gp2 2006 predictions

[bella]

art will walk the championship again.

discuss.

Car #  Driver              Country Team
 1.  Alexandre Premat        FRA   ART Grand Prix
 2.  Lewis Hamilton          GBR   ART Grand Prix
 3.  Michael Ammermueller    GER   Arden International
 4.  Nicolas Lapierre        FRA   Arden International
 5.  Jose Maria Lopez        ARG   Super Nova International
 6.  Fairuz Fauzy            MAL   Super Nova International
 7.  Ernesto Viso            VEN   iSport International
 8.  Tristan Gommendy        FRA   iSport International
 9.  Adam Carroll            GBR   Racing Engineering
10.  Javier Villa            ESP   Racing Engineering
11.  Nelson Piquet Jr        BRA   Piquet Sports
12.  Alexandre Negrao        BRA   Piquet Sports
14.  Ferdinando Monfardini   ITA   DAMS
15.  Franck Perera           FRA   DAMS
16.  Luca Filippi            ITA   Petrol Ofisi FMS International
17.  Jason Tahinci           TUR   Petrol Ofisi FMS International
18.  Hiroki Yoshimoto        JPN   BCN Competicion
19.  Timo Glock              GER   BCN Competicion
20.  Olivier Pla             FRA   DPR
21.  Clivio Piccione         MC    DPR
22.  Lucas di Grassi         BRA   Durango
23.  Sergio Hernandez        ESP   Durango
24.  Adrian Valles           ESP   Campos Racing
25.  Felix Porteiro          ESP   Campos Racing
26.  Gianmaria Bruni         ITA   Trident Racing
27.  Andreas Zuber           AUT   Trident Racing

[Mekola]

About general predictions, favourites are ART with Hamilton and Prémat, but are too Racing Engineering with Gary Anderson and Carroll, SuperNova with López, Arden with Lapierre, Viso with iSport.
Championship predictions will be matter of the first round of the 2006 GP2 Two Worlds Predictions Competition, expected to be launched next month.

[Allan Craighead]

Like many, until proven otherwise ART look the team to beat and with Hamilton and Premat behind the wheel. Looking at the entry list I also like Carroll, if gels with Anderson quickly, Glock, a proven driver, Gommendy, iSport should could be quick last year, di Grassi, if Durango give him the goods, and Piquet, though despite being a brat is very talented. Will see how it all shakes out.

Cheers,

Al.

[Sephirot1]

I choose López as my main contender for the championship.

[chunterer]

I'm not so sure ART will have things all their own way - it won't look good for the organisers!!

I'm gonna plump for one of the following:

Lopez, Lapierre, Carroll or Hamilton

with outsiders (but probable race winners): Piquet, Premat, Pla, Gommendy, Valles, Glock, Piccione, Viso & Bruni.

[kipper]

I wouldn't expect that ART would have the dominance that they had last year, howver, they are still my favourite for the championships. I would put Premat ahead of Hamilton due to his experience. However, I would expect Lappiere, Carroll and Glock to be in with a chance of regular race wins.

[flexible-flyer]

i would want to wait until i pre season testing ends just so i can see what team is where, but if im going on a ratio between last years teams and drivers performances aswell as adding in rookies i rate, i would say a top 10 something like this-

1- hamilton
2- carroll
3- premat
4- lopez
5- piquet
6- bruni
7- lapierre
8- viso
9- glock
10- di grassi

ART were so good last year that i think all the other teams will have to do so much to catch them that it will be very hard. hamilton has forgotten what its liek to lose! premat though i dont rate half as highly as his results. i mean he has had far and away the best car in f3, gp2 and even in a1 but put him in something else and im sure alot of drivers would beat him. he enjoys a crash or 2 aswell.

i beleive lopez set a very quick time in a super nova in testing a while back, but wasnt it an illegal car or something? still gotta be quick though.

racing engineering have carroll and anderson. that is enough to make a northern irish petrolhead's mouth water. both have undoubted talent and jani showed last years car could win races so if jani can do it, carroll can do it ten times over, no question!

piquet must be up there somewhere.

glock is proven, but is he in the right car?

same goes for bruni, but he is confident.....

lapierre now the arden number 1. having heikki gone now he can breathe easily...

viso aswell. i was suprised he didnt do that well last year because he was stellar in the last test before imola. maybe isport is a better outfit?

di grassi is another top driver but like glock, is he in the right team?

[Suze]

i think art will still spank the others, in places.but racing engineering and arden won't do too badly - out of the two i'd favour arden (over RE). piquet needs to pull his finger out

[SALEEN S7R]

Personally I think it will be between Hamilton, Carroll, Premat and Lappiere for the title, with Lopez, Piquet, Bruni and Pla as outsiders. All should certainly win at least 1 race this season. IMO.

[Russfeld]

Bruni struggled with Coloni, i dont really see Trident doing it in their first year.

Team wise...

ART
Rac-Eng
SuperNova or Piquet or Arden
The second best team from that group
the third best
Someone like Glock
The rest of the pack

Teamwise I predict Campos to finish ahead of Trident, maybe even Durango, definitely Coloni. Maybe they could even pip DAMS.

Interesting to see which teams have both slots with a second year driver.

[Daisy]

I'll go for Hamilton. ART had the best package last year and I see them having it this year. And besides that, he's a very talented, quick driver and I rate him higher than Premat. Premat is of course a title-contender too. I expect having Carroll, Lopez, Glock and Piquet up there as well. Suprises of the championship: Perera, one of the Campos guys (if they can prepare a better car then last year) and Gommendy.

[Russfeld]

I think Campos have a mountain to climb, but they've got good technical people and good enough drivers. They wont shock us this year, but I think they'll do a lot better than people expected.

[Go_For_Pole]

Well Hamilton hasn't won a championship in his first year of F3, I don't see why he should do that in GP2, ART or not. Besides, there are many technical changes on the cars, it is not a given that ART will still have an advnatage.

My picks are the returning top drivers from 05, ie Premat, Carroll, Piquet Jr, Lopez and I would only add Glock in that list because I really admire his talent. The rest will shine only on occasion.

[Jackman]

I don't think Hamilton will do it either, despite being in the magic car, for the simple reason that it's his first year in the series and there's a lot of experienced talent out there. He'll do very well, certainly, but I think the other teams are going to close on ART, and that will make the difference.

Carroll at RE would be my pick, along with Piquet if his team pulls their collective fingers out and sort the car. Viso with iSport will be interesting to watch, but mostly for the crashes. Premat is experienced and fast, but far too nice, and I think Lapierre probably is too. Bruni will be held back by his rookie team, and Lopez will be found out once again and dropped by RDD at the end of the year.

Glock and Yoshi will be interesting to watch at BCN, but the team will probably let them down again, and Pla will be a dark horse at DPR but will be let down by pysching himself out of it. A couple of the other rookies will do well, but none will challenge for the season.

Coloni's going to struggle with two rookies, and it'll be interesting to see whether they can beat Trident considering the ill-will there. Monfardini will be laughing constantly just because he's not driving at either of them, or Durango. And Campos to struggle again, I suspect.

[Mekola]

Interesting to see some people very keen to see Spanish Latin-American drivers out of racing frame, perhaps they though that we shouldn't have racing drivers or, in case of Argentinians, be concentrated on the old-fashioned Turismo Carretera and no more. GP2 is being too euro-centric, woultn't be?

[Mekola]

- ART is the best tech-expertise team. At least in the papers. Hamilton is main title favourite; Premat could be in a #2 role despite his racing number.
- RE have a great advantage with Anderson as engineer and Carroll as a driver.
- SuperNova and López have a do-or-die year. Nonetheless Pechito and Sears have great faith on themselves: 2006 year looks for the Argentinian better than '05 DAMS and far better than '04 Coloni. No matter if they do success or fail; is López's last year in RDD anyways. He could do well and enter next year as Renault's 3rd driver... or into another F1 team.
- I don't see Arden on the fight for the title; Lapierre has more chances because he is now #1 of the team, but I don't see more than some race wins.
- Viso has a great chance, and is well backed by PDVSA and other Venezuelan companies. iSport could continue to show their abilities, mostly with Gommendy at 2nd car.
- Piquet Jr. is in a mess, now he has to pay if he wants to test an F1 car, and has to rebuild his image. Is his aim for this year and the experience of his father could help a lot on that.
- Campos will struggle sometimes but will score more points this year. Trident will struggle because they're a "new" team, but could have some results along the year. I see FMS Coloni as the bottom team this year.

[BSchneiderFan]

If BCN can put their mishaps behind them (remember how often they let Toccacelo down in 2004), I really think Glock will fly. This is a guy who scored a point on his F1 debut (in a Jordan!) and has raced in Champ Cars too; he's got a fantastic amount of experience in big, powerful cars. He's title material in my view.

Hamilton should be extremely quick and has the best backing in ART; but coming in as a rookie and beating very quick sophomore drivers may be too much to ask. But what's the hurry? Race wins this year, title challenge the next and his career is still very much on track.

Adam Carroll did remarkable things last year, and has the security of a season-long drive this year. If Gary Anderson makes an impact, Carroll could challenge for the championship, though, to be charitable, Racing Engineering will have to step up a gear to support him.

The French cohort: Premat, Lapierre, Pla and Gommendy could all be quick; but can any of them string it together, race after race, to be champion? I'm afraid I remain sceptical.

Bruni, like Glock, has F1 experience and a long pedigree in F3000, but he's with a new team, and hardly set GP2 on fire last year. Everything to prove.

Lopez is drinking in the last-chance saloon; I think there was a feeling that perhaps he ought to have shone more in 2005, but at Super Nova there are no excuses. Multiple race wins must be a sine qua non, or his F1 future is going to start looking a bit sickly.

Nelsinho. What to think? He disappointed last year, in truth, and I've long thought that he made rather heavy weather of winning the British F3 title too. He's quick, there's no doubt about that, sometimes blindingly so. But is he missing that final 10% that makes a great racing driver? Like Lopez, he has nowhere to hide this year, if he harbours ambitions to follow in Daddy's footsteps. (Off-topic: did anyone else enjoy the irony overload of Nelsinho saying that Scott Speed had only got into F1 because of his surname? Hello pot, can I introduce you to the kettle?)

Others? Piccione and Viso have shown flashes of speed. Ammermuller comes with Red Bull backing and the support of Arden. But I don't see any of them as champions.

Of course, come the end of the season, I fully expect each and every prediction above to have been proved wrong. Such is life.

[flexible-flyer]

i agree with BSF.

and yes i also thought that piquet remark about scott speed had contradiction written all over it. i feel it has some truth, but coming from a guy who got through f3 with major help of his own surname without which he wouldnt even have a TEAM, i think he may have been better off keeping his mouth shut.

anyway ive been under rating glock in my previous post in this thread. a few weeks ago i was defending him big time and now he is confirmed he has to be up there should he have the car. if he got the ART drive i probably would have gave him top spot in my prediction but with BCN....hmmmm. isnt that the team that threw away a 1-2 finish in turkey because someone forgot that the sun dries out rain? they have the driver but they will have to step up a gear in order to get the title.

[Jackman]

Originally Posted by Mekola

Interesting to see some people very keen to see Spanish Latin-American drivers out of racing frame, perhaps they though that we shouldn't have racing drivers or, in case of Argentinians, be concentrated on the old-fashioned Turismo Carretera and no more. GP2 is being too euro-centric, woultn't be?

I don't know if you were referring to me, given that I commented about Lopez just ahead of you, but I certainly don't have a nationalistic agenda - in fact I'm really disappointed that Alvarez ran out of budget, as I think he had the ability to win the title this year with a half decent team. But I stand by my comments about Lopez, who is okay but has done little to make me think he's worth the RDD seat since winning Formula Renault all those years ago.

[Jackman]

Originally Posted by BSchneiderFan

(Off-topic: did anyone else enjoy the irony overload of Nelsinho saying that Scott Speed had only got into F1 because of his surname? Hello pot, can I introduce you to the kettle?)

His actual comments were that Speed only got into Formula One because of Red Bull, because he's American, and because of his name. And I certainly can't say that he was wrong.

[chunterer]

Have to say i most of what's been said so far seems about right.

Piquet really needs to win a lot of races and the title to maintain his rep.

Lopez is quick and has pretty good racecraft, of that there's little doubt, but he is in the 3rd year of this level and needs to move on- not everyone can get away with decades in the second formula like Marco Apicella once did!!

We might also ask who will be the abject failure of the season as well?

[Go_For_Pole]

That's easy, Bruni

[DanFlag]

Drivers Championship: Alexandre Premat
Teams Championship: ART Grand Prix

[Sephirot1]

Yep, Bruni is going to have a really, really bad year.

[Russfeld]

Then Zuber is super screwed. But they'll both beat Tahinci.