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Is it Bottas or Leclerc?

Oh you don't know?

Well have a guess anyway.

Also to make things clear, I'm just asking about a comparison between the two as pure racers and not actually introducing aspects like Merc and Ferrari politics and how well said drivers are or are not backing up their "#1" team-mates.

Right now Bottas is even or maybe has a slight edge solely due to experience but we already know what his ceiling is. i.e. his current performance. Good on his day but not consistent enough.

Leclerc has a lot of room for improvement and his consistency will even out as he gains experience.

They're both pretty damn good. Both extremely quick. Both perhaps stronger in qualifying than they are in the race. I think Charles probably has a higher ceiling than Valteri but in terms of performance this season, it's hard to vote against Valteri. He has simply been a lot more consistent overall.

For a small period I wasn't so sure Leclerc was the 2nd driver! But yeah, he is yet to win a race and still a lot to learn. I think Valteri is ahead at the moment in consistency, although there have been races that he was relatively anonymous. But at the moment I'll give it to Bottas.

I think right now Leclerc is a fraction better. He's been a bit hamstrung by Ferrari's failings and a couple of his own mistakes.

Bottas has shown he is a guy who can have top tier pace maybe 25% of the time, be nowhere near 25% of the time and be a solid tier 2 the remaining 50% of the time. Hamilton probably has twice as many top weekends, and half as many off weekends as Bottas does.

Leclerc, already better and only likely to improve further.

Right now I would say that Valtteri is the better driver by a very slim margin. He is on his seventh season in Formula 1 and his third season in a top team. Charles is on his second season in Formula 1 and his first season in a top team. IMO the experience puts Valtteri just slightly ahead.

As others said we know what Valtteri's performance ceiling is and Charles has a lot of room left to rise. By the end of the year I believe that Charles could rise above the level of Valtteri's abilities. We will have to see.

Leclerc by miles.

Bottas, did not fare too well last year when other cars were competitive. He is just looking good because he is driving a car that broke records for being most dominant in the history of F1. He was beaten by Kimi in 2018so I will even put Kimi in front of him. He been good in qualy of late but that's about all he has going for himself.
Leclerc should not be considered 2nd driver. Ferrari have shown plenty of times that they are willing to move Vettel out of his way. He should be seen more as a rookie in a top team that is in a learning season

Invade wrote:Is it Bottas or Leclerc?

Oh you don't know?

Well have a guess anyway.

Also to make things clear, I'm just asking about a comparison between the two as pure racers and not actually introducing aspects like Merc and Ferrari politics and how well said drivers are or are not backing up their "#1" team-mates.

I would suggest that without considering the relevant team politics, it is impossible to compare the two.

In a more general way, I would say you need to give your definition of a 2nd driver. Last year we saw how Ricciardo reacted to team politics and their impact on the timescale of his career, something neither Vettel nor Hamilton necessarily have to do. But I don't doubt for a second that their teams' choices of 'other driver' included politics as a prime consideration.

At the risk of completely derailing the thread... doesn't this somewhat depend on your opinion of how Lewis and Seb compare? The reason I say that is because if you think both Charles and Valtteri are both about as close to their teammate as each other, that would almost immediately make Bottas better simply because Lewis is the better of the two team leaders. Being three tenths slower than Lewis is more of an achievement than being the same amount slower than Seb, IMO.

For me they're pretty similar right now anyway. Valtteri has weekends where he looks good alongside Lewis but in general, he's not quick enough to match him (but then again very few are). Charles has probably looked closer to Seb on average and I would say he definitely has a higher ceiling than Bottas, but he's still got to reach that ceiling.

Jenson's Understeer wrote:At the risk of completely derailing the thread... doesn't this somewhat depend on your opinion of how Lewis and Seb compare? The reason I say that is because if you think both Charles and Valtteri are both about as close to their teammate as each other, that would almost immediately make Bottas better simply because Lewis is the better of the two team leaders. Being three tenths slower than Lewis is more of an achievement than being the same amount slower than Seb, IMO.

For me they're pretty similar right now anyway. Valtteri has weekends where he looks good alongside Lewis but in general, he's not quick enough to match him (but then again very few are). Charles has probably looked closer to Seb on average and I would say he definitely has a higher ceiling than Bottas, but he's still got to reach that ceiling.

This is a key and intended part of the thread.

Jenson's Understeer wrote:At the risk of completely derailing the thread... doesn't this somewhat depend on your opinion of how Lewis and Seb compare? The reason I say that is because if you think both Charles and Valtteri are both about as close to their teammate as each other, that would almost immediately make Bottas better simply because Lewis is the better of the two team leaders. Being three tenths slower than Lewis is more of an achievement than being the same amount slower than Seb, IMO.

For me they're pretty similar right now anyway. Valtteri has weekends where he looks good alongside Lewis but in general, he's not quick enough to match him (but then again very few are). Charles has probably looked closer to Seb on average and I would say he definitely has a higher ceiling than Bottas, but he's still got to reach that ceiling.

Valtteri is a mature veteran driver. Charles is still work in progress and is getting better all the time. I would say he's a better driver now than he was back in Australia at the beginning of the year.

When Ferrari make the switch Vettel will be the better 2nd driver.

Ferrari currently doesn’t have a second driver.

Bottas is a textbook second driver, in terms of both talent and mentality.

KingVoid wrote:Ferrari currently doesn’t have a second driver.

Bottas is a textbook second driver, in terms of both talent and mentality.

Yeah I don't really see Leclerc as a second driver although Vettel is being favoured in race strategies, in out and out performance I wouldn't like to call who might come out on top.

KingVoid wrote:Ferrari currently doesn’t have a second driver.

No, I would be fairer to say they currently have two 1.5 drivers.

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

KingVoid wrote:Ferrari currently doesn’t have a second driver.

No, I would be fairer to say they currently have two 1.5 drivers.

It's all a matter of perspective. Not sure why the 1.5 designation for a 4 time WDC and a brilliant youngster. They are both #1s. Bottas is a #1 on most F1 teams as well so I think we do a disservice with the whole #2 title.

KingVoid wrote:Ferrari currently doesn’t have a second driver.

Bottas is a textbook second driver, in terms of both talent and mentality.

pokerman wrote:

KingVoid wrote:Ferrari currently doesn’t have a second driver.

Bottas is a textbook second driver, in terms of both talent and mentality.

Yeah I don't really see Leclerc as a second driver although Vettel is being favoured in race strategies, in out and out performance I wouldn't like to call who might come out on top.

Charles seems to be putting performances over the last couple of races to bring himself equal with Seb.

sandman1347 wrote:

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

KingVoid wrote:Ferrari currently doesn’t have a second driver.

No, I would be fairer to say they currently have two 1.5 drivers.

It's all a matter of perspective. Not sure why the 1.5 designation for a 4 time WDC and a brilliant youngster. They are both #1s. Bottas is a #1 on most F1 teams as well so I think we do a disservice with the whole #2 title.

Alain Prost is a 4x WDC, but if he was recruited by Ferrari he wouldn't be a number one driver anymore.

Vettel of 2013 was clearly a #1 driver. But at the moment Ferrari have an inexperienced driver, with talent, motivation and enthusiasm, and a veteran driver who is currently bogged down with the politics and media storm over his dip in form over the last 12 months, who one moment says he has a contract for two years, the next moment strongly implies he could walk, only for the next moment to say he didn't mean that.

At the moment Vettel has the primary support of his race team, is edging Leclerc on performance, but is gives the impression of frustration and feeling the heat, as well as cracking at the more critical moments. Leclerc has been behind Vettel more often than ahead - but that's been down to greater inconsistency, which is unsurprising for an inexperienced driver in his first year with a major team. The difference being, that Leclerc has managed to deliver standout performances from the car (Bahrain, Austria) and those victories were lost due to a malfunctioning engine and a questionable tyre strategy. Whether or not Vettel's penalty was deserved in Canada, is irrelevant, the whole incident occurred because he made a critical error under pressure, and there would have been no stewards inquiry had he kept it on the track. And even if we forget that, it's still 2-1 in favour of Leclerc in terms of almost victories.

So, no - at the moment Vettel being a 4 WDC doesn't automatically make him an out and out number 1 driver. Contractually he is, but he's not delivering as one. The word 'currently' was the key word in my sentence.

Contractually? Proof please, Alien.

Blake wrote:Contractually? Proof please, Alien.

I thought it was common knowledge Ferrari had stipulated Vettel was the favoured driver, but here you go:

https://www.espn.com/f1/story/_/id/2600 ... arly-races

Alienturnedhuman wrote:

Blake wrote:Contractually? Proof please, Alien.

I thought it was common knowledge Ferrari had stipulated Vettel was the favoured driver, but here you go:

https://www.espn.com/f1/story/_/id/2600 ... arly-races

That is not necessarily a contract though, Alien. That is the primary point. Also the article does state that it is for the early races...a contract would not likely state it is only in effect for a partial schedule, would it?

Alien you have to get a copy of his contract and his approval to post here

FormulaFun wrote:Alien you have to get a copy of his contract and his approval to post here

Oh, I don't know about that. They let you post here.


The point is...when one states that something is in the contract, it is most often conjecture and often likely incorrect. Barring the release of the contract, it can't be proven. I know Alien understands where I am coming from on this, but...It certainly is not something that I can prove.

The thing about contracts is that people always seem so sure when claiming certain drivers have No. 1 status but nobody seems to have the same kind of evidence or proof that other drivers are on equal status contracts.

Truth is that 99.9% of the world don't actually have a clue.

Blake wrote:

FormulaFun wrote:Alien you have to get a copy of his contract and his approval to post here

Oh, I don't know about that. They let you post here.


The point is...when one states that something is in the contract, it is most often conjecture and often likely incorrect. Barring the release of the contract, it can't be proven. I know Alien understands where I am coming from on this, but...It certainly is not something that I can prove.

I never said it was in his literal contract - and never meant to - I have no idea what is written in his contract and as far as I know it's not a public document so no one can know. Clearly, the use of the word 'contractually' was a poor choice of words - and I will happily change them if people are unhappy with the ambiguity they have created - but amazingly when writing a quick reply to a forum post I am not going to spend the time proof reading it as I would to a dissertation. The point in my post was that Ferrari were officially backing one driver over the other, which if people want to get really pedantic about it, could constitute a 'verbal' contract.

Given that Ferrari have been publicly backing Vettel over Leclerc when they have to choose between them (as was still evident in their handling of the safety car pit strategies yesterday, as the level of incompetence required to accidentally do that to Leclerc yesterday doesn't exist in Formula 1, not even with the Haas drivers) I don't see how whether it was written into his contract or not makes any difference to the salient point I was making.

I was going to pic Vettel... but that option is missing

Asphalt_World wrote:The thing about contracts is that people always seem so sure when claiming certain drivers have No. 1 status but nobody seems to have the same kind of evidence or proof that other drivers are on equal status contracts.

Truth is that 99.9% of the world don't actually have a clue.

Hmm...no 1 status determined by contract...

Contract: A document between two parties, created by lawyers in a manner such that each party believes it says what they would like it to say, but true meaning is, by design, subject to expensive and differing interpretation by lawyers.

So even the 0.1% that have a clue, have just that: a clue. There is no definitive answer on the basis of contracts.