Kamui Kobayashi has made his first public appearance in a Formula 1 Ferrari, during the fifth annual Moscow City Racing event in the Russian capital. It didn’t go quite according to plan. In wet conditions, Kobayashi lost control and crashed, tearing off the front-right corner of the Ferrari F60 he was demonstrating.
Ferrari, surprisingly, did not seem too concerned. They had another car available, and Kobayashi was back in the cockpit just 20 minutes after his crash. It seems that Ferrari is an organisation that understands that motor racing is inherently dangerous and crashes sometimes happen. They had confidence in their driver and showed it by putting him back in an F1 car as quickly as possible.
Kobayashi shrugged off the crash afterwards, saying “The track was very slippery and there was a marked bump at that point, which is why I hit the barrier. A shame, but I am pleased the team let me out again after a few minutes.”
Formerly a Sauber F1 race driver, Kobayashi has been without a drive in Formula One since the end of 2012, when he lost his seat at the Swiss team. Ferrari signed him up for 2013 to compete in the GTE class of the World Endurance Championship. He is currently joint third in the points table after three races.
Kobayashi is still aiming to secure a Formula One drive in the future, aiming to be back on the F1 grid as soon as 2014. But he understands that money could be an obstacle to the resumption of his F1 career. Kobayashi said, “At the moment, there are many teams who prefer to choose their drivers based on how much money they can bring, rather than on their ability on track: I hope this trend will change, because my aim is to be back there as soon as possible and I am working hard to succeed.”
Watch Kobayashi’s crash in Moscow here:
Chris on F1 
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