What Do Records Mean In Formula One?
Records are made to be broken. This is the mantra of anyone who either sets a new record, or whose achievement is about to be outmatched. This is especially true of records set in sport. But not all sports are created equal. When the 100m dash is broken, the plaudits are very easily given to the person who set the new time.
However, when Lewis Hamilton won his 92nd Formula One race at Portimao last weekend, and thus breaking the record for most F1 race wins, it is not as simple as praising it all on Hamilton himself. Obviously, the British driver immensely deserves the credit for his accomplishment, and should no doubt be considered one of the greatest to ever do it in the sport, if not the greatest.
That said, it is just not the same as when Rafael Nadal equalled Roger Federer for the number of grand slam titles at the French Open earlier this month. What Nadal achieved has so much more self-control than anything any F1 driver has ever done.
Records in F1 cannot be framed around the individual in ways that individual records in even a team sport like football can be, where credit is easily distributed. Football is a much more meritocratic sport than F1 is, which means the narrative surrounding any world championship or race win or pole position is much more nuanced than Lionel Messi scoring 91 goals in a calendar year (2012), which broke Gurd Muller’s 40-year old record.
Again, Hamilton richly deserves praise for what he has done in F1 and there is little doubt surrounding his greatness. This is not to denigrate what he has achieved in the sport, but rather to frame his record in a way that F1 itself can be analysed, and what it means to break a record in the sport.
To put it another way, when Kimi Raikkonen started the Eifel Grand Prix, his 327th F1 race start, his accomplishment of becoming the driver with the most F1 Grand Prix starts ever was worthy of the non-celebration the Finn enjoyed that Sunday.
The first F1 race was in 1950. Just last year, at the Chinese GP, the FIA celebrated the 1000th race in the sport’s history. Since then there have been 30 more race weekends. So that means Raikkonen has competed in 31.8% of all F1 races. While this is a staggering statistic, it is so interesting not because it shows Raikkonen’s longevity — though he does deserve credit for that — but it shows how the sport has evolved in 70 years.
The average F1 season consists of 14.7 races. However, modern F1 seasons now consistently contain at least 20 races a year. The 2021 calendar was proposed to the 10 teams this week and it had 23 races listed. The F1 season is getting longer and longer.
It is only now that there is becoming an equalisation in platform. Beyond 23 races, there is not much room to fit in any more races in any given year. It could also be argued that adding any more would dilute the season as the more races there are the quicker a champion can be crowned and the more dead-rubber Grands Prix there will be.
It goes without saying that Hamilton would not have achieved this feat but for his Mercedes team. A driver can only perform as good as his car will allow him to. This hybrid era, which started in 2014, has seen an unprecedented level of dominance by a constructor. The German team has won the double every year since the regulation changes six years ago, and will no doubt go on to win a seventh title within the next few races.
Hamilton will no doubt also go on to win many more races before he retires, he will almost certainly overtake Michael Schumacher’s record of seven world titles as long as he continues to outclass his teammate Valterri Bottas. The Finn is the only one with the tools to compete with Hamilton, the Red Bull of Max Verstappen simply is not quick enough.
Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff recently hit back out at those who tried to downplay Hamilton’s achievements with the car.
“Winning races and winning championships is something you do with a team, but you have to get yourself into the position of being in the best car,” said Wolff.
“You can see that many talented drivers have made wrong choices.”
“I don’t want to hear anyone say that he drives a Mercedes and therefore wins races. The drivers who say that they should take a good look at why they are not driving a Mercedes.”
While Wolff is right that some drivers’ decision making skills with their career paths has denied them the chance to compete for the records that Hamilton is breaking, most notably Fernando Alonso and, to a lesser extent, Sebastian Vettel.
However, by failing to replace Bottas with a more capable driver, Wolff has also denied fans the chance to see who the best driver really is. As noted on this newsletter before, Bottas is simply not to the standard of Hamilton.
Over the years there have been far more deserving drivers overlooked for the sake of caution and safety. It is simply far easier for Mercedes to have a clear number one and number two driver. Bottas replaced Nico Rosberg in 2017 after his surprise retirement following his 2016 world championship.
Those three years of 2014–2016 saw Hamilton and Rosberg go toe-to-toe almost every race and was a far more entertaining period of F1 than what we have seen in 2019–2020. But the volatility that surrounded the team through the bitter rivalry of Rosberg and Hamilton has seen Mercedes avoid that same situation again by keeping Bottas in as a steady second hand.
Mercedes are not the first to follow this tactic, of course, but such is their dominance that now the F1 season is simply too predictable. Going into 2021, the final year of the current regulations, there is no sign that their dominance will end and a sure eighth title will no doubt arrive.
Bottas was useful in 2017 and 2018 when Ferrari posed a legitimate threat to their world title. Most notably, Bottas was sacrificed at Monza in 2018 to ensure Hamilton had a better chance at overtaking Raikkonen for the race win. This worked a treat, and thus Bottas proved his worth. But now, Mercedes don’t need a wingman and F1 fans don’t need to see another procession.
What most highlights just how pointless an exercise it is to look at most race wins, most championships or most pole positions, is by looking at the praise given to Vettel in 2013 following his fourth world title in a row in the Red Bull. Vettel won the last nine races of the season to claim his title in India, this remains the record for most race wins in a row and Hamilton’s comments following the German’s victory is very illuminating.
“[Vettel] is in a class of his own, and he is on his way to becoming the greatest driver in F1, if he is not already,” said Hamilton.
Since then, Vettel’s reputation has taken a knock following his struggles at Ferrari. While Vettel had two seasons with a car that could legitimately fight Mercedes consistently for race wins, the gap was still clear come the end of the season. As Vettel pushed himself to make up for the gap, mistakes creeped into his driving and ultimately this made things easier for Hamilton who remained almost faultless under the pressure.
Even other drivers on the grid have now expressed their frustration at the plaudits on Hamilton, a tinge of jealousy perhaps at the fortune of being such a dominant car or maybe due to the media attention surrounding the records and the lack of context given to what that record means. Lando Norris, following the record breaking race on Sunday, spoke out about how he felt on the occasion.
“It doesn’t mean anything to me, really. He’s in a car which should win every race, basically,” said the McLaren driver.
“He has to beat one or two other drivers, that’s it. Fair play to him, he’s still doing the job he has to do.”
Norris has since apologised for these comments, but the critique is revealing. He is not alone in thinking Hamilton is “doing the job he has to do.”
Alonso was famously very critical of Vettel’s success during the 2010–2013 era of dominance.
Well, I think you’ve been in the right place at the right time. And although everyone now thinks that it was known, it’s a bit of stroke of luck,” says the Spaniard about Vettel’s world titles.
“When Red Bull achieved four titles in a row, I think it was difficult for everyone to think that an energy drink was going to dominate F1 four years in a row against giants like Ferrari, McLaren, Mercedes,” says Alonso.
“So that was a stroke of luck and Vettel has four titles worldwide.”
It was Alonso who ended Schumacher’s era of dominance from 2000–2004, when he won his two world titles in 2005 and 2006. The Spaniard returns to the sport for 2021, with his eyes already firmly set on being the man to break Hamilton’s dominance in 2022.
F1 cars these days are as fast as they’ve ever been, but with the pace with which we are seeing Hamilton break every record in the sport, it is beginning to get boring just as quickly as his car wins every Grand Prix.
Fans are being deprived of close competition for the number one prize. Hamilton’s greatness is not in question, but it sure would be nice to see him prove just how great he is every weekend by earning his race results the hard way. Records might be made just to be broken, but fans’ spirit has long been broken seeing him do it so easily.
