Where now for Sebastien Bourdais?

[Mark F1]

French F3000 Champion Sebastien Bourdais tested a few times in the summer for Arrows and according to personnel in the team he impressed them quite a lot with his speed and maturity. Now, if Arrows had been on the grid in 2003 (Let's face it, there not coming back now) then I'm sure he would have been one of their drivers considering that there was a vacant seat left by HHF due to him joining Sauber. But, will Bourdais be another F3000 champion to be overlooked or is there a slim possibility that he can get one of the few remaining seats left in F1 for 2003?

In the past F3000 drivers have been overlooked for F1 seats. You only have to look at Justin Wilson, the 2001 F3000 champion. He wasn't able to get a seat in F1 or CART and so ended up in the Telefonica Dallara Nissan World Series in Spain. It's a decent series with some top name drivers, but at the end of the day it was still a step back in his career. And then there's Bruno Junqueira and Nicholas Minassian, first and second in F3000 in 2000. Both went over to CART for 2001, Junqueira has proved a solid racer with a couple of CART wins and the 2002 Indy 500 Pole Position to his name, whereas Minassian bombed in his first CART year and has taken a big step back in his career by racing in the ASCAR series. Both of these drivers I doubt will ever be in F1 now.

As for Bourdais, if he can't get an F1 seat then I would doubt he would stay in F3000 for another year, not many champions stay to defend their title. He could continue racing the Courage he has raced this year in the FIA Sportcar Championship, but again he would be taking a big step down in his career. And this is where talented drivers such as Bourdais are lost; because they spend the next season or two racing in a lower formulae and are quietly forgotten. Let's just hope he does get his chance sooner rather than later.

[ASCII Man]

He will be testing for Renault next year, as i have heard.

[Total-F1]

He's probably too old for Formula One by now - the team bosses don't seem to favour drivers who have been around long enough to compete in F3000 anymore...something needs to be done about that of course, but I can't see Bourdais getting any further than F1 testing - there isn't any major French force that could buy him a seat now that Prost are gone...

[greg.n]

Renault F1 tester probably. Maybe a season in Telefonica World Series. It looks as though the Telefonica series may be far more interesting than F3000. It has several top ex f3 racers, ex F3000 racers and a few F1 testers for next season and now two extra teams. 24 cars and it costs less rhan a British or German F3 season- or it did in 2002.

[LindaC]

Originally posted by ®îjñtjûh
He will be testing for Renault next year, as i have heard.

He will be testing for Renault in December. Whether or not he becomes next year's test driver remains to be seen.

[f1manoz]

I hope he gets a chance to at least be test driver while mixing in a bit of racing here and there.

Too often F3000 drivers are overlooked.

[BootsOntheSide]

I've had a high opinion of him ever since he got on the ront row of the Monaco F3000 race in 2000, and I think he deserves a chance. Renault test driver would be a good opportunity, and then maybe Flavio would farm him out to Minardi (if they even exist then) in 2004 so he can see what he does in a racing situation. He doesn't have the obvious instantly-eye-catching height disadvantage of Wilson either.