Who do you think has been the second best driver during the Shumacher era?

Answer 1

Rubens Barrichello without a doubt. Its kind of sad that most his career he was overshadowed by Micheal. Barrichello was more than capable of being Schumacher's "1b". "Rubinho", as he is often known, has continued to be successful thanks to Ferrari's dominance of Formula One: he managed to finish second behind Schumacher in the 2002 championship, as Ferrari ran away from the rest of the field. Team orders allowed Barrichello to earn four victories, with Schumacher trailing him each time by less than a second. Similar team orders also forced the Brazilian to cede to Schumacher some potential victories, such as the 2002 Austrian Grand Prix, where he pulled over at the last turn of the race. Such behaviour eventually led to team orders being banned in 2003.
In the 2004 season, Barrichello finished second behind teammate Michael Schumacher in seven of the first thirteen races, but he won both the Italian Grand Prix and the Chinese Grand Prix to clinch second place in the championship, finishing the year with an impressive 114 points and staggering 14 podiums — only one behind his teammate.

Answer 2

The only driver to have caused Michael Schumacher any real difficulties since the death of Ayrton Senna was Mika Hakkinen. For the two world championships which the two fought right down to the wire - 1998 and 1999 - both drivers were almost evenly matched. You could hardly have put a cigarette paper between the McLaren of Hakkinen and the Ferrari of Schumacher for speed and reliability. It was exhilarating stuff. Importantly, both drivers respected each other. Schumacher knew that Hakkinen was a worthy adversary and refrained from the dirty tricks for which he has deservedly earned notoriety with other drivers.

It has been suggested that Fernando Alonso is the measure of Schumacher that Hakkinen was. I don't think so personally. For all of last season and in the early part of this season, Schumacher simply did not have the equipment with which to challenge Alonso. As things evened out after Hockenheim, there emerged an opportunity for the two to go head to head. We havent really had it yet - we may well do after Monza this weekend (which, sadly, is probably going to be a Ferrari one-two).

I think Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen both have the potential to be the second best driver ever after Schumacher but it is too early to say this yet.

Answer 3

Well people may laugh but second best drivers during Schumachers era are:

1991 Andrea de Cesaris/Nelson Piquet
1992 Martin Brundle
1993 Riccardo Patrese
1994 Jos Verstappen/J.J Lehto
1995 Johnny Herbert
1996 - 1999 Eddie Irvine
2000 - 2005 Rubens Barrichello
2006 - Felipe Massa

In other words, Schumachers team mates. Though would have been interesting to see Ayrton Senna & Michael in equal machinery, it wouldn't have happened even if Senna had lived as Senna was already thinking of retiring, testing Indycars with Penske, and even a GT car! Mansell only won championship cos he had the best "active" car and it kept his sizeable a**e off the floor to win it, Prost (in 93 - during Schumacher era) same reason (with the exception of the a**e bit), as did Hill & Villeneuve, although was glad Villeneuve managed it.

One thing I really would have liked to see would have been Schumacher & rest of the current grid racing the Turbo F1 cars when at their peak (1500bhp +, slicks & no driver aids), now that would have sorted the men from the boys...

Answer 4

Judging by your words, you're making the uninformed assumption that Scumbagger was "the best". Below are the five best drivers of the past 10-12 years.

#1 - Mika Hakkinen. He won a title over Scumbagger when he had a slower car, and he beat Scumbagger easily when they had equal cars.

#2 - David Coulthard. He suffered the same fate at McLaren that Gilles Villeneuve suffered at Ferrari: a team that told him to wait his turn to be world champion and then screwed him. His driving at Red Bull for the last two years proves how great he is and could have been.

#3 - Jean Alesi. He was "the best driver never to be world champion" until Coulthard came along.

#4 - Jacques Villeneuve. In equal cars, he beat Scumbagger cleanly and outdrove him. Scumbagger had to cheat to win in 1997 and STILL got it wrong. Scumbagger has been caught cheating more times than he has "world championships", whether legit or phony.

#5 - Scumbagger. 2003 was the *only* legitimate title he won. Every other time, Scumbagger had *the* best car on the track. When Scumbagger had EQUALLY the best car (three times), he failed to win, and he NEVER won a title with a second rate car. Hakkinen, Prost and Senna all won a world championship with a second rate car.

Answer 5

Schumacher was never the best. The best drivers in his era were definitely:
1992- Nigel Mansell
1993- Alain Prost
1991-1994- Ayrton Senna
1994-1996- Damon Hill
1998-2001- Mika Hakkinen
2000-2004- Rubens Barrichello
2003-2005- Kimi Raikkonen and Fernando Alonso.

All these drivers are/were way better than Lord MS the Cheaterific.

Answer 6

Schumacher!

While he has been racing:
Ayrton Senna (1991)
Nigel Mansell (1992)
Alain Prost (1993)
Damon Hill (1994)
Jacques Villeneuve (1997)
Mika Hakkinen (1998/1999)
Fernando Alonso (2005)
have all been world champions!

Don't get me wrong, he is an excellent driver - but it is very hard to explain sportsmanship to my children when the World Champion cheats whenever he thinks he can get away with it! Has any driver been punished as many races as MSc? How can you say someone is a great driver when they have that sort of record?

So that is why I say that Michael Schumacher is the second best driver of the Schumacher era!!! (I would not like to say who the best driver was - probably Senna!)

Answer 7

Shumacher

Answer 8

Shumacher

Answer 9

Either Alain Prost or Ayrton Senna, IMO.

LOTS of sour grapes out there. How conveniently we forget that in 1997 when Schumacher and Villeneuve collided in the last race, it was only because F1 didn't want to give the title to Schumacher by default that Villeneuve was even in that race.

Villeneuve had the points lead going into the second to last race, but was suspended for a practice yellow flag infringement - his FOURTH of the season. During qualifying, Canadian Villeneuve was judged to have failed to slow his Williams-Renault at a danger point where yellow flags were being waved. Villeneuve was already driving under a suspended sentence from a previous infraction of the rules, and so was immediately disqualified.

Williams team filed a ridiculous protest, and F1 gave in because they wanted the drama of a championship down to the wire, plain and simple. In that second to last race in Japan, Villeneuve came out of the pits TWICE and deliberately tried to take out Schumacher. Both times Schumacher was forced to swerve hard to avoid Villeneuve, yet FOR SOME STRANGE REASON, nothing was done to Villeneuve for his dangerous driving.

Since he only posted 2 points in the race, Williams team decided to "forfeit" the points and accept the race in Japan as their suspension, which was correctly upheld. Wonder what they would have said had Villeneuve crossed the line first?

Speaking of Senna and Prost, in the second to last race of the 1990 season, with Prost second in the points and catching up, Senna deliberately took out Prost going into turn one and thus won the championship as Prost was mathematically eliminated. Despite the fact that it was obviously intentional, F1 again did nothing. Senna admitted it a few years later, and the telemetry data from the car also proved this.

BTW, did Prost and Senna have an unfair advantage in 1988 when their McLarens were clearly the two most superior cars on the track, and they won 15 of 16 races?

Answer 10

True enough, Michael Schumacher was the best driver for several years, but other years he was also second best (or lower) behind a list that includes:
Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna, (even) Nigel Mansell, Damon Hill, Jacques Villeneuve and Mika Hakkinen, none of whom had their season total of points taken away for antics such as those displayed by Schumacher v1.0 at Jerez in 1997.