Who should win the Autosport Young Driver Award?

[rlinter]

There are the normal 6 entries in the Autosport/McLaren Young Driver of the year award who do you think is most worthy of the title?

[Marshal]

I'm not sure any of them are really outstanding, the most interesting thing for me will be how Simon Pullan (Caterham Euroseries Champ) compares with those who've been racing single seaters this year.

[AndyF]

I have voted for Simon Pullan, just because it would be interesting to see someone from a different discipline win. I think that the two F3 and FRenault drivers have too much experience to really be counted. Kane stands a chance. The lack of Formula Ford drivers is quite woryying though.

[Marshal]

Top be fair to him Kane quite impressed me this weekend when I saw him for the first time down at Combe. Not sure about his outright pace as he didn't qualify that well, butr his racecraft was absolutely first rate. Has this been the story of his season or was he just unlucky with qualifying last weekend?

[paulzinho]

I think Robbie Kerr has been quite impressive this year.

[jiggly_puff]

def. should be robbie in my opinion!

[Rennen]

This has always been a great annual end of season contest. Some years throw up a good bunch of talent like back in '98 ie; Jenson Button, Justin Wilson, Matt Davies, Doug Bell, Robbie Kerr (getting his 3rd crack at it) & an outsider, an F600 driver James Pickford, if memory serves me? This years lot with the exception of Kane and the Caterham chap, are very much on a parr with each other in there achievements, non of them really outstanding or that inspiring. But being on a parr should make for a close contest non the less, it's really about who does the best job in the F3 car, Kerr and Gilmore have a great advantage here of course. Last year we had an interesting mix of rookie's verses veteran's, which caused a bit of furr to fly!Presentation skills are highly rated too, Kerr's F3 interviews have been a bit dull, and that snub to the camera crew after race1 at Snetterton! Talking of 'off's' he had a few this season. Breeze he's been about for years and 'fell off' in the wet last round of FRS! Watts could be a good bet, Gilmore showed class. Hmmmm.

[Francesca]

We're forgetting about Richard Antinucci.

[paulzinho]

He's American.

[Rennen]

Opps! Francesca

[Simon Pullan]

I agree it will be interesting to see how I get on against the single-seater boys. Still, I'm just going to do my best and see what happens, that's all I can do. Especially considering Robbie Kerr has 4 years slicks and wings experiance to my none! The only other guy slightly as disadvantaged as me is Steven Kane.

[OVERSTEER]

I'm sorry Simon but I voted for Carl Breeze he impressed me with both his speed and consistency this year and I hope he gets a top F3 because thats where the F1 drivers are coming from, Being an F3000 champion seamingley doesn't matter to F1 Team bosses anymore so I wish him luck with next year.

[paulzinho]

Hello Simon!!!

Havent seen much of you but good luck all the same.

[Marshal]

Hi Simon and welcome to 10 10ths. Maybe you could pop back after the assesment to give a participants view of the competition, I'm sure we'd all be fascinated. Good Luck!

[Simon Pullan]

I'd love to tell you all about it but unfourtunately I am banned from disscussing any part of the test until after the awards dinner in December. I'll tell you about it then if you are still interested.

[Paul Rayner]

Hello Simon!
Please don't take this the wrong way, but who are you and what have you done this year? I've been to mainly PowerTours and TOCATours this year, and so have seen what everyone else has done, but what is it that's got you up there? It must be something good for them to take someone from non single-seaters. How many wins are we talking?
Good luck with the awards, and I think it would be very interesting to hear what goes on, even if we have to wait until December.

[Marshal]

Originally posted by Marshal
I'm not sure any of them are really outstanding, the most interesting thing for me will be how Simon Pullan (Caterham Euroseries Champ) compares with those who've been racing single seaters this year.

Sorry Paul, but sometimes if you read the thread there's the occasional clue

Simon, I'd love to hear your account of the test after the announcement, I hope it went well for you.

[Paul Rayner]

Yes, I noticed that, but what is the Caterham Euroseries? Is it some club series or something higher than that? My apologies for not having a great knowledge of Caterhams, but I was wondering as well whether this had been a complete domination of the series in a debut year or just many race wins and an impressive drive.

[Simon Pullan]

The caterham Eurocup was new for this year. It comprised five double-header meetings at Nurburgring, Spa, Zandvoort, Dijon, and lastly Brands. In the end we only had nine races as the second one at Nurburgring was snowed off!

Overall, I won four of the nine races, one at each of the mainland European circuits. I had three seconds (2x Brands, Zandvoort), 1 third at Dijon and a fourth at Spa. I had never seen any of the circuits bar Brands before and I think that that was the reason for my nomination.

The fact that I beat more experienced opposition at circuits I had never seen. Anyway I am just overjoyed to be nominated and am going to give it my best shot. The championship is on a par for quality of drivers with the UK Caterham Superlight Championship. In fact the UK champion Chris Cooper came only 5th at Nurburgring!

The strength of Caterhams has finally been noticed with it beeing givena place alongside British GTs and F3 next year and also with my nomination.

I hope that answers your questions.

[Rennen]

Reply to 'OVERSTEER' F1 teams have overlooked F3 champions in the past as well remember, so sometimes they and F3000 champs have to go do CART or something else, while waiting for a chance to test F1. The real problem is that F1 people dont have time to follow other formulas, not helped by the 'comics' tending to promote PR hype about drivers. So F1 teams are left doubting until they actually test drivers. The real problem as I see it is that estblished F1 drivers never know when to quit! There should be a time limit to win GP's, 100 GP's max perhaps, that would make seats available for all these champions being churned out every year in the lower formulae.

[Sniffer]

To be honest I don't rate any of them that much. i think its a poor year.

Breeze has finally won the Formula Renault after the 45th time of asking.

Watts has some grit coming back from that large one at Oulton.

Kerr will win it and seems to have the strongest claim but......

Kane looks promising but nothing more.

Pullan is talented but should go the sportscar route.

Gilmore has a problem with pressure.

[Simon Pullan]

I agree with everything you've said there Sniffer ecept I think Robbie has more of a problem with pressure than Matt.

Oh yeah, and I'm going to win not Robbie.

[jiggly_puff]

Robbie was up for this award the same year as Jenson Button i seem to remember.......so its his 2nd go at it - he should get it but then again ryan dalziel has had 2 gos at it and still not won it!

[Simon Pullan]

It's actually Robbie's third go at it. He was nominated last year as well. So was Matt Gilmore

[Aysedasi]

As an interested observer who has not had the chance to see any of the nominees this year, may I just ask how many times a driver can go on being nominated?! It seems a bit of a farce IMO, bearing in mind the limited number of "places" available for nomination, that the same driver(s) can end up being nominated year after year!

I'm supporting Simon - at least he's prepared to find the time to come on 10/10ths and discuss the issue with the rest of us!