Posted by ashleigh on
March 16, 2008
Australia Result
And it’s a result for Lewis Hamilton, and McLaren.
Lewis drove a start to finish winning race, however the news is the Ferrari cars.
None of the Ferrari powered cars managed to finish the race, with two engine failures (Kimi and Bordause).
It was also nice to see the BMW and Williams on the podium, Heidfeld took the second spot, and Rosberg took a much deserved third spot.
The race was incident packed, with 3 safety cars out, Kovalinen got caught out in his second stop with the Safety Car that Timo Glock’s big accident brought out, having to stop under the safety car, and join the end of the snake along with Alonso.
David Coulthard had a big accident with Massa into turn one ending Red Bulls day. Rubens was running well in the lone Honda (Button had an incident on the opening lap), with his car running out of fuel, he had to come in to refuel while the safety car was out and the pit lane was closed giving him a 10 second penalty, he then looked to go back out onto the track through red pit lights. So it’s unknown at the moment if he managed to score points or not.
Posted by ashleigh on
November 13, 2007
Other significant moves
Besides the Fernando to Ferrari piece we ran earlier, there are also some other significant staff moves to note.
Ferrari have replaced Juan Todt at the head of the F1 team by Stefano Domenicali, who will take over the running of the team from January. This shows that Todt is obviously under an increased load with managing the Ferrari group, and can no longer manage running the team as well.
The other, more positive move is Ross Brawn, he has joined the Honda team, and I am sure will make a difference almost immediately.
Nick Fry had this to say about the appointment
"In terms of job responsibilities. Ross is team principal and is organizationally in charge of the team," Fry said. "I will take charge of the commercial side, the marketing, sponsorship and the legal side."
With Ross having this to say about his new team
Posted by ashleigh on
June 22, 2007
Testing Roundup
Testing was ongoing this week, however it was split between 2 sites. Most of the teams ran at Silverstone in an attempt to work out setup for the British GP, however the two Honda backed teams flew out to Spain at Jerez for their test.
The Honda teams worked on the new aero parts that are coming for both of the teams, with the Honda Factory team seeming to improve. Jenson finished with the fastest time for the Honda team on a 1m19.621s, with fellow Brit Anthony Davidson managing a 1m20.450s in the Super Aguri. It seems that the Honda boys may be making steps forward, even if they are small steps, it’s certainly in the right direction.
The other 9 teams testing decided on the Silverstone track. In contrast to the 3 hot days that the Honda teams had, Silverstone was wet for most of the three days.
Some surprises were to be had as well. Day one saw Ralf Schumacher fastest in the Toyota, and then Jarno backed the Toyota’s pace up on the second day registering the fastest time again.
Posted by ashleigh on
March 24, 2007
Customer cars under fire
Spyker GP have launched arbitration proceedings against the two ‘customer’ chassis teams.
The Dutch (English) team have said that they believe that the Super Aguri SA07 is a clone of the Honda RA106 (from last year). They have also said that the Scuderia Toro Rosso STR2 is a repackaged version of the Red Bull RB3 designed by Adrian Newey.
They say that because of this both teams are in violation of the 2007 sporting regulations.
This is not the first time that Spyker have complained about the two teams. They complained to the stewards at the Australian GP after qualifying, the stewards however threw the complaint out on procedural grounds.
The case will now go to the Swiss court that judges Concorde Agreement cases. Both of the teams involved say that they comply to the Concorde Agreement, as they own the intellectual property for the chassis they are using.
If Spyker actually get this through, the probable outcome would be that the teams would not be eligible for constructor points, this would not affect the drivers points however.
Posted by ashleigh on
March 4, 2007
Super Aguri Delay Launch
So the Tokyo Launch on the 12 is off. Why may we ask? Is it because Williams and Spyker (to name a few) are hoping to take the team to task if they believe the car is not Super Aguri’s own design (we already know it’s based at least on the 2006 Honda). Perhaps Super Aguri are hoping that if they launch the car at Albert Park on the GP weekend then the teams that will protest will have no time to do so.
If I were Super Aguri I would be less worried about my car, as they are not really a challenge (although I would love to see them perform, certainly Anthony Davidson). I believe all the teams will be complaining more about the Toro Rosso car that is not last years Red Bull, but is rather this years Red Bull with a different engine.
With only this year left of the rules that block chassis and major component sharing, I believe the teams should just buckle down and be done with it, after all it’s not the first time in F1 that teams have shared chassis.
