formula one

FIA post-race press conference - China

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 08:19:00 -0700

Reproduced with kind permission of the FIA

1st Jenson Button (McLaren), 1h46m42.163s; 2nd Lewis Hamilton (McLaren), 1h46m43.693s; 3rd Nico Rosberg (Mercedes), 1h46m51.647s.

Q: Jenson, what a race. Another great call for tyres at the start, a safety car re-start for you to control and then some heart-stopping moments in the final laps.
Jenson Button: I mean the safety car for clearing debris off the circuit was just... I had my heart in my mouth when that happened as I just did not know what was going to happen. We had built up such a good gap and then, unfortunately, everyone else caught up, so it made it very tricky. At the end of the race when we put the inters on, the new set, I felt really good. The car felt great and I wasn’t pushing the tyres too much. I could see I was pulling a gap to Lewis and then it started racing again. I made a mistake at the hairpin and ran wide and from then on I just could not get any heat in the tyres and every bit of water I touched I aquaplaned, so I really had to back off. This victory is very special and really means a lot. It was a tricky race out there and again we called it right and it means a lot. It is not just about being quick, it is about reading the conditions and obviously coming across the line just one second in front of Lewis I think shows what a team effort this has been and what a great result for the whole team.

Q: Lewis, the first time you and Jenson have been on the podium in F1, standing together. But quite a battle you had to get there though.
Lewis Hamilton: I had quite an eventful race. First of all congratulations to Jenson he did an incredible job today and yes, made the better choice on the tyres. But it was very tough. Obviously at the beginning with the weather it wasn’t easy making the call or when to change the tyres. I chose very, very late, when I was half-way round the last corner and clearly it wasn’t the right choice. I fought my way through, we both did a tremendous job and it is really down to an awesome job the team are doing. We have been working very hard, so it is great for the team.

Q: The stewards are still looking into the pit lane incident with Sebastian Vettel. Any worries on that one?
LH: Not really aware of. Not really sure what they are talking about.

Q: When yourself and Sebastian came out of the pits together. It got very close after the pit stop and the stewards are having a look.
LH: Are they.

Q: Everything okay as far as you are concerned?
LH: As far as I am concerned I think it was okay. I think the team waited for quite some time and they released me when they thought it was the right time but I got quite a lot of wheel spin, so I struggled to get out the actual box. As I came out I noticed Sebastian was there and he was pushing me a little bit to the right. We touched wheels but otherwise I think it was fair.

Q: Nico, for you the second time in a row you have been third on the podium. Like Jenson the right call on tyres at the start of the race.
Nico Rosberg: It was a good call and I took the advice from my team and my engineer and eventually just decided, okay, let’s give it a go and stay out. It turned out to be really good. Out there you are saying ‘please stop raining, please stop raining’ and it is just so on the edge. If it rains a little bit more it is the wrong call. If it rains a little bit less it is fine and that went really well. It was nice to be leading the race for a long time from there. But I think I got a little bit more tyre deg than Jenson and as soon as it started raining a bit more again I struggled a little bit more and made a mistake, so he came by. But, in general, obviously I am really happy with this result. It is a good step again in the right direction.

Q: And comfortably ahead again of your team-mate. Life at Mercedes has been very good for you so far.
NR: At the moment I am feeling really comfortable in the team and I am really thankful also. They have helped me integrate really well, so it is all coming together for me nicely. We have had a good step forward again this weekend. We had some upgrades for this track, very small actually, so we have a lot more to come, so it is quite promising for us.

Q: Jenson, the World Champion leads the World Championship table after the first four races. Take us through some of the highs and maybe some of the lows of your time at McLaren so far.
JB: I think you can pick the highs and the lows out pretty easily. I have had two wins and a seventh and eighth, so you know. The tricky conditions helped me but as I say again it is not luck we came out on top today. We chose correctly in the conditions. The start of the race, as Nico said, was you know... It was the right call definitely but it was very, very slippery out there. But we knew how quickly the soft tyres were going to destroy themselves, the inters. So the right call and later in the race the right call as well. My first few months with the team have been extraordinary you could say and I really feel a part of this team now. It is a nice position to be in after four races, leading the championship. Three weeks break now. I am going to enjoy that very much and I am looking forward to Barcelona.

Q: I hope you call all get home okay.
JB: It is alright. I am going on holiday.

PRESS CONFERENCE

Q: Jenson, it was a pretty amazing race for us. What was it like from where you were Jenson?
JB: Pretty damn good I must say, except for the last four laps. They were a little bit scary. It was raining a lot at the end and I was really struggling with the tyres. I pulled a good gap on Lewis but maybe I pushed the tyres a bit hard and when it rained I was just skating all over the place and as you saw, I went straight on at the hairpin. Made it difficult for myself but great to come away with a victory.

Q: How important was that early call on tyres, do you think?
JB: Really important. That made the race. If we didn’t have that safety car later on for debris we would have been a long... well, I don’t know, I don’t know how quick Lewis was in the race. But the safety car definitely helped the situation for people that stopped for inters. Staying on the drys was the right thing. You wouldn’t think it driving around as it was raining quite a bit but we got a lot of grip from those tyres. We just had to be a little bit careful as every time you arrived at a corner it was a different condition to the previous lap, either better or worse, so it was pretty tricky but it was definitely the right call. When the team called me in for inters that was the right call as well because the tyres had started graining on the front left and the rear left and it was too wet for the slicks.

Q: Where does this victory rate amongst the other ones?
JB: For me it is my best victory. Every time that you win I think it becomes your best victory but this one was very special as it was very tough conditions and the great thing is our pace was good today. It wasn’t just the luck of calling the weather, we had good pace. The team towards the end of the race said ‘you are two seconds odd quicker than most people except for Lewis who was doing the same time as you.’ The pace was very good in those conditions and it is great to see that. We still don’t know where we are in the dry but we are going to forget about it at the moment as we are just going to enjoy this victory in the wet. We have proved that our car is good over the race distance.

Q: People were talking perhaps about going onto wet settings, going onto dry settings. Was there any difference for you?
JB: I didn’t do wet or dry settings, so I don’t know.

Q: But in terms of yesterday, did you set the car up for today?
JB: You want to be quick in qualifying. That is so important these days, so you work on getting a good set up for qualifying but you also need a car that is good in the race. Cars that are good in the dry normally work in the wet as well, reasonably well. I think you have got to go for a general balance of wet and dry. It seemed to work for us. I don’t know the pace of the other quick cars that were quick in qualifying but for us it looked very good. We were able to pull a good gap, cruise a few laps before it started raining, then I had my heart in my mouth while I was trying to keep the thing on the road.

Q: Lewis, what was it like for you at the end because the gap was really fluctuating between you and Jenson?
LH: Yeah, very tough for me at the end. The same as Jenson. My tyres were finished. I came into the pits, I think, a lap or two earlier than him and pushed as hard as I could to close the gap. It wasn’t particularly easy, simply because for my first stop I came in too early which was really the wrong call for us and kind of ruined the race a little bit in terms of obviously putting on the wrong tyres. At the end after the safety car I was seventh, so I had a long way to come from, as before that I was something like fourth or fifth, so I lost some more spaces, so I had to work hard to catch up Jenson. After that I came into the pits and pushed so hard, so I think I ruined the tyres and it was the same for Jenson and he started to pull away. At the end he started to struggle. I was struggling but closing a little bit and he had an off. It was very similar times but I think we did an awesome job between us both. I am very happy that we could get a one-two. The first one-two this year and hopefully the first of many.

Q: But you had a fantastic race. You were racing somebody, Nico, Michael Schumacher, Sebastian in the pit lane. It was absolutely fantastic.
LH: Maybe for you it was. It was for me. It was definitely an exciting race. I just felt that every time I made up the places somehow I would lose them again. If I made up three places I would lose two. Make them up again and I would lose one, so it was very hard, a very tough race but I am very happy with the result. To climb my way back up to second was a good job, so I am happy with that.

Q: And seeing you racing with Michael. I think that is basically what we have all waited for, for the last three races. It was tremendous.
LH: Yeah, I mean Michael… I couldn’t really see him in my mirrors and it wasn’t easy. It was ages to get past him, same as Nico. The two Mercedes obviously have got very good engines and we had a good battle. I think I lost a little bit of time behind him but once I got past I felt I was gone.

Q: Nico, what about you, especially with your old team-mate coming up behind you?
NR: It was quite an eventful race also. Really good choice at the beginning as well. I mean I just used the advice from the team and decided to give it a go and stay out. Then just hoping as it was so much on the limit. If it rained a little bit more it was the wrong decision, if it rained a little bit less it was fine, so it rained a little bit less, so it was great. Then I think I had a little bit more deg than Jenson, so as soon as it started raining I was struggling a little bit more with my tyre temperature and things like that, so he managed to get by me. From then on we didn’t quite have the pace on the intermediates and so Lewis was pretty fast when he came up from behind. But I had quite good fun with Lewis. After he got me I thought ‘okay, he is never coming by me again.’ I think that was the only place he could have overtaken me but still third place was great and it was really tough at the end with (Fernando) Alonso. I was a bit worried as my tyres were shot and as soon as it started drizzling a bit it was really difficult out there but I think he must have been struggling quite a bit too, so it worked out great and I am really pleased for everybody.

Q: He did seem to get really close and then you just managed to maintain the gap.
NR: I was taking it easy. It was a compromise as you have to take care of your tyres but at the same time push enough, so he doesn’t come by and you don’t know how much he has pushed or what pace he has, so it is difficult but really happy to have made it out in front of him.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Gary Rose – The Press Association) Lewis, another podium finish and another great drive. There were some reports out today that you’re not speaking with your father. Do you feel that that is the case and that you’re doing perfectly fine on your own at the moment?
LH: Yeah, I’m doing perfectly fine, enjoying life, taking my time in the decision process of finding a new manager, in no particular rush. I’m speaking to the family, I don’t speak to them every single day but things are fine.

Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto, Motor und Sport) To Jenson and Lewis: who made your decision at the beginning to come in or not to come in for tyres?
LH: For me, I was speaking to the guys down the back straight and they weren’t clear whether we should come in or not. I came on the radio at the last corner I think it was, when the safety car came out and said ‘shall I box now?’ and there wasn’t a fast enough communication between the team and they didn’t get back to me in time. I got halfway round the last corner and I think they said something, I think they said ‘box this lap’ and so I turned right but I wasn’t really sure, so I just pulled in and at the end of the day it wasn’t the right call, whether it was mine or theirs. At the last moment, I think I turned because I thought that that was what I was meant to do. Unfortunately it lost us a little bit of ground but we made up for it.
JB: The call at the start of the race; we discussed it on the radio, the same as Lewis, on the back straight and they said ‘pit this lap if you feel it’s too wet,’ so I decided to stay out. And then later on in the race, they made the call to go to inters, which was definitely the right call. I was thinking of staying out again and they made the right call there: one all. I think what won us the race today was the right calls for the right conditions and being on the right tyre at the right time. It makes such a difference.

Q: Jenson, how satisfying is this to get one over Red Bull? They sat where you are yesterday, very pleased after qualifying, and you both said on Friday that you suspected that they could go a lot quicker. How satisfying was this?
JB: I don’t think it’s just because Red Bull were sat here. It’s always massively satisfying when you win a Grand Prix, it means so much, and when you get a one-two with the team. It’s been a long time for myself and it’s been a long time for Lewis, I think, since we’ve had one-twos. So yeah, it’s a very special feeling and I can’t wait to get back there and see the team. They do so much work over the weekends and I can’t wait to get back down there and see them. This is a great result for us, and I’m leading the championship now. Red Bull have been very quick all year, like they were last year at the start of the season, but we’re leading the championship at the moment which is a great position to be in. There’s still a lot of work to do to find some pace but that’s what we’re working on, we’re working very hard and it’s great to get these results when maybe we haven’t quite got the legs on the Red Bulls, so these points mean a lot to us, and hopefully when we get to Barcelona, we will be there fighting with the Red Bulls in qualifying and the race.
LH: Like Jenson said, it’s a great feeling for the team, rather than worrying about whether or not we beat the others. Obviously we want to finish ahead of the others but it’s more the effort that the team puts together and the effort that we all put in through all the testing we did, to finally be here, having the pace but not quite getting it in qualifying but finally our first one-two in a race. I know the team have all got their red shirts on, for sure, and we will be celebrating tonight.

Q: (Stéphane Barbé – L’Equipe) Lewis, please could you tell us a little bit about your pit stop alongside Vettel? Even the entry into the pit lane was quite tricky.
LH: I don’t really remember too much about it. I think Vettel got on the outside of me on the exit of the last corner; I was worried that he was going to turn into the last corner and I was going straight, so I just kept going and he came with me. We got round into the pit lane, it was fine. When I did the pit stop the guys waited for some time to let all the cars go past and they released me at what I thought was a good time and there’s a big, long, blue line down the pit lane which is all painted and it’s so slippery. As soon as I hit that I had some major wheel spin and lost a bit of traction. Unfortunately that let Vettel get alongside me, but otherwise it was good racing.

Q: (Beniamino Natale – Ansa) Nico, looks like you are driver number one in your team and number two is Michael Schumacher, so my question is, how does it feel?
NR: It’s definitely not the case. From the beginning on we have been even in the team and I was saying even before, when everybody saw Michael was number one and me number two it’s even, we both get the same possibilities, but of course I’m very, very happy with the way it’s going for me, really getting some consistent results, making the best of it, so I’m really pleased with my season so far. And it’s nice also, I’m bonding well with the whole team, it’s been important for me also to work hard to get some respect also within the team and things like that as soon as possible, and I think I’ve managed to do that quite well, so I have quite a strong position now in the team which is really nice, so that’s why I have quite high hopes for what’s to come.

Q: (Marco Degl’Innocenti – La Gazzetta dello Sport) The same issue: yesterday, when I asked Ross Brawn if the pupil has overcome the teacher he said ‘at the moment.’ Do you think this moment will last long?
NR: I don’t know. Before the season I was hoping to be on one level with Michael, that would have been fantastic for the whole season and at the moment I’m in front which is great but I expect him to be right there again at the next weekend of course and to be fighting with him would be fantastic for the rest of the season and would be good for the team also. I’m very confident that I can do a great job all year.

Q: (Chinese media) To all the drivers: because of the volcano eruption, a lot of airports are closed. So what are your plans after this race?
JB: I was always going to go away for a few days, relaxing after this one, but I’m hopefully going to be heading back to Europe at the end of the week, so we will see about that. We might all be driving back which would be fun.
NR: Trans-Siberian train.
JB: We’ll rent some cars and race it back. No. Sorry. Go on the train.
LH: I’ve got a sponsor appearance in South Africa, so I’ve got to travel there and then go back to Europe.
JB: You do so many sponsor appearances!
NR: For me, I’d always planned to go to Thailand, so I’m going to go to Thailand for a week and then back to Europe after that.
JB: See you there.

Q: (Chinese media) Jenson, it seems that your tactics were quite similar in Australia and in Shanghai and you have had good fortune in both. It seems you are good at start strategy; was it similar in Australia and here?
JB: I don’t know. It’s a difficult one to answer but I felt that it was the right thing to do, to stay out. A few other drivers did it as well. I wasn’t alone in that one. Yeah, I’m sure I will make the wrong calls as well. It doesn’t always happen that you get the right call. Sometimes you’ve got to take those risks and that’s what we did and it paid off again.

Q: (Chinese media) Lewis, what was your feeling when you followed Michael, do you feel any pressure after that kind of exciting fighting, and you’re successful? What’s the secret?
LH: Jenson says ‘tell the truth.’ It’s just as exciting as racing with any other driver.

Q: (Chinese media) To Lewis and Jenson, as we all know, this is the last year of the contract between FOM and Shanghai and maybe this is the last time you are appearing here. What is your deepest impression of Shanghai?
JB: I like this circuit. It’s never going to be our decision whether we’re racing here next year, but I think you guys have done a great job with this circuit and I think that the facilities are pretty special, there aren’t many circuits like this. And I think you’ve had some great racing here. You’ve had a different winner every year since this Grand Prix started so yeah, I think it’s a great Grand Prix, but it’s not my decision and I don’t know the ins and outs of the situation, so it’s unfair for me to say whether it should be on the calendar or not.
LH: I think it’s a very, very impressive city, lots of great restaurants, seems to be surrounded by lots and lots of good people. There’s something like 24m people here, so it’s huge in comparison to all the other cities we go to. But when it comes to the track, for me I love this track, I’ve always generally gone well here. Not the best memory in terms of the end result in 2007 but a great weekend. 2008 was a great weekend. Generally, every trip here has been fantastic for me. And one particular thing I would say is the fans. You travel the world and you go to all these different races and you have lots of fans at each track, but I’ve never known – apart from the British fans who come here and back home – this is probably the second most incredible place in terms of the support you get from the fans. They’re waiting at your hotel in the morning, they’re waiting at the airport and they buy you gifts and they’re just so excited and enthusiastic. I’ve got a flag in my room which was given to me by a fan. I’ve got all these letters back in my room which I have read and I think that for me, that’s what powers the season and through the race weekend, so I’m most appreciative of that.
JB: It’s also great to see so many people here. The grandstand was pretty much full today, which assumes that the sport is getting bigger and bigger here in China which is very good to see.

http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2010/4/10682.html

2010 FORMULA 1 CHINESE GRAND PRIX

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 08:11:00 -0700

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Pts
1	1	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	56	1:46:42.163	5	25
2	2	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	56	+1.5 secs	6	18
3	4	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes GP	56	+9.4 secs	4	15
4	8	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	56	+11.8 secs	3	12
5	11	Robert Kubica	Renault	56	+22.2 secs	8	10
6	5	Sebastian Vettel	RBR-Renault	56	+33.3 secs	1	8
7	12	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	56	+47.6 secs	14	6
8	6	Mark Webber	RBR-Renault	56	+52.1 secs	2	4
9	7	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	56	+57.7 secs	7	2
10	3	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes GP	56	+61.7 secs	9	1
11	14	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	56	+62.8 secs	10
12	9	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	56	+63.6 secs	11
13	17	Jaime Alguersuari	STR-Ferrari	56	+71.4 secs	12
14	19	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Cosworth	55	+1 Lap	21
15	10	Nico Hulkenberg	Williams-Cosworth	55	+1 Lap	16
16	21	Bruno Senna	HRT-Cosworth	54	+2 Laps	23
17	20	Karun Chandhok	HRT-Cosworth	52	+4 Laps	24
Ret	18	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Cosworth	26	Hydraulics	20
Ret	25	Lucas di Grassi	Virgin-Cosworth	8	Clutch	22
Ret	22	Pedro de la Rosa	BMW Sauber-Ferrari	7	Technical	17
Ret	16	Sebastien Buemi	STR-Ferrari	0	Accident	13
Ret	23	Kamui Kobayashi	BMW Sauber-Ferrari	0	Accident	15
Ret	15	Vitantonio Liuzzi	Force India-Mercedes	0	Accident	18
Ret	24	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	0	Engine	19

FIA post-race press conference - Malaysia

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 4 Apr 2010 05:40:00 -0700

Reproduced with kind permission of the FIA

1st Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull), 1h33m48.412s; 2nd Mark Webber (Red Bull), 1h33m53.261s; 3rd Nico Rosberg (Mercedes), 1h34m01.916s.

Q: Sebastian, a victory today set up by an excellent start and one that looked fairly comfortable if you ever can be comfortable in the heat of Malaysia.
Sebastian Vettel: Well, it wasn’t comfortable. I realised straight away that I had a good start and passed Nico, who was alongside, and then got the tow from Mark, so I was able to gain, gain, gain. It is a long sprint down to turn one and I clearly had an advantage over him and then I took the chance I had into turn one. It was quite late, so I just made it and then Mark had a bit of a better exit out of turn two, through turn three and it is very slippery and we both tried to push. We are here to fight ourselves but you should keep the respect and I think we both had the respect for each other. If Mark would have been in my position I am quite sure he would have done the same. After that it was just a question about getting away from our competitors. I could see Mark and I were more or less having the same pace, I think he was a little bit quicker in the beginning. I was trying to save my tyres. It did work, so before the stop I could pull away a little bit and the second stint was extremely long. It is extremely hot here and I didn’t stop sweating. Fortunately, I didn’t run out of drinks in the car. I was trying not to be too extreme in the beginning. But it is very hot and very physical and at some stage I was hoping for rain, just to get a bit of a cool down. What a day. Yesterday was extremely difficult with the conditions. Today it stayed dry all the time fortunately and we had a magnificent car. The key was to pace yourself, watch your tyres. Bridgestone did a good job bringing two compounds here that worked fairly well. A very good result for us, especially for myself after two races where we didn’t finish where we wanted to be. To come back, thanks to the team. It is very crucial in that moment not to panic and to stay relaxed. It is a long season but getting here on Sunday afternoon having won the race is the best result we can get. On top of that Mark in second place is a big, big plus for the team. A lot of points and I am very, very happy.

Q: Mark, we heard the call on the radio to look after the tyres on the seventh lap. At the pit stop you lost two-and-a-half seconds. Was that when you lost the chance of catching up with Sebastian today?
Mark Webber: We know these days with the strategy and how the races unfold that the first part of the race is crucial and the first sector. As Seb explained I got a little bit of wheelspin and on the run to the first corner Seb had a big tow. I didn’t really know where Nico was either. I didn’t know to go fully to the inside or stay in the middle, so I just braked late and both of us were on the limit to make the apex at the first corner. I had a bit better exit coming out of two as Seb explained and then the fight continued to turn four. We had a chat to Christian Horner at the start of the race and Christian said ‘boys, behave yourselves’ and we did. The spirit and the chemistry in our team is awesome. We fight very hard, you saw that today. It was a good fight between Seb and I. The result could have gone either way. But in the end he did the job at a crucial stage and deserved the victory. A one-two for us as a team is sensational. The cars ran very well. It was a nice comeback for us after some tough races where we didn’t finish where we should. All in all coming to the weekend you never know, you would probably take this type of result, but as the weekend went on I would like to be one spot further but a great result for the team and we executed a beautiful weekend for everybody. Well done for Red Bull and Renault, of course, the engines were great.

Q: Nico, you watched the Red Bulls sail away into the distance. You sort of had a race all to yourself but the first podium for yourself with Mercedes.
Nico Rosberg: It is a fantastic result for us. Quite pleased. The start did not go too well. I think this time it was quite a lot down to me. I just wanted a bit too much and got a bit too much wheelspin and lost out a little bit there. From then on, once I was third, I knew it was going to be difficult to follow the Red Bulls but I was struggling a bit in the first stint with the options. I don’t know why, we need to analyse that, and (Robert) Kubica stayed pretty close which wasn’t the plan. But once we did the pit stop and got on the prime I was very comfortable. A bit worried about (Lewis) Hamilton initially as I didn’t know how he was going to come up after his pit stop and I was expecting him to be very fast but apparently he didn’t get by the people behind me. It is a fantastic result for us here at one of our home grands prix also as we have backing from Petronas, so a lot of support here at this race and it is a great co-incidence that the first podium comes over here too. I really have to thank the whole team for all the hard work they have put in over the winter. They worked crazy hours, so a little reward now with the podium, so we need to push on as we are not there yet where we want to be but it is a good step in the right direction.

PRESS CONFERENCE

Q: Sebastian, how much of a relief was that after the last couple of races?
SV: A big relief. I am sorry. I feel a bit tipsy from the champagne. I think I took a bit too much. I am very pleased. A great day for us and Red Bull. As you said, the first two races we weren’t finishing where we want to be. But a great result. The start for myself was crucial. I had a good start, good initial momentum. I was a bit worried to start on the dirty side as the right side is the clean side but I was patient really trying to control the wheelspin and didn’t ask for too much throttle too early. That was the key to get past Nico and then run with big tow down to turn one. It is a long sprint. It is one of the longest sprints to turn one behind Mark and I was able to catch him and outbrake him into turn one. It was quite late. Big respect for Mark. I think he would have done the same thing. But he could have behaved differently down into turn one and turn two but that was good. The fight carried on down to turn four. It was extremely slippery for both of us and it was a question who is braking first and if the car stops. Obviously going out of qualifying it was wet, but usually you are having a completely different reference point. Now you start with the car fully filled and it is a bit of an adventure to find your braking point. From then onwards I could see we were one-two which was crucial, so we were able to pull a gap to Nico. But Mark didn’t stop pushing, so I had to push myself. I was trying to look after my tyres in the first stint especially with the soft compound. I was quite pleased that they held together. I was trying to save them a little bit for the end of the stint and then the hard tyres were quite solid and you could push all the way through. Mark again did not stop pushing. He came a bit closer and I could see he was doing faster lap times than I was, so I was just trying to control the gap. It was quite difficult with the lapped cars as they were coming quicker than you thought. Over the team radio I got the call that at some stage we were about 10 seconds quicker a lap compared to them which is funny as two laps before you had nobody there and then all of a sudden you catch them up. But in the end of the day very, very pleased with the result. I think we did a very good job yesterday as a team. Mark was the poker face yesterday and got the pole but today to finish one-two is fantastic especially for myself after the first two races, so I am very happy.

Q: Mark held onto you pretty much in the opening stages but in the second stint he came back at you. Was that all to do with the traffic?
SV: When you are in the lead and you have got a couple of seconds on your side then you don’t try to do anything stupid in traffic. For the guys I think in the slower cars it is a pretty difficult job to do as three corners before they had no-one in their mirror and all of sudden they had someone behind, so sometimes you find yourself in a bit of an adventure trying to get past. But they did a very good job. Sometimes you lose a little bit more depending on where you have to pass them and how quickly they move over but it was all fairly in control. On the primes in the beginning Mark was a bit faster. I was just trying to react to his times and then the gaps are sometimes shrinking, sometimes I am gaining a bit again. I was trying to bring the car home at some stage. I was hoping for rain as it was quite hot. I think we all lost quite a bit of water, so that is why after two sips of champagne you might feel a bit dizzy. I am still young. I am not used to this.

Q: Mark, a little bit of frustration for you with the start and the wheel nut as well.
MW: Seb has wrapped it up. The team has performed incredibly well today and the whole weekend. We were very quick all weekend and very important that we had a clean run yesterday in a very tricky session. It could easily have gone wrong for us but both of us did a good job in tough conditions which laid the foundations for a clear race today. We didn’t expect it to be dry for the whole grand prix but it was and knowing that the third, fourth row there wasn’t the normal people, so the race was going to explode massively and probably wasn’t the normal grand prix in that sense. The run to the first corner I had a little bit too much wheelspin at the start and as Seb said he was in a reasonable position to get the tow and then it was just fighting on the brakes for the first two big stops of the lap and Seb has the inside and we fought pretty close but in the end it was really tough fighting your team-mate as we have an amazing chemistry in our team and all the mechanics, Renault, everybody, we arrive at every track in such a good style. We want to get the best result we can. Every team is like that but this is by far the best team I have ever been with in terms of wanting to get the results. When you have got all those guys in your mind it is not the best thing to see Red Bull Racing wheels flying in the air, so we had a good fight but in the end today Seb got it. After that I was like, ‘my God, I have got the whole race now I am in second’ and that was how it was going to be unless Seb had a failure or he was going to make a mistake. But we know the quality of him. Both of us pushed each other to the end and that was that. I had Hamilton after the second stop but the wheel nut was putting up a fight and it seemed like an eternity when we are used to really quick stops. Then it was waiting, waiting, waiting, ok down it goes then I went. I had to sit behind Hamilton a little bit to start with and it was then a case of bringing the cars to the end of the race. You didn’t know how they were going to go. It is still a bit of a learning phase for all the teams as we go to different venues and we do a bit of work on Friday which I didn’t get to do myself but Seb did a bit of work and we still did a lot on Sunday afternoon. Sensational result for the team and we got what we deserved. Other races we didn’t as we weren’t prepared. Today we were prepared and we blew everyone away which was great.

Q: Nico, on the podium here; you said you liked the place, what does this mean to you, the team and your sponsors?
NR: I’m really happy for the whole team. Also for Petronas who is our biggest sponsor. It’s a great result and it’s really nice to have our first podium here at Malaysia which is a coincidence. We’ve had a lot of support. Even on the podium it was really nice to see all the Petronas guests cheering, so that was really cool. I’m also pleased because the team put so much work into it and they deserved the good result that we got here. Of course, we still need to work hard, because as we saw again Red Bull is just quicker than us at the moment and we really need to push on to close the gap now, to come up with some good ideas and some good upgrades, but I’m confident that we can do it for sure.

Q: How threatening was Robert Kubica, because he got pretty close to you?
NR: Yeah, I was not quite so happy with the first stint. It wasn’t going well because Robert could properly stay with me and I think he was just as fast as me, so I was a bit surprised by that, but it was the option tyres, I didn’t feel very comfortable on them and I was struggling especially with the rears on high fuel. And then after the pit stop, going on the prime, it felt much better and I could really push on and I was quite comfortable after that.

Q: He still got very close to you. On lap 34 he was…
NR: Yeah, that was a bit of a problem with (Karun) Chandhok, I think, who… I’m not sure but I don’t think he did a very good job on that particular occasion. He should have moved out a bit earlier. I think he maybe didn’t see me or something and that really gave Kubica a chance which shouldn’t have been there, because he was miles away. So we need to review that in the drivers’ meeting. It’s obviously difficult with all the slightly slower teams, the new teams that are out there. There’s always going to be an occasion where it’s never going to be perfect but we need to try and get it as good as possible.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Sebastian, it only took you one race to wipe out the gap to Massa and Alonso, who were quite far ahead. Were you expecting to do that so quickly?
MW: The championship is over, isn’t it? I thought the championship was over!
SV: Yeah, that’s what people are saying. We are just here to race. Yes, as I said before, obviously there’s always a lot of talking and things happening. Yes, we didn’t have great races, the first and second one, we didn’t do the best job we could, but that’s life. You build racing cars to go as quickly as you can. They’re built on the limit and sometimes something breaks. Obviously it depends when. When it happens on Friday, no one cares but if it happens on Sunday, obviously everyone is highlighting the issue and blaming you for poor reliability. We are a team, we stick together in good and bad times. We win and lose together and it’s not like in football where you probably change the coach after you’ve lost two times. So we carry on and we’ve proven that we can come back. I don’t know the ranking in the championship now but I think today we scored 25 points. I saw that Fernando (Alonso) had an engine failure, I think, on the last lap. As far as I remember, our gap was about 25 points, so it’s not anymore. I think that’s a good thing. If anything, it shows how quickly it can turn around. It’s a long, long season. We still have 16 races to go which is a lot, so we are here to do our best and we want to fight for the championship, both of us, and for the team, so at the end of the day, finishing first and second was good points for the team and good points for ourselves, so I think we’re in a much better position now than probably on Friday or this morning.

Q: (Simon Arron – Motorsport News) Mark, can you talk us through turn one? You said in the unilateral that you weren’t sure where Nico was. Did you have any clue where Seb was and when exactly were you aware of his presence?
MW: I initially had a look off the start where Seb was and he wasn’t mega close initially; in second or third gear, he wasn’t mega close. It looked reasonable. You know the track is so bloody wide you think where the hell is everyone? I’ve obviously only got the mirrors to check the immediate positions just behind me. To be honest, I didn’t know Seb went to the inside. I thought he was more on the outside. Obviously that’s why I probably went back and maybe I’ll opened the door completely for him but it’s very difficult to see where the guys are on the run to turn one on such a wide track, so I just thought, ‘get in there nice and deep,’ for sure he arrived late, he wasn’t beside me, I couldn’t hear him or he wasn’t beside me when we were on full throttle or when we started braking. It was a fair fight and obviously there’s lots of different options into turn one, so it’s hard to know whether to go inside or outside. I saw him when we were on the brakes.

Q: (Heikki Kulta – Turun Sanomat) Sebastian, last year you won the third race, and this year you’ve now won the third race. Are you on the same schedule like last year, to carry on fighting for the championship?
SV: I need to remember where we finished the fourth race and the fifth race. Last year is last year, this year is this year. I think we are always looking ahead but you can live in history or you can live in the future, but I think the best thing is to live in the now and live the moment, so we have to focus on what is happening now. From here, first of all we go back and then kind of come back to Asia to go to China. The cars go more or less straight there, but there’s a bit of break between races. And hopefully we will have the same result in China as last year, that’s all I can say. Every race is a new challenge. Into the first race, I think we were pretty quick. Ferrari was very quick and in Melbourne all of a sudden we were kind of back. They weren’t really that far behind in Bahrain but it just shows that a slightly different kind of track, a different layout… you know, we’ve seen here Mercedes was very strong, so we probably do have a little bit of an advantage at the time, but we have to work hard and focus on what is happening now to maintain the good performance and then we go race by race. There may be times when we will struggle as well and we won’t be able to win. We might only get fourth or fifth but we have to make sure we finish fourth or fifth then, and not put the car in the wall or finish eighth or out of the points. I think that’s how it should work.

Q: (Livio Oricchio – O Estado de Sao Paulo) To Vettel and Webber, if we’d had a normal qualifying yesterday with Ferrari and McLaren closer to your team, do you think the result of the race would have been the same?
MW: No. It was a luxury today, for Seb and I, not to have to kill the engines, kill the tyres, kill everything because the gap to the other guys was more comfortable, no question about it. But Nico drove a good race, but I think there were some quicker guys, maybe particularly Lewis, who had a different day, starting at the back. Tactically the race could have been a little bit different if he was around, or Fernando or Felipe (Massa). I obviously didn’t see how their race went. Obviously Fernando didn’t finish at the end. As Jack Brabham used to say: ‘win at the slowest possible speed.’ One second or thirty seconds is the same result. We were very much in control of today’s race. It’s not always going to be like that but when it is, you have to make the most of it.
SV: Not much to add. Walter Röhrl once said that he’s not interested in winning a rally by one second having had a close fight. He wants to destroy the others and win by a minute, so two great drivers, one in rallying, one in Formula One, but I think that in the end, especially here, the result is obviously most important for us. We got good points. As Mark said, it probably wasn’t the easiest race for Ferrari and McLaren, but still, it was a long hot race and first you have to go out and do it.

Q: (Joris Fioriti – AFP) Mark, you had a different strategy to Sebastian; do you think that without the problem you had in the pit stop you could have passed him, after the pit stop?
MW: I don’t think the pit stop cost me the victory. The start cost me the victory and then when the first car is leading, he sort of has priority or the luxury when he can stop. It was clear. Obviously if I stopped first there was a big chance I could jump Sebastian but that would not have been fair for the guy who was leading. It was really down to the start and who had track position in the first stint. I knew, when Sebastian peeled off for his stop, I pushed. Obviously I found quite a bit more pace on the in-lap but it’s not enough to take on the fresh tyres of a competitor who in this case was Seb, because we know the cars are the same weight. In seasons gone by obviously the cars were different weights because of the fuel. Now they’re the same weight and fresh tyres, so it’s very difficult to fight and then, as you say, the pit stop was a little bit of salt in the wounds or a fly in the ointment. It doesn’t help things.

Q: (Joris Fioriti – AFP) Nico, you said you were really satisfied after your third place, but it also underlines how far you are from the Red Bulls, so doesn’t that frustrate you?
NR: Frustrating? No, I would not say it was frustrating. It’s really early days. The team has just come together in the way it is now with Petronas and Mercedes and the ex-Brawn team. I think we’ve started the season OK with two fifth places and now a third place. I think it’s a good start with some solid results and I’m happy with that and it’s very important now that we push on because we need to develop faster than the others, which is not going to be easy, but I’m confident that we can do the job and that’s going to be the most important thing, to really push on now. Looking at today, it didn’t seem to be such a huge gap to Red Bull at the beginning. I’m not sure, but anyway, it’s definitely some tenths that we need to catch up.

http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2010/4/10636.html

2010 FORMULA 1 MALAYSIAN GRAND PRIX

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 4 Apr 2010 05:35:00 -0700

2010 FORMULA 1 PETRONAS MALAYSIAN GRAND PRIX

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Pts
1	5	Sebastian Vettel	RBR-Renault	56	1:33:48.412	3	25
2	6	Mark Webber	RBR-Renault	56	+4.8 secs	1	18
3	4	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes GP	56	+13.5 secs	2	15
4	11	Robert Kubica	Renault	56	+18.5 secs	6	12
5	14	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	56	+21.0 secs	4	10
6	2	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	56	+23.4 secs	20	8
7	7	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	56	+27.0 secs	21	6
8	1	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	56	+37.9 secs	17	4
9	17	Jaime Alguersuari	STR-Ferrari	56	+70.6 secs	14	2
10	10	Nico Hulkenberg	Williams-Cosworth	56	+73.3 secs	5	1
11	16	Sebastien Buemi	STR-Ferrari	56	+78.9 secs	13
12	9	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	55	+1 Lap	7
13	8	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	54	+2 Laps	19
14	25	Lucas di Grassi	Virgin-Cosworth	53	+3 Laps	24
15	20	Karun Chandhok	HRT-Cosworth	53	+3 Laps	22
16	21	Bruno Senna	HRT-Cosworth	52	+4 Laps	23
17	18	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Cosworth	51	+5 Laps	18
Ret	19	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Cosworth	46	Hydraulics	15
Ret	12	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	32	Gearbox	11
Ret	15	Vitantonio Liuzzi	Force India-Mercedes	12	Throttle	10
Ret	3	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes GP	9	Wheel issue	8
Ret	23	Kamui Kobayashi	BMW Sauber-Ferrari	8	Engine	9
Ret	24	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	2	Spin	16
DNS	22	Pedro de la Rosa	BMW Sauber-Ferrari	0	Engine	12

FIA post-race press conference - Australia

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 06:26:00 -0700

Reproduced with kind permission of the FIA

1st Jenson Button (McLaren), 1h33m36.531s; 2nd Robert Kubica (Renault), 1h33m48.565s; 3rd Felipe Massa (Ferrari), 1h33m51.019s.

Q: Jenson, an incredible race. 50 laps plus on a set of soft tyres. You made the early gamble for the slick tyres and that was the game changer. Was that your call?
Jenson Button: It was. I think it is a lot easier for the drivers to feel the conditions. The team can see it on TV with the clouds coming in, but we can feel out on the circuit what is happening. I didn’t have a balance on the inters, I was really struggling and I lost a couple of places, so I thought ‘let’s get in, stick the slicks on.’ There was a dry line. A few places were a little bit wet. When I went into the pit lane I thought I had made a catastrophic decision as it was soaking wet in the pit lane. But once I got it going and up to speed, I had a little off at turn three, but the pace was pretty good and I was able to put in some good laps and overtake three or four cars when they stopped and put their tyres on, so it was the right call and I am very happy that I made it.

Q: How do you feel to win on the second race with your new team?
JB: I mean, it is very special. It has taken me a little while to get to grips inside the car. The team has been fantastic though. They have really welcomed me in, but it has taken me a little bit of time to adapt to inside the cockpit. I don’t know what to say really, it is very difficult to put it into words. But a very special feeling and we will take a lot from this. I feel I am just building in confidence and hopefully when we get to the next race we can do something similar as this feels too good.

Q: Robert, you went from ninth to fourth at the start, then decided not to take a second pit stop for a new set of tyres. How hard was that call for you?
Robert Kubica: It was difficult because we struggled with the warm-up, so when we saw Jenson being very quick we just pitted in the same lap as Felipe did. Our guys, the mechanics, did a fantastic job and I overtook Felipe in the pit stop but Jenson was much quicker with one or two laps already on the tyres. He built the temperature up, so they are very quick on the straight lines and I was not confident about the conditions as it was my first lap going through the corners with the slick tyres, so it was very difficult to fight with Jenson. It was tough. First of all I thought we would pit again. Then when I had really big degradation I asked my team if we are going to pit again and they said if we can manage we will not do it, so I took a bit more care with the tyres. But on the other hand I had first of all Lewis attacking quite strongly. He came very quickly behind me and I then..., I don’t know, he decided to pit. Then Felipe again, so I was just taking care of the tyres but also keeping good speed and that we would keep second place to the end.

Q: Felipe, it looked like pretty hard work early on and then the race came towards you and two podiums in two races.
Felipe Massa: It is just fantastic, especially coming to Australia. My best result here was sixth. Having a problem in the qualifying and starting last in 2007 and then getting here which I cannot say was the best race for me. In terms of pace I was struggling a lot yesterday, but I did a fantastic start. We lost some positions on the pit stop and also a little bit on the track because of some mistakes with the difficult track. But it is just fantastic to have one second and one third. We know how important this is for the championship, especially my past. At the beginning of the championship I never had a lot of points like I have now, so this is very nice. The team did a fantastic job, so very happy to finish third in a difficult race like this.

Q: Jenson, Lewis pitted for a second set of tyres and complained about it afterwards on the radio. How did that decision process play out with you and the team and him?
JB: I don’t know what their idea of pitting was. I guess he was stuck behind Robert and couldn’t get past. I never thought of putting on a second set. I didn’t think that would be an option really. It was always to run the race on one set of tyres if we could after it stopped raining. My pace was not great once I settled into the car. I felt I was starting to damage the rear tyres, so I settled into a pace that was consistent to not destroy the rears. The good thing was Robert was not closing and about 20 laps to go I started pushing just to pull the gap a little more just in case people had pitted and were two to three seconds a lap faster and it was just enough to get me to the end comfortably. We could not have done a better strategy. I think my decision at the beginning was my call but from a lot of feedback from what the circuit was doing and the other cars. It is always a team effort and I need to thank the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes team for all their hard work and it is good to see we are improving every step of the way.

Q: Robert, this is the first time you have finished in Melbourne. What does this result mean for you and the Renault team?
RK: Unfortunately, Australia was never lucky for me. I have been very quick each year and could finish in the last two years easy on the podium but for two crashes I didn’t manage it. To be honest we were not expecting to finish on the podium, so I think for Renault and myself it is a very special result as we were trying to push really hard during the winter. This is the best result we could get from the beginning of the season and it is a big thanks to the guys for all their effort but we have to keep realistic. We are not up to the pace for fighting for the podium in a normal race, so we have to keep pushing, keep working and I am sure we will manage sooner or later to be with the pace of the top teams.

Q: Felipe, a sweet moment for you at the start and a reverse of what happened in Bahrain. You passed your team-mate Fernando Alonso. Tell us about it.
FM: Actually, I had a fantastic start, so I was able to do the start without wheel spin and I saw many cars in front, especially Fernando and Webber doing some wheel spin and I was able to do a very smooth start and pass them in a good way. I was very happy for the start and also the whole race was very difficult. Lots of slippery, low grip everywhere and to finish the race was very difficult today.

Q: Jenson, the track was damp at the start but when it dried out why was it so much easier today to overtake? Why was there so much more overtaking than there was in the first grand prix in Bahrain? Can you explain that?
JB: I think it comes down to degradation. You had a lot of cars out of place which is different to Bahrain. The top eight cars were in the top eight slots pretty much. I think a lot of it is the degradation of the tyres. There was a lot of rear graining, some people did two stops, some people did one stop. Some people were trying to look after tyres, other people were pushing hard. There were lots of different ideas out there and it is great to see as, as you said, Bahrain was not the most exciting grand prix. I love that place and it was disappointing not to have a good grand prix, but here I knew what was going on. I could see quite a bit on the TV screens and it did look like a very exciting race. Hopefully we are going to have more races like this and that is what we all love.

PRESS CONFERENCE

Q: Jenson, second win here in Australia. You must be getting to like the place.
JB: It is. It is. The start of the race wasn’t perfect for me. I touched with Fernando at turn one. I was half-way alongside him on the inside and I don’t know if he just couldn’t see me because of the mirrors. I don’t know what, but we touched. It obviously cost him a lot of time and it cost me a lot of time. It wasn’t the best start to the race and then on the inters I was really struggling. I just did not have a balance. A lot of oversteer in the car. There were very strange grip levels out there on the tyre and I was really, really struggling. I could see a dry line appearing in most places and at the rate my rear tyres were going away I knew there must have been enough grip for slicks. I made the call to pit early as I thought if I don’t pit early I am just going to keep going backwards. I thought it was a terrible call initially as the pit lane was so wet and after my first lap out of the pits I thought it was a pretty catastrophic mistake. But after that I could get into it. I found on the dry parts I could push pretty hard and then really it was about picking people off as they came out onto the circuit. It was a nice feeling as they are searching for the grip and I know where it is and I am able to overtake. It was a good feeling. I got up behind Sebastian and made a little mistake, ran wide, so I couldn’t really have a go at him. He obviously had his own problems. But from then on I just had to conserve the tyres. I had a big issue on about lap 15 where the rears just started going away from me and I had a lot of graining from the rear and I thought that’s it for me, they’re just going to swallow me up. I took a lot of front wing out, closed the diff and just hoped for the best really. Towards the end of the race I could start pushing and got the balance back and the car felt very good. I was in a very happy place the last 20 laps knowing I had a good gap and it would have been very difficult for anyone to catch me.

Q: What about the pace of Sebastian? Do you think you could have got on terms with him?
JB: I was catching him initially and it was strange. He would start pulling away and I would start pulling him in. Then the team said you have got to look after these tyres. You are going to try and do the whole race on these tyres, 45, 50 laps, and I thought we will back off a little bit and see where we are. From previous experience, I don’t know if it is the case now, but the Red Bulls have been quite tough on their rear tyres. I just settled into a pace and we would see what would happen. I don’t know. If he had stayed in the race there are always ifs and buts and we don’t know how he would have ended up. The important thing is we came away with a win for whatever reason and I am very happy. The team should be very proud of themselves. We didn’t put a foot wrong.

Q: Robert, surprised to be second?
RK: After yesterday, yes. Before the season, I think after two tests, I called my friend and I said ‘I think in Australia it will be possible to finish on the podium.’ It was around two months ago. Of course we were planning to finish on the podium with our pace. As we saw yesterday our pace was far off the podium but with this strange race we were able to make a lot of places and finish second.

Q: Do you think the higher temperature today was better for you whereas the low temperature yesterday wasn’t so good?
RK: We know where we are struggling and I think yesterday was unfortunately a good example. We were very strong in P1 where there was a lot of sunshine and hot track conditions. Extremely competitive. Then unfortunately clouds came in for all weekend and the temperature dropped down and we were just struggling. We were not able to stress the tyre and increase the temperature, especially every lap of their usage. This was the case in qualifying. Okay, we are still not up to the pace of the top cars but today was a good example of not giving up and with a hard job, sometimes you get paid back.

Q: How much of a challenge did you have from the Ferrari?
RK: I had more challenge from Hamilton and I was very surprised he pitted. First of all I thought it was a drive through as for me it was strange that he was pitting. He was much quicker than me. He was not far behind Jenson and at that point of the race if he had managed to overtake me, most probably he would go for it. He had quite a difficult time to catch me although there were a couple of places where he was very close to me and I think once he overshoot the braking. We were very close to touch, but then I had to take care of my tyres. Felipe came quite quickly behind me but I knew the cars behind they would struggle even more with the tyres, so I just settled to the consistent lap. As soon as I tried to push I did like three or four-tenths quicker a lap but then the lap again was four-tenths slower, so I just put up my pace which I thought would be reasonable without mistakes and try to bring the car home.

Q: Felipe, tell us a little bit about the first corner. What happened there?
FM: The start?

Q: Yes.
FM: I just did a great start, so I was able to spin the wheels much less than the cars in front. I was changing gears very quickly just to not get it to go into the wheel spin as the grip was very low. That gave me a lot of possibilities to just go through. I saw Fernando and Mark spinning the wheels and that was just great, especially to arrive at the first corner. It was very slippery to brake at the right place and not try to fight with everybody. It was a good point of the race.

Q: And you had quite big challenges from both Mark and Lewis during the race.
FM: Yes, I made some mistakes. My tyres were suffering, trying to keep the tyres in the right condition, at the right temperature, especially at the beginning of the race. I was suffering from that yesterday as well. But then after 20 laps, let’s say, they started to improve a lot. Maybe I picked up the pace with a bit of degradation and I started to do my race twenty laps after I changed my tyres. For sure, we had some fights and I lost some positions in the race. But the team did a great job with the strategy, not to stop, and I think that was a great job for the top three.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Paolo Ianieri – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Jenson, would you have ever thought that it would take you only two races to win your first race with McLaren?
JB: No. I thought it would take longer than this, but a lot of it depends on what sort of car you come out of the box with. This race was obviously unusual. I don’t know where we would stand in general pace but it’s not what all racing is about. It’s about strategy, it’s about thinking and it’s about conserving and we did it correctly today and we came away with a good victory. This is very special. Whatever happens over the next few races, this means a lot to me, to be in this position right now. After being with one team for seven years and clinching the title and here, after two races, getting a victory is very special to me. A lot of that goes to the team for their efforts and making me feel welcome within the team, because that’s something I do need, to be competitive, and I have that. So now we’ve just got to look at improving the car because out and outright pace in qualifying is something that we’re lacking a little bit, so it’s an area we desperately need to work on. When you can get good points’ finishes like this it really does mean a lot to you when you don’t have a car that you think is quick enough to win races every weekend, so these are important points for us and we’ve just got to work hard and hope that we can bring some good packages to the next few races.

Q: Jenson, there’s been a lot of talk over the last couple of days over Bahrain; is this the race that might put the suggestions to rest for a while?
JB: I don’t think there’s any getting away from the fact that we probably all thought that the last race was not the most exciting and what were we going to do about it now, but I’m glad that we haven’t really jumped to too many conclusions or ideas, because I think this race was a great race. I had a lot of fun; obviously when you win the race you have more fun than any other position but overtaking cars on the circuit and watching on the screen I could see that there was a lot of action going on. I hope it’s not just because of the weather conditions. I hope that we can have races like this because this is what we love and hopefully these sorts of races are here to stay. You are going to have races that aren’t the most exhilarating experience for us but that’s the way it is. Not every football match is fun to watch. It’s got to be a bit of a balance, I think. One thing that was pretty tricky in this race was the light. I had a clear visor and at the end of the race I was struggling to see on the last few laps. It seemed a lot darker than last year. I suppose it was because there was no sunlight, it was all behind clouds, so that might be something we need to look at a little bit.

Q: (Flavio Vanetti – Corriere della Sera) Felipe, did you have a real chance to catch Robert, and what about the duels you had during the race with Fernando, except of course the first one at the first turn?
FM: Well, I caught Robert but we didn’t have very good top speed on the straight and when I got very close, I lost a lot of grip, so it was not possible to get close enough to try to pass. So the only time I was passed was because I made a mistake in the second last corner, and then Lewis passed me and then I also made a mistake in turn one and then Mark passed me, so that was the only way I lost a position. So when you get very close, it was quite difficult and also Fernando, when he was behind me, sometimes he was just locking wheels. Then you see a guy coming closer and then you just do two good laps and then he’s far away with no possibility to pass, but it was a good fight from everybody, not just from me and Fernando but from most of the cars on the track. Most of the cars on the track were fighting the whole race, I think.

Q: (Joris Fioriti – AFP) To all of you; Red Bull has the fastest car but they are off the podium for the second race running. What do you think of that?
RK: Better for us.
JB: I think they have got a very quick car and for whatever reason they aren’t here. I think reliability was the issue for Sebastian at the first race and I don’t know what happened here, so I can’t really say much on that.

Q: (Sudhir Chandran – Chequered Flag) Robert, you mentioned about those laps with Lewis behind you. Was it as difficult to keep him behind you as it appeared to us?
RK: It was quite difficult because we are quite quick on the straight but McLaren, with the device that they are using, they are extremely quick and it was very, very difficult. He was much quicker than me, his tyres were in better shape and he had a more competitive car. I knew that without a mistake it would be difficult for him to overtake me, but I think he once tried before corner eleven and I didn’t see him in the mirrors and I thought he was on the inside. I left a space and it just shows that they were really quick. Jenson was side-by-side with me in the middle of the straight going into turn 13. That’s how it is. I was surprised when he pitted. It was very good for me, because I could just concentrate on saving the tyres, driving my pace and not concentrating on looking in the mirror and just blocking him, so it was a much better, much easier race for me.

Q: (Chris Lines – Associated Press) Jenson, could you tell us about the decision-making within McLaren? You stayed out, Lewis was called in. How much of that was the driver’s call and how much of it was the team’s call? Also, your thoughts on the first corner: Fernando got caught between you and Michael (Schumacher).
JB: It’s always a very tricky corner here. It’s very, very narrow. When one person gets a bad start it can be a bit of a nightmare. Fernando got a poor start, so that meant that I was on the inside, Michael was on the outside and it’s difficult for three cars to get through turn one as we saw. But when you’re in a racing environment it’s very difficult and it can also be very dangerous to back out of that situation, because if you hit the brakes during the straight, you can cause a big accident behind you. I think it was just one of those things and I’m sorry for Fernando that he was turned around. It cost me a lot of places as well. So that was turn one, really. It was very slippery as well, so it was tricky for us on heavy fuel.
As for the stops, I don’t know if it was Lewis’s decision or the team’s. For me, I didn’t think we would be pitting at all, because that was never the idea for us, and that’s why I was looking after the tyres. Maybe he was graining the rears or maybe he flat-spotted a front or something, I don’t know. But it’s very tricky to look after the tyres when you’re behind another car as we’ve seen many times before, so maybe his tyres were getting seriously damaged behind Robert.

Q: An open question: how difficult is it to pass, with the cars’ aerodynamics the way they are, because we saw Hamilton and Webber really struggling towards the end with obviously better tyres. Is it extremely difficult this year or is it just the same as other years?
JB: I found it very difficult in Bahrain. You’ve got a much smaller front tyre, so mechanically you have less grip, so when you lose the downforce by following other cars, which inevitably happens, you have less mechanical grip, so you have less grip. I think it’s more difficult this year. If we have another race like this where we have mixed conditions and the tyres are graining and people do two stops and some people do one, I think we can have a great race and especially in somewhere like Malaysia where it’s wide, it’s open, you can overtake, I think we can have a really exciting race, but here you’re a little bit limited to overtaking, so I’m surprised there was so much.
RK: I don’t think it’s just the tyres. For me actually it’s easier to overtake this year than it was in the past, because I’m driving a car that has better top speed. There’s quite a lot of percentage if you have good top speed or not and you want to overtake. If you are the quickest car in a straight line it’s easier to overtake than if you are the slowest. I don’t think it’s just the tyres, it’s everything. It’s always been very difficult to overtake in F1.

Q: (Tom Cary – The Daily Telegraph) Jenson, you appear very calm at the moment; how does the first win for McLaren compare with you first win with Brawn 12 months ago?
JB: You can’t really compare victories like that. They are both very special but they are very different and the emotions that were going through my head before and after the race were very different also than last year. This one is a special victory because I’ve only been with this team for a short period of time but this is one of the main reasons why I wanted to be here. I think that the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes team is pretty much always fighting it out for victories and as a driver you want to be in that situation. But on the other hand, I think the conditions helped us in this race, definitely. We’re not in the position to go to the next two or three races and walk away with victories, so we’ve got to enjoy this moment and think that we’ve got some good points when we’re not the quickest and we’ve got to work on the areas where we think we’re weak. We’re doing that right now and I think that every race we go to from here we will be closer and closer to the front when it comes to qualifying and hopefully race pace is pretty much there now.

http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2010/3/10595.html

2010 FORMULA 1 AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 06:21:00 -0700

2010 FORMULA 1 QANTAS AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Pts
1	1	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	58	1:33:36.531	4	25
2	11	Robert Kubica	Renault	58	+12.0 secs	9	18
3	7	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	58	+14.4 secs	5	15
4	8	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	58	+16.3 secs	3	12
5	4	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes GP	58	+16.6 secs	6	10
6	2	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	58	+29.8 secs	11	8
7	15	Vitantonio Liuzzi	Force India-Mercedes	58	+59.8 secs	13	6
8	9	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	58	+60.5 secs	8	4
9	6	Mark Webber	RBR-Renault	58	+67.3 secs	2	2
10	3	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes GP	58	+69.3 secs	7	1
11	17	Jaime Alguersuari	STR-Ferrari	58	+71.3 secs	17
12	22	Pedro de la Rosa	BMW Sauber-Ferrari	58	+74.0 secs	14
13	19	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Cosworth	56	+2 Laps	19
14	20	Karun Chandhok	HRT-Cosworth	53	+5 Laps	22
Ret	24	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	41	Suspension	23
Ret	25	Lucas di Grassi	Virgin-Cosworth	26	Hydraulics	24
Ret	5	Sebastian Vettel	RBR-Renault	25	Wheel issue	1
Ret	14	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	9	Engine	10
Ret	12	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	9	Spin	18
Ret	21	Bruno Senna	HRT-Cosworth	4	Hydraulics	21
Ret	16	Sebastien Buemi	STR-Ferrari	0	Accident	12
Ret	10	Nico Hulkenberg	Williams-Cosworth	0	Accident	15
Ret	23	Kamui Kobayashi	BMW Sauber-Ferrari	0	Accident	16
Ret	18	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Cosworth	0	Hydraulics	20

2010 FORMULA 1 BAHRAIN GRAND PRIX

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 12:01:00 -0700

2010 FORMULA 1 GULF AIR BAHRAIN GRAND PRIX

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Pts
1	8	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	49	1:39:20.396	3	25
2	7	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	49	+16.0 secs	2	18
3	2	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	49	+23.1 secs	4	15
4	5	Sebastian Vettel	RBR-Renault	49	+38.7 secs	1	12
5	4	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes Benz GP Ltd	49	+40.2 secs	5	10
6	3	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes Benz GP Ltd	49	+44.1 secs	7	8
7	1	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	49	+45.2 secs	8	6
8	6	Mark Webber	RBR-Renault	49	+46.3 secs	6	4
9	15	Vitantonio Liuzzi	Force India-Mercedes	49	+53.0 secs	12	2
10	9	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	49	+62.4 secs	11	1
11	11	Robert Kubica	Renault	49	+69.0 secs	9
12	14	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	49	+82.9 secs	10
13	17	Jaime Alguersuari	STR-Ferrari	49	+92.6 secs	18
14	10	Nico Hulkenberg	Williams-Cosworth	48	+1 Lap	13
15	19	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Cosworth	47	+2 Laps	21
16	16	Sebastien Buemi	STR-Ferrari	46	+3 Laps	15
17	18	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Cosworth	46	Hydraulics	20
Ret	22	Pedro de la Rosa	BMW Sauber-Ferrari	28	Hydraulics	14
Ret	21	Bruno Senna	HRT-Cosworth	17	Mechanical	23
Ret	24	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	16	Gearbox	19
Ret	12	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	13	Suspension	17
Ret	23	Kamui Kobayashi	BMW Sauber-Ferrari	11	Hydraulics	16
Ret	25	Lucas di Grassi	Virgin-Cosworth	2	Hydraulics	22
Ret	20	Karun Chandhok	HRT-Cosworth	1	Accident	24

Alonso and Ferrari romp to victory in Bahrain

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 11:49:00 -0700

Race winner Fernando Alonso (ESP) Ferrari on the podium. Formula One World Championship, Rd 1, Bahrain Grand Prix, Race, Bahrain International Circuit, Sakhir, Bahrain, Sunday, 14 March 2010 Race winner Fernando Alonso (ESP) Ferrari F10 celebrates as he passes his team at the end of the race. Formula One World Championship, Rd 1, Bahrain Grand Prix, Race, Bahrain International Circuit, Sakhir, Bahrain, Sunday, 14 March 2010 Bahrain flag on the grid. Formula One World Championship, Rd 1, Bahrain Grand Prix, Race Day, Bahrain International Circuit, Sakhir, Bahrain, Sunday, 14 March 2010 Sebastian Vettel (GER) Red Bull Racing RB6 leads at the start of the race. Formula One World Championship, Rd 1, Bahrain Grand Prix, Race Day, Bahrain International Circuit, Sakhir, Bahrain, Sunday, 14 March 2010 Felipe Massa (BRA) Ferrari F10. Formula One World Championship, Rd 1, Bahrain Grand Prix, Race Day, Bahrain International Circuit, Sakhir, Bahrain, Sunday, 14 March 2010

Fernando Alonso drove a superbly judged race to emulate Nigel Mansell and Kimi Raikkonen, as he sped to victory on his debut for Ferrari in Sunday’s Bahrain Grand Prix. Alonso chased Sebastian Vettel’s fleet Red Bull fruitlessly in the early stages, when both were running the super-soft Bridgestone tyres, but had an advantage after they had respectively switched to the harder compound on Laps 17 and 16.

Alonso then began to hunt down the German, whose lap times got slower and slower until the moment of truth arrived on Lap 34. That was when exhaust problems hit the Red Bull and the Ferrari dived past in the penultimate corner, to grab a lead it never lost. Felipe Massa had also closed in driving the second Ferrari and passed Vettel as they braked for Turn One at the start of Lap 35. Crucially, however, Alonso put in some fearsomely quick laps to break his team mate’s challenge, after that there was nobody left to put him under pressure.

As Massa consolidated second place, conserving fuel as a temperature problem in the cockpit obliged him to ease back, it was nevertheless a great day for the Scuderia. Vettel came under increasing pressure from Lewis Hamilton’s McLaren, which was a lot more competitive on the harder rubber. Eventually the 2008 world champion moved on to the final podium slot on the 38th lap after overtaking on the main straight.

Vettel almost fell prey to Nico Rosberg’s Mercedes GP, but hung on for fourth ahead of the Silver Arrow. Almost four seconds further back, Michael Schumacher’s return yielded a hard-fought sixth place, pressured all the way by 2009 champion Jenson Button in the other McLaren and Red Bull’s Mark Webber. Over the last 30 laps they were never more than metres apart.

A great drive rewarded Vitantonio Liuzzi with ninth for Force €ndia, while Rubens Barrichello was in 10th place for Williams, taking the final point.

There was drama from the start when Webber’s Red Bull spouted clouds of oil as the field braked for Turn One, and both Renault’s Robert Kubica and Force €ndia’s Adrian Sutil spun. They eventually finished 11th and 12th, with Jaime Alguersuari 13th for Toro Rosso. Nico Hulkenberg’s debut was marked by a wild spin early on, and the need to claw back to 14th in the second Williams.

Lotus won the race for the new teams, with Heikki Kovalainen placing 15th after a commendably reliable run. Sebastien Buemi was 16th for Toro Rosso though he stopped three laps from the end, and Jarno Trulli’s ailing Lotus was 17th, also three laps down.

There were more retirements than usual, with neither BMW Sauber making the flag, Bruno Senna’s HRT eating its engine, the Virgins of Timo Glock and Lucas di Grassi falling prey to mechanical problems (after the German had waged a great fight with Kovalainen), Vitaly Petrov’s strong early run in sight of points coming to nothing with a suspected suspension problem which was detected when he made his tyre stop on the 13th lap, and Karun Chandhok crashed his HRT on the second lap.

The result gives Ferrari the perfect start to the world championship with 43 points, ahead of McLaren on 21, Mercedes GP on 18 and Red Bull on 16. Alonso leads the title chase with 25 points from Massa on 18, Hamilton on 15, Vettel on 12, Rosberg on 10 and Schumacher on 8.

And the general verdict is that the ban of refuelling, while creating a slow-burn effect initially, made the racing much more exciting.

Stefan reconfirms 2010 desire

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 07:55:00 -0800

With reports continuing that USF1 and Campos Meta will more than likely miss the upcoming 2010 Formula one championship after gaining entry last year, Stefan grand Prix has reiterated that they are ready willing and able to make the start of the championship as soon as they are given the all clear.

“SGP would like to re-confirm its desire and, importantly, its ability to compete in the whole of the FIA 2010 Formula One World Championship,” they said. “It recognises that this can only happen with the consent of the FIA and the FOM, but has faith that the Formula One 'family' will make the correct decision in the end. There will be no more press releases on this subject and we look forward to being allowed to show everyone our team in Bahrain.”

With teams scheduled to ship out this week for next weekend’s season opener, Stefan Grand Prix is said to already have their equipment ready and waiting in Bahrain. Now it is a case of wait and see if they will actually be able to race!

2010 F1 calendar

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Thu, 4 Mar 2010 08:15:00 -0800

2010 F1 calendar

This is the official 2010 F1 calendar:

Round Dates Race Circuit

1 March 12-14th Bahrain Grand Prix Bahrain International Circuit
2 March 26-28th Australian Grand Prix Albert Park, Melbourne
3 April 2nd-4th Malaysian Grand Prix Sepang International Circuit
4 April 16-18th Chinese Grand Prix Shanghai International Circuit
5 May 7-9th Spanish Grand Prix Circuit de Catalunya
6 May 13-16th Monaco Grand Prix Monte-Carlo
7 May 28-30th Turkish Grand Prix Istanbul Park
8 June 11-13th Canadian Grand Prix Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, Montreal
9 June 25-27th European Grand Prix Valencia Street Circuit
10 July 9-11th British Grand Prix Silverstone
11 July 23-25th German Grand Prix Hockenheimring
12 July 30th-August 1st Hungarian Grand Prix Hungaroring
13 August 27-29th Belgian Grand Prix Spa-Francorchamps
14 September 10-12th Italian Grand Prix Monza
15 September 24-26th Singapore Grand Prix Singapore
16 October 8-10th Japanese Grand Prix Suzuka
17 October 22-24th Korean Grand Prix Jeonnam*
18 November 5-7th Brazilian Grand Prix Interlagos
19 November 12-14th Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Yas Island

Fernando Alonso: The Youngest Double World Champion in History

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 11:26:00 -0700

Name: Fernando Alonso
Born: July 29, 1981 in Oviedo, Spain

Team: Renault
Height: 5'6"
Weight: 150 lbs.

Hobbies: Soccer, Training, Cycling, Magic

Previous F1 Teams:
* 2001 Minardi
* 2003 - 2006 Renault
* 2007 McLaren
* 2008 Renault

Victories: 21

Background:
Fernando, like most of the other Formula 1 drivers, began racing go karts while still a child. In fact, his first race was at age 3. He won several national and local Spanish championships and in 1996 he won the world junior karting championship. He began racing cars at 18, winning his first championship, the Euro-Open Nissan series, where he won six races. He joined the Formula 3000 series in 2000, where he finished fourth, winning at Spa-Francorchamps.

His Career Thus Far:
With only two seasons of car racing behind him before he joined Formula 1 in 2001 at the age of 19, Fernando had shown very little reason to outsiders to merit the praise of his manager, Flavio Briatore, the man who had hired Michael Schumacher at Benetton in 1991 when he was an unknown. Early on, Briatore would compare Fernando to the German driver.

After a year learning the ropes at Minardi, Fernando joined Renault in 2002 for a sabbatical from racing as a test driver. During this year he developed his technical knowledge and his rapport with the team. The result was that in 2003 when he became a full-time driver at Renault, he was a fully-fledged and experienced F1 racer. At the Hungarian Grand Prix in August he won his first race, becoming the youngest ever Formula 1 race winner at 22 years and 27 days old.

Fernando finished the series in sixth position in 2003, in fourth position in 2004, and then won it the following two years, becoming the sport's youngest world champion in 2005. After that first title, he announced he would join McLaren in 2007. McLaren finished second in the series in 2005. But in 2006 McLaren failed to win a single race for the first time since 1996.

Driving Style:
Fernando has a smooth driving style marked by the intelligence of both his technical approach and in dealing with traffic and other competitors. On the track he keeps his head under pressure, rarely cracking or making a mistake when it is vital to hold position.

Character:
When he moved to the McLaren team in 2007, Fernando exposed another side to his character. He found himself racing against the greatest rookie driver in F1 history: Lewis Hamilton. The two drivers were involved in controversies as the season unfolded. At the Hungarian Grand Prix Fernando blocked Lewis during qualifying, causing the British driver to lose his last qualifying lap and pole position. Fernando was then penalized for this, and Lewis was awarded pole. Fernando was then involved in presenting emails he had received related to the summer long spy scandal, which eventually resulted in McLaren being eliminated from the championship. Although the Spanish fans remained loyal to their driver, many other fans considered that Fernando had shown previously unsuspected weaknesses in his character. Fernando left McLaren and rejoined Renault for 2008, where he amazed even himself by winning two races, and set the stage for a comeback in 2009.

profile Rubens Barrichello

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 07:34:00 -0700

Name:
Rubens Barrichello
Born:
May 23, 1972 Sao Paulo, Brazil

Team:
Honda
Height:
5'6"
Weight:
157 lbs.

Hobbies:
Karting, Golf, Bowling

Previous F1 Teams:

* 1993 - 1996 Jordan
* 1997 - 1999 Stewart
* 2000 - 2005 Ferrari
* 2006 - 2008 Honda
Victories:
9

Background:

Racing was a part of Rubens' life since he was born, as he grew up beside the Interlagos race track, where the Brazilian Grand Prix at Sao Paulo takes place. As a child he would sneak in through the fence to watch the races. He began go-karting at age 6, and became Brazilian champion. But like just about all of the South American drivers who had ambitions to go into F1, as a teenager he went to live and race in Europe. In 1990 he won the European Formula Opel series, and the following year he won the British Formula 3 title. In 1992 he finished third in Formula 3000.

His Career Thus Far:

When started in Formula 1, Rubens was only 20 years old. By only his third race he was seen as a future star. It was the European Grand Prix at Donington, England. Five laps from the end he was third, when a fuel pressure problem forced him to retire. His mentor, friend and countryman, Ayrton Senna, won the race in one of his greatest drives in the wet.

The following year, Rubens also played a minor role on a weekend that would be remembered for Senna, this time as a tragedy. During Friday practice at the San Marino Grand Prix, Barrichello had a wild crash and injured his arm. The next day, Roland Ratzenberg was killed in an accident. During the race on the Sunday, Senna crashed into a wall and also died.

Suddenly, the youngster carried all the weight of Brazil's hopes for a new star. It took years for him to absorb the shock of Senna's death and the responsibility to his country.

He would not win his first race until the German Grand Prix at Hockenheim in 2000. On the victory podium, Barrichello cried, looked into the sky and thought of Senna.

Driving Style:

Barrichello is one of the smoothest, fastest and most incisive of drivers. Although it looked when arriving at Honda in 2006 as if he might be overshadowed by his new younger teammate, Jenson Button, the Brazilian worked closely with the engineers to resolve his problems with the car. He was soon in excellent form and giving Button a hard time.

Character:

Starting as young as he did, Barrichello's early years would forever be marked by the shadow of Senna, and many people wondered if he would ever come into his own. After leaving Jordan and joining the Stewart team in 1997, he did just that.

Joining Ferrari as Michael Schumacher's teammate in 2000, he finally had a car capable of winning. Unfortunately, Schumacher was Ferrari's No. 1 driver. As a result, Barrichello often came under public criticism for being too soft, and allowing Schumacher to win races that Rubens should have won. Yet at the Austrian Grand Prix of 2002, Rubens protested a team demand that he hand Schumacher the lead for the victory. He waited until the last yards of the last lap before slowing down to hand victory to Schumacher, and it caused worldwide scorn.
Rubens later said that he was happy to stay at a team where he could win races occasionally, even if it meant serving his teammate at other times.

Timo Glock Profile

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 07:08:00 -0700

Timo Glock is staying on in 2009 after impressing his Toyota bosses - and a number of F1 pundits - during his first season with the team.

Glock first entered Formula One in 2004 when he tested for the Jordan outfit. As the team's official third and reserve driver, he was handed the opportunity to race at the Canadian GP as Giorgio Pantano's replacement.

The German clinched 11th place in the grand prix but was later promoted to P7 when both the Toyotas and Williams were disqualified. That resulted earned Glock and Jordan two World Championship points.

He was again called up to compete in the final three races of the season, although failed to score another World Championship point, finishing all three events P15.

In 2005, Glock shifted his racing career to the United States, racing in the Champ Car World Series with Rocketsports team. His best finish of the year was a second place finish at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal. He went on to finish 8th in the final season points standings and win Champ Car World Series Rookie of the Year honors.

The following year Timo moved to the GP2 series. He started the series with the midfield BCN Competicion team, gaining average results. However, a mid-season move to the front-running iSport team proved conducive and after a series of impressive results he finished 4th in the final classification.

Staying with iSport in 2007, Glock clinched the title after winning one feature and four sprint races.

The German's performances earned him a three-year contract with Toyota, which started in 2008 when he partnered Jarno Trulli. And although his team-mate got the better of him at the start of the campaign, so much so that there were questions hanging over Glock's future, the German soon came to the fore, even bagging a second-placed finish at his home race.

His good run continued through to the end of the season with him collecting four points finishes in the final seven races, which resulted in Toyota confirming him for the 2009 campaign.

Jenson Button: A British Driver Makes Good at Honda Formula 1 Team

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:10:00 -0700

Name: Jenson Button
Born: January 19, 1980 in Frome, England

Team: Honda
Height: 6'
Weight: 151 lbs.

Hobbies: Water sports, cycling, cars, music and skiing

Previous F1 Teams:

* 2000 Williams
* 2001 Benetton
* 2002 Renault
* 2003 - 2005 BAR Honda
* 2006 - 2008 Honda

Victories: 1

Background:

Jenson started go-karting at age eight and won several British national and international championships. He moved to cars at 18 and won the British Formula Ford series and the Formula Ford Festival, in his first year. In 1999 he raced in British Formula 3 and took third place, and was the rookie of the year.

His Career Thus Far:

Jenson was such a sensation in both karts and cars, that at 20 years old he was signed up for a season at the Williams team in Formula 1, then one of the top teams in the sport. He was the youngest British driver ever to race in F1. In only his second race, he finished sixth, at the Brazilian Grand Prix, to become the youngest driver ever to score a point. He finished the season in eighth position in the drivers' series.

After a year at Williams, Jenson joined the Benetton team in 2001 and stayed there for two seasons. Unfortunately, the team was in transition after being bought out by Renault, which it would be called in 2002, and Jenson scored only two points in his first season there. He then joined BAR Honda, with Jacques Villeneuve, the former world champion, as a teammate. In 2004 Jenson finally found his stride, as did the BAR team, and he scored 11 podiums and finished third in the championship. But his first victory still eluded him.

The Williams Scandal:

During the summer of that same 2004 season Jenson stunned his BAR Honda team by announcing that he would rejoin the Williams team for the following two years. A long battle ensued with first BAR and then Jenson deciding he would not join Williams. That led to a battle between Jenson and Williams. In the end, Jenson said he would buy himself out of the contract to Williams, and he paid the team an estimated $50 million. Jenson also signed a four year deal to race for Honda at $45 million per year.

Character:

Although Jenson gives off the impression of having a cool, laid back attitude to life and racing, the incident with Williams showed not only his level of ruthlessness to achieve what he wants, but also a certain acumen. Aside from the financial return, the choice to stay at Honda paid off, after Williams went downhill and Honda improved: Jenson won his first race with the team at the Hungarian Grand Prix last season.

Lewis Hamilton: World's Youngest World Champion Driver at McLaren-Mercedes

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 09:30:00 -0700

Name:
Lewis Hamilton
Born:
January 7, 1985 in Stevenage, England

Team:
McLaren Mercedes
Height:
5'7"
Weight:
150 lbs.

Hobbies:
Guitar, Music, Training

Previous F1 Teams: 2007 - 2009 McLaren

Victories: 9

Background:

Lewis's climb to Formula 1 was fairy-tale like. From a modest family in England, with a white mother and a black father, Lewis began racing go-karts at age 8. He won the McLaren Mercedes Champions of the Future series and at age 10 he met Ron Dennis, the owner and director of the McLaren Formula 1 team and told him he wanted to race in F1. At 13 years old McLaren signed Lewis up with the McLaren young driver program and the team supported his career through karting and car racing, taking him on as a full-time F1 driver starting with the 2007 season.

His Career Thus Far:

Lewis's pre-F1 career was one of the most convincing of the recent crop of young drivers. He won several karting series, including the European Formula A championship in 2000. After a year of learning in Formula Renault, he won the 2003 British Formula Renault championship with 10 victories and 11 pole positions. After a year of learning in the F3 Euroseries, he won that series in 2005 with 15 victories and 13 pole positions. In 2006 he did not even need a year of learning to win the title in his rookie year in the GP2 series, an F1 support race series.

Hamilton: The F1 Rookie Phenomenon:

Lewis did not disappoint in his first year in F1 either. In fact, he finished third in his first race and then proceeded to smash the 40-year-old rookie record of two consecutive podiums at the start of a season. Lewis scored nine podiums in his first nine races and he won two of those races. In total, he won four races in 2007 and he finished the championship in second place, one point behind Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari. Lewis's first year was the best by any rookie in the sport, and it was not until errors in his last two races that cost him the title that he finally looked human after all.

Driving Style:

During his GP2 season, F1 people first saw the best of Lewis's driving style as he proved to be not only lightning fast, but also a gutsy driver of the old fashioned style. His passing move driving around the outside of two other drivers during the second race at Silverstone in England was a breathtaking maneuver that no one who saw will forget. He started eighth and won the race. This style was to continue in his first F1 season.

Character:

Lewis is a personable, level-headed driver who has shown in apprenticeship years that he can stand up to the toughest situations both on track and off without losing his head. Yet before he joined F1 in 2007 as teammate to the double world champion, Fernando Alonso, specialists were divided as to whether his character would stand up to the job of racing with the greatest young driver in F1. In the end, the drivers finished level on points.

In his first year in the sport, Lewis proved that had the necessary strength of character up to a point. After squandering a 17-point lead in the series two races before the end, he still had to prove he could go all the way in F1. But in 2008, he proved that by becoming the youngest ever world champion and winning that title in the last race of the season.

Kimi Raikkonen: The Iceman From Finland, a Cool Ferrari Driver

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 08:36:00 -0700

Ferrari

Name:
Kimi Raikkonen
Born:
October 17, 1979 in Espoo, Finland

Team:
Ferrari
Kimi Raikkonen
Height:
5'7"
Weight:
138 lbs.

Hobbies:
Snowboarding, jogging, going to the gym, MotoX, ice hockey

Previous F1 Teams:

* 2001 Sauber
* 2002 - 2006 McLaren
* 2007 - 2008 Ferrari

Victories: 18

Background:

When Kimi joined the Sauber Formula 1 team in 2001 he was only 21 and had raced in only 23 car races in his life. But he had won more than half of them. He raced go-karts until age 19, and was Finnish champion and he also did well in the international series. He began car racing in 1999, and in 2000 he won the British Formula Renault series. He also raced in three races in European Formula Renault, winning two of them. Michael Schumacher saw him testing in the Sauber in 2000 and said that he had a bright future in Formula 1.
His Career Thus Far:

In his first year in Formula 1 Kimi proved that he had his place in the sport despite having so little experience racing cars. Even so, he finished the championship in ninth position with nine points. But his teammate, Nick Heidfeld, finished in seventh position, with 13 points.

McLaren-Mercedes nevertheless decided that Kimi was a driver for the future, and signed him up for the following year. (This was a blow to Heidfeld, who had been nurtured as a Mercedes driver for years.) In his first year at McLaren, Kimi finished sixth in the series with 24 points, compared to his teammate David Coulthard's fifth place finish in the series and 41 points. That was, however, the last time his teammate would do better than him. Raikkonen won his first race in 2003 and finished second in the championship, missing the title by two points to Schumacher. He won seven races in 2005 and again finished second in the series, but this time to Fernando Alonso. He joined Ferrari in 2007 hoping he would finally win the title at the sport's most successful team.

Raikkonen the World Champion:

The 2007 season was a four-way battle for the drivers' title between the two drivers of the McLaren Mercedes team and the two drivers of the Ferrari team. But from early in the season to the very last race, Lewis Hamilton, the rookie driver at McLaren, created the show. Kimi fell behind his teammate, Felipe Massa, for several races and looked out of the running. With two races left, Lewis spoiled his 17-point lead to score only two points, while Kimi won the two races for a perfect score, to win the drivers' title in the last race. In 2008 he won only twice.

Driving Style:

Although Kimi lost the title mostly because of the unreliability of his car in 2005, he has been publicly accused of driving his cars hard. In fact, Kimi's style is marked by such an apparently superhuman and cool, incisive approach that he developed the nickname of Iceman. He is very fast on a single lap, but is also a master of fighting his way up the pack.

Character:

His cool character, light complexion and icy blue eyes also contributed to his nickname, but Kimi remains the coolest of drivers. Whether he wins a race or his car breaks down and robs him of certain victory, the Finn stays cool and detached, showing little emotion of any kind. That he is in fact human is clear in his private life from his occasional, highly-publicized blowouts at parties.

Todt confirms FIA intentions

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 09:28:00 -0700

Former Ferrari Chief Jean Todt, who played a major role in helping the Italian team secure multiple world championships together with Ross Brawn and the legendary Michael Schumacher, has now confirmed his desire to run for FIA President.

The man currently in the top job at the FIA, Max Mosley, gave his 100% support of Todt’s application when he confirmed recently that he would not be running for re-election in October of this year. At that stage, Todt’s intentions were only speculated but now confirmation has arrived...

"Following the decision of Max Mosley not to seek re-election and his unequivocal support of my candidature I've written to the members of the FIA to inform them that I wish to run for the presidency. It is my intention to continue and expand the outstanding work of President Mosley,'' he said.

There has been some voiced opposition to Todt’s decision with the majority wanting former Rally champion Ari Vatanen in the role instead, believing that he would give the FIA a fresh outlook when Todt would not.

2009 FIA Formula One World Championship Race Calendar

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 09:23:00 -0700

01	2009 FORMULA 1 ING AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX (Melbourne)	27 - 29 Mar
02	2009 FORMULA 1 PETRONAS MALAYSIAN GRAND PRIX (Kuala Lumpur)	03 - 05 Apr
03	2009 FORMULA 1 CHINESE GRAND PRIX (Shanghai)	17 - 19 Apr
04	2009 FORMULA 1 GULF AIR BAHRAIN GRAND PRIX (Sakhir)	24 - 26 Apr
05	FORMULA 1 GRAN PREMIO DE ESPANA TELEFONICA 2009 (Catalunya)	08 - 10 May
06	FORMULA 1 GRAND PRIX DE MONACO 2009 (Monte Carlo)	21 - 24 May
07	2009 FORMULA 1 ING TURKISH GRAND PRIX (Istanbul)	05 - 07 Jun
08	2009 FORMULA 1 SANTANDER BRITISH GRAND PRIX (Silverstone)	19 - 21 Jun
09	FORMULA 1 GROSSER PREIS SANTANDER VON DEUTSCHLAND 2009 (Nürburgring)	10 - 12 Jul
10	FORMULA 1 ING MAGYAR NAGYDIJ 2009 (Budapest)	24 - 26 Jul
11	2009 FORMULA 1 TELEFONICA GRAND PRIX OF EUROPE (Valencia)	21 - 23 Aug
12	2009 FORMULA 1 ING BELGIAN GRAND PRIX (Spa-Francorchamps)	28 - 30 Aug
13	FORMULA 1 GRAN PREMIO SANTANDER D'ITALIA 2009 (Monza)	11 - 13 Sep
14	2009 FORMULA 1 SINGTEL SINGAPORE GRAND PRIX (Singapore)	25 - 27 Sep
15	2009 FORMULA 1 FUJI TELEVISION JAPANESE GRAND PRIX (Suzuka)	02 - 04 Oct
16	FORMULA 1 GRANDE PREMIO DO BRASIL 2009 (Sao Paulo)	16 - 18 Oct
17	2009 FORMULA 1 ETIHAD AIRWAYS ABU DHABI GRAND PRIX (Yas Marina Circuit)	30 Oct - 01 Nov

Sponsorship arrives

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:39:00 -0700

The Lotus 49 at a demonstration run in 2005. The 49 was the first F1 car to appear in a sponsor's livery.

In 1968 Lotus lost its exclusive right to use the DFV. McLaren built a DFV-powered car and a new force appeared on the scene when Ken Tyrrell entered his team using Cosworth-powered French Matra chassis driven by ex-BRM Jackie Stewart as lead driver. Clark took his last win at the 1968 season opening South African Grand Prix. On 7 April 1968 the double champion was killed at Hockenheim in a non-championship Formula Two event. The year saw two significant innovations. The first was the arrival of unrestricted sponsorship, which the FIA decided to permit after the withdrawal of support from automobile related firms. In May the Lotus Formula One team appeared at Jarama in the red, gold and white colors of Imperial Tobacco's Gold Leaf brand. The second innovation was the introduction of wings as seen previously on the Chaparral CanAm and endurance cars. Colin Chapman started the arms race with modest front wings and a spoiler on Graham Hill's Lotus 49B at Monaco. Brabham and Ferrari went one better at the Belgian Grand Prix with full width wings mounted on struts high above the driver. Lotus replied with a full width wing directly connected to the rear suspension.^[12] Brabham and Matra then produced a high mounted front wing connected to the front suspension. At the end of the season most cars were using mobile wings with various control systems. There was several case of wings, struts, or even suspension collapsing. Lotus won both titles in 1968 with Graham Hill with Stewart second.

The 1968 Matras most innovative feature was the use of aviation-inspired structural fuel tanks but the FIA decided to ban the technology for 1970.^[13] For 1969 Matra made the radical decision to withdraw its works team and build a new car using structural tanks for the Tyrrell team, even though it would be eligible for only a single season. The 1969 season started with cars using larger and more sophisticated wings than the previous year. When both Lotus cars broke their wings' struts and crashed at the Spanish Grand Prix, the FIA banned wings for the next race at Monaco. They were reintroduced later in the season but were to be restricted in size and height, and attached directly to the chassis in a fixed position.

Safety became a major issue in Formula One and the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa did not take place as the drivers boycotted the circuit after safety upgrades were not installed as demanded. Stewart won the 1969 title easily with the new Matra MS80, a spectacular achievement from a constructor and a team that had only entered Formula One the previous year. It remains the only title won by a chassis built in France. 1969 also saw a brief resurgence of interest in four wheel drive with a record of four such cars on field at the British Grand Prix. Johnny Servoz-Gavin became the one and only driver to score a point with a 4WD, finishing sixth with the Matra MS84 at the Canadian Grand Prix, although the front wheel transmission was actually disconnected.^[14] Wide tyres and downforce had proved to be better means of increasing grip, and the technology was largely abandoned. Jacky Ickx finished second in the championship for Brabham, competitive again after dropping its Repco engines in favour of the DFV.

For 1970 Tyrrell were asked by Matra to use their V12, but decided to retain the Cosworth instead.^[15] As Matra was now a Chrysler affiliate and Tyrrell derived much of its income from Ford and Elf (associated with Renault) the partnership ended. Ken Tyrrell bought March 701 chassis as an interim solution while developing his own car for the next season. The new wedge-shaped Lotus 72 was a very innovative car featuring variable flexibility torsion bar suspension, hip-mounted radiators, inboard front brakes and an overhanging rear wing. The 72 originally had suspension problems, but once resolved the car quickly showed its superiority and Lotus' new leader, the Austrian Jochen Rindt, dominated the championship until he was killed at Monza when a brake shaft broke. He took the 1970 title posthumously for Lotus. 1970 saw the introduction of slick tyres by Goodyear.

After Rindt's death the Lotus team had a desultory 1971 season with its two new and inexperienced drivers - Emerson Fittipaldi and Reine Wisell. The team spent a lot of time experimenting with a gas turbine powered car, and with four wheel drive again. After Jack Brabham's retirement, his old team went into a steep decline. Using their own chassis heavily inspired by the Matra MS80 but with conventional tanks, Tyrrell and Stewart easily took success in 1971.

Focussing again on the type 72 chassis, now fielded in John Player Special's black and gold livery, Lotus took the 1972 championship by surprise with 25-year old Brazilian driver Emerson Fittipaldi becoming the then youngest world champion. Stewart came second, his performance compromised by a stomach ulcer.

In 1973, Lotus teammates Fittipaldi and Ronnie Peterson raced each other while Stewart was supported by François Cevert at Tyrrell. Stewart took the Driver's title, but then at the final race of the season, the United States Grand Prix at Watkins Glen, Cevert crashed during Saturday practice in the notorious esses and was killed instantly. Stewart and Tyrrell withdrew from the race effectively handing the Constructor's title to Lotus. At the end of the season Stewart made public his decision to retire, a decision that was already made before the US Grand Prix.

McLaren, having fully recovered from the death of his founder, ended the 1973 season with three wins and several poles. The new M23, an updated interpretation of the Lotus 72 concept, appeared to many as the best design on the field. Fittipaldi made the choice to leave Lotus for McLaren that offered him true lead driver status that Chapman refused to him.

Technology emerges

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:37:00 -0700

John Surtees (Ferrari) at the 1964 British Grand Prix.

In 1962, the Lotus team ran the Lotus 25 powered by the new Coventry-Climax FWMV V8 engine. The car had an aluminium sheet monocoque chassis instead of the traditional spaceframe design. This proved to be the greatest technological breakthrough since the introduction of mid-engined cars, but the Lotus was unreliable at first. Jim Clark finished second that year leaving the title to Graham Hill and his new V8 powered BRM.

As soon as the car and the engine became reliable, the era of the Lotus and of Jim Clark began. Clark won the title twice in three years, 1963 and 1965, the latter being the only occasion to date of a driver winning both the Championship and the Indianapolis 500-Mile Race in the same year. For 1964 Lotus introduced the new Lotus 33 and Ferrari made considerable technological and financial effort to win the title. Ferrari used no less than three different engines in the season—the existing V6, a V8 and a flat-12, while Lotus was struggling with the teething troubles of a new car. The title went to John Surtees and Ferrari. Surtees' title was especially notable, as he became the only driver ever to win the World Championship for both cars and motorcycles. The 1965 Mexican Grand Prix, the last race of the 1.5 litres Formula One, saw Richie Ginther giving Honda its first victory at the end of a season that was otherwise disappointing for the Japanese newcomer. This was first victory by a Japanese car and, as of today, the only one by a car powered by a transverse engine.

1966 saw a 'Return to Power' as Formula One changed the engine rules once again, allowing engines of 3.0 litre normally aspirated, or 1.5 litre supercharged capacity. 1966 was a transitional year for most teams, however, the year did see the first use of a technology which would later go on to revolutionise the sport: composite materials. The McLaren M2B, designed by Robin Herd, used an aluminium-wood laminate known as Mallite for much of its monocoque, although the car's design did not make best use of the new material.

Ferrari was the great favorite with a 3 litre version of his well tested sports car V12 design, but the engines were underpowered and the cars were heavy; an enlarged V6 held some promise but Surtees left mid-season after a dispute with team manager Dragoni. Coventry-Climax, formerly supplier to much of the field, pulled out of the sport leaving teams like Lotus to struggle with enlarged versions of obsolete Climax engines. Cooper turned to a development of an otherwise obsolete Maserati V12 that was originally designed for the Maserati 250 F in the late 1950s while BRM made the choice to design an incredibly heavy and complex H-16. The big winner was Jack Brabham, whose eponymous racing team took victory two years with a compact spaceframe chassis powered by the aluminium-block stock-derived Repco V8 unit. With SOHC heads and no more than 330 bhp,^[9] the Repco was by far the least powerful of the new 3 litre engines but unlike the others it was light, reliable and available right from the start of the new rules. 1966 was Jack's year, while 1967 went to his teammate, New Zealander Denny Hulme, as Jack tried new parts on his car.

In 1967 Lotus introduced the Lotus 49, powered by the Ford-Cosworth DFV V8 engine that was to dominate Formula One for the next decade. Like the Repco the Cosworth was light and compact but it was a real racing engine using 4-valve DOHC heads and delivering much more power - Cosworth had aimed for 400 bhp (300 kW) and exceeded this when the engine first ran. The DFV was designed to be fully stressed (an idea pioneered by the Lancia D50).^[10] This allowed Chapman to design a monocoque that ended just after the driver's seat while the Brabham were still using a very classic tubular frame that supported the engine, the gearbox and the rear suspension wishbones. The newborn DFV suffered from frequent failures due to excessive vibration from the flat-plane crank, forcing Keith Duckworth to redesign several parts and allowing Hulme to win the World Driver's Crown on reliability.

1967 also saw a remarkable result by Rhodesian driver John Love with a 2.7 litre four-cylinder Cooper-Climax; Love, who was in his forties and although seen as one of the finest drivers in Southern Africa was not a major star, led and finished second in that year's South African Grand Prix. Love's Cooper was originally designed for the short races of the Tasman Series; to run a full Grand Prix Love added two auxiliary gas tanks. Unfortunately the auxiliary tanks fuel pump failure forced him to refuel after having led most of the race.^[11]

Love was the king of South Africa's flourishing domestic Formula One championship, which was run from 1960 through to 1975, winning the drivers championship six times in the 1960s. The frontrunning cars in the series were recently retired from the world championship although there was also a healthy selection of locally built or modified machines. Frontrunning drivers from the series usually contested their local World Championship Grand Prix, as well as occasional European events, although they had little success at that level.

By the late 1960s, 'overseas' races outside Europe like the South African Grand Prix formed about a third of the championship in any year. The core of the season remained the European season run over the Northern Hemisphere summer, with overseas races usually falling at the start or end of the season, a pattern which has continued to this day. There were also a number of non-championship races run outside Europe – the South African Grand Prix was occasionally one of these.

The mid engine revolution

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:36:00 -0700

Mike Hawthorn in his Ferrari in the 1958 Argentine Grand Prix.

Although the basic formula remained unchanged in 1958, races were shortened from around 500 km/300miles to 300 km/200 miles and cars had to use Avgas instead of various fuel mixtures using methanol as the primary component.

With Fangio retired, Mike Hawthorn in a Ferrari took the 1958 driver's championship – becoming the first English driver to earn a title. The British Vanwall team took the maiden constructors championship that season, but ruined their driver's championship aspirations by taking points off one another. Stirling Moss, despite having many more wins than Hawthorn, lost the title by one point. This season saw a woman driving in Formula One for the first time with Maria Teresa de Filippis racing a private Maserati at the Belgian Grand Prix^[5].

1958 was a watershed in another crucial way for Formula One. Against a small field of Ferraris and Maseratis (BRM and Vanwall were still working to convert their engines to Avgas), Stirling Moss won the Argentine Grand Prix driving a mid-engined Cooper entered by the private team of Rob Walker, and powered by a 2 litre Coventry-Climax Straight-4. This was the first victory for a car with the engine mounted behind the driver in Formula One.^[6] The next Grand Prix in Monaco was also won by that Cooper, this time driven by Maurice Trintignant and facing a more substantial opposition. Powered by undersized engines, the Coopers remained outsiders in 1958 but as soon as the new 2.5 litre Coventry-Climax engine was available, the little British cars went on to dominate Formula One. The 1959 season saw fierce competition between the works Cooper of Australian Jack Brabham and Moss in the Walker team's Cooper. As the use of a modified Citroën Traction Avant transaxle was Achilles heel of the Coopers, Walker switched to a home design. Unfortunately the special transmission turned out to be more unreliable that the standard part and Brabham took the title with Moss second.

For 1960 while Enzo Ferrari adopted a conservative attitude, claiming "the horses pull the car rather than push it",^[7] Lotus and BRM introduced mid-engined machines. Walker's team switched to a Lotus 18 chassis. Moss gave Lotus its first Formula One victory at Monaco but his season was ruined by a crash and Brabham took a second title with his Cooper.

The mid-engined revolution rendered another potentially revolutionary car obsolete. The front-engined four-wheel drive Ferguson P99 raced in British Formula One races in 1961, winning the non-Championship Oulton Park International Gold Cup,^[8] but was too heavy and complex compared to the new breed of mid-engined machines.

In 1961, in an attempt to curb speeds, Formula One was downgraded to 1.5 litre, non-supercharged engines (essentially the then-current Formula Two rules), a formula which would remain for the next five years. Ferrari could have used its already proven V6 powered mid-engined Formula 2 cars, but preferred to go one step beyond by designing a very sophisticated car powered by a 120° V6. This led to Ferrari dominance for the 1961 season as the British teams scrambled to come up with a suitable engine.

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the Formula One World Championship was merely the tip of the iceberg when it came to races run to Formula One regulations. The total number of races run to Formula One regulations remained about the same as it had been before the introduction of the World Championship. Many famous races, such as the Pau and Syracuse Grands Prix, the BRDC International Trophy, the Race of Champions and the Oulton Park Gold Cup, were not part of the World Championship, but nonetheless continued to draw the top drivers and teams to compete.

World Championship

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:35:00 -0700

See 1950 season, 1951 season, 1952 season, 1953 season, 1954 season, 1955 season, 1956 season and 1957 season.

Juan Manuel Fangio drove this Alfa Romeo 159 to the title in 1951.

In 1950, as an answer to the Motorcycle World Championships introduced in 1949, the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) organized the first ever official World Championship for Drivers using the Formula One rules. The organization of the championship, to be held across six of the 'major' Grands Prix of Europe, plus the Indianapolis 500, was a mere formalization of what had already been developing in Grand Prix racing during the previous years. It was the Italian teams of Alfa Romeo, Ferrari, and Maserati which were best positioned to dominate the initial years of the championship. Other national manufacturers – such as the French manufacturer Talbot or the British effort BRM – competed, although less successfully. A number of private cars also took part in local races.

Alfa Romeo dominated all before them in the 1950 season, winning every race in the championship with the pre-war "Alfetta" 158s. The sole exception was the Indianapolis 500, which was part of the championship, although not run to Formula One regulations and rarely contested by the European teams. The race would never be important for Formula One and was no longer part of the championship after 1960. Nino Farina won the inaugural championship, Juan Manuel Fangio taking it in 1951 with the Alfa-Romeo 159, an evolution of the 158. The Alfetta's engines were extremely powerful for their capacity: In 1951 the 159 engine was producing around 420 bhp (310 kW) but this was at the price of a fuel consumption of 125 to 175 litres per 100 km (2.26 to 1.61 mpg imp/1.88 mpg to 1.34 mpg US).^[2] Enzo Ferrari, who had raced the Alfettas before the war, was the first to understand that the 1.5 litre supercharged engine was a dead end: Any increase in power meant more fuel to carry or more time lost in the pits for refuelling, For the last races of 1950 Ferrari sent his 1.5 litre supercharged 125s to the museum, and fielded the new V12 4.5 litre normally aspirated 375s. With a fuel consumption of around 35 litres per 100 kilometres (8.1 mpg_-imp; 6.7 mpg_-US) the 375s offered fierce opposition to the Alfettas towards the end of the 1951 season. Alfa Romeo, a state-owned company, decided to withdraw after a refusal of the Italian government to fund the expensive design of a new car. Surprisingly, Alfa Romeo involvement in racing was made with a very thin budget, using mostly pre-war technology and material during the two seasons. For instance the team won two championships using only nine pre-war built engine blocks.

No Alfa Romeo, a supporting cast of privateer Lago-Talbot entries and an almost undriveable, unreliable BRM would make Ferrari effectively invincible. The FIA was in an embarrassing position as it had already announced that current Formula One regulations would last until 1954 before switching to 2.5-litre atmospheric engines. Major manufacturers were already working to develop cars for the future regulation and it was obvious that nobody would develop a new car for only two years. The promoters of the World Championship Grands Prix, mindful of the lack of serious competition for the Alfettas, eventually all adopted Formula Two regulations for two years. However, Ferrari's dominance went on with the light 4-cylinder powered 500s, bringing Italian legend Alberto Ascari his two championships in the 1952 and 1953 seasons. Ferrari's Formula One cars continued to race very successfully in non-Championship Formula One and Formula Libre races through this period. Ironically, during this period the only World Championship race for which Formula One cars were eligible was the Indianapolis 500. In 1952 Ferrari entered four Formula One 375s with Alberto Ascari as lead driver, but with little success.

Discounting the Indianapolis 500, the World Championship was entirely based in Europe until 1953 when the season opened in Argentina. Since then there has always been at least one race outside Europe.

As planned, the World Championship races returned to Formula One regulations for the 1954 season, now based on 2.5-litre atmospheric engines. With them, Lancia and Mercedes-Benz came to the formula, hiring the best drivers of the era: Ascari for Lancia, Fangio for Mercedes. Featuring desmodromic valves, fuel injection, magnesium and exotic alloys parts, "streamlined" bodywork and other advanced features, the brand new Mercedes began the 1954 season with Fangio taking pole position at the "Grand Prix de l'ACF" at Reims-Gueux with the first lap over 200 km/h (124 mph) in Formula One before winning the race after a duel with other Mercedes driver Karl Kling, who finished second.

The Mercedes cars swept the next two seasons with Fangio winning all but three of the races. However, at the end of the 1955 season Mercedes vanished as swiftly as they had come. They had proven the superiority of their technology, but the crash of one of their sportscars that year at Le Mans, killing 83 people, was also a significant factor. The company would not return to Formula One for forty years.^[3] After Le Mans, three of the year's remaining Grands Prix were cancelled.

The Monaco Grand Prix saw a spectacular incident when Ascari and his Lancia crashed into the harbour after missing a chicane. Ascari was pulled out of the water alive and apparently well. However, there was speculation over an undetected internal injury when four days later Ascari was killed at Monza while testing a sportscar. After Ascari's death, Lancia followed Mercedes out of the category, passing their engines, cars, information and technology to Ferrari.

The 1956 season saw Fangio make good use of the Lancia-born Ferrari to win his fourth championship. Driving for Maserati, he took his fifth championship in the 1957 season, a record which would not be beaten for 46 years.^[4]

The early years

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:34:00 -0700

Formula One was first defined in 1946 by the Commission Sportive Internationale (CSI) of the FIA, forerunner of FISA, as the premier single seater racing category in worldwide motorsport. It was initially known as Formula A, but the name Formula One was widely used early on and became official in 1950. [1]

In the beginning, the formula was largely based on pre-war regulations defined by engine capacity. The regulation expected to bring a new balance between supercharged and normally aspirated cars. Non supercharged 4.5 litres pre-war Grand Prix cars were allowed to race against the pre-war 1.5 litres supercharged 'voiturettes' while pre-war supercharged Grand Prix cars were banned. The first race under the new regulations was the 1946 Turin Grand Prix held on 1 September, the race being won by Achille Varzi in an Alfa Romeo 158 Alfetta, although in reality the cars were no different to those that had raced earlier in the season. Indeed Varzi's car was built before the war. Championships for drivers or constructors were not re-introduced immediately. In the early years there were around 20 races held from late Spring to early Autumn (Fall) in Europe, although not all of these were considered significant. Most competitive cars came from Italy, particularly Alfa Romeo. Races saw pre-war heroes like Varzi, Jean-Pierre Wimille and Tazio Nuvolari end their careers, while drivers like Ascari and Fangio rose to the front.

History of Formula One

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:33:00 -0700

Formula One has its roots in the European Grand Prix motor racing (q.v. for pre-1947 history) of the 1920s and 1930s. However, the foundation of Formula One began in 1946 with the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile's (FIA's) standardisation of rules. A World Drivers' Championship followed in 1950. The sport's history necessarily parallels the history of its technical regulations; see Formula One regulations for a summary of the technical rule changes. Although the world championship has always been the main focus of the category, non-championship Formula One races were held for many years. Due to the rising cost of competition, the last of these occurred in 1983. National championships existed in South Africa and the UK in the 1960s and 1970s.

Formula One History

noreply@blogger.com (sukses jaya) — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:29:00 -0700

The modern era of Formula One Grand Prix racing began in 1950, but the roots of F1 are far earlier, including such pre-World War II legends as Italian Tazio Nuvolari and the great German teams, Auto Union and Mercedes Benz.

The modern era of Formula One Grand Prix racing began in 1950, but the roots of F1 are far earlier, tracing to the pioneering road races in France in the 1890s, through the Edwardian years, the bleak twenties, the German domination of the 1930s and the early post-war years of Italian supremacy.

At the birth of racing, cars were upright and heavy, roads were tarred sand or wood, reliability was problematic, drivers were accompanied by mechanics, and races — usually on public roads from town to town — were impossibly long by modern standards. Regarded as the first motor race proper was a 1,200 km road race from Paris to Bordeaux and back in 1895, won by Émile Levassor with his Panhard et Levassor in 48 hours. One of the most successful drivers of the early years was Fernand Charron, who won the Paris-Bordeaux race in 1899, also in a Panhard, at the blazing average speed of 29.9 mph.

The first race using the appellation "Grand Prix" was 1901's French Grand Prix at Le Mans, won by Ferencz Szisz with a Renault, who covered the 700 miles at 63.0 mph. In 1908 the Targa Florio in Sicily saw the appearance of "pits," shallow emplacements dug by the side of the track where mechanics could labor with the detachable rims on early GP car tires — themselves a major technical improvement over the earlier technique of permanently attached wheels and spokes. But even so, racing cars of the early years were too heavy and fast for their tires; Christian Lauteschalnger's winning Mercedes shredded 10 tires in the 1908 French Grand Prix at Dieppe!

In 1914, the massive 4 1/2 litre Mercedes of Daimler-Benz dominated the French Grand Prix at Lyons — 20 laps of a 23.3 mile circuit — taking the first three places and introducing control of drivers by signal from the pits. During World War I, racing was halted in Europe, and many drivers participated in the U.S. Indianapolis 500. Enzo Ferrari — who's real fame was to follow as a team manager and manufacturer with Scuderia Ferrari, formed in 1929 to race Alfa Roméo P2s —- finished second in the 1920 Voiturette race at Le Mans, the first international road race in France in six years.

By tradition the Italian racing driver in action is an excitable character given to shouting, gesticulating, waving his fists, baring his teeth and in general giving way to his emotions. Tazio Nuvolari filled this role splendidly.
The Farmer's Son - Cyril Posthumus

The first (and, until Dan Gurney's Eagle-Weslake at Spa-Francorchamps in 1967, the only) Grand Prix victory by an American-built car was by Jimmy Murphy in the 1921 French Grand Prix at Le Mans, driving a Duesnberg. Among the best of the 1920s manufacturers were Bugatti, whose straight-eight Type 35Bs won the French and Spanish GPs in 1929 and the Monaco, French and Belgian GPs in 1930, and Fiat, which introduced the supercharger for the first time in 1923.

The Great Depression of the early 1930s led to a lack of money and interest in Grand Prix racing, but saw the emergence of the legendary Tazio Nuvolari, whose wins in the Alfa Romeo P3 "Monza" in the Mille Miglia, at Monaco and the Italian GP at Monza were stunning. His victory in the 1933 Monaco GP was the first in which staring grid positions were determined by qualifying times. But in 1934, the balance of power in racing would begin to shift from Italy to Germany, with the emergence of factory teams from Auto Union (now Audi) and Mercedes-Benz, behind massive financial support from the Third Reich government on orders from Adolph Hitler.

These powerful and beautiful German machines introduced aerodynamics into Grand Prix car design and ran on exotic, secret fuel brews. Driving the sleek, silver 3-litre V12 Auto Union in his trademark canary yellow jersey, Nuvolari achieved new greatness with these incredibly well-engineered automobiles — but nothing to top his 1935 German GP victory at the Nürburgring, where he defeated nine modern German cars in a four-year old Alfa Roméo.