Kaltenborn takes one-third stake in Sauber

F1 Fanatic round-up

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In today’s round-up: Sauber CEO Monisha Kaltenborn now owns one-third of the team.

Links

Top F1 links from the past 24 hours:

Continuity in the Sauber F1 Team: CEO Monisha Kaltenborn receives a third of the stake in the Sauber Group (Sauber)

Peter Sauber: “Transferring one third of the stake to her represents an important step for me in providing continuity. My desire is to ensure that the company continues to be led as I would want over the long term.”

Webber column: Williams win ‘unreal’ (BBC)

“Drivers and teams do everything they can to try to predict how the car is going to be at a given race and how the tyres are going to behave. But it looks like there are some other ingredients that can tip it in a different direction for you and you suddenly end up in a whole other box.”

Mateschitz against F1 tyre ‘lottery’ (Autosport)

“Everyone has to learn F1 again. It has become a kind of lottery to find out the window in which a tyre works. And I do not believe this just happens on purpose to create more overtaking and tension in the races. I suppose no-one really understands these tyres.”

Conor Daly to conduct F1 test this week (The Buxton Blog)

“Young American racer and GP3 Series race winner Conor Daly has been chosen by the Sahara Force India F1 Team to conduct aero testing for the squad this week at Cotswold Airport [formerly Kemble] in Gloucestershire, the team has announced this morning.”

Darren Heath, F1 photographer (No Borders Magazine)

“I can have a five minute chat with Button or Webber for example, but drivers generally are often more than a little self-centred, guarded, arrogant, into themselves, blinkered etc, etc. I don’t mean to sound disingenuous about them – there are of course exceptions – but it is often the case.”

A shock weekend (ESPN)

“As I was heading back I could hear this explosion and everybody looked up at the smoke so I ran back through it all to see people pulling all the fire extinguishers down the pit lane. It was absolute bloody chaos, but what was amazing about the fire was the camaraderie and all the support that the teams gave.”

First among friends (Grand Prix)

Former Tyrrell chief mechanic Neil Davis: “I was over at Lotus, borrowing some bits and pieces [another interesting reflection on the times] when I turned round and saw a huge orange ball of flame where our team was. Ken [Tyrrell] had been using a five-gallon churn to add petrol to one of the cars. Fortunately the tanks were nearly full and Ken was adding the last little drop when the whole thing erupted like an inferno. Ken dropped the churn, partly on fire.”

Ayrton Senna’s debut F1 car does not sell at Silverstone auction (BBC)

“The car, which had a reserve price of 550,000, was being sold at the Northamptonshire racing circuit. However, it was withdrawn after bidding ended at 505,000.”

Contrary to the headline, this Toleman TG184 is not the car Ayrton Senna made his F1 debut in – that was the TG183B. Pictures of both below.

Woman’s Hour 16/5/2012 (BBC Radio 4)

How to make the perfect salad Nicoise. Also, an interview with Williams test driver Susie Wolff.

Comment of the day

Does the significance of the next race, the Monaco Grand Prix, get lost in today’s crowded schedule? Here’s what Bullfrog has to say:

I’m loving the sense of occasion in the weeks before the Indy 500, and there’ll be similar anticipation for Le Mans when testing gets underway. But the other event in the racing “Grand Slam”, the Monaco Grand Prix, doesn’t have the same build-up. It’s crammed into a packed calendar and presented as just another F1 event that begins with the same old team press releases full of words like “aggressive”, “programme” and “challenge”… seems a shame to me.
Bullfrog

From the forum

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Ponzonha and Tenerifeman!

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

Nigel Mansell’s domination of the 1992 season showed no sign of stopping in the San Marino Grand Prix.

He won from pole position for the fifth race in a row. And for the fourth time in five races he spent every lap in the lead.

Team mate Riccardo Patrese was second and he spent every lap in that position as well. Ayrton Senna, third, finished almost 50 seconds behind Mansell.

Here’s the start of the race:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMDw1u3AGLI

Image © Sauber F1 Team

Author information

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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30 comments on “Kaltenborn takes one-third stake in Sauber”

  1. thatscienceguy
    17th May 2012, 0:10

    Sweet! Always wanted a good recipe for salad Nicoise. Thanks for the link Keith!

    1. Same here, now listening to it!

  2. Don’t know what to make of Kaltenborn yet. She must be qualified if she’s been hand picked by Peter Sauber. All the best to her, she’s gonna be the first woman in the Piranha club!

    1. But how’s her salad Nicoise?

    2. A month or so ago I watched her being interviewed on CNN, she’s very passionate about her job and F1. I’m a fan.

  3. Nick.UK (@)
    17th May 2012, 0:53

    Well deserved I say. Whenever she gets TV time she comes acorss as having her head well settled on her shoulders. Which is more than I can say for some…. *cough, McLaren… *cough!

  4. What is most amusing about this ESPN telecast from twenty years ago is just how eerily similar it is to today’s American broadcasts. Same exact announcers. Similar fringe network. Same foolish spinny world graphics even.

    1. Todd (@braketurnaccelerate)
      17th May 2012, 5:41

      Yes, on those accounts I agree. Also, broadcasts from those days did not have quite the number of commercials American TV has today. NASCAR is ridiculous with adverts. In the final 40 or so laps, it’s almost 1:1 race to adverts. F1 is getting really bad with advertisements as well. For the GP’s taking place in Asia/Middle East that air at 1am-4am here in the States, there is always one particular sex chat hotline commercial that plays 5-8 times per race. Very low brow.

      1. there is always one particular sex chat hotline commercial that plays 5-8 times per race. Very low brow

        – as if the races are that boring you can actually use that offer and not miss a thing! Dear Advertiser, those times are definitely over for F1 :-) @braketurnaccelerate

      2. As an American that watches every F1 race on SPEED channel, there are ZERO commercials for sex hotlines. Those commercials must be coming from your LOCAL television provider.

        1. Todd (@braketurnaccelerate)
          17th May 2012, 9:29

          TV provider is DirecTV.

      3. @braketurnaccelerate – F1 doesn’t have adverts during the race or qualifying in Britain – wether you watch it on the BBC (which never has adverts anyway) or Sky (who now even have an uninterrupted build up too)

    2. Love the graphics!

  5. The key consideration for Sauber was that she was instrumental in the survival of the team after BMW pulled out. That alone mans she can be entrusted with the running of the team.

    1. That’s a good point.

  6. It seems the Austin Statesman is arguing to have the details of the court case between Tavo Hellmund and the rest of the COTA investors to be public, instead of keeping everything behind closed doors, as the COTA people want.

    Let’s hope they succeed and the public does get a grip on what is going on.

  7. Talking about the ‘tyre lottery’, I don’t believe it’s just a matter of luck. There are teams that haven’t been able to unlock the tyres in any of the 2012 races, like Mateschitz’s Toro Rosso. There are some who have been able to do that occasionally and Lotuses seem to be fine with the new Pirellis almost all the time. If you don’t understand the tyres, you simply need to work harder instead of believing that you possess subscription to GP wins just because you have more money to invest in your team than Sauber and Williams do.

    1. Exactly. Maldonado didn’t win by coincidence, that team got it right.

      He didn’t have a problem with the tyres last year mind :D

    2. I agree with that assessment @girts, this statement from Mateschitz shows he does not like not being in complete control as his first team is still looking at how to get it perfectly right and no doubt Toro Rosso is hurt by having two drivers who do not have experience with the teams, one of them a complete rookie.

      As you say, Lotus seem to be on top of the tyres mostly, and Williams also are pretty close to the sweetspot at most races. For the rest, it might be partly to do with temperature, but its something these teams just have to find out how to get right.

  8. Sorry, don’t agree with that COTD at all.

    The Indycar schedule is just as “packed” as the F1 calendar – it only has four fewer races but the F1 season has a couple of extra months to fill. Aside from break before the Indy500 there’s an Indycar race at least every couple of weeks.

    The reason for Monaco’s low profile is the awful/non-existent promotional work done by FOM.

    It annoys me when fans seem to think that expanding the calendar would be a bad thing.

    I’m sure there is a saturation limit for the number of races but if FOM can escape it’s obsession with big state-sponsored marquee events, restructure the calendar in a more logical way and actually start allowing circuit owners to make a real profit (and charge reasonable ticket prices) we could easily see the calendar expand by another 3-5 races.

  9. Nice commentary on why the owner of a big team would dislike the current “lottery” by Mark Gallagher ‏on twitter (@MarkGallagher62)

    Re comments from F1 teams, it’s clear they’re rattled that spend-fest on technology counts for nothing when they don’t understand the tyres.

  10. Button said something similar to Webber’s post. JB said even Williams cannot fully understand their performance at Circuit de Catalunya.

  11. Webber’s quote is taken out of context, although they used the same headline on the bc website.

    If you read the whole section about the Spanish race, it’s clear he didn’t mean unreal in the sense of lucky. He meant it as fairy-tale like.

    1. I think you are right there @ral, the Webber column is very nice in how he highlights how inspiring it is to see Sir Frank achieve all of this with his team, now with successfully climbing out of another low, despite having been paralyzed for a couple of decades.
      And also the notion of speedway rider Lee Richardson losing his life in an event this weekend (RIP), who I have never known but spend a thought thinking about thanks to Webber.

  12. Talking about Tyres, just look at this nice analyses by James Allen, and don’t forget to scroll down the comments to one from Alan Permane (LotusGP) reacting and putting in a slightly different view on Kimi’s stints.

  13. I’ve always been a fan of Sauber, and it’s nice to see that along with Williams they look to have managed to get themselves together as a well-run smaller team able to challenge the ‘grandee’ outfits. Is there a more well liked driver pairing than Sergio and Kamui?

  14. This sounds brilliant for Sauber. They’ve done such a good job of remaining a competitive midfield team since BMW packed up and left. It’s good to see that like Williams they’re putting measures in place to secure their future.

  15. Of course Mateschitz doesn’t like the ‘lottery’, because his cars aren’t the ones who are benefiting from it. There are teams who are getting on top of the tyres, like Williams, Sauber and Lotus. I think it’s interesting that the usual ‘midfield’ teams are the ones who seem to be coming out on top. It seems that the midfield teams that are more used to such a tight-knit pack are getting the most out of the little things, that this year turn out to be big things, like tyre usage.

    We’ve already seen McLaren make crucial mistakes, that otherwise may have gone unnoticed had the field been more spread out.

    1. I don’t think making two ten second pit stops twice and a normal but quite slow one in a race would have gone unnoticed.
      And even more about putting wrong quantity of fuel.
      Even if they where fighting just one team such mistakes would have lost them the win.

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