Colton Herta reckons he could be competitive in F1, following the IndyCar drivers' McLaren test at Portimao ⬇️
Herta, who has racked up seven wins and eight pole positions since joining the IndyCar Series full-time in 2019, tested last year’s McLaren MCL35M under the TPC [testing previous car] rules, running 162 laps of the 2.891-mile Autodromo Internacional do Algarve across two days.
“I was happy with the lap time but we’re on a little bit of a different tyre than we’d have had on a race weekend. And if you look back to the quotes from a lot of guys from a year ago, they would talk about how windy it gets here and how much that can change the car here from corner to corner. “Whether they agree, I guess time will tell, and hopefully I can get more chances in the car and hopefully I can show it.”
“But it would be cool to have a taste of the 2022 cars and see how they compare with this car. So yeah, I’d be up for it.”“I think the first thing was, when I got off the pitlane speed-limiter, all the torque is pretty incredible,” he said. “Even when you’re at such low rpm, it still pulls. That was the biggest thing for me – the straightline speed, the acceleration, and the braking.
Herta said a switch to F1 “is a goal of mine, it has been for a while” and that the timing needs to be in two or three years, rather than 10. Asked if Herta was a serious contender for a McLaren F1 seat in 2024, McLaren principal Andreas Seidl responded: “The objective for this test today was, as Colton mentioned, to give Colton the chance to experience an F1 car for the first time and explore its performance.
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