Force India sign Calado

[team underdog]

Autosport reporting FI have appointed James as official test and reserve driver - will get a Friday practice starting at Monza.

Great news for James and bravo to Force India for supporting talent rather than chasing monied drivers like most other teams.

[Life Saab Itch]

Bye bye Paul.

[DanielSan]

Bye Bye Adrian surely?

[Crafty_]

I doubt if he'd get a race seat until 2015. Nevertheless its good news for british drivers.

[rubystone]

Hats off to Vijay for once again not going the pay driver route. That guy deserves more support.

[Allyc85]

Really happy to see James has been given this chance, even though his Gp2 season with ART has been very up and down to say the least. Its going to be a hard Friday doing Gp2 and F1 duties!

Edited by Allyc85 on Monday 2nd September 20:49

[Redlake27]

I'm impressed by Force India. Since coming into F1 they've given seat time to Bianchi,Sutil, Hulkenberg,Di Resta...... All worthy of the chance.


I have a feeling that Calado might prove to be the most talented of a pretty strong bunch. Personally,. I think he's the best brit since Lewis.

[designndrive62]

good news but i was rather hoping they would go for Sam bird personally. If any guy deserves a shot its him. I can still remember watching him lose the fbmw champ im the last race at brands hatch for a crash that wasn't his fault. Summed up his luck until now really! He has outperformed all expectation this year in gp2 with a brand new team. Considering his links with Mercedes f1 as a test driver I'd've thought someone would give hima chance!

[Crafty_]

Sam Bird is affiliated with Merc is he not ?

[Flying Toilet]

Crafty_ said:

Sam Bird is affiliated with Merc is he not ?

Yep, he was scheduled to do the YDT with Merc but....

[designndrive62]

My thoughts that were as DiResta was also (not sure if he still is) a contracted Mercedes driver, that Bird may get a look in at Force India too.

[Henry Fiddleton]

Williams have Merc engines next year...

[chevronb37]

Calado's had a strange kind of a season, hasn't he? He looked so strong last year. He was fantastic in battle - reminded me of Hamilton in that respect, really prepared to roll up his sleeves but very fair and with good spatial awareness. I thought his tyre management wasn't great but those skills will improve with F1 seat time.

Sam Bird has been routinely excellent this year. I wondered where he could go after WSR last year but he's looked superb since the off in GP2 at his second try. In fact, I think we have much to be proud of in GP2 at the moment - Jolyon Palmer's looked very handy ever since his 2010 F2 campaign, Jon Lancaster must be the lowest profile GP2 race winner in history and Adrian Quaife-Hobbs seems to be doing the business.

I expect only one of those lot will ever end up with an F1 race seat. Maybe Calado at FI with Bird ending up in DTM. Expect Palmer and Quaife-Hobbs to get decent seats in sports cars or IndyCar. There simply aren't enough race seats in F1 to accommodate everyone who's handy.