Briatore advises Kubica not to rush his return
While the Polish driver reportedly got back behind the wheel of a rally car and did a few laps on a go-kart, Briatore revealed that he advised him to take the necessary time to heal and return at 100%.
Absent from the 2012 World Championship, a year after his terrible accident at the Rallye Ronde di Andorra, Robert Kubica is nonetheless present in the media spotlight on the eve of the Australian Grand Prix. Thus, while Jaime Alguersuari, a new consultant for the BBC, stated a few days ago that, according to the latest information he had, the Pole could not even hold a glass on his own, it seems that the former Renault driver has found his way back to rally tracks and other karting circuits.
Indeed, just a few days after Alguersuari’s statements, the magazine Autosprint contradicted the Spaniard by claiming that Robert Kubica had taken the wheel of a Skoda Fabia WRC, which he owns, for a brief testing session. Then, it was the turn of the Italian site 422race.com to mention Kubica’s return to the tracks, as the Pole was seen driving a kart on the Montecatini covered track, completing three laps before signing a few autographs.
In any case, if the Pole were to make his return to Formula One, it would probably only be possible from 2013 onwards. Flavio Briatore, former team manager of the Renault team who tested the Krakow native before he became BMW’s third driver, revealed on the Italian version of Sky Sports that he advised the Polish driver to take the necessary time to come back at 100%: “I saw him several times, I went to see him in the hospital, and I told him not to rush his return, that talent doesn’t disappear, and that he needed to focus on healing and being at 100%. At the time, it was difficult for him to accept. I experienced something similar with Nannini [who had his amputated arm reattached following a helicopter accident in 1990]. He wanted to hurry back, and everyone knows how that ended. I believe Robert can recover, but he must plan his return over two years; you can’t drive an F1 if you’re not at 100% yet: the road ahead is still tough. I would be opposed to seeing him do tests now, it’s pointless, he needs to understand the situation and live with it. Unfortunately, that’s life.”
