Kubica's rally to recovery

There's a sardonic irony that the very sport that turned Robert Kubica's world upside-down is now his chosen form of motorsport rehabilitation. His horrific crash on the Ronde di Andora rally in February 2011 curtailed the Formula 1 career that promised so much more than the single grand prix victory he has to his name.

With an F1 return still his ultimate goal - and who knows if that will be ever become attainable? - his hobby of rallying has now become his day job.

That brings its own risks, and his approach to learning the discipline as a professional has so far led to one burnt-out car, and crashes in his two European Rally Championship starts - the most recent a double roll on Rally Azores, an event in which he went on to finish sixth.

He's phlegmatic about the incidents, with an 'it comes with the territory' outlook: "In other sports, like football, if you kick the ball wrong, to the side or over the bar, nothing bad happens," he says. "In rallies, if you make a small mistake, you can learn a big lesson."

You only have to glance at his right arm and hand for the evidence of the consequences of that, and while Kubica is still damaged in this department, he is also very much undeterred. While you'd expect him to take time to get on
the pace on the stages, especially on gravel, this hasn't been the problem at all.

He's racked up stage win after stage win on various surfaces so far in his brief full-time rally career - speak to those close to him and you'll get a, "Well, what did you expect? This is Robert, after all!" The problem, however, has been keeping the car on the road, and finding the right balance of speed and precision to do so.

Kubica in action during Rally Azores

"It's quite difficult to run at the proper pace the first time you're driving on a rally," he admits. "Actually, we should back off a bit! But when you back off, you don't learn.

"I definitely need to find a compromise. But I need to learn at a good pace, not backing off. If I back off all the time, and then push, then more mistakes will come.

"Like this weekend's crash, if I'm two seconds off the pace then that accident will not happen. But then I'm not learning - rallies are quite harsh on those lessons."

The incident he refers to occurred on SS11 on Rally Azores. Having set fastest time in qualifying and the opening three stages on Thursday, Kubica was forced to drop his pace - and relinquish the lead - on Friday due to thick fog descending on the second day of the mid-Atlantic volcanic island event.

He was pushing again, to make up for lost time, when he flipped his Citroen DS3 over twice, and was forced to limp out of the stage with left-front suspension damage.

"The roll was nothing to do with the fog," he says. "Something I have to learn is not to use all of the road, like I do on the racetrack. Practically, it was my fault. But after looking at the videos, I understood what happened now. When it happened, I didn't understand the reason.

"I lost the car on the right-hander before the one I crashed on. I went wide - wider than all the other drivers - but that wasn't the problem, because I was still on the road. But there was so much mud that I didn't realise the line was more on the inside than where I was.

"Turning into the next corner, which was quite a short distance away, it was quite an open corner but I didn't have grip because I was half a metre off-line. At the time, I wasn't expecting anything to go wrong, because it's something new for me.

He is aware that he has to find a compromise and stop crashing

"I've had this feeling before on a rally stage, when I'm using too much road, but when you have fog and many new things to keep in mind... it's a good lesson, but a hard lesson. Definitely an important one to learn for the future, because it will save me a lot of troubles!"

Kubica's next chance to put that learned lesson into action will be on the twisty roads of another island, Corsica, later this month. In theory, it should suit his style. But there are many perils attached to this event, as history has shown, and perhaps it will be the perfect barometer to evaluate his approach and what lessons he's learned - his speed is not in doubt; his judgement appears to need fine-tuning, which will only come with time.

After Corsica - where he should be considered a potential winner - Kubica aims to concentrate on his WRC2 programme (apart from his home ERC round in Poland), which means we won't see him fighting for overall wins.

"To do both, we don't have enough funds, and we don't have enough time - we're better off preparing properly for WRC events," he confirms. "But I think ERC is a good-level championship, and doing the Canaries, Azores and Corsica is good preparation for WRC. Discovering new rallies and new roads is good for me."

Rallying had always been his passion away from the circuits, but had he ever considered a professional career on the stages at some point after his F1 career?

"No, I wouldn't say [as a] professional," he says, "Because I was definitely hoping I'd stay in F1 for a long time, and one day F1 would stop for me, so I was thinking of doing some rallies then, but more for fun and the challenge.

"For different reasons, unfortunately, my F1... [he pauses, searching for the right word] not career, but my F1 story got interrupted, so I found rallying was my best option to slowly come back. For this year, it was what I was looking for."

So, let's cut to the chase of the million-dollar question: does Kubica think we'll see him behind the wheel of an F1 car again?

Kubica is still unsure if he will return to F1

"There is no guarantee I will or will not come back to F1," he says. "I decide to change completely my route, and abandon [racing], not completely, because I'm doing some things on the circuit this year, but rallying will occupy my mind for longer during the year."

Rallying appears to be having the desired effect, in terms of his recovery. Beyond the arm injury, you'd barely recognise any other physical sign of the immense trauma he went through two years ago.

After all those operations, he's a fully functioning human being again - but to get back to a level where he can drive an F1 car again... He realises this is another level entirely, and more improvements in terms of his movement and dexterity need to come.

"There are periods where I am moving forward," he says of his injuries. "Not every day, but they are very small steps, and there's a very long way to go. It might happen that I will never be back in F1, but what is most important is that I see every step forwards, and definitely it will not be an easy task.

"There is not any guarantee, there is no percentage to say whether I will come back or not, but it's also not 100 per cent that I will not be back in F1. I will try my best.

"I have been through a difficult period, and I'd say it's an easier period now, I am enjoying myself, but it is still not a totally easy period for me, because I'd definitely prefer to be in F1 driving, 100 per cent fit. The reality is different.

"Now I need a little bit of everything - a little bit of luck and motivation, which I think I have, and to keep working so maybe I have the chance to get back to where I was before the accident."

He's kept the lines of communication open to allies and confidantes in the Formula 1 paddock, but realises the longer he stays away, the harder it will be to return.

"I still have contacts with a few people from F1, but not a lot," says the 28-year-old. "When I was in F1, even if you are not racing, you are always on the pace [with what's going on] away from the racetrack.

"I am not disturbing people who are working, but of course I'm watching the races and looking from the outside into F1, which is difficult to understand from outside of a team - it's really impossible to understand what's really going on."

The Pole could have raced in the DTM this year

Those contacts, of course, include Mercedes-Benz. It's no secret that it tabled a DTM contract for this year, to which he politely declined despite a hugely impressive test at Valencia, but he didn't turn down the chance to drive its F1 simulator - although he remains coy on whether he'll do it again.

"For me, now, the priority is to get as fit as I can," he says of the potential for a racing return outside of F1.

"I'm not able to come back into single-seaters at the moment, and my vision is not to come back in saloon cars on the circuit at this stage."

Why not? Surely a DTM or GT car would keep him race-sharp, something rallying can't offer...

"DTM, for me, is one of the highest-level championships in the world, the drivers who are racing there, I'd say there's a minimum of 10 who can win races. It's a very high-level championship.

"It's not that I'm underrating these cars, or GTs or anything else, it's just that I have something in my mind and I'm trying everything to achieve it, and this is the best way for me.

"Maybe one day in the future I will race in DTM or GT or whatever, because I will feel that it's the right moment. I'm still young, I think I can still achieve something in motorsport, I will try my best.

"If I decide to do GTs or something one day, it will be my decision to do it, not because it's the best offer of money I get. My main motivation is to do the best series I can."

At the current time, he feels that's rallying. Perhaps the discipline that truncated his F1 career may just be the one that helps put him back on track in years to come.