100eme

Ayrton Senna

Possibly. Certainly the version to which I reverted is slightly too colloquial for Wikipedia, although I don't believe it contains any actual errors of the English language. Or at least none that are not normal usage. I'll leave it up to you, but please note that your version has one typo ("focued") and one split infinitive. It also alters the meaning somewhat from what was originally written (are you sure this reflects sources?), and I'm not sure "Prost remained focused" actually means anything very much in this context. 4u1e (talk) 22:33, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi. Firstly, thanks for discussing the changes rather than making more changes to the article - that's the right way forward :) I see 4u1e has made a few comments above, with which I am inclined to agree. Ayrton Senna was written by a fairly large number of people, and parts of it are written in a style which is too chatty for an encyclopedia, using a few jargon words which are avoidable. That said, technically, the grammar is basically OK. That's not to say it can be improved. I also agree with his observation of the typo, the split infinitive (which is not concretely incorrect) and the use of the "remained focused" phrase, which is too indistinct for this sentence. Prost "kept his foot down" specifically, i.e. he did not back off the accelerator in a situation of great danger.

Your points: I see your point about "intensified into battles on the track" - it's not ungrammatical and it does make sense, but it is a little clumsy. We could change it to your suggestion. I do not agree with your second point about "and a psychological war off it". The object noun of the sentence (the track) has been stated and there is no grammatical necessity to repeat the object. "It" replaces a recently-stated subject or object, and does so satisfactorily in this case. There really is nothing else in this sentence that "it" could reasonably be.

"Unreliability" is used particularly here to describe mechanical unreliability, i.e. his car failed in those races - as you say, this is what the word suggests, and it is accurate in this case. It had nothing to do with Senna himself, or luck, and suggesting so is inappropriate. The term "mechanical unreliability" could be substituted if you wish. The sentence, with the comma splitting the clauses, is perfectly grammatical and is exactly how a native speaker would phrase it. However, it does need a comma after "Portugal", creating a separate relative clause. Exchanging the first comma for a full stop does nothing really except result in the first sentence being a little too short.

With regard to the sentence: "Prost took the 1989 world title after a collision with Senna at the Suzuka Circuit in Japan..." - there is no other driver mentioned, so the only meaning of this sentence can be that it was Prost who had the collision with Senna. Had it been another driver in collision with Senna, he would be mentioned or the sentence would fail to transmit its meaning. The other point I'd like to make about "collisions" is a very fine point. I don't know whether you're a native speaker or not, but to say "Prost had a collision with Senna" implies that Prost caused the collision. This sentence is composed in such a way that no blame for the collision is apportioned to either driver by way of the words used.

I hope my comments make sense to you, and please let me know if you have any other comments or suggestions. Cheers, Bretonbanquet (talk) 20:44, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

I think we picked up on the typo, so no problem there. I think actually it has been reverted to "kept his foot down" because that literal sense is exactly what we're looking for. Prost literally kept his foot down hard on the throttle because he was not intimidated by Senna's tactics. So yes, it's not deceiving at all.

I'm happy with your suggestion of "intensified into numerous battles on the track". I'm only one editor though, of course, so other opinions may differ. But it's fine with me.

The unreliability sentence is already grammatically correct (perhaps apart from that missing comma), though it is a moderately complex sentence. If the sentence were to be split into two, I would pad out the first sentence by elaborating a little on Senna's three wins, maybe by mentioning where those wins took place. This would avoid a rather clunky short sentence. I prefer to avoid semi-colons by just simplifying the text, and that would be a way to do it. A comma after Portugal would suffice then for the second sentence, as well as changing the first word "But" for "However".

Certainly one of the problems with Wikipedia is that many articles, like this one, are written by many different editors, all with a different style, and it's often difficult to reorganise the text so that it flows properly. While it is important to help readers for whom English is not their first language, it is equally important not to over-simplify the text. Likewise, as you say, there are many variants of English, and what may seem perfectly legible to one reader may seem gibberish to another. Formula One articles are generally written in British English, but it makes no sense if other English speakers are discouraged because the wording seems odd to them. That's why it's important that editors like you speak out when something looks wrong, and changes can be made. Bretonbanquet (talk) 20:24, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

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