You ever heard of Luca Badoer?
He was Ferrari's test driver during one of the most dominant periods.
Being a test driver doesn't always translate to being fast on track.
It means you can see what the car is doing and give input into how and why.
The engineers can then use that information to make the car better or at the very leasr, fix problems.
Badoer was extremely slow on track once deployed in the absence of the regular driver.
So too may Gutierrez.
His past showings against teammates in the same equipment, was nothing to write home about.
Heard about one of the unluckiest drivers in modern times? Yes.
Badoer, the guy who won the F3000 title quite convincingly in his debut year?
The same guy who then joined BMS Scuderia Italia in F1 for 1993, outpaced and outraced Michele Alboreto (who, while over the top, was still a handy driver). The BMS Scuderia Italia team that was a bit up and down, but usually could fight for points, but became a backmarker team in 93 with a move from Dallara to Lola.
Alboreto was then chosen to drive for Minardi in 94 while Badoer became the test-driver (based on the 93 results, it should've been the opposite). A year where Minardi managed a couple of top 10 qual results, and had a fairly good car.
Badoer being the guy that finally would get a race drive for Minardi in 1995, the year they had gotten their hands on some pretty potent Mugen-Honda V10 engines, and had a car designed for that.
The engines they lost to Ligier, when Ligier lost their Renault engines to Benetton when Briatore/Walkinshaw started buying in to multiple teams to take different deals and swap them around.
That caused a Minardi team, that always had a low budget to start re-designing their car in 1995, get a new engine deal, and try to make it all fit. Or as they said, they were proud of designing two cars in the time they usually made one.
The 1995 Minardi ending up with a customer Ford engine, that, even with special engine mapping made by Magnet Marelli (which is why the Minardi-Ford engine is called ED
M and not EDA/B/C/D/E), it lacked around 100 HP compared to the Mugen-Honda. Still, Badoer managed to qualify the car in the upper half that season, even getting ahead of Barrichello and a McLaren. Though, there wouldn't be any points for him, he would still in general be on the pace, or quicker than his teammates.
For 96 Minardi had to continue with the 95 car, as the money they should've used to upgrade the 95 car through the year, or design a new one, had gone to make the Ford-engine car. They had to resort to pay drivers, and Badoer left for Forti.
The less said about that the better, but he did actually manage to outqualify a non-Forti once.
Then the first Ferrari-test driver stint came.
Then Minardi in 1999, on loan from Ferrari, still having testing duties for Ferrari, and being the official reserve driver.
In Australia he was as high as 5th, but the gearbox seized and he retired from possible points.
Then Schumacher had his accident, and Ferrari suddenly decided to take on Salo, and not Badoer. For reasons still not fully known.
At the end of the season there was
that race. The European GP 1999.
Minardi stuffed up a pit-stop for Badoer, spent extremely long time, messing around with tyres (somewhat the same as Ferrari did with Irvine), and still, he was 4th in the race. When yet again the gearbox seized. It would've been the a perfect result. Equaling Minardi's best ever, while beating the Ferraris.
The worst thing is, it's quite likely the long time stationary in the pit caused the gearbox to overheat and lead to damaging it. Without the time-loss in the pits, Badoer would'be been 2nd on track, on merit in that race. Just imagine what legacy he would've had without that pit-stop issue.
He then went back to Ferrari, pumping in thousands and thousands of laps every year. Declining rumoured race seats at teams like Jaguar, Arrows, Prost, Minardi(again).
Then 2009. In a Ferrari he had never tested. Due to the test ban, he had never sat in the 2009 Ferrari. The same Ferrari that Kimi Räikkönen and Felipe Massa, with full pre-season testing, they barely got in to Q3, even going out in Q1 and 2 in the first races, getting their first points in the 4th race. Then going out in Q1 the next event. The car was extremely hard to drive with KERS and the braking system due to that.
Then, Badoer would get his chance. Finally a chance to drive for Ferrari. He had never tested the car, and never driven a new-regulation car either. Of course he was race-rusty, and would struggle.
His legacy was sealed.
The fact that Fisichella, who had finished second in a Force India at Spa, and got put in a Ferrari after Badoer, failed to score a single point for Ferrari in his five races, actually getting worse as the races went on, from managing Q2 in his first race, to qualify last for his two last races for Ferrari seems to be forgotten, as does the major struggles Massa and Räikkönen had to get used to the car. Instead, it is just used to show how awful Badoer supposedly were.
Yes. I know about Badoer.
That was not my point though. It was 50% being amazed that teams are not using their actual reserve drivers, and 50% poking fun at Racing Point using last years Mercedes, that Gutierrez did lot of work with, and should know the car *nudge nudge, wink wink*.