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Ericsson keen for Alfa Romeo test
Marcus Ericsson is eager to test for Alfa Romeo at some stage this season to keep himself in tune with this year’s Formula 1 cars, despite planning another campaign in IndyCar.
The Swede is competing in his rookie year for Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports and impressed on his Indianapolis 500 debut as he qualified in 13th before an error entering the pits ended his race. Alongside his IndyCar drive, Ericsson remains Alfa Romeo’s reserve driver and says a test would be beneficial in case he’s ever called upon to race in F1 this year.
“I’m hoping I can do a test during the season at some point just to keep me up to date with the cars and everything,” Ericsson told RACER. “That’s what I’ve been pushing for when I’ve been speaking to them, just to try and get in the car for a test day.
“There’s nothing confirmed yet but the plans is -- as far as I know -- when my season is finished here I will try and go to quite a few of the races left on the F1 calendar to be there with the team. That’s the good thing about IndyCar -- it finishes in September and then I can still go to a few of the races in F1 after that. So I think that’s the plan and then we’ll take it from there.”
Ericsson believes he would be limited to carrying out tire testing duties for Pirelli, because it would be difficult for one of the race drivers -- Kimi Raikkonen and Antonio Giovinazzi -- to give up track time during a Friday practice session.
“Nothing is decided yet but that’s sort of what I’m pushing for. I’m still the reserve there, so it would make sense for me to get some track time in case something would happen, but FP1 is hard to take from a race driver. I’m more looking at trying to get a test somewhere and then focus on how I’m doing over here.”
Chris Medland
While studying Sports Journalism at the University of Central Lancashire, Chris managed to talk his way into working at the British Grand Prix in 2008 and was retained for three years before joining ESPN F1 as Assistant Editor. After three further years at ESPN, a spell as F1 Editor at Crash Media Group was followed by the major task of launching F1i.com’s English-language website and running it as Editor. Present at every race since the start of 2014, he has continued building his freelance portfolio, working with international titles. As well as writing for RACER, his broadcast work includes television appearances on F1 TV and as a presenter and reporter on North America's live radio coverage on SiriusXM.
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