Can Force India Become a Force in F1?
Coming into the 2010 Formula 1 season, there were very few expectations for the Force India team. In fact, there was a point before the start of the season when there were some questions about whether the team would even be able to take its place on the starting grid. At the beginning of the season, it was reported that the team was late in filing their mandatory accounts with the UK Companies House.
Force India officials said the report was much ado about nothing and that many companies are late with their filings. The team did take their place on the grid for the season-opening event in Bahrain. However, few people expected the team would improve much on their ninth place overall finish in the Constructors’ Championship last year. Even that was misleading as the team’s cars only finished in the points twice during the season: Giancarlo Fisichella was second in Belgium with Adrian Sutil claiming fourth in the Italian Grand Prix the following race.
Given the past track record of the former Spyker team and the fact that the veteran Fisichella was replaced at the end of 2009 by the relatively inexperienced Vitantonio Liuzzi, the team’s results in 2010 have to be qualified as one of the major surprises of the season. After Sutil finished eighth and Liuzzi 11th at the British Grand Prix on July 11, the team moved to sixth in the Constructors’ Championship with 43 points - more than three times the number they earned all of last season.
Force India currently sits ahead of teams like Williams and BMW Sauber, which have many more years of experience and much deeper pockets. They have reached their new heights this season primarily because of their new-found consistency. The team debuted a new car in 2010 to go along with its Mercedes engines and McLaren gear boxes. The combination has worked as Sutil has finished all but one race and Liuzzi has finished all but two halfway through the season and neither driver has failed to finish since Liuzzi was involved in an opening lap crash in round four in China.
There are several reasons to suspect that Force India’s success is more than just a flash in the pan. They showed potential last season (as shown by the occasional strong races by Fisichella and Sutil) and this year’s success has built off that. In addition, they have locked in two talented drivers in Liuzzi and especially Sutil. The knock against Sutil has been that he is sometimes too aggressive and can lose his head if things aren’t going his way on the track. However, Sutil appears to have matured significantly in 2010. After the British Grand Prix he finished in the top 10 in seven races and was 10th in points.
In addition, Force India has an ownership team with deep pockets headed by Indian industrialist Vijay Mallya. The chairman of United Breweries Group and Kingfisher Airlines has taken a personal commitment to the team and seems willing to invest his personal fortune into its success. The potential to reach into the vast, untapped Indian market also gives the team a chance to see major endorsement and marketing deals.
But there are potential hurdles. The team has been engaged in a war of words with their rival Lotus, which turned more serious recently when Force India sued Lotus and claimed that they stole Force India’s chassis design. The team will also be looking for a new technical director for the second consecutive year after Mark Smith, who just joined in February, announced that he would be leaving in April 2011 to join Lotus. Finding a way to build on the success of 2010 might be more difficult with Smith and other key engineers leaving for one of the team’s major rivals.
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