F2 driver opposed to 'young driver test' for Alonso
Sep.17 - Formula 2 driver Louis Deletraz admits he is opposed to Fernando Alonso being invited to take part in F1's 'young driver test' in Abu Dhabi later this year.
Reports claim that Cyril Abiteboul has made an application for an exemption to the rule limiting the F1 test to drivers with less than two grands prix under their belt.
Alonso, who is returning to F1 as Renault becomes Alpine next year, is 39. And although he has been out of Formula 1 for two years, he has contested over 300 grands prix and won two titles.
"The young driver test should be for young drivers. Isn't that the whole point?" wondered Deletraz, a 23-year-old Swiss driver who is seventh overall in the F2 points.
Alonso has already confirmed that he will travel to Abu Dhabi later this year to be with the Renault team.
"I am not planning to go to an F1 race until Imola," the Spaniard told El Mundo newspaper.
"In the meantime, I will do a simulator day at the factory. I will also try to get close to the team in Bahrain and Abu Dhabi.
"It (Abu Dhabi) is the final race of the championship and I want to see the team work, but my contact with the engineers is already constant. I follow the races and the meetings from home."
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I like F2, great series, but why should the FIA care one iota about Deletraz's opinion. I would think that having ALO as benchmark at the Abu Dhabi test would be a huge benefit for the youngsters.
The FIA should care about what F2 drivers and say about it because it is those drivers the event is for. Those drivers don't need a benchmark from ALO at a track that has so much data available already. What ALO and Renault are doing is depriving a real young driver of a chance to help himself.
So it would just be testing for ALO , if he is so good ( and I know he is) why take away a place from an up and coming (?) NEW driver?
I am surprised that ALO is involved at all. He should be embarrassed and shamed, he is as far away from being a young driver as Deletraz is from being and old driver and should have been denied the exemption. I was a huge ALO fan but at 40yo and have not raced in F1 in 2 years, soon to be 3, is trading on glory from a decade ago. Didn't he shoot himself in the foot when he left Ferrari and had to settle for Mclaren and that Honda powered nightmare of a car. I wish that he could but he will not be very successful this go round and wonder why he is doing it. I bet he will give it 1 season and retire.
Well, it certainly is very interesting to see how he performs against Ocon with the same car. Don't forget the real GOAT Fangio was over his 40's when he won his 5 titles.
How many races did he race a year, how many thousands of miles did he travel, how many continents did he cross? The physical beating today's drivers take from G forces as high as 7 or close to it. 40 was probably close to the average of all the drivers in that era. Anyway the eras aren't comparable.
The good part of ALO's return is Ocon can learn from him if he is humble enough and opens himself to it but race car drivers and humility are rarely found together. The worst that can happen top a driver is to lose confidence in his driving.
Good point about the opening up, most of the drivers sure think that being vulnerable is a disease. About Fangio, don't forget that the mental pressure in the old days was brutal. Making an error was in many cases the end of your life. If the last race would have happened in the 50's we probably would have ended up with 4 dead drivers.
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