Who were the top 10 drivers of 2011?

Mr Men said:
If team bosses were like Skeeter no driver would ever move up into the top teams :D must be hard to see F1 in such a black and white manner.
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The WDC ranking is the only one used to award and rank drivers consistently. Every other ranking is susceptible to opinion and bias, and will always cause disagreements and arguments, but at the end of the day remain utterly pointless.
 
Skeeter said:
The WDC ranking is the only one used to award and rank drivers consistently. Every other ranking is susceptible to opinion and bias, and will always cause disagreements and arguments, but at the end of the day remain utterly pointless.
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No it really is not, but if you find it pointless to have opinions then so be it, you don't need to post in a thread you find pointless :)

You have spent all season posting opinions, now you find them pointless? strange
 
Skeeter said:
The WDC ranking is the only one used to award and rank drivers consistently. Every other ranking is susceptible to opinion and bias, and will always cause disagreements and arguments, but at the end of the day remain utterly pointless.
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The trouble is though, it's not a spec series is it? So it's not just a ranking of pure driver talent, it's a ranking of driver talent that is dependent entirely on what car they are driving.

I don't think anyone could sit here and say with a straight face that Webber is a better driver than Alonso, but this year he has been in a better car which has put him higher in the standings.

Whilst you dismiss other rankings as susceptible to bias, ultimately the WDC is too - it's biased by the differences between the cars themselves.
 
Kenai said:
The trouble is though, it's not a spec series is it? So it's not just a ranking of pure driver talent, it's a ranking of driver talent that is dependent entirely on what car they are driving.

I don't think anyone could sit here and say with a straight face that Webber is a better driver than Alonso, but this year he has been in a better car which has put him higher in the standings.

Whilst you dismiss other rankings as susceptible to bias, ultimately the WDC is too - it's biased by the differences between the cars themselves.
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I've never said the WDC is perfect. I'm just saying its the only one that matters. The same thing applies when the whole 'deserving the title' argument crops up. The WDC is not decided by popular vote, its decided by points. It might not be the fairest, or the most objective way to define who is best, but its how its done.

Threads like this are just going to be not stop disagreements, or in this case, just and excuse for arknor and Mr Men to argue with everyone. There is absolutely nothing that can be said in this thread that someone else wont argue about. The only ranking completely devoid of personal bias is the WDC rankings, and they were dismissed within about 3 posts...
 
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Skeeter said:
I've never said the WDC is perfect. I'm just saying its the only one that matters. The same thing applies when the whole 'deserving the title' argument crops up. The WDC is not decided by popular vote, its decided by points. It might not be the fairest, or the most objective way to define who is best, but its how its done.

Threads like this are just going to be not stop disagreements, or in this case, just and excuse for arknor and Mr Men to argue with everyone.
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It's not the only one that matters in a thread about who people subjectively feel have been the 10 top drivers of the season though, that's the point.

Sure, you happen to agree that those ten drivers were the 10 standout drivers this year but everyone is free to have their own opinion, that's the point of the thread, if you think it's just going to be a non stop disagreement or excuse to argue, you don't have to participate, it's entirely optional. Everyone else is happy to discuss and debate their choice of top ten, that's why they posted in the thread to begin with.

Personally, I think my Top 10 would be as follows:

1 Button
2 Vettel
3 Alonso
4 Webber
5 Hamilton
6 Sutil
7 Rosberg
8 Schumacher
9 Kobayashi
10 Massa

I'd put Button up top as I think this year he performed way above expectations, no one would have bet on him being the last guy in title contention nevermind outscoring Hamilton so significantly.

Vettel did great but I really can't help feeling that the car was a huge part of success and we saw cracks the few times he was actually ever put under pressure, such as Canada.

Alonso put in some great drives but also some fairly forgettable ones, he did well but perhaps not as good as a man lauded by many as the best in F1 should have done.
 
Top 10, huh? Seems like a lot to pick. Sure, there were 28 drivers in the field but most of them were pretty awful.

Barichello, Maldonado, Liuzzi, d'Ambrosio, Glock, Karthikeyan, Ricciardo and Chandok are all easily dismissed from the running.

de la Rosa only had a single race so I don't think we can judge him at all.

Petrov, Perez, Buemi and Massa all had pretty mediocre seasons. Heidfeld did okay, finishing with just 3 less points than Petrov despite being kicked mid season but surely doesn't deserve a real look in. Senna did better than I expected with a few bright moments in qualifying but failed to develop promising positions into race success.

That leaves thirteen drivers who can - in any seriousness - be consider for the top ten.

Kovalainen can surely stake a good case, lumbered with a dog of a car he still managed to struggle through to second qualifying on an impressive number of occasions. Trulli finished ahead of him in the WDC but that was down to getting lucky on days where there were few finishers. Kova schooled him in both quali and race the rest of the time so Trulli is, I think, out of the running.

So, my top ten:

1. Vettel - he put barely a foot wrong all season. It was an incredibly dominant performance. Yes, he had the best car. Yes, he faced little challenge and crumbled under pressure in Canada; but you just can't ignore that kind of dominance.

2. Button - A great season for the brit. He just seems to get better and better. And, well, Canada!

3. Alonso - only 4th in the drivers, but he was consistently putting that Ferrari above where it deserved to be and made the best of what he had.

4. Kobayashi - a quiet season, in some ways, from the former master of the overtake. But this shows the growth of wisdom, less of the crash kid of before he took a pretty rubbish car and wrung a mass of points out of it. Perhaps flattered by being partnered with Perez

5. Sutil - a little overshadowed by Di Resta's brilliant rookie season but there's no denying the fact he got much more from the car than Di Resta did, and put that Force India further up the rankings than it deserved.

6. Di Resta - a smashing first season for the brit, especially in qualifying. I have high hopes for him as he gains a bit more F1 experience.

7. Alquersuari - another driver who did impressively well with poor equipment.

8. Hamilton - Far too many foolish incidents marred his season but let's not forget that he pulled off as many race wins as Button and more than a few impressive overtakes. Still one of the best drivers there is, let's just hope he can get his head back in the game next year.

9. Webber - Webber was sitting in the best car on the grid and yet only just clung onto third place in the championship. Without the win in Brazil I wouldn't have included him at all. Still, he managed a decent number of good moves through the year and did seem to get Seb's share of the bad luck as well as his own. He must be hoping and praying he can find something extra next season because Seb has made him look decidedly second rate this season.

10. Kovalainen - it must be hard driving the new team cars. Try your absolute guts out and the best you can hope for is that you make it to second quali and only get lapped once. Kova impressed by delivering the most the car could over weekend after weekend.

Which leaves me, somewhat to my surprise, with Rosberg and Schumi out of the top ten. Both, it seems to me, failed to be the full package this season despite good moments and the 4th best car. I think both would have a hard job impressing this season. The Mercedes was too slow to challenge the top three, but two quick to allow them to impress by merely staying ahead of the rest. Rosberg was, at times, very impressive in qualifying but too often he simply failed to produce any magic in the race itself whereas Schumi was dismal on the Saturdays but there was a little hint of the old magic come race day.
 
Skeeter said:
Threads like this are just going to be not stop disagreements, or in this case, just and excuse for arknor and Mr Men to argue with everyone. There is absolutely nothing that can be said in this thread that someone else wont argue about. The only ranking completely devoid of personal bias is the WDC rankings, and they were dismissed within about 3 posts...
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deary me, what are you on? I see no arguing in the slightest, it's only you that seems to have a problem dealing with this thread, stop trying to derail things as per usual, it's very tiresome.
 
Duke said:
Sutil has been in F1 for ages and should be beating a newbie driver. Di Resta had a solid season for his experience.
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i dont see the step to f1 as beeing the huge leap it used to be though so i take that into consideration.

its almost expected a gp2 driver etc will easily makle the transition , i supose di resta coming from a closed cockpit series makes it a little more impressive but i dont buy into the british hype around him

the same hype follows every british driver sometimes they make it like button other times they end up on radio 5 live
 
1. Button

Incredible season - considering the state of the car at the beginning, and his string of podiums at the end. Canada was brilliant but beating everyone in Japan (on a real drivers circuit) in the dry stood out as well. considering McLaren was considered "Hamilton's " team less than 2 seasons ago - to beat one of the fastest drivers on the grid in the same equipment is incredible.

2. Vettel

Brilliant season in a class leading car - but still can be pressurised into a mistake if other's cars are upto the job on the day.

3. Di Resta - Excellent rookie season (even if he was a little unlucky in the middle part of the season). Team tactics also made him look worse than he really is in some races.

4. Sutil . Did well but was overshadowed by his rookie team mate (given his experience I think he should have made more of the car)

5. Hamilton . Got three good wins and some other good results for the team but had a pretty awful season compounded with how his teammate performed and bonded with "his" team.

6. Hate Alonso, hate Ferrari - but win in Britian was worthy of mention

Massa and Webber dont deserve mentioning - they were so massivly outclassed by their team mates it should be embarrasing.
 
Button : most improved driver this year ?, been impressed that he seemed to add something extra to his normal driving and it showed.
Koby : pure entertainment, you know he's going to give it 100%
Alonso : did the best he could with the fez.
Vettel : only put 4th as although he sustained his run from last year the 3 above added to there season.
Di resta : good start to the season and did pretty well holding his own against his teammate
kova : did a really good job in the lotus and moved them onto the next step getting out of 1st qually,
Rosberg : there or there abouts all season, needs to take it up a notch tho
MS : had some good runs, and seems to be improving
Sutil : was hoping he would have moved on, but seems to have gone stale
Lewis : few glimpses of what he can do, but could have done much better with care.
 
arknor said:
i dont understand why rosbergs so high up on peoples lists when he only just managed to outscore his teammate who had 3 technical DNFs to rosbergs 0

Schumacher had three 5th place finishes and a 4th place finish this season.
Rosberg only had two 5th place finishes.

yet on some peoples lists rosberg is 4th and schumacher doesnt even get listed
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Rosberg had some really good qualifing times, sometimes beating Massa.

Schumacher never touched Rosberg in that respect.

Whilst Schumacher was better on race day, Rosberg was a lot closer to the top 3 teams more often or not.

If we just go by points then you make your point, but the points don't tell the whole story.

I'm a big Schumacher fan since he returned, this isn't some Rosberg fan talking, in fact I'm not a fan of his at all.

I hope they have a better car next year and we see some interesting racing from them both.
 
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