Community Article - Join here and write your own articles!
HRT - the story continues...
Well before the start of the 2010 Formula 1 season, HRT's induction into the ranks was a rocky one.
After the buy-out by shareholder José Ramón Carabante, the former Campos team was rebranded to the Hispania Racing Team and held the two signed drivers of Bruno Senna and Karun Chandhok. Former team princpal Adrian Campos was replaced by Colin Kolles from Force India and the entire team went straight to the first race in Bahrain with no testing on the cars behind them.
With 10 races now behind them and another 9 to go, not only are HRT trying to improve on their highest race position of 14th, they have once again found themselves at the forefront of gossip.
During the afternoon of Thursday 8th July, HRT made the surprise announcment that their driver Bruno Senna was to be replaced by their reserve and test driver Sakon Yamamoto. They promised to disclose the reason for this change the next day, with that reason never arriving.
Rumours have abounded ever since as those in Formula 1 try to work out why HRT was pull their driver from the race lineup for the British Grand Prix.
One rumour suggests that Senna was dropped due to an unfortunate email that was apparently written by Senna that critised team principal Kolles, and that Kolles's response to such a take on his authority in the team was to pull Senna from their line-up.
Another rumour, and perhaps this is more true to the point, is that Senna was pulled due to finaces. Both Chandhok and Senna have sponsors and it has been suggested that some of Senna's sponsors hadn't paid their cheques to HRT in time and that, with HRT needing money, they decided to put Yamamoto in his place due to his £5 million secure sponsorship that he has behind him.
For whatever reason, in a world where news and reasons leak out worse than using a paper towel to plug a water hole, the true reasons for Senna being pulled at the British Grand Prix weekend still remain unclear.
No reason has been given by HRT and one is now unlikely to be given. Senna, Chandhok, Yamamoto and Kolles are all remaining surprisingly tight-lipped as well.
So will we ever know? Only time will tell. And perhaps only then with the announcement of the team line-ups for the 2011 F1 season.
Official McLaren eShop - Get your official team kit now!
Comment awaiting moderation. Why?