It’s a terrible thing, insecurity. The realization that you are ever-so-close to being a has-been (if you’re not already there) must be an awful feeling. Particularly since you were once king of the hill; top of the mountain. World Champion.

Jacques Who?

Jacques Villeneuve was asked by someone at autosport.com to to comment on the progress of Lance Stroll, the 18-year-old Canadian who scored his first points in the recent Grand Prix du Canada held at Montreal. Said Jacques: “One of the worst rookie performances in the history of F1.”

That’s quite an indictment, coming after only seven races of 20 scheduled in 2017.

I trust Jacques took note of the fact that five drivers who’ve lined up on the grid every time there’s been a Grand Prix this year (or nearly every time, in the case of one of them) have scored exactly no points. I have not heard him say that the performance of Renault’s Jolyon Palmer is among the worst in the history of F1, considering that his teammate has scored 18 points. Or that the performance of one Fernando Alonso, who has scored zero points to date, is among the worst turned in by a two-time champion in the history of F1. Actually, I’m surprised that Jacques didn’t point out that he won the Indianapolis 500 and Alonso didn’t, which surely - according to Jacques’ logic - would put the Spaniard’s performance among the worst in the history of the 500-mile race.

No, Jacques didn’t do that, probably because Alonso would have invited him out behind the garage where he’d have delivered him a knuckle sandwich. Ditto Palmer’s father.

It’s easy picking on an 18-year-old kid who’s not going to fight back because he can’t.

Jacques must have forgotten he might be working in construction today if he hadn’t gotten his big break by mistake. In the scoop of the auto racing century, the Sun’s Dan Proudfoot years ago reported that the president of Imperial Tobacco decided to sponsor Jacques Villeneuve in the 1992 Trois-Rivieres Grand Prix for Formula Atlantic cars. The word went down the line to get hold of Jacques Villeneuve and the youngster assigned the task contacted young Jacques instead of Uncle Jacques. If that hadn’t happened, Jacques Villeneuve wouldn’t be where he is today.

Then, of course, after showing he had some talent, Jacques received nothing but the best in terms of coaching and equipment. With Player’s money behind him, he was assigned to drive for Gerry Forsythe and Barry Green in the Atlantic series for a season before he was moved into the CART Indy car series. To his credit, he was CART and Indy 500 Rookie-of-the-Year and the following year, 1995, he won the CART title as well as Indianapolis.

Signed to the powerhouse William-Renault F1 team for 1996, he had 10,000 miles of testing before the season started. He won his fourth race in F1, lost the world championship by an eyelash but then won it the following year, 1997. Good for him.

But then, nothing. Zilch. Nada. He never won another race in any racing series again - F1, NASCAR, Indy cars, sports cars, speed cars, V8 supercars, Formula E - you name it, there are goose eggs beside his name.

If I was Jacques, describing my own performance post-1997, I would call it one of the worst - if not the worst - in the history of motorsport. But he wouldn’t and I won’t.

What he said about Stroll was not true. It was not accurate. It was also unprofessional and uncalled-for. Here’s hoping Jacques Villeneuve will stop and think the next time before putting his foot in his mouth.

The Azerbaijan Grand Prix will be held at the weekend and one of the familiar faces in pit lane will be missing. Team principal Monisha Kaltenborn left Sauber this week after a difference of opinion with the team’s owners, Longbow Finance.

It’s interesting to note that F1 is like every other sports league in the world these days: if a team is losing, fire the coach. Sauber’s two drivers, Pascal Wehrlein and Marcus Ericsson, had only scored four points so far this season (Wehrlein in Spain) and the owner didn’t think this was good enough. So, off with her head.

Some are feeling sorry for Kaltenborn, in that she was the first female team principal in F1’s history. Okay, But she was also involved in one of the most sordid episodes of double-dealing in recent F1 history when, in 2015, she (or someone at Sauber) accepted a whole ton of money from a race driver called Giedo van der Garde on the condition that he drive for the team. But then after taking the money, they fired him.

When he either asked for it back, or to be fitted for a race seat, he was told to take a hike and so was forced to sue and to file injunctions (he won them all, by the way) before Bernie Ecclestone stepped in and settled everything down.

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The interesting thing is that prior to this happening, van der Garde had been a not-bad F1-calibre racing driver. But when Bernie gave him some money and told him to get lost, his F1 race-driving career ended.

Why does the expression “blackballed” keep popping into my mind?

TV THIS WEEKEND

Friday, 8:30 p.m., NASCAR Camping World Trucks Series, Iowa Speedway, FOX Sports Racing

Saturday, 8:55 a.m., Formula One qualifying, Azerbaijan Grand Prix, TSN4/5

Saturday, 8:30 p.m., NASCAR Xfinity Series stock cars, Iowa Speedway, TSN2

Sunday, 8:55 a.m., Formula One Grand Prix of Azerbaijan, TSN5

Sunday, 12:30 p.m., Verizon IndyCar Series race, Road America, SN360

Sunday, 3 p.m., NASCAR Monsater Energy Series, Sonoma Raceway, TSN2

Sunday, 6 p.m., NHRA drag racing, Norwalk, Ohio, FSR

NOTE: I will not be providing a Racing Roundup this coming Monday. I will be in Switzerland this weekend at the launch of two new cars for Toronto Star Wheels and won’t be returning until late next week.

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