Which Formula 1 Driver is Under the Most Pressure?
Formula 1 racing might be the most pressure-filled form of motorsports. Much of this has to do with the costs associated with the sport. Formula 1 cars are the most technologically advanced in all of racing and teams spend incredible amounts of money on developing cars and preparing them for races. This includes giving drivers multimillion dollar contracts to drive for them. When team owners are spending tens of millions of dollars in a season, they expect results and the driver is the person who usually receives the brunt of the criticism when things aren’t going well.
Simply put, it’s tough for an unhappy team principal to fire his entire team. However, drivers are much more interchangeable. Even drivers who are locked into multi-year contracts are vulnerable to losing their seat at any time; they either have buy-out clauses written into their contracts or teams are willing to just eat their salary to get them off the books and start fresh with a new driver.
Pressure behind the wheel
As the Formula 1 season enters its second half, almost every driver has to be experiencing some pressure to perform and finish the season strong. However, this is more important for some drivers than others. For a few drivers, the pressure to do well in the second half of 2010 will be intense - and in some cases could even be the difference between them having a ride or not next season.
Making Schumacher sweat
There is probably no driver who is feeling more pressure to perform on the track than Michael Schumacher. When the seven-time world champion announced before the start of the season that he was returning to the sport after a three-year retirement and would be driving for the new Mercedes team, he cautioned that it would take some time for him to get back up to speed. However, fans are still waiting for glimpses of the previously dominant Schumacher midway through the season and are beginning to wonder if that driver will ever reappear.
Schumacher has been a non-factor this season; in fact, he hasn’t even been the best driver on his own team as his young teammate Nico Rosberg has outperformed him. After Silverstone, Rosberg was sixth in the Drivers’ Championship after scoring a third-place finish in the British Grand Prix while Schumacher was a shocking ninth. The fact that the “second” car has been doing so much better than Schumacher’s has eliminated his ability to blame the equipment for his lack of success.
Throughout the first half of the season, Schumacher has remained defiant that his comeback is a multi-year process and that the troubles in the early part of the season have been natural. However, news that a top Mercedes official recently travelled to meet with former world champion Kimi Raikkonen has caused further speculation about Schumacher’s future. Raikkonen moved to the rally cars this year but has been poised to return to the sport in 2011. Most people felt he would move to Renault to support Robert Kubica but news of the meeting caused many people to speculate that he would be replacing Schumacher at Mercedes (through Schumacher leaving voluntarily or otherwise).
Massa made to muse about mediocrity
Schumacher isn’t the only driver who will be under extreme pressure during the second half of the 2010 season. The Ferrari team has performed below expectations after a solid start to the year, and there were rumours that Felipe Massa would be leaving. Massa signed a contract extension although that hasn’t stopped some speculation about his future. And the McLaren team of Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button has their own unique brand of pressure - sitting first and second in the standings, anything less than a world title and Constructors’ Championship will be considered a bitter disappointment.
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