Sunday driver of the day: Richard Hammond crashed his Morgan Aeromax in a pile-up near Gloucester. Only the car went to hospital. It happened during a gumball where dragsters were fortunately excluded.
Have you noticed how Hammond look more and more like Rod Stewart?

Formula one is to expensive: The South African province Gauteng has decided against bidding to host a formula one race. They said that they’d rather spend their money on creating jobs. Respect.
This will allow South Africa to focus on the football world cup where the events also last one and a half hour, but with longer pitstops.
The rumors says that they were not too happy to see the Rooivalk being compared to an open wheel car.

Schumacher v Raikkonen v Alonso v Hamilton v Vettel v Webber:
Whilst Schumacher is working on his pain in the neck, we are only one week away from the confirmation that Renault will be present in Valencia.
In the meantime Hamilton confirms his worries about the German driver: “Coming in at this part of the season, Michael is at a disadvantage because he hasn’t had the same experiences as everyone else”.
Schumacher is yet to be allowed to test the McLaren.

Colin Edwards does the weather forecast: The American gave an insightful overview of the current state of MotoGP during a series of “Tornado Warning”, with the official Web site of the Red Bull Indianapolis GP.
“Our cornering speeds right now are so just astronomical that if you didn’t have traction control, man, you would be in orbit every other frickin’ race.”
NASA is looking at the allegation.

Good news for the automakers: There are signs that the market are about to enter in a post-crisis phase.
The Royal Bank of Scotland is now working on the lack and the cost of credit.

The car rolled into a ditch and although crowds of spectators managed to drag it back onto the road it was too badly damaged to carry on.

It has been confirmed that M Schumacher will be in charge of the future development of the F60.

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Kinda, it is the McLaren widget, with videos, pics, blogs, etc.

Instructions: first thing to do is to click bottom right to enlarge the appli, then browse its content.

A must-see: the telemetry.

Schumacher said on Wednesday he received “almost 100 messages from fan-clubs urging me to think again” but that he felt it was time move on.

“Extremely grateful though I am for all the letters, e-mails and messages I have received, I have decided to reconfirm my decision. I will not be a driver in October,” Schumacher wrote in a letter to Felipe Massa.

What used to be a well hidden secret has now become an explosive revelation: North Korea will launch a long-range formula one car within a couple of days, according to Japanese intelligence officials.

The Torpedo DPRK2 with a range of up to 300 kilometers behind safety car, would be launched in early September from the Dongchang-ni site on the north-western coast of the country.

“It’s cheaper than investing in A1GP” said the officials. First outings of the DPRK2 are expected in Hawaii before the end of this summer.

It has become a gimmick in the F1 talks to mention the youngest pole, the youngest win, the youngest champ. In football we look at record transfers, whilst in tennis and golf you will be noticed for your earnings.
It could be that Michael Schumacher’s records will never been beaten, and everyone knows this. It will never be “the most” anymore.

Toro Rosso’s youth policy may not be that unexpected. Who drinks Red Bull? Not Bourdais: too old, too French.

As a consequence Alguersuari is barely in and already out. Webber should start talks with Brawn very soon.

Tagged: Alguersuari, Bourdais, Reb Bull, Toro Rosso, Webber ]]> http://gplounge.wordpress.com/2009/07/22/baby-vroom/feed/ 0 jm1138 http://gplounge.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/two-tantrums-and-one-orgasm/ http://gplounge.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/two-tantrums-and-one-orgasm/#comments Wed, 15 Jul 2009 03:16:06 +0000 jm1138 http://gplounge.wordpress.com/?p=1104 ]]> Two Tantrums and One Orgasm, German GP report.

Barrichello

“They made me lose the race. To be very honest, I wish I could get on the plane and go home … I don’t want to talk to anyone in the team. It will be all ‘blah, blah, blah’ and I don’t want to hear that.”

Nobody is interested in Barrichello. If I dont read the grid carefully I always forget that he is there. In this sport’s history he is perhaps the driver who put down his pants with the most religious consistency. He is responsible for Schumacher becoming a hero. That’s a very bad achievement. He should be sacked.

Wait, we have some jokes to crack before he goes.

Bourdais

After the race l’Equipe reported that Bourdais had said about his retirement: “it is shameful”. The correct translation came a few hours later: “it is a shame”.

That was pretty quiet though.

What was less quiet was Bourdais telling the French telly to “stop pissing me off” about his seat being at risk.

Bourdais will still retire. Definitely. He is to old to be here anyway. You will see.

Besides despite Bourdais being around the track, the French keep forgetting that they have a national driver in F1. Indeed they pray for Loeb to be the first in 10 or 20 years to defend the flag.

Webber (when OZ meets Sally)

Orgasm of the year. The guy must have a lot of friends, which he confirmed in revealing the astonishing amount of text messages that he received before and after the race (250 at least). And a special email from Jack and David Brabham:

“The Brabham family has always been fantastic towards me,” he said. “I remember 15 years ago, Jack telling me that he had always found it great to come over and beat those Europeans, even if he didn’t put quite as diplomatically as that.

“Certainly a small part of my victory is down to Jack, because my father was a great admirer of his and probably I wouldn’t have been racing cars without Jack lighting that little fire in the Webber family.”

Of course you had to overcome the anger at a justified penalty that Webber collected at the start. One and a half hour later you could hear that:

In a lot of ways, terrible to say this I suppose, but apart from the fact that Hitler got taken away and persuaded to do things that I have no idea whether he wanted to do or not, he was in the way that he could command a lot of people, able to get things done.

“Max would do a super job. He’s a good leader with people. I don’t think his background would be a problem.”

Ecclestone-Mosley sure make a nice pair, the FIA boss himself lost his dignity a year ago. O father!

A must read today in The Times; Ecclestone’s comments have left some communities in shock. The German GP in in seven days.

Ecclestone manifesto’s here.

Call it “The News on Mosley’s World on Sunday Gossip”: he still can’t stop it.

As a repeat of what he’d said on Friday:

‘The question of FIA president is a matter exclusively for you, the members clubs of the FIA, and most definitely not for the vehicle manufacturers who make up FOTA. To have an FIA president under the influence of vehicle manufacturers would put at jeopardy all the excellent work our organisation and your clubs do in promoting better safety and environmental outcomes in the vehicle fleet”.

As a coincidence, once the Sunday collective hangover will be gone, everyone will notice the content of the “official” F1 website: safety-hemet, safety-track, safety-car.

Montezemolo, who once led the rebels, is still selling the pros of a ceasefire:

“I am very pleased with the agreement (between FOTA and FIA). I understand the spectators, they are pissed off of all these politics, press releases, unclear rules, rules changed every six months. We need stability, we need peace, we need transparency. We love Formula 1, we need the best teams, the best cars and drivers.

“Together with the FIA we came to a good agreement and we now need to stop the politics. We love Formula 1, we should not get rid of the big charm and unique elements of Formula 1.”

Mosley’s stance is good news.

The compromise between FOTA and FIA was/is frustrating for everyone. Same rules, same cars, same tracks.. is that “what the fans wanted”?

Other parties involved in F1 remain silent. Like Ecclestone. All corporate organizations know that there is a time to annoy with references to ethics, and a time when it becomes too indecent to refer to the sole interest of money.

.. back to the track and it’s almost half-way through the season.

So far it has been a success story for Brawn and Button. Brawn came up as the clever guy, or sometimes as the sneaky one, who rebranded a useless Honda into a war machine. The most amazing part of it has been the absence of sponsors. Had Virgin been a risk-taker they would have been a winner. But they only look at F1 as they consider the household: they capitalize.

Button – call me Jenson – has become a credible driver. The unknown is the margin or the advantage that he is given by the car he races against his opponents. There is some good competition there. It is likely that when this season ends we will have four world champions sitting on the grid.

It is hard to believe that the Brawn allows Button to just sit in the car and deliver on each and every track. The Monaco and Istambul wins were already special. Winning at Silverstone would be for Button an achievement. The only next big thing for him would then to become the 2009 F1 world champion.

Although it is probable that most of the biggest names have already capitulated, Brawn and Button will find out that there is still some competition out there when the advantage that they enjoy goes to someone else. The performances are already even and it required a perfect driving from Button when Vettel himself (who could have been saved by his team) was doing some rookie stunt.

The latest improvement on the RB5, a modified rear diffuser, has seen the Red Bull car shine in the first two practice sessions at Silverstone. Yes, Red Bull did not start the season with a double D. In the meantime the new wings given to the Brawn BGP001 did not seem to allow Button to fly. Still we know that practice is not the race and also that the Brawns are not obsessed by a performance for the Friday crowds.

Red Bull now has the car, perhaps the best in the bunch. It also has the most competitive pair of drivers as of today. Young Vettel and unlucky Webber are in for the show. It could be that Vettel will jump to fame as some of his predecessors did: a higly talented young driver suddenly becoming the leader of the pack.

It could also be that Webber realizes that all being combined: performance, talent and experience, he is the one guy who comes as a prime choice for the win in 2009.