Formula 1 isn’t just a sport where cars spin around a track. Apart from the contribution of this sport to technology and engineering, the characters of the racers have given us the opportunity to watch unique stories for many years. Some rivalries remained on the track, while others spilled over the track.
For books and movies, it’s often said that a hero can only be as good as the story’s bad. Just as Luke is alone without Darth Vader and Batman without the Joker, the same goes for legendary racers in Formula 1.
Alain Prost vs Nigel Mansell
Nigel Mansell, one of the greatest drivers England has ever produced, was not a good fit for the rest of the circuit. Although Mansell was the last racer Enzo Ferrari had personally chosen, he did not fit in very well with the team. The other driver of the team, Alain Prost, was a three-time world champion and he immediately adapted to the team with his fluent Italian speaking.
At the 1990 British GP, Mansell realized something was wrong with his car. Later, the British pilot, who pressed the team engineers about this issue, learned that his vehicle was replaced with Prost’s vehicle without being asked. The reason for this was that, according to Prost, the vehicle given to Mansell was better.
Withdrawing from the race, Mansell announced that he would leave F1 completely at the end of the season. Williams team boss Frank Williams convinced Mansell to become the first driver for his team. In 1993, when he learned that Prost would join Williams, he definitely put an end to his Formula 1 career this time.
Nelson Piquet vs Nigel Mansell
Mansell’s early Williams years were also eventful. Piquet, who joined Williams as a two-time world champion in 1986, thought that he should be the first driver of the team. Mansell, on the other hand, had a different view.
Mansell often faced Piquet on the track. For this reason, Piquet chose not to share his technical knowledge of the car with his teammate. In 1986, while Prost was the champion, the Williams drivers were bickering among themselves. After the 1987 season, this fight came to an end when Piquet left the team.
Ayrton Senna vs Alain Prost
Arguably the biggest rivalry in Formula 1 history is the rivalry between Senna and Prost. Both drivers were fighting for the McLaren team to reach the top of Formula 1. Let’s face it, both pilots were very good and there was only one seat at the top.
The accident between Senna and Prost in the 1989 Japanese GP ignited the fight between the two. The championship went to Prost when Senna was disqualified from the wrong turn on the track. That year, Prost won his third title, while McLaren was the constructors’ champion. That year, 21 teams participated in the championship and 39 pilots appeared on the track.
A year later, Prost was at Ferrari this time. The two met once again in Suzuka. While the duo crashed again, Senna was the champion at the end of the year. Prost called Senna “a man without values” at the time. Senna, on the other hand, explained in a statement a year later that he had done that accident on purpose.
When Alain Prost went to race in Brazil in 1993, he was traveling with police protection. It was met with a huge backlash in Brazil.
However, this story was finally set in motion. Senna, who won the last race of Prost, took the former world champion to the podium and hugged him. Prior to Senna’s accident, Prost was now a commentator. “Dear friend Alain, we miss you,” Senna told Prost over the radio, who was on a special tour for the audience.
Prost, on the other hand, said in an interview he gave in the pit area that they are no longer rivals and that they can be friends in the future. However, this conversation between them was the last conversation of the duo.
Mika Hakkinen vs Michael Schumacher
The love of Formula 1 for a generation in Turkey and around the world started with the rivalry of Mika Hakkinen, a flying Finn, and Michael Schumacher, for whom Ferrari had been waiting for a long time. In the 1998 season, Hakkinen became the champion with the monster MP4/13 under him.
In 1999, Schumacher missed his chance to win the title when he was injured in an accident at Silverstone. In 2000, the winner was Schumacher, who was preparing to start a new domination this time. On the other hand, the two drivers had great respect for each other, both on and off the track, despite their rivalry on the track.
Fernando Alonso vs Lewis Hamilton
In 2007, Alonso and Lewis Hamilton came together under the umbrella of the McLaren team. Alonso, who has two world championships, entered into a serious rivalry with Hamilton. That season, the duo repeatedly made political moves against each other within the team. Moreover, both drivers complained that the team did not allow them to compete.
At the end of that season, Spanish driver Hamilton said goodbye to the team and returned to Renault, where he started his career. Both drivers finished the season with 109 points and 4 wins. Alonso blocked Hamilton at the Hungarian GP and was therefore penalized. The bench penalties the duo received that season brought a miraculous championship by one point to Ferrari driver Kimi Raikkonen, who came silently but deeply at the end of the year.
Lewis Hamilton vs Nico Rosberg
In the turbo-hybrid era, Mercedes AMG’s undisputed dominance combined with perhaps the most consistent driver of all time, Lewis Hamilton, resulted in a huge domination. The only person who could stop Hamilton was another Mercedes AMG driver.
Rosberg, who has been with the team since Mercedes returned to Formula 1 in 2010, also gave the team its first win in the 2012 Chinese GP. Hamilton joined the team in 2013, and Mercedes’ dominance began the following year.
Actually, there was a friendship between the two at first, but after the events, they both started to grind their teeth at each other. After the 2014 Belgian accident, Hamilton blamed Rosberg. In 2015, Rosberg threw the podium cap back to Hamilton, which Hamilton was holding in his hand. Even today, these iconic moments appear frequently on the Internet.
In 2016, Hamilton did his best to stop Rosberg in the title fight. In the final race of the year, Hamilton tried to hold back his teammate so that those behind could catch up and overtake Rosberg. The result was not what Hamilton expected and Rosberg said goodbye to Formula 1 after winning the championship in 2016.
Bonuses:
Raikkonen vs McLaren cars
In the early years of his career, Kimi Raikkonen was a controversial name. This unknown young Finn had succeeded Hakkinen, the “Flying Finn”. To sum up, in those years Raikkonen would sometimes win, and sometimes he would decide not to race McLaren.
Senna and Bergher
Although the two drivers were rivals on the same team, Senna led the team on the track and Bergher led the team off the track. “Senna taught me how to drive, I taught her how to laugh,” said Bergher, a true party and entertainer.
Raikkonen and Vettel
When you put two world champions on the most popular team in the world, you expect a big fight between them. That wasn’t the case at all when Raikkonen and Vettel got together at Ferrari. When the two got together, they were playing badminton and chatting for hours.
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