F1 Fanatic round-up: 24/8/2010

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Apologies for all the technical problems yesterday – everything should now be running smoothly. A big thank you to Ed Marshall for all his help getting us back online.

Here’s today’s round up:

Links

McLaren to remove F-duct for Monza (Autosport)

"McLaren will remove the F-duct from its car for the first time this season at the Italian Grand Prix, with the low downforce nature of the circuit negating any benefit the system brings.

"The Woking-based team was the pioneer of the F-duct at the start of this year, and the design has proved such a success that all its main rivals have copied the idea. Renault will be the latest to introduce it at this weekend’s Belgian Grand Prix."

Q & A with Graeme Lowdon (Autosport)

"It would be fair to say that Virgin Racing’s debut season in Formula 1 has been nothing less than a baptism of fire. With wing failures in testing, early reliability dramas, a fuel tank-sizing issue and continued scepticism about a team using only CFD to create a car, it’s not been an easy time for the operation.
"Matters were also not helped recently when Bernie Ecclestone hinted that Virgin Racing’s future could be in doubt because of financial reasons."

Ferrari prepared to launch civil action against the FIA (ESPN F1)

"Ferrari would be prepared to launch civil action against the FIA if the team is stripped of its points accrued from the German Grand Prix at the World Motor Sport Council hearing next month, according to La Gazzetta dello Sport ."

Webber may not race in F1 beyond 2011 (ESPN F1)

"Mark Webber has revealed that he may only be in Formula One for one more year if he wins the world championship.

"Webber, who currently leads the drivers’ standings, has a contract with the Red Bull team until the end of 2011. But the Australian told Brazil’s weekly Esporte Espetacular programme that he could not guarantee he would be on the grid beyond then.

"’I cannot guarantee that my head will be in the same place in 2012,’ said Webber. ‘For sure I want to go for the championship. I know that it changes people’s lives, changes the person and I want to know how it feels.’"

Raikkonen appears to turn his back on a return to Formula 1 (James Allen on F1)

"I see that the leading French sports paper L’Equipe has an interview with Kimi Raikkonen this weekend, where he appears to close the door on F1 for good.

"The 2007 world champion switched to rallying this season after being dropped by Ferrari in favour of Fernando Alonso. He joined forces with Red Bull and Citroen in WRC and this led to suggestions that his route back into F1 might be with the current championship leaders, but RBR team principal Christian Horner has always dismissed such suggestions and this weekend Raikkonen seems to be saying that he will not be back in F1,

"’You never know, but I will probably not return to Formula 1,’ he said. ‘I became the F1 world champion, which I had always wanted to do, but times have changed. I do rallying now and there is far more to life than F1.’"

Video: How a team builds a car around its driver (James Allen on F1)

"You will have heard the expression "seat fitting" in connection with F1. Well this is what it looks like.

"This is a behind the scenes video I shot a little while ago at McLaren which provides a fascinating insight into the detail a team will go into to get the driver comfortable in the car. They have a perfect mock up of the chassis and all the components in it, like the steering wheel, headrest, seat padding and so on. You can see Lewis Hamilton working on the fine detail of the steering wheel movement and his seat padding.

"It is timely because we are now in the design phase for next season’s cars and this process is exactly what teams will be doing, working with a chassis mock-up so that when the 2011 chassis are built for real, all the driver-influenced details are in there and there are no nasty surprises."

Toyota Could Have Had Strong 2010 (Speed)

"Toyota was reportedly heading for a competitive season in Formula One this year until the Japanese carmaker decided to pull out of the sport altogether.

"The Cologne based team had completed its 2010 car, dubbed the TF110, when the shock decision to withdraw at the end of last season was made.

"Timo Glock, now at the back of the grid with Virgin, has said earlier this year that – according to the data – he might currently be fighting for the 2010 title had Toyota stayed another season in F1.

"’When we stopped the development, we had 20 to 30 points more downforce (with the new car) than the last version of its predecessor,’ Toyota’s technical director Pascal Vasselon has told Auto Bild in Germany."

USGP Austin Promoter Hellmund On Wind Tunnel With Dave Despain (Speed)

"USGP Austin promoter Tavo Hellmund interviewed on Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain Sunday Night.

"Hellmund: ‘I think the most important thing for American fans ?óÔé¼?ª for a true, natural terrain road course, kind of like in the ’60s, you’re going to be able to see a lot of the track.’

"’We don’t want to do this event for five, six, seven or even 10 years. The idea is for the Grand Prix to be here for the next 40 years.’"

Comment of the day

Bernie Ecclestone has announced a new deal to boost Formula One with financial services company UBS to become a global sponsorship partner of the sport. BasCB said:

The fact UBS signs this deal means F1 has been doing a good job to present itself as a good prospect for sponsors.

After the last 2-3 years I feel not only the financial crises but also the political bickering and uncertainty that went with the end of the Mosley era made a lot of sponsors (and participants) reconsider participating.

Will this bring another era of financial institutions bringing money into F1? Surely Williams and Sauber as well as all the new teams, and the other established teams would love to get a share of that.
BasCB

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday Andrew White, Hlahalasas and Lord Stig!

On this day in F1

Fernando Alonso earned his first win on this day in 2003 at the Hungarian Grand Prix.

This result at the time made Alonso the youngest ever driver to win a Grand Prix at the age of 22 years and 26 days – a record which remained unbroken until Sebastian Vettel won the Italian Grand Prix five years later.

Alonso led from start to finish, followed by Kimi Raikkonen for McLaren and Juan Pablo Montoya driving for Williams. Michael Schumacher came eighth and was lapped by Alonso.

72 comments on “F1 Fanatic round-up: 24/8/2010”

  1. Interesting, I though McLaren’s F-duct would make them even faster at Monza. Show’s I know nothing about the technical stuff!

    1. i thought the same, on long straights less drag is important, so the F-duct should fit them. i really can’t understand McLaren’s move…

      1. The F-duct is used to turn off the downforce if you will. That’s of benefit when you have a long straight on an otherwise twisty course. At Monza so much less downforce is required overall that all teams will run special low downforce setups that reduce drag over the entire circuit, not just on the straights. Hence, no real need for the F-duct.

        1. The interesting part here for me is, that McLaren has actually developed a aeropackage without the F-Duct, as they claimed at Monaco, that they have no such thing when they were asked why they run the F-duct there.

          That shows just how competative the season is, they found the need to develop this for Monza only!

          1. can’t be that hard to take off. just remove the duct at the front and remove the pipes in the bodywork. no real aerodynamic difficulties…

          2. They make a specific Monza rear wing anyway. These things are so flat they probably didn’t even have room to put the f-duct in.

            Look at the 2009 Monza spec wing vs the Spa wing already:
            http://www.f1technical.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=127190#p127190

    2. yeah me too. With no testing though, surely they should give the f-duct a run in friday practice?

    3. Surprisingly, the F-duct will add drag to the car. The wings they run at Monza produces so little downforce that there nothing to reduce with the F-duct.

    4. Lol glad to see I’m not the only one! I thought the F-duct would help, but thanx to all that explained above that in fact it will add more drag..

      Happy Birthday our moderator Lord Stig! Hope you have a great day :) and Happy B-day to Andrew White & Hlahalasas

      1. Thanks LAK! (I guess even as a moderator I still have to make a long sentence…)

    5. You’re not the only one.

    6. I would imagine that the reason for Mclaren not running the F-duct is to do partly with the lack of need of the downforce cancelling element of it, as they, like every other team will be running minimum trim, but also to do with the fact that the tiny monza wing might be too small to fit all the slots and ducts required to drive the duct in the first place.

    7. How do you stall a front wing I wonder?

  2. That Mclaren news was certainly a shock when I first read it but I guess it does make sense. I don’t really understand the reason but im guessing in laymans terms it means the downforce the f duct gets rid of wont be there anymore because of the package they are building.

    Whilst at firsts it looks like an advantage for Red Bull the article says that most teams will adopt this, and the Bull just oozes downforce which means a lot of drag plus the reanult engine doesnt help I guess.

    I personally think RB will be strong at Spa but I really think they will struggle in Monza. Should be interesting next couple of races

    1. Red Bull will run a low-drag low-downforce setup at Monza just like everyone else, so while I don’t expect them to be dominant, they shouldn’t be left in the dust. Their bigger problem at a circuit like Monza is that their engine is down on horsepower over their two main competitors.

      1. it’s easier to strip off downforce then put on downforce. They should be able to get a very balanced car fast in the corners but the question will be there top speed. They will be I predict fastest in the twisty middle sector but top speeds will probably go to Force India, Toro Rosso and McLaren as usual. Virgin might actually score got on top speed to. The start will be hard for the RBR guys but if they can hold others of until the middle sector I think they should be good to go.

  3. “Ferrari would be prepared to launch civil action against the FIA if the team is stripped of its points accrued from the German Grand Prix at the World Motor Sport Council hearing next month, according to La Gazzetta dello Sport .”

    Exactly what kind of civil action could they possibly peruse?

    1. i meant “pursue”

    2. Good question, some italian specialty?

      They can hardly argue that they are not subject to FIA rules, so i guess they would argue that a lot of TO has gone unpunished or even unquestioned in the last years.
      But to do that, they would actually have to go the full stretch of full admittance, that they actually did use team orders. That is their choice, but how on earth are they going to prove or make viable the fact that TO are pretty commonly used?

      Or maybe this is just a bit of eye balling before coming to an agreement with the FIA and settle the matter without too much problems.

      1. I don’t think that the FIA can give them another penalty for using team orders, Ferrari can always argue that it was only an advice and it was Massa’s decision to let Alonso past and so on. I don’t even know if the 100k fine will remain.
        However, they are also called to the WMSC for breaching the infamous article 151c, ‘bringing the sport into disrepute’. If you look at the crowd reaction, the post-race press conference and all the news in the days after the race it is pretty clear that they brought the sport into disrepute with their actions. And we have seen in the past that there is a very wide range of penalties available for this particular offense…

        1. Your absolutely right on the 151c. That’s a kill all solution for giving penalties when other things cannot be proven.

        2. People should remember that a whole lot more was said than the few lines we heard on TV.

          For instance when Ferrari needs to explain Smedley saying that Massa “could still win this” when he was comfortably in the lead. Or why he said “sorry”.

          The WMSC is just a popularity vote type tribunal. Both sides state their case and the members vote who they think was most believable. There is no hard evidence needed there.

          For instance when no hard evidence was there in Briatore’s case, they still banned him. Then the court overruled this. Don;t think this will work so well in Ferrari’s case though.

  4. “Ferrari would be prepared to launch civil action against the FIA if the team is stripped of its points accrued from the German Grand Prix at the World Motor Sport Council hearing next month, according to La Gazzetta dello Sport .”

    Exactly what kind of civil action could they possibly pursue?

    1. technichally they never actually told him to move over, so they didnt really break any rules.

      1. They where found to have given team orders, Meaning they broke the rules.

        The stewards decide if and when someone has broken the rules, and they decided that Ferrari had.

      2. one interesting element of this though, is the fact that Ferrari have more or less confessed that it WAS a use of team orders, through some of their press statements and the infamous “horse whisperer” blog. So I dont see how they could make a case that it wasnt team orders. Sounds like a bunch of posturing to me.

        1. Abunch of posturing from an Italian La Gazetta Dello Sport, not Ferrari by the way.

  5. Hey Webber, your boy Will Power needs someone to give him a challenge on a road course. Come to Indycar!

  6. Tavo Hellmund certainly makes it sound like Austin is gonna be great. It’ll be interesting to see if it’s all just hype or not. I read somewhere a while back that they planned to release the track layout to the public sometime in September. Here’s hoping that’s still true.

    1. Yes, a September release has been confirmed. They need to run it by the FIA first to get approval. That presentation is said to be some time in September.

      1. Let us hope the FIA go along and won’t feel the need to add tarmac run off etc., as this would postpone start of the actual building.

        I am looking forward to seeing the track design Hellmund is so proud of, that will rock our boat for the next 40 years.

    2. It would be cool if they could get a mockup into F1 2010 as a DLC at some point not long after the release

  7. well, i still have my ticket for the 2003 hungarian grand prix. I was devastated when some spanish guy won the grand prix, and he gave a lap to Schumacher, and he only finish 7th or 8th. So i was there when alonso got his first ever win in F1. I was angry back then, and now, thing have changed. I’m still a ferrari guy, and kinda proud that i was there at alonso’s first ever win
    just a thought

  8. I was one of that people who thought that Toyota could have won their first race in their history in normal condition.

    1. I also think Toyota could have won last year. And with their super car, why did they quit instead of winning and then stopping?

      Is it possible that the management new exactly what they had in hand and did not want to win it?
      It might have been the reason why they did not want to sell the package mirroring the Honda-Brawn deal, that would have made the desicion to quit pretty stupid.

      1. You see in the end they were lucky. Around the time they quoted they had all sorts of trouble with Prius car which did cost them a lot to repair.

        1. And then it went off the track with Toyota cars being reported as having brake/gas problems (a recent investigation showed, most of these cases were caused by the driver actually pushing the gas pedal instead of braking).

          But it would have taken some of the good feeling out of it, if Toyota were winning in F1 while at the same time having to take back millions of road cars for problems.

    2. So was I. But

      Timo Glock, now at the back of the grid with Virgin, has said earlier this year that – according to the data – he might currently be fighting for the 2010 title had Toyota stayed another season in F1

      is pushing it surely. Glock is a good driver but could he be beating Vettel and Webber in their Red Bull? Not very often, I think.

      1. Who knows, if the car would have been as good, he might have been into the regular winner circle by now.

        1. If nothing else F1 has taught me that more often than not, the car makes the driver.

          1. A great car can certainly build confidence, but it won’t make the driver on its own.

    1. A 500 dollar fine, and having to apologize and state it was stupid (he did already do that right after the incident).

      At least it shows that there is no witch hunt going on there, i suppose he can miss the money any time!
      The worst punishment for him was the fact they busted him (it seemed to unsettle him in qualli) and the bad press in the aftermath.

      1. Even after all that groveling the judge still gave Hamilton the highest possible penalty for a first offender.

      2. I thought the whole thing was a bit odd really and that he was hard done by. He was charged with intentionally losing control of his vehicle but I find it hard to believe that one of the best grand prix drivers in the world was not in control of his road car at low speed wheels spinning or not.

  9. Thanks for puttin that Tavo Hellmund interview link on the site Cari. I like Tavo telling us how great it will be and how it will all work.

    Now they must be really intensive with the FIA to get the track design finalized, maybe it can be announced at the Monza weekend, that’s after the FIA world council has its planned meeting.

  10. Could anyone else Not get on to f1F yesterday afternoon, I could in the morning but in the evening my iPod and laptop both wouldn’t let me on :(

    1. Yep, the site had some software problems apparently, but now it is working OK. Cari refers to it at the top of the page.

      1. I too had some trouble getting in but later found out that there was a problem.

    2. I couldn’t get on the site either, was very odd!

  11. Guess who didn’t read the first sentance and feels like a fool for commenting before doing so…

  12. I was going to rant about Ferrari threatening legal action – but actually the ESPN article begins by saying that it’s the opinion of Gazzetta dello Sport, yet the quote from Ferrari is:”In this sort of situation, the best policy is to respect and to trust in the highest level of the sport’s governing body.” Questionable reporting there.

    1. Well spotted,

      If Ferrari do take legal action, well, that speaks for itself.

      But you may be right with that one.

  13. That Schumacer lap from 2003 reminds how awesome the V10’s sounded compared to todays engines.

    1. We should plan a birthday present.

  14. The 2007 world champion switched to rallying this season after being dropped by Ferrari in favour of Fernando Alonso. He joined forces with Red Bull and Citroen in WRC and this led to suggestions that his route back into F1 might be with the current championship leaders, but RBR team principal Christian Horner has always dismissed such suggestions and this weekend Raikkonen seems to be saying that he will not be back in F1.

    Well, that’s the end of that nonsen…

    Webber may not race in F1 beyond 2011

    Sod.

    1. Hahahaha!

      Actually, This Webber stuff isn’t really new news, He has been saying as much since the start of the year if not before. He said at the Aus GP that he would only continue if he had a championship winning car.

  15. When are we going to see this ruddy U.S track?? :(

    1. Did you bring a shovel? :-)

  16. Thanks for the birthday shout out :D

    1. HAPPY BIRTHDAY Andrew!

  17. Apologies for the outage guys, our hosting provider suffered an outage we had to recover from.

  18. Above was me using the wrong account :)

    1. Glad it’s working again!

  19. I agree with Mosley, Ferrari should have their German GP points withdrawn.

  20. “On this day in F1”

    The point is F Alonso’s victory for his first time but, despite there are many videos in YouTube about that win, you post an onboard video of M Schumacher. I’m still wondering why. I know this is not a big deal, just my curiosity…

    1. yer I wouldn’t mind but its not even 2003. Although to be fair to Cari the video was labelled wrong. The track was modified for the 2003 race and that lap was the old track

  21. Great Round up Cari, Lots of content, interesting content too. And there’s also a heap of new articles for me to read. Thanks!

    Now the only complaint can be that I don’t have nearly enough time to read it all!

    1. Thanks Ads for ruining my essay ;)

    2. Haha, Murray’s on fire in the ’93 one, when the TV director shows us the wrong car!

      And it’s fascinating to see Schumacher’s block on Hakkinen again (2000 race, the lap before the famous move with Zonta). It’s just like the Barrichello one, but without the pit wall. Which doesn’t make it alright.

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