Jean-Eric Vergne feels he's ready for F1 after topping each day of young driver test
Jean-Eric Vergne believes that his performance during the Yas Marina young driver test proves that he is ready to race in Formula 1
The 21-year-old Frenchman, who has already driven in two Friday practice sessions for Toro Rosso, was fastest on all three days during the test.
His best time of Thursday was only 0.4s off Sebastian Vettel's Abu Dhabi Grand Prix pole time, and he is hopeful that Red Bull could choose to promote him to a race seat next year.
He is a possible candidate for a Toro Rosso seat, either as a full-time third driver or race driver. Red Bull could also choose to farm him out to another team, as it has done with Daniel Ricciardo at HRT this year.
"This shows that I have the pace to be in F1," he told AUTOSPORT. "But it's up to Red Bull to decide.
"Thanks to them, I could test this car and thanks to them I went from karting into single-seaters and got to here. I've done my best now and they have to decide what is best for me for the future.
"I've done everything that I could have done in the three days and now I have one more session to do, driving in Brazil. Then we will see."
Vergne added that he was satisfied not only to have shown his pace, but also to have done a good job for Red Bull in working through its test programme.
"I'm really satisfied," he said. "These were three mega days for me and I'm really happy with what I've done for the team. Everything went well."
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