Stoffel Vandoorne

Its been announced this week that Belgian Mclaren development driver Stoffel Vandoorne will return to the GP2 series in 2015 again driving for the ART team. Vandoorne is hoping a successful championship year with ART will be the pathway for him to get into F1 for 2016, preferably with Mclaren, but is that actually really likely to happen?

Vandoorne’s potential is not in any doubt. He won the F4 Eurocup title in 2010 and then had a close tussle with Dani Kvyat in Eurocup 2.0 in 2012, a tussle he eventually won and took the title. In 2013 he jumped up to the WSR 3.5 series and scored a win on his debut. He scored 4 wins in total with 10 podiums in 17 races, all this in the much unfancied Fortec car as well. He was piped to the title by fellow Mclaren development driver Kevin Magnussen who had already done a year in the series and was driving the all mighty DAMS car. K-Mag landed himself an F1 seat with Mclaren and Vandoorne switched feeder series to join ART in GP2. Once again Vandoorne scored a win on his debut before suffering the same fate the majority of rookies do when joining GP2 and falling backwards whilst getting used to the difficult Pirelli tyres. To be fair to Vandoorne this only lasted for a few rounds and by the time he got to round 7 in Austria he was back up there with the front runners. Unfortunately for him Jolyon Palmer, again in a mighty DAMS car, was already out of sight but he did manage to haul back to 2nd in the championship with a further 3 wins and 5 podiums. He was cost better results by some questionable tactical decision by ART on occasions too, especially when the failed to pit him under the safety car when the entire rest of the field did leaving him in an almost impossible position. Anyone who saw his comeback drive that day can’t have failed to be impressed.

Vandoorne will most likely go into the GP2 2015 season as favourite for the title, even if he does have some stiff competition in Gasly and Lynn (DAMS again!), but will even a dominant season in this series guarantee him a seat in F1? In these times of financial trouble pure talent does not now make it a certainty that an F1 seat will become available. Vandoorne is currently backed by Mclaren but with a lack of so-called feeder teams where would they put him? They already have K-Mag on their books who has been dropped from race seat to 3rd driver for 2015 and they have another talented youngster in Nick de Vries queuing up right behind Vandoorne. With Alonso and Button locked into the F1 seats and Vandoorne not even being next in line is the Mclaren root even a valid one for him to get into F1? On the other hand if he breaks away from Mclaren he has no funding so would a seat become available to him at all then either.

Rumour has it that back in 2013 Vandoorne was approached by Helemt Marko and offered the Toro Rosso seat for 2014. Vandoorne decided he wasn’t ready and that he would stick with Mclaren. That seat then went to his old rival in Eurocup Kvyat who now in 2015 will be driving for the Red Bull A team. Whilst at the time I thought Vandoorne had made a wise decision with hindsight it looks like he may have missed out.

Can F1 afford to miss out on talent like Vandoorne? Are you confident we’ll see him in F1 one day? Have you been impressed by him or do you think he is just all hype? I would be interested to hear your thoughts.
 
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Stoffel was not mentioned in Daniel Johnson's Telegraph article about Stevens and Palmer not getting a drive next season as a candidate for either seats at Lotus or Manor
 
Yes I saw that. Daniel Johnson is a British journalist though. He wrote about Stevens and Palmer who are British drivers. I don't think its an insight into the going on's of Stoffel Vandorne or Mclaren.
 
He did mention Vergne, Magnussen , Rossi and Wehrlein. He is at most grand prix's right to know that the GP2 feeder series Vandoorn thrashed everyone and the rumours keep coming about trying to find him a drive?:thinking:
 
There was no mention of him as a candidate for a start which is odd nor was there a mention of the second Haas seat in the same artcile
 
I think you're taking one journalists missing out of one potential candidate a bit too much as fact. I bet there were a lot of other drivers in the running he didn't mention either.

As for the Haas seat - the reason for that is we've all known who has it for about 2 months now. Even the journalists can't make that one sound exciting.
 
okay forget the Haas one because if it aint Gutierez there would be outrage from Ferrari and the whole of Mexico

Well the way Mr Johnson put it was that K Mag and Vergne were front runners and ahead of Palmer and yet Stoffel has been making a lot of noises recently
 
There is some rumour that he will be driving in the super formula series. Another talent denied for the f1 grid.
 
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Stoffel I think will get a Mclaren seat be it 2017 or 2018 because their current line up can't go on forever so there will be at least 1 spot on the team
 
As we've seen with KMag being out of the limelight as a Mclaren youth driver does not bode well for an F1 career.

I do think if Vandoorne doesn't get to F1 then the sport has a major issue. Then again I said that when Robin Frijns was shunted aside too.
 
Well Perez thinks its Mclaren's fault for shafting with K Mag's career as he thinks the environment was a bit political namely in terms of the power struggle between Ron Dennis and the other owners

Stoffel hopefully won;t wait too long for his chance
 
You know there could be a seat at Williams in 2017 seeing that Massa is thinking he could be asked to make way possibly for Nasr and Bottas is being lined up for a top drive either at Ferrari or Mercedes. So maybe Stoffel could get a seat there
 
Nah, probably in 2017 Sirotkin and Lynn join the f1 grid and Jenson again renews his contract with Mclaren to rejoice the time at Mclaren after another terrible season in 2016. You heard it here first. ;)
 
There has been a lot of Mclaren reserves. Gary Parfeet, Oliver Turvey, Alex Wurz etc etc. Never seen many in race seats.

If Vandoorne had accepted the offer to drive at Torro Rosso for 2014 he'd be sticking it to Danny Ric by now. So are the fates of motorsport I guess.
 
Unless your name is Lewis Hamilton but I do think Mclaren want to get rid of Button next season ideally unless Alonso throws a wobbler and storms out

Stoffel could have driven for Force India if the cards fell for him and the opportunity to drive for Toro Rosso I think the problem was he may have been worried about the brutal treatment that Helmut dishes out to anyone who does not live up to expectation immediately
 
i find it a shame that man man who has dominated gp2 in his 2nd season in a way no one has since probably hulkenburg wont get a seat next season

i was looking a gp2 records as well & its crazy the records he hold in just 2 seasons (& the ones he tied with, with 3 races left with probally take on his own)

- He's tied for overall wins on 10 with Maldonado
- Has the most Feature race wins with 9
- Most pole positions with 8
- Most consecutive pole positions with 6
- Most Podiums with 24
- He's tied for Most podiums in a season on 14 with Hamilton
- Most Total points with 532.5
- Most points in a season with 304
- Tied for 2nd for Total fastest laps with 11 (1 behind coletti)
 
Some say he should have gone with Red Bull when offered the chance. He will be in F1 because so far Ron Dennis has done little to suggest that his return to the helm has been a resounding success and needs something to prove it

He talked about it was he who promoted Magnussen to the F1 seat, it was him who got to sort out the deal with Honda as a factory team.

So I think Stoffel will be at Mclaren in 2017 because I really don't see how both current drivers will want to stay for another winless and back of the grid season.
 
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