The 2015 season has been a mixed one for the Toro Rosso team, they have 2 young new prospects and are on the verge of their best ever points haul with 9 races to go, but how have the team fared in the first half of the season?
It started out with a good pre-season testing for Toro Rosso as they managed to record over 1200 laps in total over all 3 tests. Carlos Sainz set the fastest time that put them 6th out of the 9 teams that tested and the time he set was nearly half of a second faster than their sister team Red Bull. The development of the car and parts which were used on the Red Bull car seemed to have helped them close the gap to some of the top runners, like their sister team. Their car had developed well over the winter, looked very reliable on that Renault Power Unit and looked a good prospect coming into the first few rounds of 2015.
The flyaway races came, first was Australia where Carlos Sainz qualified inside the top ten and scored his first Formula One career points and his team’s first points of the season. Malaysia was next and this time it was Max Verstappen who got the car into the top 10, he qualified in 6th place and then went on the become the youngest ever points scorer in the championship, finishing in 7th place, ahead of his team-mate who had battled to 8th place. Both cars failed to finish in the points in China and then both retired from the Bahrain Grand Prix, scoring 0 points in 2 races.
The European part of the season started and in Spain points were back on the board, after their best qualifying result of the season Sainz in 5th and Verstappen in 6th they then went on the finish in 9th and 11th respectively, meaning Sainz Jnr scored points finishing in 9th place in his home Grand Prix, he then went on to finish 10th in Monaco whilst Max crashed out. Both cars made it into Q3 in Monaco Sainz qualifying 8th and Verstappen qualifying 10th.
Canada saw both cars fail to make it into the top 10 during qualifying they qualified 11th and 12th with Carlos Sainz once again ahead of Max Verstappen. But then unfortunately they both finished outside of the points finishing 12th for Sainz and 15th for Verstappen. Austria saw Max Verstappen qualify 7th and finish in 8th, whilst his team-mate qualified in 13th and retired from the race. The British Grand Prix saw both cars retire from the race after qualifying 8th and 13th, with Carlos Sainz once again being the one making it into the top 10 and once again out-qualifying his team-mate.
In Hungary, Max Verstappen turned his qualifying performance around and out qualified and out raced his teammate. Max qualified 9th while Carlos went out in Q2 and qualified 12th. Carlos then did not finish the race, with only 9 laps to go he retired with a fuel pressure problem. Max Verstappen went on to finish in an amazing 4th place after a hectic race, his career best race finishing position.
So far in the 2015 season Toro Rosso lie in 7th place in the constructor’s championship, they are also 10 points off equalling their best ever points haul in 2011 with 41 points when Sebastian Buemi and Jaime Alguersuari were driving for the team.
Max Verstappen – 22 points / 11th in Drivers Championship
Max Verstappen certainly turned a few heads when he was announced as having a drive for the 2015 season, at just 17 years of age he has announced himself and show a lot of potential to go far in this championship. His best qualifying came in Spain where he qualified in 6th, and his best race was at Hungary where he crossed the line in 4th place. Max needs to work on his qualifying a little bit more after only being in the top 10 on 5 occasions in a car which could be there most race weekends.
Carlos Sainz Jr – 9 points / 16th in Drivers Championship
With 4 point scoring finishes, you would expect Carlos Sainz to have scored more points than he has on the board. Two 9th place finishes in Australia and Spain, one 10th place in Monaco and then his best race finish in 8th at the Malaysian Grand Prix are all he has to show for his races this year. His qualifying performance has been a lot better, he has qualified in the top 10 on 4 occasions and it is 5-5 in qualifying battles between the teammates.
