Another week begins but this time there’s a Grand Prix to look forward at the end of it. Here’s the Monday round-up:
Links
The raging bull! How Webber has left world champions Button and Hamilton trailing (Daily Mail)
“‘I drove round the track again in my road car looking to see where the rubber was, just taking in the moment. The last time I’d driven it, I’d been pretty wired! I am not one for the glitz or glamour, but I know how tough it is to win there. A small error and your race is over. I just wanted another look on Monday.”
Red Bull F1 on track to sell naming rights (Daily Express)
Dietrich Mateschitz: “As soon as Red Bull Racing is recognised as an established team, a title sponsor could be possible.” Remember there were rumours about Barclays bank getting involved with Red Bull a few weeks ago.
Comment of the day
Paul A makes an interesting comparison between the qualifying statistics posted here on Saturday and the drivers’ positions in the championships.
After all the talk this year about how important qualifying is and how difficult it is to overtake, it’s interesting to compare the average starting grid positions with standings in the WDC.
RBR obviously score a "one-two" in both lists, although in reverse order.
The big losers appear to be Mercedes – Rosberg slides from 3rd to 8th, and Schumacher from 5th to 9th. McLaren gain a little, with Button going from 6th to 4th and Hamilton from 8th to 7th. A mixed bag for Renault, Kubica loses a little while Petrov gains a little.
But Ferrari are the clear gainers – Massa from 7th to 5th and Alonso from 9th to 3rd (although, to be fair, if you do not count "no qualifying at all" in Monaco, Alonso would have been 4th on the average grid position list.)
Conclusions? Reliability, in very general terms, seems to even out over the top five teams. Ferrari needs to improve qualifying capability while Mercedes need to improve race performance. In terms of "driver excitement" Alonso appears to best at making up lost ground, while (rather to my surprise) Rosberg seems to fall back worse than others. It’s also a bit surprising to see that Hamilton shows "unexcitingly" near the bottom of the "top" teams.
Let’s see if the rest of the season can bring big changes to these statistics.
Paul A
Site updates
There’s a new section where you can find all the articles on next year’s championship in one place – hit the F1 2011 Season button at the top of the page for more.
Happy birthday!
No F1 Fanatic birthdays today. If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is by emailling me, using Twitter or adding to the list here.
Update: Actually it turns out it’s Pete Walker’s birthday so happy birthday to him!
On this day in F1
Jarno Trulli was involved in a dramatic crash similar to the one he suffered in Monaco on this day ten years ago.
Except on this occasions he was the innocent party. While testing for Jordan at Valencia he was hit by Giancarlo Fisichella, whose Benetton flew over the top of his car in much the same way Trulli did to Karun Chandhok.
Harv's
24th May 2010, 0:44
the frequency of 1-2’s reb bull score shows thier dominance, look at the number of 1-2’s in 2008, and you can see that although there were two dominant teams you can see that the speed between teams was alot more ballanced, something that i feel this season will lack.
George
24th May 2010, 1:37
The Red Bulls are only much faster in quali trim though, granted they had plenty in hand in Barcelona but that’s a one off track (and Hamilton still managed to get in between them). For general race pace the top three teams are pretty even, more like the end of last year when McLaren, Brawn and Red Bull all had similar pace.
Fer no.65
24th May 2010, 0:44
pfff… I remember those days in 2000 when Eddie Jordan was saying Trulli was a future world champion…
DanThorn
24th May 2010, 9:31
If it wasn’t for a certain Mr. Alonso, maybe he could have been.
Tom L.
24th May 2010, 16:00
Remember in the early part of 2004 when he was keeping up with and often beating Alonso at Renault. You do wonder what might have happened had Trulli stayed for a couple more years, what with the team reaching its peak of competitiveness and arguably Trulli himself as well (in early 2005 he was second to Alonso in the championship for a while, driving a Toyota!).
wasiF1
24th May 2010, 2:09
2010 hasn’t finish yet & we are already in 2011, Keith you are quick?
Can anyone tell me when will the Indian GP on 2011 will be host?
wasiF1
24th May 2010, 2:48
Lewis Hamilton has been charged following an incident on the eve of the Australian Grand Prix.
http://www.espnstar.com/motorsport/f1/news/detail/item443880/Hamilton-charged-over-Oz-incident/
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
24th May 2010, 8:09
No idea at the moment. You’d expect them to group it with some other flyaway races in that part of the world, and at whatever time of year is likely to give the most appropriate weather.
wasiF1
24th May 2010, 9:36
I think they may give the race at the tail end of the season sometime around the Singapore GP, as it’s really hot in the March-April session.
Bullfrog
24th May 2010, 11:58
The new races seem to be late in the season at first, but move to an earlier date as they become less popular… Malaysia, Indianapolis, China, Turkey and Valencia have all done this.
Patrickl
24th May 2010, 9:58
Not sure what happened with Rosbergs statistics, but his qualifyin statistics put him on an average of 5.2 and he finishes his race on average on P6. Not much difference between the two.
I guess the thing is that there were several races where the McLarens and Ferrari’s had qualifying problems and they ended up in front of him.
I do feel that the Mercedes has turned into more of a qualifying machine though. Like the Red Bull. As opposed to the McLaren and Ferrari which seem to do better in the race rather than in qualifying.
matt90
24th May 2010, 11:12
I watched part of 1982 F1 review the other day. The commentator was brilliantly sarcastic. He said about cars of the fifties (clips were shown of the Monaco historic thing) ‘they have engines in the front and not the rear, and seats instead of beds- they barely look like cars at all…’
Scribe
24th May 2010, 11:17
Istanbul Park is the last chance the 2010 season has it in it to provide good dry races now we’re passed two of F1 pernial snooze cruises.
Obviously the Redbull will be on pole, but if no one can take them on in the race the season is doomed. Unless of course one of the big teams out develops them in a season they’ve almost already won.
Ned Flanders
24th May 2010, 11:57
I had a dream last night that McLaren were about to leapfrog Red Bull because they still hadn’t fitted their double diffuser yet. Also, they were planning some innovative fan diffuser device, so it would escape the diffuser ban next season. Basically, McLaren were looking good
(you know you’re an F1 geek when diffusers infiltrate your dreams…)
Ned Flanders
24th May 2010, 12:06
Ever wondered what the mysterious ‘Andy’ who films Martin Brundle’s grid walks looks like?? Wonder no more:
http://twitpic.com/1ql7jl
Calum
24th May 2010, 20:05
You need another pic to show the eyes on the back of his head. You knw the ones he uses to be able to walk backwards around a crowded grid :P
Prisoner Monkeys
24th May 2010, 13:29
Parris Mullins is putting together a project to enter Formula 1 in 2010. It has nothing to do with Cypher group and it won’t be a start-up operation. He has, however, cited the Genii-Renault deal as an arrangement that he thinks can and will work.
I wonder who he’s interested in buying into.
Ned Flanders
24th May 2010, 14:10
I’d guess Sauber or Toro Rosso
Prisoner Monkeys
24th May 2010, 14:23
I know Dietrich Mateschitz was attempting to off-load Toro Rosso before last year’s political crisis. He’s also suggested that Red Bull could take on a title sponsor. I could see Mullins purchasing Toro Rosso and keeping Red Bull as a title sponsor.
I’ve also long suspected that Peter Sauber only purchased the team back from BMW so that he could sell it on in the future. I can easily see Mullins doing a deal with a GP2 team – Barwa or maybe Rapax – and acquiring the team through them.
Scribe
24th May 2010, 17:09
Matschitz may well take on a Redbull title sponser but it almost certainly won’t be a Benetton style name change, Redbull is effectivley already running that model. An it would be contray to the way Redbull has gone about publicing itself, which the team is a typical example of.
Calum
24th May 2010, 20:08
I heard Redbull want to sell the title naming rights to their team for around £30 million in order to capitalize on their success and help reduce the £80 million investment that the owner of Redbull puts into the team.
Glenn
24th May 2010, 15:26
I read the article, I love the shot he takes at Ken Anderson.
“But there are a lot of other lessons that can be taken away from US F1 too, like don’t go to the trouble of assembling a brilliant group of people if you are not going to allow them to execute. I don’t think any one of us signed up to work under a dictatorship – and that is effectively what happened.”
Prisoner Monkeys
24th May 2010, 22:52
I don’t think it was intended as a shot at Anderson. I think Mullins is simply stating a fact, or an opinion, but there’s nothing malicious about it.
Pete Walker
24th May 2010, 17:16
Its my birthday today Keith! :) Not April 24th, when I got the mention. I’m just sayin :)
Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
24th May 2010, 17:41
Sorry Peter have updated my records. Happy birthday to you!
BasCB
24th May 2010, 20:59
Nice birthday to you Pete!