Roberto Merhi

So Roberto Mehri looks set to make his F1 debut for Caterham in the 2014 season, if not at Monza at least at some point of the season. Merhi's sudden step up to F1 is a dramatic change of fortunes for a driver who had basically dropped out of single seater racing two years prior to 2014.

At 18 Merhi started racing in the F3 Euroseries and whilst his first two seasons were consistant rather than spectacular he certainly showed he had a sensible head on his shoulders. He jumped into a GP3 seat near the end of the 2010 season and scored a double podium on his first weekend. It was all a pre-cursor to his championship year in F3 Euro in 2011 where he streaked away from the rest of the field. Merhi had one retirement all season with only one 5th place blotting a perfect record of top 4 finishes. When you think that there were 27 races in the F3 Euro that year then once again consistancy is the word you have to use.

Unfortunately Merhi did not have a major amount of funding and found no seat in single seater racing in 2012 so he joined the Merc junior team in DTM for two years. I don't really follow DTM so I can't really comment on his performance there but his results don't look amazing.

It was a bit of a shock in 2014 when it was announced that Mehri would be driving in the WSR. The commentators seemed very confused. Despite being out of single seater racing for 2 years he scored a 2nd place on his first race out (at Monza by the way) and, whilst it was obvious he was getting used to the machinary for the few rounds after, his form gradually started to return to the point where he has won 2 out of the last 3 races and finished 2nd in the other one. Merhi is the only driver to really have given Sainz Jr a problem in a straight fight this year in WSR and had just pulled himself into a position to challenge him for the title.

Merhi's move back into single seater racing was obviously very calculated after picking up his Russian backers. He even raced at British F3 round at Spa during the WSR break to 'keep him sharp' Merhi comes into Caterham with a massive amount of race experience and experience at jumping into different types of cars and learning them quickly. He also has a level head and a massive reputation for consistancy. All of these can only be good things when coming into F1 but ultimately whilst his pedigree is good (think above Chilton and Ericsson but below Bianchi) its not spectacular and unfortunately when coming into a back end team mid-season only spectacular will stop you picking up a reputation of 'pay-driver' or 'mediocre'.

He certainly seems a lovely guy who genuinally loves racing so I hope he does well and I expect him to get the best of Ericsson. However when all you can say about a team bringing in a driver is 'they could have picked worse' you know you're not expecting a world beater.
 
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So Merhi has decided not to do WSR 3.5 for the rest of the year.

Merhi pulls out of FR3.5 programme

I'm still struggling to understand why he was doing it in the first place!

yeah same here as back during the malaysian gp weekend, i remember seeing merhi potential calendar if he was to combine both & i thought then he was mental because he would be burned out come november because every week he flying to another destination. now im unsure if travel has compromised his performance in both series or he just not good enough. might be harsh but im for inclined to believe the latter as stevens is widely acknowledged to have beaten him well over this season & in fr 3.5 from the time sheets i see hes around midfield

------------------------ Chinese GP 10/12 apr
------------------------ Bahrain GP 17/19 apr
FR3.5 Spain 25/26 apr ----------------------
------------------------ Spanish GP 8/10 May
Monaco 21/24 May
FR3.5 Spa 30/31 May ------------------------
------------------------ Canadian GP 5/7 June
FR3.5 Budapest 13/14 Jun ------------------------
------------------------ Austrian GP 19/21 June
------------------------ British GP 3/5 July
FR3.5 Austria 11/12 July
------------------------ Hungarian GP 24/26 July
------------------------ Belgian GP 21/23 Aug
FR3.5 GB 5/6 Sept Italian GP 4/6 Sept
FR3.5 Ger 12/13 Sept ------------------------
------------------------ Singapore GP 18/20 Sept
FR3.5 Fra 26/27 Sept Japanese GP 25/27 Sept
------------------------ Sochi GP 9/11 October
FR3.5 Jerez 17/18 Oct ------------------------
------------------------ US GP 23/25 October
------------------------ Mexican GP 30 Oct /1 Nov
------------------------ Brazilian GP 13/15 Nov
------------------------ Abu Dhabi GP 27/29 Nov
 
Merhi kept up WSR because it was unclear whether he'd keep the Manor seat for the whole season as he doesn't come with as much as backing as some other available pay drivers.

It's difficult to compare him with Stevens as Merhi usually has the worse car (apparently it's written into Stevens' contract).
 
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