he is an exemption which confirms the rule

oh, fair enough. I was changing channel quite often in the last stint so must have missed that. Badoer was already in front of him anyway.

he brings comedy to F1. hope he will drive in spa too.

All this blood-smelling rampaging Badoer trashing... this comes to mind:




...except not so funny. Sorry, couldn't resist.

Ferrari is really pushing for that 3rd in WCC, eh? Is it really worth it to lose money for letting your reserve driver embarass you? There must be millions of dollars difference for finishing third rather than fourth or fifth in WCC.

I honestly though people were being a bit harsh after the practice sessions. But after now seeing him in qualifying and the race I am shocked. It is like he can't place the car within about a meter left or right. Even a 12 year old on a Playstation would take better lines then he does.

How is he of any use even as a test driver? Being slower then the main drivers is one thing, as that should even be expected. But he isn't even consistent! What possible feed back could he give to the team at a test session .

Luca just told the BBC he was happy with his performance...

I would be too. He did fantastic today. Well done Ferrari!

...and his boss just said he's be in the car for Spa!

what a waste of seat

what a brainfade again

Are you serious? What a bunch of sentimental fools in charge of Ferrari

I actually thought Domenicali was lukewarm about having him in the car for Spa on the pre-race show....

sorry, anyone that puts Badoer and fantastic together after watching that, well...........

I'm uncertain about keeping him in for Spa, and he doesn't have the excuse next weekend of 'I haven't driven the car, I don't know the track, I haven't raced with KERS, I haven't done a race yet' etc etc etc

Well he hasn't tested anything F1 thanks to rules for some time now, and earlier I suppose he was 'used' as a cheap dummy to check if parts would last certain distance. So he just pounded the miles, slowly.

Badoer's quali time: 1:41:413

Badoer's fastest race lap : 1'40.590

He did almost 1 sec better in race than in quali; a clear sign that the real problem is the lack of mileage.
He'll be OK in Spa.

It's not sentimentality, now it's bosses (Montezemolo) unwillingness to admit that he was wrong with his choice and his subordinate (Domenicali) was right. It's a matter of personal pride here.

Which means more comedy on the way.

well, he went from 3 secs off kimi's pace to 0.8 secs off so i'd say give the guy one more race and see what he can do. To jump into a car you've never driven in anger on a circuit that's new to you and lined with walls, allied to his total lack of driving all year is a hell of a handicap. At least spa is a more open track where you can get away with a mistake, should help his confidence.

If he drives like that again at spa he'll have to retire altogether, no way would the team have any respect for him even as a tester.

Do the right thing for Ferrari and step down... you will only get trashed even worse in SPA imo.

I reckon he'll do better at Spa.

He'll know the track from untold test days.

Define better? 15th? Having a car that's had two podiums in a row needs a driver that can bring home points and I just can't see him scoring points no matter how long he stays.

The funny thing is that F1 Racing in a test driver rating back in 2003, rated him just above, you guess it... Felipe Massa! His speed was judged only to be 1/20 less than the Brazilian talent back then. How could Ferrari do tyre testing with this guy? Just to test endurance and how they cope offline, huh...

It's a HUGE difference between any testing session and a race weekend.

Being a good or even great test driver matching the race driver in ultimate lap time doesn't at all mean that correlates into being a good race driver. The mental mindset for one is completely different.

What can he do?

Not a lot.

Badoer claims he'll do better at Spa because he's raced there. Well, for his own sake, I hope he improves dramatically. If Kimi can bring the same car to a podium finish, anything less than being out of the points lower than 8th place is unacceptable for a replacement driver. I think after Spa, no matter how 'well' he preforms, he'll be out of the car and Ferrari will surely give someone else a shot. The only reason I think Ferrari are keeping him in there is to see if Schumacher will be fit enough to race after Spa in Monza. Keep in mind the 4 driver race rule in F1. Any tam can only contest 4 drivers ina season. Ferrari has already used 3 drivers this season, so whoever they put in next will be the final one for the remainder of the season. You know it's for Schumacher. If Schumacher is not fit enough to race, Ferrari would be crazy to continue racing Badoer.

Its a no brainer that someone else will be there in Monza. I doubt it will be Schumi. The Q & A with Stefano is quite interesting. Especially this one



First of all, consider the situation that we had the objective when we decided not to go ahead with the development of this year's car, it was a moment where we felt with Kimi and Felipe in that shape, that we could fight for third position. Then unfortunately with this situation, and considering the gaps that we have now, it is very, very difficult for every driver to give a lot of points to the team in order to be able to match the power of the two McLarens. It seems they have done a big step.

So having the better position from 17th to 15th, or from 14th to eighth, it is always better no doubt. One of our objectives was to be third.

Then, you have to consider that if you put a young driver in, it is for the future. We are thinking for sure to see if we can work on a young driver programme for the future. We have already decided that but unfortunately after what has happened to us, where everything is going in a certain direction, which will be announced soon

Hmmmmm.............

Well look on the bright side, Luca. Milka Duno is SEVEN seconds off the pace in champ car qualifying:

Pos Driver Team Time
1. Dario Franchitti Ganassi 1m16.7987s
2. Ryan Briscoe Penske 1m16.8485s
3. Helio Castroneves Penske 1m16.8702s
<snip>
22. Milka Duno Dreyer & Reinbold 1m23.6185s

Makes merely being three seconds off the pace look quite good doesn't it

Badoer is EMPLOYED by Ferrari while Duno is a classic pay-driver
I am really sorry for Luca B. IMO the best thing for him is to admit that he's not able to drive the car and let somebody else to do it.

With gene they have a test driver available who has lost none of his drive for competitive racing and regularly puts himself in the position of racing against other people on real tracks. Why not use him instead of the Italia....oh...I get it. Maybe. I sincerely hope that this sort of sentimentality is not driving their decisions.

This is quite funny, from Jonathan Noble's Twitter feed...

NobleF1: It's a wrap from Valencia for the night. Although word is Badoer's weekend ended when he ran into the back of Sutil's car in parc ferme...

Would sum up last three days... He must ask himself why on earth did he accept that drive

Badoer just said he has the lap record at Monza

I don't think Badoer is that bad. He just not had competition practice for years, he is that: a test driver. Which means to test braking in corners, top speed in straights... not about making fastest laps. I'm sure if Badoer had the chance to practice more he'd recover some speed (practice does not mean 2 or 4 races, it means to have a lot of private testing). It's unfair to bash him it's Ferrari who made such a wrong decision. Gene would've been a much better decision, as easy to use as Badoer but he's been competing in Le Mans and looked more ready. No doubt that it has been a decision made with the heart - not with the brain. And that's been a bad one in this case.

Maybe he can work with the McLaren comedy pitcrew team.

For real, he seems to be a nice guy and feel kind of sad for him like with Kovi, Nelson and Bourdais. All good guys with good driving skills but just not good enough for F1.