These are some of the biggest F1 underachievers within the time I have watched the sport from 1984.
Mike Thackwell - 1980 +1984. Youngest ever driver to race in F1 at the time (1980). Very very quick and a successful driver in F2/F3000 and Sportscars, had a win ratio of almost 20% of races entered, drove in only 2 Grand Prix (+3 fails to qualify). Retired from racing aged only 27. Regarded by many as one of the greatest lost talents of the sport.
Ivan Capelli - 1985 to 93. Made F1 Debut in 1985, F3000 champion in 1986, raced for Leyton House March in F1 from 1987-1991, when the Leyton House was reliable Capelli was fast. Joined a Ferrari team in turmoil and never settled a total nightmare for an Italian driver, career peetered out after that.
Stefano Modena - 1986 to 93. One of the most hyped up drivers ever by the media, called by many the next Senna. Modena was super quick, but maybe lacked the mental toughness, let his head go down too often. 81 starts, had a 2nd and a 3rd in his career. Really should have done better. Martin Brundle had him as his team mate at Brabham for a season and he had raced alongside incredible talents like Stefan Bellof, Michael Schumacher and Mika Hakkinen, Modena was rated as good as these guys.
Roberto Moreno - 1982+1985+1987 to1992+1995. Its one of these mysteries why Roberto never became a top F1 driver, his record in the other catagories is supurb, raced everything and won in everything except in F1, spent far to many seasons in poor machinery and when he got his chance in a Benetton he gave his team mate and friend Nelson Piquet far to much respect and ended up being dropped for rising star Michael Schumacher. He did have a long career only retiring from racing in 2007 having raced on and off in Indycar/Champcars.
Bernd Schneider - 1988-90. Vastly underrated as a F1 driver, should have been in far better machinery than a Zakspeed. F1's loss was the DTM's gain though.
Alessandro Zanardi - 1991-94 + 1999. Almost certainly underachieved as a F1 driver maybe better suited to the more relaxed nature of Champ Cars. As a F1 driver was very quick, quicker than any team mate he was put up against in his 1st term and arguably regarded as quick as Michael Schumacher ( the 2 tested together at Benetton). Left F1 to race in Champcars before coming back to race for Williams, unfortunately he found it tough trying to adapt and returned to Champcars.
Alan McNish - 2002. His season at Toyota in 2002, doesn't really show how good he really was. Into F1 at least 12 years too late. This was a driver that matched and beat Mika Hakkinen in F3 in races and won races in many catagories, tried for years to get into F1 without success. I'm surprised Ron Dennis didn't give him a drive when Hakkinen was banned in 1994 for Hungary.
Jan Magnussen - 1995 to 1998. Probably one of the most frustrating drivers ever. Won more F3 races in a season than anyone up to that time. Raced for Jackie Stewart's team and more often than not was out qualified and out raced by team mate Rubens Barrichello and was eventually dropped, left F1 for racing in the USA.
Jacques Villeneuve - 1996 to 2006. World Champion within 2 years of stepping into F1. Jacques it could have said had fulfilled his potential as one of the sports rising talents, until you read that all his wins and pole positions were won within these first two years. Was it the supurb Adrian Newey designed Williams Renault that someone remarked that the car was so good that even the designer would have won races?. Maybe. But there is absolutely no doubt he was a talented driver but his move to British American Racing ended up as one of the worst career moves within the sport and almost certainly blunted his competitiveness and compromised his chances of ever becoming World Champion again, but made him one of the most highly paid drivers in the sport, which made many question his motives.
Giorgio Pantano - 2004. Race winner in F3000 joined the Jordan team for 2004. He was quick but spent to much time either of falling of the track or over driving, pointing to a need for this guy to calm down. Dropped down to the new GP2 series the following year and focused on improving which he did but never got another break into F1 despite winning the title in 2008. He came into F1 too early in 2004 but by 2008 he was more than ready but the team owners passed him over for the next generation of talent like Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel. He remains the only GP2 champ not to race in F1 after winning the title.
Sebastian Bourdais - 2008 to 2009. Probably should have driven in F1 about 4 or 5 years earlier instead of heading of to America to race in Champ Cars and likely would have had a long reasonably successful career. But Bourdais quickly found himself up against it at Toro Rosso with the future World Champion Sebastian Vettel. There was no doubt the car was a complex beast but Bourdais' constant tinkering with it and sending it the wrong way on set up always put him behind the young Vettel's less complicated approach and frustrated the mechanics. Watching Bourdais through out the season of 2008 you could visually see a man so wound up to be almost on the verge of tears anticipating the next mishap. He was unlucky at times but did create his own problems. After being given the hurry up by his team bosses he did and like his team mate began to qualify top 10. A very unlucky race in Belgium nearly got him on the podium after a suppurb race and also starring in practice and qualifiying. As Vettel was set to move to the Red Bull team for 2009, Bourdais should have been in a good position to make the team his, but again his performances dropped and he was often out paced by his new rookie team mate Sebastian Buemi and was finally dropped.
There are many others who never got the chance or decided against racing in F1 and you wonder how good they might have been like Helio Castro-Neves, Dario Franchitti, Kenny Brack, Thomas Scheckter, Gary Paffett and so on.
This post has been edited by CityDave: 18 September 2011 - 08:44
F_T_Y, on 11 September 2011 - 08:42, said:
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