Timo Glock’s experience will be missed at Marussia
While Marussia will field the least experienced driver duo on the grid, Timo Glock acknowledges that his former team could suffer even though he claims to understand the choice they made in appointing Max Chilton and Luiz Razia as full-time drivers.
By choosing Luiz Razia over Timo Glock, the Marussia team did not hide the fact that reason prevailed over the heart. However, while the Anglo-Russian team saves on the salary of the experienced German driver and can count on the financial support of Luiz Razia’s partners and sponsors, it still fields the only duo of drivers who have not competed in any Grand Prix, with only three sessions during free practice: “It is definitely not going to be easy for them, especially in practice where you need to be able to make the right decisions by pinpointing the weaknesses of the car. It’s something that only comes with experience,” judges Timo Glock in the columns of Autosport. “There’s a lot of pressure on Luiz [Razia] and Max [Chilton] to perform very quickly with the car. That’s the critical point knowing that the simulations you’ve done for a circuit might not be accurate and you’ll need to be able to progress from there.”
Aware of the situation, Max Chilton recently acknowledged to Motorsport-total.com that having two rookie drivers isn’t ideal for a team: “We will sometimes face difficult moments. I was looking forward to teaming up with Timo because of his great experience.” However, the Briton puts things into perspective and even tries to see the advantages: “If we weren’t capable, we wouldn’t be in Formula 1. Neither of us is number 1 or number 2, so the team will treat us the same way.”
While several members of the paddock have been concerned about the preference given by certain teams to wealthy drivers over experienced ones, Timo Glock still says he understands the situation of his former team and the need it has to first of all secure its foundations in Formula 1: « Generally speaking, they just need to find a way to have more financial support in order to move forward and make progress. The big teams are not going to stop their development and that’s what makes it difficult to bridge the gap for smaller teams. The leading teams bring new updates to each race, while the smaller ones have new parts every 5 or 6 Grand Prix maybe. »
The German is also optimistic about the Anglo-Russian team: « At least they have certainly taken a step forward with the car. It is faster this year. It’s all a question of development and how they will manage with the KERS. »
