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Not 100% in agreement with issues of driver talent w/ Bourdais or coming from Champ car to F1...
Looks where he landed at... Toro rosso... last team this year to get the upgraded diffuser - ironically they will have it next week so he's missing out on that chance to prove himself...
Villeneuve did well, but he came to the best team at the time ! Williams...
Montoya did OK and he came at a time when williams was still decent too ! To me it's more where you land... Andretti did not come to MacLaren at the height of their domination either...
Yes, Bourdais should have outclassed him team mates, but unlucky him, Vettel is turning out to be a champion in the making, so looking back a little, he did not do too bad there, and really Buemi only scored 1 point more than him so far and only shone a little more in qualifying.
I've also heard that the technical team at TR really liked Bourdais for his development skills - that seem to be confirmed by the televised "hug" from the tech director after last race, whereas the marketing team had made up their mind to put in another red bull protegé and was just slowing assasinating him in their press releases.... The supposed constant complainign about the car coming from bourdais was way overblown in the press thanks to the TR marketing dept wanting to get rid of him...
All in all, You don't win 1/2 the champ car races you start by sucking completely as a driver. Nor do the laps he did at Le Mans in the 908...
Personally, I think he just did not have the extra "juice" his younger teammate had because he was in a ****e car and risking life and limb to go from 18th to 17th was not worth it to him, whereas Buemi has to prove himself more... I think had he landed in a good car, things might have turned out better for him... To me he was not first tier material in F1, but neither was Damon Hill and in a good car he became WC... If this seaon has proved anything at all, it's that the car is 90% of the equation - Hamilton can't win driving a dog, Button was all but dead and now he's a star...
I'm not an unconditional fan of Bourdais or anything, just met the guy in St Pete on his first Champ car season and he was very approchable and nice... And he wears glasses, I like that, not the uber-perfect young aryan F1 driver, you know...
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