After four seasons in the IndyCar Series, Simona de Silvestro will drive for her home team, the Swiss-based Sauber F1. De Silvestro will be an 'affiliated driver' and will test the car at Barcelona after the Spanish Grand Prix and depending on the results of said test, will earn a Super License, which would allow de Silvestro to participate in Friday practice sessions and pursue a race seat in 2015.
In her four IndyCar seasons, de Silvestro recorded her career-best finish second at Houston this past October and achieved her career-best oval finish at the following race weekend at Fontana where she finished eighth. The Swiss driver accomplished her best career finish in the points standings in 2013 by finishing thirteenth ahead of IndyCar race winners Ed Carpenter, Takuma Sato and Graham Rahal. Overall, de Silvestro ends with one podium, three top-fives and fourteen top-tens.
If you follow IndyCar closely, you would expect some are not handling this well. To them and their extreme pessimistic mindset which only sees the glass as empty (it's never half empty because for them that is too much of a good thing), this is seen as a loss for IndyCar and I am talking about a loss of a driver but a chalk it up in the L-column, beat down.
Don't get me wrong, it's going to suck not seeing de Silvestro on the grid especially after the progress she had made in 2013 but we all saw this coming. I even foreshadowed it last week when I paired de Silvestro with The Beatles' song "She's Leaving Home."
But it's not the end of the world or a loss for IndyCar. De Silvestro was always going to take that Sauber offer. She is twenty-five and isn't going to get this opportunity again. She had to take it. And you would have too if you were in her shoes. As selfish-minded IndyCar fans can be, they would be crazy to think any driver is going to struggle looking for a ride and funding for said ride when five-sixths of the grid is full and you would be making your third team change in five seasons when there is a Formula One test driver slot open and could lead to a race seat the following year.
And there was nothing IndyCar could do to stop her from leaving. What could they have done? Pay her $10 million? Buy her a seat at Penske or Ganassi? You really think that would have solved all of IndyCars problems because it would put a female driver in a seat capable of winning a race and would get more people to turn their tubes to NBCSN and ABC or drop $80 for tickets to a race? Don't be so naïve. There was nothing IndyCar could have done.
This was an individual with an offer on the table making a professional decision to move on. It happens everyday across the world in many professions that aren't motorsports. It's part of life. She is a driver. The beauty about motorsport is you don't have to be tied to one series for your whole career. She wasn't tied to being an IndyCar driver for her whole life. Just like every driver out there, has the capability to move to a different discipline whenever they feel the time is right. If opportunities dry up in one series, there is always another where the door may be open. If you accomplished everything possible in one series, there is always another to conquer.
De Silvestro's move is encouraging as more and more women in enter motorsports. It shows progressive especially with Sauber as de Silvestro joins the team with the only female team principal in Formula One, Monisha Kaltenborn. American open-wheel racing has had great success with female drivers. The last time there wasn't a full-time female driver in IndyCar was in 2004. Nine seasons with one full-time woman driver is what many series would die for but IndyCar has been fortunate with the likes of Danica Patrick, Sarah Fisher, Katherine Legge, de Silvestro, Ana Beatriz and Milka Duno running full-time (Ok, Duno isn't one the series is going to be promoting that loudly). Let's not forget Pippa Mann, who has made six starts in that time frame.
IndyCar finds themselves in an actually unusually position of not having a full-time woman competing but More Front Wing's Steph Wallcraft puts it best in her commentary saying no one should panic. IndyCar shouldn't just throw a female driver into a full-time seat in hopes of garnering attention. However there is a lack of female talent in the Road to Indy ladder series. Last year, a total of two women competed in the three lower-tiers of the Road to Indy, both in Pro Mazda with Argentine Julia Ballario running Mid-Ohio and Trois-Rivières and Filipina Michele Bumgarner at Houston. A few promising drivers have moved on. Shannon McIntosh ran two seasons in U.S. F2000 but has moved on to ARCA. Ashley Freiberg ran one season of Star Mazda in 2012 but has moved to the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge and won the season opener with co-driver Shelby Blackstock at Daytona last month but even after winning, Freiberg has nothing set for the rest of 2014.
I am sure there are a few teenage girls in karting who dream of racing on a top level someday but dreams alone aren't enough. Last week I told you to brace yourself for de Silvestro's departure. This week brace yourself, because it may be a while before IndyCar sees it's next full-time woman driver.
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