More difficult to drive F1 or rally car ?

[Combat squirrel]

Having a discussion with my flat mate, he maintains that a rally car is more difficult to drive than an F1 car, I DO NOT, my reasons are

1) F1 cars race on a track with other cars to take into account (imagine a really busy moterway at rush hour, its a headache)
2) Much greater overall speeds and forces to deal with
3) F1 cars much more unpredictable with there behaviour, with small differences becoming massive due to the greater sensitivity of the cars
4) a few other reasons but wont go into great details

He thinks that driving one is simply pointing the nose of it to get round corner, i.e. turn wheel to 35degrees angle and 'leave it there', i just laugh and challenge him to watch a drivers eye view in car, have you seen how much there fighting with the wheel/car? moving the steering wheel as much as a rally cars wheel.

Anyways my views there, and 1 vote for F1 being more challanging a car to drive, whats your view people ?

Mods could you turn this into a poll ?

CS

 

[Combat squirrel]

hmm odd thought, place joe bloggs in an F1 car and a rally car, im gonna guess he will get the hang of a rally car way quicker, of course due to them being modified 'off the self' cars (b4 being shot down i know about the only thing the same is there shell lol), but i ask, gettin a car around the corner asap in the various weather conditions, yes difficult, id have a hard time doing, but thats my point, i reckon i could after a days practice, however i see it taking a good few weeks to get the F1 around track corners at speeds comparable to professional drivers

 

[Combat squirrel]

i think both are skilled drivers, i just think on a pure 'skill level', F1 cars are more difficult to drive, again in car views of f1 drivers in front of another car breaking, iv never seen reactions like them, its like 0.1 seconds of time to avoid hitting the car in front, even more so at 200mph!

 

[Combat squirrel]

Rally cars.

1) F1 race on the same track 60ish times in a race, they will come to learn the track quickly and where all the small bits of traction are. Rally drivers will drive a stage once maybe twice over the course of a weekend, but even then conditions will change between the two stages, due to either rocks being thrown onto the road, tracks being driven into the stages etc, and the rally driver will have the corners shouted for him, but he has to analyse every bit of road that he drives on to look for the best grip.

2) much greater speed but over a smaller area, formula one track = 5ish km, rally stage = 12km minimum usually.there may be greater speed involved but only over 5km of track, a rally driver has to drive at 100mph+ on gravel roads that arent exactly easy to predict, aswell as in finland where they take jumps at over 130mph. this is whilst deciding what route to take whilst you are driving.

3)F1 cars are far from unpredictable, they are sensitive but have a large number of computer controls these days, they have traction control, launch control everything. Rally Cars maybe have as many computer controls such as launch control etc, but they are driving over rough ground where you have to predict what the car is going to do and move the car before it happens so that you dont spin/crash etc

4) Rally drivers have to drive within sometimes as little as 10ft of people (let alone cars)spectating now imagine how crazy you have to be to have faith in your ability and drive flat out whilst not crashing into people.

so imo rally drivers is a much harder discipline, just due to the amount of driver thought that has to go into every movement you make of the steering wheel and throttle/brake. f1 is nowhere near as complicated!

hmm again interesting

your points tho,
1) as soon as it rains on F1 track, whole new ball game again
2) They may come to learn the track, however its different everytime round due to other cars being on field, unless ** in P1 at the front and dont run into any1 of course
3) I saw on topgear or C5 program that bussinessman who bought ferrari's 2002 car, it took him like 15 laps to go around at a speed faster than a normal car can do, he said it was insanly difficult to drive, v v senstive, a car weighing what, 250/200kg ? with about 1000bhp is unbeleaveably difficult to control, one weighing im guessing about 1000kg, (my 306 deisal is ~1480kg) with say 300bhp is more predicable to control on any surface, stick 1000bhp in a rally car and see how they go.
4) yes rally drivers do indeed drive with 10ft of crowds, but they know the crowd will not move (i could drive my car through a 10ft gap at any speed as long as the gap doesnt move or change size), however f1 car in front of another f1 car as no idea what the other driver will do/when he will break

carnt think of anything else right now lol

 

[Combat squirrel]

This is like a PS2 vs XBox argument

I don't particularly favor either side, but imagine the highest G-Force rollercoaster that you've been on (if you have), and then imagine taking the simplest of corners in your own car while feeling those forces.....

explain a simple corner, the corners in most F1 world circutes are a nightmare at 170+ mph, especially in a car that if you even sneeze the whole setup and speed of it changes , most rally corners are simple no ? just like roads around outside my house thanx for this goverments excellent expendature on roads