I got to admit, we had nothing but beat downs this weekend from Road America to Circuit Paul Ricard to Sonoma. None of the races were close. The second Pirelli World Challenge race was good and the first World Superbike race from Laguna Seca was respectable. The most interesting thing might have been the traffic at Circuit Paul Ricard. It will not be clear until next Thursday and there are abandoned cars littered across Southern France. Team Penske is seven victories away from 500 victories as an organization. Here is a run down of what got me thinking.
Series Don't Make Drivers Great
Fernando Alonso won the 24 Hours of Le Mans and then travelled south to Le Castellet for the French Grand Prix and finished... It was the second time in as many years the Spaniard went to an unfamiliar place and was one of the best drivers on track. While his Indianapolis 500 debut did not end with as such a glorious result as his Le Mans debut, he did impress plenty, earning him a standing ovation and confirmed his standing as one of the best drivers in the world.
On the same top step stood Sébastien Buemi and Kazuki Nakajima, two drivers who have won championships in multiple different disciplines as well as many races in the FIA World Endurance Championship. However, neither is put on the same level as Alonso. The major difference is Formula One.
Alonso won two World Drivers' Championships and has 32 grand prix victories. He has 97 podium finishes. Buemi and Nakajima combined for zero World Drivers' Championship, zero grand prix victories and zero podium finishes. While Alonso's Formula One success should not be diminished, it has always been easy to dismiss those who either never raced in Formula One or had minimal success in Formula One. It is easy to say Buemi and Nakajima weren't good enough but there is a flaw when both have been successful everywhere else they have gone.
Every series believes it has the best drivers in the world. Formula One and NASCAR are tied for who says it the most. Formula One believes it and is more confident about it. NASCAR says it and is brash about and does it more to inflate its own worth. Both series believe you can succeed there then you can succeed anywhere and when a driver goes out and wins elsewhere it is another gold star on the board.
However, you can't cherry-pick and only take the good and ignore the unsuccessful or the less successful. While Alonso's success is taken for granted as a Formula One driver showing why that series consider itself the best in the world, Formula One has tot take responsibility for all the drivers. There are plenty of Formula One drivers who weren't winning races and were laughed at and have had success elsewhere. There are also Formula One drivers who were good drivers, won races and didn't match that level of success.
If Formula One will claim it has the best drivers in the world when Alonso succeeds then it can't distance itself when the likes of Max Chilton are mid-pack in IndyCar or when Rubens Barrichello was good but not great in IndyCar or when Scott Speed was mediocre in everything. And Formula One can't belittle other series when the likes of Buemi and Nakajima are winning races but weren't successful in Formula One.
The same goes with NASCAR. As quick it is dismiss drivers from open-wheel backgrounds when the likes of Dario Franchitti, Danica Patrick, Patrick Carpentier and well... Scott Speed were not competitive it can't make exceptions when IndyCar champion Tony Stewart becomes NASCAR champion Tony Stewart nor try to diminish Juan Pablo Montoya when he finished eighth in the Cup championship or try to say A.J. Allmendinger and Michael McDowell aren't that good when both keep getting Cup rides. If they weren't good teams wouldn't continue to hire them.
Great drivers are great drivers regardless of what they are driving. Some drivers succeed in multiple forms of motorsports and others don't but success in one does not guarantee success in all. Alonso is a great driver, not a great driver because he is in Formula One. Stewart was a great driver, not a great driver because he was in NASCAR. Scott Dixon is a great driver, not a great driver because he is in IndyCar. The best find a way and for some it takes time to adjust to a new car and the differences from one car to the next.
Kyle Larson won twice in a sprint car before Sonoma. He was winning in sprint cars before he was a NASCAR star. You can't just pluck any Cup driver and have him win twice in a week in a sprint car. You could take Jimmie Johnson, Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick, all past Cup champions, put them in a sprint car and none of them would come close to matching what Larson did.
There is not a hierarchy of series with one on top of the other. It is more of a quilt and talent is weaved through all. Some make it to Formula One while others don't but are successful in IndyCar and sports cars. There are those who are on a completely different path whether that is driving a stock car or a rally car. Some get to float around and try different things and some find success in all, others find success in more than one but struggle in others and then there are those are have only one fit.
Alonso's success doesn't mean Formula One gets to reassert itself as having the greatest drivers in the world. It reassert Formula One has a great driver in Alonso alongside Lewis Hamilton, Sebastian Vettel and Daniel Ricciardo to name a few. The same way IndyCar has a great driver in Sébastien Bourdais alongside Scott Dixon, Alexander Rossi and Will Power to name a few. The same way NASCAR has a great driver in Kyle Larson alongside Kyle Busch, Jimmie Johnson and Kevin Harvick to name a few.
No one series has all the great drivers; they are spread around the world in many different forms of motorsport. Some were in France this weekend, others were in Wisconsin and Sonoma, a few were climbing Pikes Peak, some are unknown competing at a racetrack you never heard of. One might be right behind you. Keep your eyes open.
Winners From the Weekend
You know about Josef Newgarden but did you know...
Colton Herta and Victor Franzoni split the Indy Lights races from Road America. It was Franzoni's first career Indy Lights victory. David Malukas swept the weekend in Pro Mazda, his first two victories in the series. Kyle Kirkwood swept the U.S. F2000 races.
Lewis Hamilton won the French Grand Prix.
George Russell and Nyck de Vries split the Formula Two races from Circuit Paul Ricard. Anthonie Hubert and Callum Ilott split the GP3 Series races.
Romain Dumas won the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb for the third consecutive year and his fourth overall.
Martin Truex, Jr. won the NASCAR Cup race from Sonoma. Justin Haley picked up his first career Truck series victory at Gateway.
Álvaro Parente and Michael Christensen split the Pirelli World Challenge GT races from Road America. Ian James swept the GTS races.
Jonathan Rea swept the World Superbike races at Laguna Seca.
Edoardo Mortara and Marco Wittmann split the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters races from the Norisring.
The #1 Belgian Audi Club Team WRT Audi of Christopher Mies and Alex Riberas swept the Blancpain Sprint Series weekend from Misano.
Yvan Muller, Mat'o Hamola and Thed Björk split the World Touring Car Cup races from Vila Real, Portugal.
Coming Up This Weekend
Formula One has its second of three consecutive races and it heads east to Austria.
IMSA returns with its third round of the North American Endurance Championship, the 6 Hours of the Glen.
MotoGP is in the Netherlands in July for the first time in a long time.
NASCAR's first race of July will be at Chicago.
Super GT heads to Thailand.
Covering All Motorsports. From Indianapolis to Le Mans, Daytona to Monaco.
