Alex Yoong

[nippy]

I'm an F1 fan and i have recently learnt that Alex Yoong moved from Minardi F1 to Champ Cars errm what is he like is he as bad as he was in F1

[BootsOntheSide]

He only ended up doing four races before his money ran out, as his sponsors realised the series didn't have enough following in Malaysia. Considering that he missed all the pre-season testing, and drove for Dale Coyne Racing which was probably the worst team of all, he actually did pretty well, only finsihing once but being thoroughly competitive, especially at Brands.

His future plans are unclear, but he did do the Bathurst 24 Hours, whcih lead to an amusing joke on here. The race ran from 3pm Saturday to 3pm Sunday, and one of his team-mates refuses to drive on Saturday due to his religous beliefs, so he did all his stints after midnight. One member commented of the driver in question that "because of this, he has started many rraces at the back of the grid", and someone else (sorry I can't remember who) replied "what are Alex Yoong's religious beliefs? He often starts at the back of the grid"

[nippy]

lol but do you think he had potential if you stuck him in say a B.A.R. or Jag

[Snrub]

I think in his brief CART appearance Yoong showed he's a pretty decent driver and has some potential. Given some experience and a competitive car I'd say he could be a consistent 6-10th finisher. His biggest problem is that he bought himself a F1 ride before he was ready. By F1 standards he could eventually be good enough for a mid-field ride.

[Hazza]

I seem to remember that he did to Dayle Coyne what Salo did to PK - brought it up where it shouldn't be

He was in my mind the best driver for Coyne this year!

[nippy]

As i don't follow champ cars hugly i don;t know if they are a good team, although i do watch some races if there on but is Dale Coyne one of the good teams or are they just medioca

[BootsOntheSide]

Calling them 'mediocre' would be an insult to mediocre things the world over. They cobble a team together weekend-by-weekend, using an assortment of paydrivers, very few of whom are up to the job. Their best result all season was Gualter Salles' fluke 6th at Surfers, otehr tahn that it was two ninths.

I think Yoong is among the top 40-50 single-seater roadcourse drivers in the world - the trouble is, there's only room for 20 in Formula 1. Given more experience he could've been closer to the pace, but he'd never really do justice to his equipment.

[nippy]

Well i'm glad we share the same view BootsOnTheSide

[Snrub]

The best comparison would be to call Coyne the Minardi of CART. Only problem is that Minardi is not usually off the pace as much as Coyne is! The scary part is that instead of having inferrior equipment Coyne had the Lola chasis. They reused equipment and didn't have spares, etc. but I'm almost certain they spent more on parts than Walker did for Manning's car.

Plain and simple, Yoong wasn't ready for F1. Everyone pans his performances, but there were a couple times later in the season when he was reasonably close to Webber. We all know Webber is the real deal. These are more in line with the Alex Yoong that was in CART for 4 races. What was most impressive about Yoong was how quickly he was up to a good speed. (again I'm not saying he was going to be a star)

Lots of drivers are better than some of the drivers in F1. F1 doesn't only get the top 20 of 50. They get *maybe* 10 of the 15 best and an even distribution from 15-50. Granted I think the quality of F1 drivers has gone up in recent years. Watching F1 decade ('93 season) there were a LOT of mediocre drivers. Heck Christian Fitipaldi was pretty good by '93 standards!

[Hazza]

Like Tom K (I cannot for the life of me spell his sir-name) in Sportscars, he is meant to be hot "stuff"

[mitchie]

I have to say, I dont really think Alex Yoong is that bad. He was pretty unlucky in F1 to be up against 2 of the sports next big things in Alonso and Webber, and if you compare what Alex did against Webber in 2002 to what the highly touted Pizzonia and Wilson (mainly Pizzonia) did against Webber.

And being in a Minardi, where more than likely you are going to qualify on the back row, didnt help either. I really think he has copped a bad wrap over his skills.

In Champ Cars he did alright as well, given that he was in the Coyne mobiles, which never really got away from the back row of the grid except when Alex was steering them. In Mexico, first race in a Champ Car, new track, he did ok to come home inside top 10, or just outside it i think.

[Aircon]

I think he's either going to Newman-Hass this season or back to DCR again.

[zerO]

Originally posted by Aircon
I think he's either going to Newman-Hass this season or back to DCR again.

No NHR, but possibly DCR - Dale Coyne has currently four drivers under consideration for his two (as promised) seats: Tomas Enge, Joel Camathias, Alex Yoong, and Alex Sperafico... although I have a feeling that only one Coyne car will materialize - most probably for Tomas Enge - and Yoong will be staying in Kuala Lampur ?!

zerO

[racer69]

Originally posted by BootsOntheSide
His future plans are unclear, but he did do the Bathurst 24 Hours, whcih lead to an amusing joke on here. The race ran from 3pm Saturday to 3pm Sunday, and one of his team-mates refuses to drive on Saturday due to his religous beliefs, so he did all his stints after midnight. One member commented of the driver in question that "because of this, he has started many rraces at the back of the grid", and someone else (sorry I can't remember who) replied "what are Alex Yoong's religious beliefs? He often starts at the back of the grid"

Unfortunatly for the team, the car only did about the first 5 minutes of the race, got packed away and returned for about the last 20 minutes.

[BootsOntheSide]

My mistake racer69.

As for Dale's team next year, I presume Salles and Boss are out of funding - Enge was suppsoedly to have replaced Geoff for Fontana. Not sure where Joel Camathias' resumed money might've come from.

Dale was quite reliant on the Entrant Support Program money last year, so one car seems more likely, as you say.