Should Massa be watching his back?

JRS said:
Has he [Massa] And there was me thinking he'd finished ahead of his illustrious team-mate four times in the nine races so far, and was easily starting races better than him as well¹.
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JRS,

In 2011, after 10 races:

Alonso: 130 pts
Massa: 62 pts.

In a nut shell, Alonso has more than double his team-mates' points. Of the top 5 teams, I do not believe any driver pairing has such a disparity in points totals.

Alonso has completely demoralised and broken Massa. In truth, he has probably never driven against a driver of Alonso's quality. Even when Massa was driving with MSc, MSc was on his way down and his best year's were behind him.

If Alonso's mission this year, was to end Massa's F1 career, he is going about it the right way.
 
Telescopi said:
For a young driver, ordered to get out of the way or not, being able to test yourself against alonso in equal machinery is a hell of an attractive proposition.
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It is also potentially, a career breaker. If Alonso destroys you, there will be a good chance that you will go to the back of the grid and never drive a front running car again.

Heikki is the best example of this, in recent times. He was humiliated by Hamilton at McLaren and is currently at Lotus (a new team, near the back of the grid).

Of course, if you have supreme ability, driving alongside Alonso can "make" you. Hamilton did this and his stock basically when from newbie, to 'WDC elect', in just a few months. It takes most drivers (even Senna/MSc), years to achieve 'WDC elect', status.

It's a massive risk though and a lot depends on just how good, the driver believes himself to be. If I were in F1 and was still proving my skills, there are 3 drivers who I wouldn't drive alongside: Alonso, Hamilton and Vettel...unless I absolutely believed that I could beat those drivers.
 
JRS said:
'LOL MASSA SUCKS LOL'
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Who's said that here, exactly? :confused:

All I see is people saying Massa hasn't looked as good a driver since his accident, and that he's lagging some way behind his teammate, which the points prove.

Personally, I think the public emasculation his team performed on him last years has had far more effect on his driving than the accident. I'd quite like to see him go to another team where he'd be free of the baggage that being a Ferrari driver (and a no. 2 at that) lumbers you with.
 
I think was clear though. If Massa could maintain a 3+ second gap then he'd would have been fine. He couldn't. Alonso was faster, so it made sense from a team pov (not for fans) to move Massa aside.

It almost helped win Alonso the championship too. Just how Kimi moving over in 2008 almost helped Massa win the championship.
 
Well, before the German GP, Alonso was hammering Massa. Massa was broken long before the German GP.

It could not have been good for Massa's mental state when Alonso started at the back of the grid at Monaco that year and then cruised up behind Massa in the race, who qualified well up the field.

People seem to under-estimate just how good Alonso is.
 
Just saw that. Massa stays at Ferrari then unfortunately. I can only assume Alonso has said that he'd rather have Massa as a team mate next year than Perez.

Well done to Peter Sauber for keeping hold of them. I suspect Perez would have been quite sought after.
 
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JRS said:
Australia - Alonso down 4, Massa up 3
Malaysia - Alonso down 2, Massa up 1
China - Alonso down 1, Massa up 1
Turkey - Alonso up 1, Massa held position
Spain - Alonso up 3, Massa held position
Monaco - Alonso up 1, Massa held position
Canada - no changes, unsurprisingly (safety car start)
Europe - Alonso up 1, Massa up 1
Britain - Alonso held position, Massa lost 1
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That's interesting, and kinda surprising. I wonder though, how meaningful those stats are; do they actually reflect differences in driver ability, or are they a reflection of which cars were near them at the start? Massa has generally qualified poorly meaning that he has slower cars next to him than Alonso.
 
Massa's starts have been good this year.

Massa is a bit like button in a way. In a perfect car, he is awesome. In a car that isn't amongst the best or 2nd best, then he is nowhere.

Unlike Alonso, Hamilton, Kubica, he doesn't have the ability to out perform the car.
 
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