Karun Chandhok’s hopes bleak for a 2011 seat
There is little hope for the Indian driver, Karun Chandhok to steal a place on the 2011 Formula One grids. After an abortive rookie season, the driver has not been able to secure any competitive cockpit for the upcoming season. While talking to the media
earlier this week he revealed that he has turned down offers from a few teams in hope of getting a better car next season.
Last year, Chandhok had his rookie season in the sport, behind the wheel of HRT. The driver took part in the first ten races of the season and was later replaced by the Japanese driver, Sakon Yamamoto after the British Grand Prix. All through the season,
the Indian driver did not earn even a single point, thus wrapping his first season amidst much disappointment.
As the first race of the upcoming season, the Bahrain Grand Prix is around the corner; almost all the teams have given their drivers’ line-up for 2011. Besides, Force India and Toro Rosso, HRT is the only team that still has one of its driver’s seat vacant.
While talking to some local reporters, Chandhok revealed that he had the chance of driving another season with the Hispania squad but he turned down the offer. The Indian insisted that his aspiration for the Formula One journey is completely different. The
Indian driver does not want to spend another year in a car which cannot bring him any points. While explaining his current situation Chandhok expressed, "I had the offer from them (HRT) but I turned it down because it would not have served my purpose in the
long run. Racing for the team in the first year made sense, but now I am looking at a team that could fetch me points.”
However, the 26-year-old added that he is still not hopeless. The Indian assured that negotiations are still taking place with one of the "two teams" left and insisted that there will be news "in a couple of weeks".
Well, the sport’s analysts see little hope for the driver to make his place in the paddock. The two teams left so far are Toro Rosso and Force India. There are no chances of the driver to be signed with the Red Bull owned team. Although Chandhok has expressed
his desire to be under the umbrella of the Force India team, a number of times but the team boss Vijay Mallya, has hardly ever reflected any such interest. Moreover, there are also reports that the driver does not have a big sponsorship behind him, which makes
his position even weaker. There is no doubt that Karthikeyan’s signing in HRT has been possible because of the strong backing of TATA. When the HRT team boss Colin Kolles was asked about it he admitted saying, "Of course we would like to have Tata as a partner,
we would like to have more companies from India as a partner.”
Talking about the importance of sponsors he added, "What is Sauber doing with Mr Perez? Williams with Mr Maldonado? Do you think we are running on air? The money has to come from somewhere."
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