Source: http://www.planetf1.com/driver/3370/9035235/Title-challenge-over-in-July-Alonso
Saturday, November 30, 2013
Title challenge over in July - Alonso
Fernando Alonso admitted that he knew he wouldn't be able to prevent Sebastian Vettel from recording a fourth successive title as early as July...
Confusion remains over 2010 entry list
There remains confusion over how many teams will be on the grid in the season-opener in Bahrain next wee
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/teamus/motorsport/story/10015.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
Discredited US F1 reaches the end of the road
US F1 will not launch a renewed bid to debut in Formula One in 2011
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/18561.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
Friday, November 29, 2013
Bernie Ecclestone - No plans to put the brakes on
 |
The way I feel at the moment, why stop? I do it because I enjoy it. And yesterday is gone. I don't care what happened yesterday. What else would I do? People retire to die. I don't get any individual pleasure because we don't win races or titles in this job. I'm like most business people. You look back at the end of the year and you see what you've achieved by working out how much money the company has made. That's it.
Source: http://blogs.espnf1.com/paperroundf1/archives/2010/10/bernie_ecclestone_no_plans_to.php
Practice Two - Rosberg quickest again in rain-hit Brazil session
After topping the times in Friday morning's wet first practice session, Mercedes' Nico Rosberg was quickest again in FP2 as the rain continued to fall in Sao Paulo in the afternoon.
With lots of standing water on track, many of the teams left it until the last half hour of the session before doing any serious running. Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel went quickest late on, but Rosberg dislodged him with a terrific final run
With lots of standing water on track, many of the teams left it until the last half hour of the session before doing any serious running. Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel went quickest late on, but Rosberg dislodged him with a terrific final run
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2013/11/15289.html
Cool, canny Alonso seems to have all the answers
The remarkable story of Fernando Alonso and Ferrari's incredible season continued at the German Grand Prix as the Spaniard became the first man to win three races in 2012 and moved into an imposing lead in the world championship.
Those three victories have all been very different, but equally impressive. And each has demonstrated specific aspects of the formidable army of Alonso's talents.
In Malaysia in the second race of the season, at a time when the Ferrari was not competitive in the dry, he grabbed the opportunity provided by rain to take a most unexpected first win.
In Valencia last month, it was Alonso's opportunism and clinical overtaking abilities that were to the fore.
Other drivers may wonder how to stop Alonso's relentless drive to a third title. Photo: Getty
And in Germany on Sunday his victory was founded on his relentlessness, canniness and virtual imperviousness to pressure.
Ferrari, lest we forget, started the season with a car that was the best part of a second and a half off the pace. Their progress since then has been hugely impressive.
But vastly improved though the car is, it was not, as Alonso himself, his team boss Stefano Domenicali and Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel all pointed out after the race on Sunday, the fastest car in Germany.
Vettel's Red Bull - which finished second but was demoted to fifth for passing Jenson Button by going off the track - and the McLaren appeared to have a slight pace advantage over the Ferrari, given their ability to stay within a second of it for lap after lap.
But Alonso cleverly managed his race so he was always just out of reach of them when it mattered.
He pushed hard in the first sector every lap so he was always far enough ahead at the start of the DRS overtaking zone to ensure his pursuers were not quite close enough to try to pass him into the Turn 6 hairpin.
After that, he could afford to back off through the middle sector of the lap, taking the stress out of his tyres, before doing it all over again the next time around.
Managing the delicate Pirelli tyres in this way also meant he could push that bit harder in the laps immediately preceding his two pit stops and ensure he kept his lead through them.
Equally, he showed the presence of mind to realise when Lewis Hamilton unlapped himself on Vettel shortly before the second stops that if he could, unlike the Red Bull driver, keep Hamilton behind, it would give him a crucial advantage at the stop.
It was not quite "67 qualifying laps", as Domenicali described it after the race, but it was certainly a masterful demonstration of control and intelligence.
And there was no arguing with another of the Italian's post-race verdicts. "(Alonso) is at the peak of his personal performance, no doubt about it," Domenicali said.
It was the 30th victory of Alonso's career, and he is now only one behind Nigel Mansell in the all-time winners' list. The way he is driving, he will surely move ahead of the Englishman into fourth place behind Michael Schumacher, Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna before the end of the year.
At the halfway point of the season, Alonso now looks down on his pursuers in the championship from the lofty vantage point of a 34-point advantage.
That is not, as Red Bull team principal Christian Horner correctly pointed out in Germany, "insurmountable" with 10 races still to go and 250 points up for grabs. But catching him when he is driving as well as this will take some doing.
Alonso is clearly enjoying the situation, and is taking opportunities to rub his rivals' noses in it a little.
He is not the only driver to have been wound up by the index-finger salute Vettel employed every time he took one of his 11 wins and 15 pole positions on the way to the title last year.
So it was amusing to see Alonso do the same thing after he had beaten the German to pole position at Vettel's home race on Saturday.
The exchange between Alonso, Button and Vettel as they climbed out of their cars immediately after the race was also illuminating.
After standing on his Ferrari's nose to milk the applause, Alonso turned to Button and said: "You couldn't beat me?" He then pointed to Vettel and said: "He couldn't either."
All part of the game, but a little reminder to both men of what a formidable job Alonso is doing this season.
The race underlined how close the performance is between the top three teams this year.
Red Bull had a shaky start to the season by their standards - although to nowhere near the extent of Ferrari - but have had on balance the fastest car in the dry since the Bahrain Grand Prix back in April.
And while McLaren have had a shaky couple of races in Valencia and Silverstone, they showed potential race-winning pace in Germany following the introduction of a major upgrade.
Despite a car damaged when he suffered an early puncture on debris left from a first-corner shunt ironically involving Alonso's team-mate Felipe Massa, Hamilton was able to run with the leaders before his retirement with gearbox damage.
And Button impressively fought his way up to second place from sixth on the grid, closing a five-second gap on Alonso and Vettel once he was into third place.
This has not been Button's greatest season, as he would be the first to admit.
Germany was the first race at which he has outqualified Hamilton in 2012 and even that may well have been down to the different tyre strategies they ran in qualifying.
Nevertheless, he remains a world-class grand prix driver and Germany proved the folly of those who had written him off after his recent struggles.
And despite Alonso's lead in the championship, the season is finely poised.
Germany was a low-key race for Mark Webber, who was unhappy with his car on the harder of the two tyres but remains second in the championship. And Red Bull's two drivers clearly have the equipment to make life difficult for Alonso.
The McLaren drivers are determined to make something of their season still and Lotus are quick enough to cause the three big teams some serious concern.
Mercedes, meanwhile, have a bit of work to do to turn around their tendency to qualify reasonably well and then go backwards in the race.
"It's going to be a great, great season," said McLaren boss Martin Whitmarsh on Sunday. "It already has been a great season."
And the next instalment is already less than seven days away in Hungary next weekend.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/07/cool_canny_alonso_looks_diffic.html
Daniil Kvyat Q&A: Shortened Toro Rosso session a frustration
Just days after earning his Super Licence credentials, 2014 Toro Rosso racer Daniil Kvyat made his first official practice appearance for the team in the United States on Friday. With his session drastically curtailed thanks to fog and a faulty medical helicopter, the 19-year-old Russian got only limited running. Nevertheless, his pace was impressive to say the least
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews/2013/11/15253.html
Thursday, November 28, 2013
Ready Stefan GP hits out at US F1
Stefan GP will reveal its 2010 car next week in the hope that the FIA will allow it to take the place of any no-shows in this year's championship
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/9736.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
F1 present ideas in the 2013 F1 Fanatic Gift Guide | 2013 F1 season
Looking for a present for the Formula One fan in your life? F1 Fanatic's selection of F1-themed gifts include dozens of different ideas. 
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/f1fanatic/~3/1UP67hRXZP4/
Ferrari confident of title challenge
Ferrari Team Principal Stefano Domenicali is confident that the Maranello outfit will have a championship-winning car to call on next year...
Source: http://www.planetf1.com/driver/3370/9042929/Ferrari-confident-of-title-challenge
Race - selected team and driver quotes
Sebastian Vettel on claiming his ninth consecutive victory this season; Mark Webber on bowing out of F1 racing with second place; Fernando Alonso on ending the year on the podium; Lewis Hamilton on his tangle with Valtteri Bottas; Felipe Massa on his controversial penalty; and the Marussia team on beating Caterham to tenth in the constructors' championship. All 22 drivers and senior team personnel report back on an emotional day of racing in Brazil
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2013/11/15309.html
Wednesday, November 27, 2013
Title challenge over in July - Alonso
Fernando Alonso admitted that he knew he wouldn't be able to prevent Sebastian Vettel from recording a fourth successive title as early as July...
Source: http://www.planetf1.com/driver/3370/9035235/Title-challenge-over-in-July-Alonso
Nico Rosberg Q&A: Mercedes' motivation 'mountain high'
After victories in Monaco and Great Britain earlier in the year, Nico Rosberg is about to complete the most successful season of his Formula One career. This weekend his primary mission is to help Mercedes secure second place in the constructors' championship. But with the Silver Arrows' form very much in the ascendancy in 2013, Rosberg is already thinking of bigger things in 2014
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews/2013/11/15284.html
F3: West-Tec gets Mercedes power for '14
Top European Formula 3 Open squad Team West-Tec has completed a deal to use Mercedes power for its step up to the FIA F3 European Championship
Race - Vettel victorious, Webber bows out with second
Sebastian Vettel took his ninth consecutive win of 2013 at the final race of the season in Brazil on Sunday, as Red Bull team mate Mark Webber ended his F1 career with second place.
Vettel lost the lead at the start, but swiftly regained it and then never relinquished it. Webber too slipped back early on, but battled his way through, as Ferrari's Fernando Alonso completed the podium
Vettel lost the lead at the start, but swiftly regained it and then never relinquished it. Webber too slipped back early on, but battled his way through, as Ferrari's Fernando Alonso completed the podium
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2013/11/15308.html
Ferrari's aim is to win - Allison
Technical Director James Allison is confident that Ferrari will return to winning ways in the coming years after a transitional 2013 season...
Source: http://www.planetf1.com/driver/3370/9031341/Ferrari-s-aim-is-to-win-Allison
Tuesday, November 26, 2013
Raikkonen in rude health
Kimi Raikkonen already had a bottle of beer in his hand by the time he joined his Lotus team for the now-traditional group photo following a grand prix victory.
Knowing Raikkonen's reputation, it will almost certainly not have been the last drink that passed his lips in Abu Dhabi on Sunday night as he celebrated his first win since returning to Formula 1 this year after two years in rallying.
"For sure we're going to have a good party today," the sport's most famous hedonist said on he podium, "and hopefully tomorrow, when we are feeling bad after a long night, we will remember how we feel."
How long will you celebrate for, he was asked.
"I have almost two weeks," he said. "As long as I manage to get myself to the next race I think the team is happy. I try to get home at some point."
The party is well deserved. Raikkonen's comeback year has had its ups and downs, but a win has looked a probability since the start of the season, and in many ways the big surprise has been that it has taken so long.
Raikkonen has been remarkably strong and consistent in races this season, but until Abu Dhabi his best chances of victory had been squandered by starting too far down the grid.
Raikkonen has now taken 37% of his career victories after starting from outside the top three on the grid. Photo: Getty
He is the first to admit that he has made too many mistakes in qualifying. Indeed, for the first half of the season he was generally being out-paced over one lap on Saturdays by his novice team-mate Romain Grosjean.
But in the second half of the season his qualifying pace has edged forward, the mistakes have dried up, and this weekend everything came together to produce the result the team and he undoubtedly deserve.
Out of the car, Raikkonen is about as uncommunicative as they come. He simply refuses to engage in the media game. That can be frustrating for journalists who are searching for insight from an undoubtedly great driver, but still there is no mystery about his true character.
The radio messages that caused such amusement during the race sum him up.
His poor race engineer was only doing his job when he informed him of the gap to Fernando Alonso's Ferrari behind him, and some may find it rude that Raikkonen would respond by asking him to "leave me alone, I know what I'm doing".
But that is Raikkonen all over. He's a no-nonsense character, and he just wants things the way he wants them. And if he is not comfortable in the spotlight, he was born to be in a Formula 1 car at the front of a grand prix.
"Kimi is a man of few words but he's all about racing," McLaren driver Jenson Button said, summing up the Finn's unique appeal.
"It's good to see him have a good race here and collect the victory. He does deserve it. He is back for the racing. That's what he loves and it's good to see that."
For all his impressive performance, Raikkonen owed his win to Lewis Hamilton's wretched fortune at McLaren.
Yet another failure - this one in a fuel pump on the McLaren's Mercedes engine - cost Hamilton another victory. It's the second time it has happened in five races and it is the story of his season.
Hamilton said on Sunday that he had "been at my best this year" and so it has looked, but he also made a pointed reference to McLaren's myriad problems throughout the season: "We have not done a good enough job to win this championship."
For the men who can win it, it was a weekend of wildly fluctuating fortunes.
Following Sebastian Vettel's exclusion from qualifying because not enough fuel had been put in his Red Bull to provide the requisite one-litre sample, it appeared that Alonso had a golden opportunity to close down some of the advantage the German had eked out with his four consecutive wins through Singapore, Japan, Korea and India.
But after a wildly topsy-turvy race and an impressive drive by Vettel, the German joined his Spanish rival on the podium.
All three podium finishers gave an object lesson in racing to the many drivers who crash-banged into each other behind them, including each of their team-mates, and while Vettel's drive quite rightly stood out, so too was a little luck involved.
Vettel damaged his front wing against Bruno Senna's Williams on the first lap, but was able to continue and overtake the rabbits at the back of the field.
Then, not for the first time in his career, he made a mistake behind the safety car, misjudging the pace of Daniel Ricciardo's Toro Rosso as the Australian warmed his brakes, veering to avoid him, and finishing off the front wing against a marker board.
The mistake forced Red Bull to pit Vettel when they were not going to and the fresh tyres he fitted at the stop meant he had a grip advantage over the drivers he now had to pass.
Again, he sliced rapidly through the backmarkers - this time without incident - so that he was up to seventh by the time the pit-stop period started for those in front of him.
By the time the leaders had all stopped, Vettel was in second place, and suddenly it looked like he might have a chance of pulling off a sensational victory.
Raikkonen's Lotus team, for one, thought Vettel would not be stopping again, but Red Bull were concerned enough about tyre wear to want to play safe, and the 20 seconds he lost in his second pit stop were then wiped out by another safety car.
Fourth at the re-start, the fastest car in the field and on fresher tyres than Raikkonen, Alonso and Button ahead of him, it again looked like he might win.
In the end, though, Button's clever defence kept him behind long enough to ensure that although he could pass the McLaren, third was as far as he was going to go.
BBC F1 chief analyst Eddie Jordan said Vettel's ability to salvage a podium finish from a pit-lane start must feel like a "dagger in the heart for Ferrari" but if Alonso was disappointed you would not want to play poker with him.
He talked about his pride at finishing second in a race Ferrari had expected to deliver a fifth or sixth place - and as Red Bull team boss Christian Horner pointed out, Alonso celebrated on the podium as if he had won the race.
For a while now, Alonso has been saying Red Bull's winning run would end, that eventually they would have some bad luck.
Well, in Abu Dhabi they had it, and still Alonso could gain only three points on Vettel, and it was noticeable that the tone of his remarks after the race shifted slightly.
In India two weeks ago, he said he was still "100% confident" of winning the title. After Abu Dhabi, though, he did not repeat that remark.
"Without the problem for Sebastian we were thinking we would exit Abu Dhabi with 20 points deficit or something and we are 10 (behind)," Alonso said. "In the end it was a good weekend for us.
"They will have the fastest car in the last two races. There is no magic part that will come for Austin or Brazil. But as I said a couple of races ago, they have the fastest car, we have the best team. So we see who wins."
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/11/post_abu_dhabi.html
F3: German F3 engines align with British
Germany's national Formula 3 Cup has fallen into line with the new British F3 rules by readopting the last generation of production-block engines
Monday, November 25, 2013
F1: Bottas sure he did nothing wrong
Valtteri Bottas is confident he did nothing wrong in his Brazilian Grand Prix collision with Lewis Hamilton.
Massa: Germany 2010 one of the worst
Felipe Massa has billed Germany 2010 as the lowest point of his Ferrari career, right up there with his horrific crash a year earlier...
Source: http://www.planetf1.com/driver/3370/9034621/Massa-Germany-2010-one-of-the-worst
F1: Kovalainen blames start for poor race
Heikki Kovalainen has blamed his failure to get the start right for his disappointing result in the Brazilian Grand Prix.
Vettel claims margin 'a big surprise'
Sebastian Vettel said it was "a big surprise" to qualify so far clear of the rest of the field for the Brazilian Grand Prix
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/brazil/motorsport/story/137217.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
GT: Loeb McLaren elevated to Baku podium
Sebastien Loeb and Alvaro Parente have been promoted to second position in the FIA GT Series championship race in Baku
Sunday, November 24, 2013
Vettel equals record with ninth consecutive win
Sebastian Vettel equalled Alberto Ascari's record of nine consecutive victories by winning the Brazilian Grand Prix from team-mate Mark Webber and Ferrari's Fernando Alonso
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/brazil/motorsport/story/137415.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
Smooth Button masters F1's greatest test
At the circuit widely regarded as the greatest test of a racing driver in the world, Jenson Button took a victory in the Belgian Grand Prix on Sunday that was probably the most dominant this season.
Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel, who finished second to Button after an impressive performance of his own, had an even bigger margin of superiority in Valencia but he was unable to make it count because his car failed.
Button had no such trouble. He stamped his authority on the weekend from the start of qualifying and never looked back, as all hell broke loose behind his McLaren.
In order to see this content you need to have both Javascript enabled and Flash installed. Visit BBC Webwise for full instructions. If you're reading via RSS, you'll need to visit the blog to access this content.
The frightening first-corner pile-up helped him in that it took out a potential threat in world championship leader Fernando Alonso's Ferrari. The Spaniard was up to third place from fifth on the grid before being assaulted by the flying Lotus of Romain Grosjean, who had collided with the other McLaren of Lewis Hamilton.
But before the race Alonso had entertained no prospect of battling for victory, and while he would almost certainly have finished on the podium, there is no reason to believe he would have troubled Button.
The Englishman also comfortably saw off in the opening laps the challenge of Lotus's Kimi Raikkonen, hotly tipped before the weekend.
Raikkonen was left to battle entertainingly with rivals including Vettel and Mercedes driver Michael Schumacher, on whom the Finn pulled an astoundingly brave pass into the 180mph swerves of Eau Rouge which was almost a carbon copy of Red Bull driver Mark Webber's move on Alonso last year.
Button, meanwhile, was serene out front, never looking under the remotest threat.
For Button, this was a far cry from the struggles he has encountered in what has not overall been one of his better seasons.
A strong start included a dominant victory in the opening race in Australia and second place in China.
But after that he tailed off badly, struggling with this year's big Formula 1 quandary - getting the temperamental Pirelli tyres into the right operating window.
The 32-year-old had a sequence of weak races and even at other times has generally been firmly in Hamilton's shade.
Those struggles were ultimately solved by some head-scratching on set-up at McLaren, but they were undoubtedly influenced by Button's smooth, unflustered driving style.
Button's weakness - one of which he is well aware - is that he struggles when the car is not to his liking. Unlike Alonso and Hamilton, he finds it difficult to adapt his style to different circumstances.
The flip side of that is that when he gets the car's balance right, he is close to unbeatable. It is a similar situation to that of two former McLaren drivers - Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost.
Senna, like Hamilton, was usually faster, but when Prost, whose style was similar to Button's, got his car in the sweet spot he was matchless.
"I obviously have a style where it's quite difficult to find a car that works for me in qualifying," Button said on Saturday, "but when it does we can get pole position."
Perhaps an elegant style that does not upset the car or over-work the tyres was exactly what was needed through the demanding corners of Spa's challenging middle sector.
That was McLaren technical director Paddy Lowe's view, certainly.
"It could well be," Lowe said, "because it's made up of these longer flowing corners rather than the short, stop-start ones. So that may well be something he can work with well, just tucking it all up and smooth lines."
Was this the secret to Button's performance in qualifying, when he was a remarkable 0.8 seconds quicker than team-mate Lewis Hamilton?
In a well-publicised series of tweets after qualifying, Hamilton blamed this on the team's collective decision - with which he agreed when it was made - to run his car on a set-up with higher downforce.
This is a perfectly valid decision at Spa -it was a route that Raikkonen also took - and in pure lap time the two differing approaches should balance themselves out. But for them to do so, the driver with the higher downforce set-up has to make up in the middle sector the time he has lost on the straights.
As the McLaren telemetry of which Hamilton so unwisely tweeted a picture on race morning proved, however, that was not the case. Hamilton was not fast enough through sector two - indeed his time through there on his final qualifying lap was 0.3secs slower than his best in the session.
Hamilton tweeted a photo of the McLaren telemetry, prompting a rebuke from his team.
That was the real reason why he was slower than Button in Spa qualifying - not the fact he was down on straight-line speed, which was always going to be the case once he went with the set-up he did.
It's worth pointing out in this context that Hamilton was also significantly slower than Button in final practice - a fact that led him to take the gamble on the different set-up.
How Hamilton would have fared in the race will never be known, because of the accident with Grosjean.
It was a scary moment - Grosjean's flying Lotus narrowly missed Alonso's head - and the incident underlined once again why F1 bosses are so keen to introduce some kind of more effective driver head protection in the future.
From the point of view of a disinterested observer, the only plus point of the accident, which also took out the two impressive Saubers, was that it has narrowed Alonso's lead in the championship. Vettel is now within a race victory of the Spaniard.
Despite this, to his immense credit, Alonso was a picture of measured calm after the race.
Invited to criticise Grosjean, he refused. Although, being the wise owl he is, he not only had at his fingertips the statistics of Grosjean's first-lap crashes this season, but slipped them into his answer.
"I am not angry [at Grosjean]," he said. "No-one did this on purpose, they were fighting, two aggressive drivers on the start, Lewis and Romain and this time it was us in the wrong place at the wrong time and we were hit.
"It's true also that in 12 races, Romain had seven crashes at the start, so..."
It was, Alonso pointed out, a good opportunity for governing body the FIA to make a point about driving standards this season, which Williams's Pastor Maldonado has also seemed to be waging a campaign to lower.
It was an opportunity the stewards did not decline.
Grosjean will now watch next weekend's Italian Grand Prix from the sidelines after being given a one-race suspension, the first time a driver has been banned since Michael Schumacher in 1994. Maldonado has a 10-place grid penalty for jumping the start and causing his own, independent, accident.
Earlier this year, triple world champion Jackie Stewart, who is an advisor to Lotus, offered to sit down with Grosjean and give him some advice about the way he approached his races.
Stewart is famous not only for his campaign for safety in F1 but also for his impeccable driving standards during his career. He has helped many drivers in his time, but Grosjean turned him down.
On Sunday evening, I was contacted by an old friend, the two-time winner of the Indianapolis 500 and former IndyCar champion Gil de Ferran, who was involved in F1 a few years ago as a senior figure in the Honda team.
That coaching, De Ferran said, "seems like a great idea".
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/09/smooth_button_masters_f1_great.html
Rate the race: 2013 Brazilian Grand Prix | 2013 Brazilian Grand Prix
What did you think of today's race? Share your verdict on the Brazilian Grand Prix. 
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/f1fanatic/~3/nrQvRTXM6BU/
Friday practice - selected team and driver quotes
Mercedes' Nico Rosberg on his table-topping performances in FP1 and FP2; Red Bull's Mark Webber on his final Friday of F1 action; Toro Rosso rookie Daniil Kvyat on his impressive wet-weather showing; and Ferrari's Felipe Massa on performing in front of his home crowd. We hear back from all the drivers and senior team personnel after a soggy first day in Sao Paulo
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2013/11/15290.html
Vettel bemoans tyre restrictions
Sebastian Vettel says restrictions on wet tyre allocations will need to be lifted to ensure more running during Friday practice
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/brazil/motorsport/story/136921.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
Saturday, November 23, 2013
Vettel claims margin 'a big surprise'
Sebastian Vettel said it was "a big surprise" to qualify so far clear of the rest of the field for the Brazilian Grand Prix
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/brazil/motorsport/story/137217.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
Webber takes blame for missing pole
Mark Webber admitted a mistake in the last two corners of his qualifying lap cost him pole position at the United States Grand Prix
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/usa/motorsport/story/135647.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
Singapore swing hands Vettel the initiative
Lewis Hamilton cut a remarkably phlegmatic figure after the Singapore Grand Prix, considering his retirement from what seemed a victory for the taking left his championship hopes in tatters.
The McLaren driver said all the right things after the race about not giving up, but the sad reality is that he is 52 points behind Ferrari's Fernando Alonso with only 150 still available.
To expect Hamilton to be able to make up more than a third of the points still remaining on a man who is driving one of the best seasons in Formula 1 history is ambitious in the extreme, although it's certainly going to be entertaining watching him try.
Hamilton's performance in Singapore confirmed two things about this season - McLaren are the team to beat with the consistently fastest car and the 2008 world champion is driving superlatively well.
A gear box failure caused McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton to retire from the Singapore Grand Prix. Photo: Getty
His pole lap on Saturday was a sight to behold, all controlled aggression and commitment, brushing the walls, judging the balance between risk and reward to perfection to leave his rivals breathless.
Until that point, Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel had appeared to be evenly matched with Hamilton but when it mattered the German found his car's grip had mysteriously disappeared. Hamilton found plenty, though, to go more than half a second clear of anyone else.
It was, as McLaren sporting director Sam Michael put it, a "fantastic" lap and he followed it with a controlled performance in the race, taking only as much as he needed to out of the car and tyres, confident that he had pace in reserve if Vettel upped his pace behind him.
But then the oil started leaking out of his differential, he lost his seamless gearshifts, then third gear and finally all his gears, and he sadly coasted to a halt at Turn Five with more than half the race still remaining.
It was the latest in a series of disappointments for Hamilton this year, without which he would be right up with Alonso in the championship.
For nearly all of them he has been blameless. Only in his collision with Pastor Maldonado in Valencia could you perhaps lay any small fault at his door - of course the Williams man drove into him, but ex-drivers, including Ivan Capelli, have questioned whether Hamilton might have been wiser in the circumstances to leave him a bit more space.
Despite the series of McLaren-related incidents that have cost him his best chance of the title since 2008, Hamilton's mood upon getting back to the paddock was notably different from his subdued bearing after taking pole and victory in Italy two weeks ago.
In Monza, he was downbeat, almost monosyllabic, despite his crushing performance. Here, the speed was the same, but the disposition far sunnier.
It remains to be seen whether that was to do with him making up his mind about his future one way or the other.
But it would take a brave man who gave up the pace of the McLaren for the uncertain and unimpressive form of Mercedes, whatever the difference in remuneration, real or potential, there may be between the offers.
"I think it would have been a nice result for us but we still have more races to go," he said.
"We really couldn't afford today but it is what it is. The good thing is we have good pace. I have to go and win the next races."
On his and McLaren's current form, he could easily win all of them, but if the season continues in its topsy-turvy way, with wins shared about, it is difficult to see him making up so many points on Alonso.
Vettel, though, is a different matter. The low-downforce circuits of Spa and Monza behind them, the Red Bull is likely to be competitive everywhere.
Even if it is not as strong as the McLaren, it is certainly consistently quicker than the Ferrari and in that context a 29-point deficit following the victory he inherited from Hamilton in Singapore is eminently bridgeable.
As Red Bull team boss Christian Horner pointed out, Vettel "was 25 points down with two races to go in 2010, which indicates anything is possible for all the drivers. We need to keep taking points off Fernando, which ideally means getting a few more cars between us and him."
And there's the rub.
Alonso has not won since Germany in July. A potential win escaped him in Italy two weeks ago because of a mechanical problem in qualifying, but Ferrari's poor performance in Singapore, when he had been expecting to fight for pole and victory, was a wake-up call.
On the form of this weekend, Alonso does not look likely to win in normal circumstances unless Ferrari can bring some more speed to the car.
But what he does keep doing is finishing in the points.
In the 10 races since the Spanish Grand Prix in May, Alonso has retired only once - after being hit by the flying Lotus of Romain Grosjean in Belgium three weeks ago. Of the nine he has finished, seven of them resulted in a podium - including two wins - and the other two fifth places.
No-one else has consistency anything like that, and it is in that consistency that lies his best hope.
The concern for Alonso is that if both McLarens and Vettel finish races, those podiums will be hard to come by, and in those circumstances that gap would come down quickly indeed.
So well has he been driving this year that Alonso has to still be considered a narrow favourite for the title.
But while McLaren's weaknesses have made the championship a long-shot even for Hamilton, as Alonso leaves Singapore, he will be casting worried glances over his shoulder at Vettel.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/09/in_singapore_lewis_hamilton_cu.html
Friday, November 22, 2013
Missing pole cost shot at victory - Webber
Mark Webber said Saturday's qualifying performance cost him a chance of victory at the US Grand Prix on Sunday after he spent most of the race trying and failing to pass Romain Grosjean for second
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/usa/motorsport/story/135963.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
Team order rule needs a re-think
 Jean Todt arives for Wednesday's hearing |
“Whether you are for or against team orders, if the FIA could not back up its own rules and nail a competitor in a blatant case such as this the rule really does need reviewing. Perhaps Ferrari’s thinly-veiled threat to take the matter to the civil courts if they were punished too harshly scared the governing body, who as much as admitted the flimsiness of its rule."Paul Weaver, reporting for the Guardian in Monza, was in favour of the ruling which keeps alive Ferrari’s slim chances in an enthralling championship.
“The World Motor Sport Council was right not to ruin a compelling Formula One season by taking away the 25 points Alonso collected in Germany. That would have put him out of the five-man title race. But the council was widely expected to increase the fine and possibly deduct points from the team, as opposed to the individual. In the end, it could be argued that common sense prevailed. But the decision will dismay those who were upset by the way Ferrari handled the situation as much as anything else.”The Daily Mail's Jonathan McEvoy expressed outrage at the FIA tearing up its own rule book by allowing Ferrari to escape unpunished.
"Although the race stewards fined them £65,000 for giving team orders in July, the FIA World Motor Sport Council, to whom the matter was referred, decided not to impose any further punishment. It leaves the sport's rulers open to derision. It was, after all, their rule they undermined. In a statement, the WMSC said the regulation banning team orders 'should be reviewed'."
Source: http://blogs.espnf1.com/paperroundf1/archives/2010/09/team_order_rule_needs_a_rethin_1.php
Bottas overjoyed at scoring first F1® points
Williams' Valtteri Bottas has expressed his joy after finally scoring his first points in Formula One racing at the 18th time of asking.
The Finn came home in eighth place in Austin to score four world championship points and climb above team mate Pastor Maldonado in the drivers' standings
The Finn came home in eighth place in Austin to score four world championship points and climb above team mate Pastor Maldonado in the drivers' standings
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2013/11/15271.html
Thursday, November 21, 2013
Friday practice - selected team and driver quotes
Following a delayed start to Friday practice at the Circuit of The Americas due to fog and issues with the medical helicopter, the running got underway with Ferrari's Fernando Alonso posting the fastest time in the morning, and Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel in the afternoon. Rookies Daniil Kvyat for Toro Rosso and Caterham's Alexander Rossi both impressed in FP1, whilst Lotus debutant Heikki Kovalainen ended FP2 an impressive fifth. They join other drivers and senior team personnel in reflecting on a disrupted opening day in America
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2013/11/15248.html
Ready Stefan GP hits out at US F1
Stefan GP will reveal its 2010 car next week in the hope that the FIA will allow it to take the place of any no-shows in this year's championship
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/9736.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
F1: Brazil preview quotes: Sauber
Brazilian GP: Sauber preview quotes
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
Never forget how great Michael Schumacher was
Michael Schumacher was given a round of applause by the assembled media after he finished the prepared statement with which he announced his second retirement from Formula 1 at the Japanese Grand Prix on Thursday.
It was a mark of the respect still held for Schumacher and a reflection of the appreciation for what was clearly an emotional moment for the man whose seven world titles re-wrote the sport's history books.
Schumacher stumbled a couple of times as he read off the paper in front of him and once, as he mentioned the support of his wife Corinna, his voice almost cracked.
Once through the statement and on to a question-and-answer session with the journalists, he was more comfortable, relaxed in a way he has so often been since his comeback, and so rarely was in the first stint of his career.
Schumacher's retirement from the Singapore Grand Prix had a familiar look to it. Photo: Getty
The Schumacher who returned to Formula 1 in 2010 with Mercedes was quite different from the one who finished his first career with Ferrari in 2006.
The new Schumacher was more human, more open and more likeable.
As he put it himself on Thursday: "In the past six years I have learned a lot about myself, for example that you can open yourself without losing focus, that losing can be both more difficult and more instructive than winning. Sometimes I lost this out of sight in the earlier years."
Most importantly, though, the new Schumacher was nowhere near as good.
In every way possible, there is no other way to view his return to F1 than as a failure.
When he announced his comeback back in December 2009, he talked about winning the world title. Instead, he has scored one podium in three years, and in that period as a whole he has been trounced by team-mate Nico Rosberg in terms of raw pace. In their 52 races together, Schumacher has out-qualified his younger compatriot only 15 times.
It is ironic, then, that there have been marked signs of improvement from Schumacher this season. In 14 races so far, he has actually out-qualified Rosberg eight-six.
And although Rosberg has taken the team's only win - in China earlier this year, when he was demonstrably superior all weekend - arguably Schumacher has been the better Mercedes driver this year.
Schumacher has suffered by far the worst of the team's frankly unacceptable reliability record and would almost certainly have been ahead of Rosberg in the championship had that not been the case. And he might even have won in Monaco had not a five-place grid penalty demoted him from pole position.
That penalty, though, was given to Schumacher for an accident he caused at the previous race in Spain, when he rammed into the back of Williams driver Bruno Senna having misjudged his rival's actions.
That was only one of four similar incidents in the last 18 months that have crystallised the impression that the time was approaching where Schumacher should call it a day.
It is unfortunate timing, to say the least, that the last of those incidents happened less than two weeks ago in Singapore, almost as if it was the straw that broke the camel's back.
That was not the case, of course. Schumacher has been vacillating on his future for months and in the end his hand was forced. Mercedes signed Lewis Hamilton and Schumacher was left with the decision of trying to get a drive with a lesser team or quitting. He made the right call.
His struggles since his return have had an unfortunate effect on Schumacher's legacy. People within F1 - people with the highest regard for his achievements - have begun to question what went before.
There have always been question marks over his first title with Benetton in 1994, given the highly controversial nature of that year. Illegal driver aids were found in the car, but Benetton were not punished because governing body the FIA said they could find no proof they had been used.
But since 2010 people have begun to look back at the dominant Ferrari era of the early 2000s, when Schumacher won five titles in a row, and begun to wonder aloud just how much of an advantage he had.
It was the richest team, they had unlimited testing and bespoke tyres. Did this, people have said, mean Schumacher was not as good as he had looked?
If you watched him during his first career, though, you know how ridiculous an assertion this is. Schumacher in his pomp was undoubtedly one of the very greatest racing drivers there has ever been, a man who was routinely, on every lap, able to dance on a limit accessible to almost no-one else.
Sure, the competition in his heyday was not as deep as it is now, but Schumacher performed miracles with a racing car that stands comparison with the greatest drives of any era.
Victories such as his wet-weather domination of Spain in 1996, his incredible fightback in Hungary in 1998, his on-the-limit battle with Mika Hakkinen at Suzuka that clinched his first title in 2000 were tours de force. And there were many more among that astonishing total of 91 victories.
So too, as has been well documented, was there a dark side to Schumacher, and it was never far away through his first career.
Most notoriously, he won his first world title after driving Damon Hill off the road. He failed to pull off a similar stunt in 1997 with Jacques Villeneuve. And perhaps most pernicious of all, he deliberately parked his car in Monaco qualifying in 2006 to stop Fernando Alonso taking pole position from him.
Those were just the most extreme examples of a modus operandi in which Schumacher seemed often to act without morals, a man who was prepared to do literally anything to win, the sporting personification of Machiavelli's prince, for whom the ends justified the means.
Those acts continue to haunt Schumacher today, and even now he still refuses to discuss them, won't entertain the prospect of saying sorry.
"We are all humans and we all make mistakes," he said at Suzuka on Thursday. "And with hindsight you would probably do it differently if you had a second opportunity, but that's life."
He was given a second opportunity at F1, and he took it because in three years he had found nothing to replace it in his life.
His self-belief persuaded him that he could come back as good as he had been when he went away, but he learnt that time stands still for no man.
He has finally been washed aside by the tide of youth that with the arrival of Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen towards the end of his first career already seemed to be replacing one generation with the next.
It seems appropriate in many ways that the agent for that was Hamilton, the man who many regard as the fastest driver of his generation.
That, after all, is what Schumacher was, as well as one of the very greatest there has ever been. And nothing that has happened in the last three years can take that away.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/10/never_forget_how_great_schumac.html
Exclusive Q&A - STR's Tost on Ricciardo, RBR & Russian rookies
One of Scuderia Toro Rosso's main functions is developing driver talent for senior sister team Red Bull Racing. And it looks like they have done it again in Daniel Ricciardo, who moves on to partner Sebastian Vettel - himself an STR graduate - in 2014. Will his replacement, Russian rookie and GP3 champion Daniil Kvyat prove as big a talent? Toro Rosso team principal Franz Tost seems to think so
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews/2013/11/15266.html
Vettel breaks 60-year-old record with eighth win | 2013 United States Grand Prix stats and facts
Sebastian Vettel became the first driver in Formula One history to win eight consecutive rounds of the world championship. 
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/f1fanatic/~3/JjA0nJtt374/
2013 United States Grand Prix weekend in Tweets | 2013 United States Grand Prix
Get a glimpse behind the scenes of the United States Grand Prix with Anthony French’s round-up of the best Tweets from the race weekend. 
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/f1fanatic/~3/dlQNETLexek/
Would Vettel or Alonso be more deserving champion?
On the surface, Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso seem very different. Alonso is all dark, brooding intensity; charismatic but distant.
Vettel is much sunnier - chatty, long answers, always ready with a joke and, as the Abu Dhabi podium ceremony proved, a salty English phrase.
Underneath, though, they share more than might at first be apparent. Both are highly intelligent, intensely dedicated to their profession, and totally ruthless in their own way.
Equally, although Alonso’s wit may be less obvious than Vettel’s, it is highly developed, bone dry, effective, and often used to tactical ends.
Sebastian Vettel (right) leads Fernando Alonso in the Championship going into the penultimate race of the season. Photo: Reuters
And they are both, of course, utterly fantastic racing drivers.
These two all-time greats head into the final two races of a marathon and topsy-turvey 2012 Formula 1 season separated by a tiny margin. Ten points is the same as a fifth place - or the margin between finishing first and third.
Vettel, on account of being ahead and having comfortably the faster car, is favourite. But within F1 there is a feeling that Alonso would be the more deserving champion, so well has he performed in a car that is not the best.
But is that a fair and accurate point of view? Let's look at their seasons, and you can make your own judgement.
THE GOOD
Vettel
It seems strange now, in the wake of Red Bull's recent pulverising form, but at the start of this season the world champions were struggling.
The car always had very good race pace - it was right up with the quickest from Melbourne on - but qualifying was a different matter.
In China, Vettel did not make it into the top 10 shoot-out in qualifying; in Monaco he did – just - but then did not run because he didn’t feel he had the pace to make it worthwhile.
In both races, though, he was competitive, taking a fifth place in China and fourth in Monaco, where he nearly won.
That was the story of the first two-thirds of Vettel’s season. He kept plugging away, delivering the points and keeping himself in contention in the championship.
He took only one win – in Bahrain, from pole – and he should have had another in Valencia, when he was as dominant as he ever was in 2011 only to retire with alternator failure.
Then, when Red Bull finally hit the sweet spot with their car, he delivered four consecutive wins (one of them inherited following Lewis Hamilton’s retirement in Singapore), the last three from the front row of the grid, including two pole positions.
And in Abu Dhabi there was an impressive comeback drive to third after being demoted to the back of the grid, albeit with the help of a significant dose of luck.
Alonso
It is hard to think of a race in which, assuming he got around the first corner, Alonso has not been on world-class form.
In Australia, when Ferrari were really struggling with their car at the start of the season, he fought up from 12th on the grid to finish fifth (including getting up to eighth on the first lap).
His three victories have been among the best all year –in the wet in Malaysia from ninth on the grid; in Valencia from 11th, including some stunning, clinical and brave overtaking manoeuvres; and a superbly controlled defensive drive in Germany, holding off the faster cars of Vettel and Jenson Button for the entire race, by going flat out only where he needed to, lap after lap after lap.
Then, to pick out some other highlights, there was beating the Red Bulls to pole in the wet at both Silverstone and Hockenheim; his rise from 10th on the grid to third in Monza, including a courageous pass on Vettel a couple of laps after being forced on to the grass at nearly 200mph; and splitting the Red Bulls to finish second in India.
THE BAD
Vettel
Impressive Vettel has been this year, flawless he has not.
In Malaysia, he cost himself a fourth place by sweeping too early across the front of Narain Karthikeyan’s HRT while lapping it. There was a hint of frustration and a sense of entitlement about the move – as there was in his post-race comments in which he called Karthikeyan an “idiot”.
In Spain, he was penalised for ignoring yellow caution flags.
In Hockenheim he overtook Jenson Button’s McLaren off the circuit, earning himself a demotion from second to fifth place, despite the drivers being warned only a month or so before that they could not benefit by going off the track.
In Monza, he earned a drive-through penalty for pushing Alonso on to the grass at nearly 200mph, in presumed retaliation for a similar move the Spaniard had pulled on Vettel in the same place the previous year. Again, this was despite the drivers being warned that they had to leave room for a rival who had any part of his car alongside any part of theirs.
In qualifying in Japan, he got away with blocking Alonso at the chicane, despite Toro Rosso’s Jean-Eric Vergne being penalised for doing the same thing to Williams’s Bruno Senna earlier in the session.
And in India he appeared to break guidelines about having all four wheels off the track at one of the chicanes on his only top-10 qualifying lap, but kept his time because the only available footage was from outside the car, and showed only the front wheels. So the FIA had to give him the benefit of the doubt.
Alonso
Er… Has Alonso made any errors at all this year?
Well, he did cost himself a couple of points in China when he ran off the road attempting to pass Williams’s Pastor Maldonado around the outside of Turn Seven – a move that Vettel did pull off against Lotus’s Kimi Raikkonen.
He spun in a downpour in second qualifying at Silverstone, just before the session was red-flagged because it was too dangerous.
And some argue that, defending a championship lead, he should not have put himself in the position he did at the start in Japan, where his rear wheel was tagged by Kimi Raikkonen’s Lotus on the run to the first corner, putting Alonso out of the race.
The claim is that Alonso had everything to lose and that, while he did nothing wrong, trying to intimidate Raikkonen into backing off, and squeezing him twice, was too big a risk.
The opposing view of that incident is that Raikkonen, who was behind Alonso, had a better view of the situation and should have realised he wasn’t going anywhere from where he was and backed off.
THE MISFORTUNE
Vettel has lost points from two alternator failures, one in Valencia when he was leading and one in Italy when he was running sixth. And third became fourth in Canada when a planned one-stop strategy had to he aborted. That’s 36 points lost.
Alonso was taken out twice at the start – once definitely not his fault (Belgium, when Romain Grosjean’s flying Lotus narrowly missed his head); and once arguably not (Japan).
He lost a possible win in Monaco because Ferrari didn’t realise that if they left him out a bit longer before his pit stop he could have overtaken leader Mark Webber and second-placed Nico Rosberg as well as third-placed Lewis Hamilton.
He should have finished second in Canada and probably won in Silverstone - rather than being fifth and second - but for errant tyre strategies, and he would have been on the front row and finished at least second in Monza had his rear anti-roll bar not failed in qualifying.
That’s 60-odd points lost.
A POST SCRIPT
While we’re analysing Vettel and Alonso, spare a thought for Lewis Hamilton.
The McLaren driver finally lost any mathematical chance of the title after his retirement from the lead in Abu Dhabi. He is 90 points behind Vettel.
Hamilton has said that he has driven at his absolute best this season, and it’s hard to disagree – he has not made a single mistake worth the name.
But his year has been a story of operational and technical failures by his team.
At least three wins have been lost (Spain, Singapore and Abu Dhabi), as well as a series of other big points finishes, as detailed by BBC Radio 5 live commentator James Allen in his blog.
Without that misfortune, Hamilton would be right up with Vettel and Alonso, if not ahead of them.
So, if you’re thinking about ‘deserving’ world champions, if such a thing exists, spare a thought for him too.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/11/benson.html
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Hamilton looks for long-term success at Mercedes
Lewis Hamilton's move to Mercedes is the biggest development in the Formula 1 driver market for three years.
Ahead of the 2010 season, Fernando Alonso moved to Ferrari, world champion Jenson Button switched from world champions Brawn (soon to become Mercedes) to McLaren and Michael Schumacher came out of retirement to replace Button.
Now, the man who most consider to be the fastest driver in the world has taken a huge gamble by switching from McLaren, who have the best car this year and have won five races this season alone, to Mercedes, who have won one race in three years.
To make way for Hamilton, Mercedes have ditched the most successful racing driver of all time.
Schumacher's return at the wheel of a Mercedes 'Silver Arrow' was billed as a dream for all concerned, but with one podium finish in three years the German marque have abandoned the project.
Hamilton leaves a team that has won more races in the last 30 years than anyone else. Photo: Getty
That the announcement was made just five days after the latest in a series of collisions in which Schumacher rammed into the back of another driver after misjudging his closing speed simply rubs salt into the wound.
Hamilton will be replaced at McLaren by one of F1's most promising rising stars - Sauber's Mexican driver Sergio Perez, who has taken three excellent podium finishes this year.
That's quite a shake-up, and it raises any number of fascinating questions, the first and most obvious of which is why Hamilton would leave a team that has won more races in the last 30 years than anyone else - even Ferrari - for one that has won one in the last three.
The explanation for that lies both at his new and current teams.
Mercedes sold the drive to Hamilton on the basis that they were in the best position to deliver him long-term success. In this, there are echoes of Schumacher's move to Ferrari in 1996.
Back then, the Italian team were in the doldrums, having won just one race the previous year. But Schumacher fancied a project, and saw potential. It took time, but by 1997 he was competing for the title, and from 2000 he won five in a row.
The architect of that success was Ross Brawn, then Ferrari's technical director and now Mercedes' team boss. Brawn is one of the most respected figures in F1, and Hamilton is banking on him being able to transform Mercedes in the same way as he did Ferrari.
Undoubtedly, Brawn will have made a convincing case to Hamilton; he is a very persuasive and credible man. It is also worth pointing out that Mercedes - in their former guise of Brawn - have won the world title more recently than McLaren. Button succeeded Hamilton as world champion in 2009.
Mercedes believe that the new regulations for 2014, when both the cars and engines will be significantly changed, will play into their hands.
They are devoting a lot of resources towards that year, and are optimistic they will be in good shape - just as Brawn were, in fact, when the last big rule change happened for 2009.
And Mercedes have a technical team that, on paper, is immensely strong. In Bob Bell, Aldo Costa and Geoff Willis, they have three men who have been technical directors in their own right at other top teams all working under Brawn.
Part of this argument is predicated on the fact that new engine regulations always favour teams run or directly supported by engine manufacturers, on the basis that they are best placed to benefit from developments, and to integrate the car with the engine.
But this is where that argument falls down a little - McLaren may be a mere 'customer' of Mercedes for the first time next year, but they are still going to be using Mercedes engines in 2014, and on the basis of parity of performance.
The love affair with McLaren, who took him on as a 13-year-old karting prodigy, ended some time ago.
Since 2010, Hamilton has been complaining from time to time about the McLaren's lack of aerodynamic downforce compared to the best car of the time.
Through 2009-11, he grew increasingly frustrated at his team's apparent inability to challenge Red Bull. Hamilton is well aware of how good he is, and it hurt to watch Sebastian Vettel win two titles on the trot and not be able to challenge him.
That explains his ill-advised - and dangerously public - approach to Red Bull team boss Christian Horner at the 2011 Canadian Grand Prix.
This year, McLaren started the season with the fastest car for the first time since, arguably, 2005. But again they could not get out of their own way.
Pit-stop blunders affected Hamilton's races in Malaysia and China early in the season, and then a terrible mistake in not putting enough fuel in Hamilton's car in qualifying in Spain turned an almost certain win into a battle for minor points.
These errors badly affected his title charge and in early summer his management started approaching other teams.
His favoured choice was almost certainly Red Bull, but they weren't interested. They also approached Ferrari, where Alonso vetoed Hamilton. That left Mercedes.
It is ironic that his decision to move teams has been announced on the back of four races that McLaren have dominated.
Meanwhile, Hamilton's relationship with McLaren Group chairman Ron Dennis, the man who signed him up and who promoted him to the F1 team in 2007, has collapsed.
It was noticeable that after Hamilton's win in Italy earlier this month Dennis stood, arms-folded and stoney-faced, beneath the podium, not applauding once. Nor did Dennis don one of McLaren's 'rocket-red' victory T-shirts, or join in the champagne celebrations with the team once Hamilton had completed his media duties.
In Singapore last weekend, it seemed that McLaren still believed they had a chance of keeping Hamilton; at least that was the impression from talking to the team.
But did Dennis already know in Monza of Hamilton's decision to defect? Was Hamilton's sombre mood after that win a reflection of his wondering whether he had made the right decision?
Was Hamilton's ill-advised decision to post a picture of confidential McLaren telemetry on the social networking site Twitter on the morning of the Belgian Grand Prix, the weekend before Italy, the action of a man who had had enough and didn't care any more because he knew he was leaving?
When was the Mercedes deal actually finally signed?
Was it done before BBC Sport broke the story of it being imminent in the week leading up to the Italian race?
Or was it not inked, finally, until this week, on the basis that only now has the Mercedes board committed to new commercial terms with F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone?
In which case, was the gearbox failure that cost Hamilton a certain victory in Singapore, and effectively extinguished his title hopes for good, the straw that broke the camel's back?
In short, was Hamilton's decision based on cold, hard logic, rooted primarily in performance, in making more money, or founded on emotion as much as calculation. Or was it a combination of all those factors?
All these questions will be answered in time. Whatever led to Hamilton's decision, it is fair to say that it is an enormous gamble, one on which the next phase of his career hangs.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/09/hamilton_looks_for_long-term_s.html
'F1 needs to find the right balance'
Stefano Domenicali says F1 cannot go too conservative with the tyre compounds next season as the sport needs to hype up the show...
Source: http://www.planetf1.com/driver/3370/9030177/-F1-needs-to-find-the-right-balance-
US F1 closes shop
US F1 has ceased operation, laying off its entire staff indefinitely and closing its factory
Source: http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/13412.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
Monday, November 18, 2013
Qualifying - selected team and driver quotes
Sebastian Vettel on pipping Red Bull team mate Mark Webber to pole; Romain Grosjean on being best of the rest for Lotus; Sauber's Nico Hulkenberg and Williams' Valtteri Bottas on their impressive showings; Heikki Kovalainen on participating in his first qualifying session for nearly a year. All 22 drivers and senior team personnel report back on Saturday's action in Austin
Source: http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2013/11/15260.html
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)