It has just been announced that Italian Formula One driver Jarno Trulli will not be racing in 2012. This after his (former) team said he had been replaced by Russian Vitaly Petrov.

It is the first time since 1970 that no Italian driver will participate in F1.

Jarno Trulli of Italy leaves his car during the Hungarian F1 Grand Prix in July 2011. Picture: REUTERS

Will Italy, on the driver front, be missed? I would have to say no.

What happened? They produced the first double world champion, Alberto Ascari, and the first-ever world champion in Giuseppe Farina. It is as if the whole country then paid more attention to Ferrari than to the drivers, and now it finds itself without a representative on the grid.

The Italian teams — there is only one anyway — need to share the blame in this one. Look at what McLaren are doing in their “youth development” structure; they are nurturing young British talent for the future, and it is paying off. What have Ferrari done in the past?

Can anyone remember Luca Badoer? He used to be the official test driver for Ferrari but then got a chance in 2009 to race for the team. After a couple of races he was fired and forced to see out the rest of his racing career in the dungeon that is GT racing. Not a very nice present for a driver who was loyal to Ferrari for 12 years.

The last two Italian drivers didn’t set the world on fire with their pace, and the only headlines they made were, well, for all the wrong reasons.

Take Jarno Trulli. He has breathtaking pace in qualifying, but come the race, there is usually a string of cars behind him trying to get around him. This is also known as the “Trulli Train”.

His only victory came in Monaco in 2003 at the wheel of the Renault. Things went downhill after that: he left Renault to join Toyota (the only glimmer in this relationship was 2005, when he should have won a couple of races), and then Lotus/Caterham or whatever you want to call that green team at the back of the grid.

I liked Trulli. He seemed to be a good guy and he will be missed in F1.

Let’s take the other Italian ex-F1 driver, Giancarlo Fischicella. He was supposed to be the next Ascari when he started his career at Minardi in 1996. His career only started when he won his first grand prix in Brazil in 2003 — who can forget that race? — and then Renault in 2005.

He is better known for what he did at Ferrari, or didn’t do. Yes, the car was a dog in 2009, but you just have to look at the driver in the other car, Kimi Raikkonen. We all know Raikkonen lost interest after winning the title in 2007, but he still blew Fisi out of the water and made it look easy.

Tags: Italy, Jarno Trulli