Final practice and qualifying for the Bahrain Grand Prix are coming up soon but before then make sure you’ve sent in your F1 Fanatic Predictions Championship entry.
Here’s the round-up for Saturday:
Links
Steve Matchett explains McLaren’s ‘F-Duct’. And, er, rabbits…Ferrari boss on racing Schumacher, tyre and money problems (James Allen)
Stefano Domenicali: “The financial situation is difficult, it’s a real problem. There are no big brands that have invested in F1, we are one of the only teams who have good brands that work with us, because they feel loyal to our brand and see a future. It’s a big concern that we need to address. We need to address the show and the model as a business.”
A message from Stirling following his accident (Youtube)
What a class act. Get well soon, Sir Stirling:
Todt in favour of 107 per cent rule (Autosport)
“We are very in favour of reintroducing the 107 percent limit. The reason why it was abandoned was because of the change in qualifying which was happening with fuel to start the race in the car. Now to change that for 2010 you need to have the unanimous agreement of the teams, and to get the unanimous agreement of the teams the FIA will be supporting this solution. I don’t think it will happen so we have to wait until 2011 to introduce it.”
Heikki Kovalainen official site
Heikki Kovalainen has a new official site.
Comment of the day
Lee is full of praise for the F-duct:
I can’t understand the problem that people seem to have with McLaren’s F-duct. To me F1 is half about the technology and half about the racing and it is this that makes it stand out above most other motorsports. Unfortunately the days of radical concepts like the fan car and six-wheelers are long gone it is heartening to see engineers pushing the envelope with ingenious designs like the F-duct.
The whole point of having teams develop their own cars is surely to let engineers get around the rules otherwise they might as well have one car for all. I thought the double diffusers were fine last year and the F-duct is fine this year. It seems to me that the other teams are just infuriated that they did not think of it themselves.
Lee
Happy birthday!
Today’s birthday trio is Starosta, Armen and Pabs – happy birthday to you all!
On this day in F1
Nelson Piquet stood on the top step of the podium after the Brazilian Grand Prix on this day in 1983. Just as he had done the year before – the difference this time was he’d won the race…
Piquet and second-placed finisher Keke Rosberg were disqualified from the results of the 1982 Brazilian Grand Prix because of the water-cooled brakes used by their two teams to get around the minimum weight rules.
However the governing body chose not to disqualify other cars which broke the rules in the same way – such as John Watson’s McLaren, which finished fourth originally and was promoted to second by the disqualification.
In 1983 Piquet finished first in his home Grand Prix for the second time in his career – but this time he was allowed to keep the win. Rosberg, meanwhile, was disqualified from the runner-up spot for the second year in a row, this time following a fire during his pit stop.
Alex White
13th March 2010, 0:14
A couple of highlights from todays practice :)
Senna onboard
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqghheMUYcM
Vettel struggling to get past
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cRB9fhsyqE&feature=channel
Cheers! :)
Patrickl
13th March 2010, 1:41
They removed the Senna onboard video, but Vettel’s pass was still available.
I don’t really have much of a problem with the slower cars on track, but they do need to pay more attention. Or maybe their team should warn them of oncoming traffic.
gabal
13th March 2010, 10:04
How is that struggling? He was behind him and at first straight he passed through – I don’t really see a problem there.
newnhamlea1
13th March 2010, 0:17
love how stirling describes his fall as a ‘shunt’
Mark Hitchcock
13th March 2010, 7:27
haha yeah me to. Great guy, I’m glad he seems to be doing ok.
John H
13th March 2010, 0:36
I think this isn’t quite how the F-Duct works due to the snorkel’s small size.
The air from the snorkel (with flow controlled by the knee) is more likely to be a passive duct that may act as a relay like switch for something bigger. This ‘relay’ would trigger air from the airbox intake to stall the rear wing. You can see the vertical stacking of the intake on this image which is a good clue:
http://tinyurl.com/ycyo436
George
13th March 2010, 0:52
Great to hear from Stirling, he looks a lot better than I expected.
Rob R.
13th March 2010, 1:24
The F-Duct is utter nonsense.
This is the “technological innovation” that F1 is supposed to boast about? Wow this sounds great doesn’t it?
A driver operates an air duct by moving his knee around? That’s supposed to sound cool? It should be banned just for being so bizarre. I guess you guys who like this, also liked Honda’s “elephant tusks”, BMW’s ugly extra wings in 2006, and all other crap lke that.
I like to see these guys using their hands, their heads and their feet, not their knees.
If you guys find loophole dodging sexy, maybe you should date lawyers, or go watch the EU parliament at work.
I can see Ayrton and Gilles looking down from heaven, utterly bemused.
Myles Woerner
13th March 2010, 1:28
Rob, that rant was one of the weirdest and most illogical I have ever read. Literally nothing you just wrote made any sense.
Rob R.
13th March 2010, 2:13
I think you are weird.
This is, literally, the latest innovation in F1, a sport that wants to be like a James Bond movie, but for the last few years has seemed more like an episode of Scrapheap Challenge on LSD.
We’re talking about jiggling your knee around to operate an air duct system to gain a slight aerodynamic advantage. You don’t find that bizarre? And you’re calling me weird?
matt90
13th March 2010, 2:15
lol completely bizarre. I think he meant 2008 for the ugly BMW wings, which I thought they were awesome, not because they looked nice, but because they were complex, incricate and innovative. And making the car look spikey was also kind of cool. And if you don’t like innovation, then why not watch gp2 instead?
Rob R.
13th March 2010, 2:21
No I was in fact talking about 2006.
This.
https://www.racefans.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/kubi_magn_bmw_2006.jpg
btw, I didn’t have a problem with the 2008 BMW wings you mistakenly thought I was criticising.
matt90
13th March 2010, 2:27
Fair enough, those wings do look ridiculous. Still kind of interesting though.
John H
13th March 2010, 9:57
Go and watch NASCAR Rob.
Wateva
13th March 2010, 1:37
well, if this is not genius than what is?… the rules are ritten very rigorously by some clever people…. and to get around them you have to be genius and innovative. and Rob you are wrong in thinking us guys who likes this also liked Honda’s “elephant tusks”… those actually made the car look horrible, but mclaren’s stuff is much more subtle. and one of James Allen’s article talks about how they have made this so that even copying it will be difficult for other teams as they cant make alterations to their cockpits once the season starts. and that is serious innovation. u have not jus went around a rule, u made is difficult for other to steal your idea.
Hazel J
13th March 2010, 4:36
I’m sorry Rob im gonna have to disagree with your post, what your saying is that you don’t like the F-duct, not because of the way it affects the car, but because of the way it is operated? The way its operated really isn’t important, what is important is the theory behind the aerodynamics of it and how it improves the performance of the car. Would you prefer it if it was somehow operated from the steering wheel?
And as for “it should be banned for being so bizarre” thats what technological innovation is all about! Coming up with something so different and weird, something completely out of the box that no one has thought of before. Personally one of the reasons that I like this is because not one other F1 team even thought of connecting this up, that is innovation.
Also Senna and Villeneuve were great racers, they would want any technical advantage they could get no matter how they had to operate it.
Joey-Poey
13th March 2010, 8:03
If anything the simplicity of it is part of the genius of the solution. It doesn’t require a complex computer system or crazy composites. It uses simple science to solve a problem. Ever heard of occam’s razor? The fact that you think it NEEDS to be more whizbang and complex is probably a good indicator why you are not working for an F1 team’s aerodynamics dept. solving these problems.
thestig84
13th March 2010, 9:29
Utter rubbish. I can see Colin Chapman looking down and thinking now thats something I would come up with.
Totally what F1 is all about. If you dont like innovation then maybe a spec series is more for you. Mclaren have thought of a cheap, simple and cleaver idea to gain more speed. Whats not to like. I todays restrictive rules Im amazed the designers can still come up with sure things. Fantastic!
Rob R.
13th March 2010, 19:47
Hey thestig84.
You have a very weird way of thinking. You think “I don’t want to see innovation” just because I don’t get excited about a niggly little aerodynamic fix that is just so odd sounding?
I think that’s called jumping to conclusions.
Maybe you and the others jumping on me, telling me to “go watch NASCAR”, etc, should go and watch it, because then you’ll realise F1 isn’t that far off becoming NASCAR, with its ridiculously tight regulations which force people to come up with bizarre stuff like this.
manatcna
13th March 2010, 1:42
If you could increase your top speed by 5/6 mph, why wouldn’t you do it?
Oh, I see – nobody else thought of it
Icthyes
13th March 2010, 1:52
I love that comment by Lee, I read on Autosport that one engineer was complaining how the F-duct would spark off an arms race, all in the name of a few tenths. What sport did he think he think he was in?
K
13th March 2010, 2:25
Is chalk talk actually a serious feature of Speed TV or something? Is that actually supposed to be serious?
As for Sir Stirling has the age of celebrity really come to this? I guess it has.
Alex Bkk
13th March 2010, 4:10
Very clever! and that is coming from a Ferrari fan.
Here’s another description that I found on Wired.
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2010/03/mclaren-rear-wing?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29
Klon
13th March 2010, 7:58
And here we go again, Ferrari proving themselves to be some kind of … people …
Let’s look at the teams and their famous brands:
McLaren – Vodafone, SAP
Mercedes – Petronas
Red Bull/Toro Rosso – … too easy
Williams – Philips, AT&T
Renault – Renault itself, Lada
Virgin/Lotus – … again, too easy
Which mean the only team without world-wide known sponsors are HRT and Force India (and I only didn’t include Kingfisher because of eurocentric views, correct me if I’m wrong).
rampante
13th March 2010, 9:15
Lets look at the list of sponsors in 5 years and see how is with who. Apart from the oil crisis in the early 70’s Shell have been with Ferrari since 1950. They are only saying that teams need reliable sponsors.
steph
13th March 2010, 9:33
From James Allen’s article and in his own words “The lack of sponsorship is something that has shocked many F1 insiders. Things may be looking rosy on the track, but behind the scenes there are some problems which need addressing fast.”
F1 insiders…not just Ferrari even if the interview is with Stefano and Allen himself wrote “but behind the scenes there are some problems which need addressing fast.”.
Sauber are looking pretty bare, ING left last year and sponsors do seem shaky at times with not that many new faces. Yes the new teams have brought some but that was always going to happen.
Alex
13th March 2010, 9:37
Man… these teams are so boring. First double diffusors, now the F-duct. If I have to believe some of what other teams are complaining about they would like the FIA to make a car design, which they all build so everyone has its “own” car but no-one “abuses” the rules like mcclaren did. And it would be perfect… Since it’s made by the FIA they could incorporate everything “everyone” wants like better overtaking and a “greener” car. That it would make F1 into the next spec series would not be a problem since the group of people bernie wants to attract into watching F1 wouldn’t mind anyways.
rampante
13th March 2010, 10:07
Mclaren have come up with a good idea and now others will try to introduce the same. Well done to them. This is the kind of innovation you expect,it works and it’s cheap. What has anybody got to complain about?
marc
14th March 2010, 10:06
who does rubbens barachelo race for this seaoson??????
sato113
14th March 2010, 10:24
Williams
marc
14th March 2010, 10:11
whos lotuses drivers?
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
14th March 2010, 10:51
See here: 2010 F1 drivers and teams
Chaz
22nd March 2010, 16:54
I hope we see Stirling out and about at a GP soon…