GPWizard F1 Forum
F1 News & Discussions => General F1 Discussion => Topic started by: John S on April 17, 2013, 09:22:59 AM
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He'll run FP1 in Bahrain & Spain to help with upgrade work.
Amazing how F1 is as hard to give up as smoking. :D
Heikki Kovalainen, who was dropped by Caterham in favour of a pay driver, has rejoined the Anglo-Malaysian outfit as reserve driver.
Kovalainen's first duties will be to take part in FP1 at the forthcoming Grands Prix in Bahrain and Spain. The Finnish driver will take part in the sessions as part of a formal technical development role he is taking up with Caterham, helping support the introduction of the first performance updates to the 2013 car, an important milestone in the strategy the team are working to in the current season.
"It's obviously great news that I'll be on track in Bahrain and Spain," said Kovalainen, "and I'm really looking forward to getting back to work and helping the team as much as I can. I'll be taking part in the two FP1 sessions in Bahrain and Barcelona to give the team my input on the new parts we're bringing to those races, and I'll be working closely with the race drivers and the engineers on track and back at Leafield to help everyone get the most out of the new package.
Edited from article from Pitpass (http://www.pitpass.com):
Published: 17/04/2013
Copyright © Pitpass 2002 - 2013. All rights reserved.
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Good news for Heikki. Maybe he'll get noticed by someone with a struggling driver.
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Good news, he's a smiler :D
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I really rate Heikki. I know 'steady' and 'reliable' will never win a championship but it may win points and I would love to see him back in F1.
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Glad to see him return. I hope he takes a fair chunk of the pay driver's money home with him.
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Caterham needs Heikki, whether it likes that or not. Don't be surprised to see Heikki in the car to race it in 2014 or earlier.
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I wonder if there is a market for drivers like that, who miss F1 and still feel they have something to offer.
Would Villeneuve or Barichello be interested in putting in an hour on Fridays for struggling teams? I should think that even MS might be coaxed into it (whatever one thinks of his sportsmanship, he has a reputation as an excellent tester)
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Caterham had to do something in my opinion. They're behind Marussia in terms of development this year, and their driver line up never looked as good on paper as Marussia's to boot. Kovalainen's return is great news. I think that they are badly missing his experience. I wouldn't be at all surprised for him to take over racing duties later this season if the team's performance doesn't improve.
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I have a feeling that Caterham wants Heikki as their driver in 2014, so they are offering him these FP1 so that he is touch with the team, and their way of development. If I am not wrong Caterham opted for 2014 season sacrificing 2013, thus they wanted two pay drivers in the seats, because they knew they didn't have much chance with Marussia this year. And Mr. Jules Bianchi has made their life much more difficult, because for the last three races he has shown how these not so fast machines can be pushed and give a scare to the midfield teams.
And if you look at this closely two rookies are race drivers, while a grand prix winning driver is your reserve. :fool: :fool:
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And if you look at this closely two rookies are race drivers, while a grand prix winning driver is your reserve. :fool: :fool:
If you look even more closely one of the drivers is not a rookie but a 2nd year driver who acquitted himself quite well against his very experienced teamate Glock, last year. :tease:
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If you look even more closely one of the drivers is not a rookie but a 2nd year driver who acquitted himself quite well against his very experienced teamate Glock, last year. :tease:
Yes, Pic is solid enough, but he doesn't have much in the way of experience to lead a team, so that's clearly why Kovalainen has been brought in.
I'm not convinced about Van de Garde at all though. His GP2 record was, at best, inconsistent, so it's clear that money is the primary factor keeping him in his position. Still, he'd be considered a good driver relative to some of the pay drivers we used to see in Formula 1 cars, so I don't want to be too critical.
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Caterham had to do something in my opinion. They're behind Marussia in terms of development this year, and their driver line up never looked as good on paper as Marussia's to boot. Kovalainen's return is great news. I think that they are badly missing his experience. I wouldn't be at all surprised for him to take over racing duties later this season if the team's performance doesn't improve.
If one is conspiracy minded, this might be a way of getting a sponsor to pay up. If Caterham has a driver ready to go the instant a cheque bounces, that's a good reason to keep the cheques coming.
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If one is conspiracy minded, this might be a way of getting a sponsor to pay up. If Caterham has a driver ready to go the instant a cheque bounces, that's a good reason to keep the cheques coming.
I would say that this is one of those conspiracy theories that could be closer to the truth than we might think :). After all, there's no doubt in my mind that if either Pic or Van de Garde were to default on payment, the team would be more than happy to put Kovalainen in the car.
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In my opinion he will have a race seat by the end of the mid season break. Beating Marussia is crucial to Caterham.
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If Heiki is to have any chance he will have to out perform Pic and VDG and at the moment he is 7 tenths of Pic's practice time! Come on Heiki!!
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In my opinion he will have a race seat by the end of the mid season break. Beating Marussia is crucial to Caterham.
:confused: I seem to recall it was Petrov who beat Marussia last year not Heikki, in fact Kovalainen was out performed by Vitaly in my, and a lot of other people's, opinion.
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If Heiki is to have any chance he will have to out perform Pic and VDG and at the moment he is 7 tenths of Pic's practice time! Come on Heiki!!
Maybe he's a bit rusty. As you say it'll be very interesting to see if he can beat Pic and VDG - it might help us ascertain if these rookies are any good or not (Ok Pic's not a rookie but he's green to Caterham) - it's hard to tell if it's them or the cars. That's what you get when you have 2 newbies in the car I suppose.
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Consistently 7 tenths behind VDG but both ahead of Marussia.
However, we all know FP results mean nothing!
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He might have some new pieces on his car along with sensors too.
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Well VDG is almost a second slower than Pic and his best time hasn't matched Heiki plus he is slower than both Marussia's so perhaps Heiki is looking OK?
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Kovalainen was running the old spec car. Only Pic has the updates for Caterham this weekend.
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In my opinion he will have a race seat by the end of the mid season break. Beating Marussia is crucial to Caterham.
:confused: I seem to recall it was Petrov who beat Marussia last year not Heikki, in fact Kovalainen was out performed by Vitaly in my, and a lot of other people's, opinion.
Your right Petrov did out perform Heikki last year but i meant, with all due respect to Pic and Van der Garde, Heikki would have more chance to beat the Marussia's than they would
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In my opinion he will have a race seat by the end of the mid season break. Beating Marussia is crucial to Caterham.
:confused: I seem to recall it was Petrov who beat Marussia last year not Heikki, in fact Kovalainen was out performed by Vitaly in my, and a lot of other people's, opinion.
Your right Petrov did out perform Heikki last year but i meant, with all due respect to Pic and Van der Garde, Heikki would have more chance to beat the Marussia's than they would
I have to beg to differ on that, Pic gave Glock a few shocks last year and seems to be doing quite nicely at Caterham. Heikki may have his uses in setting up the car but for me it's not a given that he will do any better than last year.
I see Bianchi as the main threat in the Marussia and I believe Pic's younger & more adventurous style is the only chance Caterham have of matching him, unless they improve the car to be regularly one second ahead of Marussia. Sadly I think Heikki's best has now passed.
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Kovalainen was running the old spec car. Only Pic has the updates for Caterham this weekend.
I think it will be unfair to compare his times with others, as because he will be testing parts, in a different set of program, where his sole focus will be on the improvement of certain numbers in engineers computer, while VDG or Pic will be trying to get to the race pace. I think it proves that you need someone with experience to improve your times, people with bagful of money can't do that.
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I think it will be unfair to compare his times with others, as because he will be testing parts, in a different set of program, where his sole focus will be on the improvement of certain numbers in engineers computer, while VDG or Pic will be trying to get to the race pace. I think it proves that you need someone with experience to improve your times, people with bagful of money can't do that.
That's what I was indicated when I posted that comment ;).
Interestingly, Pic did perform a lot better this weekend with the upgrades, so the car clearly has been very poor in the first three races. It was Kovalainen who gave them a lot of feedback on how difficult it was to drive relative to last year's car, so his technical input is clearly helping.
I still view him as being faster than both Pic, and Van de Garde, providing he's motivated enough. Petrov didn't out perform him last year on a consistent basis, he just achieved the team's highest race finish.
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Says alot about how highly they rate their two race drivers
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Good race drivers are not always good test drivers and vice versa. It looks as though his feed back made a difference to Pic's set up and results in China so they've made a sound move.
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Says alot about how highly they rate their two race drivers
I think that the underlying message is that they don't think that their drivers have enough experience to give the team the necessary technical feedback to improve the car in the right direction. In terms of pace, I think that they would be pretty happy with Pic, but Van de Garde needs to up his game once he too gets the upgraded parts.