Less than two weeks away from the season opener in Las Vegas, Paul
Stoddart's Minardi Team USA officially named its drivers today. It was
always likely that Robert Doornbos, who has tested all winter for the team
and raced for Minardi in Formula One in 2005, would be confirmed and it was
just a matter of when. Not as likely was the second seat, where Briton Dan
Clarke has been announced for his second season in the team.
Clarke was not among the ones originally in contention for the ride as it
was assumed Nelson Philippe would have returned and Doornbos would have
been in the second car. Philippe no longer wants to fund his own drive,
particularly based on his breakout 2006 season, and is in search of other
opportunities for this season and down the road.
Despite no testing in the new Panoz DP01 chassis, Clarke is upbeat about
returning to the series after a long wait. "I've been waiting and hoping
for this news for a few weeks now, and I'm relieved it has finally been
confirmed," said Clarke, whose rookie season featured a pole at the
challenging Road America circuit and his first podium at the now-defunct
race in Denver.
"Although I haven't been in the new car yet, I've kept in close contact
with the team and attended the tests, while also concentrating on
maintaining peak fitness, so I'm as prepared as I can be at this stage
without having driven the DP01," he continued. "I would like to thank Paul
(Stoddart) and Keith (Wiggins), for putting their faith in me, and I look
forward to building on my debut season and bringing the team strong
results."
Doornbos will split his 2007 as Champ Car race driver and test driver for
Red Bull Racing, where he drove three Grands Prix last season, in F1. "I'm
really pleased to be racing with Paul Stoddart, Keith Wiggins and Minardi
Team USA," Doornbos commented. "It's obviously a different Minardi team
from the one I last drove for, but there is still the same, close-knit,
family feeling about it that I like.
Doornbos has tested extensively for the team, at all three official pre-
season tests in Sebring, Houston and Laguna Seca, as well as sampling one
of Forsythe Racing's old Lola chassis late last season.
The team also has Zsolt Baumgartner, another ex-Minardi F1 driver and
something of a cult hero on the Internet, as an official test and reserve
driver. That signing was confirmed at Monterey, but Baumgartner struggled
to get up to speed in testing and had a heavy crash in one of the team's
cars. His role will likely consist of driving the two-seater cars that
have been tried, tested and accepted in F1 but yet to be raced in Champ
Car.
