At the end of last season, Force India made a significant
decision. They would, they announced, no longer require the
services of Adrian Sutil. The man who had spent the last six years
of his career at the team (surviving three changes of ownership)
would be left out in the cold, replaced by former GP2 champion and
Williams refugee Nico Hulkenberg. The man who finished a career
best ninth in this year's world championship would be sidelined in
favour of the team's young test driver. It was a brave decision -
but what was the reasoning behind it?
Adrian Sutil has never truly entered the spotlight. If he did,
it was for the wrong reasons, having been involved in a brawl with
a senior Renault man at a Chinese nightclub at the start of the
2011 season. But on track, he delivered some hugely underrated
drives. Under his leadership, Force India went from back of the
grid to the top half of the constructor's table in a remarkably
short time. In the past two years alone, Sutil has delivered twenty
two points finishes - a strike rate of 57% - not bad considering
that Red Bull, McLaren, Ferrari, Mercedes and Renault have
dominated the top ten in raw pace. Five of those finishes were top
six results. Not a record to be sniffed at.
Against his team-mates, Sutil has generally come out favourably.
In 2010 he outscored team-mate Vitantonio Liuzzi by a ratio of more
than two to one, and this year he came up against the DTM champion,
Britain's Paul di Resta. The Scot came highly rated and has been
repeatedly tipped for a bright future, with rumours swirling about
the possibility of him replacing Schumacher at Mercedes in 2013.
Despite the hype, Adrian got on with his job, and come the end of
the season he was four places and fifteen points ahead of the
"Rookie of the Year". Yet it was Sutil who lost his seat.
So, we've established that Sutil has considerable pace, and
unrivalled experience at the team. What else does he have going for
him? The first thing that comes to mind is a multi-million euro
personal sponsorship from Medion, the German electronics company.
Any team that gives refuge to Sutil benefits from this tasty fund,
and it is strange that Vijay Mallya has overlooked it, given the
dire trouble currently faced by his airline and key sponsor
Kingfisher, and his recent decision to sell off a significant
portion of the team to Indian conglomerate Sahara.
So what of his replacement, Nico Hulkenberg? The veteran of one
season at Williams certainly has potential, as he displayed during
his ill fated stint at the Grove based squad. Initially it looked
as if the runaway 2009 GP2 series champion was struggling to adapt
to F1, but over the course of the season he got steadily better and
took a brave (and fortunate) pole position in wet weather
conditions in Brazil. Williams certainly wanted to keep him, but
economic conditions forced them to choose between the rookie and
team-mate Rubens Barrichello, who had beaten him handsomely
overall. Hence Hulkenberg was relegated to the test role at Force
India. There is undoubtedly pace in the younger German, but
sponsorship and experience (particularly of DRS, KERS and Pirelli)
are thin on the ground. It's a risky decision.
Ironically, Hulkenberg's return to the grid may spell out the
end of former team-mate Barrichello's career, with Sutil (and his
chunky wallet) reportedly one of a number of candidates in talks to
replace the consistent Brazilian at Williams next year. It will be
a difficult decision for Williams to make, but for the reasons
detailed above, they could do far worse than employ Adrian Sutil.
He's a man who's taken one team from the abyss to the points. Now
that Force India has turned their back on him, Vijay Mallya's loss
could yet turn out to be Sir Frank Williams' gain.