Simona de Silvestro had a successful first day of F1 testing at Fiorano on Saturday, completing a total of 112 laps at her first attempt, a pretty impressive start in terms of mileage.
Here she is in the re liveried Sauber C31.
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joeblogsf1 
Interesting that no times were issued by Sauber.
It’s not interesting really – when did you last see a team release the lap times from a private test?
For example, did Williams ever release the times from the test session Nico Rosberg did back in 2004? Sauber didn’t reveal what times Kimi set during his first test for them, and as far as I’m aware neither did McLaren when Hamilton first tested for them in 2006. Just because times have not been announced does not mean that they must be bad.
I don’t know why you bother to comment… Being negative is easy. Try thinking positively.
And her best time was?
Wow – that’s a lot of laps and a lot of G’s. Good for her. I’d need a pair of straps holding my head in place inside of 3 laps. In 10 laps I’d be asking for a nap! Sounds like a Super License is in order here, (even if I felt she was qualified anyway). I met her at he Toronto Indy car race two years back – hopefully nice people like her DON’T finish last as she is very personable and bloody quick to boot.
Be glad you met her at an Indycar race as you won’t get that privilege when she is at an F1 race! Illustrates the difference in a series that wants to welcome the fans and one that only wants to welcome Celebs and the Rich!
Anyway it would be good to have a committed woman racer in F1, it is well past time that there was, and as the new cars are said to be physically easier to drive and require more brain power and multi tasking ( where the female of the species has a known advantage over us males ), then she ought to be ok and maybe open some doors to other woman racers which would be great.
That’s Great and Thanks for the update.
any laptime benchmarks?
Would be pretty hard to work out what a good time is. Lots of configurations at Fiorano, what tyres was she on, never mind fuel load etc etc.
God save us from seeing the Sauber painted like that.
read my comment about purple Rolls Royces
Appreciation of art and beauty are subjective. Personally Ifind this livery quite attractive. Certainly more than the current Sauber. But that’s me.
Any representative times ?
Representative relative to what?
Continues Sunday I think. Wonderful and deserving person.
Thanks for letting us know, Joe. Cool picture too ! I really think she’s the real deal. Any lap times ?
You really like her don’t you Joe..
I think she is one of the ingredients that is badly needed in F1 right now ..
She is real ….
I think she is perfect for F1, with out one proviso: she has to prove herself to be quick enough to be there ON MERIT. If she can do that she will be brilliant for F1. If not, it will not help the cause of equality. The breakthrough comes not in having a woman racing in F1, but rather having a woman who is there solely on merit. The thing I like about Simona is that she thinks of herself as a racer, not as a woman racer. We will see how she does but thus far she is doing it right and she looks to be good.
It will be fascinating seeing both her and Susie Wolff in regular practice.
“she has to prove herself to be quick enough to be there ON MERIT.”
Double standard. Half of the grid aren’t there on merit, Joe.
Yes they are!
Yeah frankly these days it’s really just Pastor who is there 100% on pay and 0% on merit! 😉
(Unless the FOM sees merit in him reliably bringing out the safety car to bunch Mercedes up and give the TV audiences some awesome racing?)
No, I’m afraid I have to disagree. Pastor won a race. Drive magnificently and thoroughly deserved his success. However before and since he has been all over the place.
Vittorio Brambilla won the 1975 Austrian GP…didn’t make him a top F1 driver though. Pastor won Spain, but some races are like that, a guy wins and never troubles the rest of the field again. If he didn’t have the cash, he wouldn’t be in the Lotus. Having said that, even with the subdued form of Sauber & Ferrari, I would think that both The Hulk & the Kimster have the right to feel relieved not to be at Enstone…..
You can blather on as much as you like but on his day – his only great day – he was majestic. And you cannot and should not take that away from him.
Like I said, some races are like that. He isn’t a top grade driver, and there are many others with far more talent, who ought to be in a decent seat…but not a Lotus…at least not this season….
Formula One pilots are Top-Grade drivers. That is what Formula One is. Even the back-markers are top grade drivers. I know when people play the role of the fan they often joke about how bad the back-markers suck, and how awesome their driver is compared to the others, but all of those guys are there because they have climbed a ladder. It’s not like they found some cash and got into F1. They have spent years in karting an junior formula, racking up wins, and being “the best” on their day. Just because they are not currently winning, or even finishing in the top ten does not mean they did not yesterday, or will not tomorrow.
Hey Dale D, this is bad form I know, putting a reply into one’s own post, but yours didn’t have a post comment with it….maybe it’s to do with moderation? Anyway, not all F1 pilots are Top Grade. Many are just there on money grounds.
RBR/Ferrari/Mac have drivers they chose for the simple reason that they are the best.
At Force India, The Hulk is obviously a top potential guy, Perez is maybe a bit iffy.
Toro Rosso are RBR Jnr team, so Vergne & Kyvat are there for examination, and may go forward or be just dumped…and we know TR do that without compunction.
Lotus have a potential decent driver in Grosjean, but Pastor is clearly all about the Money!
Williams have Massa who lovely guy that he is, is headed past his best. Bottas has potential, and some Finnish backing….
Sauber has Sutil…jury out, Guiterrez, mostly money use, and now Simona who ought to bring them big cash benefits.
Caterham, Kobayashi, bit like the curate’s egg, good in parts, but had cash support. In a better car he might be a decent option for some team.
Ericcson has support and hasn’t starred really in other series.
At Marussia Bianchi is a protégé of Ferrari and Nicolas Todt, while Chilton is not short of Dad Cash.
So, to sum up, there are out of 22 drivers, Vettel, Ricciardo, Alonso, Raikkonen, Button, Magnussen, The Hulk, Kyvat, Grosjean, Bottas, in total 10 drivers out of 22 on the grid, that have been/could be GP winners, WCD title winners, and 12 that are unlikely to ever be either, even if sat in a top car.
Therefore there are not 22 Top Grade drivers, but only around 10!
For another example, I always thought Vergne looked racier than Ricciardo, but Ricciardo is looking very good in the RBR, whereas Kyvat is making Vergne look a touch ordinary?
It’s always been the way that money could buy you into F1. However apart from really Bernie @ Brabham, it was usually the case that you only got in to a private car. Or if you got a works car you only had 2-3 races to prove ability in. Nowadays, cash gets you into a good team and you get to crash all year with no decent results, because at least you can pay the teams bills and they don’t have to pay you….which is utter rubbish imho!
In the past a guy could beat F1 drivers in an FAtlantic 1600cc single seater as Gilles did, and then be in a McLaren and suddenly No2 at Ferrari, that is simply totally impossibly unrealistic in modern F1, and that is also entirely wrong minded and another reason why F1 has lost it’s way completely.
It’s really fascinating how some people can tell whether HRT-guy Ricciardo is a top-grade driver and Marussia-guy Bianchi is not.
And yes, there is certainly some difference in class between Hamilton and Chilton, but it does not mean Chilton is not a top-grade driver, and if you want to name just top-of-the-tops driver, then I wonder how can you tell there is 5, 10 or 15 such ones anywhere in the world.
To me the colour scheme looks cheap and tacky, with a bit of luck maybe a few extra race seats come available with the new teams give her a chance at a race seat.
I once saw a purple/custard-liveried Rolls Royce with gold accessories. Taste is in the eye of the beholder, isn’t it?
Personally, I like the “clean” look of the Fiorano Sauber, much more than the grey-on-grey Sauber of today. To each his own.
The color scheme looks to be similar to what she used in Indycar last year,possibly a tie in to her sponsor from that season.
I mentioned in the previous blog and I’ll mention it again, as I’m completely impressed with the concept; having a seporate sponsor, complete with their own livery, apart from the teams regular paint scheme and sponsorship, I think is groundbreaking. What does it tell me? It says that we will be seeing concentrated press releases in the media as Simona progresses to her super license. This is only the first of many. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t recall anything like this ever being done before? Seporate sponsorship, different livery, followed by an actual press release promotion. Simona is a driver first, in her mind, however an way you cut the mustard, she is a woman going for her super license, a story that beckons newsworthy attention and her sponsor is going for it. Look at the reaction it’s getting from this blog alone. It also suggests that this is paving the way for the sponsor’s entr into F1, starting with IndyCar, followed by this. If this is a first, I call it marketing genius
As many have inquired, no times were released by Sauber.
That’s pretty impressive by anybody’s standards. I doubt we’ll get any lap times but then you wouldn’t be able to make any comparisons to anything else anyway, except to times within the test itself, consistency etc. You can check out her form on Wikipedia and she has the credentials, although since 2010 she hasn’t really made any mark but due more to reasons beyond her control than anything else. She’s certainly got as much if not more credentials than certain other drivers I can mention on the current F1 grid. It’s now a matter of whether she gets the right breaks, which is a tricky so-and-so in F1. I wish her luck.
My guess is that the demo tyres used make the times impossible to compare with other runs.
The livery is not far off from her Nuclear Clean Energy Indycar. I could get used to that
For those asking for lap times, why does it matter and what on Earth could one possibly compare it to?
Good luck to her. I would love to see Simona in F1.
I would (on merit, as Joe says above) if only to shut up once and for all those people who truly believe a woman could never be a top racer. Once it happens, it’ll be a non-issue – rather like the idea of a woman prime minister was in the UK after 1979.
I wish her all the best; sounds as if she may be the real deal.
Indycar’s loss is F1’s gain. I still can’t figure out why no top Indy team gave her a ride besides lack of judgment on their part.
She was offered rides in INDYCAR but she turned them down for various reasons.
Andretti, Penske or Ganassi should have picked her up. KV is a weird team, a real underperformer. I’m glad to see her testing at Sauber and hope she gets a drive next year- can’t say current the Sauber lineup has done anything to feel secure, barring bringing money. Until she actually races who knows, but I think she could be an upgrade over either of those guys.