Sebastien Bourdais seems to be getting a bit of press these days, and most of it is bad. Up until now he seemed to be his own worst critic. But today he struck back, perhaps providing some explanation to why he has not been performing as well as his teammate.

“I am convinced I am not any slower than Sebastian(Vettel) in a car where I am comfortable.”

The statement reminds me of a comment Graham Rahal made last year:

“Sebastien likes his car setup different than I do. I can’t drive a car like Sebastien does; he likes a lot of understeer in his car and I just can’t cope with that.”

Some are going to label Sebastien as a baby, no doubt. Let us examine some of the arguments that he has going against him.

2. Vettel has been out performing him.

Take a look at the results:

Race  Bourdais  Vettel

Australia  7th RET

Malaysia  RET  RET

Bahrain  15th RET

Spain  RET  RET

Turkey  RET  17th

Monaco  RET  5th

Canada  13th  8th

France  17th  12th

GB  11th  RET

Germany  12th  8th

Hungary  18th  RET

Europe  10th  6th

Belgium  7th 5th

Of the 13 races, 4 go to Bourdais , 7 go to Vettel and 2 no finishes. 3 top 10′s for Bourdais and 5 top 10′s for Vettel. Vettle has 6 DNF, Bourdais has 4.

No one can possibly say that Bourdais hasn’t been competitive.. especially before the STR3. But here is the thing… Did anyone else notice that Vettel has failed to finish almost half of his annuities?. I guess it only matters when a driver crashes during testing sessions.

Here is another interesting fact. Here is a list of all drivers this year and last, and the DNF count by the 10th race (2008 and 2007).

Bourdais: 4
Vettel: 5
Speed: 7
Vitantonio Liuzzi: 6