Has there ever been a less-hailed two-time F1 champion than Fernando Alonso? Projected salary numbers for top F1 drivers get thrown around all the time, and for some reason Kimi Raikkonen always gets mentioned as the top paid driver.

Yes, he's undeniably quick, but the fact that Alonso wasn't the most in-demand driver since Michael Schumacher is pretty puzzling to me. He won his titles after 5 years of Ferrari domination, even though in neither season he had the best car. Kimi's McLaren in 2005 was the class of the field, and Michael's Ferrari seemed like the car to beat in 2006.

In my opinion, of all the top F1 drivers currently, Alonso has the inside track on potentially reeling in some of Michael's records. Case in point, at age 25, he's won the title 2 times and already has 16 wins, 15 poles, and 39 podiums to his name.

Now he jumped into a very competitive McLaren. Maybe a 3rd title to his belt by age 26? Certainly within the realm of possibility.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Alonso

After a bit of time off, we're bringing back F1 Blog in 2007.

It's been an exciting new season thus far in Formula 1... saying bye to some old faces (farewell Michael) and saying hello to the new. We've had some revelations this year already.

Lewis Hamilton has taken the world by storm, many hailing him as the Tiger Woods of F1. The sample size is still too small to tell for certain, but he certainly looks like a competent driver alongside reigning two-time world champ Fernando Alonso. How much he'll affect the sport, who knows - auto racing is requires more money to get into than just about any big-market sport. For one thing, you need much more than a ball to get started.