LOL, mario andretti? In the same company as MS, Senna, Fangio, Prost, or lauda?
With all due respext not in my book.
mario couldn't hold a ride in F1 so he went back to the minor leagues where he did pretty good.
Now he's hocking cheap mufflers in commercials.

It doesn't matter IMO, whether he is or isn't the greatest driver of all time. His show of emotion at the end of the race shows me he's human. Were I in his shoes, I'd rather be respected as a mere mortal, wearing heart on one's sleeve, than placed on some pedestal, deserved or not.

He showed great character before and during the post-race interview, and he gets a lot of points from me. A good person with good character trumps "greatest" any day of the week.

He's done more for F1 than anyone else in history. . . with the possible exception of the current stewards who are doing everything in their power to sensationalize the hell out of the championship. It wouldn't even surprise me to find out they sabotaged Alonzo's car so the engine would blow up just to make the driver's championship closer. I'm utterly disgusted with the stewardship's arbitrary and selective enforcement of the "rules" this year. Schumi's getting out at a good time before F1 becomes its own worst enemy between that and the idiotic homolagation rules regarding no engine upgrades for five years. Utter bunk.

Anyway, I've always admired Schumi's legacy as a driver. He has put up the big numbers but the big asterisk next to his name will be "but at what cost"? He's a terrible sportsman, completely arrogant and generally a jackass. But he is a good driver. He's kind of like most of the Dallas Cowboys in that regard - good players, but the biggest d1ckheads out there. Ultimately not worth rooting for. Though I respect the talent, I think it's ultimately wasted.

F1 will be better for his having been here. . . and for his leaving.

I actually like MS a lot more after this season. Maybe it's seeing how FA behaved as champion to realize that by comparison MS wasn't as big a jerk.

I have a softspot for Senna and think he was the most talented driver of all time. But he wasn't the most "sporting" guy out there either. Face it...to compete at that level, you have to be incredibly talented and fear very little. That type of personality is not going to be particularly generous or "nice." All things considered, MS has been a pretty good ambassador for F1. He is eloquent, works harder than probably *any* athlete around (except maybe Armstrong when he was racing), and is a student of both the art and science of racing.

Say what you want about him having a good "team" around him, but that is part of being a champion....picking those that are around you. Todt, Brawn et all are all people that are part of his package...but it didn't happen by magic. That is part of the intangibles of sport...the true champions not only have skills, but surround themselves with people that riase their game.

I hope he wins out the season and goes out on the highest of notes. He's worked for it. He deserves it.

And the stewards suck :p

++++1

Bravo!! Bravo!!!

I wish I could have said that myself. Well said.

Can't say who is the greatest of all time, but if we did a top ten in no specific order, Schumacher, Senna and Prost would be in mine automatically, as would Stewart, Andretti, Moss and Nuvolari. We will never know how good Niki Lauda could have been because even though he was still winning after the accident at the Ring, he was not quite the same and also had to lay out for a good long time. Similar argument for Mark Donahue. He won everywhere he went. It would have been very interesting if he had been able to compete in F1. He is kinda the motorsports equivelant of Jimi Hendrix or Duane Allman....we have no way of knowing just how much he would have accomplished, bit we are sure that it would have been quite a spectacle to watch. I would also consider Jackie Ickx, Rosemeyer, Petty, Foyt and at least one of the recent Audi pilots (maybe Christensen)for an extended list. The problem you have nowadays is that a goodly number of very talented chaps will never get an F1 ride simply because they can't fit into the cars....lol. Most promising guy for a long tenure at the top is Alonso. Schumacher was singing his praises a few years back when he was still driving low rent equipment. Youngsters like Marco Andretti will also bear watching. It is tough to be an all around driver today because the schedules and the business side of any of the major racing series are so demanding.......all of the team owners and sponsors probably have nightmares about incidents like Dale Jr. almost burning up in that Vette in a race that was, from the Nascar perspective, fairly low rent.......Junior doing a favor for Chevy and having a bit of fun on the side. And we haven't even mentioned the motorcycle greats. If he sticks with MotoGP or if he eventually hass success on four wheels, 10 years from now, we may be making a very legitimate argument that Valentino Rossi is the greatest racer of all time.

Any of you guys think that Schumacher will be back next year in a Renault???

Only if he feels that half a billion dollars isn't enough seed capital for a business empire.....lol

MS is a great driver, no doubt about that
but to call him the greatest driver of all time ,mweh , i rather give that title to mr Jacky Icxk, who drove hard in F1 , GT racing and Dakar
and won in all 3... with trickier cars... less electronics, less safety, tracks that were longer and more difficult...

I have to put in another vote for Prost. What MS has accomplished is nothing short of amazing (and I am a big MS fan), but Prost had this incredible ability to drive really, really hard and be easy on the equipment at the same time. They didn't call him the "Professor" for nothin'...

Senna had tremendous talent, but he would often do stupid things. Try a risky move on a backmarker with the race well in hand and screw it up and take himself out of the race.

I also think that someone like Colin McRae needs an honorable mention. Those WRC guys are nuts...

Mike

This is where you lose credibility with me MFAFF- the clear implication here being that MS did not achieve success in a manner that "demonstrated his ability and skill as superior to the others.." but because he ensured "that others were unable to win".

That, with respect, is crap. MS has demonstrated his skill and superiority consistently over many years. He holds more records than anyone in the sport. You think, on the basis of a handful of racing incidents, that his record is what it is because ensured that others were unable to win in some devious fashion? Give me a break!

There is a well documented and widespread dislike of MS in the UK, and my guess is you are merely reflecting the prejudices of your countrymen here. MS is simply too German for you Brits. Too focussed, too disciplined and too thorough. He is fit and hardly drinks. He is happily married. There is nothing of the hooligan about him. In other words there is nothing about the man that would endear him to an English public. Could it be as simple as this?

Next year, without MS, who will all these kids say they beat? Alonso? No. Webber? NO. This sport is going down. Look at the heavyweight Boxing Division after Tyson.
Look at World Superbike racing after Fogerty.
All Sports need a Champion to be competative.
F1 is going to find next year very difficult without MS. I will miss him in this sport. He's the best I've ever seen.

And ask yourself this:
Would you like to race with him?
Would you like to race against him?
Would you want him on your team?
Would you like a driving lesson from him?

Don't Hate.

At least he's not in NASCAR.
JLC

No....he is a freak of nature, as was Fangio, Rossi, Petty, Ted Williams, etc. Some guys just have some inate physical abilities that the rest of us don't. He is easy on cars because driving is easy for him. That is how Rossi wins too. Everyone else goes out,hauls ass and tears up their tires tryingto keep away from the guy and after they are spent, he passes them and wins. The complaint some may have about Shumacher is that his is so mecahnical in his precision, but that is a question of STYLE, not ABILITY and there are no style points in any real racing.......notice i said REAL racing for all you drifters out there........lol

I think Michael would probably still say that Alonso is the next great one. There is always someone. Who was the Honda rider who won the 500cc championship 4 or 5 years runing in the 90's? (edit...Mick Doohan) I'm sure many thought that there would never be another like him, what with maufacturer parity, etc. Or Mike Hailwood, etc, etc. And yet you have Rossi now. Fogarty was one of the greats, but he ALWAYS had the best gear and a bit of an unfair advantage with the rule setup that let him run a 916 twin against 750cc 4's.

I am seriously considering booking a trip to Sao Paulo to see his last race. I am pissed I did not go to the USGP this year like I wanted to.

I am taking my 13 y/o son and my brother another Farrari fan and MS fan.

I might pull the trigger on this trip tomarrow.

Well, good post until the NASCAR part. What does that have to do with it? Who knows, maybe he'll come over to kick JPM's butt, LOL. But, I'm really not interested in developing a dialog around that theme.

What I would point out is a blog on the Autoweek website last week that included an interview with MS. Lot of insight there. The point made by the author was that MS is the last of the old school. I agree except I'm old enough to know another "old school," the last of which would be hard to finger. There is overlap, to be sure, and MS happened in his time, a very advantageous time. Like Todd said, there's nothing you can do about his incredible robotic skill, and neither can you about his time in history.

Do we need to compare MS with people he never raced with in equipment he's never driven? Each was in his own time to do with the competition what he could do. One of my favorites was Jean Alesi, a driver whose time was not as fortunate. There are many other soldiers of F1 I admire, mostly the guys who were in the game for a solid decade, or more, like MS, and drove hundreds of races. It's a whimsical sport with money buying everything and anything you see.

Here's the link to the piece: http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060706/BLOG05/60706009
Scroll down to just past the "Cars" image to see the statement I refer to.

Watch out for Vittel. Test driver for BMW Sauber. 19 years old and sick fast.

Kubica is a pretty sick driver too.

No matter how many F1 races I watch, I am constantly floored at the skill of even the medicore GP drivers.

True dat! Although i am less than pleased with the politics involved in getting Bernie's buddies teams instead of better financed and more experienced owners, at least the back markers are no longer hobbyist owners and rich boy drivers who "bought" their ride. Another couple of names to add to the list of recent greats. Piquet and Rosberg......guys who drove the craziest, most out of control GP cars since the flamethrowing Mercedes and Auto Union beasts of the 30's. Those 1.5l turbo cars are still right up their with the 917/30 as the sickest, most hazardous cars of the post war era.

i think Red Bull should be lookig at some of the young kids that are coming up in the US for their American driver program. The two i can think of right off the top of my head are Marco Andretti and Bobby Rahal's son. There are a couple of either who are like 16 and already racing in a mid-major series. Can't remember, but Nascar probably alrady has their eyes on them all. Andretti is probably ready for a test ride now.