Brought to you by TheJudge13 contributor Andries van Overbeeke
Editors Note: When TJ13 started the vision was simple, the voice of Formula 1 fans – by the fans for the fans. As the TJ13 community grew more and more people from different walks of life shed light on aspects of the sport that they find interesting. The result is that the content published through TJ13 is different and unique but more than that, it gives the community a voice.
With this in mind, what does art and Formula 1 have in common? Through “The Art of #F1” TJ13 will bring you the beauty of F1 through the eyes of artists to convey the passion and emotion often hidden to the naked eye.
In the first instalment we will have one of our protagonist of the last few weeks, Nico Rosberg.
This season Nico Rosberg can finally establish himself as one of the top drivers in Formula 1. Being Michael Schumacher’s teammate was always going to be a lose-lose situation, although the guy still set a magnificent Monaco pole in his forties. Of course it was at this same circuit where the battle for the 2014 title intensified to a level where it paralleled the story of a bygone era: the naturally gifted and passionate driver versus the calculating cerebral strategist. With the championship winning car at his disposal and Lewis as a team mate, this is the perfect storm for Rosberg to make his mark once and for all: the coming of age of his career.
I’m not going to say anything about what happened at Mirabeau on the Saturday, apart from saying that something happened. More important are the effects these events are having. Is this affecting Lewis’ mindset in a negative way? Can Nico really handle the situation better, being the more cerebral one of the two, the multilingual driver with the mind of an engineer? Can he be a match for allegedly the fastest driver in F1?
As the fable of the tortoise and the hare shows us, racing isn’t always about downright speed. If one Formula 1 race is seen as a marathon, we might as well compare a whole season to the march of the White Walkers heading for The Wall. If you don’t get the reference: apparently it’s a long walk.
The story of the tortoise and the hare doesn’t necessarily imply Rosberg to be the tortoise and Hamilton to be the hare. It merely means that in life, and especially life in the complex Formula 1 bubble, requires you to sometimes be swift and agile as a hare and sometimes be restful and calculating like a tortoise.
The cynic might say that Rosberg exhibited these characteristics perfectly in Monaco Q3. It simply means using your strengths and weaknesses, dosing your power and leveraging your position. If you’re on pole in Monaco you can win the race like a tortoise, just because you can make the other cars more tortoise. And that’s just one on track example, we’re not even mentioning the mind games yet. Impressions are Rosberg is better equipped for that. So as far as the fable of the tortoise and the hare goes: maybe Lewis can take a leaf out of that book.
Nice!
To be honest, your automotive design work is far more interesting.
Call it coincidence, all of a sudden the word cerebral pops up whenever Hamilton is compared to his team mate. Suddenly everyone can measure mental ablity
I guess Hamilton hasn’t developed himself since he was born with a “natural ability” to drive a car. I guess also it has nothing to do with mental ability, just pure reflex action.
Is the Author of this article encouraging cheating, going against fair play? Because all I can read into the praise of Rosbergs Q3 performance is that he used his head to stay in front. There is nothing cerebral about that, it is cheating. And many of us want to believe that was a genuine mistake.
Before the start of the season, the great alain prost said the new engines will benefit those drivers that can think and are intelligent. Now again, they now say Hamilton is born with the “natural ability” to drive a complicated car, everyone else has to “work harder”.
…its all mind games John. I’ve just finished an interesting article on this and how Hamilton’s PR people are failing him.
It’s with the editor – should be published soon…
I know we don’t really see eye to eye with our opinions, but I doubt this has anything to do with what his PR people do or don’t do. I’ve been watching f1 for more than 20 years now and during that time, I’ve rarely if anything ever heard those words used to compare teammates.
Have you noticed that those words, “cerebral, intelligent, smart etc” weren’t use when he had Alonso and Heiki as teammates?
The moment He was teamed up with Jenson and now Nico all of a sudden, it’s all you can hear. So where was Jenson’s intelligence and so forth when he was unable to setup his car and the team had to use Lewis setup data to sort out his problems? Where was Nico’s cerebralism and engineering now how when he couldn’t sort out his start issues? Who did the work Lewis and the voila in Monaco he had his best start so far this season.
Before the season started, it was the talk of the town, “will Lewis be able to learn and adapt to all the new changes?”, ….. Yet so far this season, the only mistake he has made, was in qualifying in Bahrain, however his cerebral teammate has cocked up in every single race so far, with Bahrain qualifying being the only exception.
But let’s not speak on the issue, because some people are scared to really look and understand what’s being said.
Does not say a lot for either Heiki or Alonso 😛
At the end of the day, Hamilton has skill aplenty. Given a wheelbarrow he’d probably still beat most in an F1 car.
But similar to the previous 4 years with Vettel, if you’re flying high people will notice you and then analyse.
I was thinking about this whole Hamilton talent thing and who’s better, harder worker etc earlier. If Ham is so talented why would he work harder?
I’m just thinking, is it Hamilton’s style (from what we see in F1) to want to spend hours at the track? Nico (or any of Hamilton’s previous teammates for that matter) knows that they can only beat him by working harder and being different.
If Ham applied himself like Schumi, Alonso or Vettel did would anyone be able to win? I think not but that is just my opinion.
One thing that does grind me with Hamilton is his attitude. If Senna is his hero and he wants to be like that he has a long way to go in some areas. It may be harsh but playing a victim is not going to win you anything. Criticising your team will not make them like you.
Let us keep on having these debates, I don’t need to agree with you on this one, at the end of the season either Ros will win or Ham will win. The winner will deserve the trophy!
No Don, there’s will be no arguing of that I can assure you….
Talent without hardwork, renders your talent useless…
Some of the greatest and most talented sportsmen and women in the world, works 10 times harder than anyone else. It’s harder to stay at the top than it is to get there (IMHO). But who says he’s not applying himself like Schummi, Alonso, Vettel etc? I’ve never heard a past or present teammate or team principal criticise him for his work ethic. All this talk, is coming from the media, because he’s expected to win whenever he steps inside the cockpit. This is his 7th year in the sport and his worse season to date, was in 2011. Did you see his interview with Herbert last weekend? If not, give it a watch.
He has flaws, of that we will all agree, but is it not those flaws that makes him endearing to some and a right plonker to others? They say all geniuses have their flaws. Senna wasn’t so perfect himself.
Is he the only driver to ever criticise his team when he feels that they have cocked up? Didn’t Alonso call his team morons over the radio at the Italian GP in 2012? Nothing was made of it, if anything, some found it funny.
Think the idiots comment was last year (Alonso). I get your point. No one is perfect I agree but if you were around here last year you’d have seen Vettel, Maldonado, Grosjean… jeeze, everyone got a tap of the gavel.
It’s just as if we’re not allowed to criticise Hamilton? And why not? If he is out of order then lets call it so. As you say, he has his flaws too, but he is (arguably) the most high-profile driver in F1, the most marketable if I recall correctly from a couple of weeks back. Say Hamilton and then everyone knows who you’re talking about…
He’s got the world’s eyes on him but I guess guys like you (his supporters) are here to give us the other side that we sometimes miss… help keep a balanced view of him. 🙂
com on we know this is all Racist yes racist,Lewis the black driver is the only F1 driver who,when compared to his teammate intelligence comes into play.Button a journeyman in F1 for yrs is suddenly a tower of intelligence and stretegy.
we know it is Racist because when Rooki Kevin joined Mclaren,everyone expected him to challenge Button.no one said the tech and rules would restrain him.
But world champ LEWIS who by the way beat Rosberg the season before is gonna be beaten because of intelligence,but a white rooki kid would have nooooo problem.
No one attributed Rosberg beating Micheal to intelligence because white guy white guy no issue.
When ask for evidence of intelligence they point to language the amount of languages his speaks…….That is such an ignorant British english one language speaking thing to assume…
Every one in continental europe speak atleast 3 languages plus some english,you cant even get a job as a waitress in some parts if you not fluent in several languages .Its like growing up by the sea side and learning to swim and fish…no big deal,but for those in inner cities swimming might seem frightening and comlex.
Swizerland has 3 national languages which almost everyone speaks altleast 2 and that the dumd ones…….co on people …we are in 2014
Different and thought provoking – exactly what this site is all about.
But I didn’t expect to need my dragonglass handy whilst reading this blog!!
Dragonglass?
To combat the White Walkers – Google might help you
Google did thank you Cassius 🙂 Maybe I should watch a bit more TV 🙂
Great read Andries. Thanks for your efforts.