Ma Qing Hua’s new helmet for home practice run

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Chinese driver Ma Qing Hua will make a one-off appearance for Caterham in the first practice session for his home race tomorrow.

Ma made four appearances for HRT during practice sessions last year at Monza, Singapore, Yas Marina and the Circuit of the Americas. This will be the first time a Chinese driver has driven in an official F1 session in China.

He will sport a new helmet during tomorrow’s practice, trading his black and white yin-yang for one incorporating the Chinese flag and, of course, Caterham’s sponsors:

Charles Pic will give up his car during the first 90 minutes of running for the GP2 driver to use.

See the helmet designs being used by all the regular F1 drivers here:

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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17 comments on “Ma Qing Hua’s new helmet for home practice run”

  1. Ha, pointless!!

  2. Nice helmet but I read they had to lift him out of his GP2 car last time out because he was so exhausted. If he ever wants a realistic chance in F1 he needs to start working on his fitness level, fast!

    1. and speed

      1. @lifew12 And a bag full of Renminbi bills………oh wait…….never mind

        1. 10 seconds off at COTA is pathetic

    2. @force-maikel To be fair, he was crippled by food poisoning…although Mitch Evans suffered from it too, and finished on the podium..

  3. How far will he be off this time? And will he be a moving chicane?

    1. More like a moving red flag…

  4. This is a very interesting helmet design.

    Hopefully Ma gains more experience this way and thus moves one small step closer to becoming a race driver, even though it is not going to be easy. China still doesn’t look like a country where people love F1 even though it is hosting the Grand Prix for the 10th time this weekend. A Chinese driver might help to change the people’s cold attitude.

    1. @girts Looks like you would welcome his entry into F1..
      I don’t think he deserves a seat. Nationality bedamned. The last thing the sport needs is a ‘continental quota’ or something. And I am Asian.

      1. @wsrgo That’s true, I would be happy to see him in F1 and I hope he gains more experience and improves his skills enough to deserve to be in F1 on merit.

  5. I quite like the look of that actually.

    1. Me too, its an interesting design, not overly complicated either.

  6. Interesting to see Safran joined Airbus as sponsors, although I find it strange that they went with Pic instead of Vergne or Grosjean.

  7. WilliamB (@william-brierty)
    11th April 2013, 17:50

    I’m sorry but I have grandmas that are faster than Ma…you see what did there, oh forget it. Let’s find a proper Chinese driver not, because in such a big country there will undoubtedly be a proper talent, as opposed to a failed touring car driver.

  8. I would pick another trick to learn from Vettel – and I don’t mean the finger either…

    1. he could give the finger to Vettel

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