Antonio Giovinazzi says he is no closer to knowing his future, as Alfa Romeo are yet to confirm who will take the final place on the Formula 1 grid for 2022.
Giovinazzi said he was “trying to ask every week” regarding an extension of his contract into 2022 “but there’s still no news yet, no answers, so unfortunately it’s like this.”“It’s not ideal to come [to] the track, that you don’t know what you will do next year and what will happen, but it’s like this and hopefully we can know bad or good news soon,” Giovinazzi continued. “So at least we know what will happen then and it will be better for everyone in the team.”
Giovinazzi said the lack of clarity over his future was “not easy” but there’s “nothing that I can do” besides wait for team principal Frederic Vasseur to make his decision.
“The only thing I can do is drive the car, bring the results and then it’s not my decision. So it’s more for Fred than for me.”
Giovinazzi has regularly beaten his world champion team mate Kimi Raikkonen in qualifying this year but says that’s “not my only goal” and he needs better results from the races. “I’m happy that it’s been quite good in qualifying, but something that we miss is points.
“If we’re looking in also the race result with Kimi, we are in front, but we have less points and this is not good. This is what I want, just score more points from here to Abu Dhabi is the main goal for now.”
Repeated finishes just outside the top 10 frustrated him “a lot,” he said. “To race to P11 is not great. Istanbul we were just one corner behind that top 10, Austin it was a little bit more difficult, but I guess hopefully this time we can be in the points. That is what we need to do.”
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kpcart
5th November 2021, 14:33
He deserves the drive. Killing Kimi in qualifying and the car. But Sauber wants money so will not retain him
Jere (@jerejj)
5th November 2021, 16:33
@kpcart Races matter more than qualifyings.
Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
5th November 2021, 17:34
He has actually been much better than kimi overall this year, but most don’t seem to factor in giovinazzi’s bad luck. Kimi has looked overall better in a few of the more recent races, but over the whole season, kimi has made more mistakes and tends to have worse race pace too. Recently has been a bit different pace wise for kimi, but mistakes remain.
Robert
5th November 2021, 16:51
Extremely mediocre, average driver. Not suitable for f1
rwpanda37
5th November 2021, 17:00
I think he’s had his chance. He’s done a decent job, but that’s it, decent. There are many junior drivers that deserve a shot (E.g Piastri, Pourchaire). Not knocking Gio, but I don’t think he’s shown enough flashes of brilliance or speed. I do feel for him though, as the Alfa Romeos haven’t been overly competitive – but as the comment above states, races matter more and Kimi usually finishes ahead when it matters.
Proesterchen (@proesterchen)
5th November 2021, 14:46
What uncertainty?
Adam (@rocketpanda)
5th November 2021, 15:25
I don’t think he’d deserve to stay.
Chris Horton
5th November 2021, 16:06
I feel Gio has done much much better this season and unlike at times in the past, he deserves to keep that drive.
Ciaran (@ciaran)
5th November 2021, 17:06
I can’t see Giovinazzi staying on. Not enough improvement over 3 years, poor race pace, and super talented youngsters like Pourchaire and Piastri are coming up the ranks. What we’ll all miss is his hairdo! Hopefully he could do well in sportscars though.
Omar R (@)
5th November 2021, 17:32
So next year no Kimi and no Jesus in F1!!!
Tone
5th November 2021, 20:18
But we’re led to believe he’ll come back one day.
AndrewT (@andrewt)
5th November 2021, 17:36
I believe that the delayment of the announcement is an indication that Alfa Romeo tries to have someone in their car, that is problematic to negotiate with (or with his management) due to ties to other teams and interests. Giovinazzi or Hülkenberg woiuld be an easy case and could have been announced months ago if Alfa Romeo wanted to go down this way. Zhou and de Vries and their Renault and Mercedes background respectively generate the issues. Giovinazzi has shown everything a team has to know about him to decide if he deserves another year or not. Beating Räikkönen in qualifying on a regular basis sounds good, but staring at the Finn’s rear wing right after the start or at the end of the first lap pretty sums how much outqualifying Räikkönen worth. Gio is a nice guy, I’d certainly miss him, but considering the sheer number of young talents knocking on the door of F1, I just don’t see him retained for another season. I also don’t think that’s fair from the team’s side that they keep him waiting and hoping, not that there are any more seats left that he could have targeted.
RandomMallard (@)
5th November 2021, 19:25
@andrewt I assume the delay thus far was likely due to the Andretti takeover talks, as Andretti seemed quite keen to put Colton Herta in that seat if they could. Now I reckon they’ll wait until the end of the F2 season so as not to distract the juniors too much. But also as you say other management issues may also be at play
AndrewT (@andrewt)
5th November 2021, 19:30
@randommallard Good point about Andretti! It would also be nice to know when the talks between them began, was it days, weeks or months before the public even just assumed negotiations were in progress. The fact that Bottas didn’t know about the Andretti-possibility, doesn’t mean that it wasn’t already happening in the background I guess.