Narain Karthikeyan insists he does not regret gambling his future on an abortive return to Formula One in 2011.
The Indian driver was settling comfortably in the NASCAR system last year before the opportunity arose to take his sponsors back to F1 with the struggling HRT team. But after Valencia in June, the now 34-year-old lost his seat to the Red Bull-backed Daniel Ricciardo, and is only now returning for a one-off drive this weekend in his native India.
However Karthikeyan insists the move was worth the gamble.
“F1 is the pinnacle of motor sport and it is definitely worth the sacrifices that I’ve made,” he told the Press Trust of India. “The fact that (the) Indian GP was on the calendar did play a part in my decision to return to F1 despite my comfortable position in NASCAR last year.
“But (I have) no regrets, I didn’t want to think ‘What if?’.”
He reveals that he did not consider returning to NASCAR when he lost his full-time F1 seat in June.
“I have been completely dedicated to F1 this year so I didn’t have any thoughts of going back,” added Karthikeyan. “The circumstances were difficult but I was assured that I’d be driving the Indian GP which was certainly encouraging.”
Source:GMM
