“More friction” between teams now – Hembery

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In the round-up: Pirelli motorsport director Paul Hembery says growing friction between the teams has frustrated attempts to gain agreement on tyre testing.

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‘We don’t need to do Formula One to survive’ (ESPN)

Pirelli motorsport director Paul Hembery: “The teams in the first year were quite a lot better at working together and we’ve seen that dissipate over the last two and a half years. That’s not just with us, I think there’s lots of things going on there behind the scenes with new agreements – the Concorde Agreement – and things like that, some teams struggling, so there’s a lot more friction between the teams than we’ve seen before. Whilst individually we have fantastic support from all of them, collectively it’s not quite there.”

Daniel Ricciardo Q&A: I drove to my ability (F1)

“It was my mistake – I just lost the rear on the entry to the corner. I was probably pushing a little too hard. The gravel was a bit like quicksand – I thought I’d get out but I couldn’t.”

Maldonado laments test limits (Autosport)

“It was quite limited by Pirelli and the FIA, so we just tested the different compounds of tyres they give us – medium, hard and prototype.”

Da Costa targets 2014 drive (Sky)

“I don’t hide it – my goal is to be in Formula One next season, but this will only happen if I do a good job in World Series [Formula Renault 3.5].”

Ecclestone described as ‘difficult to control’ (FT, registration required)

CVC Capital Partners chairman Donald Mackenzie: “The difficult situation here was we had a manager who was the owner of the company, who was also very powerful [and] who on the other hand was also difficult to manage.”

Silverstone test – day two (Toro Rosso)

Carlos Sainz Jnr: “When I got out of the car at the end, I went round to every mechanic and said ‘thank you for being part of the happiest day of my life!’ Driving the car was an incredible feeling and this track helped, because if there is one circuit where you are really going to feel you are in a Formula 1 car, it’s Silverstone.”

Race Of Champions returns to Bangkok (Race of Champions)

“The 2013 Race Of Champions will be held at Bangkok’s Rajamangala Stadium on December 14-15. The news comes after Thailand, which hosted last year’s ROC, again beat off a wide range of contenders from all round the world to stage the prestigious event.”

Tweets

https://twitter.com/PaulHembery/status/357857027722186752

Comment of the day

@Webbo82 was disappointed by what they saw – or couldn’t see – at the Young Drivers’ Test at Silverstone:

I was there and have been very disappointed. If you’re looking for a chance to see F1 cars at their best, don’t bother going. Nowhere will you find in advance that a third of the track is closed, until you walk to each end of the cordons.

You guessed it, Copse, Maggots/Becketts and Stowe all blocked-off. All you get for your money (add a third for buying on the day, by the way) is a short section of Abbey, then nothing until the end of Brooklands up to before the turn-in of Copse. What a let-down.

I tried to get a refund (had to walk another half a mile from the ticket stand) but was refused. Was told that it was only my opinion that those corners are the best places to watch, despite a driver and the track announcer saying just that only an hour before!

Apparently there aren’t enough staff to cover the track (though there were plenty to block it off and to man the Silverstone merchandise shops, of course).

Unless I get a refund, it will be the last of my money they see, I’d rather go to any other circuit – and I’m told it can be cheaper to travel to Spa for race day!

If you’d like to get a refund, or dispute their treatment of the fans – I have a contact name to write to, though after speaking to her today, I’ll be addressing her manager.
@Webbo82

It seems Silverstone have since updated the information on their website to show which areas are not accessible.

From the forum

Happy birthday!

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If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is by emailling me, using Twitter or adding to the list here.

On this day in F1

It was a one-two for Ferrari’s British pair Peter Collins and Mike Hawthorn in the British Grand Prix 55 years ago today.

With Roy Salvadori third for Cooper and Stuart Lewis-Evans fourth for Vanwall, the top four places were taken by British drivers at their home race.

Images © Daimler/Hoch Zwei, Red Bull/Getty

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46 comments on ““More friction” between teams now – Hembery”

  1. Interesting stat! When was the last time the top four drivers in a home grand prix were from that country?

    1. 1982 French Grand Prix I think

      1. Yeap…Arnoux, Prost, Pironi and Tambay…to add that it was a Renault 1-2 as well. It was just short of a French clean sweep of Pole, Win and Fastest lap. Patrese set the fastest lap in His Brabham.

        1. Interesting, I would have expected it to be Gemany in early 2000’s , with the schumacher brothers, heidfeld, frentzen and some other german’s in competative cars

          1. Well, Germany had a number of races where it got close – 1999 Brazilian Grand Prix. If Mika Häkkinen had been German, there would have been a German 1-2-3-4 win, pole and FLAP with a German engine winning.

          2. *had one race where it got close

    2. Just to add to that: if you dismiss the Indy 500, it has occurred three times. Apart from the 1982 French GP, the others were 1958 Britain and 1965 Britain.

  2. I really do feel sorry for Pirelli, no wonder Michelin wanted more control and a modern profile if they were to comeback.

    1. I really do feel sorry for Pirelli

      i don’t because a lot of the issues they have seen this year have been there own doing.

      nobody asked them to make the changes they did to the tyres with the steel belt & other construction changes & its those changes & those changes alone which caused all of the problems through this year so far.
      had they stuck with the same construction they ran in 2011/2012 (which is what were going back to for the rest of the year) then we would not have seen any of the problems we’ve seen this year.

      also consider that had pirelli said earlier in the year that they had some safety concerns with the tyres then they could have made changes pre-silverstone without needing the teams to agree. the tyres were delaminating, they were suffering a lot more cuts than in the past & the gpda (the drivers) felt there was a safety concern yet pirelli did nothing & instead insisted thee was no problem but that they wanted to bring new tyres anyway knowing teams would never agree to it. they put there own pr image above the good of the sport & created the farce at silverstone before finally admitting there was a safety concern.

      i thought pirelli did a great job in 2011, i applaud the job they did that year. however in 2012 they started going too far with the low operating window & in 2013 with the new construction & steel belt they clearly went way too extreme & that led to safety problems, stupid levels of degredation & boring tyre management races early on.
      if they get the contract they need to go back to what they did in 2011, tyres that suffer from sensible levels of wear but that can still be pushed so that we actually see some hard racing instead of lap-delta running & silly tyre management.

      if they cannot do that then they should leave f1 & let someone who can come in!

      1. Perhaps going to the steel belt was a less than stellar idea, but their intention was to prevent the tyres from deflating in the even of a cut. Too bad it ripped the whole bloody thing off!

        I dont think the blame lies squarely with Pirelli. I think they have done a great job. They have done what they were asked to do…its almost a case of “damned if you do damned if you dont”

        Paul Hembery has conducted himself well, but every person has a breaking point, I think its fast approaching, the cracks are appearing through his comments. The situation has not been managed well as far as I can tell. F1 always makes things difficult for itself. Its always a problem when an organization is run at the whims and fancies of a few people…this is F1, its a bloody circus.

        Pirelli should walk away. I would if I was Paul Hembery. It will a slap in the face to F1…hopefully they will learn from it…but the chance of that is slim. Bernie has very thick skin.

        1. Perhaps going to the steel belt was a less than stellar idea, but their intention was to prevent the tyres from deflating in the even of a cut.

          No, the idea was to increase thermal degredation to make races even more “exiting”.

          1. erhaps going to the steel belt was a less than stellar idea, but their intention was to prevent the tyres from deflating in the even of a cut.

            No, the idea was to increase thermal degredation to make races even more “exiting”.

            No, the idea was to save money.

      2. I think it was the enthusiasm in 2011 and 12 for race upsets that pushed Pirelli into ever greater fragility, but the artifice could not go on.

      3. Pirelli was asked to do this. It’s arguable about the steel belt issue “problems” though. If they’re truly safe then Pirelli should not have had to change the tires and just put in a rule to use the tires properly. Simple as that.
        But the overall problem stems from the fact that had they not been tasked with the made-to-degrade tires in 2011, this likely would not have been a problem it has come to today.

        1. Yeah I think Pirelli were basically doing as they were mandated by F1 to do. And F1 also mandates the limited testing opportunities, so unfortunately nobody within or without F1 knew until they were racing in anger how these tires were going to fail particuarly at hot, high-speed-corner venues.

          Personally I don’t like tires being so much of the story of F1 like it is these days. And I also think Pirelli/FIA/F1 should have had the guts to call the tires unsafe when they first started to delaminate. I never bought, and never will, the argument that because they weren’t deflating they were still safe. Michelin had to make a hugely gutsy decision in the US to advise their teams not to race on their tires, and that was because they couldn’t handle one corner of one venue all season. Pirelli didn’t need nearly the courage to pull the safety card, because they have been mandated to make these tires under conditions of very limited testing. Had they and F1 pulled the safety card, there wouldn’t have needed to be the controversy of calling upon a team to do a private tire test just so that Pirelli and F1 could get themselves out of a jam fairly under the radar ie. Mercedes wouldn’t have been put in the position they were.

          1. @robbie, you make a good point about the indy/michelin incident, I think it is also worth reminding people that the problem with that “one corner” was that it was part of a very high speed BANKED OVAL which induced much greater loading on the tyre than the normal unbanked corners of F1 tracks.

  3. That Ed Foster must have been thinking this one up since Melbourne. *slow clapping*

  4. The news comes after Thailand, which hosted last year’s ROC, again beat off a wide range of contenders from all round the world to stage the prestigious event.

    *’beat off’ should read as ‘outbid’

    1. Yes, but I like to think of the bidding process ad being a lot like the Thunderdome.

    2. If you consider the venue, then “beat off” is indeed apropos.

    3. Wow, they really want that race..

      1. @nackavich – hehe lol… you owe me a keyboard, to replace the one I just fouled by spraying diet coke out of my nose as I laughed hysterically to your comment!! haha

    4. I hope the have a bigger stadium this year, it was jam packed last year!!!

      1. Looks like you gotta beat off the spectators from rubbing elbows

  5. I have to say that I think the COTD is a little unfair. Anyone who expected to see the cars going at full throttle was always setting themselves up for disappointment. The teams have a testing programme that they need to get through, and that takes priority over putting on a show for the fans. It’s the sane problem as people complaining about the lack of running in Friday practice sessions. You might have paid good money to get in, but the teams don’t owe you anything – especially if meeting your expectations is detrimental to their own programme. It has been well-documented that teams don’t do much running in testing, and that what running they actually do is rarely done flat-out. So I think it’s unreasonable to ask for a refund just because access was limited and you were disappointed with what you saw.

    If I could go to a test session like the one at Silverstone, I’d pounce on the opportunity. The only time I’ll get to ser Formula 1 cars in person is if I can get to the Australian Grand Prix, which is held in a city over a thousand kilometres away. I have to stay up late to watch races, and usually have to miss races like Brazil and Canada because I work on Mondays (try teaching 30 Year 7 kids first thing on Monday with four hours’ sleep – it’s not fun). So if I had the chance to go to a test session for twenty pounds, I’d be there in a heartbeat and I’d try to enjoy every minute of it. On the other hand, I wouldn’t complain because I couldn’t access parts of the circuit or the drivers were going slowly.

    1. Liam McShane (@)
      19th July 2013, 9:00

      I agree entirely. It is a test after all. It was silly to expect the whole track to be open considering they weren’t expecting many people to show and they were right. I went to the Silverstone classic last year and a lot of grandstands and places were closed but I didn’t mind because there will still great places to watch.

      1. If you read the follow-ups from the initial comment, then Silverstone had actually said those areas were going to be open. If you’re turning up with a camera expecting to get some good pictures (having been told the good places to get shots are open in advance) and then they aren’t, I think you’re quite entitled to feel hard done by.

        I think you’ve misinterpreted “seeing F1 cars at their best”, my take is he means it solely in the visual sense, not in any sort of performance sense.

        1. I still find it to be a fairly unreasonable criticism. Most test sessions are closed to the general public, or held so far away that it’s difficult to justify going. The circuit was open, and tickets were fairly cheap. That would be good enough for me, so maybe we can swap lives for a few weeks. I can appreciate the sessions for what they are when they are available, and he can enjoy being forced to miss races so that he can make it to work the next morning.

          1. If you fancy a steak, and you see a restaurant selling steak, you then make a point of calling them up to check they do steak (which they say they do), turn up and get told that they only have basic salads, are you supposed to be happy anyway solely because someone else is only eating a tin of baked beans?

    2. @prisoner-monkeys you’re completely missing the point. the frustration is about only having a few corners to go see the cars. he’s not annoyed about them not going full throttle or anything. read the whole COTD.

      1. @sat0113 – Hey, he gets to see the cars. Me, I live a thousand kilometres from the nearest circuit that can handle Formula 1. If I want to go to a race, I get one chance a year and I have to take the following Monday off work (and if I want to see free practice and qualiying, I have to take the Thursday and Friday off as well) in order to be able to see it and get back home. Which I can’t afford to do.

        1. That isn’t a reason for Silverstone to manage the event shoddily, otherwise you can dismiss any complaint about anything by saying ‘well you still have it better than me’. That isn’t constructive and doesn’t justify substandard information or management.

  6. I couldn’t disagree more with the COTD, I know I was lucky to be at the circuit early in the morning on the first day, when there was no security about, so I could see the cars through Copse, Maggots and Becketts and also on the other side from the same point Village, the Loop and Aintree (Refer to my forum topic YDT experience) but it was still an amazing day with that part of the circuit closed.

    The noise of the cars was immense, and seeing them through Brooklands, Luffield and Woodcote was great too. I seriously urge anyone who has the opportunity to go…to go! If not just for the pit lane walk, which was another fantastic experience.

    1. @jamiefranklinf1 Out of curiosity, what was the pit walk like? It was one of the main things that tempted me to go down, but unfortunately I couldn’t because of work.
      I saw some ‘show cars’ on display in the photos, but did many teams put the 2013 cars out, or leave the garage doors open at all?

      1. @bleeps_and_tweaks – The pit lane walk was very good. Most of the teams had 2011 or 2012-spec cars out on display, although the Red Bull certainly looked like the 2013 model, which is probably why they covered up the rear. Lotus were allowing pictures with the car, and Max Chilton came out to sign autographs and take pictures with the fans, which I thought was great.
        The garage doors were left open, although there were screens up covering the actual cars…or at least some of the teams used screens. Sauber didn’t feel it was necessary :P

  7. what cheeks from silverstone. tickets were originally 15 quid. then they bumped it to 20 once they saw it was popular!

    1. *cheek (not cheeks, lol)

    2. @Sato113 – It was £15 to pre-order the tickets, but it was always meant to be £20 on the day, which is what they stated on the site. It was only the day before the event started that you could no longer pre-book the tickets.

  8. Well it was me that asked people’s opinions on the experience of the day, because I was going yesterday and wanted to know what to expect. I must admit it was a bit of a shame not being able to get to the best vantage points, and perhaps to some extent my disappointment was kept in check by the fact I’d seen those comments before I went and knew that to expect.

    But regardless I think a little perspective is needed. This is a test, for the benefit of Pirelli, the teams, and young drivers. I remember the test days of yore and this was always the case – they open the track to spectators purely to make a few quid back from the day, but really it’s not a show which is being put on for the benefit of the spectators, so you shouldn’t expect that big concessions are going to be made for your benefit. There were plenty of food stalls, and you still get to experience seeing F1 cars for what amounts to little more than pocket change. For anyone that thinks that’s bad value needs to consider the fact that you’ll pay several hundred quid for general entry to a GP weekend at Silverstone.

    I had a good day, enjoyed seeing the cars in action, and thought that it was one of the nicest experiences I’ve had at that track. There weren’t any of the shirtless, shaven headed yobs strutting around swilling beer like you get at race events, and there were lots of seats in the grandstands. It was a relaxed atmosphere, the weather was stunning, what more could you possibly ask for? Is that not worth £15?

    1. Well said and is it fair to say that at least yesterday you got to view the cars from several vantage points, even if they weren’t the best vantage points in some people’s opinion? ie. on Sat and Sun of a race weekend you are paying full pop and your seats are your seats…one vantage point all weekend.

    2. thanks for your angle on this @mazdachris!

  9. Thanks to Roscoe for doing some much needed tyre testing for Mercedes!

    1. Bit unfair though…Roscoe has 4 wheel drive, and is a ringer at chasing tires.

    2. His “wheel tether” seems to be holding up nicely: he ain’t going nowhere!

  10. bernie ecclestone is a hard man to control…never would have guessed that :P

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