Best rookie driver 2014
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We have Daniil Kvyat- STR , Kevin Magnussen- Mclaren and Ericcson- Caterham as Rookie drivers for the 2014 Season
Who is the best rookie so far for you guys
I thought Kevin was best after first race but right now its Daniil Kvyat , He was doing a stellar job so farIt has to be Kvyat, he has done superbly well with the equipment he has. He has been fast, consistent and has already provided a few good team radio sound bites. You can’t really argue with 3 points finishes out of 5 races. He is 3-2 down on JEV in qualifying though, but he is 2-1 up in the races they have both finished.
Magnussen was stellar in Australia, but since then it has been a tale of missed opportunities, first lap blunders and struggles with another poor McLaren. He is also 3-2 down on Button in qualifying and 3-1 down in races they have both finished, so it isn’t going to plan so far.
Ericsson is nowhere. 4-1 down on Kobayashi in qualifying and 2-0 down in races they have both finished he is fast getting used to the feeling of starting on the last row and getting out of the way when being lapped. Frankly I don’t see him holding on to his seat for the whole season as Tony Fernandes seems to really like the look of Robin Frijns.
First, it’s fair to say that JEV and Ericsson have been hampered by their cars being over the weight limit, compared to their team mates. Ericsson was closer to Kobayashi in Spain, where I think they trimmed some weight from the Caterham. To be honest, it would have been better to run the lighter Frijns this year, but being at the back wouldn’t help him much, either. JEV I think would be a little ahead of Kvyat for now if not for the weight difference.
So that leaves me with Magnussen – he beat JB in the first race, and since then was better in Malaysia, but lost the result tapping Kimi. Since then JB has been in front, so we’ll have to see how KM can come back to that, although the car has also gone backwards. Shades of the last few McLarens…
By my count, KM would still be beating WDC JB in the points tables, despite being behind in the last three races, so he is my current ROTY. It’s not outlandish to suggest Jenson being hampered as well by weight, but, if so, we haven’t heard it; it sounds like a problem mainly for the mid-rear teams.
Kvyat sending Vergne to retirement or to a different category
Kvyat
He is FAST!!!
It would be hard to take away from what Kevin Magnussen has done this year. Australia was a great race for him, and he can’t take the blame for the team’s dip in form since then.
Dany Kvyat has done better though, in the context of the situation. He just turned 20. He leapfrogged the top-tier feeder series entirely to get to Formula 1 and went over a guy who many predicted would be at Toro Rosso by mid-2013. At Australia, he had a couple practice spins and people immediately began lumping him in with the likes of Esteban Tuero – a very young driver who came in way too soon.
Since then, he’s been damn near flawless, in a car that’s not as quick as the front running entries. His racecraft is absolutely exceptional – sure, Vergne has an edge in qualifying, but Kvyat holds his own against the best come sunday. He has a quiet consistency that is almost unheard of for a driver of his age and experience level – finishing in the lower half of the top 10 almost every weekend, a point here, a point there – where most rookies that are older and have spent more time in the ladder to F1 would be chucking it into a barrier or sand trap every other race.
Kvyat for me, slightly ahead of the other two, but they’ve all been decent so far.
Magnussen has made too many mistakes in close racing, his race pace is ok but he’s been surprisingly weak in qualifying against Button.
Ericsson is lacking some speed, but he also has far less seat time than the others (missing a lot of testing and dropping FP1’s for Frijns), so I think it would be unfair to castigate him for not competing against a decent team-mate. Not to mention he has the worst car on the grid, discounting early season Lotus.
Kvyat has been the most consistent rookie, close to Vergne on performance and barely any mistakes so far. Qualifying seems to be his weakest aspect so far, considering that has also been Vergne’s for the last couple of seasons.
@george Frijns didn’t drive too much in testing (just one day if I remember correctly) and only had one FP1 opportunity, and that time he got Kobayashi’s car.
Don’t get me wrong… if we see how ready JEV was, and how it took him time to gel with the F1, Kvyat is definitely ahead at this moment.. I did think off his GP3 Monza domination that Kvyat is the next serious contender for a Red Bull seat. Kvyat could replace Vettel eventually if he moves to Ferrari.. But while Kvyat has bested Vergne, KM has bested Button, a WDC (even if he’s in his twilight years now).
The thing that Kvyat has in his favour is if he can get even stronger in the F1 car as the season goes on….. his pattern has always been to improve as the year goes on, which hints at a very high potential maximum – something Marko loves. He’ll keep on improving, while Bianchi, Ericsson, Frijns and Nasr will hit their potential maximum quicker. We need to see the same improvement from Magnussen, Vandoorne etc. to be McLaren’s next big guns.
Kvyat has impressed me a lot. Red Bull seem to have a knack for doing such with their young drivers – Vettel and Ricciardo have both earned a huge amount of admiration from me.
@vettel1 it looks as if Red Bull is “the new Sauber”, Vettel, Ricciardo and Kvyat are 3 great drivers… so Red Bull (company) may end up having to power up Toro Rosso, as they can’t fire one of them!!! (That assuming not any other big team hires one of the 3).
@omarr-pepper @vettel1 They’ve definitely picked up some of the best drivers they could find (and discarded a lot along the way), but are getting very refined now. Sainz Jr looks to be over his growing pains, and is now firing on all cylinders, closely followed by Eurocup champion Gasly and Formula Renault UK champion (when that still meant something) Lynn. Leading FR 3.5 and GP3 gives quite a choice to make.
They can choose one of them to replace Vergne next year, but after that, they have until the end of 2016 to keep Kvyat going and see how he progresses, and how things develop at Red Bull. Things could change before 2017. Gasly is young enough to wait a few more years, but Lynn and Sainz Jr will want to get on with it (Sainz has been on the program a long time, and must be the favourite to replace Vergne). But Lynn has the time to move up from GP3 if Red Bull so desire.
A telling point is that they have no one following those 3 and Mardenborough, unless they plan to look again after this year…. That would be the first sign for me of when they are looking to quit (from the junior programme first finishing, up to Toro Rosso and finally Red Bull). There’s no point bringing more karting juniors through now if you plan to quit within the next ten years. Most of the other programs have karting juniors on them… even Lotus..
@fastiesty hey inform me more on that please, what or where is Mardenborough? and has Red Bull closed any of their junior programmes? I knew they have reduced their number of “applicants”.
@omarr-pepper Jann Mardenborough, mini-Lewis Hamilton lookalike (IMO), but he was a karter that ran out of funds.. turned to winning GT Academy and thus got funded into GT and British/FIA F3; now with Red Bull in GP3. A bit like Bruno Senna, he has catching up to do, but is doing OK so far. You could say he has the ‘experimental’ or ‘diamond in the rough’ slot in the programme, like Beitske Visser last year.
I didn’t know about applicant numbers being reduced.. I’m just reading from them trimming down to 4 drivers, 2 in GP3, 2 in FR 3.5.
PS. Good lap from Kvyat in Q2 to add more fuel to the ROTY 2014 fire… yet Magnussen equalled Button in Q1 and Button disappointed in Q2 (for whatever reason). But it looks like Toro Rosso are more competitive than McLaren and Force India at Monaco…..
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