Caterham running out of time to enter COTA race

F1 Fanatic Round-up

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In the round-up: Caterham’s chance of making the next round of the championship at the Circuit of the Americas is growing slimmer as the stand-off continues between Engavest and Caterham Group.

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Your daily digest of F1 news, views, features and more.

Caterham could miss United States GP (BBC)

“Ecclestone has this year been pushing for the big teams to supply customer cars to be run by smaller teams, but he says his preference for small teams such as Caterham to survive. ‘I’d rather not lose the teams,’ he said.”

Kolles: I’ve done everything I can (Autosport)

“Although the cars are being shipped on Saturday, Kolles said it would be possible to get them away even if the team only gets access to the factory a few hours before they are due to leave.”

Previous owners left £256K unpaid legal bills at Caterham (Adam Cooper’s F1 Blog)

“The previous owners of the Caterham F1 team failed to pay over £256,000 in legal fees before the team was sold to a consortium in June, court documents show.”

Michael Schumacher ‘could recover in three years’ (The Telegraph)

Schumacher’s doctor “I have seen some progress but I would say give him time. It’s like other patients, we are in a timescale that ranges from one year to three years, so it takes patience.”

Test in Valencia – Fong and Nissany debut in a Sauber C31 (Sauber)

“I have achieved my objective to complete 300 km without making any mistakes and at a good speed.”

Red Bull & Vettel: Frage nach Sponsoring “stellt sich nicht” (Motorsport Total, German)

Red Bull will not remain as personal sponsors to Sebastian Vettel when he makes his expected switch to Ferrari next year.

Allarme! La Ferrari 2015 sembra lenta (Autosprint, Italian)

Italian weekly Autosprint is already worried about next year’s Ferrari, claiming it’s slower than their current model based on simulations.

Kings of the road: Justin King and his son Jordan on living life in the fast lane (Evening Standard)

“Mexican driver Sergio Perez, recruited to McLaren last year, was bankrolled by telecoms tycoon Carlos Slim, for example. But then it boils down to talent. Perez, incidentally, didn’t last long in F1.”

The importance of timing (ESPN)

“Bernie Ecclestone’s big mistake in his initial approach to the Russian Grand Prix was one of timing. The then Soviet Union had no need for Formula One, with an image that was firmly fixed in the minds of the majority of the world’s television audiences.”

Emmo: 1974, and what happened next (McLaren)

“In truth, we, the Formula One community, are still focused on Jules [Bianchi]. Of course we are. We are all hoping and praying for him daily.”

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Comment of the day

Will Gene Haas’s team sink or swim in F1? @Bullmello is optimistic:

I think Haas has the ability to make it in F1.

He is already in the business of racing and knows what kind of commitment it takes.

He is bringing partners and sponsors on board, but is also self sufficient financially. He is not dependent on OPM (Other People’s Money).

He is partnering with the most iconic team in F1. Not always the most successful on the track, but certainly the team with the most clout in F1. Success on the track is cyclical and Haas knows that. As Haas learns and becomes more established in F1 he can adapt and change partners if needed. First, a team needs to become established, then find whatever it takes to improve. Ferrari have made some changes and maybe they will have more success within the next few seasons. Maybe Haas has tied in with Ferrari at just the right moment, time will tell.

His expectations are realistic. His future in F1 is not tied to winning races in his second or third season or else. He has stated five years to see what they can do. Some teams come into F1 with very unrealistic expectations only to disappoint everyone including their investors and then the money runs out.

Haas can adapt. Already he has changed some of his original plans and adapted. Part of this is due to the fact he did not rush to make it to the grid in 2015. That was a good move. It has given Haas more time to see what will work and what may not work.

All these points make it more likely that Haas will be in F1 for the long haul. Success on the track will be determined by many different factors and fortunes over the next few years. Within that time frame (starting in 2016) I would certainly give Haas better chances than Caterham, Marussia, Lotus or Sauber. It’s sad to think some or all of those teams may not even be on the grid in 2016. Over the first five years for Haas I would hope they have more success than Toyota did, for example. We shall see.

From the forum

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Adam Tate!

If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is via the contact form or adding to the list here.

On this day in F1

Juan Pablo Montoya departed Williams with a victory in the Brazilian Grand Prix ten years ago today.

He defeated his future McLaren team mate Kimi Raikkonen and pole sitter Rubens Barrichello, who had to settle for third. Here’s Montoya’s final lap:

Image © Caterham/LAT, BMW ag

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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60 comments on “Caterham running out of time to enter COTA race”

  1. Seb must be thinking: “AT LAST I’ll paint my whole helmet the way I want it without those stupid blue and grey squares…”

    1. Mind, he hasn’t used the tin can design as much in recent years! It will be interesting to see his helmet design next year though. My guess would be a blue one for Bergstrasse (the region of his birthplace). I doubt he’ll be changing it quite as frequently as he usually does!

      1. OmarR-Pepper (@)
        24th October 2014, 4:17

        not the tin (silver or grey / blue pattern) but what sometimes I don’t like in the helmet is the yellow circle. That’s why I really liked his helmet in Korea 2011, where the circle is turned into a golden ring:
        http://wtf1.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Korea1.jpg

        1. Agreed, that one is lovely.

    2. “Italian weekly Autosprint is already worried about next year’s Ferrari, claiming it’s slower than their current model based on simulations.”

      Damn. If this is indeed true, then thank god Alonso jumped from the sinking ship to the floating (hopefully) ship! And Vettel? Well, he just jumped into the fire caused by the sinking ship.

  2. “Mexican driver Sergio Perez, recruited to McLaren last year, was bankrolled by telecoms tycoon Carlos Slim, for example. But then it boils down to talent. Perez, incidentally, didn’t last long in F1.”

    Who on earth wrote that article? It takes just moments to check that Perez is STILL racing in F1 and quite frankly someone who knows so little – or can’t even be bothered to check – should not be writing articles on – or related to – the subject.

    1. jsw11984 (@jarred-walmsley)
      24th October 2014, 1:16

      I suspect it was meant to say Perez didn’t last long in McLaren

      1. @jarred-walmsley But the point is, some paid journalist wrote the wrong thing – something that could get him/her into masses of trouble.

        1. Sorry, not the journalists fault for this mistake (although James Ashton is a useless right-wing hack.)
          The subs are totally to blame, it’s their job to make the copy readable before it gets published. Easy to make a mistake when you’re writing it, unforgivable not to spot a mistake when sub-editing.
          Also worth mentioning this is in the lifestyle section of the paper, not sports.

          1. The subs probably don’t follow the sport and trust his authority and only correct grammatical errors or spellings.

      2. Or wishful thinking.

    2. The very words on my mind. Well said. Drivel like that only serves to remind me of why I was so happy when I found this website.

      1. But why is it even being requoted and linked to by this website.

        1. Perhaps as an example of how badly F1 is reported by mainstream media.

          1. @bazza-spock @timothykatz I don’t like to gloat at others’ mistakes – I do make plenty of them myself! – but in the context of the ongoing pay driver debate I thought it was worth highlighting this rather uninformed view on Perez.

    3. +1 I triple checked it when I saw his error, and I’ve already informed him via Twitter. LOL

      1. I just checked it and it looks as though he’s removed his error.

  3. how can next year’s Ferrari is slower than their current model, is there any new aerodynamic regulation that i haven’t heard of.

    1. ColdFly F1 (@)
      24th October 2014, 4:47

      Probaby referring to car & driver combo. We do not know officially, but we all ‘know’!

      1. Made me chuckle! :)

    2. Its only slower when you subtract Alonso’s 6 tenths.

      1. Well played, sir.

    3. ” I have achieved my objective to complete 300 km without making any mistakes and at a good speed. ”

      I don’t like the sound of this. These are the exact base criteria to be granted a super license (next to official approval of course) – I hope that’s not the reason why that was the objective and why he’s stressing it was fullfilled. I’d rather do without this kind of drivers in F1.

      1. It would be enough to have that superlicence if Lotus wanted to have a bit of leverage over Maldonado and Grosjean @mattds.

        1. @bascb I’m not sure if I would want Fong instead of even Maldonado :)
          But I can see how he could be a threat to Maldonado, if he brings a lot of cash.

    4. I’d rather wait to see.

    5. Maybe they should call Rory Byrne again… I wouldn’t trust those italian simulators I thin we all know that italian electronics are phenomenally reliable.
      This year’s car is actually not that bad if you consider how poor their engines were collectively in Monza. Rory did some consulting in this year’s car and he reckons the turbo is to blame for all complications. Anyway I’m hyped, I’m sure Allison can deliver the 2nd quickest car…

  4. Came across this today:
    http://charts.animateddata.co.uk/f1/
    It’s a really neat infographic webpage with the ages and wins of F1 drivers over time.

    1. +1 Wow it pretty nice, I bookmarked it.

    2. Oh,nice I Love infographics like those, bookmarked it

    3. Even Bernie is in there ! And what a long and colourful carrier he had ! :-)

    4. If only DNS’ and DNFs were seperated….. (Bernie had a DNS)

    5. @chaddy so you’re saying there’s still hope for me to start carts now at age 30 and by age 35-40, I’m good to go? :p

  5. Chris (@tophercheese21)
    24th October 2014, 2:37

    Wow, 2014 has been an incredible year for headlines.
    – Mercedes driver rivalry
    – Ricciardo upstaging Vettel
    – Marussia scoring their first points
    – Ferrari lose their team principal, and then their head honcho.
    – Vettel leaving Red Bull for Red overalls.
    – Verstappen becomes youngest driver to ever get a race seat.
    – Jules Bianchi’s tragic accident
    – Putin on the podium… And everywhere else.
    – and now Caterham look to be shutting up shop.

    This has been an incredibly memorable year, both for the right reasons, and the wrong.

  6. Chris (@tophercheese21)
    24th October 2014, 2:40

    Oh, and Susie Wolff being the first female driver to take part in an official session in a LOOONG time.

  7. Ferrari’s 2015 car is even slower? Ye Gads, what has happened to the team…

    1. What has happend to Ferrari? Ross left them years ago! Mind my words: The same will happen to Mercedes!

      1. So, by your logic, F1 is doomed because one guy left?

        1. So, by your logic, F1 is composed of two teams: Ferrari and Mercedes?

    2. Alonso leaving. That’s what will have happened to the team

  8. If Air Asia is any means to judge Tony Fernades (I know it really isn’t) business acumen, well, no wonder Caterham tanked. Air Asia is just about the worst flying experience you can have. Non existent customer service, add on payments for everything (want to check in at the counter, pay extra, want to check in a bag, pay extra, want to eat, pay extra), this was done to make it a cheap alternative, but when you start paying extra, the tickets usually end up costing about the same as a decent airline. And oh yea, if you fly into our out of KL, you end up walking and walking down the runway to find your plane, in the blistering Malay heat, clever huh? I know that it is not realistic to make a comparison, but there is almost some comparison there. A bargain basement shoe string run airline, a competitive F1 team, just doesn’t fit does it?

    1. *considering the market it serves what I use it for

    2. Fernandes has a nice smile and says all the right things. That should be some comfort?
      The business isn’t a charity, he wants to make lots of money.

  9. @KeithCollantine, brilliant response to Reid there!

    1. Indeed.

      Bernie must go! F1 needs a fresh approach.

  10. maarten.f1 (@)
    24th October 2014, 8:27

    Caterham made a mess of things. It’s just embarrassing that nobody knows who the owner is and all this mud slinging is just incredibly sad. On the other hand, the way Formula 1 goes (no cost cap, etc.) it’s far too easy to make a mess out of things. It’s difficult for small teams to keep their head afloat, let alone be competitive.

    I am sad that it looks very much like the team will collapse and drop out. That’s sad for everyone who works at Caterham and on the long run not good for Formula 1. I’m not sad to see the owners (whoever they may be) go. I hope they’ll not be the first of many, but I know Sauber and Marussia aren’t exactly wading in cash either.

    Formula 1 needs to get their act together and I don’t think Ecclestone is the right man for that. I know he did a lot for the sport, to take it where it is now. However, in more recent times he did more harm than good. Also, the FIA must implement a cost cap (no matter how difficult that may be) and make sure that small teams can survive longer than 3 seasons!

  11. Is the failure of Renault another reason behind Caterhams fiasko? Was there any chance of Caterham to stay in F1 if Renault’s PU was more competitive? I mean this could happen to Force India as well. I know that they are older and bigger team but luck can swing fast in F1. If Caterham drivers were on 10 to 15 position on the starting grid, things would be much different. The decision to pull the plug off in the middle of the season is the real indication of this theory. Marussia is not far of the same path as well unfortunately…. There is something wrong F1 definitely.

  12. Gene Haas F1 project can work because he knows the business of motorsport (at a different level of course), he has money and people trust him and it’s good when you need sponsors. However, there are two things that worry me: (i) his base in North Carolina and (ii) Ferrari Power Units.

    Being the states can prove challenging because they could struggle to attract talent. Moving around from there could add extra operating costs and stress to staff.

    On PU, with the knowledge pushing for a Mercedes PU would be the right thing available, but for reasons I can’t explain it never happened.

    I hope they make it. It will be good for US and F1.

    1. maarten.f1 (@)
      24th October 2014, 14:05

      @jcost Didn’t he back out of the idea of having a US based team? I thought he wanted to have the factory in the UK after all.

      1. @jcost @maarten-f1 I believe he did decide after all to have a base in the UK. That was one of the adaptations I was thinking of. I’ll look for a link to confirm.

          1. He said the team will have two factories, one in the US and another in the UK for to fix the cars during the european rounds.

  13. Marussia is also running out of time to get their cars to Austin as the deadline is tomorrow. We could have 18 cars on the gird. @keithcollantine what will happen for qualifying structure

    1. @william Marussia? I didn’t know about this! Got a link please?

        1. Marussia also aren’t going to the US GP.

  14. If I were Kobayashi, I would leave Caterham now (if there is a way out of the contract), and attempt to jump into Marussia’s empty seat.

    1. Agree, but i heard somewhere that Mello is driving next year for marussia. and i hope that Marcus is in f1 next year. he is making motorsport coming back to life in sweden. Motorsport is seen as crap in sweden since Ronnie died. in sweden its all about ZLATAN! -.-

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