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Archive for category F1

Renault F1 with MOV’IT

Mar 11

Posted by Insider in F1, Renault

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Only a couple of days before the start of the new season, Renault F1 Team received another boost (financially speaking) by signing a new partner. We’re talking about German company MOV’IT, a worldwide player in high-performance brake systems for sports, racing and security vehicles.

We weren’t given the full details of the new agreement, but we believe it will extend for the duration of the upcoming season only, with the company’s logo due to be painted on the nose of the Renault R30 starting the very Bahrain Grand Prix this weekend.

“One of the primary motivations for our investment in Renault F1 Team was to use the sport as a powerful business-to-business platform and create synergies between different companies within our partner network,” said the Enstone based team owner Gerard Lopez.

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Schumacher Facing Understeering With W01

Mar 11

Posted by Insider in F1, Mercedes-Benz

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Michael Schumacher is yet to get comfortable with the Mercedes W01, despite the 7 or 8 days of testing during the month of February. According to both the team’s boss Ross Brawn and Schumacher’s little brother Ralf, it seems that Nico Rosberg finds it more natural to drive the 2010 challenger than the 7-time world champion.

“Nico (Rosberg) has felt a little better in the car (than Schumacher) in his test days,” said Brawn in recent days, echoing the comments of Schumacher’s long-time manager Willi Weber - who was replaced by Sabine Kehm in that position a few days ago - who revealed that his former client doesn’t like his car’s tendency to understeer.

However, this is not a fresh problem for the cars built at Brackley, as the predecessor of the W01, the Brawn BGP01, had the same problem throughout the course of last season. However, the racing styles of both Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello made it easier for the car to be controlled at performing levels during the races.

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Jordan Think Schumacher Can’t Win The Title

Mar 10

Posted by Insider in F1, Mercedes-Benz

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BBC pundit Eddie Jordan - formerly a team owner inside the Formula One Championship - said that Michael Schumacher must be “out of his mind” to return to the sport that turned him into a 7-time world champion. Speaking his mind about Schumacher’s chances of making a difference in the 2010 championship, Jordan believes the German made a terrible mistake returning in F1.

“If I was his father I would have said to him, ‘Son, why? Why?!’ Seven times a world champion - he must be out of his mind! In life, you - as an individual with that sporting legacy - have to give your sport up, not the sport give you up, and he’s putting himself in that position,” said Jordan during a pre-season BBC discussion this week, according to crash.net.

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No Sponsor For Sauber F1 in Bahrain

Mar 10

Posted by Insider in F1

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Although hoping to secure a major sponsor for the 2010 Formula One championship - that gets off from as early as this weekend - Peter Sauber will bring his team to Bahrain without an official backer. While some teams have recently announced new title sponsors for the 2010 season, Sauber F1 Team is yet to find a company willing to pour some money into their account for at least one year.

Consequently, the well-designed Sauber C29 cars - as showed in one of our recent reports - will show up on the Bahrain grid in a mostly-blank bodywork. Hopefully, some good results in the first few races will cause some sponsors to look the Sauber way in the near future.

“After the withdrawal of BMW and the takeover of the team, the time was simply too short for us to find a partner or principal sponsor. We only had confirmation of the 13th team entry in December so concrete negotiations (with backers) could only start very late,” said Sauber, according to Switzerland’s 20 Minuten.

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Lotus F1 Looking Forward To Bahrain

Mar 9

Posted by Insider in F1, Lotus

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A few weeks ago, the technical director of Lotus F1 Team, Mike Gascoyne, insisted that his aims for the upcoming season is to become the best of the newly entrant teams of F1 and, by mid-season, start seeing some points on the scoreboard from one of its two drivers, Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen.

As far as the first goal is concerned - out-bettering HRT F1 and Virgin Racing - we can all agree that it’s more realistic than the second. One proof is that the Malaysian backed team’s aim for the season opening Bahrain Grand Prix is simply to finish the race with both cars.

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Vettel’s Car Will Be Called “Luscious Liz”

Mar 8

Posted by Insider in F1

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Sebastian Vettel’s new car for the 2010 Formula One championship will be called “‘Luscious Liz” according to a report issued by the GMM news agency. This will be the second time the 22-year old German driver will change the name of his F1 challenger, after previously driving “Kate’s Dirty Sister” to runner-up spot in the 2009 drivers’ classification.

The name belonged to the team’s 2009 single-seater, the RB5, as the team piggybacked on the name of their previous car, the RB4 - named Kate. Since the last year’s car was obviously more aggressive and efficient in terms of points scored in the series - 6 wins and 2nd place in the manufacturers’ classification - it was nicknamed as a “dirtier” version of Kate.

Back in 2008, when he scored his first ever win for Scuderia Toro Rosso in Formula One - and became the youngest driver to ever win a race in the series - the nickname he gave to his STR single-seater was Julie.

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Red Bull Pit Stops in 2 Seconds

Mar 8

Posted by Insider in F1

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Some time ago, we were reporting that pit stops will probably take under 3 seconds in 2010, given the refueling ban introduced by the International Automobile Federation (FIA) for the upcoming campaign. However, with the majority of the teams testing the new pit stops during recent test meetings, it seems some stops will take even less than 2 seconds.

According to Red Bull Racing’s boss Christian Horner, the mechanics of the Milton Keynes based team have managed a record 1.8 pit stop after some intense hours of practice. Although unofficial, this result means that ultra-speedy pit stops will likely become a regular thing in the series through 2010, given the new devices the teams have debuted this winter.

“We have done sub-two second stops. They are absolutely lightning,” said Horner. “The guys have trained like hell over the winter. They have all lost weight and got fitter in the process. The guys have been training in the gym at 12 and 4pm every day since November.“

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Bye bye Ian Phillips

Mar 7

Posted by Insider in F1, News

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Force India Mercedes’ business affairs will no longer be coordinated by Ian Phillips, as the Brit parted ways with the Silverstone based outfit late on Friday, according to an official press release from Force India.

The release did not state the reason why Phillips left - or was let go of - the team only one week before the season opening round of Bahrain Grand Prix. However, if one remembers correctly what happened within the Vijay Mallya-controlled team about 6 months ago, it all becomes a lot clearer.

Back then, Ferrari was desperately looking for a replacement for injured Felipe Massa, and no one was available on the drivers’ market. Once they’ve contacted Force India for Giancarlo Fisichella - following his great podium appearance at Spa-Francorchamps - Phillips admitted to the media that the Italian was already one step in the Ferrari garage.

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F1 Entry List for 2010

Mar 4

Posted by Insider in F1

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With the news that US F1 will not be joining the 2010 Formula One Championship due to internal issues, the International Automobile Federation (FIA) released what we believe will be the final entry list for the upcoming campaign.

As most of you might suspect, the big hit of the list is actually a missing piece that we had all believed will make the grid of the Bahrain Grand Prix two weekends from now. We’re obviously talking about Stefan Grand Prix, a team willing to take the place of US F1 on the 2010 entry list after some intense preparations in recent months.

Nevertheless, the FIA argued that replacing an F1 entry with another one in such a short period of time would be inappropriate, and made public a 12-team entry list for the season to come. Basically, we’re going to have 24 cars on the grid this year, 10 of which will score points at the end of each Grand Prix.

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Hakkinen, Be The Hamilton’s Manager?

Mar 3

Posted by Insider in F1, Mclaren

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Yesterday, it was confirmed that Lewis Hamilton’s interests in Formula One and beyond will no longer be represented by his father Anthony. However, the 2008 Formula One champion did not reveal the name of his future manager, as he’s yet to make that decision in the upcoming few weeks. Until then, McLaren put their driver under the management of Monaco based sports management Aces Group.

The aforementioned firm has been ran for some time by long-time manager Didier Coton, but the interesting fact about it is that former McLaren champion Mika Hakkinen is also an employee there for more than a year, since joining Coton in November 2008.

Which takes us to at least the assumption that Hakkinen could take on a management role with Hamilton. While still very close to his former title-winning team McLaren Mercedes, it has been reported that Hakkinen is also getting along quite well with Hamilton also. When asked about it, Coton argued that such an opportunity should not be turned down for anything.

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