Over the last decade Grand Prix engines have attained levels of RPM never previously envisaged and have also undergone an unthinkable extension of mileage.

How did the 3.0 litre V10s, which gave way in 2006 to 2.4 litre V8s break through perceived barriers to progress?

The next issue of Race Engine Technology magazine reveals all with an in depth insight into Toyota’s Grand Prix engine development since 2002. The Toyota V10 progressed to become the most powerful of its era then the spin-off V8, still used today for Pirelli Formula One tyre testing, became state of the art for the current era.

RET has been given exclusive access to the technology of these cutting edge Grand Prix engines. This insight follows on from the exclusive profile of the Toyota Formula One V8 published in RET 49 (September/October 2010), which is still available as a back issue.

Thanks to the cooperation of Toyota’s former Formula One operation Toyota Motorsport GmbH (TMG), issue 054 of Race Engine Technology reveals in detail the development path from 2002 explaining how RPM and mileage were increased against all odds. With all Formula One engines by regulation now frozen in specification, this is the full and exclusive story of how a state of the art contemporary Grand Prix power unit came about.

Finally followers of Formula One and all who appreciate fine engineering have access to the secrets of one of the greatest technical adventures of recent times.

To secure your copy of this historic issue of the world’s most technical motorsport magazine simply visit www.highpowermedia.com.

Renault have said the following

“After undergoing extensive medical checks this morning, Robert Kubica has been diagnosed with multiple fractures to his right arm, leg and hand. He is currently undergoing surgery at the Santa Corona Hospital in Pietra Ligure.

“Robert suffered a high-speed accident this morning while competing in the Ronde di Andora Rally.

“Daniel Morelli, Robert’s manager, will be available for the press in front of the hospital emergency entrance at 16:30 CET (15:30 GMT).

“Lotus Renault GP driver, Robert Kubica, suffered an accident at high speed this morning while competing in the Ronde di Andora Rally.

“The driver was airlifted to Pietra Ligure Hospital, where he is currently undergoing medical checks. His co-driver is fine.”

He was due to be taking part in testing this week, however it looks like either Bruno Senna will be taking over that role.

Italian television video of the aftermath.

Also Scarb has a cracking write up on the new Lotus Renault front facing exhaust setup, and like I mentioned it is definitely being used to try claw back some of the lost double diffuser downforce.

I’ll have a roundup of testing day 1 later today, but until then, go check out the pictures.

First off let’s look at the first of the big teams to show their car, the Ferrari F150.

The F150 does have a few interesting things to take note of, but for the most part is an iteration of last year’s car, taking into account the rule changes (more on those later).

We can tell the front wing on the show car is not the 2011 part as it still has the driver adjustment on it (no longer available to drivers in 2011)

The rear of the car too is known to be ‘unfinished’ as Aldo Costa has said that Exhaust and Rear Wing development is high on the list of work to do. We do notice though that the ‘shark fin’ body work is gone, now that does not mean it wont be seen again at some point, as it’s not pretty, and the car looks better for it’s launch photo’s without it. There is some fairly significant changes for Ferrari at the back of the car however already on show. The rear wing is now mounted by a centre pylon

It can also be seen in this shot how the rear wing flap opens and closes (probably hydraulics fed upto the flap).

The Ferrari rear diffuser was a very simple affair, probably meaning that they do not currently want to show off the development one that will be run in testing.

Next up we have Sauber’s C30 car.

The new Sauber C30 is the first car for a few years to not have been developed with the help of BMW.

The team is back to it’s independent roots, and has brought James Key from Force India in to look after the development of the car.

The car is a basic evolution of most of the concepts in the C29 from what we can see, a lot of the teething issues with the Ferrari power plant last year should have been solved in this car, as the team have had time to fit the Ferrari power and ancillary parts into the car properly, rather than the shoehorn style of last years car.

The nose section is slightly higher than the C29’s and has a more ‘V’ style to it, again a lot of the front of the car is actually carried over from last years car for the launch, and will change during testing.

The sidepods have been reshaped, and now have a much more Ferrari’esque U shape to them rather than the triangular one of the C29.

The diffuser was kept well covered during the launch, however the car has been snapped on track and it seems to be quiet a complex setup that Sauber have adopted. Obviously the double diffuser is now banned, but the engineers will find ways of recovering the loss, and the Sauber team seam to be using the exhaust outlet to blow the guerney flap and starter hole to generate some of the loss, you will also see some small ‘finger’ vanes on the end plates, these are to help the airflow out of the diffuser.

And now to Lotus Renault (the team previously known as Renault)

The Lotus Renault team have launched the R31 and there are some very interesting touches to this car.

Chief among them is where the exhaust’s exit the car, there is rumour and talk that they actually exit forward of the sidepods, this would allow some clever use of the airflow under the front of the car, heading back to the diffuser, and would also solve the feeding issues of blowing the rear diffuser to some extent.

The team says that the new car maintains the weight distribution and balance of last years car even though it’s 50mm longer (to house the new KERS systems) and that there will be many changes during testing. The front of the car is one of the biggest visible changes to the car, as the raised V style nose has made an appearance on this car as well.

There are also some interesting changes to the side and top of the car, the Ferrari style U sidepods turn up here as well, and the Roll structure above the driver seems very simplistic at first, but it seems may be hiding something as well, I’m sure that will come out in due course.

All in all some nice cars launched so far. So then, now for the changes to the 2011 season that need to be kept in mind, and watched out for.

Tyres – Completely new to all the teams, Pirelli are now the sole manufacturer of tyres in F1, Bridgestone pulling out after last year. All the teams need to acclimatise to the new rubber, as Pirelli have been using a 2009 Toyota for most of the development work.

F-Duct – Gone, simple as that, this is no longer allowed, although some of it’s benefits have been replicated with the new rear wing.

Diffuser -  The double diffuser is now banned, we are sure however that the teams will find ways and means to bend the rules and claw back most of the loss of aero downforce.

KERS – KERS makes a return to the cars this year, The Ferrari system is said to be much more advanced than it was last time it was used in 2009, and we know that McLaren had a very good system then as well. Renault also had a working system, and 12 months of development to rid it of it’s bugs. I’m sure that KERS will add to the show this year, as push to pass and the changeable rear wings will compete with each other.

Wings – Adjustable front wings are now gone, and have been replaced by driver adjustable rear wings, I’m sure we will see some innovation here as it’s the area of the new rules with most scope for creativity. The front wings however will be seen to ‘flex’ more from all the teams this year. The Red Bull was the team using this the most to their advantage last year, and consistently passed all the FIA deflection tests, therefore with the precedence set we will see all of the front running teams using deflecting wings, how far teams can ‘push’ this rule though will be interesting to see.

These are the rules that I see being most influential on the new cars we are and will see, let’s bring on the testing season, see what all the teams have got up their sleeves.

The magazine, revamped at the end of last year, has teamed up with Renault F1 chief designer Pat Symonds to give motorsport fans a glimpse of what the F1 car of 2020 will look like and how it will perform.

In an article featured in Issue 179 of F1 Racing, on sale from January 27, Symonds theorises on how future regulation changes could lead to radically-different F1 designs.

The results take into account the likelihood of future rules on fuel consumption and CO2 emissions but assume that F1 will remain an open-wheel, open-cockpit formula.

F1 teams have already been instructed to reduce their fuel consumption by 35% in future generations of racing cars, while a more environmentally-friendly 1.6-litre turbo engine will be introduced for the 2013 season.

Symonds says that the F1 car of 2020 will incorporate much more change than has been seen in the sport over the last 10 years.

“A few simple assumptions can determine the basic architecture of the car,” he explains. “By the time we add a few changes, such as larger wheels and low-profile tyres, we start to get a fairly clear picture of what the car might look like.

“The illustrations we’ve produced are certainly an artistic impression, but they capture the essential characteristics of a car that will be contesting the Formula 1 World Championship in 2020.”

F1 Racing magazine is available in all good newsagents, priced £4.60.

Apologies for the lack of updates, The site should get back to full force shortly

The drive was not without it’s issues for him though. Four safety cars, as a fair few accidents caused his dominant lead to be cut each time.

Vettel took a decent, and well fought for second spot, with Kubica pushing him all the way to the end trying to get that spot, but eventually had to settle for third. That does mean though that it was a 1,2,3 for Renault engine cars.

Felipe Massa took fourth spot, with a controlled drive, and Lewis had to settle for fifth, after struggling with his front brake temperature for almost half of the race.

Michael Schumacher took a last corner lung to take sixth spot, as Fernando Alonso was not expecting it with it being the last corner, and the safety car just having released them.

The incidents started early, with Hulkenberg seeming to loose his car in the tunnel on lap one. Then whilst behind the safety car, Button’s Mercedes engine gave up on him after overheating on his lap out to the grid because one of the air intake bung’s was left in the car by accident.

Rubens Barrichello then had a big accident up the hill, when it seems that the rear left wheel or suspension assembly failed on him, causing a big accident at the top of the hill into Casino.

The third safety car was brought out when a member of the safety crew noticed a suspected storm drain had come loose. This seemed to not be the case, and the cars were released to race again.

The final safety car was caused on lap 70, when Jarno Trulli tried to overtake Karun Chandhok, and seemingly mounted the HRT-Cosworth causing both drivers to stop, and the race was almost finished under the safety car.

There is some discussion that the overtake Schumacher made on the last corner was illegal, so we will have to wait for the official results to check that. But for now the official timing screens show him finishing sixth.

A couple of weeks now till we go to North America, and Montreal where the racing is always interesting.

UPDATE – It seems that the overtake Schumacher did on Alonso was deemed illegal, and he has been given a 20 second penalty. This demotes the German 7 time world champion to 12th place, and moves all the other drivers up.

The Renault of Robert Kubica was the sensation of the day though, as it set great times in all of the sessions and looked at one point to have had the pole position tied up, but then Webber pulled an extremely quick lap out of the bag in the dying minutes.

Vettel also tried for the top spot, but just couldn’t manage to equal Kubica’s pace, let alone his team mates.

Massa was the sole Ferrari taking part after Alonso crashed his car hard in third practice, and it needed a new tub, and therefore could not be repaired in time to take part in the Qualifying sessions. He will then have to start from the pit lane in the race tomorrow, on a notoriously difficult to overtake track.

Lewis seemed to get to grips with his McLaren better this weekend so far, and outpaced the points leader Button to take 5th on the grid.

Rosberg in the SWB Mercedes just outpaced his 7 time world champion team mate to take 6th, with Michael in 7th

Jenson then follows up, with a car that looked a bit of a handful, and not the smooth driving Button we are used to seeing around the principality.

Rubens get’s the Williams into the top 10, to take the ninth spot, and Liuzzi showing he has got pace takes the last of the Q3 runners spot in 10th.

The race could go one of two ways. It could be a precession as we are so used to seeing here, or with a couple of drivers out of place in the way of the two McLaren cars that seem to go better with fuel on board, and the Ferrari of Alonso starting from the back, we could get a good race.

Lets hope for the latter.

However the story of the race was McLaren pitting Lewis (while running third) for tyres late in the race. The teams did not have to change dry tyres, as the race was started under wet conditions with all the cars on the Inter tyres.

A full rundown shortly. But congratulations to Jenson on a well deserved win.

Webber looked to be the pick for the top spot right up until the final moments of the Q3 session, when his talented team mate Sebastian Vettel pipped him to the post to take pole on Marks home GP.

Michael Schumacher has shown better form this race so far, getting a lot closer to the times Nico Rosberg in most sessions so far.

This should be a decent race, with a lot more spice than there was in Bahrain, especialy as weather has been forecast to be stormy/rain.

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A very subdued race at Bahrain, I’ll do a full rundown of the GP shortly, but suffice to say that even with the rule changes, overtaking was not particularly evident. Perhaps it will get more exciting when the teams get used to the new format (or Bridgestone make the tyres less impressive).

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