Hamilton “really happy” with Mercedes progress
F1 Fanatic round-up
In the round-up: Lewis Hamilton says he’s “really happy” after covering more laps than any other driver in Wednesday’s test.
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Mercedes progress pleases Hamilton (BBC)
“It’s going in the right direction. I’m really happy with it; 121 laps is really good.”
Kimi unflustered by lost laps (Sky)
Alan Permane: “Our target was more laps today and we’ve missed that. We were able to diagnose a problem with the gearbox, but rectifying this took quite a lot of time.”
Interview with Lotus’s Kimi Raikkonen (F1)
“I still want to do rallying. I had a good time and I knew from the very beginning that it was going to be tough. People say ‘oh, it’s been a failure’. Not at all – I started with zero experience and for that I did pretty well. Sure I went off, but anybody believing he could do better, go and prove it!”
Alguersuari unlikely to race outside F1 (Autosport)
“Possibly I did close other opportunities in other series but now I’m concentrating on this [the Pirelli role].”
The fastest woman in the world (The Daily Mail)
“Formula One female test driver Susie Wolff has announced that she will appear in a BBC documentary this spring about her life as the only woman in F1.
“The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) announced that it has asked banks in India to freeze bank accounts belonging to the Sahara group and some of its directors.”
Incheon to host world’s racing club with Lamborghini and Williams (The Korea Times)
“London-based investment firm Weingrow Partners said Tuesday that it will build the ‘world’s first exclusive lifestyle and racing club’ on Yeongjong Island off Incheon, close to Incheon International Airport, in collaboration with Italy’s supercar maker Automobili Lamborghini and England’s Formula One team and engineering firm Williams. It aims at completing the facilities by 2016.”
Tweets
Talked to someone yesterday who knew details of Ferrari’s break in to Williams pit in the dead of night on Thurs before German GP in 1980!!!
— sniffermedia (@sniffermedia) February 20, 2013
F1 driver customer satisfaction survey would be at all time high right now. Gridwalks will be easy, they’ll all be on pole. Podiums busy too
— Martin Brundle(@MBrundleF1) February 20, 2013
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Comment of the day
@Kodongo challenges the view that Lewis Hamilton is harder on his tyres than most drivers:
Did Hamilton have any trouble with last year’s tyres?
If memory serves, on this very track in 2012, he raced from 24th to 8th – overtaking his team mate – all whilst consuming one fewer set of tyres than anyone else in the rest of the field.
Perhaps we should pay more attention to what happens on track rather than outmoded assumptions.
@Kodongo
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On this day in F1
Lotus’s pre-season build-up was derailed one year ago today when they had to withdraw from the pre-season Barcelona test after discovering a suspension fault:
Tango (@tango) said on 21st February 2013, 16:12
I might be a bit late on the topic (and unfashionable), but Susie Wolff’s bio has reignited an idea here.
I know women can be as good as men in car racing. But fact is really little of them achieve anything at the top levels. Let’s take two hypothesis here : “There are no women in F1 because by 15 female kart racers leave the sport as there is no role-model for them and no support from parents”. “Women who do have a leg up in the sport are not always the most deserving and a lot is based on their image”.
I would say that the answer to that is to have a female F1 league with a female GP2 and why not GP3 (lets separate males and females at age 15). I know it seems very backwords of me to propose such thing, but I believe a successful FF1 (Female F1) would in the long term bolster the recruitment of talented women by increasing the talent pool, especially for the 14-to 17 yo and their parents who would carry on driving and investing in their sports careers as they would have models to inspire them. And then, maybe, in 20-40 years time, take F1 and FF1 best drivers and pit them in a Super F1 category and have fun seeing a great F1 show running men and women to know who (and not which sex) is the best open wheel driver in the world.
BasCB (@bascb) said on 21st February 2013, 17:42
Interesting theory. But I am afraid that when the current “male” series are already to expensive to be viable, it will hardly be possible to sustain anything close to a ladder to success for an extra female branch next to that @tango
Tango (@tango) said on 22nd February 2013, 8:27
Oups, wrong post ! Anyway, sure, I believe it is not viable, but I can’t see another way for more women in the sport. Thanks for the feedback @bascb
xjr15jaaag (@xjr15jaaag) said on 24th February 2013, 19:34
But Alice Powells hero and role model is Michael Schumacher, so I’m not really buying that.
Also, having a championship exclusively for women is a bit sexist; ‘here is your own special race series because you can’t race against the men’
Carrick Stonehouse (@cstonehouse) said on 25th February 2013, 0:10
Looking at American motorsport; a female league would be a bit silly. I can name a lot of females in NASCAR and IndyCar who aren’t Danica or Simona. Who’s heard of Johanna Long? Jennifer Jo Cobb? I could go on.