it comes to support.
The answer, The internet. Faceless warriors who fear no come back, people who like to make themselves big by putting down others. I've been to a couple of races and its always been brilliant banter between rival fans, hours spent next to each other with mutual respect and a barrel of laughs. The modern world hey ....
SilverArrow… Wow! Silver tongue, or what? I have rarely been so impressed to read two consecutive posts from any passionate member of a forum, which display such relative objectivity… No sarcasm. No irony. - Just serious applause.
Ya, wise words, it kinda went down with the new generation spuring in. The really young peeps are sometimes such hypocrites thats not even fun. I miss the good old times when i watched Niki Lauda in his McLaren Cosworth rolling up the field when the turbos started always from the front rows.
Rant... moan, bitch, gripe... you can call it whatever.... It's all the same. Let's call it venting then, hey?
Yes, I like Kyle. As Bhaji says, he always apologises after he's gone to far which counts for a lot in my book. I wonder what he did that was so bad. I don't use the football boards but I know here that we try to reel it back in when it gets out of hand; maybe it's different over there and they fuel each other. So, yeah: Bring Back Kyle! And a big for your post from me too, Silver.
Better informed and more aware? It's called entropy and it's the ineluctable consequence of pitting the commercial interests of F1 against its sporting interests. Ever since Balestre sold out to Ferrari and Ecclestone, the polarisation of every aspect of the sport from the top down has been inevitable. Controversy sells F1; indeed, division and negativity are the key strategies in FOM's 'M'. Tomcat is right to hearken back to times when inequality was the result of a natural bias (rich vs. poor, innovation vs. convention, skill vs. power) and could swing this way or that, instead of being the foundation on which the organisation of F1 is built. That's how far back you need to go to find the integrity and reality whose loss you so lament. It is specious, BLS, to blame social networking for the polarisation of opinion simply because it provides a new platform for participants to express the same kinds of views they were expressing over water coolers and pints in, say, 1994 and 1997. I'm only aware of one person with a vendetta on this forum, SilverArrow. Only one person always and without fail attempts to deflect any criticism of his favourite driver onto another. Even EternalMSC, the arch-fan, doesn't take criticism of his favourite as an opportunity to dredge up past criticisms of another specific driver. Not that I care, I just find it astonishing that you see vendettas anywhere other than in your own posts. I'm sorry, the last thing I want to do is offend another member of this forum, but I think this comment is hypocritical. How often has someone asked you this? I expect this post will cause a bit of a rift between us and, if it does, then I regret that and I hope we'll get past it sooner rather than later.
No, it's called 'double standards' one is a 'nice bloke' Australian and one is a 'Nazi' German. SO when the nice Australian storms into the pits calling people idiots because HE HIMSELF ****ed up and smashed into the back of a back marker, it's ok because he's a 'bloody nice bloke' who is just being honest and straight talking, rather than the bitching griper he is. However, when the German gets hit from behind by someone being lapped who is trying to catch his slipstream, someone 99% of this board are in agreement DOES NOT BELONG IN F1, in a car 99% think shouldn't be on the grid either and says matter-of-factly, "there are idiots on the grid in gurks (german slang for slow car)' Well, soemone get the rope we gonna hang us a Nazi. Sad. The biggest difference here is Karthikeyan, normally when a driver gets called an idiot or other such name, they generally ignore it and carry on as usual, but Karthikeyan NEEDS the publicity badly, so calls a big press conference to bad mouth the reigning double world champion.
Nah, it was the only other driver I could pick out who went on the same kind of warpath. Difficult weekend check! Insulting another driver check! Media involved check! High profile driver check! Etc etc...
