Maldonado doesn’t deserve the bad reputation that is attached to him
After the 2014 season, Alain Permane comes to the defense of Pastor Maldonado. According to him, the Venezuelan driver does not deserve the negative image given to him by many F1 observers.
Alain Permane believes that Pastor Maldonado does not deserve the harsh media hype he faced after the very complicated 2014 season. This season, the Lotus team went through struggles and only finished in the points three times for an 8th place finish in the constructors’ championship.
Pastor Maldonado found himself at a crossroads between his former team Williams, which performed well in 2014, whereas during his time the Grove team finished 9th. Subsequently, he signed with Lotus where he experienced challenging moments. Despite everything, Permane remains satisfied with Maldonado’s behavior in the adversity he faced.
Pastor has a bad image from the outside, and of course, he does stupid things on the track from time to time. But working with him, he is one of the best drivers I’ve worked with; he has an incredible calm and his feedback is relevant. He is very good, he works very hard. In any circumstance, he steps up, explains Alan Permane to Autosport.
The track operations manager of the Enstone team also praises the qualities of Romain Grosjean’s teammate: « In F1, there is very rarely a magic button to press to make things work; only hard work will get you out of trouble. Pastor knows this, it’s no secret, everyone knows he brings a lot of money to the team. In his position, it would be very easy for him to throw tantrums and get hysterical, but he has never done that, in any case, he has the right attitude. »
Permane also commented on Romain Grosjean’s situation. This season, the Frenchman was left frustrated by his performance, only scoring points twice: « Pastor is not someone who is naturally frustrated, but there is no doubt that this season Romain was, he wants to succeed, he wants to win races, he wants to win championships, and we had a very bad year. I think the way Romain drove in the second half of the season was just exceptional; he was the only driver to challenge the Red Bull cars. Pastor, I think, handles problems a bit better, he acts differently. It doesn’t affect Romain, whereas Pastor will sit down and think about it with a list of why not try this, that, and that. »
