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Showing posts with label force india. Show all posts
Showing posts with label force india. Show all posts

Monday, 27 July 2009

Hungary Quali

Firstly our thoughts go out to the Surtees family after the tragic accident to Henry at Brands Hatch. This freak accident just shows how dangerous motor racing still is as the wheel off one of the other competitors cars hit him on the head.

What brings it home even more is the spooky freak accident to Felipe Massa only a week after when a spring from the rear of Rubens Barrichello's Brawn bounced down the circuit and was collected by Felipe who, it appears finished up with a fractured skull.

All the signs are that Felipe will fully recover but as I write he is still in an induced coma. Whether he will drive again seems to be in doubt and their is talk of him being replaced by, wait for it, Michael Schumacher and that would be a real revelation.

Anyway that is unimportant compared with Felipe's complete recovery and our thoughts go out to the Massa family in the meanwhile.

On a somewhat sombre note after Brands the F1 circus goes to the tight Hungaroring noted for no overtaking which the drivers seemed to ignore all weekend.

We, I am sure all welcome Jaime Alguersauri to F1 who is the youngest driver to take an F1 seat and obtain his super license. He has replaced the luckless Sebastian Bourdais at Toro Rosso or maybe even STR -Ferrari, and as the 2008 Formula 3 champion he has been brought in under the Red Bull young driver program and he seemed to be consistent during his first run.

There was the usual fight to see who was to lose out in Q1 and apart from Alguersauri who broke down it was the Force India's and again the BMW's who just don't seem to be able to get things right. One expects better from BMW and I wonder what is being said in Germany about their continuing in the sport through these difficult times.

On into Q2 which is where Felipe had his accident and I don't think we should dwell on that. The loss of the spring in Ruben's car meant he couldn't progress to Q1 and the team launched an immediate inspection to find why and he finished 12th.

The Red Bulls's, Mclaren's (isn't that nice to be able to say) and Williams's were having an almighty fight at the top with Rosberg in P1 at one stage. Q2 saw the demise of both Toyota's, Nelson in the 2nd Renault, Rubens and of course Felipe.

On into Q3 and the same 6 cars were fighting it out but this time, with a lightly fueled Renault it was Fernando who put the Renault on pole followed by Sebastian (Vettel) followed by Mark, Lewis and Nico and then Heikki, Kimi. Jenson seemed to having tyre problems again and finished a lowly 8th and then rounding out the top 10 it was Kazuki and Sebastian (Buemi).

Albeit all the drivers were concentrating on the job in hand all the talk was correctly about Felipe and the only news we had post quali was that he was in hospital and stable. We desperately await good news.

Saturday, 13 June 2009

F1 2010 and the New Teams

The grid for 2010 is still not settled albeit there are now entries from the existing teams in 2009. McLaren, BMW Sauber, Renault, Toyota and Brawn have entered on mass as FOTA (Formula One Team Association) but the entries are subject to them lifting conditions they placed on their entries by next Friday, June 19. What those conditions are is for Max Mosley and FOTA to know.

Williams, Force India and Ferrari are not a part of that and their entries are secure. Williams have had their membership of FOTA recinded until final agreement has been reached between FOTA and F1 but I haven't heard that about Force India or Ferrari!

So, after a lot of speculation we now know we have 3 new teams on the grid for 2010 and they are Campos Grand Prix, Team US F1 and Manor F1. Accepting the current 20 cars are on the grid that will give us a full 26 car grid for 2010 and should introduce some interesting racing.

No one is sure what the full regs will be but maybe we will know after 19 June. The new teams in brief.

Manor F1 Grand Prix. Former single seater champion, John Booth established Manor in 1990 when he decided to form his own team. Their successes include 171 Race wins and 19 Championship titles in formulae such as Formula Renault and the F3 Euroseries.

Based in the UK they have 2 sites, one in Sheffield and the other in Bicester. Its technical innovation is characterised by the fact that the race cars are designed, tested and refined entirely in the digital domain using the processes originally developed by Wirth Research Limited (WRL).

As Technical Director of Manor Grand Prix Racing, Nick Wirth founded WRL (Wirth Research Limited) in 2003, a company specialising in research, development and manufacturing in the high technology sector. Their designs won both the 2004/5 Indy Racing League (IRL) championships as well as being instrumental in producing winning designs in the American Le Mans series.

Nick Wirth has an impeccable background initially with March, Simtek F1 and Chief Designed for the Benetton F1 team. To compete in 2010 an engine deal has been agreed with Cosworth and it will be great to see them back on the grid.

Campos Grand Prix. Launched in 1998 Campos was launched in 1998 by ex-Formula One driver Adrián Campos. Campos has won six driver championships, five team championships and currently holds the GP2 Series 2008 title.

Their HQ is in Madrid where the marketing and admin are run. The technical centre is based at Campos Racing’s current headquarters in Valencia, 25km from the Ricardo Tormo race track.

As part of its application to compete in the 2010 FIA Formula One World Championship, Campos has also agreed an engine supply deal with Cosworth and technical partnerships with Dallara Automobili and Xtrac.

Team US F1. With 30 years of motor sport experience, team Principal Ken Anderson including designing and constructing multiple Indy 500 and IndyCar Series-winning race cars. This is a real departure for F1 bringing an American Team into F1 as it has been proved Indy 500 and the Indy car series are a different ball park to F1.

Fellow team director Peter Windsor is known to us all having worked in F1 for over 35 years as team manager for Williams-Renault team, manager for Ferrari’s F1 chassis and suspension departments and as a consultant for F1 drivers Nigel Mansell and Carlos Reutemann.

As part of its application to compete in the 2010 FIA Formula One World Championship, US F1 has agreed an engine supply deal with Cosworth.

Cosworth. I don't think Cosworth need any introduction to we petrol heads after 50 years in engine design for most racing teams at one time or another throughout the world. It is a name synonymous with motor racing and has been missed from the recent grids. All the new teams to F1 have opted to use Cosworth engines and I have no doubt the parterships will flourish.

I am sure we all wish the new teams every success. One has to congratulate Max Mosley on his management of this process and hopefully pre Silverstone all will be known about 2010 and beyond.