Simona de Silvestro

[Moneyseeker]

Originally Posted by Tucky

Sauber have massively dropped the ball this season so I can understand them not wanting to take a risk, but then again they've employed two of the slowest drivers on the grid this year... I wonder whether SdS was bringing any money to Sauber or if she was asking for money. Compared to F1, Indycar drivers pretty much all get paid a decent amount.



To be fair when Susie got the drive with Williams Toto wasn't allowed to help make the decision and I think she did a very respectable job in Germany.

I believe she was supposed to bring funds, but aside from paying for a test in an old car, allegedly the funds for the seat are not forthcoming, according to Sauber.

[Cookie85]

Originally Posted by m355y

This is really sad to me, because she was a driver who genuinely looked like she might have the ability to make a good job of it, F1 kinda seemed on the cusp of a big moment in terms of having a good, competitive and talented female driver who was actually there on merit and a serious, dedicated character who was just another 25 year old newcomer to the sport with a real chance of making the grade. Gender less of an issue, ability more.

In contrast to someone like Danica Patrick who is all gloss and hype over any remote substance as a racing driver, or Susie Wolff who seems like a lovely person but it blatantly nowhere near the standard to ever set foot in a F1 car were she not, y'know, married to Toto Wolff. Those two would not be positive because the only reason they're anywhere near where they are is gender. Simona De Silvestro is actually a talent, a proper, genuine talent who with the right combination of luck, application and grit might actually one day stand on an F1 podium or better.

If not her, who? Back to Susie driving a Williams? Great.

Exactly. I'm so gutted by this, I really thought we finally had a great female driver who could actually get somewhere. F1 has messed up big time on this one.

[Tucky]

Will Buxton seemed to get very personal with his tweets about this a few days ago.

"Very sad to hear of @simdesilvestro’s financial struggles. When a certain last-placed GP3 driver gets legs up on big deals. Catastrophe."

Can't think of a last placed gp3 driver but I can think of an American gp2 driver who's results this year in GP2 are about as exciting as watching paint dry, and yet he's still a test and reserve driver for Marussia...

[Hawkwood]

Last place in GP3 this year (and probably 2013 and 2012 too), of the full season runners, is Carmen Jorda.
I'm not aware of her having help to get any higher up the ladder, though to be honest she is out of her depth in GP3 as it is.

Could he have meant GP2 and Gonzalez getting IndyCar tests?

[bjohnsonsmith]

I just wonder if Simona de Silvestro will go back to IndyCar. Pagenaud's gone to Penske, so Sam Schmidt needs to fill a seat and newly formed CFH could potentially run 3 cars next year.

[Rob29]

Hope Simona gets a drive somewhere-paid for BT sport so I could see her in Indycar!

[JeremySmith]

Lets not forget this lady....

[Nicholosophy]

Needs to find some finance or it won't happen sadly. Sad state for drivers wanting a seat in F1 who aren't part of a young driver program.

[Paradise City]

Yeah, it depends how keen her sponsors are of course and if she wants to do sportscars, she could do something there. Some drivers aren't drawn to that discipline though and she hasn't done any one off events there IIRC. I could be misreading that, maybe she's keen. NASCAR seems somewhat jaded of female stars so I doubt she'll find fertile ground in that area.

Of course she's Swiss, so she has touring cars of various stripes in Europe. She could do the 500, where she has something of a reputation. But, frankly, I half expect she'll retire.

[jondownunder]

Originally Posted by Hawkwood

Last place in GP3 this year (and probably 2013 and 2012 too), of the full season runners, is Carmen Jorda.
I'm not aware of her having help to get any higher up the ladder, though to be honest she is out of her depth in GP3 as it is.

Could he have meant GP2 and Gonzalez getting IndyCar tests?

I'm sure he was referring to Jorda as a comparable female example. He often has little digs about her in his commentary, and I agree she's still out of her depth after three years in the series.

And now two other mediocre drivers, Adderly Fong and Roy Nissany (son of Chanoch), will be testing a 2-year old Sauber at Valencia next week.

http://www.sauberf1team.com/en/seaso...-a-sauber-c31/

If it brings Sauber much-needed funding then fair enough. They're certainly not evaluating those two based on talent.

[Nikki Katz]

I still maintain that I don't think she's F1 standard, but admit that she's much better qualified than these two guys. Since when has being an F3 / GP3 backmarker been good enough for F1??? Surely if anyone should trip up on a superlicence decision then it should be them?

Hopefully the team are just doing this for some short term cash aren't aren't looking at them seriously.

[W.A Trichlorostyrene]

Originally Posted by Nikki Katz

Hopefully the team are just doing this for some short term cash aren't aren't looking at them seriously.

I don't know, this seems like a pretty good, risk-free way to make a quick buck - as long as the driver don't stuff it in the barriers of course. I'm actually quite surprised we don't see more teams doing that. I think the likes of Minardi were doing it quite often back in the day(remember a certain Pastor Maldonado testing for them in 2004?), but of course this was at an age when testing rules were far more relaxed.

As far as the next female star goes, I think Beitske Visser might perhaps have the chops to make it big. Putting her in 3.5 straight from Formel Masters was a very strange move, pretty much a "sink or swim" kind of deal. But it might pay off next year, she has already made good progress in 2014. We shall see.

And for Simona... Well... The fact that she and/or her management team constantly had money trouble with HVM, KV and now Sauber worries me a little. Who knows what's going on behind the scenes.

[W.A Trichlorostyrene]

As for whether Simona would've been good enough for F1, well it's awful hard to say. I think a lot of people are overlooking how different F1 and IndyCar are. In particular, the road and street courses are very bumpy, slow and low-grip, with very little room for mistake. Quite a difference to F1's fast corners and tarmac run offs. Also, no power steering. I think Simona had a very good physique for IndyCar, as she clearly has plenty of upper-body strenght. Quite a difference with Danica Patrick for example, who has a morphology more similar to Takuma Sato(one must wonder how much a factor this has been in their respective struggles on road and steets).

By the way, trying to read too much into results is a dangerous game. IndyCar is a spec-series with a very homogeneous talent pool, and therefore the engineering side has a huge importance. Gone are the days when the extra 200-300hp allowed the best drivers to make the difference. Also, there isn't a lot of practice time, so if you don't unload with a good base set-up it's an uphill battle for the rest of the week-end. On the other hand, the track keeps evolving so much throughout the week-end you may see the fastest drivers in practice fade later in the week-end and vice versa. Throw wreck, cautions, and so-called "alternate" strategy(which is more like trying to get a lucky yellow when you're having an hopeless week-end) into the mix and you often end-up with wacky results.

Anyway, it would have been interesting to see Simona have a go in the 2014 Sauber. Clearly it's a very unstable and somewhat unpredictable car(especially on corner entry), and it would have been intriguing to see what someone with an IndyCar background would have done with it, as in IndyCar "improvisation" and car control is paramount due to the bumpy circuits with ever-changing grip. One must also wonder if the post-2014 F1 specs would have made for a smoother transition from one side of the pond to another, compared to the pre-2013 F1 specs when it was more about sticking your foot to the floor and hope the aero does the work.

Sorry for double post.