In the round-up: Pastor Maldonado admits he is looking at other racing championships for a comeback besides Formula One.
Links
Your daily digest of F1 news, views, features and more from hundreds of sites across the web:
Pastor Maldonado: 'For sure we will work on a Plan B' (Adam Cooper's F1 Blog)
"At the moment yes, but for sure we will work on a Plan B, but at the moment we don’t have anything clear. We’ll see, maybe Indy, LMP1 or DTM."
Low tyre pressures not a factor for Ferrari's Jock Clear (F1i)
"We do not believe the stories that some teams can lower their tyre pressures significantly. Perhaps half a PSI, but not two. We think that's impossible."
Manor chief Ryan 'not up to speed' yet (Autosport)
"The drivers are frustrated, which is understandable because it's their career isn't it? So we have to do as well as we can for them."
Williams can be 'proud' of place in F1 pecking order (Motorsport)
"I think we can consider ourselves to have done a good job and we should be proud of the job we have done to be in that position, fighting against teams – and I know we say it repeatedly and it is boring – but teams with budgets three times the size of ours and keeping the teams who are behind us, behind us."
Got a tip for a link to feature in the next F1 Fanatic round-up? Send it in here:
Social media
Notable posts from Twitter, Instagram and more:
Send him my email, phone # and Twitter handle!#ilikewinners https://t.co/Joehz2jzhA
— Chip Ganassi (@GanassiChip) June 4, 2016
- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Comment of the day
This weekend’s Caption Competition winner is @Jonny705:
With 15 races still to go, Sebastian could hardly contain his excitement at the thought of a new helmet design.
@Jonny705
Thanks to all of you who joined in this week, especially Chris, Rocky, Daz, Cliffery, Will Wood, Ashwin and Urpo who all came up with funny suggestions.
From the forum
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to Paradoxos, Jenny O’G and Saurabh!
If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is via the contact form or adding to the list here.
On this day in F1
Three future F1 drivers filled the podium in the Nogaro round of the Formula 3000 championship 25 years ago today: Christian Fittipaldi led home Alessandro Zanardi and Damon Hill.
Author information
Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...Read more about Keith Collantine, find all their articles and get in touch with them
Got a potential story, tip or enquiry? Find out more about RaceFans and contact us here.
26 comments on “Maldonado eyeing WEC and IndyCar as well as F1”
Comments are closed.
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
6th June 2016, 1:22
Welcome to Indy and Maldonadoland, where nothing can possib-lie go wrong!
Warner (@warner16)
6th June 2016, 1:40
I think Maldonado could be possibly going to Sauber next year since the team is in some financial trouble, and he believes he has the money for a drive. If this doesn’t work for him, he’ll be racing in WEC, Indycar or DTM next year like he said.
Alex (@ziltoid)
6th June 2016, 2:39
Maldonado will end up killing someone in Indycar, maybe he should come back to F1 where it’s relatively safe to drive like an idiot these days. Not sure he’s actually a pay driver after you take into account the damage he does to the car over the course of a season though, can Sauber afford him?
Chris (@tophercheese21)
6th June 2016, 3:35
Ooohh Maldonado to Sauber, now that’s intriguing! I think there’s probably a reasonable chance of that actually happening.
PaulK (@paulk)
6th June 2016, 4:21
Does he really have the money? Venezuela is completely broke. Where is his money coming from?
Excuse me :D (@square-route)
6th June 2016, 5:58
That’s how Venezuela is broke; financing Maldo…
Gabriel (@rethla)
6th June 2016, 8:16
Sponsoring Maldonado is nothing for a state economy, broke or not. People suffering on the street has never stoped corrupt big spenders from enjoying F1 and Venezuela is no exeption.
Optimaximal (@optimaximal)
6th June 2016, 9:10
@paulk As Gabriel says, bankrolling a couple of million is nothing when nation states consider billions pocket change. Maldonaldo lost his seat because Renault played a harder game than Genii on financing, but they also stood to lose nothing by jettisoning him, so it was win:win.
FlyingLobster27
6th June 2016, 9:32
I doubt he’ll be picked up by a team in a Pro class in the WEC or in the DTM, he doesn’t have the professional mindset of a factory driver. He was dropped by Renault when they took over Lotus, that’s not the best of signals for the other manufacturers. He can only enter a class where money is of interest to team bosses: P2, IMSA, GTE Am, GT3, F1.
Mick
6th June 2016, 2:43
People in his country have no food but this ‘talent’ should not be wasted.
BJ (@beejis60)
6th June 2016, 3:46
I imagine that is the face MAL makes under his helmet when he crashes.
Sensord4notbeingafanboi (@peartree)
6th June 2016, 4:27
Web can’t get away from the TT.
Willem Cecchi (@)
6th June 2016, 7:10
Maldonado in a late season Manor soiree?
Andrew Miller (@andy-m)
6th June 2016, 8:51
This is where I’m at. Maldonado pops up again just as it emerges that Haryanto hasn’t paid half his bill…
WilliamB (@william-brierty)
6th June 2016, 9:21
@andy-m Why? Maldonado cannot pick-up Haryanto’s slack now he no longer has several wheelbarrows full of Venezaulan state oil money and the ear of a leftist, totalitarian dictator. Given that there are no longer around forty million reasons to hire Pastor, he won’t be getting an F1 seat any time soon.
Andrew Miller (@andy-m)
7th June 2016, 7:01
You may well be right. He, Maldonado, who presumably knows his financing better than you do, seems to think differently. So I guess we’ll see how it plays out. But it’s quite clear he wouldn’t need 40 million of anything to get Haryanto’s drive.
WilliamB (@william-brierty)
6th June 2016, 8:37
So Maldonado could be haring around in circles at 230mph or weaving between GT cars at night? I’m not actually joking; someone’s going to get hurt…
Optimaximal (@optimaximal)
6th June 2016, 9:12
Maybe Indycar is looking to find justification for all the caution periods.
GeeMac (@geemac)
6th June 2016, 12:00
I can’t see any reason why the WEC big boys would give Pastor a drive on merit (that goes for all of the LMP1, LMP2 and the crack GTE teams). The same goes for any Indycar team. He would have to offer a significant budget to make him a viable option and he doesn’t seem to have that at his disposal anymore. I don’t really know were his next drive will be, but if I was him I wouldn’t be knocking on the doors of WEC or Indycar teams with the attitude that they are “back-ups” to his main F1 goals. He needs a drive to try rescue his reputation and his career, if a drive comes along the best he could do is just humbly accept it.
I have defended Pastor in the past because he is undoubtedly quick, but he just didn’t show that he had the mentality to be a top line racing driver. He never learned from his mistakes and he never took responsibility for his actions.
Sridhar
6th June 2016, 12:02
Guess the web admin for hasmaldonadocrashedtoday.com is licking his lips at the prospect of the return of Crashtor.
He is down but not out !!
DavidS (@davids)
6th June 2016, 13:32
Well, if Maldonado has his eye on F1, he’ll probably end up crashing into another category that he isn’t looking at.
NewVerstappenFan (@jureo)
6th June 2016, 13:51
So to fix Sauber drivers crashing in to eachother…
Replace one with Maldonado. Well played.
He is an ok driver with one genuine victory. And several genuine crashes.
I am sure he would do well in indy, probably not DTM. WEC though, teams like tace finishes.
Imagine giving your car to Maldonado at Le Mans around 11am sunday?
Indy sounds perfect. Cars are resonably equalised.
In F1 what can he hope to achieve? Land a top seat? Best he can do is paydrive Manor or Sauber. Both competing for final spot.
If I was him, I would take my money elsewhere.
There is also a remote possibility of getting professional help like Grosjean and now being a safe and fast driver?
Michael (@freelittlebirds)
6th June 2016, 15:10
@jureo Your comment about handing the car to Maldonado at LM on Sunday – hard to argue with!
Good point about F1 – what’s the point of being in F1? As I think about it, I suspect he’d be paid millions per year and it might be the only way to access the money – it’s not for glory although they somehow manage to delude themselves.
Good point about professional help – he should definitely have been trying to change on track. He should have spent more time on the forums to understand the impression fans have of him which is not that far from the teams and press:-)
NewVerstappenFan (@jureo)
6th June 2016, 18:26
Well with a good psychologist Romain Grosjean much improved.
Who knows, maybe Maldonado year off will do good for him.
Maybe his backers only support him if its F1, regardless of team. Though Venezuela is on verge of bankrupcy. Who knows.
kpcart
9th June 2016, 14:30
I don’t believe Maldonado should get a second chance in f1, he is a race winner and has undeniable speed, but so do thousands of other drivers around the world that could do well in f1, as we now see with unproven talent (Verstappen), coming into f1 and developing their craft quickly straight out in an f1 car. Maldonado sadly made too many errors – many more drivers deserve a first chance then him a second chance. I wont troll bash on him, I know he has the speed, but I believe he should go to another high level series like wec or formula e – he should easily find a top team, and he can be a winner again instead of driving for a midfield f1 team, and he can win back respect the way Nelsen Piquet jr has with so many racing fans.
Mangy Black Sheep (@mangyblacksheep)
10th June 2016, 12:01
The very possibility of Maldonado racing on a speedway going 230+ mph or racing at the dead of night navigating through GT traffic is horrifying to me.