Sebastien Bourdais dreamed of being a Formula One driver for most of his life.
Having finally achieved his goal last year, he is hoping his second F1 season, beginning in the Australian Grand Prix on Sunday, is better than his rookie campaign.
Growing up in Le Mans, France — the home of the world’s most famous 24-hour sports car endurance event — Bourdais knew early on he wanted to race.
But it was the sleek, powerful F1 cars, not sports cars, that roared through his mind when he closed his eyes at night.
“I got the opportunity to drive these (sports) cars as early as 2000,” Bourdais said last week in Sebring, Fla., where he was part of a Peugeot team that finished second in the annual 12-hour American Le Mans Series season-opener. “Back then it was the biggest car I’d ever driven and it was cool.
“I come from Le Mans and I always liked the atmosphere in endurance, the intensity that builds in the week leading to the race and the history of places like Le Mans, Daytona and Sebring. I’ve always loved it and I still do.
“But F1 is the top. It’s what many drivers strive for.”
It looked like he had reached the top after he signed with the Arrows F1 team after a successful test in 2002. But the team had financial problems and the deal dissolved. He then tested with Renault, but fellow Frenchman Franck Montagny — one of his teammates at Sebring — got the ride.
So Bourdais took a different route, heading to the United States, where he won an unprecedented four straight championships in the now-defunct Champ Car World Series.
That finally earned him his shot at F1 with the second-tier Torro Rosso team.
After so much success in Champ Car, everyone wanted to know how he would handle driving a car that had virtually no chance to compete with the top teams, let alone win races.
“In F1, you test yourself and your car,” he said before his final Champ Car race. “I’ll be fine doing that. It’s what I’ve always wanted. I’ll be fine.”
But getting what you wish for doesn’t always live up to your dreams.
Things started off well, with Bourdais getting an eighth-place finish at Melbourne last year. He was later moved up to seventh when Rubens Barrichello was disqualified, giving Bourdais his first two world championship points.
Unfortunately, he managed only two more points the whole year — finishing seventh in Belgium — and wound up 17th in the season standings.
Worse, he was totally outshone by teammate and rising star Sebastian Vettel, who won the Italian Grand Prix, finished eighth in the points and has moved to the sister Red Bull team for 2009.
Bourdais, now 30, will team with yet another Sebastien — Swiss rookie Sebastien Buemi — this season.
“I hope I’ll have more fun racing this year than I had last year,” Bourdais said. “It was a hell of a tough season for me. Not because I got my butt kicked by my teammate, (but) because I was looking good and fairly happy with the car initially.
“Then, when the new car arrived, I just wasn’t happy in that car. I couldn’t get the balance right for my driving style and (Vettel) was super happy with the car and it showed. It was a quick car, but I just couldn’t find what I was looking for.”
Bourdais said his frustration and disappointment just kept building.
“It’s very hard when you’re giving your very best and you see that you’ll never really be able to match the pace of your teammate — not because you’re weak or not as good, but just because you can’t produce what you’re looking for. It’s really, really frustrating. I just hope I’ll be able to have some fun and enjoy driving again because it didn’t happen so many times last year.”
Until February, Bourdais wasn’t sure he was even going to get the chance to improve on his rookie performance.
Torro Rosso kept him hanging through the winter and Bourdais even talked with a couple of IndyCar teams about coming back to America.
“It was more than considered when I didn’t know what was going to be my future in the winter,” he said. “It seemed like, initially, there were a few people interested, and then the (economic) crisis developed and it got harder and harder and harder and the options kind of ran out. The first one that really came out with something was Torro Rosso in the end, even as late as it was.”
But there are still more questions than answers for Bourdais and his team heading into the new season.
“With the new regulations, it’s totally different,” he noted. “That’s the reason why we had four-day testing in Barcelona, which turned out to be for me a one-day test and for my teammate a day and a half. So, obviously, we’ll be driving a new car and trying to understand it.
“I can’t really say we even have a starting setup for Melbourne. We’re just kind of going to discover everything at the beginning, so it’s going to be a steep learning curve and tough beginning of the season. Maybe by the time we reach Spain (the fourth race of the season), we’ll have things figured out and more development on the car and we can race against other people. But it’s going to be difficult for sure.”
Still, Bourdais is living his dream and trying to remain optimistic.
“It’s been the hardest and longest winter of my career,” he said. “But now we’re looking forward and, hopefully, we’ll have some fun.”
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