| By Kevin Turner and Edd Straw |
Versatile drivers are easy to admire. Not only do they demonstrate their abilities in different machinery and a variety of series, they also tend to be among the most passionate and enthusiastic of racers. They love doing what they do. When talking about stars such as Stirling Moss, Jim Clark and Mario Andretti, it's easy to lament the fact that top drivers rarely do more than race in their main championships these days. That is partly an inevitable consequence of the increasing professionalism and quality of top series. Jumping in and taking on the specialists is no easy task and requires proper commitment. Moss is often held up as the benchmark for all-round driving talent. But is he the best ever?
YES - Kevin Turner, Editor (@KRT917) Many drivers have competed across different motorsport categories and a select few have been successful in multiple disciplines. But only Moss was so consistently the benchmark whatever he got into. There's little doubt that Moss was the world's best sportscar driver by the mid-1950s, underlined by the significant advantage he had over Mercedes team-mate Juan Manuel Fangio during '55. How he stacked up against the Argentinian - who must still be regarded as one of the top 10 Formula 1 drivers ever - over the next two F1 campaigns is open to debate, but once Fangio retired Moss became the undisputed top dog. He famously never won the F1 world title, but his peers knew he was the man to beat. From the start of 1958 to the end of '61, Moss won more world championship grands prix than anyone else (10, to second-best Jack Brabham's seven), despite missing some of the '60 season and driving for Rob Walker's privateer squad against factory teams. He was thus the best in both F1 and sportscars, which at that time was virtually on a par with grand prix racing. But that is only part of the argument for Moss. He also won the first saloon car races in the United Kingdom at Silverstone - events that led to the formation of what we now call the British Touring Car Championship - and was an ace in F2 and 500cc F3 machines, taking on and beating the category specialists. He often won multiple races in different cars on the same weekend. One of the reasons he was able to do this was that Moss could win in inferior equipment. He could jump in, get on the pace quickly and maximise what he had, surely essential traits for any potential 'greatest all-rounder'. He was, simply, versatile at a higher level than everyone else.
NO - Edd Straw, Editor-in-Chief (@EddStrawF1) Most of what is said about Moss is indisputable; he was one of the all-time greats in Formula 1 and sportscars, supported by great success in other machinery. But this was predominantly within one racing culture, even though he did also have some success in rallying. We are talking about the greatest all-rounder here, and Moss's body of work is not quite broad enough for that accolade. A great all-rounder? Yes. The greatest all-rounder? No. That accolade can only go to Mario Andretti. Did Andretti quite reach the heights of Moss in Formula 1? Despite winning the world championship that Moss never did, no. He never was indisputably the very best in GP racing in the same way Moss was, but it was precisely because of his versatility that he was rarely dedicated to F1. It wasn't until his ninth season that he contested a full campaign. You could argue that his pursuit of the F1 title was simply a sideline to his American career. And what a sideline. But Andretti is a contender for the greatest of all Indycar drivers, winning four titles and 52 races, including the Indianapolis 500. He was also a force in sprint and midget cars and excelled on dirt tracks. And did I mention he also won Pikes Peak, and even a drag race?! Sportscars? Well, he was a serious force there, winning the Daytona and Sebring classics a combined total of four times, and the Brands Hatch 1000Km in 1972. Not convinced? He was also a force in stock cars, winning the 1967 Daytona 500 with a gamechanging performance, and taking the 1979 IROC crown. Andretti probably could have been the best had he focused on any of these areas. Instead, he left his mark in more forms of four-wheeled competition than anyone else before or since.
YES: Moss conquered left-field classics There is certainly no arguing with Andretti's breadth of achievement, but I think Edd underestimates that trait for Moss. It's true that his successes were largely achieved in one racing culture, but within that was greater variety than you might see today, or even in Andretti's era. For example, road-racing epics such as the Mille Miglia, Targa Florio and Dundrod Tourist Trophy (Moss's 1954 win is pictured above) were very different to circuit events of the time. Moss won at all three, with his 1955 Mille Miglia success being one of the greatest motorsport performances of all time, while Andretti has no equivalent on his admittedly impressive CV. You would need to combine several of the categories in which Andretti was successful to reach the range of challenge faced by sportscar competitors of the '50s, such was the variety of events. I think it's also worth pointing out that Moss's rallying ability was outstanding. Outside of his normal comfort zone, he won the coveted Coupe des Alpes en Or for three consecutive penalty-free Alpine Rallies. That's not a bad sideline either. Would Andretti have been a successful rally driver? Probably. But I'd argue that Moss would have been incredible in an Indycar. The point is that Moss was the best whatever the challenge, whether it be a non-championship half-hour F1 encounter at Goodwood or a 10-hour test of endurance around Italy. If no driver had ever been the benchmark across so many categories, then Andretti's breadth of success would surely make him the greatest all-rounder. But Moss, as Edd agrees, still stands as one of the all-time greats in F1 and sportscars, before you even get onto his other triumphs. Andretti could have been the best had he focused on one area, but Moss was the best even though he didn't. His depth trumps Andretti's breadth.
NO: Andretti went further out of his comfort zone There's no underestimation of the breadth of Moss's achievements. And while there's no doubting how different the road-race events Kevin mentions were, they remain firmly the same European culture and Moss never encountered anything like the hostility Andretti did in NASCAR - it was clear the stock-car establishment was desperate for this open-wheel upstart not to win the Daytona 500. It's not that Moss's achievements were narrow, it's simply that Andretti's were far broader. Moss never won a race on the dirt, he never won on a one-mile oval, he never won on a superspeedway - and while it's unfair to hold this against him, Moss never actually managed to win the F1 title, which Andretti did. Kevin is absolutely right that this argument is rooted in depth versus breadth, but the very nature of searching for a greatest all-rounder means it's the latter that has to be the overriding factor. Hypothetically, both Andretti and Moss would surely have been very successful in any form of motorsport they turned their hands to. Indeed, they probably could have thrived in plenty of other non-motorsport endeavours. But Andretti is the one who had the more diverse career by an enormous margin. Had Andretti simply turned up in some of these areas and done OK, the Moss argument would prevail. But Andretti was a relentless winner during a career that stretched from 1959-94 and is regarded by most as the greatest North American racing driver in history. So let's not paint him as anything less than an incredible driver. In a greatest-racing-driver argument, depth would trump breadth. But not in the all-round argument. There, Andretti's unique career jumping from road courses to ovals, from paving to dirt, open-wheelers to stock cars to sportscars, is streets ahead.
YES: Moss had greater technologic versatility We'll have to agree to disagree on the depth-versus-breadth argument, or risk going round in circles! But there is another element to Moss's versatility we have not yet explored. He showed an ability to move with technological change, or even make the most of engineering cul-de-sacs. Moss was the first driver to win a world championship GP in a mid-engined car - one giving away 500cc to his rivals - and remains the only driver to have won an F1 race in a four-wheel-drive car, thanks to his 1961 Oulton Park success in the Ferguson P99 (pictured above). He was also one of the first, along with Jim Clark, to truly start exploring rotating a mid-engined single-seater on the brakes, a style now essential for any professional racing driver. Andretti did have to get on top of downforce, but all the top drivers managed that, including Moss's old rival Brabham. In short, Andretti was very good at understanding and perfecting what was required. But Moss was capable of moving the parameters of what that actually meant. I'd also take issue with the argument that Andretti was a relentless winner throughout his career. In both F1 and Indycar, he had barren spells while he manoeuvred himself into the right car/team. That he was able to do so several times underlines his status as a great, but you won't find such spells on Moss's CV once he became established. One last question: if you had to pick a driver to race for your life, without knowing where the event would be or which cars were in play, who would you choose? Moss won nearly half of all the races he contested, a remarkable statistic in the days when cars were less reliable than they are today, so would you really put your life in Andretti's hands? Or Moss's?
NO: Andretti endured for decades If you're using the mastering of technological change as an argument against Andretti, that's a spectacular own goal. During Andretti's 41-year career he raced and won in a far broader range of machinery than Moss did, albeit not through any fault of Moss, whose frontline career did end prematurely. Downforce, non-downforce, front-engined, rear-engined, slicks and treaded tyres, midgets and stock cars, he was the first proper ground-effect F1 champion - the list goes on. He won races in the '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s, '90s and had his last outing in a Panoz Roadster at Le Mans in 2000! Inevitably, in that period there were times when Andretti wasn't winning, but Moss on his best day wasn't going to win a grand prix in an Alfa Romeo 179C or a Parnelli VPJ4. As for changing the game, he barely raced in NASCAR but still managed to create and popularise a 'loose' driving style. And he was the gold standard in Indycar in the 1960s. As for Kevin's final question, the hypothetical one-off race is not fit for purpose. For the greatest all-rounder, this should be a series of four or five races across multiple disciplines, including ovals and the loose. Both Moss and Andretti would excel at two or three, but there'd be no weak points for Mario because of his breadth of experience. To conclude, the term all-rounder is derived from cricket. You can be a great all-rounder without necessarily being the best batsman or bowler. It's been argued very well that Moss was an all-time great with the bat in various conditions, but not with the ball. You can argue that Moss is the greatest racing driver, but Andretti's longevity, his success across multiple different types of cars, technologies and in different racing cultures, makes him the greatest all-rounder.
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| By Kevin Turner and Edd Straw |
Versatile drivers are easy to admire. Not only do they demonstrate their abilities in different machinery and a variety of series, they also tend to be among the most passionate and enthusiastic of racers. They love doing what they do. When talking about stars such as Stirling Moss, Jim Clark and Mario Andretti, it's easy to lament the fact that top drivers rarely do more than race in their main championships these days. That is partly an inevitable consequence of the increasing professionalism and quality of top series. Jumping in and taking on the specialists is no easy task and requires proper commitment. Moss is often held up as the benchmark for all-round driving talent. But is he the best ever?
YES - Kevin Turner, Editor (@KRT917) Many drivers have competed across different motorsport categories and a select few have been successful in multiple disciplines. But only Moss was so consistently the benchmark whatever he got into. There's little doubt that Moss was the world's best sportscar driver by the mid-1950s, underlined by the significant advantage he had over Mercedes team-mate Juan Manuel Fangio during '55. How he stacked up against the Argentinian - who must still be regarded as one of the top 10 Formula 1 drivers ever - over the next two F1 campaigns is open to debate, but once Fangio retired Moss became the undisputed top dog. He famously never won the F1 world title, but his peers knew he was the man to beat. From the start of 1958 to the end of '61, Moss won more world championship grands prix than anyone else (10, to second-best Jack Brabham's seven), despite missing some of the '60 season and driving for Rob Walker's privateer squad against factory teams. He was thus the best in both F1 and sportscars, which at that time was virtually on a par with grand prix racing. But that is only part of the argument for Moss. He also won the first saloon car races in the United Kingdom at Silverstone - events that led to the formation of what we now call the British Touring Car Championship - and was an ace in F2 and 500cc F3 machines, taking on and beating the category specialists. He often won multiple races in different cars on the same weekend. One of the reasons he was able to do this was that Moss could win in inferior equipment. He could jump in, get on the pace quickly and maximise what he had, surely essential traits for any potential 'greatest all-rounder'. He was, simply, versatile at a higher level than everyone else.
NO - Edd Straw, Editor-in-Chief (@EddStrawF1) Most of what is said about Moss is indisputable; he was one of the all-time greats in Formula 1 and sportscars, supported by great success in other machinery. But this was predominantly within one racing culture, even though he did also have some success in rallying. We are talking about the greatest all-rounder here, and Moss's body of work is not quite broad enough for that accolade. A great all-rounder? Yes. The greatest all-rounder? No. That accolade can only go to Mario Andretti. Did Andretti quite reach the heights of Moss in Formula 1? Despite winning the world championship that Moss never did, no. He never was indisputably the very best in GP racing in the same way Moss was, but it was precisely because of his versatility that he was rarely dedicated to F1. It wasn't until his ninth season that he contested a full campaign. You could argue that his pursuit of the F1 title was simply a sideline to his American career. And what a sideline. But Andretti is a contender for the greatest of all Indycar drivers, winning four titles and 52 races, including the Indianapolis 500. He was also a force in sprint and midget cars and excelled on dirt tracks. And did I mention he also won Pikes Peak, and even a drag race?! Sportscars? Well, he was a serious force there, winning the Daytona and Sebring classics a combined total of four times, and the Brands Hatch 1000Km in 1972. Not convinced? He was also a force in stock cars, winning the 1967 Daytona 500 with a gamechanging performance, and taking the 1979 IROC crown. Andretti probably could have been the best had he focused on any of these areas. Instead, he left his mark in more forms of four-wheeled competition than anyone else before or since.
YES: Moss conquered left-field classics There is certainly no arguing with Andretti's breadth of achievement, but I think Edd underestimates that trait for Moss. It's true that his successes were largely achieved in one racing culture, but within that was greater variety than you might see today, or even in Andretti's era. For example, road-racing epics such as the Mille Miglia, Targa Florio and Dundrod Tourist Trophy (Moss's 1954 win is pictured above) were very different to circuit events of the time. Moss won at all three, with his 1955 Mille Miglia success being one of the greatest motorsport performances of all time, while Andretti has no equivalent on his admittedly impressive CV. You would need to combine several of the categories in which Andretti was successful to reach the range of challenge faced by sportscar competitors of the '50s, such was the variety of events. I think it's also worth pointing out that Moss's rallying ability was outstanding. Outside of his normal comfort zone, he won the coveted Coupe des Alpes en Or for three consecutive penalty-free Alpine Rallies. That's not a bad sideline either. Would Andretti have been a successful rally driver? Probably. But I'd argue that Moss would have been incredible in an Indycar. The point is that Moss was the best whatever the challenge, whether it be a non-championship half-hour F1 encounter at Goodwood or a 10-hour test of endurance around Italy. If no driver had ever been the benchmark across so many categories, then Andretti's breadth of success would surely make him the greatest all-rounder. But Moss, as Edd agrees, still stands as one of the all-time greats in F1 and sportscars, before you even get onto his other triumphs. Andretti could have been the best had he focused on one area, but Moss was the best even though he didn't. His depth trumps Andretti's breadth.
NO: Andretti went further out of his comfort zone There's no underestimation of the breadth of Moss's achievements. And while there's no doubting how different the road-race events Kevin mentions were, they remain firmly the same European culture and Moss never encountered anything like the hostility Andretti did in NASCAR - it was clear the stock-car establishment was desperate for this open-wheel upstart not to win the Daytona 500. It's not that Moss's achievements were narrow, it's simply that Andretti's were far broader. Moss never won a race on the dirt, he never won on a one-mile oval, he never won on a superspeedway - and while it's unfair to hold this against him, Moss never actually managed to win the F1 title, which Andretti did. Kevin is absolutely right that this argument is rooted in depth versus breadth, but the very nature of searching for a greatest all-rounder means it's the latter that has to be the overriding factor. Hypothetically, both Andretti and Moss would surely have been very successful in any form of motorsport they turned their hands to. Indeed, they probably could have thrived in plenty of other non-motorsport endeavours. But Andretti is the one who had the more diverse career by an enormous margin. Had Andretti simply turned up in some of these areas and done OK, the Moss argument would prevail. But Andretti was a relentless winner during a career that stretched from 1959-94 and is regarded by most as the greatest North American racing driver in history. So let's not paint him as anything less than an incredible driver. In a greatest-racing-driver argument, depth would trump breadth. But not in the all-round argument. There, Andretti's unique career jumping from road courses to ovals, from paving to dirt, open-wheelers to stock cars to sportscars, is streets ahead.
YES: Moss had greater technologic versatility We'll have to agree to disagree on the depth-versus-breadth argument, or risk going round in circles! But there is another element to Moss's versatility we have not yet explored. He showed an ability to move with technological change, or even make the most of engineering cul-de-sacs. Moss was the first driver to win a world championship GP in a mid-engined car - one giving away 500cc to his rivals - and remains the only driver to have won an F1 race in a four-wheel-drive car, thanks to his 1961 Oulton Park success in the Ferguson P99 (pictured above). He was also one of the first, along with Jim Clark, to truly start exploring rotating a mid-engined single-seater on the brakes, a style now essential for any professional racing driver. Andretti did have to get on top of downforce, but all the top drivers managed that, including Moss's old rival Brabham. In short, Andretti was very good at understanding and perfecting what was required. But Moss was capable of moving the parameters of what that actually meant. I'd also take issue with the argument that Andretti was a relentless winner throughout his career. In both F1 and Indycar, he had barren spells while he manoeuvred himself into the right car/team. That he was able to do so several times underlines his status as a great, but you won't find such spells on Moss's CV once he became established. One last question: if you had to pick a driver to race for your life, without knowing where the event would be or which cars were in play, who would you choose? Moss won nearly half of all the races he contested, a remarkable statistic in the days when cars were less reliable than they are today, so would you really put your life in Andretti's hands? Or Moss's?
NO: Andretti endured for decades If you're using the mastering of technological change as an argument against Andretti, that's a spectacular own goal. During Andretti's 41-year career he raced and won in a far broader range of machinery than Moss did, albeit not through any fault of Moss, whose frontline career did end prematurely. Downforce, non-downforce, front-engined, rear-engined, slicks and treaded tyres, midgets and stock cars, he was the first proper ground-effect F1 champion - the list goes on. He won races in the '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s, '90s and had his last outing in a Panoz Roadster at Le Mans in 2000! Inevitably, in that period there were times when Andretti wasn't winning, but Moss on his best day wasn't going to win a grand prix in an Alfa Romeo 179C or a Parnelli VPJ4. As for changing the game, he barely raced in NASCAR but still managed to create and popularise a 'loose' driving style. And he was the gold standard in Indycar in the 1960s. As for Kevin's final question, the hypothetical one-off race is not fit for purpose. For the greatest all-rounder, this should be a series of four or five races across multiple disciplines, including ovals and the loose. Both Moss and Andretti would excel at two or three, but there'd be no weak points for Mario because of his breadth of experience. To conclude, the term all-rounder is derived from cricket. You can be a great all-rounder without necessarily being the best batsman or bowler. It's been argued very well that Moss was an all-time great with the bat in various conditions, but not with the ball. You can argue that Moss is the greatest racing driver, but Andretti's longevity, his success across multiple different types of cars, technologies and in different racing cultures, makes him the greatest all-rounder.
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