Three new teams since he has been with Ford and none of them teams in a position to challenge for the championship.
I won't blame Lowndes if he goes back to Holden after his contract is up, he is wasting his awesome talent at Ford.
As one of the highest paid Ford drivers, Lowndes should be in a team where he can use his talents to there full protential.
Awesome drive by Lowndes today in the Clipsal 500, if his car had made it to the end he would have been in a good track position for tomorrows race.
Yes I know FPR are a new team and they need time to develop, but if 888 racing can make their cars go that fast ( Max quickest lap today ) in less than a year, with more than likely less finance than FPR, what is FPR problem?
I suppose it's like how Dave Richard's explained it," put Ferrari in V8 supercar's and they wouldn't do so well straight up, it takes time" but their time is getting bloody long and anoying.
Maybe after all those years driving a Holden he is used to going slow!
I certainly agree with what you are saying. It's very frustrating to see a driver as good as him go to waste.
If he goes back to driving a Holden, I couldn't see him wanting to drive for HRT again though and when it comes down to it, Kmart racing is the only one out in front of the Holden teams.
Max Wilson might have been fast but where did he finish?
Lowndes wouldn't go back to HRT while Skaife is there. The way Skaife worked it so the team was more focused on him resulted in Lowndes' falling out with them. He should consider moving to another Ford team. Even DJR and 888 racing would be a better move than staying with FPR. If he could move into SBR alongside Ambrose, that would be even better, or SBR expand into 4 cars and keep Ingall and recruit another driver.
Well today's race will see just how FPR and Lowndes can go,I feel Lowndes will come through very strong from the rear of the grid, hopefully his talent will shine today,aswell as FPR's.
He's obviously one of the best drivers (if not The Best) out there and he's been given an inferior car for 4 years!
I can understand Ford's reasoning to try and build a team around their star driver and make a marketable product out of it - but it didn't work for Gibson Motorsport, 00 or FRP, - so it's about time they tried a different tack - put their best driver in the best car available - pour more money into SBR and field another car or do a deal with another team to put a better engine in the FPR cars (look at what happened to the Orrcon cars) - there's a lot Ford could have done to not waste the asset they had in Lowndes - I think if they keep treating him like a second class driver, and giving him second class equipment, he'll move back to Holden, or lose the fire he once had. I'd much rather see a 'Lowndes to SBR in 2005' headline than a "I'm glad to be back at Holden, Ford treated me like poo" headline.
If Lowndes is that good he can show us !! that car might be a little off the pace but if hes so good let him show it, there is only one driver thats good at the moment and thats Ambrose, I think Ford should get together all the teams that they are putting money into, and have a good look at what Ambrose/SBR is doing and copy it,Ford are putting a lot of money into SBR so they should exchange data between teams for the good of all the Ford teams,"eg" HRT/Kmart & the others,thats what Holden do, But while the Ford teams are trying to beat each other they will never beat Holden, Getting back to Lowndes/FPR do a deal to get SBR engines and forget the Prodrive things, there got no idea how these 5L V8s work, We have the best 5LV8 builders in the world right here.John Sidney, Rob Benson and the like are the best at there game, So why the pomes think they can do better is beond me,as they said FPR will be building there own motors here soon, the pomes were a great flop at it wern't they.......
Bout halfway through the year they are supposed to start building their own engines in Aus. If ya look at the reasons lowndes aint winnin is a lack of grunt an alot of DNF's for engine related probs. I reckon this is their last year to get it sorted. after that they can be classed as flops.
damn right JC ... its Broser and FORD ..Lowndes & gonna ... gonna get better , gonna take time , gonna go away , i wish. It didn't take ol Rusty Ingaa's any time to fit in at FORD, even if it is SBR. FPV can't back sh*t they've proven that the last 2 years, i say hand-over FPV to SBR .. SBV .. then we may have something .. Seton , good driver, an ambassador in V8's, but when you need a wheelchair to walk it's time to give up the seat to young blood, Ship Lowndes to whereever, Id like to see Mark Winterbottom and Owen Kelly at the FPV wheels.
Now here's a well thought comment, you have to be joking right,we cant allway's rely on one team,and you are right FPR will come good but so will Seto, soon as the team does,there's nothing wrong with Seto, he can drive, it's the team that his posistion's are reflecting from, just like Lowndes.
And if the performance of Ambrose drops off, or the other holden teams pick up the pace will you still follow Ambrose, or will you start following the next best Ford Driver / team otherwise know as a bandwagoner.
Do you support a diffrent football team according to who is winning the most?
Did you follow Ambrose in his first year at SBR when he was strugling in the AU?
The fact is people do follow drivers and not just jump from one winning team to another.
And I think you will find there is alot of people that care about Lowndes and Ford.
considering that FPR have NOT had a single test session this year, i think they're doing the best they can. their new HQ and workshop is complete, and midseason they'll be assembling the engines there instead of shipping them in from europe.
combine that with some serious testing time and i think they'll soon be competitive.
It will take time , as David Richards said they are on a 3 year plan ( to get competitive), this being there 2nd year, they just got in to there new workshop, so things should only get better...
Ford has totally mis-managed Lowndsey's swap from Holden. The current FPR setup taking over GSR should have happened right from day 1. Where are we now? The beginning of year 4 out of a 5 year contract between Lowndesy and Ford and we still have his team building up?? The Gibson/00 setup, which was a house of cards, was hastily thrown together and don't get me started on the FTR/GSR debacle.
The issue here is not just FPR, they went ok last year Lowndes 5th in the championship and 2nd at bathurst.
The issue is how Ford have handled the Lowndes situation right from the start, 3 new teams in 4 years and to make a team compeditive takes time.
Hence Lowndes has spent 3 years of his 5 year ford contract, in cars that were not in the position to challenge for the championship.
And he looks like he might be in his 4th.
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