IndyCar 2014 Review: P10 – Sebastien Bourdais

Robin Miller says…

A return to victory lane and a renewed vigor were the storylines for the talented Frenchman in 2014. And, if you could have removed ovals from the equation, Bourdais might have been fighting for the championship.

In his first season with KVSH Racing, the four-time Champ Car king returned to form with a dominating drive and a W at Toronto (RIGHT), a pole position and a second at Mid-Ohio and fourth places at the Indy GP and Houston opener. After a rocky start

(13-14-15 in the first three races), his average finish on streets and road courses was 7.5 (champ Will Power’s was 6.0 for 12 races) as he and engineer Olivier Boisson clicked.

Starting from pole in Toronto’s first heat, the 35-year-old veteran took the race by the throat like he use to do and led 58 of 65 laps in scoring the 32nd win of his career. Had Scott Dixon not made amazing mileage at Mid-Ohio, Seabass could have been a two-time winner since he was out in front for 38 laps but settled for second place.

His average starting spot on road and street courses was 6.3 – only Helio Castroneves was better at 5.7. Bourdais’ best oval performance came at Indianapolis, coming from 17th to seventh, but was never better than 12th in the other five.

KVSH isn’t funded like The Big 3 but as long as Bourdais is in the seat, they’ve always got a shot at the top step on a road course or street circuit.

David Malsher says…

However much I respect Sebastien Bourdais’ immense talent, and however much I think KV Racing has always contained more potential than it’s shown down the years, I doubted this combination would work. Since he returned to Indy car racing on a

part-time basis in 2011, SuperSeb has been a driver who was brilliant a lot of the time, well able to carry mediocre cars into promising positions, but a guy who made too many unforced errors.

This is a phase many star drivers go through when they join midfield teams in the second half of their careers – snatching at a half-chance because they believe it may be their last/only one. When the No. 11 KVSH Racing car crashed twice within 15 laps during this year’s Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, my doubts grew. Four months later, running into the back of Ryan Briscoe at Sonoma suggests Bourdais has still not expunged those errors, either.

But in between times, he was magnificent in Toronto’s race 1, and superquick at Mid-Ohio. He didn’t just win in Canada, he dominated, leading 58 of the 65 laps without a hint of a mistake. At Mid-Ohio he fought clean and fair with Josef Newgarden, and although he was unable to beat Scott Dixon who was just having one of his amazing days, Bourdais and KVSH were well worthy of second place, having outpaced the Penske and Andretti drivers. Elsewhere, Seb’s struggles were pretty much what you’d expect from an ace whose team doesn’t have the

budget of the Big Three, and hasn’t given him a teammate whose feedback he trusts.

Like countless others, Bourdais and race engineer Olivier Boisson seemed to take a while to realize that although the tires – and closeness of the grid, front to back – had forced road and street course setups to shift quite fundamentally since 2013, oval setups were pretty much as before. (Of course, if you started off with a lousy one, you still had plenty of work to do…) But it’s literally just experience that Bourdais needs on ovals to decide how to configure his car: when he hits it right, he’s got the bravery and panache to shine. Think how well he raced at Fontana last year, and remember he qualified sixth at Iowa this year, ahead of Will Power, Marco Andretti and winner Ryan Hunter-Reay.

So my conclusion is that there are a few more wins in Bourdais yet. Give him a teammate of similar caliber, and team owners in Kevin Kalkhoven, Jimmy Vasser and James “Sulli” Sullivan who’ve realized they can’t afford to deconstruct and rebuild the team each winter, and you could see him finish in the top five in the 2015 championship.

Marshall Pruett says…

The four-time Champ Car champion can find faults in puppies and ice cream, but when it comes to the performances he and engineer Olivier Boisson cooked up this year at KVSH Racing, there’s not a lot to criticize. IndyCar’s grand pessimist was a genuine pleasure throughout the 2014 season, and despite his negative tendencies, there were mostly positives to note during his first season with KVSH.

You know the stats by now: A win, a couple of poles, a handful of top-5s, but if you look beyond the stats that propelled my man to 10th in the standings, some bigger happenings took place last season.

The modestly-funded operation closed 2013 with an amazing win at the Indy 500, but also parted ways with both drivers as Tony Kanaan left for Ganassi Racing and Simona de Silvestro embarked upon a training program to try and reach Formula 1. There were divisive elements within both entries that made the two-pronged split a positive for the KV team, and with the drama all but gone, the team looked to Bourdais to usher in a new era of calm and stability.

Beyond anything Seb accomplished with KVSH on the racetrack during 2014, I’d say the foundation he helped to establish under the awning was his greatest contribution. With Steve Moore matching Bourdais’ effort on the team management side, those involved with the No. 11 Chevy program appeared to be at peace all year and rarely lacked motivation. Given the dismal season Sebastian Saavedra had in the sister KV AFS Racing entry, Bourdais’ No. 11 effort was effectively a one-car operation, making his run to 10th in the standings even more remarkable.

He wasn’t perfect in 2014; there were a few occasions where uncharacteristic driving errors diminished his results, but overall, and to my amazement, a glass-half-empty driver and a team coming off of a glass-half-empty season combined to create an environment where everyone was brimming with optimism. Who’da thunk it?

With a season of experience to draw from and ongoing development input from Bourdais heading into 2015, KVSH could be even stronger next year. All they need is a proper teammate to place alongside Seb to make it happen.