Goodbye to the 90′s Generation…

What an excellent thread - thanks for that post, Dan - this even hadn't even occurred to me.

My first full race was Adelaide '94, having followed very sporadically since the events of Imola. Despite not really understanding any of the rivalries, I couldn't help but feel sorry for Damon as he sat in the pits with the car's suspension being prodded at. I was a Hill supporter from then on, being an impressionable 10-year-old.

I moved on to Button in 1999, having the useful window of an Autosport magazine subscription. I'd like to think that I stayed as a loyal fan throughout the bad years, but I was probably more of a Senna fan by that point - hence the username.

I'd almost agree with Jim on my favourite era of cars - I'll generally love anything that raced between 1994 and 1997, with the possible exception of everything entered by Forti

Another thing that struck me about the mid-90s was the amount of spinning - it was almost certainly a function of the downforce cuts in '94, but I remember so many drivers retiring as the result of a spin; even ones at the sharp end of the grid. How often do you see that now?

EC83 Wrote:
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Even now I think Alesi was a phenomenal talent which just got lost. His drives at Phoenix and Monaco in 1990 were genuinely Senna-esque IMO. With the right car and the right team environment and coaching, I'm pretty sure he would've been a Champion, maybe more than once too.

ISTR he turned down a Williams seat for Ferrari - imagine what could have been, eh?

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I started watching F1 in 1988 and was straight away a Senna fan, there was just something about the guy they way he drove and the way he was.

I have seen so much over the years, so many drivers come and go and teams.

My favorite year was 1993, the battles with prost and senna was simply amazing. Senna had no right in that car to even be fighting the Williams, and of course his wins for me stand out some of them were his best. Senna never rated 1993 though due to the computers he was not a fan.

1994 was the worst experience ever for me, it was the 1st time I had experienced death and it took me a long time to get over.

I remember when MS joined F1 and I find it so funny how people slag off new drivers for errors. It took MS from 1991 to 1994 to stop spinning and crashing. It was shocking that MS went from a spinner to a winner from 1993 to 1994, never have I seen a driver improve that much (or did he

Anyway 1998 was a good year for F1 but the years from 2001 until 2006 were some of the worst ever. The racing was poor and there were to many politics.

The last 3 years seem to have made F1 more of a sport again with more respect between the drivers and teams. The racing is better now and I think we have best grid since the mid to late 90's. Drivers now race wheel to wheel without causing the other one to spin off.

I fear for 2014 though as I think the field will be spread again.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/28/2012 04:04PM by marcl.

Atticus. Wrote:
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> Good piece.
>
> I started watching F1 in 1996, my first GP was
> actually the curtain raiser in Melbourne with
> Villeneuve holding onto the lead in his first ever
> GP in an ailing car, until Hill passed him in the
> dying stages.
>
> So, in a way, with the retirement of Schumacher, I
> also lost the last driver, who was there when I
> watched my first GP. But then again, it happened
> back in 2010 as well with Rubens pulling out.
>
> The first driver, whose career I followed from
> start to finish, being the rookie at or closely
> after my first GP!? Jacques and Giancarlo most
> probably.
>
> On the teams. I tend to count them as a structure.
> I mean in a way, I consider the current Lotus team
> the same as Renault and Benetton, because only the
> owner changed and the team still uses the same HQ
> as its predecessors. So in that respect we have
> the following teams still in the championship
> compared to 1999:
>
> Ferrari (1950)
> McLaren (1966)
> Mercedes/Brawn/Honda/BAR/Tyrrell (1970)
> Williams (1978)
> Lotus/Renault/Benetton/Toleman (1981)
> Toro Rosso/Minardi (1985)
> Force India/Midland/Jordan (1991)
> Sauber (1993)
> Red Bull/Jaguar/Stewart (1997)
>
> Only the three new teams are missing. I think
> that's impressive. It shows infrastructure has a
> huge role in success, the accumulated, sort of
> unseeable, traditional experience and know-how,
> knowledge, particularly if we take into account
> how unsuccessful Toyota was with creating
> everything from scratch. Or the current new teams.

GAH you forgot about SPYKER.

I started watching properly in 1993, when I was just 6 years old. But I remember watching the occasional 1992 race even now.

I am trying to think about the facts but the first driver who I saw the entire career was probably.................













Michael Andretti.













Pic of him in action there - doing what he did best.


















Michael Andretti.


LOL.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/28/2012 11:24PM by loque.

Cheers for all the comments and feedback guys. Didn't think I'd end up with so many replies. We've ended up with some really great stories in this thread. Really nice to see everyone's different experiences.

Thinking about it the first driver who's entire career I watched would probably be Gaston Mazzacane. Remember him?

He did the 2000 season in the vomit yellow Telefonica Minardi with Gene (who was actually pretty decent) and then a handful of races at the start of 2001 for Prost until his PSN money ran out I think.

Glorious career.

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Races: 163 - Wins: 23 - Pole Positions: 24 - Fastest Laps: 22
Season 9: Constructors' Champions

loque Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Atticus. Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> >
> > On the teams. I tend to count them as a
> structure.
> > I mean in a way, I consider the current Lotus
> team
> > the same as Renault and Benetton, because only
> the
> > owner changed and the team still uses the same
> HQ
> > as its predecessors. So in that respect we have
> > the following teams still in the championship
> > compared to 1999:
> >
> > Ferrari (1950)
> > McLaren (1966)
> > Mercedes/Brawn/Honda/BAR/Tyrrell (1970)
> > Williams (1978)
> > Lotus/Renault/Benetton/Toleman (1981)
> > Toro Rosso/Minardi (1985)
> > Force India/Midland/Jordan (1991)
> > Sauber (1993)
> > Red Bull/Jaguar/Stewart (1997)
> >
> > Only the three new teams are missing. I think
> > that's impressive. It shows infrastructure has
> a
> > huge role in success, the accumulated, sort of
> > unseeable, traditional experience and know-how,
> > knowledge, particularly if we take into account
> > how unsuccessful Toyota was with creating
> > everything from scratch. Or the current new
> teams.
>
> GAH you forgot about SPYKER.


Indeed. That makes it Force India/Skyper/Midland/Jordan (1991). Those 2004-2008 years were so turbulent for that team. I remember I really feared F1 might lose it. Then came that bunco-man Mallya, who actually created a pretty decent team. Jordan must be proud.

my f1 experience started in the early 90's when i was 7-8 (despite being brought up on motorbike racing, kevin schwantz being the "man" in our house), with being aware of the likes of senna, mansell. i would watch a bit of the races in 95 if i happened to stumble across them on tv, and became quickly hooked on the battle between hill and schuey. portugal 96 being a standout race as it was the first race weekend i purposely recorded on video as i was going out that weekend as i didnt want to miss any of the action.
and from 1997 from the 1st minute of action, i either watched every SECOND live or recorded and watched several times over. damon hill being my hero, with the hats, t-shirts and car models being purchased at great expense, to show my support, and back then merchandise, news and footage was hard to come by without the internet and digital tv platforms we have today.
ive watched almost every race live and most quali's up until the last few years where work and life commitments have clashed.
ive supported schuey and rubens the last few years as being the only remaining "old skool" racers remaining, and now it is truly the end of an era

Coincidentally, Monaco 1999 was one of the first races I remember watching also. I remember watching Australian GPs a bit earlier, back to 1997 I think, but because the European races are 10pm in Australia, it wasn't until mid-1999 that I started taping races and watching them. My dad fell out of love with F1 after Japan 1990 so I was sort of left to my own devices to discover it in the late 1990s.

Also, I wouldn't write off de la Rosa yet, he's made more surprise comebacks than almost anyone!

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X (@ed24f1)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/29/2012 11:25PM by SchueyFan.

senninho Wrote:
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> ISTR he turned down a Williams seat for Ferrari -
> imagine what could have been, eh?

Yeah. He signed for Tyrrell and Williams as well as Ferrari for '91, and Ferrari had to buy him out of his Williams and Tyrrell contracts before they "got" him. I guess that sums up Alesi's whole F1 career itself in many ways. During the 1990 Spanish GP there was a rather nice rant by James Hunt about the situation(which turned out to be amazingly prophetic).

RE your username - I've always thought it was the truest form of the diminutive. I've been aware of the "Senninha" cartoon character since soon after he died, but couldn't understand why the name ended in "a" which sounded feminine. I always thought "Senninho" would've been more appropriate.

By the way, regarding "complete" F1 careers - any of us who were watching F1 regularly by 1993 would've witnessed the shortest start-to-end F1 career currently in history(and it'll take some beating): Marco Apicella in the '93 Italian GP. He lasted about 800 metres before he got involved in a collision(according to Wikipedia it's 800m anyway). :P

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Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/30/2012 04:00AM by EC83.

I started watching from melb 97 (aged 11) and have only missed 1 race since then - china this year, which I spent $15 for internet access for wifi to watch live timing after the sports bar in the casino I was staying at laughed at me asking if they were going to show f1.. even though it was after midnight on a sat night in the states...

will miss singapore next year as I'll be on a plane back from Europe...

It is odd for me seeing the 90's drivers go, first Mika, then DC, fisico and Trulli, now Schumi again and de la rosa it is odd! Its even more crazy to think of JB as the most experienced driver in f1 now.. I still think of him being so young... not starting his 13th season!

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2013 - Nando must come through..

My first encounters with F1 were sometimes in 1995, I was amazed by the promotion videos by the broadcaster, but my attention span during the races was too short to appreciate it. I was 10. In 1996, Imola I tried again, sat through the whole GP and was hooked. Got myself a Lego-Technics-Formula-One-car and over each weekend, I sat and watched F1 and tried to remodel it to closer resemble the real Ferrari-car by raising its nose, remodeling sidepods, wings, cockpit…

At the beginning of 1997 I was so excited seeing the new cars, I bought any magazin I could find, just for the pictures. I continued to remodel my Lego-car and in 1997 for the first time it feld "close" to the original. I hate myself for not taking pictures every now and then as it evolved through the years.
Each weekend, I added new features, common to the current era. My car even had tower-wings in 1998.

1998 was an awesome year and one of my favs. 1999 and 2000 were the peaks of my interest in F1, I missed maybe 1 GP per year and I was really angry when I did. I was a Schumacher fan and him not winning the WCs by small margins was very exciting. This slowly changed in 2002, when the races got quite boring and by 2003 I pretty much withdrew from watching down to 1 GP a year until 2009, since then I watch more occasionally and the current racing is quite enjoyable without the requirement of being a fanboy for anyone in particular.

As for my lego car, I continued to upgrade it untill the beginning of 2001, which was when the real cars shapes became so intricate that you couldn't do it well in Lego anymore. So I froze the car on the 2000 state.
In my excitement for the 2009 season, I created a duplicate loosely based on the Ferrari 2009 spec. Took me another 5 weekends, but hey. :D



Ok, finally pictures

Website | Blog | Twitter | CTDP: Site Blog Twitter



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/30/2012 11:21AM by Dahie.

cannot believe the '90s drivers' have left. the last connections of senna, mansell, prost, mika, berger. wow. proud to have watched f1 from that time. Some scintillating races. just not like what they used to be.

first proper race I watched was with my dad and his mate sometime in 93, only 3 years old then, was bought a burago ferrari 1990 f1 model. then properly watched the 95 season! wow! times change!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/30/2012 09:59PM by elpasho2005f1.

Even though I missed the '90s races due to being too young to remember them. There are a lot of names that come to mind when I think of the '90s. Haikkinen, Couthard, Trulli, Villeneuve, Herbert, Zonta, Frentzen, Verstappen, Hill.

I love the idea of a "farewell" race full of '90s drivers in their '90s cars (and Murray Walker commentating). I would pay to see that.

Having been a huge fan of Schumacher and now being a fan of multiple drivers (Webber, Button, Alonso, Raikkonen, Perez) I must say F1 is much better when your barracking for more than one driver.

Retired drivers coming together to race in their original cars could probably never happen. The closest thing we got to it was GP Masters with the likes of Mansell, Fittipaldi, Patrese, Warick etc racing in some hacked about Indycar.

It quickly flopped.

J i m Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Retired drivers coming together to race in their
> original cars could probably never happen. The
> closest thing we got to it was GP Masters with the
> likes of Mansell, Fittipaldi, Patrese, Warick etc
> racing in some hacked about Indycar.
>
> It quickly flopped.

I remember it. The best part was the Murray Walker commentary.

I actually went to see the Silverstone round of that! The cars looked and sounded pretty good, but the racing was a bit flat. Didn't help that Mansell's car broke down before the race even started.

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I remember it, too... wasn't the first race at Kyalami shown on the BBC, then after that... nothing? I remember wanting to watch the rest of the races, but wondering what happened to it.

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You know you want to. [judgegrudge.mybrute.com]

mclarenaustralia Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Having been a huge fan of Schumacher and now being
> a fan of multiple drivers (Webber, Button, Alonso,
> Raikkonen, Perez) I must say F1 is much better
> when your barracking for more than one driver.


My main favourites are the same. Schumacher during his 'first career', then Raikkonen till 2009, now Alonso, but I also agree with F1 being better when you support more drivers. I still support Schumacher to an extent, I'm actually more fond of the matured Raikkonen than I was the reckless one before 2012... I kind of learned to respect the different personalities of certain drivers, and I tend to discover likeable personality traits in more than one of them nowadays. This makes me like Button and Pérez as well. I even recognise how Hamilton, who I disfavoured really till 2010-ish, battled his way through a lot of obstacles and how HE handled them well and even he earned my respect. Strange things these...

On the other hand, although this is a fascinating thread and I also contributed to it with my admission of following F1 since 1996 and then familiarising myself with the Nineties, I'm actually not very fond of the post-Senna, pre-2005 period. I generally think that the Eighties and the current era is better in terms of the show, driver skills, etc., than a somewhat dull nineties were. I think there were a particular lack of true talents back then. Only Schumacher and Hakkinen shined really for me. Of course there was an upward trend from 2000 with the arrival of great talents like Button, Alonso, Raikkonen, Webber, etc. and then Vettel in 2006, Hamilton in 2007, etc.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/2012 02:50PM by Atticus..

senninho Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I actually went to see the Silverstone round of
> that! The cars looked and sounded pretty good, but
> the racing was a bit flat. Didn't help that
> Mansell's car broke down before the race even
> started.


I went as well. Pissed it down all day. Think Eddie Cheever won, Mansell's car had problems but he was also embarrassingly crap all weekend, (he only superseded that crapness at Le Mans a couple of years ago). The best quote came from Emmo "Well, I've never been in post race conference for finishing eighth before" I like Emmo, he comes across as a genuinely nice man, probably the most gentlemanly F1 driver with exception of Fangio.

The Ricardo Patrese fan site used a couple of pics of mine, which was nice.

The best race of GP Masters was Kyalami because it was like a re-run of indycar 1993 with Mansell and Emmo fighting over the lead.

J i m Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> senninho Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I actually went to see the Silverstone round of
> > that! The cars looked and sounded pretty good,
> but
> > the racing was a bit flat. Didn't help that
> > Mansell's car broke down before the race even
> > started.
>
>
> I went as well. Pissed it down all day. Think
> Eddie Cheever won, Mansell's car had problems but
> he was also embarrassingly crap all weekend, (he
> only superseded that crapness at Le Mans a couple
> of years ago). The best quote came from Emmo
> "Well, I've never been in post race conference for
> finishing eighth before" I like Emmo, he comes
> across as a genuinely nice man, probably the most
> gentlemanly F1 driver with exception of Fangio.
>
> The Ricardo Patrese fan site used a couple of pics
> of mine, which was nice.
>
> The best race of GP Masters was Kyalami because it
> was like a re-run of indycar 1993 with Mansell and
> Emmo fighting over the lead.

Do you know, I'd managed to filter the weather out of my memory, but it's all come back now. The rain was so heavy on the way back, we slowed down to 30mph on the motorway at one point!

Cheever did indeed win, and I wonder how much Mansell's car troubles were exacerbated by his pace he did go through about three engines IIRC...

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