The action kicked off in Japan today, with Hamilton leading Free Practice 1. It was bright and sunny, a vast difference to the state of the track this time last year. There were barely any incidents, bar a few wide corners, and we spent most of the session trying to distinguish between the soft and hard tyres with the lovely green stripes.
Free Practice 2 saw much more action, although still few incidents, and several drivers led the timesheets at one stage or another. Timo Glock ended the day as the fastest man, giving Toyota a much needed boost at their home race weekend. Alonso was close behind in second, whilst early pace-setter Hamilton settled for third.
Elsewhere, the Montreal government have said they will meet with Bernie Ecclestone to try and get the Canadian Grand Prix reinstated. Mayor Gerald Tremblay said he wants to understand the economic state of the race first, as the disagreement with Bernie is worth between $10 and $20 million.
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
Apparently, F1 team principals are organising a meeting to get together and discuss the possibility of reinstating Canada to the calendar. They don’t want to lose the only North American Grand Prix of the season, and no one wants to lose the Canada race as it’s such a good one. However, it seems as though a commercial disagreement cut short negotiations between organisers of the Canadian GP and Bernie Ecclestone, and the Montreal circuit officials say the only way it could return is with government help.
Other negotiations are going on, according to autosport.com, who are reporting that Force India, McLaren and Mercedes Benz are in talks to supply engines for 2009. Force India do have a contract with Ferrari for next season, but are clearly keeping their options open. The engine deal proposed could also extend to technical help and Force India running some drivers to eventually make the switch to McLaren.
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
Today is the 8th October 2008, welcome to F1 Minute.
This weekend in Japan, Bridgestone are painting the stripes on their tyres green. The FIA has a promotion called “Make Cars Green”, and in support Bridgestone will be painting every groove on the harder tyre a bright green colour. The announcement of coloured tyres, came with a joint statement from Honda, Williams and BMW, all supporting the idea of Formula 1 becoming greener. I can honestly say the green does not look great, but it’s all in a good cause.
Along with environmental issues, Max Mosley has also issued a stark warning that if Formula 1 doesn’t drastically cut costs it will face serious difficulties in the future. Today it was announced that the FOTA will meet with the FIA president immediately after the Chinese Grand Prix to discuss the matter. The FIA statement read: “At this meeting the FIA will discuss and share with the teams the strategic decisions which are now urgently required, having regard to current world-wide economic problems.”
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
It’s the 7th October 2008, and you’re listening to F1 Minute.
The shock news of the day is that the FIA have confirmed the calendar for 2009, and have dropped the Canadian Grand Prix. Teams have got back the summer break that they were looking for, but we will no longer be heading to North American shores. Both the Belgian and Italian races have been shuffled by a week as well. Back to the Canadian GP, though, and organisers say that they weren’t informed of this decision ahead of time. They released a short statement that said they had only learnt of it through the media, and would therefore not be commenting until they’d spoken to the FIA and FOM. Needless to say they’re not happy.
Elsewhere today, Ferrari boss Stefano Domenicali has confirmed that they will be going back to the old lollipop pit system at this week’s Japanese Grand Prix. After many, many pit lane incidents in the last few races, Domenicali says: “We need to stay calm so we’ve decided to go back to the old system.”
That’s it for today, please join me tomorrow for another F1 Minute.
BMW have become the next team to confirm their driver lineup for 2009 and it remains unchanged. Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld line up beside Christian Klien as test driver. BMW Motorsport Director, Mario Theissen said, of the pairing: “We are in no doubt that we will again achieve our ambitious aims with them in the team’s fourth year.” Of course, this news narrows down Alonso’s options for next year, with his main choice now being between Renault and Honda.
Elsewhere today, Bernie Ecclestone has hit back at the statements Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo made regarding Singapore. The team boss said the safety car rules make F1 a circus. Ecclestone has apparently responded to this with: “After the weekend Ferrari had, their president should have shut up and kept his head down. If Massa loses the world championship, he will know the team were responsible. He would have destroyed everybody in Singapore if he had kept going.”
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
Today is the 5th October 2008, and this is F1 Minute.
Half of Toro Rosso has been up for sale for a while now, and we haven’t heard of any buyers. Now it looks like Dietrich Mateschitz may want to keep his 50% stake in the team, after some good results. Of course, we could be reading too much into the quote, which simply says: “We will see if an interested buyer shows up, but it might happen that we do not want to sell at all any more. Right now, I would say nothing is fixed yet.” Mateschitz is mainly worried about the customer car regulations, so he wants to wait and see what happens with that.
Meanwhile, the Red Bull boss has also admitted that several teams are interested in Sebastian Vettel, but they want to build a good enough car to keep him at the team and Dietrich admits they would be disappointed if he wanted to leave. Vettel has also got into the good books of Bernie Ecclestone who predicts the youngster will win a championship one day. He says: “Sebastian is young, smart and friendly so he is the ideal example for other young drivers who one day hope to join the F1 circus.”
That’s it for today, please join me again tomorrow for another F1 Minute.
You’re listening to F1 Minute and today is the 4th October 2008.
This week, Williams hosted the launch of the F2 series at their factory, and we got to learn some more details of the new feeder formula. We already know that Williams have designed the F2 cars, and that Jonathan Palmer has secured the rights to operate the series. Now we know that the winner of the F2 championship will get to spend time in the Williams F1 simulator and then get a test in the car out on track. Of his hopes for the series, Palmer said: “I am absolutely determined that Formula 2 will attract the greatest depth of talent by virtue of its extraordinary cost effectiveness, and through its carefully considered format and equality of opportunity produce most of the best future F1 star talent in the coming years.”
Elsewhere, technical director of Renault, Bob Bell, has said the Alonso we saw in Singapore was “the Fernando of old”, the one who was capable of winning championships.
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
We heard earlier in the week that McLaren are pushing forward with development this year and it’s good news to hear that BMW haven’t given up on the title, either. Technical director Willy Rampf said that they will still develop despite Kubica being 20 points down on Hamilton. He said: “We will continue though. We will try to have at least small modifications and updates for the next races and hope to get closer to the top. We are not far away, not the team and not Robert as our leading driver.”
Elsewhere today, Autosport.com is reporting that the FOTA are looking at a new concept of sharing commercial revenues between the teams equally. Currently, teams get a bigger share, the higher they finish up the constructor’s championship. You’d imagine the larger teams wouldn’t appreciate getting less money, but Autosport has asked Frank Williams who said it’s the best way of making things more competitive. I’d love to know what you think about this potential new scheme, leave your thoughts at F1Minute.com.
Williams have confirmed their driver lineup for next season and it remains unchanged. We already knew that Rosberg would be driving for them in 2009, but now Nakajima has been signed up for next year as well. Frank Williams believes it is good to be consistent with the two drivers, plus Nico Hulkenberg as tester, and says: “Nico Rosberg continues to be one of the most capable drivers in the sport. Kazuki is getting stronger all the time and has more to offer and Nico Hulkenberg is developing well.”
Also today, Flavio Briatore has apparently said he will be taking a different role at Renault next year, and bringing a team director on board to run the day-to-day business. Briatore has said he already has someone in mind.
Finally, Red Bull believe they have found what caused Webber’s gearbox to malfunction in Singapore. They’ve narrowed it down to an electrical surge from the tramlines on the street circuit. What are the chances?
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
You’re listening to F1 Minute and it’s the 1st October 2008.
With most teams saying they will be focusing on 2009 now, it’s a refreshing change to hear that some updates will be taking place for McLaren. CEO Martin Whitmarsh says Singapore was supposed to be their last upgrade, but now they’ll be bringing in some more aerodynamic “bits and pieces” for Japan and China. Whitmarsh also had a bit of a moan about the penalty process in Singapore, saying that because the stop/go call for Rosberg pitting under the safety car came so late, that he had been able to pull out enough of a lead to effectively cancel it out. Whitmarsh believes Hamilton could have won it had things been different.
Elsewhere today, Malaysia have reportedly said no to the night race idea. Previously Bernie has said that the 2009 race would begin at 7pm local time, but officials have said they will compromise to start at 5pm. They certainly don’t intend to host a race after dark.
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.