Nelsinho Piquet’s clarification

Many of you reacted to Nelson Piquet Jr’s comments about Ayrton Senna. The son of the three-time world champion Nelson Piquet indeed believed that Senna was certainly very fast but had no talent in technical and mechanical areas.

Remarks that quickly went around the world and caused some waves. In his column for Yahoo Brazil, the young man revisits this controversy, stating that journalists misinterpreted his comments and took them out of context. “I said that if Ayrton had raced ten years earlier, he would not have had the success that my father had. Those were different eras. In the 1970s and 1980s, reliability was much less important and drivers had a lot to do from a mechanical perspective. It’s not by chance that my father developed tire warmers, active suspension, improved the turbo engine, and worked on various solutions that everyone knows,” argued the recent winner of a Truck Series event, the third division of NASCAR.

« Senna arrived a little later when it was possible to drive at 100% almost all the time without needing developer skills like before. Like me, Ayrton came to Europe solely focused on driving. He was super fast and the best in terms of pure speed. But he didn’t have the same range of skills in terms of mechanical aspects as the previous generation and didn’t have to worry as much about preserving the gearbox or the engine. Everyone did what was necessary to dominate their era, each era requires different skills. It’s as simple as that. There’s no controversy, » concluded Nelson Piquet Jr.

We can only agree with young Nelson on the fact that each era is unique. Therefore, it is somewhat futile to engage in comparisons that are not necessarily warranted. It’s as unproductive as debating whether Schumacher or Fangio is the greatest champion in F1 history. Each dominated their own era and are thus two iconic figures in the sport, just as Piquet Sr and Senna are in their respective periods.