F2 Boss Shares His Disappointment With Ferrari-Backed Junior Not Being in F1

It looks like that Chinese driver Guanyu Zhou might be the only driver to get a call up to F1 next season. But he is not the F2 championship leader at the moment; it is Oscar Piastri with teammate Robert Schwartzman in P3. Prema Racing Head Rene Rozin believes both drivers, who are part of Alpine and Ferrari Driver Academy, respectively, deserve a chance in Formula One.

The two have been the standout drivers in the 2021 season, but it looks like they will both miss out on the seat. The only remaining seat in F1 is available at Alfa Romeo Racing. Despite being part of the FDA and the Italian team supplying the engines to the Swiss team, Robert is not in the race for the seat.

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Rene Rozin gives his take on Ferrari-backed junior Robert Schwartzman

As reported by Championat.com, Rozin has blamed the unusual calendar of the F2 championship in 2021 for Robert missing out on the seat. He stated that because of the calendar, drivers could not build momentum and use their experience week after week.

“I want to emphasize that on a calendar like this year, both Robert and Oscar are doing an amazing job. With such long pauses, they cannot really use the experience of previous races and have only one practice at their disposal to get back into shape,” said Rozin.

“In such conditions, their performances should be noted. Both drivers deserve to be in Formula 1. Such a calendar is hampering riders who struggle for titles and top spots until so late in the season that they could hurt their plans for next year.

It is more difficult for pilots to negotiate, and for us as a team. It is good that next year we will return to a more standard format, in which there will be more stages, and the season will end a little earlier than now.” said Rozin.

The gap between the races in the 2021 F2 championship has made it difficult to monitor the progress of the drivers. Despite that, both Piastri and Schwartzman have been consistently fast.

This is truly a shame that a talent like Robert Schwartzman cannot find a seat in F1. But we would hopefully see the driver on the paddock with Ferrari learning more with the team.

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