Toro Rosso is not up to par

Nice surprise from last year, thanks to the young prodigy Sebastian Vettel, the Scuderia Toro Rosso risks having all the difficulty in the world to repeat its performances from last season, where it even won against the parent company Red Bull.

Published on 25/03/2009 à 16:24

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Several reasons can explain these concerns, the most important being the fact that the STR4 did not see the light of day until very late, on March 9, and that, consequently, the time was considerably lacking for the Italian-Austrian team to tune up the car. During the Barcelona tests, the two drivers knew little or nothing about their machine and were victims of recurring technical problems, particularly with the front suspensions.

The second being of course the departure of Sebastian Vettel for Red Bull Racing, replaced by another Sébastien (definitely!), Buemi of its name, taken from the GP2 program.

Franz Tost, main team of Toro Rosso, for his part believes that it will be “really very difficult” for his team to do as well as in 2008, at least for the first four events of the season. Because, in fact, the STR4 will undergo a first evolution aimed at correcting its youthful mistakes from the Spanish Grand Prix, next May.

“At the moment we can only aim for the middle of the pack. Repeating Vettel?s exploits last year will prove difficult, but, as was evident from the times during the last collective testing session, the teams are very close to each other and we do not despair of winning. some podiums. We will do our best and I remain convinced that this car has potential, the future developments will demonstrate it very quickly. »

Bourdais was intended to be relatively reassuring: “Despite the fact that I was not able to ride as much as I wanted in Barcelona, I have the feeling that we have a very solid base. The car is rather well balanced, much better than last year in any case. Adrian Newey lived up to his reputation, he really did an excellent job in such a short time. For the moment, it?s difficult to place one or the other, but we already know that we still have certain things to review in order to hope to be able to fight behind the favorites.

“Personally my goal is simple, I have to score as soon as I have the opportunity. I know it won't always be easy, but I know the magnitude of the task and I will fully appreciate the results we are all expecting."