The Hindu : Sport : F-1: Team sport or individual pursuit?

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Thursday, Aug 09, 2007
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F-1: Team sport or individual pursuit?

Like most sports, it’s hard to build friendships amidst rivalries in F-1, writesRohit Brijnath

After the McLaren soap opera in Hungary was over, Lewis Hamilton was asked if he had respect for Fernando Alonso, and he said yes. It would have been discourteous to say he didn’t; it was also probably the truth. But he should have then been asked if admiration ever got in the way of mercy. Most certainly not.

Regard for a teammate is nice, it’s what people want to hear athletes say, yet regard does not extend to Hamilton allowing Alonso a pass in qualifying. The team may have instructed him to, but the team could go to hell. Dale Carnegie be damned, Hamilton is not here to make friends and obey orders: he is here to win. Stripped of all pretence, ambition can be as disturbing as it is compelling.

Strange mix

Formula One and teamwork is a strange mix, in the sense that a driver’s teammate is in fact his rival. In football, for instance, there is an understanding amidst disparate men that only together are they potent, that it is in ‘their’ larger interest for the next man to play well. This is true of most team pursuits, but it doesn’t work entirely in Formula One. Certainly it is not in Hamilton’s interest that Alonso drives well, or vice-versa.

F1 is an individual adventure under a team banner, an endeavour requiring a group of like-minded individuals yet a uniquely solitary pursuit. The team builds the car, and the car is the decisive factor, yet at year’s end it is the triumphant driver not the team that we record in our memories. It is hard to cheer for a car, so we must believe it is the driver who is the ‘constructor’ of all victory.

Selfish

Indian race driver Narain Karthikeyan, who drove for Formula One team Jordan in 2005, insists the team has to be respected, for 300-400 employees are sweating for a shared goal. Yet, he concedes: "When you’re fighting for the World Championship, you have to be a little bit selfish.”

A driver is dependent on his team, yet he risks his own life for his own benefit. He may travel as ‘part’ of a team, be identified through particular colours, yet the scalp he wants to own most is of the fellow with whom he shares a garage. As Karthikeyan admits: “The first guy you want to beat is your teammate.” Why? Because “you’re gauged against him.”

In a sport of uneven cars, here is a test between drivers in the ‘same’ car. In an adrenalin-swimming, testosterone-fuelled, engine-growling, masculine adventure, this is the ultimate ego trip. At McLaren, it’s clear: this is a team yet overtaken by an individual duel, as it once was when Prost and Senna stalked the same garage.

The unwritten rules of Formula One can be bizarre to the outsider. Teams favour drivers, pressure them, ask them to lower their speed to let a teammate pass, a behaviour that bewilders sportsmen from other codes.

As Mahesh Bhupathi, former No.1 doubles player, and a Formula One enthusiast, explains: "No one wants to race and not win. What satisfaction does that give you? Athletes train 25 hours a day to win, and suddenly the team says don’t win, step aside." It seems contrary to the very idea of sport.

In Formula One, and here it finds common ground with rival codes, friendship has become a casualty of a gung-ho mind-set. This is the curse of modern times.

Karthikeyan admits “the competitive instinct makes friendship very difficult”. Bhupathi echoes him: “There are no close friendships when competing for pride, titles, money. No one wants to get too cozy in a world where coaches are always droning on about the “psychological edge”.

Occasionally a delightful exception will occur, like Carlos Moya and Rafael Nadal, men who share not just respect but meals and PlayStation contests.

Perhaps their friendship works because they are wise, but perhaps also because each man knows his place: Moya was not just mentor to Nadal, he is not a threat either. They are friends, but not quite rivals. Alonso and Hamilton are rivals, but will never be friends.

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