Hmm, Liuzzi is a slow poke. He has never shown any kind of greatness or good speed at all if you ask me. He shouldnt even drive a F1 car because of his sheer lack of "everything".
'Everything' that is, other than his technical ability. As I say, he is not the greatest racer but what these lowly teams need most of all is a driver who gives good technical feedback.
Sure, as he has driven lots of different cars. So he should at least have some technical knowledge, but isnt that alone far to less to get him a car in F1? His only way in F1 is down, just look at his career. And lower than HRT isnt possible, so what does this tell us about him?
Well, too bad for F1 anyways. I think he might do better in other racing series like Le Mans or DTM. He just never got it running in F1. At least he is a nice bloke.
Nice opportunity for Ricciardo and good business by RB/TR. Will be interesting to get some analysis on his comparative times to Karthikeyan and then see his pace against Liuzzi, Virgin etc. He might take the dog of a car up a notch or two. As an aside and totally offtopic, I wonder how much better a laptime Alonso/Hamilton/Vettel would set in the HRT than they currently achieve... 1 second, maybe 2?
This is the $6 million question few people ever ask but there is a point which escapes many people⦠If the average non-racer was put in a passenger seat and prevented from seeing who was driving, they would not be able to tell the difference between the fastest and the slowest drivers in F1, even if they might detect a difference in style (which is far easier to notice in a road car). Karthikeyan is the slowest of today's F1 drivers, but even he is included in this statement. The difference between fastest and slowest is in the order of 1%. Thus a lap time of 1:20 by Karthikeyan could theoretically be brought down to 1:19.2 by Hamilton/Vettel/Alonso and Button (when he gets the car in its sweet spot). However, normally the differences between team mates are down to less than 0.5%.
Buemi and Alguersuari look safe until the end of the season then. And its not goodbye Narain yet. Autosport are reporting that he will be back for the indian GP.
As I said earlier, I don't really see the point of that. Team Lotus's line is clearly, "look, we have our preferred race drivers but to kick off F1 in India we'll give an Indian driver (Chandhok) a race." HRT's seems to be, "look, our preferred race driver is rubbish so we're binning him and putting someone good in instead - except for the Indian GP, when we'll put the rubbish guy back in the car, just for you." It's very patronising.
Also a bad move. The indian gp is towards the end of the season, and they'll be fighting with virgin for an 11th placed constructors finish. If i were colin kolles i would not take out my new best driver, to put my old worst driver in. It's just stupid. Narain doesn't belong in F1, from what i've seen, Ricciardo does.
How is he their best driver before he has completed a race? Liuzzi will beat Ricciardo. Atleast at first.
Don't take comments so literally, JC. I think what cowboy meant was along the lines of "my new bestest driver" as in they've chosen to run one driver in preference to another. Likewise, when I said the only driver Liuzzi had beaten was his team mate I didn't mean literally, statistically. It was a generalisation meant to imply that on the whole the HRT is basically in a class of its own.
What i mean is yhat HRT are basically a spoilt child, where they have a new best thing every week. Julius, i imagine that ricciardo will beat liuzzi after a race or two, he seems to have more natural speed, look at that young drivers test in abu dhabi last year, where he completely annihilated Sebastian Vettels pole position time. You must have some ability to do a faster lap than Mr. V.
I suspect Algersuari's recent performances in the races have convinced the team to retain for at least the 2011 season, leaving Ricciardo without a Torro Rosso drive this season. If they were planning to give him half a season to get some experience, this is a good move. Let's face it, Karthikeyan was a complete failure in his time in F1. I can't really praise Karthikeyan's driving in any way, although he does hold the record for the lowest finishing position in F1 history I do wonder how much money Red Bull are paying to HRT - Karthikeyan brought millions through sponsorship. Red Bull must have a lot of faith in Ricciardo. To be fair, the track conditions were completely different and that would have helped Ricciardo significantly.
You beat me to it Forza: there was no meaningful comparison at all. As for Karthikeyan retaining a drive for the inaugural Indian Grand Prix; the move is entirely political.
