F1 Fanatic round-up: 9/10/2010

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Final practice is coming up soon but if you’re quick you can still get your Japanese Grand Prix prediction in before it starts: Predict the Japanese GP winner here to win F1 DVD boxsets, T-shirts and more

Here’s today’s round-up:

Links

Here comes the rain! (Renault F1 Team fan site)

“As darkness falls around Suzuka this evening, so does the rain. And if you listen to the weather forecasts, the wet conditions looks set to continue for the next 24 hours. So it’s a case of rain coats and umbrellas at the ready as we brace ourselves for what is likely to be a very wet qualifying session tomorrow afternoon.”

Japan GP – Conference 2 (FIA)

Franz Tost on the Korean Grand Prix: “As far as I know, Charlie Whiting will go there next week, will have a look, will have an inspection and then they will make a decision and so far as I know we will go there and we will race there. Maybe there’s a little bit of an advantage (to that for us), we will see. Just let’s go and see what’s going on, because I haven’t yet seen the track, therefore it’s difficult to estimate the conditions but I’m convinced that the FIA and FOM will find the correct decision.”

Angry Massa hits out at newspaper misquote (ESPN)

“The newspaper put in Rubinho’s name. It wasn’t something I said. I spoke to the journalist today and they apologised.”

Mistakes mounting up for Hamilton (BBC)

“‘I see Hamilton and McLaren are throwing it away again under pressure,’ said a rival technical director.”

New bid to revive South African GP (Autosport)

“In exchange for building a 200 million venue, the group wants the local authorities to help support the plans by paying the 36 million per year race fee plus leasing it the land.”

Comment of the day

David A is not impressed with the limited scope of the new GP2 Asia calendar:

That is not a schedule.

If this series is to be taken seriously, this is what they should have:

2010
Round 1-2: Singapore
Round 3-4: Japan
Round 5-6: Korea
Round 7-8: Abu Dhabi

2011
Round 9-10: Bahrain
Round 11-12: Australia
Round 13-14: Malaysia
Round 15-16: China

You know, so it can actually be the Asian/Oceanic equivalent of GP2 Europe.
David A

From the forum

DamionShadows poses a controversial question: Le Mans or F1?

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Toby!

On this day in F1

Hear in Britain watching the Japanese Grand Prix live means setting the alarm clock very early. Those who did five years ago today were rewarded with an exceptional race – even though the drivers’ championship was no longer at stake!

Kimi Raikkonen and Fernando Alonso scorched through the field from lowly starting positions after a rain-hit qualifying session.

Raikkonen snatched victory from a flustered Giancarlo Fisichella on the very last lap. Alonso, though delayed by a race control error, put a memorable pass on Michael Schumacher around the outside of 130R on his way to third place.

The 2005 Japanese Grand Prix was runner-up in our ‘best race of the 2000s” poll last year.

Read more: 2005 Japanese Grand Prix: Last-lap pass seals stunning win for Raikkonen

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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22 comments on “F1 Fanatic round-up: 9/10/2010”

  1. It’s apparently still raining in Suzuka. Sounds like it ought to make for pretty exciting FP3 and qualifying. I’ll miss the live blogs tonight, but catch you all tomorrow for the race!

  2. I remember that race. I woke up (at 2 am) and saw the entire race happy because my favourite driver at that time (Fisichella) was winning and it looked like he’d get it no matter what, with Kimi and Alonso almost out of the race.

    I was so depressed when Kimi overtook him that I went to bed straight away, woke up very late, watched the TC2000 race (my fav driver there won, but i didn’t care anymore) and went back to bed after lunch :(.

  3. Completely agree with David A. The current GP2 Asia schedule is an absolute disgrace. They should look to support the Grand Prix’s as often as possible, with a few stand alone races at other Asian circuits over the winter, like Sentul in Indonesia, Dubai, Qatar etc

    1. Or just combine the two GP2 series into a more substantial global series. Isn’t all the same teams anyhow?

      1. Before the coming seasons the GP2 Asia series did use the older cars, probably to save cost.

        With the new car is will probably be only a larget testing session and maybe in the future they will join the seasons.

  4. Glad to hear what Massa said about Rubens wasn’t true, I thought there was something shady about that.

    I finally bought F1 2010 today, as i’ve only just acquired a PS3. Wish me luck guys, should be fun…

  5. I’m all for new races, and I’ve long said that the calendar needs to visit Africa and Russia in order to be a true World Championship … but I’m not sure I like the plan for the South African Grand Prix. It’s too compact, too tight. It’s clearly been built within a perimeter, but the problem is that the perimeter itself fees like an afterthought, as if they’ve tried to squeeze it. It doesn’t help that the circuit would be better if run clockwise (anti-clockwise circuits seem to be a bit of a fad these days). The article says it was based off the rejected Cape Town proposal, so I don’t see what’s wrong with borrowing parts of that circuit and working them into this one, preferrably in the place of that hairpin.

    1. Personally I think it looks rather good, like a better version of Hungary. I think it would work both clockwise and anti-clockwise. The big bonus for me is there’d only be 11 corners – having lots of unnecessary ones seems an even worse fad to me than direction (Shanghai, Valencia, Korea, Rome, Austin).

      1. I remember when a new circuit had fifteen corners – Sepang – and it was a big deal. Now we’re getting twenty-five in Valencia and Singapore. Tilke scaled it back with twenty in Austin, but I’ve never understood this “more is better” line of thought. Especially since you could impve both Valencia and Singapore by taking corners out. This is the Cape Town Proposal:

        http://farm1.static.flickr.com/23/38978455_078f69e654.jpg

        Work is needed – it’s still built to a triangular perimeter – but there’s some good stuff in there. Why couldn’t they stitch the back half of this circuit (the curvy bit) onto the front half of this new proposal instead of having that dreadful hairpin? If you could take the two best parts of each circuit and splice them together, it could actually be really good. These parts (sorry it’s so crude):

        http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/8762/southafricak.jpg

        That said, I’m not expecting much to come of it. It’s not a Hermann Tilke design, even if the backers are Bernie’s new friends from Abu Dhabi. I’m expecting it to go the same way as the talk of that circuit under construction in Mallorca (which was clearly intended for motorcycles first) stealing th European Grand Prix away from the disinfatuated Valencians: it won’t go anywhere.

        1. I see where you’re coming from but personally I think even the spliced version is too twisty.

          By the way, I think it’s meant to be run clockwise, because looking at it closely that would be one god-awful pit exit if it wasn’t.

          Interesting to see the Bahrain-style overtaking spot (if clockwise) if it’s not a Tilke track.

  6. Emlyn HUghes via Twitter:

    “…There is an extremely nasty storm cell 50 miles to the south of #suzuka #F1 circuit. Is currently bang on course to strike in the next 2 hrs…”

  7. ” The 2005 Japanese Grand Prix was runner-up in our ‘best race of the 2000s” poll last year” BOOY it deserve that. It was one of those race that even an F1 hater will love it.

    1. Sorry for the double post, isn’t it was Suzuka that once the qualifying on Saturday was called off due to storm & it took place on Sunday. Was it 2004 or 2005?

      1. I think it was 2004’s Grand Prix that had qualifying on Sunday morning. Because the race was entertaining, (I think) it lead to the early 2005 system where there was a session on Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning.

      2. that was 2004. A typhoon hitted Suzuka and they had to call off qualy on saturday.

        In 2005 the qualy was wet, but all the guys except Schumacher, ALonso, Montoya, Raikkonen and Alonso had to do their laps with wet tyres because just when Fisico (on inters, like all the others) was finishing his lap, it started to rain heavier than before.

  8. My second COTD! :D

  9. re: GP2 calender.

    People have to remember these teams are all based in Europe. Sure it would be nice to have the teams have a 10 event calender at locations all over Asia and Oceania, but realistically the teams just can’t afford it. Going back and forth between Europe and Asia is expensive a couple of times, nevermind 10 times! It makes sense for the survivability of the series to have a short calender based mainly in the middle-east.

    They probably should change the name to GP2 Winter Series or something to be a better description of the series.

    1. They don’t go back and forth, they go out once and hop between the races. Or at least I think so and if they don’t, it would seem a more sensible tactic!

      1. you can’t expect team members to go away from home for months on end. And I’m sure the teams would want the cars back at base for tinkering/maintenance if it was an extended series.

        1. The drivers tend to stay out, but I think most of the team go home. They say it’s hard to bring upgrades to the flyaways so that’s what leads me to think the cars themselves might not make the trip too. Although I’m probably wrong – what ever makes sense?

  10. Is it me, or are they denying this a bit too strongly: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/9076348.stm

    On the face of it seems a pretty far-fetched story anyway, but it seems to be gathering pace.

  11. RBR running the wing on the ground is back according to R. Brawn.

    What a joke! No wonder no one could get near them in free practise.

Comments are closed.