Vitantonio Liuzzi

Hoping for a good debate on this one because I change my mind about him about every other week.

Antonio has a decent background in other formula and was Formula 3000 champion(pre-GP2) in 2004 - only his second season in that formula.

Graduated in to F1 the following year and was originally going to get the second car at Red Bull alongside DC but in the end Red Bull decided to give him and Christian Klein a share option of the car. Antonio only go 4 races and Klein got the rest of the season. To be fair to Liuzzi he was coming into F1 for the first time with little testing and Klein had already done a full season with the same team(then the Jags of course). Records show he scored a point on his debut at San Marino after the BARs got the cut for their 'extra fuel tank' but 2 retirments and 9th there after wasn't enough to get him the seat.

Red Bull can't have been 2 unimpressed though because the following year he was given a seat at Toro Rosso their junior team alongside american clown Scott Speed. Antonio scored Toro Rosso only point that season with an 8th place in the U.S. He consistantly beat Speed but only acheived 4 top ten finishes all season. Again to be fair to him the Toro Rosso was not a good car and had an underpowered V8 engine which left them struggling. Liuzzi's contract was renewed for 2007 but he was under increasing pressure due to a certain bloke named Sebastian Vettel waiting in the wings and due to American sponsorship the idea of KART champion Sebastian Bourdais being signed. Liuzzi didn't respond well and had an awful start to 2007. Strangely enough it was the arrival of Vettel that spurred Liuzzi into some form and he was unlucky to be given a time penalty in Japan that slipped him back to 9th denying him some points. The very next race in China he out qualified his soon to be very famous team-mate and took 11th on the grid. He also had a fantastic race coming hime 6th and pretty much keeping pace with the Honda of Jenson Button all the way. Unfourtunatly for him Vettel finshed 4th so it looked less impressive.

Dropped by Toro Rosso he became Force India's test driver in 2008 and finally got his chance at a race seat part way through 2009 when Fisichella decided to go to Ferrari. He didn't score any points but he pretty much kept pace with Sutil which secured him his seat for 2010. You could say he was unlucky in 2010 - seem to have a habit of getting involved in first lap incidents. When he did manage to avoid them though he used to be in the top 10 and had a brilliant drive in the wet in Korea where he was 6th and pretty much kept pace with the front runners.

Dropped again by Force India he picked up the drive with HRT where he's been doing whats been expected of him I guess.

If you look at his results compared to Sutil and then look at Di Resta's results compared to Sutil then Antonio actually comes out on top so was Liuzzi dropped unfairly? If you look at the results he also did a much better job than Bourdais at Toro Rosso who replaced him there. Has Liuzzi been the victim of PR? With a better management team behind him would he have kept those drives and proven himself? Is there any point him being at HRT? Martin Brundle suggested he was doing his career more harm than good.

Any thoughts?
 
Rasp-
In th 2007 China race, Speed wasn't even on the team. Vettel started 6 positions behind the more experienced Liuzzi, yet wound up ahead of him at the end!!! It is quite possible that the stars were so aligned that Speed could have done so as well. By the way, finishing higher than someone who DNFs is NOT "beating" them in my book.
 
By the way, finishing higher than someone who DNFs is NOT "beating" them in my book.

It is in my book if they were comprehensively beating them before the retired example, Petrov beating Kubica in Hungary last year...

Unfortunately I can not remember Liuzzi's and Speed's races back then so I can't say...maybe Rasputin is using my logic.
 
They actually only need to score another 13th place to get in front of Lotus so its not impossible. They'd have to hope for another wet Canada like race to get it but with Belgium, Japan, Korea and Brazil still to come they have some hope.

As for Liuzzi resigning - I hope for his sake he does as I can't see another F1 seat on offer for him. I think he's done a good a job as can be expected at HRT and it would probably do them good to have some consistancy with their drivers. The new owners wanting a 'Spanish feel' to the team could spell trouble for him though - looks like Villa will be in and think they'd snap up Alguesari if Toro Rosso drop him.
 
So Liuzzi took part in the V8 Supercars race at Surfers Paradise at the weekend - which he probably did realising he wasn;t going to be racing in India.

He was only dipping his toe in the water and him and his partner Tony D'alberto (running in D'alberto's own car) failed to finish in the first race and came 19th in the second race(he was at least on the lead lap though) which isn't spectaculor but the fact he's taken time out to try out different forms of motor sport I guess shows he loves to race.

Interestingly one of the V8 races was won by Sebastian Bourdais and the field contain quite a few other ex F1 drivers including Jan Magnussen, Mika Salo, David Coulthard, Christian Klein and Gianni Morbidelli
 
Watched the highlights last night, really like the series and I thought he didn't do too bad... I guess we can see him end up there when he leaves F1?

PS It's not David Coulthard :) I was under that impression too at first, but it's actually Fabian Coulthard, who is a second cousin of DC!
 
Doh - my bad on the Coulthard front.

What was interesting is that Liuzzi announced he'd be racing there way back before HRT even signed Ricciardo so had more than likely done a deal with HRT not to race this weekend back then so although it looks like HRT have 'dropped' him I don't think they have.

I actually think Liuzzi will keep his seat at HRT next year
 
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