Sébastien Buemi

Sebastien Buemi - know to some in these parts as The Moose - has always been a bit of a mystery to me. I go through stages of rating him and stages of just thinking of him as an avergae midfield driver so thought I'd put an article up there and see if the rest of you are as confused about him as me.

His junior formula record is not that impressive. He's was a front runner in the majority of series he ran in but champion in none. The season before he came into F1 he finished runner-up in GP2 Asia and 6th in proper GP2 season - including 2 wins. One of the wins came in France where he started 21st on the grid - which is pretty impressive.

He arrived in F1 with very little fanfare and you can pretty much say he's not made much louder noises since - the most viewed clip of Buemi is of course this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBVuvIPe0tc

Incidently in the interview directly after this crash the dictaphone the reporter was using also fell apart leading some to believe that Sebastien has some sort of unknown X-Man power.

Although there hasn't been much fanfare about his F1 career if you look at his record he has fared fairly well. He scored points on his debut and consistantly got the better of Sebastian Bourdais, who lets not forget was highly rated and an indie car champ when he came in at Toro Rosso, until Bourdais was dropped 9 racers into the season. In then stepped the man who has been his team-mate ever since.

Its seems to felt by most that Jamie Alguersuari is the favored son at Toro Rosso. He came in at 19 for the Hungarian Grand Prix in 2009 and actually beat Buemi on his first race out (ok they were 15th and 16th but he did!). Buemi took a little time to respond to his new team-mate but showed himself to be clear number 1 with 2 points scoring finsihes in the last 2 races of 2009 which made 4 for the season and gave him a grand total on 6 points.

As 2010 started it looked like Alguersauri was going to show Buemi up as Jamie scored into the points twice whilst Buemi just had a handful of retirements. Buemi scored a good 10th placed finish at Monoco though and that seemed to spur him on. He finished in front of Alguersauri in 10 of the next 14 races - scoring points a further 3 times and giving him a total of 8 at the end of the year compared to Alguersauri's 5.

This season the pressure was on from the very start. Danial Ricciardio was sitting in the garage and it was pretty clear that Red Bull were looking to bring him into F1 and that the obvious place to do that would be Toro Rosso. Buemi seem to start well with this and beat his team-mate in all of the first 6 races ot the season scoring 3 points finishes on the way. Despite another points finish in Canada he's been overshadowed by a returning to form Alguersauri he has scored 3 points finishes in the last 3 races and has actually gone in front of Buemi in the WDC by a point. Will Buemi respond to this like he did last season and come back? Is he in contention for a seat at Red Bull if Webber leaves or will Toro Rosso put him on the scrapheap at the end of the year?

Seems very at home in F1 but does he have the potential to go and win races or is he just a good midfield driver?

what do you think?
 
Jos - all the kids are writing thinlk now days - its the new in thing - honest. *ahem* corrected that.

You don't think Red Bull wouldn't consider him as a steady replacement for Webber?
 
haha if you say so ill take your word for it! however I think the red bull toro rosso thing is in name alone nowadays Vettel was the last person going through, if anyone was to replace Webber it might just be the raikkonen rumours true
 
We know Buemi wasn't hired for his looks so it's not inconceivable that the guys got talent. ;)

It looked like he was about to kill off Alguersauri's STR career following Monaco...but then Algersauri, his back up against it, make a decent enough recovery in Montreal and then Valencia and then Silverstone. That's three races on the trot that Buemi has seen his target worm his way back into the competitive mix.

For all we know Alguersauri is stupidly quick and, so, Buemi is a man to watch.

Red Bull are known to discard drivers at a drop of a hat:

Liuzzi, Klein, Bernoldi, Doornbos, Freisacher, Speed, Bourdais, Armermuller, Zaugg, Hartley...the racing circuits of the planet are littered with young Red Bull Academy prospects who've become cannon fodder.

We'll see.
 
The Moose! You can't say he doesn't look like a moose, man I love that comparison, it all happened when I watched a programme with a moose on it! ROFL

The fact is, I very much doubt he will get the Red Bull seat, I for one hope he does, as yes, I am a fan of his, could be because he looks like a moose, but his drive in China 2009 made me keep an eye on him.

The reason why I don't think he will get a seat, is as you mentioned, that Alguersuari seems to be their "favoured" driver out of the two, he hasn't been delivering Alguersuari for the past two seasons, only now has he been doing good with some major luck in Canada, great drive in Valencia. But it seems as if Toro Rosso give Alguersuari chance after chance.

Then there's Ricciardo, and we all know Red Bull are so keen on this guy, so for the Red Bull seat I think he's the last likely out of the 3.

Buemi is consistent, I can see him as a grand prix winner (not a World Champion, but he is only 23?), plus, he is not a man, nor a human being, he is a Moose.

Being a Moose and being able to mix it up with human beings should give him an edge over Alguersuari and Ricciardo, but the Red bull crew don't feel the same way unfortunately. :disappointed:

I am quite sure he will bounce back at some point, but then again that Toro Rosso is going to get less and less competitive by the day as they are looking towards 2012, so point finishes will be hard to come by.
 
I'd just like to give a shout out for The Moose and a great drive in Hungary from 23rd to 8th. After a couple of bad results was well needed and puts him back in front of Alguersuari in the points stake.

Also must mention that my other half who has no interest in F1 has adopted Buemi as her driver due to him looking like a moose and 'sounding like a kinder chocolate bar' - she even watched 10 laps of the GP with me so she could 'keep an eye on that moose guy'

Maybe that means I can get Sky now?
 
Also must mention that my other half who has no interest in F1 has adopted Buemi as her driver due to him looking like a moose and 'sounding like a kinder chocolate bar' - she even watched 10 laps of the GP with me so she could 'keep an eye on that moose guy'

Glad she thinks the same LOL

And he got to 8th with no safety car aswell, great drive.

Is this the first "Wet" race with no safety car??? :shocked:

Going by recent times one must think......yes!
 
I think he eats Team Mates for breakfast!

2009 Bue 3 Bou 2
2009 Bue 3 Alg 0
2010 Bue 8 Alg 5
2011 Bue 12 Alg 10

Never lost to a team mate yet but I'm still worried he won't have a drive next year.

With those stats, I am surprised Alguersuari still has a drive...

Somthings wrong here :whistle:

Wait wait....what the hell? I never knew there was "22" races in 2011? Buemi 12 and Alguersuari 10?

Come on Moose! :cheer:
 
Well removing the gravel traps and tarmacing all the run offs has made it and other corners easier because its effectively widened the corner if you run wide. Everyone will jump down my throat when I say this but bring gravel traps back.
 
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