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Susie Wolff, Daniel Juncadella to join Maldonado for Williams at Young Driver Test

Susie Wolff and Daniel Juncadella will join Williams driver Pastor Maldonado at the upcoming Young Driver Test at Silverstone.

Susie Wolff has completed a number of straight line tests for Williams but this will be her first participation in an official test session. She is hoping to get a better understanding of the car which will help her in her development feedback at the factory simulator testing which she regularly participates in.

“It’s a fantastic opportunity for me, so now it is up to me to prepare myself the best that I can for the day,” she said. “It’s going to be a big challenge but the most important thing is to do a solid and consistent job and to give good feedback to the team to be able to prove I am at the level to compete on a day such as this. Most of my work is based in the simulator which is why this day is so important for me. It will give me a better understanding of what the car is like on track and how that correlates to the simulator which will also help further develop the work I can do there.”

Daniel Juncadella is currently racing in DTM and like any young driver is relishing the opportunity to test in a Formula One team.

“It’s a great chance for me and I hope I can help the team next week,” he said. “It’s an important test for any young driver as there aren’t many opportunities to drive a Formula one car. I had my first taste of Formula One as a prize for winning the 2012 Formula 3 Euro Series title, but it was a 2009 car so I therefore see this as being the real deal, having the chance to drive a current car in a full test. I’ve spent a couple of days at the factory getting to know the team and I felt at home. Looking at the history of the team is also amazing and so to get this chance with Williams, a team so many great drivers have raced for, makes it even more special.”

Now that current race drivers are also permitted to take part in the Young Driver Test, Pastor Maldonado will also get a day behind the wheel of the Williams taking part in tyre development tests for Pirelli.

Photo: Williams F1 Team

July 16, 2013
Red Bull to test Daniel Ricciardo at Young Driver Test

In a move that has sent the rumour mill into overdrive, Red Bull have announced that Daniel Ricciardo will be testing the RB9 in this week’s Young Driver Test at Silverstone.

This will certainly give the young Ricciardo’s hopes of replacing fellow Australian driver Mark Webber at Red Bull next year a boost.

According to Red Bull, Ricciardo – who is facing competition for the Red Bull seat from Lotus driver Kimi Raikkonen and fellow Toro Rosso driver Jean-Eric Vergne – will be in the seat of the Red Bull RB9 on Wednesday afternoon.

Mark Webber, who is leaving Formula One at the end of the season to race for Le Mans sports car racing with Porsche, will be testing the Pirelli tyres on Thursday afternoon and Sebastian Vettel will be in the car on Friday afternoon.

Portuguese driver Antonio Félix da Costa who is a member of the Red Bull young driver programme, and would be most likely to replace Daniel Ricciardo at Toro Rosso, will test for Red Bull on Wednesday and Thursday mornings.

Carlos Sainz Jr will take over for the final morning at Silverstone.

The Young Driver Test at Silverstone was originally intended to be for young drivers only but after a spate of blow outs during last month’s British Grand Prix, the FIA opened it up to regular race drivers to test for Pirelli.

July 16, 2013
Marussia’s Pat Symonds Moves to Williams

The Marussia F1 team announced today, (16 July 2013) that their Technical Consultant Pat Symonds has been released off his responsibilities to the team with immediate effect.

At the same time Williams F1 announced that Mike Coughlan has stepped down from his role as Technical Director at the Grove based team and Pat Symonds will take up the role as Chief Technical Offier at Williams, effective from 19 August 2013.

“I have thoroughly enjoyed my time with the Marussia F1 Team over the course of the past two and a half seasons. The Team has developed immeasurably during that time and it now has all the right people and resources in place to achieve great things in the future. I wish the Team the success it so richly deserves.” said Symonds.

“I’m delighted that Pat is joining the team. His technical capabilities and sporting successes speak for themselves and I’m sure that his knowledge and leadership will contribute considerably to the success that all of us at Williams are working hard to achieve.” said Williams founder, Sir Frank Williams about appointing Pat Symonds.

Symonds who brought success to the Benetton and Renault, and with his partnership with Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso that produced 32 race wins, 4 Drivers’ World Championships and 3 Constructors’ World Championships, had this to say about Williams F1; “Williams is a team steeped in success and engineering excellence and I’m honoured to be asked to play a role in returning the team to its rightful place at the pinnacle of Formula One.

July 16, 2013
Marussia F1 Announce New Engine Deal With Scuderia Ferrari

The Marussia F1 team announced their new engine partnership with Scuderia Ferrari on Tuesday.

The deal will see the Marussia team running the 1.6l turbo charged engines from Ferrari for the 2014 Formula 1 season. The deal also includes, together with the engine, the gearbox, the Energy Recovery System (ERS) and all other additional components.

The full statement from the CEO of the Marussia F1 team, Andy Webb, is included below:

“The Marussia F1 Team is delighted to be entering into a technical partnership with Scuderia Ferrari for the supply of a full powertrain from 2014. The importance of this development to our Team cannot be overstated. Not only will we benefit from a customer supply from the most successful engine manufacturer in Formula One’s history, but this also provides further confirmation, if it were needed, of our commitment to the sport and determination to maintain our progression towards our long-term ambitions. The new powertrain regulations being introduced next year represent the most substantial engine development within the sport since the introduction of the V8 formula and are all the more significant for the increased contribution of the Energy Recovery System. We look forward to working with Scuderia Ferrari during this exciting new era of Formula One competition. We would also like to take this opportunity to thank Cosworth, with whom we have partnered since our debut season in 2010. We have shared an important part of our Team’s journey together and Cosworth have been an integral part of our clear progression. We will continue to work together during the latter half of the season to ensure we all achieve our combined objectives before Cosworth leave the sport.”

July 16, 2013
Fan Opinion: Red Bull Young Driver Program

Reynard Gelderblom, Motorsport Editor of Streetmotion, sent us his perspective on the Red Bull young driver program.

We’d love to hear your thoughts too! Let us know what you think in the comments below, or let us know if you’d like us to publish your opinion too.

Here’s what Reynard had to say:

Do I see red for the young bulls?

Well there is certainly lots to talk about after the German Grand Prix, so let me start off by saying what I’m not going to talk about…

I’m not going to talk about tyres again. We’ll have to wait for what comes from the Silverstone test and after the Hungarian GP where Pirelli will introduce some more tyre upgrades. On that point, I’m also going to disappoint those who tweeted me to talk about Mercedes still being excluded from the young driver portion of the Silverstone tests since all the teams will now be doing tests with 2013 cars and drivers as well. It’s a penalty, or more of a slap on the wrist – live with it.

I’m also not going to talk about safety gear for media – that’s a point for the FIA to address. Then there are cars reversing over a straight, wheel guns and Sauber going to Mother Russia… all of those are tempting, but no.

Now we’ve filtered it down to Lewis Hamilton’s love life, but this is of course a column for two online motorsport publications. If an entertainment magazine would approach me I’d love to sit here and give my views of how Lewis is driving better when Sir Cliff’s “Bachelor Boy” is playing on his iPod, sadly none of them have contacted me yet.

That leaves me with something I’ve been looking at now for the last few weeks: The Red Bull young driver program. We all know what a success story this turned out to be. Sebastian Vettel is a three-time consecutive World champion and came through the ranks which included the Red Bull “B” team, Torro Rosso.

In fact, at Monza 2008, Vettel took what was essentially a rebadged Minardi to a maiden win for a Red Bull liveried car. At the end of June 2013, Mark Webber announced his retirement from Formula 1 which means there’ll be an opening in the Red Bull teams for 2014. With Torro Rosso retaining both Daniel Ricciardo and Jean-Eric Vergne for 2013, this surely means that it will be up to one of them to progress. Wrong.

Here are the names that are being mentioned: Kimi Raikkonen, Adrian Sutil, Romain Grosjean… oh and Ricciardo. With Sauber’s salary checks being written by the same people designing the soft compound tyres you can probably expect the name Nico Hulkenberg to be added to that list shortly considering that he’s on every other team manager’s shortlist now. Vergne has been putting in some good performances, but those are really few and far between compared to Ricciardo. That means one name from the young driver program is realistically in the running, although I’m quite sure that Raikkonen must be the favourite.

Ricciardo and Vergne aren’t the only two names who may never make it higher in the organisation than the “B” team. This program started long before the popular energy drink manufacturer purchased their first team, Jaguar in 2004. Have a look at this list: Enrique Bernoldi provided some capital for Arrows, Christian Klein brought 10 Million Euros to Jaguar and no real results, Vitantonio Liuzzi, Robert Doornbos, Patrick Friesacher, Narain Karthikeyan and Karun Chadhok filled gaps here and there.

In fact if there’s something which this program did well through the years, it was to supply drivers-on-demand for the HRT team. Scott Speed, Sebastian Bordais, Sebastian Buemi and Jamie Alguersuari all looked promising at the start of their Torro Rosso careers, but eventually they all slipped back as well. Neel Jani and Adrian Zaugg at least had a taste of success in the former A1GP series. At present there are six driver in the program with Antonio Felix da Costa, Carlos Sainz Jnr and Daniil Kvyat looking like the next to be in line for future vacancies.

Vettel made it through this system, but granted he is being compared by some to Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna. A good driver will always find a way to the top… even in a mediocre car. Have Red Bull backed the wrong drivers through the years or is there maybe a bigger problem here – maybe a lack of actual driver development? Has the program become a victim of its own success? Has it really become too overpopulated? I don’t know but one F1 race winner in fourteen years hardly screams of success.

In my point of view, Ricciardo is the man who should be looking forward to partnering Vettel in 2014. If not, maybe it’s time to relook something which has been globally called a success story, because choosing Raikkonen or Sutil will prove the exact opposite.

Reynard Gelderblom is the motorsport editor for Street Motion.

Keep up to date with the latest local motorsport news by following Street Motion on Twitter.

July 13, 2013
Juan Manuel Fangio’s W196 sells for £17.5m at auction

Juan Manuel Fangio’s 1954 Mercedes W196 sold for a world record auction price of £17.5m at the Goodwood Festival of Speed.

The previous auction record of £11m ($16.7m) was paid for a Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa in 2011. After commission and taxes are added, the sale of the W196 reaches a total of £19.6m.

Juan Manuel Fangio’s W196 went up for auction after being found in a warehouse earlier this year. Initial estimates expected the car to sell for around £5m.

Racing historian Doug Nye described it as “a beautiful survivor” when it was discovered. He told Eurosport, “The first time I saw this car I needed oxygen; it’s landmark technology and it was driven by a landmark driver. Some people think it looks grotty – that’s not the point – the really rare cars today are the unrestored ones. Every car that’s restored has lost a part of its history because it’s been obliterated by repainting or by rebuilding. Nothing’s been obliterated on this; it’s just a beautiful survivor.”

In the W196 Juan Manuel Fangio won the 1954 German and Swiss grands prix and secured the second of his five world championships.

July 13, 2013
Red Bull exploring Pirelli tyre test options

Red Bull team principal, Christian Horner, has said that the team is exploring the option of carrying out a Pirelli tyre test.

This follows the International Tribunal’s ruling on the Mercedes tyre test where it has been made clear that running a 2013 car is perfectly legal as long as plans are communicated to and approved by the FIA.

None of the teams have agreed to run a current car but Red Bull seems open to completing a test running a 2011 car, similar to the test carried out by Ferrari for Pirelli in Barcelona earlier this year.

Horner told Sporting Life, “We will see, it is something we have to discuss with Pirelli”.

When asked about what the importance would be to Pirelli, Horner replied: “That is for them to judge, what they need and what they require from testing. Whatever happens it has to be done transparently. We don’t want people sneaking off behind closed doors – and wearing nondescript helmets.”

Pirelli motorsport director Paul Hembery says that Pirelli will continue to push to use current (2013) cars. He told ESPN, “We’re asking for [a 2013 car]. We’ve got a couple of teams maybe interested in running a 2011 car and doing 1000km, which is good, but I think the big thing is we’d like to get the 2013 car run.”

July 13, 2013
Video: Cutaway Insights – Episode 9: F1 Security Data Recorder (SDR) – Sauber F1 Team

In this episode of the Sauber F1 Team’s Cutaway Insights series, Matt Morris (Chief Designer for the C32) shows you the F1 Security Data Recorder (SDR). FIA is planning to introduce a new g-force sensor for 2014 which will be placed in the drivers’ earpieces. This will be in addition to the SDR and will more accurately measure the forces actually acting on the drivers and, in particular, their heads. Enjoy the video!

July 13, 2013
Video – Alonso drives the Ferrari F12 Berlinetta around Nordschleife for an interview

Doing interviews is probably not a driver’s favourite pastime, but when it involves grabbing a steering wheel and putting the pedal to the metal to unleash the sort of power which is almost on a par with that of a Formula 1 car, then this actually becomes a pleasure.

Watch Fernando Alonso take the Ferrari F12 Berlinetta around Nordschleife while he chats to German TV in a most interesting interview.

July 13, 2013
Sauber will run Hulkenberg at the Young Driver Test

The FIA’s decision to allow race drivers to take part in the upcoming Young Driver Test in order to test the new Pirelli tyres has seen quite a few teams opting to make use of the opportunity to run their regular drivers.

Sauber have announced the they will run Nico Hulkenberg along with reserve driver Robert Frinjs and Japanese driver Kimiya Sato at the 17-19 July test.

Hulkenberg will be testing on the Thursday afternoon with Frinjs getting track action in the morning as well as on Wednesday. Kimiya Sato will take the C32 around Silverstone on the Friday.

Sauber have also confirmed that they will be bringing a new upgrade package to the Young Driver Test.

July 13, 2013