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.
We saw our first Singapore track action today and it was unbelievably beautiful. The lighting seemed to work according to plan, and it was down to the drivers to get to grips with the circuit. Free Practice 1 saw Mark Webber crash into the barriers, and Rubens Barrichello suffer the same fate. Trulli spun round on the main straight, and decided it was safer to travel several car lengths the wrong way and u-turn into the pits, rather than swing round on the straight. The stewards disagreed, though, and after the event reprimanded him and fined him 10,000 Euros.
Hamilton led the first session and much of the second, until Alonso pipped him at the very last moment. FP2 was a quieter affair, with Glock knocking his front wing off against the wall, and a near miss between Bourdais coming out of the pits and Heidfeld on a flying lap. Webber missed a lot of the running but did get some laps in, whilst Fisichella retired halfway through with a gearbox problem.
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
Free Practice got underway in Monza today, with Sutil leading the first session, and Raikkonen the second. Yes, you head me right. Both sessions were declared wet, but FP1 saw torrential rain, that meant organisers red-flagged the session with just five minutes remaining. The Force India driver’s time was set earlier in less treacherous conditions. Man of the morning, Sutil, let himself down slightly by missing the pit entrance once the second session was over, and he had to complete an extra lap.
Also today, a couple of important announcements were made. Red Bull confirmed they are using their freebie engine on Mark Webber’s car, as both a precautionary measure, and to get him on a better engine cycle for the upcoming races. Ferrari announced that Raikkonen had extended his contract with the team until 2010, which means Alonso won’t be moving there anytime soon. And finally, the date of the Belgium penalty hearing has been set as 22nd September, just before the Singapore Grand Prix.
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
Hello and welcome to the second F1 Minute for the 7th September.
A quick update on the FIA investigations into the Belgium Grand Prix results. That’s right, investigations plural. Earlier I mentioned that the stewards were looking into a Hamilton incident, but before that they announced that Glock would receive a 25 second penalty for overtaking under yellow flags. Presumably this was on the last lap with the waved yellows for Raikkonen’s crash. That drops him out of the points and promotes Webber to 8th place.
Hamilton’s investigation was for not handing back the advantage to Raikkonen after cutting across the chicane. The stewards investigated and have now handed Hamilton a post-race drive-through penalty, meaning he is demoted to third. Massa inherits the win, and Heidfeld takes second. This decision is causing a lot of controversy, as Hamilton was fully behind Raikkonen before overtaking him on the straight, but has apparently still been deemed to have taken an advantage. McLaren have lodged an appeal.
There’s plenty of discussion in the comments at Sidepodcast.com, or start afresh and let me know what you think at F1Minute.com.
You’re listening to F1 Minute and it’s the 5th September 2008.
The Belgian Grand Prix weekend got underway today with two free practice sessions, one led by Massa and the other by Alonso.
Free Practice 1, Massa was fastest ahead of Raikkonen and then Hamilton. It stayed dry for most of the session, although the track started out wet after overnight showers. There were no major incidents but Trulli had some electronic problems and Kubica moaned to his team for pretty much the entire morning.
Free Practice 2 saw some rain, and some incidents. Webber, Fisichella, Raikkonen, and Piquet all came off track, with the first two unable to continue. Alonso was fastest ahead of Massa and Kovalainen.
After both sessions, drivers were allowed to practice starts from the grid. In FP1, Bourdais couldn’t take part because his car came to a stop at the end of the pitlane, and in FP2 Kubica couldn’t take part because he stalled it. How embarrassing.
That’s everything for today. Join me tomorrow for another F1 Minute.
Today is the 14th August 2008, and this is F1 Minute.
A few snippets of news today, starting with Mark Webber who says that Red Bull are targeting fourth in the constructor’s championship by the end of the season. They’ve struggled slightly recently, but Mark believes they can get back on form: “It’s a significant target and it would be nice to get it. Dietrich Mateschitz is very keen to finish fourth and there’s always pressure. We know what we have to try to achieve, but I don’t think he’s going to sack everyone if we finish fifth instead.”
Also today, my favourite story for a long time, it’s emerged that Kimi Raikkonen is to be honoured on some Finnish stamps. They are to celebrate the Finnish Postal Services 370th birthday, and Raikkonen will get his very own copy of them at the Belgian Grand Prix.
Finally, Fisichella still says he is happy with Force India, despite the fact that he’s heading towards his first pointless season of his career, and says he looks forward to next year’s car instead.
That’s it for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
Well, the result is in, and Max Mosley has won his court case against the News of the World. The High Court decided that Mosley’s privacy was invaded, and he deserved a £60,000 settlement in damages. Mosley has said he is delighted with the result and the money will go to the FIA Foundation.
Now, in real F1 news, Webber topped the timesheets in Jerez today, ahead of Piquet for Renault and Raikkonen in the Ferrari. Piquet did manage to bring out a red flag after hitting the wall, and de la Rosa, Glock and Barrichello also saw red flags. Glock was returning to action today after his accident and thankfully didn’t crash, but simply stopped out on track.
Also, we don’t appear to have had any KERS related incidents today, but fears about the safety of it continue. Webber has said that he doesn’t want to look into the technology too much as it makes him nervous, and the drivers are happy to let the engineers sort it out. From his position within the GPDA, he said they won’t be getting involved just yet.
That’s all for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
Another one of those stories that falls into the most unsurprising news ever category, is today’s announcement by Red Bull that they havesigned Toro Rosso star Sebastian Vettel for next year. As predicted by pretty much everyone, Vettel will replace the retiring Coulthard and team up with Mark Webber for the 2009 season. Team boss Christian Horner says he knew Vettel was the one: “As he was already part of the Red Bull family, choosing Sebastian as Mark Webber’s team-mate was not a difficult decision.”
And the man himself, Vettel, is obviously happy with the announcement: “I am very proud to be joining Red Bull Racing and it’s always good to have an early decision on what you are doing next year. As a driver your target is always to be with the most competitive team possible and, over the past couple of years, Red Bull Racing has proved it has great potential…”
Finally, this puts pay to the rumours that Alonso will be joining the team. Horner says the timing just wasn’t right for that to happen, whilst Alonso says that doesn’t mean he will have to remain at Renault.
That’s all for today, please join me again tomorrow for another F1 Minute.
It’s the 16th July 2008, and you’re listening to F1 Minute.
Mark Webber paid a visit to the Red Bull factory in Milton Keynes today, although it was probably cut a lot shorter than he was expecting. At about lunchtime, one of the new components the team was testing out, failed and gave off a lot of smoke. Everyone inside that part of the factory, including Webber, was evacuated while the fire alarms rang. A spokesperson said it’s all fine and has no effect on their preparation for this weekend’s race.
Following the news earlier this week, that Takuma Sato is desperate to return to Formula 1, we now have Tonio Liuzzi eyeing up a return to racing. Currently test driver for Force India, Liuzzi says sitting on the sidelines each race weekend is more difficult than he expected.He also hints at the drivers market for next year, saying it all rests on a certain someone’s shoulders…again. “The decisions will be taken around mid-August, and I’m not just talking about Force India. Everything revolves around Alonso and the market will move once he moves.”
That’s all for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.
Today is the 6th July 2008, and you’re listening to F1 Minute.
It’s always hard to get a full picture of what’s happening in a race from the side of the track, but I will do my best for you, and give you a rundown of what happened at Silverstone today.
Hamilton had an amazing start, overtaking a couple of cars to sit behind team mate Heikki who was in the lead. It was only a matter of laps though, before the spirit of the crowd cheered Lewis on to overtake. From then on, despite a few rain showers, and some close calls with spinning cars, Hamilton was cool, calm and collected and took a win at his home Grand Prix.
The spins I was talking about? That would be Webber, Nakajima, Massa, Coulthard, Vettel, Massa again, Sutil, Button, Kubica, Piquet, and probably Massa once more. Essentially, it was a wet race and only those who kept clear heads and more importantly, their cars on track, were successful. The final podium was Hamilton, Heidfeld and Barrichello. The championship now has three leaders all on 48 points, although Hamilton is actually in first place.
That’s all for today, I’ll be back tomorrow with another F1 Minute.