ITV Interview With Franz Tost And Giorgio Ascanelli

The ITV website recently carried an interview with Toro Rosso team principal Franz Tost and technical director Giorgio Ascanelli. As one of the STR drivers, Sebastien Buemi was focal to the discussion. Here I give a run down on what was said relating to Buemi.

Obviously Sebastien Buemi was discussed in detail, with a question asking how they rated Buemi's performance. I'll quote the response by Franz Tost in full:

Buemi has done a really good job so far. You have to consider that, as the only rookie on the grid this year, he is the first real victim of the in-season testing ban.

He had therefore never driven at circuits like Silverstone or the Nurburgring in a Formula 1 car, which is completely different to tackling them in other types of car.

While he knows the tracks from Formula 3 or GP2, it is not at all the same, because F1 is much more complex and little details like how track conditions usually change from the third free practice session on Saturday morning to qualifying that same afternoon, are all part of the package that only comes with experience.

Up until this year, we would have done a minimum of three days testing at Silverstone, for example, prior to the British Grand Prix and at many other race venues.

But you can’t have everything and while we are saving money through not testing, the downside is that young drivers will suffer.

What we can say is that Buemi will be a much more complete driver for the 2010 season.

This is a promising sign for Sebastien Buemi, especially in the same week where Toro Rosso sacked Sebastien Bordais for alleged under-performance.

Most people would agree that on balance Buemi has outperformed Bourdais over the course of the season so far. However, his results haven't been great - mostly due to an under performing car rather than his skills - and Toro Rosso are getting a reputation for sacking people (Bourdais, Liuzzi, Speed).

Tost also admitted that they've greatly missed Sebastien Vettel, who moved on to STR's parent team Red Bull at the start of the year.

There's a worry that Buemi will be compared to Vettel's performance last year, which is unfair for a number of reasons: Vettel had experience as a tester in an F1 car going into last year, while Buemi has had very little testing time and no one can deny that the car this year is slower than it's rivals.

Tost's response shows that Toro Rosso know that Buemi has been a victim of the in-season testing ban and that he won't mature as quickly as other drivers have been able to in the past. It also implies that STR believe in Sebastien Buemi and will stick with him going into the 2010 season.

Later in the interview, when Giorgio Ascanelli was discussing the reasons why Toro Rosso have struggled, he brought up Buemi's inexperience as one of the reasons (in that it's harder for him to adapt to changes to the car).

When asked it that was a criticism of Buemi, Ascanelli said "absolutely not" and re-iterated that Buemi's only had limited time in an F1 car and that they couldn't expect any more of him, saying:

We cannot expect him to learn any faster: he is trying his best and doing a good job.

The interview also included discussion about why Toro Rosso have struggled this year and the upgrades that the STR4 will receive in the upcoming Hungarian Grand Prix.

When asked why STR have struggled, Franz Tost indicated that for financial reasons they made a conscious decision to delay major updates to the car and bundle them into one major update package (the one coming in the next GP). As a result, Toro Rosso have fallen behind the other teams, who have all added major updates to their cars. For example, Tost points out that Toro Rosso are the only team on the grid not to have included a double deck diffuser.

This explains why the recent races have been so much of a struggle for Toro Rosso and Sebastien Buemi. Hopefully the coming updates will make the STR4 competitive again and give Buemi a chance to challenge for points.