POLL: What type of fan are you?

[Liquid]

A lot of kids at work told me that they're going to start supporting Ferrari when Hamilton drives for them. One girl who has lots of Mercedes merchandise said she's going to have to sell it all to make room. Okay, that's what kids do, sure, but it got me thinking. In football, it has been the norm to support the team and not switch allegiances following players around but this is actually changing with that horrible way that the world's most popular sport is sadly eating itself; younger and newer football fans just support an elite player and follow him round. If you've seen Al-Nassr shirts, it's literally because Ronaldo plays for them. I support Wrexham. My favourite player of all time is Gareth Owen but when he moved to Doncaster Rovers, I didn't suddenly start supporting Doncaster. It's weird and the antithesis of what is objectively a team game.

But motorsports is a bit different, it's a mix of individual and team performances and I have actually found it surprising when people don't follow it the same way I do. And, truth be told, in motorsports it's the opposite of football for me and I usually follow drivers. Not always but mostly. My favourite driver is Rubens Barrichello and I followed him and rooted for him in Formula One throughout his career at all the teams he drove for. Apart from soft spots for teams like Minardi, but those are exceptional cases, I just don't hang my hat on one particular team year after year.

I should clarify that what got my attention initially was the way the kids worded it: "I support Mercedes but now I'm going to support Ferrari."

What about you?

 

[TumeK5]

Drivers are easier to follow, since you know their strengths and abilities.

If you think F1, the team pecking order changes constantly, and as much as I love Leclerc, I have no hope in Ferrari returning to the top spot any tme soon.

And on the other hand, it's easy to appreciate good drivers in slower cars, because they're driving them to their limits and beyond (Alonso, Albon). I just feel like drivers are easier to support.

 

[Strittan]

It’s been a long long time since I gave a **** about F1, but when I did I followed drivers for sure. I mean, the cars don’t drive themselves (they didn’t last time I cared anyway, lol.)

 

[Veinz]

I'm a big fan of Honda because of their road cars, but I don't really have a team or driver that I support. I like to cheer for the underdogs, that's what makes it fun. Jumping on whatever bandwagon is not interesting, fan boys/girls are the worst.

 

[Tired Tyres]

F1 I don't watch, but when I did it was always the driver.

WEC it's the manufacturer I follow and that can change one season to the next.

 

[egl92]

Neither drivers nor teams, I follow the races.

But I can show some sympathy for those private teams that compete against factory teams.

I have never had an idol, I can understand that there are people who do, but what I will never understand is that being a follower of someone leads you to hate others.

Sadly, in recent years with social networks, some bad things about football fans have reached motorsport.

 

[Mirai]

I usually follow drivers based on their personality and driving ability, rather than the colours they race in
That’s why I’ve always been a fan of Lando Norris

 

[BKGlover]

I had an essay written...but that's not needed right now unless someone wants one...

Long story short: I am fickle and follow whoever or whatever captures my attention at that moment. I haven't supported anyone since the mid 2000's, and I've fallen to the point all I want to see is a compelling race. Bollocks to the non-racing stuff...

...Actually, that's a bit of a lie. I've fallen to "Watch it all burn and laugh". IMSA is the only major series I have kept up with that hasn't done something mindlessly stupid (that I can recall, will moodily accept reminders though.), and with the quality of racing shown I cannot bring myself to watch most others.

 

[MatskiMonk]

I will support BMW, or BMW teams, first and foremost, which sometimes leads me on to follow certain drivers thereafter, irrespective of who they drive for. I also appreciate that having met some of these drivers, that thinking you like them is fairly naïve - which can certainly change their stock in my opinion. There are some drivers I come to appreciate even if they've never driven for BMW, but there aren't really any teams I can think of that aren't BMW teams who I cheer for, even if I cheer for their teams.

Tough to answer the poll since it's primarily a manufacturer I support, but I went driver.

 

[Grand Prix]

Neither of these two options apply to me that much these days. I just follow the sport itself, waiting for that next close championship battle or even another season like 2012. The boring seasons make the exciting ones much sweeter.

Most of the current driver personalities I find to be a bit dull, which is funny because one of my favourites was Kimi Raikkonen. Mostly for his racecraft, but he had a hidden complexity and depth to his personality I feel, which his apparent aloofness attempted to hide. Fernando Alonso is another one from when I first started watching, I remember when he was this crazy and arrogant kid at Renault, who has now matured to something more akin to Nuvolari in his heyday. It's amazing what he is able to do at his age, but he is not the primary reason I watch F1.

I may be more inclined to follow certain teams if there were more eccentric entrants like classic BRM or Matra. The regulations leave no room for crazy and awesome sounding engines currently. Some extraordinary circumstances would need to occur for V12s and V16s to return.

 

[lilcat89]

I have to say I have mostly been team allied over drivers. Lewis Hamilton, at least as far as F1 goes, was the only driver that I actively switched teams to support. I have always been manufacturer/team though as far as allegiances go. There are always drivers that I respect, but could never cheer for.

 

[05XR8]

Motorsports depends for me. When I was young, it was the spectacle. Cale Yarborough, Richard Petty, Al Unser SR and Jr, Andrettis, Danny Sullivan. I mean, couldn't pick just one.

When I got into F1, it was again about the spectacle. I liked Gerhard Berger, but I didn't like Ferrari. I respected Mika Hakkinen and I liked Reubens as the underdog Number 2. Not a Damon Hill fan, but he was fighting a host of good drivers in that era.

It's when Jenson Button arrived, BMW and Toyota. Then, Stewart racing. Mark Weber at Minardi. I started to think more of the individual driver than the team.

In Super Touring cars, just the cars. Didn't matter who was driving. Loved the Nissan, Honda, Mondeo and this weird Renault Laguna.
Touring cars in the USA had me more interested in brands. The Real Time Hondas and Acuras, Tri-Point Mazdas, Champion Audi RS6, Audi S4. Turner BMWs.

(V8)Supercars started as a "Ford Man", but when Car of The Future came in. I was an Erebus fan(running E63s).

I'm pretty much done picking teams and drivers since I stopped watching NFL and NBA. Once Paul Pierce left Boston and Manning left the Colts, all that fan loyalty ended.

 

[Imari]

A lot of kids at work... One girl... Okay, that's what kids do... the way the kids worded it...

The idea that children have a bunch of F1 merch, that's pretty expensive, and that they'd sell it all and then stock up on probably even more expensive Ferrari merch seems at odds with most of the children I know. Even the ones from rich families.

Are these actual children, or are you just being grumpy old man dismissive of adults who don't think the same as you?

 

[Shaun]

Neither of these two options apply to me that much these days. I just follow the sport itself, waiting for that next close championship battle or even another season like 2012. The boring seasons make the exciting ones much sweeter.

Most of the current driver personalities I find to be a bit dull, which is funny because one of my favourites was Kimi Raikkonen. Mostly for his racecraft, but he had a hidden complexity and depth to his personality I feel, which his apparent aloofness attempted to hide. Fernando Alonso is another one from when I first started watching, I remember when he was this crazy and arrogant kid at Renault, who has now matured to something more akin to Nuvolari in his heyday. It's amazing what he is able to do at his age, but he is not the primary reason I watch F1.

I may be more inclined to follow certain teams if there were more eccentric entrants like classic BRM or Matra. The regulations leave no room for crazy and awesome sounding engines currently. Some extraordinary circumstances would need to occur for V12s and V16s to return.

This pretty much sums up my outlook also.

I just want to see good racing and the who or team isn't a massive concern anymore.
If I had to pick one it would be the drivers over the team, I have my preferred drivers as well as teams but not enough to blindly follow them.

 

[Liquid]

Are these actual children, or are you just being grumpy old man dismissive of adults who don't think the same as you?

Grumpy git? Yes, absolutely.
Dismissive of others? No but curious about other points of view.

Honestly, I teach a lot of DTS influenced kids who have lots of F1 merchandise.

"Hamilton's moving to Ferrari so I'm going to stop supporting Mercedes and start supporting Ferrari" just really caught my attention. I didn't "support" Ferrari, Honda or Williams when Barrichello drove for them, I just wanted the team to give him a good car.

 

[MagpieRacer]

It's tricky as there are so many layers to my answer.

It's also tricky because it can depend on the particular motorsport and the drivers involved at any given time. For me with WRC, it's typically been about following the driver, Colin McRae, Richard Burns, Sebastian Loeb, Elfyn Evans etc, but I think it's easier with the WRC to do thay because teams have come and gone far more regularly than in F1 and drivers have hopped around a lot. McRae for example drove for Subaru, Ford, Citroën and Skoda. Of those, only Ford remain in the WRC, and technically with a lot less input as they're more privateer with M-Sport than they are manufacturer.

With the likes of F1 I tend to lean more towards a team, Ferrari, and in F1, compared to WRC, teams are so much more established and part of the championship that it's a lot easier to get behind teams over drivers. That's not to say I won't follow drivers but the teams carry more weight for me.

The drivers involved will influence whether I take a particular interest in following/supporting them, but it will never have a stronger pull than supporting a team. Of the current grid it's only really Fernando Alonso who does that for me at the moment, Charles Leclerc is approaching that point. In the last, Jenson Button and Sebastien Vettel ticked those boxes.

And then there's the general motorsport landscape where I will follow particular drivers who I find exciting and want to continue following when they leave the discipline that introduced me to them. Sebastian Loeb, Jenson Button and Valentino Rossi, being examples of drivers I'll follow across motorsport. But there you're talking about drivers who, with the possible exception of Button, are so big that they are their own team whwreever they go, their brand is so significant that, who they drive for, is somewhat irrelevant. People won't follow Rossi because he's driving for BMW, they'll follow him because he's VR46. People won't follow Loeb at Dakar next year because he's driving for Dacia, but because he's Sebastian Loeb.

So it's a long, consulted answer, with many layers and variations based on disciplines. I've selected the follow driver option because I follow the WRC and follow multiple drivers across disciplines.

 

[LeGeNd-1]

Driver for me. Although if a driver gets associated with a team for long periods I'll grow to like the team too. Back then I was a Schumacher & Ferrari fan, but when he came back with Merc I didn't immediately support Merc. Then it's only when Lewis started approaching Michael's record that I started supporting him, and also became Mercedes fan. But even during the 2017-2018 years when he was battling Ferrari I never hated Ferrari. Now that he's moving to Ferrari himself it's easy to go back supporting the red team again (but also I won't immediately start hating Merc). In general I support most drivers and teams, it's just in terms of ranking LH comes first. About the only team I don't like is RB because of the dudebro culture (or any energy drink team like Monster/Rockstar). Max when he drove like a maniac towards the end of 2021 was really easy to hate, but now that he's unchallenged he kept it cool, and I'm fine with him (although dominating too much gets boring, but you can't blame the dominator - blame other teams for not doing well enough).

I don't really follow other motorsports closely enough to say if I follow driver or teams. In WEC I would say teams because the drivers change around a lot and the car is shared between multiple drivers. Other series usually I support any car whose livery looks nice or iconic.

 

[Blitz24]

Used to be fan of drivers like Jeff Gordon and Michael Schumacher, but when they both retired, I sort of began following teams in NASCAR and just watching the circus in F1 in general.

 

[noshog]

1st - I'm a racing fan ! If whatever series I'm watching has good racing it doesn't matter who is driving or what teams/cars are involved ... Good racing will always be good racing !

2nd - I'll back my favorite Drivers (If a Kiwi is involved it'll always be them ), but do have other fav's from around the world.

3rd - Will be Teams, I'll always back McLaren (cos of NZ roots) and Toyota teams, after them I don't really have full loyalty to any team TBH.

Was actually kinda hard to answer for me as there are always several factors involved, one of the hardest times for me was when Kimi was at Ferrari, Kimi is my all time favorite F1 driver and I was never traditionally a Ferrari fan, so was always so conflicted during that stint, wanted Kimi to win but not Ferrari ... One day I hope to have all 3 line up, epic close racing in F1 and a Kiwi winning in a McLaren .

 

[sillybilly]

Mixed depending on factors...

Mostly I follow the car - from an interest in design when I was younger, I would pick the car that I though looked the coolest at the launch and support them for the season. Fickle but then so many cool cars like the yellow Jordans, Orange Arrows, even the jags, the Earth Dreams Hondas looked so awesome.

Sometimes I'd support drivers if they really continued to exceed expectations - Schumacher was mostly my favourite driver ever from his first couple of seasons snatching podiums and odd wins were so exciting. Never a Ferrari fan but respect them for their place in the sport - I'd never buy or wear any Ferrari merch.

Last season I mostly supported Williams - if that's possible in my state of disenchantment and lack of enthusiasm for the sport - and I would then support anyone except RedBull / Verstappen > I'd be for Ferrari or Merc if they could beat RBR or against Ferrari or Mercedes if there was a lower team that could beat them.

 

[ThePotatoKing]

It's kind of a mix, for me. When i started watching the sport in 2018 i supported Vettel mostly, since he was the de facto underdog, going up against the might of Mercedes. In the same vein i supported Haas and still do even today.

I guess whether it's a team or driver i just go for the underdog, even regardless of motorsport disipline.

 

[Alfred1]

I usually follow teams but in some cases, I follow drivers as well but it only happens if a drive leaves my favorite team after spending a few years with them and has helped the team to get some podium finishes.

 

[FPV MIC]

I follow teams, drivers, manufacturers and even nations (in no particular order) depending on the type of motorsport.

Speedway GP has a World Cup (or Speedway of Nations) that's contested between national teams for example, so it's a no brainer that pretty much everyone follows their own countries team in that form of motorsport. I know I do.

 

[odeepaanh]

To me it seems like the more the sport relies on individual talent, the more people follow individual players/drivers. I’ve seen this quite a bit in basketball where people tend to be fans of individual players quite a bit considering that NBA basketball tends to thrive off individual talent, whereas NFL football is very team based and you rarely see it. People pretty much almost the whole time are fans of teams primarily.

 

[TheCracker]

I tend to interchange between team and individual driver, depending motorsport discipline. To be honest i just enjoy the racing, the competitive element over anything else.

In F1 there are drivers and teams that i favour seeing do well and other drivers and teams that i enjoy seeing been beaten. There's probably a national eliment to it as i always like to see British drivers doing well.

With something like WEC it's difficult to follow one particular driver as they can be either carried or hampered by their team mates - as well as the races being long so battling reliability is much more of an issue then it is with a sprint race and therefore individual skills behind the wheel are even less of a factor behind winning then in other motorsports. It's also not always clear which driver is driving at that moment in time. So for WEC/Le Mans i've always followed the fortunes of a team/manufacturer.

Rallying, Moto GP/WSB, BTCC and lesser single seater series i probably favour driver over team.

I'm always most happy to see an underdog performing well, perhaps above seeing some one or some team that i favour doing well.