Racing
© Jonathan Borba
Scott Speed says the moment that ended his Formula 1 run at Toro Rosso was brutally simple: after a blow-up with team principal Franz Tost at the Nürburgring in 2007, “the next race weekend, Sebastian Vettel was driving my car.”
Speaking on The Dale Jr. Download podcast, the former Toro Rosso driver revisited the confrontation that followed the rain-hit European Grand Prix and tied it directly to the seat change that brought Vettel into the team for the Hungarian Grand Prix. Speed framed it as a mistake he made, not bad luck or politics.
Speed, a former Toro Rosso driver, said on The Dale Jr. Download podcast that he mishandled his F1 chance because he was not ready for everything the role demanded beyond driving quickly. “I could have done many things differently. I had no communication skills, no real training, I didn’t understand at all how the world worked,” Speed said, reflecting on his career on Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s podcast.
He said the problem ran deeper than results alone. “I never had a clear idea of the influence I had as a driver. I thought I just had to sit in the car and be fast, but I didn’t know why,” Speed, former Toro Rosso driver, said in his retrospective account on The Dale Jr. Download podcast.
The flashpoint, according to Speed’s account on the podcast, came after the 2007 European Grand Prix at the Nürburgring. Heavy rain at the start triggered aquaplaning at Turn 1 and sent a string of drivers off the track, with Speed among them. He said he was talking to his engineer when Tost came over and asked what had happened.
Speed, former Toro Rosso driver, said on The Dale Jr. Download podcast that he answered: “The same thing that happened to everyone else, there was aquaplaning.” He said Tost replied, “Not everyone, only the idiots.” Speed then described the exchange that followed in blunt terms. “At that point I told him to go f*** himself and walked away. The next race weekend, Sebastian Vettel was driving my car,” Speed, former Toro Rosso driver, said on The Dale Jr. Download podcast.
Vettel was already on the F1 radar by then. Earlier in 2007, BMW Sauber called him up for the Indianapolis race after Robert Kubica’s accident in Canada. Vettel finished eighth on that debut and scored his first world championship point. He then moved into the Toro Rosso seat for Hungary, replacing Speed.
Looking back, Speed did not try to soften his part in it. “I was just an arrogant kid. I thought I could say something like that to the team principal and everything would be fine. But it wasn’t. I simply didn’t have the ability to understand what it took to succeed at that level,” Speed, former Toro Rosso driver, said in his retrospective account on The Dale Jr. Download podcast.
That is the way Speed now tells the story: one confrontation after a chaotic race, one decision by Toro Rosso, and Vettel in the car the next weekend.