F1 News

Marlboro McLaren becomes McLaren Nicorette, COTA business plan highly optimistic, Lewis leaving was all about the money, Austin Council votes to tax COTA, New F1 film for release in Austin

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Vodafone scale down sponsorship:  It has been widely rumoured that Vodafone will be pulling out of its 6 year relationship with McLaren at the end of 2013. This has been considered to be worth as much as $75m a year, which is stratospheric compared to the fee’s most sponsors of F1 teams pay. Joe Seward has done a great article on this today, the link is at the end if this section.

The points worthy of comment are, Glaxo Smith Klien (GSK) has been extending its relationship with McLaren, and in a big announcement in the summer the announced a “ground-breaking collaboration” which will apply McLaren’s winning expertise to the needs of GSK, the aim being to help it to function more efficiently with more efficient planning processes and better modelling tools to drive faster decision-making. This includes the construction of a learning facility called the ‘McLaren GSK Centre for Applied Performance’, which is under construction at McLaren’s Headquarters in Woking.they announcedis setting up.

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Law suit involving Austin GP promoters

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The circuit of the America’s (COTA) which will host its first Formula One race Nov. 16-18, is seeking a temporary restraining order against the track’s former founding partner, Tavo Hellmund.

The circuit is asking that Hellmund be prevented from divulging any of the circuit’s trade secrets, destroying or altering any records in his possession or using any of the circuit’s trademarks. Organizers are also seeking damages, court and attorney fees.

The history of this dispute is symptomatic of F1 and big money. Unsurprisingly Mr. Ecclestone is embroiled in the matter which at its heart is based upon a deal being done, falling into question, being undone and a new one being redone cutting out a party who had become surplus to requirements.

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Quinghua in? Fernandes to step down? Austin Sherrifs unconcerned, Marko slates Webber, FIA needs $40m more, France GP – AGAIN!!! Turkey more likely in 2013, Wolff speaks about Senna,

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Marko critical of Webber: Our favourite German newspaper Bilde.de tells us today that Dr. Helmut Marko has pointed the finger at Mark Webber, after the Australian’s messy race in Abu Dhabi. at thejudge13 we think Webber was lucky not to be penalised for his move on Maldonado and his clash with Massa. After the race Webber himself admitted he should have stayed clear of the dueling Perez, DiResta and Grosjean and by not doing so ended his own race when he was too close to avoid the inevitable crash when it occurred.

Marco, not known for mincing his words says, “You can’t have more errors than that in one race. That was not a good day for him.” As if that’s not enough, Marco wants to make his opinion crystal clear telling us, “The start was no good, and the accidents were not good. It’s too bad, because it affects us in the constructors’ championship.” This is a slightly dramatic conclusion from Helmut as Red Bull will inevitably collect the 5 points they require to win the constructor’s title for the 3rd successive year.

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How Alonso could win the title and Red Bull should change fundamental car setup: Gary Anderson

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Money isn’t everything

Ferrari are a big spending team, yet we don’t know quite how much they spend because as an Italian company their figures are not registered at Company’s House, England, where the numbers are relatively transparent. Red Bull F1 group spent 245m euro’s in 2011 and based on history it is not likely Ferrari spent less.

In fact Horner has regularly asserted that Red Bull are the 2nd or 3rd largest spending team in F1. The problem with a culture that throws money at problems, is this is not always the most efficient way to solve them.

Businesses with a tight budgetary restraint are regularly capable of getting more ‘bang for the buck’ as they have to focus on where to spend the money more than one with huge resources.

The Ferrari problem

It must be therefore highly embarrassing for Ferrari that they have been messing around with 2 wind tunnels and clearly have internal disputes over who is to blame for the fact the car has hardly developed from an aero perspective since May (Alonso – India).

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Abu Dhabi GP Review: Red Bull exploit the rules again, McLaren questioning Perez signing, Prost: French GP unlikely, Webber woeful

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After a race that left most of us breathless, I’m struggling a bit to know exactly what to say. The pictures said it all. The desert races of Bahrain and Abu Dhabi are not renown for their previous excitement – maybe 2010 because it was a title decider, yet even that was rather processional. Anyway, here’s some thoughts on the proceedings and other F1 news.

Just one point I’d like to make as we had an unprecidented number of views yesterday and today reading thejudge13 scoop on fuel being the RB issue 90 minutes before it was announced. Some people who are new to the site may not realise I am not partisan to any driver team or individual in F1. I know a number of them.

The judge13 has a skeptical eye towards all things F1 – nothing is sacred and everyone is a target for comment good and bad. I don’t hate anyone or any team as has been suggested 😀 I just love F1 whether it be the intrigue, destructive self obsession or just the racing in general. I thank you…

State of title races: Red Bull need just 5 points for constructors title and Vettel needs just 15 more than Alonso in Austin. McLaren 22 points behind Ferrari and would have closed this nicely had Lewis’ car not failed. I still think they will overhaul Ferrari as the car looks very fast – but time will tell.

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Why Red Bull volunteer for extra start penalty

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Vettel’s car fails scrutineering

Where to start. Probably at the end perversely. As reported here on thejudge13, Milton Keynes knew there was a fuel issue some 90 minutes before the stewards decision and expected to have Vettel’s car relegated to the back of the grid.

Admittedly I’ve been to the pub for 4 hours since the FIA announcement, and the journalists were pushing midnight in Abu Dhabi when the official announcement was made. This explains why I can find nowhere the questions I’m about to address, because this is not simply another example of what happened to Hamilton in Barcelona.

Short fueling cars in qualifying is an age old trick when a team is under pressure to deliver an extra 0.1s or so. Lewis qualifying time in Spain was nearly half a second faster than anyone else so under fueling his car was just clearly a mistake and not a necessary strategic decision by the team to gain a very small advantage.

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Stewards “fiddle while Rome burns”, Mercedes up budget for 2013 by 50m euros, Alonso ‘perfect’ qualifying, Ecclestone calls for F1 personnel to snitch on their own teams, Murdoch wants to own F1

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Red Bull mislead FIA: It appears from the statement released by the FIA, that Red Bull may have initially tried to mislead the stewards. The statement says, “The stewards heard from the team representatives and the driver and studied the telemetry evidence that showed the reason why the car was stopped. The stewards accepted the explanation and considered the incident as being a case of force majeure.”

“However a report was received from the technical delegate that showed during post qualifying scrutineering an insufficient quantity of fuel for sampling purposes.”

Naughty naughty

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Lauda poking around Brackley, Expect double overtakes with 2 DRS zones, Alosno persists with denials, Marrusia in finaicial crisis, Alguesuari gets desperate, Sunsets Stats & Kimi too

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Lauda – what exactly is his job?: In a Q&A with Auto Motor und Sport, Niki explains his contribution to Mercedes. When asked how Mercedes can find 1.5s to match Red Bull when the drinks company spends 100m euro more he tells us, “We now have to analyze carefully whether the money factor plays a role, and if so what. I can say it but not yet, because I still go to school. This is part of the inventory.”

Remember Lauda said a couple of weeks ago that money had been wasted so far at Mercedes F1, and they needed to deliver more for less. Mmm.

Niki was asked how he could bring Mercedes to success. “The first part of this task is to take stock. I find myself just in the learning phase. That’s why I’m already some time been in the factory in Brackley and I will continue to do so regularly. It is important for me, along with Ross Brawn introduced to every aspect of the team, the car and the tools in the factory to be. Every time I go to Brackley, I get it. I need to understand the context of the processes, and then with my logic, direct access, which I, in common with Ross find a solution.”

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Alonso unwisely refutes La Stampa, Kimi unhappy? Todt taunts Brawn, Pirelli want 8 compounds, Webber reprimanded by FIA

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Alonso refutes La Stampa story: Fernando Alonso has dismissed as “not true” reports in the Italian press of a post-qualifying row with Ferrari Formula One team members in India last weekend. thejudge13 reported yesterday that the Turin paper, La Stampa newspaper claimed the Spaniard took exception to media comments by Ferrari’s British technical director Pat Fry, and threatened to publish a ‘tweet’ about a lack of aerodynamic progress since May this year. (LINK)

Alonso hit back on twitter, “The problem is when it is not true,” and added in Spanish “It’s not fair to your readers,” ending the exchange with “Forza Ferrari.”

The difficulty for many modern F1 watchers and in this case Fernando himself is they do not understand Ferrari and its history. If something over the years is published in La Stampa, it has been historically seen as sanctioned if not leaked by Ferrari because the Agnellis family who own the publication are very much part of the same family as Ferrari.

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Why Sauber will fall back in 2013

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Not a lot to choose between them

The mid table teams can yo-yo around quite a lot, and I’ve heard many F1 drivers in retirement rue various decisions made to switch teams. Last year Force India finished the season on 69 points and Sauber with just over half as many points on 44. Here is the final table for 2011 and where we are in 2012 right now.

Final Table 2011 3 races to go 2012
1 Red Bull 650 1 Red Bull 407
2 McLaren 497 2 Ferrari 316
3 Ferrari 3
75		 3 McLaren 306
4 Mercedes 165 4 Lotus 263
5 Lotus 73 5 Mercedes 136
6 Force India 69 6 Sauber 116
7 Sauber 44 7 Force India 93
8 Torro Rosso 41 8 Williams 59
9 Williams 5 9 Torro Rosso 21

Quite an interesting read. Although the season is not yet finished there could be a switch between McLaren and Ferrari, but based on the past several races it’s unlikely the others will change. Having said that Mercedes are not developing the car at all and given a couple of very strong results from Sauber they could yet overtake them.

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