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2002 Top 12 Drivers Review
An in-depth look at the past season, team by team and driver by driver |
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| 1. Michael Schumacher | ||||||
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Seven poles, seven fastest laps, unblemished reliability that put him on the podium in every single race, a record eleven wins, a record 144 points, and a record-equalling 5th World Championship. Could there have been a more perfect year in modern Grand Prix history? This was what happens when you put one of the best drivers of all time in one of the best cars of all time. His season showed that others could occasionally be faster over a single lap in either qualifying or the race, but to win a championship you simply need to be consistently better, faster and stronger than everyone else.
Such was his dominance that he hardly had to resort to unethical racetrack tactics, but criticisms could still be levelled at him. Ferrari would not need to use team orders if Michael did not feel the need for them. It was sad that he did not have enough confidence in the superiority of his machinery to try to win the championship by himself and allow Rubens to take 2nd on his own with his intervention. That, and his absurd antics on the Austrian podium and at the Indy finish line, continued to leave blots on his copybook, and on his comparison with other F1 legends. Back to the top. |
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| 2. Rubens Barrichello | ||||||
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So the likeable Rubinho took 2nd in the World Championship with 4 wins, 3 poles, 5 fastest laps, and 77 points. How much of that was due to him, how much was due to the peerless Ferrari F2002, and how much was due to Michael Schumacher was not particularly clear. But even if Schumi had gifted him Indy and possibly Italy, and then shown his overall superiority by blowing Rubens into the weeds in Japan, there was little question that Barrichello had by his own right driven excellently throughout 2002, matching and even out-driving Schumacher for pace at certain times.
He most probably deserved to win that infamous race at the A1 Ring, but he definitely took the European and Hungarian GPs on merit. Often placed on a more adventurous pit strategy by Ross Brawn, he responded by being able to push his car to the limit in races perhaps more often than even Schumi did, and always without making a mistake. He was clinical in the many passing moves he made, especially at Interlagos, Montreal, the Nurburgring, Silverstone and Monza. Although he suffered all of Ferrari's reliability woes in 2002, he could have easily taken 2nd in the championship on his own. Back to the top. |
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| 3. Kimi Raikkonen | ||||||
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We know for certain that the young cool-as-ice Finn had an excellent 2002. Just how good is not easy to tell. Ten retirements including six engine failures left him with only 24 points and 6th in the championship. Often those failures occurred relatively early in the race, so it was not always possible to gauge how he compared with DC in race trim. But in qualifying, there was no doubt. He out-qualified Coulthard 10-7, and aside from Hungary (where he started 11th) and Belgium (where he was a sensational 2nd), he started every other race between 4th and 6th. Consistently impressive stuff.
He should have taken his maiden win in France (were it not for McNish's oil) after a scintillating drive, and his effort in Hungary to finish 4th included an awesome pass on Montoya. He still had his rough edges, though, such as when he collided with Sato in qualifying at Monza, and one might still have preferred Coulthard's race pace solidity. But it was easy to forget that Raikkonen was only in his second F1 season, and his first in a top team. He exploded doubts over his season-long stamina, and showed that he could handle the pressure, although his lack of PR skills did not endear him to all. Back to the top. |
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| 4. David Coulthard | ||||||
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Just like last year, DC couldn't really be blamed for not meeting his 'I will challenge for the championship' prophecies. In a year when the Hakkinen monkey had finally been lifted off his back, the Scot would have been appalled to find that the Mercedes engine rendered the McLaren so uncompetitive against the Ferraris. And what's more, although he probably won't admit to it, he must have felt slightly disconcerted by the shadow Hakkinen left behind, in the form of Mini-Mika, one K. Raikkonen, who out-qualified him 10-7. That did not look too good for David.
But whereas Raikkonen was perhaps a little quicker, he was also struck down by mechanical problems more often, and Coulthard was really the solid points-scoring core around whom McLaren operated this year. DC responded with a series of very commendable race drives, with only the odd downers such as at Silverstone. Eleven points-paying results and six podium finishes including that dominant win at Monaco was about as much as McLaren could have asked of him. Apart from his so-so qualifying pace, there was no reason for his confidence or reputation to be dented in 2002. Back to the top. |
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| 5. Jenson Button | ||||||
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What a roller-coaster ride it's been for Jenson in his F1 career so far. From the brilliance of his debut season with Williams to a 'Reject of the Year' performance with Benetton in 2001, then back up to 14 points, 7th in the championship, and 5th in our rankings in 2002. Perhaps the jury may still be out as to whether or not Button is really champion material in the Montoya or Raikkonen sense, or just a very good driver in the Riccardo Patrese mould, but there was no doubting the young Englishman's consistency this season, which saw him score points in no less than seven races.
Apart from starting 17th at Monza, Jenson qualified between 6th and 14th at each round, which is not sensational but fair enough. To have only lost 11-6 to Trulli in the qualifying battle was not too shabby at all. Nothing wrong with his race pace, though. He was unlucky not to have scored podiums in Malaysia, Brazil and Spain, and if anyone from the 'big three' teams faltered, it was he who often collected the points on offer. He did seem to have a bit of a down period when his departure from Renault was confirmed, but his final flourish at year's end spoke volumes for his commitment and determination. Back to the top. |
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| 6. Mark Webber | ||||||
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OK, there's some shameless parochialism here, but in terms of overall impression the Australian was easily the rookie of the year. He was not quite as brilliant as Fernando Alonso had been last year, but it had to be said that the Minardi Asiatech package seemed surprisingly less competitive, relatively speaking, than Paul Stoddart's cars had been the year before. Undoubtedly, the highlight of Webber's year was his debut in Melbourne, when he scored that popular 5th place despite his lack of traction control, a bungled pit stop, Salo's late-race surge and a broken differential after five laps.
A telling fact was that in six races Webber genuinely out-qualified non-Minardis, including de la Rosa 4 times, Bernoldi 3 times, Irvine twice, and Salo once. He was usually stellar in races, doing all that was asked of him and then some, scoring a brace of results from 10th to 12th, having often diced with BARs, Jaguars and the like. He sometimes had trouble getting off the line cleanly, and he was susceptible to the occasional brief off-track excursion, but only once at Silverstone did it look as though he threw the car off the road, although the team blamed a clutch failure for that. Back to the top. |
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| 7. Juan Pablo Montoya | ||||||
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Few would have been more despondent at Ferrari's domination than Juan-Pablo Montoya. It made an embarrassing mockery of his ambitions to confront Michael Schumacher head-on, and it left him without a win in 2002. One win in two seasons compared to Ralf Schumacher's 4 and Michael Schumacher's 20 in that time makes for very sobering reading. But even if the Ferrari wasn't quite as good as it was, would 'The Monster' have been able to sustain a championship challenge? Our answer is a resounding 'no'. The Colombian's inconsistency was one of the telling stories of 2002.
Yes, he surged his way to 7 poles including 5 in a row from Monaco to France. But if he was meant to be first up behind the Ferraris, then nine times he qualified between 4th and 6th, i.e. he had been beaten by either Ralf or the McLarens. Some weekends he was dynamite, others he was absolutely nowhere. In some races, such as Brazil, Europe, Hungary and Italy, his attempts to be his aggressive self only got him into trouble, and too often he went beyond the ragged edge. Yet his pass on Raikkonen in Germany was one of the year's best. It was truly a case of brilliance and mediocrity in equal measures. Back to the top. |
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| 8. Jarno Trulli | ||||||
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For much of 2002, it appeared as though the Italian would be doing nothing except add to his reputation of being a sensational qualifier, among the best there is over one lap, but a pretty hopeless racer. His consistency on Saturdays continued to amaze; apart from the aberration of 16th in Austria, he qualified for all the other races in the top 12, and in 13 of them started from between 6th and 9th, which should have placed him perfectly for points on Sunday. But despite out-qualifying Jenson Button 11-6, he was out-scored by his team-mate 14 points to 9. On paper, that did not look too flash.
Races like Hungary, where he started 6th, dropped back at the start, and finished a lowly 8th seemed to back up the point. But, for starters, it had to be said that Trulli suffered the bulk of Renault's reliability problems during year, something of a surprise considering that he and not Button was Flavio Briatore's chosen man. He had done well to hold off Fisichella for 4th place at Monaco, but it was the three races at year's end in Italy (4th from the back of the grid), America (5th) and Japan (mechanical failure whilst en route to 5th) which showed that perhaps, finally, Jarno was coming of age as a racer. Back to the top. |
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| 9. Ralf Schumacher | ||||||
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At the start of the year, we suggested that Ralf needed to add a bit more mongrel to his driving in order to take the battle up to his team-mate and to the Ferraris. The bottom line is that he didn't, and with only 42 points duly got fourth place in the title behind his brother, Barrichello and JPM. If consistency was the key, then Ralf had it in spades, qualifying for every race between 2nd and 5th, and only being edged out in the qualifying battle 9-8 by the potentially faster but fluctuating Montoya. But in truth, Ralf needed to find that extra something in himself during 2002, but was plainly unable to do so.
He did pick up Williams' only win of the year in Malaysia, but his late-race display in Brazil, when he caught his brother but refused to challenge for the race win, seemed to say it all about Ralf's deficiencies. Thereafter came a preponderance of 3rds, 4ths and 5ths, and only at Hockenheim did he show any sort of spark. He remained a dependable, reliable, quick driver, but he lacked the spirit of his team-mate, and his brother's skill of driving above the car's ability. In view of that, his end-of-season attempts to clumsily pick fights with JPM seemed a touch unwise. Back to the top. |
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| 10. Eddie Irvine | ||||||
| Judging by his early-season form, the Ulsterman was mightily disappointing indeed. Left unmotivated by the horrors of the Jaguar R3, apart from Brazil where he started 13th he started all of the first seven races from between 18th and 21st, and was out-qualified by Mark Webber's Minardi twice. But throughout the year he was still a commendably steady racer, with Silverstone being his only self-induced DNF in a season blighted by an outrageous sequence of mechanical maladies.
But here's the thing. Much more than Pedro de la Rosa, Irvine deserved to be credited with the development work that saw the R3 morph into the R3B, and transform into the 'best of the rest' car at Spa, Monza, and throughout free practice at Indianapolis. It may come as a surprise that his 8 points this year was the most he had scored in a season for Jaguar, and although his 4th in Australia was flukey, he earned his 6th at Spa and his sensational 3rd at Monza. In addition, Motormouth's daily proclamations to the world often made for sensible and amusing reading in what was a momentously dull season. Back to the top. |
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| 11. Giancarlo Fisichella | ||||||
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There are plenty of people who rave about the Roman's abilities, and he was certainly one of the stars of 2001. How he would have loved to have stayed with Renault instead of being shunted off to Jordan, its so-so EJ12 chassis and the problematic Honda engine! As a temperamental fellow, there was no way that that wasn't going to get to him at some stage during the season, and his horrible qualifying efforts of 18th and 17th at the Nurburgring and Silverstone, and his generally pathetic weekend at the former, were big black marks on what was otherwise a competitive season, even if not as good as 2001.
His race results speak for themselves. Eight DNFs, including 4 engine and 2 hydraulic failures indicated an unfair share of bad luck. When he finished, only once was he out of the top 10, in Malaysia when Sato rammed him and robbed him of potential points. Otherwise, there was a solid 6th from 5th on the grid in Hungary, and that fabulous but easily-overlooked run of three consecutive 5ths from Austria to Canada. Even if only seven top-10 qualifying results and an average grid position of around 11th was a shade disappointing, Giancarlo still consolidated his growing reputation throughout 2002. Back to the top. |
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| 12. Heinz-Harald Frentzen | ||||||
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Like his personal character, Frentzen's F1 career has been taking some enigmatic turns in the past two years. Dumped by Jordan and finding refuge at Prost, he hung out over the winter to see if the French team would survive, before finally signing a favourable contract with Arrows. Joining the team late to drive a new car arriving late, the German knew what to expect, and he did have his share of mechanical problems, although less so than team-mate Bernoldi. But he felt comfortable in the Arrows environment and it showed in his on-track performances, where he never gave less than his best.
His 6th in Spain where he tailed the Saubers for much of the race was one of the drives of the year, and he picked up a further point at Monaco. Some of his qualifying efforts were enough to show that his raw speed was still there, and his motivation, always a big factor in how well he competes, seemed to be high. Jumping ship from Arrows after the German GP (and becoming one of the team's creditors), he had already signed a deal with Sauber for 2003 when he was called in to replace Massa at Indy. A solid effort there with limited time in the car added to what was generally a good impression in 2002. Back to the top. |
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