Formula 1 Pirelli Gran Premio de España 2022Formula 1 

  • Thread starter Jimlaad43
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Magog
By whom?
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Mercedes-Benz, for whom Schumacher drove the C9-C11 in WSC back in those days, literally paid Eddie Jordan 150 000$ USD to have him replace Bertrand Gachot at Spa in 1991.
 
-Fred-
Michael Schumacher either, arguably the greatest pay driver of all time.
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No. Schumacher was a Mercedes junior driver. Mercedes wanted to give him some experience before they made him one of the Sauber-Mercedes F1 drivers, which they eventually did with Wendlinger. Briatore then stole him away and the rest is history.

Firstly, this is no different from how Leclerc and Russell (among many others) started in F1. As junior drivers loaned out to a small team. Notice how they're already picked up by a big team on merit. They are not paying for anything, their team is compensating the smaller team for having to use their facilities on a driver they'll never get to use in their prime. Sauber spent a year on training Leclerc, only for him to be taken away from them to win races at Ferrari. Ofcourse teams will want to get financially compensated for that. That doesn't mean these drivers are forced into F1, they belong there. Red Bull has the luxury of having a second team they can do anything they want with, but Ferrari, Mercedes and Alpine don't (though even Red Bull has loaned out drivers). They have to do this to get their hands on loyal, experienced young drivers for their first team.

Secondly, Schumacher was bought out from his Mercedes contract after one race. He couldn't possibly be the greatest "pay driver" of all time if it only lasted one race.
 
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-Fred-
Spider Man Lol GIF


He's not Taki Inoue or Jean-Denis Deletraz, but he's not Michael Schumacher either, arguably the greatest pay driver of all time.
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Schumacher or Lauda definitely the best pay drivers.
 
NICKname
No. Schumacher was a Mercedes junior driver. Mercedes wanted to give him some experience before they made him one of the Sauber-Mercedes F1 drivers, which they eventually did with Wendlinger.
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There was no Mercedes F1 team at that time. Mercedes had already given up on entering a works team by 1991. Sauber's 1993 effort is immaterial to this specific conversation.

What there was at the time though, was an intentional effort from Bernie Ecclestone to get a top German driver into Formula One. Schumacher and Frentzen were both sponsored by the National Motorsports Committee.

To replace Bertrand Gachot, Jordan could have chosen from 50 drivers. Mercedes literally paid for Michael Schumacher to get his start in Formula One. He might have been paid after that but there is no escaping that Michael Schumacher was a pay driver even if for just one race.

Point being, people's idea of what pay driver means needs perspective and the Schumacher example is a clear example of that.
 
Almost every driver is a pay driver in one way or another. Vettel and Hamilton as far as I know never had any personal sponsors because they were picked by driver academies early on. Drivers like like Latifi, Stroll, Mazepin; or hell, going further back; Yamamoto and Friesacher, are just more extreme examples because of the ratio of speed to money.
 
Stroll Sr bought the Prema F3 team as well while Lance was getting his F3 title in a dwindling field with preferential treatment. He spent 80 mil just to get Lance into F1.
 
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NICKname
No. Schumacher was a Mercedes junior driver. Mercedes wanted to give him some experience before they made him one of the Sauber-Mercedes F1 drivers, which they eventually did with Wendlinger. Briatore then stole him away and the rest is history.

Firstly, this is no different from how Leclerc and Russell (among many others) started in F1. As junior drivers loaned out to a small team. Notice how they're already picked up by a big team on merit. They are not paying for anything, their team is compensating the smaller team for having to use their facilities on a driver they'll never get to use in their prime. Sauber spent a year on training Leclerc, only for him to be taken away from them to win races at Ferrari. Ofcourse teams will want to get financially compensated for that. That doesn't mean these drivers are forced into F1, they belong there. Red Bull has the luxury of having a second team they can do anything they want with, but Ferrari, Mercedes and Alpine don't (though even Red Bull has loaned out drivers). They have to do this to get their hands on loyal, experienced young drivers for their first team.

Secondly, Schumacher was bought out from his Mercedes contract after one race. He couldn't possibly be the greatest "pay driver" of all time if it only lasted one race.
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To my mind that is in no way being a pay driver. It's still another racing team sponsoring the drive. If Bayer paid for his seat because he was German and they wanted to sell more aspirin then that would be a pay driver.
 
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Magog
It's still another racing team sponsoring the drive.
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But not an F1 racing team. Mercedes had no F1 presence at the time - it left F1 famously (or infamously) in 1955 and didn't return until 2010*. This was a company giving an F1 racing team money to have the driver it funded in a seat in an F1 car. That's a pay driver.

Pro drivers are paid by the team (as well as sponsors) to drive. Pay drivers pay money (via their sponsors) to the team to drive.


Mick Schumacher is also a pay driver. Ferrari and key sponsor 1&1/IONOS pay for his seat. Haas does not pay him.

I haven't checked since his move to Red Bull, but even when he was at Aston Martin, Sergio Perez was a pay driver. His seat at Sauber came from his Telmex sponsorship, and he brought Carlos Slim's money to Force India too.


*Unless you count the days of Ilmor engines, but that was 1994, after Schumacher's Jordan drive.
 
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Famine
But not an F1 racing team. Mercedes had no F1 presence at the time - it left F1 famously (or infamously) in 1955 and didn't return until 2014. This was a company giving an F1 racing team money to have the driver it funded in a seat in an F1 car. That's a pay driver.

Pro drivers are paid by the team (as well as sponsors) to drive. Pay drivers pay money (via their sponsors) to the team to drive.


Mick Schumacher is also a pay driver. Ferrari and key sponsor 1&1/IONOS pay for his seat. Haas does not pay him.

I haven't checked since his move to Red Bull, but even when he was at Aston Martin, Sergio Perez was a pay driver. His seat at Sauber came from his Telmex sponsorship, and he brought Carlos Slim's money to Force India too.
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Telcel are 3rd on the list of Red Bull partners (a Telmex subsidiary) and it's reported they bought money with them to Red Bull, INTERproteccion also came with him as well, so there's definitley some pay backing that will have been attractive for RB with Perez.
 
PeterJB
Almost every driver is a pay driver in one way or another. Vettel and Hamilton as far as I know never had any personal sponsors because they were picked by driver academies early on. Drivers like like Latifi, Stroll, Mazepin; or hell, going further back; Yamamoto and Friesacher, are just more extreme examples because of the ratio of speed to money.
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They all payed to be in karting lol. No one is holding trials for talent like football. Wonder how many potential legends we've missed out on because natural talents could never dream of even going karting for financial reasons.
 
Guess Red Bull will soon drop the AM issue given how they're still down the back.

Also not looking good for Alpine.
 
Good pole for LEC but going by the FP pace, I sadly can see VER easily taking this in the race as long as his car works. The RB seems to still have the edge.
 
It’s gone from, “Can Merc even make it to Q2/3” to a comfortable Q3 finish around the Top 5. They were even able to out qualify one of the Red Bulls w/ George.
 
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Veinz
Who the hell is this guy in the yellow outfit at the Ferrari garage?
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I believe like in Miami Lapo Elkann, Brother to Ferrari Executive Chairman John Elkann.

4 times awarded as best dressed man by Vanity Fair :D

elkann.jpg
 
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Ricciardo is so lucky Norris had his lap stolen from him. Ricciardo has firmly established himself as the second driver at McLaren. The rest of his career is going to just be riding the F1 carousel until his mom says it's time to go home and get to bed. And maybe too early to say but I think Hamilton is sitting on the little silver horsey next to Ricciardo.
 
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Here are the updated qualifying averages:

Leclerc +0.005
Verstappen +0.239
Sainz +0.308
Perez +0.331
Russell +0.917
Bottas +0.981
Hamilton +1.189
Gasly +1.270
Norris +1.282
Ocon +1.293
Alonso +1.303
Magnussen +1.549
Ricciardo +1.635
Tsunoda +1.693
Schumacher +1.728
Zhou +1.789
Stroll +2.099
Vettel +2.301
Albon +2.406
Latifi +3.180
 

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