6 from 6? Yeah Mate

Mark Webber won a interesting Monaco Grand Prix to make a new record as the first 6 races have been won by 6 different drivers. The Austrailians win puts him on equal points with his team mate and only 3 points off Fernando Alonsos lead in the championship.

It was another difficult weekend for McLaren who managed only to get Lewis Hamilton to 5th place while Jenson Button retired after an awful weekend in the Principality that promised much but delievered little.

Stoner Signals Shock Exit!

Casey Stoner the 26 year old reigning World Champion has made the shock announcement that he will retire from Moto GP at the end of the season. The rider is now regarded as one of the greats after his dominant season last year and his 2007 world championship on the Ducati which has embaressed ever other rider who has tried to master the Italian machine. The Austrialian has said it is a combination of the lack of support he felt in 2009 when he took the second half of the season off with fatigue which was later diagnosed as a Lactose intollerance along with the top flight of motorbike racing moving to the new CRT format.

Its a bold move and a real shame to see the 26 year old hang up his helmet. It does make for a mental silly season at the end of this year with all of the factory riders out of contract (along with Tech III) and a ride on the competitive Honda to fill.

Williams Charge Forth to Make it 5 from 5

At the weekend the usual snorefest of the Spanish Grand Prix was turned into a nail biter as Pastor Maldonado held off the home town hero’s Ferrari to take the Grove’s team first win since 2004. Its been well reported that the team have been in decline over the past decade, punctuated with finishing 9th in the standings last year. The race proved that Williams have core pace as they qualified on pole after Lewis Hamilton’s time was deleted after failing to make it back to the pits under his own steam (under fueling the car has been expressly banned since McLaren did it at the 2010 Canadian Grand Prix).

However it proved that the Pirelli rubber can provide a good race without it being a pure overtaking fest, as Alonso spent most of the race within sniffing distance while Maldonado skillfully kept him at bay. However certain drivers are still finding the performance too erratic, like Jenson Button who dialled it in on Friday but it had all but evaporated come the weekend.Pastors stock has definatley risen after a drive that would of befitted the home favourite who came how a respectable 2nd.

Ferrari did look in much better form and in the hands of Alonso have eeked out points every race this season leaving him on the same points as the leader Sebastian Vettel. Lewis Hamilton is still well in the hunt despite not managing to better the lowest step of the podium in the first 3 races. Consistancy is certainly the key which leads us onto:

The two Brazilians under pressure. Bruno Senna’s poor weekend wasn’t helped by his team mate charging forth for the victory and will hope for a better result soon to bounce back. The newphew of the late great Ayrton is having an odd season where he’s gone well in the races but struggled in qualifying which is opposite to his problems before 2012. Although it is worth noting that he was comforatbly outscoring Pastor before Spain so i’d expect this to fade away with consistant performances from the Brazilian over the rest of the season. Felippe Massa however is running out of time to save his Ferrari drive as his points total currently stands at 2 for the season while his team mate is joint leader on 61. Massa looks more so than ever a shadow of the driver that took the 2008 title to the wire and in a season where taking every little chance that presents itself, the Scuderia surely cannot afford to continue when there are younger drivers who are embaressing his total.

Finally the weekend ended on a slightly sour note as there was a serious fire in the Williams garage which left several members of the pit crews needing medical attention. One Mechanic has only arrived back to the UK today after he suffered serious burns in the incident. Investigations are ongoing but its believed to be an issue with removing fuel from the cars, we wish everyone involved a speedy recovery.

Teams gear up for Europe while HRT collect stickers

This weekend sees the start of the traditional main European season which will see the teams visit the classic tracks of Monaco, Silverstone, Spa and Monza. There are only 8 European races (split by the trip to Canada and the modern Summer break) this year a vast change from 10 years ago when 11 of the 17 races were in Europe. The first race will be at the Circuit de Catalyuna which is a highly technical circuit that many think will sort out the correct order of the grid and usually features a Noah’s ark qualifying (All the teams in order). However last year it was a great race thanks to Pirelli whereas in previous years its been quite processional as its so aerodynamically dependant – hence why the teams use it for Pre-season testing.

HRT missed the mid-season test in Mugello to move to their new base in Madrid which I was a little sceptical of, however the new factilty does look good and was visted by Jean Todt. Furthermore the team have announced two new sponsorships with olive oil producer Carbonell and windscreen replacement company Cristalbox. This is good news for the team as cars have been looking increasingly unbranded down towards the back of the grid. The spanish team will bring an update for their home Grand Prix this weekend along with running GP2 driver Dani Clos in FP1.

McLaren are also going to be running their new higher nose (dont worry theres still no step) at the 5th race of the season at Barcelona. We expect to see all teams with a large amount of new parts for this race.

F1 Takes a trip down memory lane as many things return

Today is one of those strange days for followers of Formula 1, its 18 years to the day since Ayrton Senna died at the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola (The event also claimed the life of Roland Ratzenberger in qualifying) so it seems appropriate that 2 things that have been missing in recent years are returning.

The first is the in-season test which see’s 11 of the 12 teams decamp to Mugello to conduct 3 days of testing. HRT have opted not to attend because they are moving boxes into their new base of operations and thus miss yet more testing. Ferrari have been tinkering with exhaust settings and the paddock is going into overdrive with the rumour mill before the start of the European season.

Second is the return of Silly season which appears to have started extra early with Mark Webber having reported to be moving to Ferrari to replace Felipe Massa for a single year. Red Bull are reportadly keen to promote some young blood to the main team while Ferrari dont think Perez is quite ready to replace the struggling Massa. Its been sorely missed after all the top teams (except Lotus) have had the exact same driver lineup since the start of the 2010 season.

Just as I’ve said that

In the few hours that have passed since my previous post HRT and Ferrari have outlined their plans for next weeks 3 day test at the Mugello circuit and they fit in perfectly with the stereotypes associated with the teams.

Ferrari will run Fernando Alonso for 2 days leaving the struggling Massa a single day in the middle.

HRT will skip the test completly as they will not have any new parts until the Spanish Grand Prix and are concentrating on moving their headquaters to Madrid. It is baffeling how the team would have any upgrades as the car was designed by the previous design team that were based in Germany. The team for the 3rd year in a row missed pre-season testing all together and highlights a lack of finance more than anything as it would be useful seat time for 3rd driver Luizzi to give feedback on the car alongside Pedro De La Rosa.

Return of the 3rd driver

For the first time since the 2008 season will a large majority of 3rd/test/reserve drivers get some mileage in real machinery this year. Since Jenson Buttons winning year F1 has introduced an in-season testing ban with pre-season testing limited to only the scheduled tests for all teams. However this year the teams elected to move one of the pre-season tests to Mugello next week after the first 4 fly-away rounds and before the meat of the season in Europe (+ Canada) gets underway. We assume that Ferrari has really pushed for more in-season testing and I’d expect to see some more test sessions brought in (personally i’d like to see all at non-F1 venues) in the coming years.

In the years since the testing ban Force India have ran 3rd drivers on Friday (Paul Di Resta, Nico Hulkenberg and Jules Bianchi) in preparation for them graduating to F1. This is a sensible option for the team although it means some drivers miss out on valuable track time. Williams (Valterri Bottas), Caterham (Chandok),  Marussia (Pic), HRT and Toro Rosso (both current drivers) have all followed suit in the following years with running drivers at a few selected events

However as this upcoming test is only 3 days many teams have opted to run a 3rd driver for at least one of those days:

• McLaren will run Gary Paffett & Oliver Turvey over all 3 days although Lewis Hamilton has commented he may want some track time
• Jerome D’Ambrosio will get a day behind the wheel of the Lotus
• Rodolfo Gonzalez will get one day with the Caterham team

We’d also assume we might see some of the Friday drivers get a hop into the car for a day and as soon as the lineup is finalised I’ll hopefully get some comment up on the blog.

The only other testing that has been on the calendar has been the young drivers test which is a test for drivers that have 2 grand prix or less experience which has lead to some permenant 3rd drivers taking this role. The only option for those who have been ousted from a seat is trying to land the Pirelli tyre testing roles which is what Toro Rosso refugee Jaime Alguersuari has done. I’d like to see a few tests mid-season for the teams with only non-race drivers allowed to participate in them (or limit a race drivers total number of testing days) to allow the teams to evaluate other drivers.

4 from 4 after the Desert Storm

Sorry for the lack of updates recently I’ve been busy with other things, but I have been watching the F1 and what a treat it has been. The “first leg” of the championship has proved fascinating with every race being unpredictable. Sebastian Vettel finally got his pole and victory tally underway in Bahrain but was challenged all the way home from Kimi Raikkonen who had started 11th on the grid! Other surprises have been Nico Rosbergs sublime first victory and overshadowing his more illustious team mate (despite his drive to points after technical issues held him back in Q1 last time out). Along with Sergio Perez’s near miss at Malaysia as Ferrari numbed the pain with a victory for Fernando Alonso.

We’ve also seen maiden podiums from Romain Grosjean along with Sergio Perez with every driver in the established teams picking up points. Unlike last year where the two Lotus Renault (Enstone team) drivers snuck a podium in the first race it was the famous 5 all year long that stood on the steps after the race, this year we’ve had both McLaren and Lotus drivers on the podium along with Mercedes, Red Bull, Ferrari and Sauber drivers.

The racing has been griping and exciting with the field being extremly close, just as you think one team has slipped away a little they come back with a bang. The only real dissapointment has been Caterham being still around a second off good midfield pace, everyone else has delievered in spades. Even HRT and Marussia have moved on and both are comfortably inside 107% every weekend (with the exception of Australia where HRT were simply not ready to go racing).

Before we get into the meat of the season in Europe (which is split by the summer break) there is a test in mugello where pretty much all the teams will bring large update packages so we expect the field to shift about and with the teams so close any one of them could realistically jump into the lead. Interestingly McLaren have opted not to run either of there race drivers and will use development drivers Gary Paffett and Oliver Turvey, with little real world testing now taking place its a real boost for both of those two to get some seat time. We have a sneaking suspicion that in-season testing will return due to Ferrari really pushing the issue, it would still be limited by some factor be it days or kilometers.

For the next two weekends we will be entertained by 2 wheels as Moto GP has its first back to back race weekends on the calendar after a 3 weeks break from the opening round in Qatar.

Alonso Saves, Sergio Arrives and Parr Exits

Well then kids what an exciting weekend of motorsport! Alonso’s win for Ferrari is a god send for the Scuderia (in fact I think second would still of been sweet relief) who have been under a lot of pressue after showing up in Australia and being over a second off the pace in qualifying. Although the fact that Sergio Perez announced himself with an even more shocking second place should tell you everything that the rain in Malaysia really shook up the form book. The real key was the tires this weekend and getting them to work in the rain, it would appear that McLaren struggle in very cold and damp conditions to turn the tire on along with Red Bull whereas Ferrari and Sauber have less on an issue.

Bruno Senna also had a great race after the break with a drive through the field in the wet befitting of his surname. He drove from last on the grid at the restart (after 7 laps the race was stopped due to the extreme amount of rain that fell) and cut through the field to finish in 6th place and collect a hatful of points for Williams. Paul Di Resta also used his wise head on young shoulders to pick up a 7th place in the chaos which will be relieft indeed as the Force India is currently lacking a little bit of pace. Elsewhere it was a good race for HRT who qualified on merit, quite comfortably in the case of Pedro De La Rosa and this was after Mark Webber went out for a second run (in fact Pedro De La Rosa was within 107% of the pole time) and in the race Karthikeyan was running 8th at one point before getting tangled with Button and Vettel (neither of them his fault in my opinion).

It wasn’t a great weekend for Mercedes who managed to get a car starting 3rd on the grid and then only brought a solitary point, which at the very least gets them off the mark. There was more heartbreak for Pastor Maldonado as a last lap engine failure robbed him of points.

But the big news was how close the teams are, Nico Rosberg had a scrappy lap and was 4 tenths off pole. Last year that would of most certainly of meant that he would of been 2nd or 3rd. However he qualified 8th (started 7th after Kimi’s penalty) and there was one second between 1st and 12th in Q2.

Not content with the crazy weekends race Williams dropped a bombshell yesterday announcing that heir apparent to the team, Adam Parr has resigned and will leave the team this Friday. Parr has been controversial and was known to have a rocky relationship with Patrick Head, but was the man being lined up to take over from Frank Williams who is in his 70s. He definatly leaves the team in good shape with strong finances and a car this year capable of scoring some decent points all year long.

Jenson Roars as the Paddock Rumbles

Applogies for the delay on this, I did watch the race on Sunday but just haven’t had time to post.

Jenson Button opened his 2012 account with an emphatic win in Australia, making it his 3rd win around albert park in 4 years. The McLaren looked sharp all weekend with Lewis Hamilton taking pole on Saturday ahead of the race winner. The vital overtake was Jenson’s dive into the first corner and then opened up a gap to keep him out of the DRS zone. Lewis lost out to the saftey car and finished 3rd while defending champion Vettel took 2nd after a good recovery drive from 6th on the grid. This year is lining up to be the vintage year that was promised as many cars look to have good qualifying pace but are a little shakey in the race and vice versa. However there are still many questions left to be answered this coming weekend in Malaysia:

1. Do Lotus have the second fastest car?
Romain Grosjean put the Lotus in 3rd place around Albert Park and unfortunatly couldn’t convert it into solid points. However Kimi Raikkonen made his way through the field and ended up finishing 7th showing that the E20 (the 20th car from the Enstone team that has been Benetton/Renault/Lotus) has got the whole package. Kimi looks race sharp and that quali lap from Grosjean was a beaut. Contenders?

2. Merecedes pace and their front wing?
Mercedes said they were dissapointed with qualifying 4th and 7th and in the race further dissapointment beckoned with Schumacher’s car pitching him into the gravel due to a lack of 3rd gear and Rosberg struggling with tyre deg. The team have admitted that they haven’t got the best out of the car in race trim and that the do have a slight issue with tyre wear. However next weekend at a full blown permenant race circuit should see whether they have pace or not. Also in Malaysia it will be interesting to see how much of a difference their rumoured F-Duct front wing will give them.

3. Can Sauber and Williams upset the front?
Sauber showed that not a lot has changed from last year, a pretty ordinary qualifying along with stunning race pace. The only difference being that Sergio Perez was running on par with the leaders times for most of the race but he tried to push his tyre’s one lap too far and lost out at the end. The Williams in the hands of Pastor Maldonado looks like it means serious buisness, which is good news for all those concerned. Its a shame he crashed out on the last lap leaving questions about Williams rookie duo and Senna had a poor weekend getting to only lap 52 before the wrecking ball of Massa’s prancing horse took him out.

4. What about Force India?
We REALLY dont know where Force India are, the top Independant constructor from last year said they were gunning for 4th place in the constructors and after last weekend you’d have to say they are dreaming. However Paul Di Resta got blocked in qualifying and failed to get into Q3 while his new team mate did. Hulkenberg however managed the same amount of laps as the last time he raced at Albert Park, 0. Di Resta salvaged something from the weekend with taking a point in the chaos in the last lap but next weekend could be telling for the Silverstone based team.

5. Ferrari?
The Scuderia appear to be in dire straights or are they? On Saturday everyone was shocked with how bad the prancing horse looked to drive and with both drivers out in Q2 it was certainly a shock. Fernando Alonso true to form squeezed everything out of the car on Sunday and managed to race his way to 5th which made everyone in the Scuderia happy. However come this weekend they could really be in trouble with McLaren, Red Bull, Lotus and Mercedes all looking faster along with Williams snapping at their heels. The could well be outside the top 10 on merit come Saturday.

6. Whos signed what?
Rumblings in the paddock based on a document leaked to Sky Sports are that Ferrari and Red Bull have already signed/agreed to a new concord deal for next year that will see them get a percentage of the sports commercial rights and allow them to place a person on the board. Worrying indeed for the remaining FOTA teams as Ferrari are the big fish that FOM needed to catch and seperating the teams has always been the method of trying to get the best deal for themselves. Although no-one expects Red Bull to still be racing in 20 years the team are the defending World Champions, the only other teams of real value are the traditional British duo of McLaren and Williams, along with possibly Sauber. If you don’t believe me go look at the entry list for the 2002 Championship and you will only spy those teams (excluding Red Bull). Renault and Merecedes will need to be won round as they supply enginges which could be quite damaging to 2013 if they walk off but the other teams need to really look at what they can do together to try and get a better deal.