Renault F1

Voice of the #F1 Fans: Alonso the Home Wrecker

by
Fernando Alonso 2 © Autoblog

TJ13 is committed to social media and giving the fans a voice. “The voice of the fans” articles meet this goal and so this post is brought to you by TJ13 contributor landroni Edited by Andrew Huntley-Jacobs With the impending announcement of ‘Fred’ Fernando Alonso being re-united with his long lost… love/hate… McLaren, one has … Read more

#F1 Features: Renault’s Predicament – Works or ‘just’ Supplier

by

Renault ‘must buy a works team’, says Prost Following the Jerez test, TJ13 published an article examining the reasons for Renault’s problems in producing their new F1 engine. The conclusion was that Ferrari and Mercedes had designed their engines and chassis in tandem with a sympathetic view to each other’s requirements. Having sold their works … Read more

Daily News and Comment: Saturday 27th April 2013

by

Ron Dennis responds Predictably, Ron Dennis has clarified the position at McLaren. “A little over three years ago I signed a five-year contract with the company against the background that both then and now I am the joint second largest shareholder in the group with 25% – and I own 15% of automotive. My position … Read more

F1 blows it AGAIN in the USA, Valencia Ferrari World off, Bernie’s German problem, Webber swears by the flag, Williams revert to Barca setup, RB affected most by change in DRS rules

by

For those of you who got an email yesterday saying “Fri post” I apologise – I hit the publish instead of save button. Was just getting things ready like “On this day” and “pics”  etc for today’s post – still 90 plus postings in and first time I did it.

Anyway good to see so many of you getting ready for Winter when there won’t be an article every day and are signing up for the email alert when there is one (side bar – top right). Anyway here we go for FP1 day in Austin Texas. I’ll get to the point eh?

F1 blow it AGAIN in the USA: The week before every F1 weekend, I start trawling the national and local media looking for how each country is gearing up for the big event. I won’t use Abu Dhabi as an example because its only about 8 miles long by 4 miles wide, but India was the most recent ‘unnatural’ fit of a country where F1 has visited. I say ‘unnatural’ because India is a country of 1bn people all obsessed with cricket.

Read more

The 1984 US Grand Prix: Dallas, Texas

by

This year, Formula One returns to the USA after a 5 year absence. Austin, Texas is the first purpose built circuit for the sport since F1 racing began in the country back in 1950. It’s a modern F1 design and is quite unlike the slippery, tight and twisty corners found on the street circuits in Long Beach, Las Vegas, Detroit, Phoenix and Dallas that hosted US Grands Prix in the 70s, 80s, and early 90s.

The last race in the state of Texas was in 1984 and is an event remembered by many not for the immaculate layout like in Austin, but it was a street circuit and these venues in the US particular presented an extraordinary challenge for the drivers, since one mistake could result in a race-ending crash. The 1984 Dallas Grand Prix provided an additional challenge on top of the already difficult winding track. The enormous heat of well over 100 degrees Fahrenheit left the track crumbling down as it was tormented by the cars.

Here’s an article I found from Marcel Schot (Netherlands) and a now defunct publication. Makes a good read.

Read more

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

by

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.

Read more

Just one more year: Why Red Bull are obsessed with controlling engine spend

by

Todt reforms require unanimous consensus

As we know, the old structure of Technical and Sporting Working Groups proposing rules through a 70 per cent majority for ratification by a 26-man F1 Commission is being revamped.

Autosport reports that instead, a 18-strong ‘Strategy Working Group’ is being created – which will be made up of six team representatives (Ferrari, McLaren, Red Bull, Mercedes, Williams and the next best in the constructors’), six FIA representatives and six representatives from Formula One Management.

This group will vote on rule changes that will be decided through a simple majority, and these will then be passed on to a trimmed 18-man F1 Commission.

Read more

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

by

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.

Read more

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

by

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

Read more

Hulkenberg refuses contract extension, Webber walks out of FIA conference, Sutil to return to Force India, Ecclestone refutes he’s being replaced,

by

Indian GP attendance down 1/3rd: The drivers gave a thumbs-up to the 5.14 kilometre track enjoying the challenge of the layout and the teams and media hailed the clean paddock and the facilities sported a completed look that was not the case last year. However, no one could avoid the dip in the numbers of fans, the most important constituent of any sport, as 65,000 of them turned up for Sunday’s race down from last year’s 95,000.

Mr. E is of course not worried, “First races are always high and the second year goes down. If the third year isn’t going up, then it’s something to worry about”, he jocularly observed “We have a [another] competitor here. What’s the name of that game? Cricket?”, suggesting F1 has a way to go to make an impression on the Indian sporting psyche.

Indian motor sports federation chief Vicky Chandhok reiterated the same three-year cycle and predicted a bigger turnout in 2013. “Formula One is like this only. This is the trend everywhere. From third race onwards, you’d see some kind of stability. Overall, it has been a huge improvement from last year”.

Read more