Will Vettel be the next F1 legend who win first in Monza?

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The Italian circuit of Monza holds a special place in Formula One.

Not only has Monza held a grand prix every year since the F1 world championship began in 1950, it's a track were every racer wants to win.

Monza's now overgrown but iconic banking, which hasn't been used for races in more than 50 years, was immortalized in the movie poster for the 1966 film Grand Prix. The high-speed track also took the lives of world champions Alberto Ascari, who died in 1955 at the corner which now bears his name, and Jochen Rindt, who was killed in a qualifying accident for the 1970 Italian Grand Prix and then became F1's only posthumous title winner two races later.

Legends have been born there too. Monza served as the venue for the first grand prix win in the famed career of three-time world champion Jackie Stewart in 1965. More recently, seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher thrilled the Ferrari-crazy Tifosi with a quintet of wins there while driving scarlet cars between 1996 and 2006.

Another future world champion who scored his maiden F1 victory in Italy is reigning title holder Sebastian Vettel, who won a rain-soaked race at Monza in 2008 while driving for the also-ran Toro Rosso team.

The young German won for a second time in Monza last weekend and all but sealed his second consecutive championship. His impressive Monza triumph and drive to a second title have elicited comparisons to Schumacher and late three-time champion Ayrton Senna, who many regard as the most talented driver to sit in an F1 car.

There's no doubt that Vettel's dominance in Monza punctuated what has been a stellar season for the Red Bull driver, but does his supremacy in 2011 make the Red Bull driver worthy of comparisons to legends like Schumacher and Senna?

Now, there's little doubt that Vettel possesses a gargantuan talent. That was apparent from the time he won 18 starts in 20 races as a 17-year-old driving in the 2004 German Formula BMW Series. Three years later, he scored his first F1 point. The next season he bagged his maiden win. In his second full F1 season in 2009, he was runner up overall. Last season he was champion. All of those F1 achievements made him the youngest ever to do so.

Over a single lap, he's proven to be a top performer, taking 10 poles in each of the past two seasons — and 2011 still has six races to go, which means he could eclipse 1992 world champion Nigel Mansell's record 14 by the end of the year. Vettel has won 13 races over the same period.

One of the more accurate gauges of a racer's talent is how quick he is in the rain, because wet weather takes away most of any car advantage that a driver may hold over others. In this area, Vettel has excelled. In his maiden win in Monza three years ago, Vettel put on a wet driving clinic in a terribly outmatched Toro Rosso.

Now he's driving the best car on the grid, something that gives him a distinct advantage over his rivals, especially this year where his Red Bull racer's reliability has been bulletproof. And there should be no doubt that any of the other top drivers on the grid not in a Red Bull — Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton of McLaren and Ferrari's Fernando Alonso — would definitely be in a similar position to Vettel if they had his ride.

Another good measure for any driver is his ability to outpace his teammate, who is the only one on the grid in similar equipment. In this area in 2011, Vettel has trounced Mark Webber, who drives the second Red Bull. The German has eight wins while Webber has taken none. Vettel has also outscored his teammate in points by a wide margin, 284-167. Drivers get 25 points for a win. Over the past two seasons, Vettel came out on top of his teammate in poles (20-8), wins (13-4), and points (541-409).

Of the two other top teams, McLaren and Ferrari, the driver who fares best against his teammate is Alonso, who is a double world champion. His teammate Felipe Massa has scored less than 50 per cent of the Alonso's points haul this season and has no wins to the Spaniard's one. Over the past two seasons, Alonso has also outscored his teammate in poles (2-0), wins (6-0), and points (424-226).

Some might argue that Alonso stats are inflated because he is clearly the No. 1 driver at Ferrari, especially after Massa was ordered to move over and allow his teammate to take the win at the 2010 German Grand Prix. On the other hand, a good case could also be made for Vettel getting preferential treatment at Red Bull. Fans might recall the infamous front wing incident at last year's British Grand Prix when the team took a new specification wing from Webber's car and gave it to Vettel after his broke. Webber was forced to race with the older and slower front wing but won anyway. And then there's also the little detail of Vettel's team being controlled by an Austrian corporation and run by German speakers.

At McLaren, where the outfit swears its drivers get equal equipment, Button and Hamilton are actually pretty even over the past two seasons: 4-5 in wins, 0-1 in poles, and 381-398 in points respectively.

Long story short is that a second title this year simply puts Vettel on par with Alonso. So, using Vettel's recent Monza success to start adding his name to the list of career greats and making comparisons to Senna and Schumacher may be a bit premature. But with the way he drives, he'll deserve it soon enough.

Wickens could be a champion on Sunday

Fresh off his first official F1 test on Tuesday with the Marussia Virgin team, Guelph, Ont.'s, Robert Wickens needs to outscore his teammate by 17 points this weekend in France to clinch the 2011 World Series by Renault 3.5 title. Wickens, who performed straight line testing for the Virgin team in Vairano, Italy, this week, heads into the penultimate weekend of the season at the Paul Ricard Circuit up by 34 points over his Carlin stablemate Jean-Eric Vergne, who is the only driver able to catch the 22 year old Canadian.

The good news for Wickers is that he was the quickest overall in a pre-season test at Paul Ricard in March.

The series runs two races per weekend with a maximum of 50 points available should a driver sweep. Wickens has a series high four wins this year and eight podiums in 13 races.