I, like many, was massively impressed when Kobayashi burst onto the Formula 1 since a couple of years ago. I was happy that Sauber signed him up following Toyotaâs withdrawal from Formula 1. In his first year at Sauber he was always worth watching, he was exciting, fresh, aggressive but fair. He had some great results, score some good points and generally did a very good job. This season he was looking good, he was still aggressive, he was still entertaining and generally whenever he was on the screen he was worth watching. However ever since his contract has been renewed he has not been the same driver. I cannot remember a single thing about any one of his races since that point. Heâs done nothing at all, this weekend he scored his first point since the German Grand Prix but even this race he was unspectacular, even maybe boring. There has been a lot of talk about Hamilton losing his spark and going off the boil, but I think with Kobayashi loss of form we have lost an even brighter spark. I for one hope that we see the old Kobayashi back really soon. I hope we see some spectacular, aggressive and a real charge from Kobayashi in Brazil and next season. With the point he scored at Abu Dhabi I hope that Kobayashi has regained his confidence and will let lose in Brazil. Does anyone else remember seeing Kobayashi for the first time in Brazil and thinking that we have really got a driver worth watching? How do you think Kobayashi will fair next seaon?
I think it's the Sauber that has let down Kobayashi. Sauber's decision to stop working on the EBD post-Silverstone has hurt them and it means that an exceptional error-free drive is required just to get in the points. Perez is outperforming Kobayashi and I think this will continue next season.
Kobayashi is fortunate that he is a popular driver otherwise his lack of form would of caused calls for him to be dropped.
Is Perez out performing Kobay or is the team pushing Perez because of his Mexican (Telmex) Ferrari (Ferrari) links? Also you will find sauber are allways experimenting split strategies throughout the 2nd half of the season and did pretty much give up on the season. I expect Koba to be back on form at the start of next season if not then we can question it
There is no preferential treatment at Sauber. Perez is outperforming Kobayashi in qualifying and even with a bad strategy he outraces Kobayshi. I don't think Kobayashi is driving poorly, I think Sauber's rivals are getting quicker and Perez is improving. Perez is still a bit rusty atm though - like damaging his FW on the first lap in Abu Dhabi. A very clumsy error and one that surely cost him points. Having said that, it was a good recovery to 11th.
kobayashi is definately not overated, look at the points 28-14, double the points and before anyone brings up the crash and him missing two races, how many points could he really have gained, 4 maybe 5 and a push. kobayashi had a monster start to the season and it hasn't been an amazing second half to the season but i still belive he is better than perez. to be honest i think that perez is the overated one, he had one good race in australia and the backing of ferrari and then some people are hyping him up to be much better than he actually is, other than australia can anyone think of a race where he has shone (from memory). its just because ferrari are supporting him so some people see this as instant championship material and the ferrari fans will obviously want to see the driver their team backs as a good driver
Kobayashi scored 16 points in those two races, so take those away and it's 14-12 to Perez. Add on the Australia points and it becomes 20-16 to Perez. He had an excellent race in Silverstone, fighting with Rosberg throughout the race. In Japan he was near the back of the grid (with Rosberg literally right behind). At the end of the race he finished 8th while Rosberg's much better Mercedes was 10th. In the closing stages of that race he was catching Massa and Schumacher but ran out of laps so sensibly backed off near the end. There have been other races (Valencia, Germany and a few others where his strategy has been dire and he's still done well). Ferrari are only supporting him because they've seen something in him - they know he can be the next big thing. He has been great in every race series and has impressed me in his short F1 stint.
Kobayashi is an unknown, give the Japanese driver a chance in the top 3 teams, and it will be interesting to watch.
I think that could be said about many drivers at the moment. Its a shame we'll never get a direct comparison. A1 did have something going for it there.
Rosberg-Schumacher-Senna-Petrov-Di Resta-Sutil-Buemi-Alguersari-Kobayashi-Perez-Barrichello (last hurrah)-Maldonado-Hulkenberg-Kovalainen-Trulli (with better power steering )-D'ambrosio-Glock-D'ricciardo-Karthekeyan....... we will have to wait until these guys here either get a race winner underneath them or even a race seat.
As a ferrari fan, you're obviously going to favour perez, as an F1 fan, i favour Kobayashi. Perez doesn't leave me full of confidence. He's still too inconsistent for my liking, one race he trounces Kobayashi, the next he's busy crashing into people he should really be avoiding.
fair enough i got myself mixed up but i stand by what i said, perez has not shon for me this season and neither has kobayashi to be honest, but i do think that kobayashi has been the bettwe driver overall which is shown in the points. why would you take those points away?? it was an excellent drive from kobayashi to get to fifth and to be honest i dont think that perez would have beat him and 7th in canada was also a good race and was the highest that sauber could have achieved and we'll never know if perez would have beat him?
Kobay was going great guns early in the season, then he seemed to suffer bit of a dip after Spa, when he was taken out while in 4th/5th. Kobay is the better of the two, though Perez definitley has something. Perez may beat him in quali but Kobay is usually in front before too long, he's usually been the victim of poor strategy. And Kobay could've done better than 7th in Canada, but Sauber decided to keep him out too long on the ints and the advantage he'd made up on track was lost.
To assume that Perez would have matched Kobayashi in Monaco and Canada is highly dubious, based on his form up to the point of his crash. Kamui thrashed him in three of the first five races, and was beaten by one place in the other two, due to an inferior strategy and puncture in Australia and Spain respectively. And Kamui was absolutely class at both races that Perez missed In fairness to Perez, points are a pretty unfair way to judge him in light of how the Sauber season has gone. I make the head-to-head 10-7 to Kobayashi, not counting the double retirement at Monza. Sure, Kobayashi got two of those by default due to the crash, but he probably would have won those anyway, and has also driven a couple of races so bad that even Maldonado would have looked class by comparison. I think the 10-7 record is quite a reliable guide as to where those two are. For comparison, the Force India head-to-head is 10-8 to in Sutil's favour. Sutil didn't get two of those by default (but on this measure Kobayashi would definitely have won at least one point in those two races anyway). The fact that (while underrated) he's not as good as an on-form Kobayashi is balanced by the fact that his worst is nowhere near as bad as Kobayashi has occasionally been.
