Chandhok to replace Trulli for German GP

[Koz]

He has done very well. The gap is less than Lotus' last quali outing.

[steveaki13]

I am looking forward to seeing Karun in a car that at least can now battle other cars. Last years HRT he and his team mate were always last, with the lotus he can battle HRT and Virgin and if he has a poor start at least he can finally fight other cars.

Good luck Karun.

[CaptainRaiden]

I don't think he'd have a good race. One year out of action + managing the Pirelli tyres + using DRS is all gonna be a bit too much to handle I'm guessing.

[Robinho]

good guess, he was shocking it seems

[steveaki13]

Well predicted Captain. Exactly as it turned out.

[Dave B]

It's a shame he's not doing Hungary too, two back-to-back races would have given a much fairer indication of how he's performing. Ah well, there's always India....

[CaptainRaiden]

Dismal race. I knew it would be difficult. While the qualy pace was good, it's just too much to ask after being one year out, while the car's handling and behavior has changed completely because of the Pirellis.

[CaptainRaiden]

Chandhok surprised by tyre degradation rate - GPUpdate.net

Chandhok surprised by tyre degradation rate
24 July 2011

Karun Chandhok’s German Grand Prix marked his first Formula 1 race since his outing for HRT at Silverstone last year. After sinking to the back of the field on the opening lap, the Indian suffered a dramatic off at the Schumacher S and eventually limped home to 20th place, four laps down on winner Lewis Hamilton.

“That’s a full race distance completed and an awful lot of learning under my belt,” Chandhok said after the 60-lap race. “Honestly, that probably wasn’t the race I wanted - I had a couple of high-speed spins and I think I need more time to get used to the tyres.

“When they start to go off, there’s very little give compared to last year’s rubber, but that’s all part of the learning process and I’m glad I got the car home and did the best job I could.”

THAT is exactly what I suspected. Without doing long runs in testing, there is no freakin way a driver, especially a one-off replacement, can prepare or get used to these tyres. Unfortunately for Chandhok, he's not going to get any more testing or practice time with these Pirellis until the Indian GP, and with no in-season testing, he's really in a pickle. This is exactly what's hurting Daniel Ricciardo as well.

These guys need to muscle up some more sponsors, pay for their seat in a semi-decent car, and get a full season with winter testing and the works under their belt. These kind of random, one-off or mid-year drives just makes them look worse than they are.

[DexDexter]

No disrespect to Chandhok but this driver swap takes some of the credibility of Team Lotus away . Serious F1 teams don't swap drivers for one race. They effectively sacrificed one race because there was no way Chandhok was going to be competitive with the amount of running he's had this year.

[ioan]

Well, it's not like if Trulli would have won the race or even got points anyway. So what did they lose?