No sponsorship is ‘handicap’ admits de la Rosa

Pedro de la Rosa has acknowledged his plans to return to formula one in 2011 may stall due to a lack of personal sponsorship.

After several years as McLaren’s test driver, the 39-year-old Spaniard was ousted by Sauber after 14 races of his race comeback season.

Now Pirelli’s tyre tester, de la Rosa had been linked with the Spanish team HRT for 2011, but owner Jose Ramon Carabante recently warned that “without money, there is no place for him”.

The FIA entry list published earlier this week showed 10 potential vacancies for next season, but when asked if there are actually fewer openings, de la Rosa insisted: “For sure.

“Most of them are already reserved for drivers that come with a sponsor,” he is quoted by the Spanish sports newspaper Marca.

“That’s my handicap,” he admitted, “that I haven’t got a sponsor. But I’m not giving up.

“I’m stubborn and I want to race. If in the end I have to be a reserve or a tester, I will, but first I will try everything (to race).”

De la Rosa admitted that there are options outside of F1, including the premier American open wheel series Indycar.

“I’m not considering that yet,” he insisted. “It’s interesting, but – for now – I still think that I can be in F1.”

0 comments

Other articlesgo to homepage

	Police detonate suspected bomb in F1 paddock(0) Monaco’s party atmosphere late on Thursday was broken by the sound of an explosion. Bomb police cordoned off an area of the formula one paddock near the media centre after someone noticed a suspicious plastic package. Experts detonated it with a controlled explosion just before 10pm, the Press Associated reported. It also emerges that some

	Schumacher must convince Mercedes to ‘want him’(0) If Michael Schumacher wants to keep racing beyond 2012, he will need to convince Mercedes. That is the claim of former German F1 driver Christian Danner, referring to rumours the seven time world champion’s future beyond this year is uncertain. Schumacher, 43, has said he is yet to sit down for talks with Mercedes, who

	Button says Lotus car to beat in Monaco(0) McLaren’s Jenson Button has named Lotus as the team to beat in Monaco. After Romain Grosjean was second fastest in both practice sessions on Thursday, Button’s teammate Lewis Hamilton concurred that the “Lotus looks pretty good”. “Normally, there are seven tenths between the two tyre compounds,” said the 2008 world champion. “Jenson was only four

	Raikkonen wears James Hunt helmet in Monaco(0) Kimi Raikkonen is paying tribute to one of his heroes this weekend at Monaco. During Thursday practice for this weekend’s blue-riband event, onlookers were surprised to see the late James Hunt apparently at the wheel of a 2012 black and gold Lotus. In fact, it was Finn Raikkonen wearing 1976 world champion Hunt’s iconic black

	McLaren set to offer Hamilton $150m(0) McLaren is offering Lewis Hamilton a lucrative new contract for 2013 and beyond, British newspapers are reporting from Monaco. The stories – in all the major dailies including the Guardian, the Telegraph, the Daily Mail, Express, the Star, the Sun, the Mirror and the Times – consistently contradicted an earlier rumour that Hamilton might need