Sports - Formula One #33: Our Wish For The New Year? Bernie To Stop Speaking

goodnightboy · 01-16-2010, 07:37 PM

Welcome to The Formula One Thread
On this thread we discuss the wonderful sport of F1. We post up to date news and the general info about the sport. We also talk about the drivers and the teams and what we like or dislike about them.

2014 Driver Line-Up
Infiniti Red Bull Racing
Sebastian Vettel
Daniel Ricciardo

Mercedes AMG Petronas
Lewis Hamilton
Nico Rosberg

Scuderia Ferrari
Fernando Alonso
Kimi Raikkonen

Lotus F1 Team
Romain Grosjean
Pastor Maldonado

McLaren Mercedes
Jenson Button
Kevin Magnussen

Sahara Force India F1
Sergio Perez
Nico Hulkenberg

Sauber F1 Team
Esteban Gutierrez
Adrian Sutil

Scuderia Toro Rosso
Jules Vergne
Daniil Kvyat

Williams Martini Racing
Felipe Massa
Valterri Bottas

Marussia F1 Team
Max Chilton
Jules Bianchi

Caterham F1 Team
Marcus Ericsson
Kamui Kobayashi

2014 F1 CALENDAR

16 Mar. Albert Park, Australia

30 Mar. Sepang, Malaysia

6 Apr. Sakhir, Bahrain

20 Apr. China, Shanghai

11 May. Circuit de Catalunya, Spain

25 May. Monte Carlo, Monaco

8 Jun. Montreal, Canada

22 Jun. Red Bull Ring, Austria

6 Jul. Silverstone, Great Britain

20 Jul. Hockenheim, Germany

27 Jul. Hungaroring, Hungary

24 Aug. Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium

7 Sep. Monza, Italy

21 Sep. Marina Bay, Singapore

5 Oct. Suzuka, Japan

12 Oct. Sochi, Russia

2 Nov. Circuit of the Americas, USA

9 Nov. Interlagos, Brazil

23 Nov. Yas Marina, Abu Dhabi

Previous Threads:
Formula One is GO GO GO
Formula One #2 - To Finish First, First You Must Finish
Formula One #3 - Can Anyone Truely beat Michael Schumacher?
Formula One #4 - The Iceman Cometh
Formula One #5 - IF is F1 backwards
Formula One #6 - This Season Will Ferrari still be the team to beat?
Formula One #7 - Now it's unpredictable!
Formula One #8: It's no longer the Ferrari show!
Formula One #9 The f2003 GA... as sexy as an F1 car's gonna be
Formula One #10 ~ Kimi a world champion in the making
Formula One #11 ~ With every race Alonso's star is getting brighter
Formula One #12 ~ Watch Out When Juan is About!
Formula One #13 ~ We are Running Out of Races and the Championship is wide open!
Formula One #14 ~ It's Ferrari vs Everyone Else in the Tyre War of 2003
Formula One #15 ~ It Ain't Over Until It's Over
Formula One #16 - Michael still thinks that JV is a threat
Formula One #17 - Bring on more seasons like the one we've just had
Formula One #18 - A New Year Brings a New Season
Formula One #19 ~ A new season brings new rivalries
Formula One #20 ~ The cars just keep getting faster and faster!!!
Formula One #21 ~ Schumi is showing why he is a six times world champion!
Formula One #22 - Speed and Dangerous Situations
Formula One #23 - Still waiting for a McLaren win this season
Formula One #24 ~ The Year of the Renault Boys
Formula One #25 - apparently no thread title
Formula One #26: A New Era Has Begun!
Formula One #27: We demand more rain-hit races
Formula One #28: It was the year of the Iceman...congrats, Kimi!
Formula One Thread #29: Good drivers + good cars - TC = Unpredictable season!
F1 thread #30: Who will win championship this year? Lewis did
Formula One #31: Possibly The Strangest Season Ever... We Love It
Formula One #32: Strength, Felipe - We're With You

goodnightboy · 01-16-2010, 07:42 PM

Hello all! New thread at last, hurrah. I changed the title slightly from my suggestion from the previous thread - I know it's two weeks into the new year, but hey, new decade and all. Some things still need fixing - I don't have pictures for some of the new races (I didn't realise we were debuting two new races this year! Damn!) and Suzuka and Montreal don't have pictures either. Somebody help! And I've left off the driver picture until there's been a new picture for the upcoming season.

Brucas4life · 01-17-2010, 03:44 AM

Thanks for the new thread.

And thanks for trying to sort out the openng, so we're still waiting for about 5 drivers to be confirmed.

I don't know who did the pictures before, I could try and do the ones you're missing if needed but hopefully whoever did them before is still around and can help.

Brucas4life · 01-17-2010, 03:45 AM

Sorry for the double post, not sure why it did that.

goodnightboy · 01-19-2010, 07:14 PM

David did it, come back!

Pedro de la Rosa to race for Sauber next season. It's the grid taking shape!

He races alongside Kamui Kobayashi, I completely forgot about the Sauber team when I was doing up the OP. Oops. Going to fix that now.

Piquet Junior could have raced in F1 next season if he had wanted to. One word: why? (as in, why would any team want him, not why would he want to race in F1, obviously he would).

Brucas4life · 01-20-2010, 07:19 AM

Thanks for the latest!

Have you tried PM-ing him?

And here's some more news which is interesting:

Quote:

Martin Whitmarsh named chairman of F1 team group Fota

McLaren team boss Martin Whitmarsh has been elected as chairman of the Formula 1 Teams' Association (Fota) for 2010. The 51-year-old takes over from Ferrari chairman Luca di Montezemolo but the Italian marque's team boss Stefano Domenicali will become vice chairman.

Mercedes team principal Ross Brawn continues to lead Fota's technical regulations working group.

Fota formed in 2008 to give teams a united front in their negotiations with motorsport's governing body, the FIA. The two organisations were engaged in a lengthy battle last season over the FIA's proposal to introduce a mandatory budget and technical changes for 2010.

F1 was on the brink of collapse when Fota, which had at one stage expelled Force India and Williams for breaking ranks, threatened to form a breakaway series.

A dissolution was avoided when then FIA president Max Mosley agreed to stand down in October and the teams signed up to a new Concorde Agreement - the document that sets out how F1 is run and its revenues distributed.

Whitmarsh will be charged with leading Fota through the new season when four new teams are set to join the 2010 grid. Red Bull team boss Christian Horner will chair the sporting regulations working group, while former Renault boss Flavio Briatore's commercial role will be managed collectively.

Fota said in a statement: "All members placed on record their thanks to Luca di Montezemolo for his valuable leadership and remarkable contribution. Fota teams now look forward to working with Martin Whitmarsh to continue the development of activities in the long-term interest of Formula 1."

Source: BBC

goodnightboy · 01-26-2010, 02:28 AM

Haven't yet. Do you want to PM him instead?

I don't know how to type out his username, the D has some extra thing I don't know how to replicate on my keyboard. Short of copying and pasting, but I'm lazy.

Whitmarsh chairperson? Well I never really had any thoughts about it so... none now. Heh.

More news.

Lopez joins USF1 for 2010. Hurrah for more news on the driver front!
Bahrain unveils new layout for F1 race. I highly doubt it'll make the race more interesting, but you never know.
Teams agree to tweak points system further. It solves a lot of fans' problems by awarding more points for a win, but for the love of God, why do they have to keep changing things? And if they wanted further changes, why announce the first switch in the first place?!

And the big one, I suppose - Mercedes GP's car launch. Apart from the usual blah-de-blah about each driver wanting to win the championship and other such noises... well there's not much is there? (Although I might be biased as I've never really cared about team launches, apart from looking at how each car looks like). Autosport picture gallery of the event here, if you're interested.

Just a thought - what happened to Nick Heidfeld? He hasn't got a race seat for next season, has he?

welshgirlyUK · 01-28-2010, 03:48 AM

Is it just me, or is that car getting some serious inspiration from McLaren?

Brucas4life · 02-02-2010, 08:18 AM

It's not really surprising though is it

Gwen do you know what his username is? If not then I'll go back and try and find it.

Finally testing has started

Quote:

Formula 1 adopts new points system for 2010 season

Formula 1 will have a new points system for the 2010 after an agreement between the governing body (FIA) and the teams. The new system will see places rewarded in a 25-18-15-12-10-8-6-4-2-1 sequence.

F1 bosses believe a seven-point gap between first and second place, rather than the current two-point separation, will promote a 'race-to-win' attitude. New tyre rules mean drivers must start races on the same tyres they set their grid time in, while 'double diffusers' will be banned from 2011.

The Formula 1 Commission, a decision-making forum for the teams and major stakeholders, agreed the amendments to the sporting and technical regulations at a meeting on Monday. The measures will be submitted to the World Motor Sport Council for final approval within 48 hours, which is usually a formality once all of the parties have agreed on changes.

Scoring changes have been suggested several times over the past year and two months ago the F1 Commission initially opted for a 25-20-15-10-8-6-5-3-2-1 format. However, the disparity of points between the top three was no greater in percentage terms than the 10-8-6 system currently used. Previously, F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone tried to introduce a medals system, with the championship being decided by race victories rather than cumulative points, but the idea did not catch on with teams.

In order to introduce a further element of strategy, cars running in the final 10-minute qualifying session must start the race on the same set of tyres with which their grid time was set. With re-fuelling banned from this year and the emphasis switching to tyre use, drivers with an aggressive qualifying strategy will likely be compromised early in a race, forcing them into additional stops.

The decision to ban the 'split level' or 'double-decker' diffuser will not come into effect this year. The main diffuser will be allowed in 2011, but its permitted height will be reduced from 175mm to 125mm. Diffusers improve downforce by channelling the flow of air smoothly under the car, but in 2009 there was controversy when eventual champions Brawn, Toyota and Williams produced radical versions of their own.

Teams unveiling their 2010 cars have been coy about their rear diffusers, sparking fears that a fresh row could erupt when the season starts on March 14 in Bahrain.

"This is the first car in which we have had a clean sheet of paper to really exploit the interpretation that was developed last year for a design of floors," McLaren engineering director Paddy Lowe said at their launch last week. "You will see we have produced a fairly extreme incarnation of that but we won't be alone in that. We believe you will see some pretty extreme solutions on our competitors' cars as well."

Source: BBC

goodnightboy · 02-05-2010, 10:21 PM

Sorry I haven't been around for ages. I didn't really follow testing because I had other things to worry about in the real world (aww) - what happened? More testing next week, I'll try harder to keep up with that. But without actual video it's a bit hard to really know.

Many launches, which I'm really lazy to cover even in links. But I know the teams are: McLaren, Renault, Sauber, Virgin, Mercedes. Any other? And I'm reading the article you posted, Vicky, do we know if the teams are really going ahead to not use double diffusers next season? I know Williams wanted to use their flywheel one...

In case you're interested, I found out what's going to happen to Heidfeld. Unfortunately he's accepted a role as test/reserve driver for Mercedes GP, instead of being a full race driver. I'm sad!

Also I was watching the 1993 European GP on this show we have called F1 Classics and god Senna was supreme. It's hard to take that in a year's time he would be dead

Brucas4life · 02-14-2010, 06:58 AM

I don't know how I missed your post. I hope everything is ok with you now

Yeah I saw that about Hiedfield, tbh I'm surprised no one snapped him up, and I'm surprised he agreed to be a test driver, maybe he just didn't want to sign for any of the newer teams as he didn't rate their chances and would rather at least be with a team that stood a good chance at doing well, even if he was just a test driver.

Senna was amazing, and such a character. Just watching on youtube some of his races, and the moves he made, it's just incredible. He had no fear.

In other news:

BBC Sport - F1 - F1 amends in-season testing rule after Schumacher row
BBC Sport - F1 - New Silverstone layout to be used for 2010 British GP
BBC Sport - F1 - Lewis Hamilton sets the pace at Jerez test for McLaren

goodnightboy · 02-17-2010, 07:45 PM

I'm fine! I was just busy. I had to remove my wisdom teeth too. Which was surprisingly pain-free (hurrah!).

Yep. I think he's banking on the fact that Schumacher may not last the season, or that he may get his chance later on (like Pedro de la Rosa) and I applaud him for not wanting to compromise and spend time at a backmarker team. It's just... I wanted to see him drive!

But yet again it really hurts knowing poor Timo is in a backmarker team and unlikely to do well (see: yesterday's timing sheets at Jerez). In short: I'm not looking forward to next season, if testing is to go by.

Brucas4life · 02-20-2010, 05:30 PM

You sound like one of the lucky ones then, everyone I know who has had them out as said how painful it is. Glad you're ok.

I don't know what is going on with these new teams but they don't seem ready to join F1. Well Lotus are, but as for the others it doesn't look good, no wonder Bernie wasn't expecting them to show up for the first race, they seem so far away in terms of prep for the new season, and financially they're not very secure either. I don't think it would be a bad thing to allow other teams if they are able to, to start the season as I highly doubt that all the teams that have committed to the new season will be there, but it seems ridiculously short notice.

Just look at the USF1 team. They can't seriously be planning on missing the first four races? You can't just say we're not ready, they knew when the start date was. Hardly a good start to the new season is it. Or a great welcome to F1 for the new teams.

goodnightboy · 02-21-2010, 07:54 AM

I'm grateful

Agreed. Well to be honest USF1 are just giving the newcomers a bad look, because I don't think the other teams have been that bad (although now Nick Wirth have admitted Virgin are behind schedule). But having to miss the first four races? That's terrible. Shouldn't there be a clause somewhere that says teams must start all races unless there's an injury or something? What a joke. Then again the sport is a bit of a joke so hmm.

Brucas4life · 02-21-2010, 07:56 AM

Yeah apparently it is against FIA rules and so they are asking for special permission. I guess it depends on how badly they want the team involved next season as to whether they are willing to make exceptions.


Fan Forum > General Discussion > Sports > Formula One #33: Our Wish For The New Year? Bernie To Stop Speaking