Karthikeyan was
“scared” by 2012 HRTLUNDIN(^20) 1 AUGUST 2019
acing drivers love driving racing
cars – there’s nothing revealing
about that. But the relationship
between driver and car isn’t
always straightforward and almost every
professional racer will at some point in
their career have to grapple with cars
possessing ‘diva’ characteristics – as
Toto Wolff famously coined the 2017
Mercedes W08 – that force them to
dig deep and think outside the box.
Endurance racing veteran Pedro Lamy
has experienced both ends of the scale,
from the sublime Peugeot 908 and
Maserati MC12 to the infamous Mercedes
CLR, which spat his team-mate Peter
Dumbreck into the trees in 1999. Lamy was
unfortunate enough to get his big Formula 1
break in a car he describes as “one of the
most diffi cult” of his career when in 1993,
aged 21, the Portuguese was drafted into
Team Lotus to replace the injured Alex
Zanardi, whose 107B had suff ered an active
suspension failure ascending Eau Rouge
during practice for the Belgian Grand Prix.
Lotus fi nished sixth in the constructors’
championship that year, but it was hardly
the ideal car for an F1 rookie.
“You couldn’t trust the active suspension
completely, you didn’t know exactly what
the car was planning,” recalls Lamy, now a
R
DEALING WITH A DIVA
Three experienced all-rounders reflect on some of the
most difficult cars they encountered in their careers
and share their tips for conquering them
BY PIOTR MAGDZIARZ
World Endurance Championship regular
with Aston Martin Racing. “One lap the
car would react one way and the next lap
it would react diff erently. It was diffi cult
to get the confi dence and push.”
Persevering with a confi dence-sapping
car is equally familiar to Indian trailblazer
Narain Karthikeyan, whose diverse CV
includes a stint in the NASCAR Truck
Series in a Chevrolet Silverado in 2010.
Lured by the prospect of being on the grid
for his nation’s inaugural grand prix in
2011, Karthikeyan returned to F1 for the
fi rst time since 2005 with Spanish minnow
HRT and stayed on in 2012 to drive the
F112. But the underfunded outfi t’s struggles
went beyond a severe lack of downforce to
a degree that reliability was a serious issue.
“The car was an absolute disaster,” says
Karthikeyan. “I never really enjoyed it,
the motivation went down quickly and
I was asking myself, ‘Why am I here?’”
Neither HRT qualifi ed for the 2012
Australian GP – Karthikeyan’s DRS
system wasn’t working – while he also had
a brake failure in Korea and a hydraulics
problem in Abu Dhabi, where he was
rear-ended by Nico Rosberg.
“I was scared to drive the car, it became
dangerous for myself and others on track,”
adds Karthikeyan. “You never knew what
was going to break on the car, so I never
pushed more than 90%.”
So-called ‘diva’ cars are often associated
with handling imbalances, but it’s not
only unpredictable cars that can inhibit
the driver’s ability to push. By the time
sportscar stalwart Jeroen Bleekemolen got
his hands on the Chrysler Viper GTS-R in
the 2001 FIA GT season – three years after
Lamy had won the GT2 title in it – the car
was still quick, but its eye-watering cockpit
temperatures hadn’t been resolved.
“Pretty much every race the rubber