Grosjean test with Mercedes F1 team 'still on the cards'

Former F1 driver Romain Grosjean says his F1 track day with Mercedes is "still on the cards", with the Frenchman hopefully testing with the championship winning team at some point this year.

After the Frenchman's dramatic escape from his Bahrain inferno in 2020 that brought a premature end to his career in F1, Mercedes boss Toto Wolff committed to offering Grosjean an outing onboard a 2019-spec Silver Arrow as closure for his nine-year career as a Grand Prix driver.

The Andretti Autosport IndyCar charger was due to demo Mercedes' car during last year's French Grand Prix weekend.

But that opportunity was scuppered after the event at Paul Ricard was brought forward by a week, which led to a clash with a round of the NTT IndyCar Series at Road America where Grosjean was scheduled to compete with Dale Coyne Racing.

However, the 35-year-old says his test is still on Mercedes' agenda, hopefully in 2022.

“I sent a message to Toto after Abu Dhabi," he said, speaking at an IndyCar media conference on Monday.

"Well, I left a couple of weeks, a few weeks going by, and then I sent a message to Toto, and he did reply. He started ‘Thank you,’ and then the last sentence was, ‘We need to get you in that car this year.’

"Yes, it's still on the cards. There were a few things last year that didn't make it easy. This year I cannot go at the French Grand Prix because we're racing in Iowa the same weekend.

"But definitely Mercedes is keen to do it, I am keen to do it, even though my neck will be dying because I've lost part of the muscle there. You can ask Pato [O’Ward] what it was like [in an F1 car].

"But yes, we still want to do it, and if it happens, great. But… the main focus is now trying to win races with Andretti."

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Speaking on the controversial events that unfolded last month in Abu Dhabi, Grosjean says he was on the edge of his seat during the title-decider's dramatic final lap.

"I loved it!" he said. "It was exciting, my heart was pumping like hell. And I think having two cars fighting over one lap for the World Championship was amazing!"

Chiming in on the race's epilogue and on the divisive debate that it has sparked, Grosjean made clear that the event's outcome crowned a worthy champion.

"I think the wrong conception is to think that the world championship went on one lap," he explained.

"It was 22 Grands Prix, and if you look at the full season, you know Max had the puncture in Baku, Valtteri Bottas crashed into Verstappen in Hungary, there was the Silverstone race [clash between Hamilton and Verstappen]…

"I think at the end, if we look at how many points were lost by Verstappen, not necessarily by his fault, he was the one that deserved more the championship.

"On the Abu Dhabi race, Lewis deserved more the championship. He got unlucky over the last lap. But as a race fan, I loved that last lap, and it was super exciting to watch."

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