F1 Madness

Tag: toto wolff

  • F1 2018: Japanes Gp Review – Hamilton Win Virtually Assures Title

    F1 2018: Japanes Gp Review – Hamilton Win Virtually Assures Title

    It’s not pretentious at all to declare that Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes are assured of being champions, again, in 2018. Victory in Japan makes it six wins in the last seven races for Hamilton and with a mammoth 63-point he is every bit the champion presumptive.

    A faultless weekend from Mercedes ensured a front-row lock out on Saturday while an unnerved Ferrari was left scrambling. On Saturday as the clouds rolled in Ferrari’s senseless decision-making reared its head again as both Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel were sent out onto a dry track with Intermediate tyres. Though there was enough team for both drivers to switch to dry tyres it left them with only one lap in the final part of qualifying. While Raikkonen secured fourth Vettel ran off track and was relegated to the fourth row of the grid.

    All wasn’t lost for the would-be championship contender as a good start to Sunday’s race saw him quickly into fourth. But while Hamilton and Bottas pulled away up front Vettel’s impatience got the better of him. Verstappen, who started third, was correctly given a five second time penalty for re-joining the circuit in an unsafe manner at the final chicane. The Red Bull driver had driven into the side of Raikkonen allowing Vettel to pass his teammate and settle on the Verstappen’s gearbox. Clearly faster it appeared to be a matter of time until the Ferrari would find its way past. But Vettel threw caution to the wind and attempted an overtake on Verstappen in Spoon corner. Not only didn’t he make the move stick but he also sent himself into a spin that left him plumb last. He eventually recovered to finish sixth.

    Australian GP Qualifying - Sebastian Vettel, FerrariThere is no denying that from an operational standpoint Ferrari has had some embarrassing blunders on strategy. But the mistakes in the races lay firmly at Vettel’s feet. The lock-up in Baku, the crash with Bottas in France, the bizarre crash while leading in Germany, the crash with Hamilton in Italy, the mistake on the Q3 lap in Japan, and finally the crash with Verstappen in the race.

    Together all of these moments have ensured that unless some truly miraculous happens in the last four races Sebastian Vettel will not be the 2018 champion.

    It’s clear too that Vettel, in 2018, is a far cry from the driver that won four consecutive titles between 2010 and 2013. The reason could very well be the cockpit he’s currently sitting in. The pressure of being a Ferrari driver and the constant demand and expectation to win in unlike any other and its evident that Vettel has cracked under that pressure.

    Meanwhile, it could hardly be any better if you’re Lewis Hamilton. Yes, Vettel and Ferrari’s mistakes have contributed to his enormous points lead but he’s still delivered. There’s a mental switch that happens with Hamilton in the second half of the season that means he raises his game to a level no one, with the exception of Nico Rosberg, has been able to match. Plainly put, Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes has wiped the floor with Vettel and Ferrari.

    jap1While Hamilton cruised to victory the ever-dutiful Valtteri Bottas followed him home in second while Max Verstappen snapped up the final step on the podium. The sister Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo, once again felled by mechanical issues in quali, recovered to an impressive fourth. Kimi Raikkonen was fifth for Ferrari while Vettel trundled home in sixth.

    Sergio Perez proved to be best-of-the-rest for Force India in seventh while Romain Grosjean, Esteban Ocon, and Carlos Sainz completed the top ten on a day where the mid-field battle proved the most scintillating part of the race. In fact, the battle behind Merc, Ferrari, and Red Bull is so close that only four points cover positions seven through eleven in the driver’s standings.

    Victory in Japan indicates that Lewis Hamilton’s fifth world championship crown is a mere formality. With a 63-point lead and four races remaining in 2018 it’s not if Hamilton will win the big prize but rather when.

    All images courtesy of Pirelli Motorsport 

  • 2018 Russian GP: Friday Press Conference

    2018 Russian GP: Friday Press Conference

    TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – Cyril ABITEBOUL (Renault), Toto WOLFF (Mercedes), Otmar SZAFNAUER (Racing Point Force India), Mario ISOLA (Pirelli)

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Q: Toto, third and fourth for your team in FP1 today but you’re unbeaten at this circuit, have won every Russian Grand Prix so far – so are you the favourites heading into this weekend’s race?

    Toto WOLFF: No. I never see ourselves as favourites. We were beaten in qualifying last year and Valtteri had a really brilliant started, towed the Ferraris and went into the lead. And how the season has been going this year, first of all, there’s no patterns any more, and I don’t want to put us in a favourite position, let’s see where we are tomorrow after qualifying.

     

    Q: Off-track we had another driver line-up confirmed today with Haas confirming its line-up. Is there any news concerning your young drivers, Esteban Ocon and George Russell?

    TW: No, not yet. We are still working on the alternatives, the remaining alternatives. I don’t expect there to be any news in the next week. We need to see how it all pans out at Williams and what we plan to do with Esteban long term and come up with a decision.

     

    Q: Otmar, speaking of Esteban. He was involved in that first-lap clash with Sergio in Singapore. Has there been any talks with the drivers since then? What’s the latest in terms of what they can do, in terms of racing each other?

    Otmar SZAFNAUER : Yeah, that was an unfortunate incident. We definitely spoke with them after. We analysed what happened and we’ll be speaking with them this weekend as well.

     

    Q: And what is going to be the protocol for your drivers going into races?

    OS: It’s going to be no different to how it’s been – it’s just I think they forgot, so we’re going to remind them that they have to give each other enough room, especially on lap one and even leave margin for error. So, if something does happen, they don’t run into each other. We’ll remind them of that and show them how that can be done.

     

    Q: You’re making those calls as team principal now of Force India and you’ve been in that role for three races. Having got a good view of the picture of the team now, what do you think is a realistic target for the rest of the season?

    OS: Well, if we continue to do a good job and don’t crash into each other, I think realistically we should be targeting at least sixth in the Constructors’ Championship, which is attainable but not easy to do. I think above that it will take some luck on our part or some misfortune on somebody else’s part.

     

    Q: Cyril, Otmar almost rules himself out of the fight for fourth place – but who are your main threats for that fourth position, going into the rest of the season?

    Cyril ABITEBOUL: Well, I think there is no real change in relation to that. Haas, since the season start, since the pre-season tests, has been really quick, fast but couldn’t really crystalize that pace advantage in the early part of the season. They would be our fiercest competitors but, as Otmar is saying, they are coming back very quickly in the Constructors’ Championship. They’re quick, very quick on one lap. I think our car is still very competitive in race trim but we know we’re suffering a disadvantage in qualifying, which is obviously playing a very big role in our capacity to maintain our fourth position. So, it’s all about defending on Sunday what sometimes we’re not capable of doing on Saturday.

     

    Q: Your team ran Artem Markelov in the first practice session today, continuing the momentum of Russian drivers coming into Formula One. How do you rate Artem and his performance?

    CA: I think he’s done a very good job this morning. He’s not made any mistakes, first and foremost and we had a number of new parts on the car, so we would not have wanted to lose those parts, obviously. Good also on the procedures, and God knows there is a lot in terms of engine, aero test and so on and so forth. In pace, he was very decent, more than decent, I should say. Eight-tenths off Nico, obviously who’s got a great track record of being able to extract maximum performance, in particular from the softest compound we have this weekend: the hypersoft. I think Artem struggled a little bit by degradation of the tyres. That’s an area where he needs to work and learn – but I guess an interesting referential point for his future hopefully.

     

    Q: Mario, moving on to you. Cyril referenced the tyres there. We’ve got a step in the compounds, with the soft, ultrasoft and hypersoft but with a very smooth circuit here, what does it do for the strategic options at this track?

    Mario ISOLA: We decided to nominate the hypersoft here because it is a smooth track but with some characteristics you need traction, especially for Sector Three, you need a strong tyre, especially the front for Turn Three, that is a very demanding corner. Then it is up to them to find the right setup of the car to preserve the tyres. We know that it is an aggressive choice, same choice as Singapore but with completely different characteristics of the circuit. Therefore I can imagine they will manage the tyres during the race. This is something that is happening since the beginning of the year. It’s a sort of reaction from the teams to our decision to go softer and with more degrading tyres, and we will see. This morning, FP1, I believe was not really representative, considering that we had a lot of track evolution – so probably in the afternoon we have a better picture of delta performance and the level of degradation.

     

    Q: Pirelli has also been busy since the Singapore Grand Prix doing testing at Paul Ricard, looking ahead to 2019. So just how are preparations going for next season?

    MI: The test was very good. We had Ferrari, Mercedes and we were able to complete all the programme, so the construction is now decided, so we are supplying all the data for the new construction to the teams by the 1st of October – that is the deadline. We are working on some fine tuning of the compounds, because the target for next year is to nominate five compounds. The target is five compounds. We may need to homologate an extra compound, so six, but hopefully we stay on five. That means that we will provide all five compounds with the new construction in Abu Dhabi at the test that is planned for after the race, similar to last year, to give the teams the opportunity to have an idea of the 2019 product.

     

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

     

    Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) Question to Otmar, Toto and Cyril. What are your thoughts about Russian companies investing in Formula One and motor racing and supporting Russian drivers?

    OS: We travel all over the world and it’s great to see many nations supporting their drivers. I think it’s natural that companies will support Russian drivers. I think it’s good for the sport.

     

    TW: Yeah, we’re seeing more Russian kids coming through the ranks. You can see them in go-karting. And if you look at even the small classes, the Bambini and the Juniors, there is more Russian kids inspired by Vitaly and all the ones that came early, and I think it’s good to have a mixture.

     

    And Cyril, your thoughts, especially just having run a Russian driver in FP1.

    CA: We have. And in addition to that, Renault has a very strong footprint in Russia. Russia might become one of the biggest and more important markets in the future mid-term plan of Renault, so it’s clearly a market that’s key for the future of the brand but there is no reason not to be also on the development path for Formula One. I guess for the rest it’s not really for us comment on any political aspects that goes a bit above this room frankly.

     

    Q: (Andrea Cremonesi – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Question for Cyril. I would like to know exactly what was the issue with the engine for Red Bull and McLaren and why did you decide to change the engines for those teams here. And for Toto, I would like to know if something changes in 2019 with the passage between Zetsche and Källenius?

    CA: Yeah, engine changes, lots of things said and written about that. Reality is a bit more straightforward. It’s simply the execution of a plan previously agreed with all stakeholders. In particular, with Red Bull. We had a driveability issue in Singapore in FP1, early into the weekend and, to a far less extent, in qualifying. But I think we have a very demanding user in the person of Max, and not very quiet also. But I think the team has done a great job in order to provide Max what was needed in order to have a good weekend in Singapore, it’s very clear. As far as the introduction of the previous-spec engine is concerned, again, that was part of the plan. The C-spec as we call it, is a good step, I think it is a good step that everyone recognises, that Red Bull has a clear step in power that comes also with a certain number of limitations. That was part of the plan to introduce, at a later stage, a B-spec. It’s a bit unusual in terms of pattern – but again it’s a pattern and a plan that was fully agreed, specifically on the request of Red Bull.

     

    And Toto, your comments on the changes at Mercedes next year.

    TW: Yes. Dieter and Ola Källenius have been strong supporters of Formula One all these years. Ola has been on the board of the team since a long time, has been running Mercedes High Performance Engines before, and was the managing director of AMG. So, we have a very good relationship with the two of them and Dieter is not leaving, he’s just taking a cool-off period and coming back into the supervisory board and Ola, obviously, as the new CEO provides stability for our Formula One project.

     

    Q: (Phil Duncan – PA) Toto, we’ve seen Lewis has arrived here off the back of two very impressive performances in Singapore and Italy. I just wondered if you could provide some insights into why you think he’s performing so well at the most and do you think this is the most complete and best Lewis that we have seen?

    TW: He’s certainly performing on a very high level. Singapore was definitely one of the best race weekends I’ve seen from him. I think he’s just in a good place. It’s been a while that we work together in Formula 1, that he’s been part of the team, and he’s become a very solid and reliable pillar within the team and in the car’s development. And generally, I think, without wanting to go into too much detail I think he is in a good place in his life and he enjoys racing. He enjoys the activities outside of racing and give him a good car and then he’s able to perform on a level that is unseen.

     

    Q: (Jonathan McEvoy – Daily Mail) Toto, Lewis said yesterday he had done work on how he works, or looked at how he works with his engineers this year. Is there anything that you have seen in how he goes about his day job, stuff that we wouldn’t ordinarily see that maybe has a bearing on how well he is doing at the moment?

    TW: What is impressive with him is the constant development and the search for the optimum performance, and this translates into every aspect of his life. It’s how the briefings are being down, how the interaction with the engineers happens, the analysis of his own driving. He’s the only driver I’ve ever heard saying, ‘I haven’t driven well, first we have to look at my driving and then we look at the data’. This constant drive for perfection happens every year and is, I believe, one of the reasons why he is such a complete racing driver.

     

    Q: (Andrey Kirsanov – Sputnik News Agency) My question is to Toto Wolff. As you know Saudi Arabia is preparing to provide its own Formula 1 driver. It’s a woman; her name is, as you know, Aseel Al Hamad. What do you think about her prospects for Formula 1 activities and what do you think in general for drivers for Formula 1 from Middle East countries. If anyone else wants to add something it would be great. Thank you.

    TW: Well, it was very interesting to see how Saudi starts to participate in motor racing activities. My wife was in Saudi a couple of days ago to launch the Formula E race that is going to happen on the 15th of December there and has been met very openly and I believe that with the country opening up for women driving in general it’s just a matter of time before we will see young boys and young girls from Saudi racing in go-karts and maybe making it into single seaters and Formula 1.

     

    Cyril, anything to add?

    CA: No, we had the chance to do a marketing activity with that lady at the French Grand Prix, offering her a drive around the track in one of our demo cars. She has done well. She had done some practice before that and it was happening the same day actually that women were given the licence in Saudi, so I guess it was a way to mark a milestone. There are very many more milestones necessary on a number of aspects but that was one milestone.

     

    Otmar, Mario, anything to add?

    OS: I agree with Toto.

    MI: No.

     

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines, Racefans.net) Otmar, there is all this talk about Esteban’s career next year. You’re a team of two unconfirmed seats. Is there a reason why you don’t put him into one of your cars?

    OS: He’s a great driver, Esteban; I must start with that. He’s been with the team for a bit now and we know him and like him quite well and in due course we’ll announce our drivers.

     

    Q: (Julien Billiotte – AutoHebdo) My question is also for Otmar. Yesterday we learned that the Uralkali company is suing the administrators of Force india over the sale of the team to Lawrence Stroll and his consortium. Are you worried by the situation? Are you confident that the administrator can defend their case in court?

    OS: So I learned about it just like you did, I think I read Dieter’s story. We’re not involved at all, so that’s between Uralkali and the administrators, so from a team perspective absolutely zero worries. There is no involvement, so there is no focus on it whatsoever.

     

    Q: (Livio Oricchio – Globoesporte.com) My question is to Otmar. Did you ever feel anything concerning the new partners of the team, from the practical point of view, arrives money, you can develop more programmes? And what does it mean for the future? You could plan alright? For example, next season and next year’s project car if you have the benefit of more money arriving?

    OS: Yeah, we have to be careful that the ethos of the team doesn’t degrade. We still have to spend our money wisely, but for sure financial stability helps in this sport. I can give you some examples. This year our launch car, or our first race car, that we should have had in Australia, came in, I believe, Barcelona. Had we had the money this year, for example, our performance would have been much better, much earlier. And that we will not suffer from next year. As an example, you mentioned over the winter, we will be able to realise all our developments that we come up with through some experimentation, we’ll be able to put them on the car because of the improved financial stability and that will for sure help performance.

     

    Q: (Livio Oricchio – Globoesporte.com) What about the budget?

    OS: We are going through the budgeting process now, as we do every year, and we will increase that budget for sure, especially in capital expenditure. The team has lacked capital expenditure for quite some time. And then other areas of operating expenditure that will bring performance, we’ll have the ability to increase that too. But that budgeting process for next year is happening now and should finish around December time frame.

     

    Q: (Scott Mitchell – Autosport) Cyril and Toto, we know the engine manufacturers, while we are preparing for the 2021 engine regulations, have been keen to keep the MGU-H, but that was initially part of what the FIA and F1 wanted to drop. How is that situation progressing? Do you have an update on whether you will be able to keep the MGU-H and is that what you two respectively want?

    CA: I believe the FIA is still yet to confirm a package of measures and regulation changes for 2021, so I would not want to override their credibility on that. But I think what we can say is that most of the technical regulations are set and similar to the current regulations, but it is the way we are using the engine – with more fuel, more fuel flow, higher revs, more fuel also, in terms of allocation. That is also confirmed because we all accept that we need to do better, provide a better product for the show, for the fans, for the car – cars that are getting heavier and heavier – so we need more power, because it needs to remain a power-to-weight formula. I think where there is still quite a lot to be done is on the Sporting Regulations and financial discipline in relation to engines, so exact number of Pus, supplier obligations, possible dyno limitations. We are just kicking off that process, which is an important process, because all of that will really define the business model, which needs to be attractive at the same time for the manufacturers and for the customer teams.

     

    Toto, where do Mercedes stand?

    TW: Nothing to add; Cyril summed it up well.

     

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines, Racefans.net)  This is a two part question regarding the 2020 onwards tyre supply. And that is that we now, for the first time since 2007, have two competitors for the tyre tender. The three team bosses; are you in favour of a possible change to another brand with a different philosophy and Mario, how does this complicate your negotiations with Formula One Management?

    OS: Well, we’re obviously interested. We’re going to have to use the tyres. Pirelli have done a fabulous job for us and for Formula One and for that we have to congratulate them. Yeah, there are two people tendering and we’re happy to work with whomever is the winning bidder or the winning tender.

    TW: Like Otmar said, Pirelli has been with us for a long time and a stable partner. They have been given an impossible task that whatever specification we ask for and they deliver, it’s not as good as it should be so Mario has stood firm with the teams complaining. Pirelli’s a great brand and a pillar of the sport and that needs to be considered, obviously, and the teams have no say in that. It is a commercial and political decision that’s going to be taken by FOM. They need to look at the numbers, they need to look at the brand values and on the impact that a new tyre supplier can have versus the one that we know. I’d like to leave it with them, but we’ve worked with Pirelli really well over the past years.

    CA: Nothing to add really, on the tender process. What I think is really important is to make sure to define what’s good for the sport, for the fans, for the show, for the mid-term future and really stick to it because as Toto has said, every single time we come up with a request and I think,  in fairness, Pirelli has delivered but it seems to make us even more unhappy than the situation before. I think we are all complaining about the pit stop situation, the number of pit stops, optimum race strategy that is a bit straightforward, the fact that we need to drive very slowly on occasions and manage the tyres. It’s true that there is no point in doing all the investment that we will be doing in new engines if we are still limited by another component, another factor, so that’s really important that we have a good thinking about that and that we give proper time to stability to Pirelli or anyone else to develop the right product.

    MI: As you know, we just finished the technical side of what is called phase one. We received confirmation from FIA that we are technically eligible to supply tyres for Formula One – it’s not a surprise, honestly – and now there is the commercial discussion with F1. There is no deadline for that so I cannot tell you how long it will last. They summarise very well what we did in the last eight years. We always tried to deliver what we have been asked to deliver. Sometimes it wasn’t easy, especially now you can see… Cyril was talking about pit stops and what is happening now but we know that if you add an extra pit stop to the strategy you lose 20 plus seconds. That means that you have to recover this time on track so there is a completely different approach from the teams compared to 2011, 2012 for example. They have to save the package, not only the tyres. That means that they try to plan a strategy with a minimum number of stops possible and this was clear, for example, in Singapore where the potential for the hyper soft was much higher so they could lap much quicker but the decision of more or less everybody was to save the tyres in order to plan a strategy with one stop – just have a look at the average degradation in free practice two that was more than 0.3s per lap and during the race was less than one tenth per lap and this gives you an indication of what is going to happen. How we can solve this is probably necessary to analyse the data from the first part of the championship and to understand which is the right direction in terms of the regulations and then we will see.

     

    Q: (Julien Billiotte – AutoHebdo) Cyril, coming back to the spec C engine, we heard some comments from your friend Max yesterday, saying that at high altitude the engine doesn’t perform as well, in places like Mexico or Brazil. Are these comments accurate and also are you worried by Honda’s latest updated package

    CA: I think that any engine – you can ask to Toto – but I believe that it’s fair to say that any engine performs not as good at high altitude but I guess the power increase that we have seen would have been equal in a track like Mexico so no, I don’t agree with those comments in general. I think Max would focus on the car. But we do have reliability concerns and therefore it was clear that the engine introduced for Max would not have been able to do all the races so it was decided obviously to go to a different spec but again that’s going to the plan that I was mentioning before, agreed with Red Bull engineering department and not driving department.

    Then going back to your question about Honda, yes, well, frankly I’m worried about everything in general, in life, but in particular about a situation on the engine side. Honda, as we’ve seen since last year, it was already very clear, is making big steps, big gains. Red Bull has been very clear that they are investing massively, massively, probably and apparently much more than us which we are happy for Red Bull and Honda. Frankly we have our way to do things. We have a plan and we are executing that plan. It’s not just about arms race. We have all the aspects of the package to develop. No one is providing anything to us, either in the power train or on the chassis, so it has to be step by step. We are very confident in our upgrade for next year. We want to play the long term game.

     

    Q: (Jens Nagler – Bild) One question for Toto and one for Mario Isola. Toto, Valtteri yesterday said that he has a mind just to get on pole and to win here. Is he allowed, since the championship fight is still ongoing? And Mario, we’ve heard that there was a fire in the Haas garage last night, destroying two sets of Kevin Magnussen’s tyres. Have you already learned something, how that could happen to your tyres and how they caught fire?

    TW: The most important is that you accept that a driver will always want to be on pole and win the race and closing that perspective down, at the beginning of a race weekend, is certainly not something that I’m going to do. We take it step by step, see what happens tomorrow in qualifying. Hopefully he’s going to be very strong and put it on pole and then have a strong race and then we decide what the race situation is and the points situation.

    MI: Yes, there was fire in the Haas garage. It was because of malfunctioning of the blankets, or the control unit of the blankets and two sets of tyres have been damaged. We have already replaced them with the agreement of the FIA but nothing special. You know that teams are allowed to keep the tyres in blankets at a maximum temperature of sixty degrees for the slick tyres, so usually they keep the blankets (on) during the night and they are allowed to do that. Then it happened. Luckily somebody was able to extinguish the fire very quickly so the damage was very limited.

     

    Q: (Cesary Gutowsky – Przeglad Sportowy) Mr Szafnauer, yesterday Sergio confirmed that he is staying at Force India but there is no confirmation from the team yet so it’s kind of confusing so if you could explain the current status.

    OS: Well, we’ll… like I said earlier, we will make the announcement in due course and we’d like to announce both drivers at once. We don’t see a big need to hurry into it so you’ll know very soon.

     

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines, Racefans.net) Mario, getting back to my earlier question: I had asked how complicated it becomes now that you have a competitor for the commercial side of the tyre tender negotiations. Can you see it becoming a lot more expensive, Liberty putting greater commercial demands on your board in terms of income etc?

    MI: Our CEO already announced our position so I don’t want to add anything to that. There is a commercial discussion now. We have our position, we will make our offer and so I don’t know anything about a competitor. So it’s quite easy.

     

    Q: (Livio Oricchio – Globoesporte.com) Cyril, you’ve said at the beginning that the problem of Max is related to the way he conducts in the last race. My question is, as far as we understand, all the secure system of having the power unit today, the driver won’t be able to damage one engine or am I wrong?

    CA: I’m not sure I said that. What is true is that Daniel managed to find some work around, some way to drive around the limitation of the engine in FP1 in Singapore but anyway, it doesn’t remove the fact that we should have done a better job on having the right drivability for the two drivers in Singapore which is again something that we’ve done. There are always limitations in the way that you can simulate on the dyno, the behaviour that you will then experiment on the car. We don’t have the sort of very complex full car dyno to test the engine in its ultimate environment. That’s something we are looking at. We think it’s a bit unreasonable to have to invest in such equipment but if we have to do it, we will eventually do it. We would prefer that the FIA takes action not to encourage crazy investment like that but that we may be something that would have helped in the circumstances.

     

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines, Racefans.net) Cyril and Toto, there’s talk that possibly from 2021 onwards there could be some sporting restrictions on engines in terms of restricted dynamometer or simulation time etc. Are you in favour of this as a cost-saving thing, so it would be very similar to what we have currently on wind tunnel restrictions etc?

    TW: Yes, in favour. I think the ATR functions well on the aero side and if we find a sensible way to do it on power units and cap the ability of spend, it’s something which we need to do.

    CA: Fully agree.

  • F1 2018: Belgian Gp Review – Ferrari Stroll To Spa Victory

    F1 2018: Belgian Gp Review – Ferrari Stroll To Spa Victory

    Untroubled, Sebastian Vettel drove the perfect race to secure victory at the 2018 Belgian grand prix. While Saturday qualifying, wet in the final part, went the way of Lewis Hamilton Sunday was brought a completely different complexion as the Ferrari driver skillfully scythed past pole sitter Hamilton into the lead of the race.

    Both Force India cars, starting on the second row thanks to a dramatic quali, started equally well and slotted in behind the front two. It all went off behind them however as a dramatic first corner crash, triggered by Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg, saw Fernando Alonso’s McLaren fly over the cockpit of Charles Leclerc. The halo, significantly scuffed by Alonso’s tyre, played a significant role in keeping the Sauber driver safe and uninjured in an otherwise dangerous crash. An example of how well the halo works was never needed or wanted but this serves as the perfect illustration for all those that continually criticized and moaned about the aesthetics of why it is needed in Formula 1. It’s certain that without it there would have been a different outcome for Charles Leclerc.

    Though they retired slightly later the first lap also laid claim to Kimi Raikkonen and Daniel Ricciardo. The Red Bull driver was tagged from behind by Alonso and lost his rear wing. While he did get back out he was a lap down without little prospect of gaining anything meaningful from the race consequently Red Bull retired Ricciardo’s no. 3 car.

    spa For Kimi Raikkonen it was desperately unlucky as Ricciardo’s front wing caused a right-rear puncture on the Ferrari. It subsequently damaged the right endplate of the rear wing, the DRS, and caused enough floor damage to render the car un-driveable.

    While first lap crashes are part and parcel of racing Ferrari only has itself to blame for Raikkonen’s ultimate retirement. The day before an awkward blunder in quali left Raikkonen without enough fuel to complete the final part of the session. While others improved their laptimes the Finn was left to start sixth on the grid. This position often referred to as the ‘carbon fibre zone’ is notoriously where most incidents occur. But Ferrari was flustered when the rain came down in the final part of qualifying and they made mistakes that ultimately cost Raikkonen a shot at a decent result. As if to add insult to injury Raikkonen was fastest well the mix for pole on a circuit where he is considered a specialist and has won on four previous occasions.

    spa1Up front it was as easy a Sunday afternoon drive for Vettel. While both Mercedes and Ferrari introduced upgraded internal combustion engines for this weekend Hamilton and Mercedes just didn’t have the pace to live with the Ferrari. This was something that Hamilton bemoaned after the race too by saying that Ferrari has some “tricks”. Whatever he was implying if he is hoping to play a psychological game it wont land with neither Vettel nor Ferrari.

    Hamilton went on to paint himself as the underdog despite being in the lead of the driver’s championship. But the likelihood is that he doesn’t really believe himself to be the downtrodden. After all, he is the reigning champion in a works Mercedes that will be a force at Monza.

    As Vettel and Hamilton took the first two steps on the podium Max Verstappen drove a lonely race into third while Valtteri Bottas ably recovered to fourth after starting nearly last on the grid. Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon delivered fourth and fifth for Force India in what has been a difficult time for the team off the track. Romain Grosjean and Kevin Magnussen were sixth and seventh for Haas while Toro Rosso’s Pierre Gasly and Marcus Ericsson completed the top ten for Sauber.

    Vettel’s win brings him to within 17 points of Hamilton in the drivers standing and more importantly gives Ferrari some much-needed momentum ahead of their home race this weekend.

    *Podium Image courtesy of Pirelli Motorsport
    *First lap Images courtesy of Racing Point Force India
  • F1 2018: Hungarian Gp Review – Hamilton Cruises to Victory

    F1 2018: Hungarian Gp Review – Hamilton Cruises to Victory

    The Hungarian grand prix weekend was never one Mercedes would’ve marked as one where they had a clear shot at the win. Its tight and twisting layout rewards superior aerodynamics and a shorter wheelbase, which are two areas where Ferrari and Red Bull hold the upper hand.

    But Formula 1 in 2018 has arguably been one of the most unpredictable seasons of this decade and likely the previous one too. Extraordinarily a downpour during Saturday qualifying nullified Mercedes’s biggest weaknesses and brought their drivers’ prowess to the fore. Lewis Hamilton took a stunning 77thcareer pole and Valtteri Bottas ensured a team lock out of the front row.

    Mercedes biggest job on race was to orchestrate a clean start and from there Hamilton would be able to control the race.  It panned out beautifully for the Silver Arrows as Bottas slotted in behind with Vettel and Raikkonen in third and fourth. Before long Hamilton had built a handy lead with the assistance of his teammate Bottas who team boss Toto Wolff referred to as a “sensational wingman” post race.

    56i0670Try as they might Ferrari couldn’t make inroads on Hamilton who never looked troubled on his way to a sixth victory around the Hungaroring. It wasn’t quite the day Red Bull had envisioned either. Max Verstappen had made a rapid start from seventh to fifth but was soon forced into retirement with yet another power unit failure this time on the MGU-K. If the Red Bull/Renault relationship was fraught before it is now boiled over and some serious questions are likely to be asked by Christian Horner and co.

    The ever dependable and impressive Daniel Ricciardo, who started 12th, made his way through the field in true Honey Badger style as he dispatched several drivers with numerous brilliant overtakes. Still Hamilton was leading with ease with a significant gap to Bottas who was now beginning to struggle on his soft compound tyres.

    Vettel was on the gearbox of the Mercedes but never within striking distance of taking the place. However, it all went off the closing stages for Vettel as he elbowed his way into second. Bottas desperately tried to maintain his position and lost a good chunk of his front wing in the process, which also allowed Raikkonen through into third. Raikkonen finished just 2.9 seconds behind Vettel despite making an extra pitstop and losing time in the pitlane. His fifth podium in a row surely means that the Finn deserves to be signed up for 2019.

    54i6661It wasn’t the last of Bottas’ woes as he frantically tried to keep Ricciardo at bay by running into the side of the Red Bull in Turn One. Ultimately Bottas was handed a ten second penalty but still finished fifth on the road behind Ricciardo. For as quick as Bottas occasionally can be, i.e. Russia and Austria, he does not have the essential mettle against the top drivers. In Bahrain earlier this year he was mugged by Vettel, similarly in Silverstone and again in Hungary Vettel doffed him up.

    Unfortunately for Bottas he’s beginning to get a reputation of being soft in wheel-to-wheel combat. It’s unquestionably an issue that he should be pondering over the break.

    Elsewhere, Toro Rosso’s Pierre Gasly finished a superb sixth with Kevin Magnussen of Haas in seventh. Birthday boy Fernando Alonso finished eighth ahead of Carlos Sainz and Romain Grosjean in ninth and tenth respectively. Early on Charles Leclerc was out of the race with suspension damage. Verstappen joined him on the DNF list as did Stoffel Vandoorne whose McLaren conjured up yet another gearbox failure.

    Hamilton’s win ensures him a 25-point lead in the driver’s championship standings over Vettel ahead of the Belgium grand prix on August 26.

    All images courtesy of Pirelli Motorsport 

  • 2018 Australian Grand Prix: Friday Press Conference

    2018 Australian Grand Prix: Friday Press Conference

    TEAM REPRESENTATIVES –Toto WOLFF (Mercedes), Maurizio ARRIVABENE (Ferrari), Christian HORNER (Red Bull Racing)

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    A question to all of you to start with, what sort of shape are you in relative to each going into this new championship? After all, one of your is likely to be the world champion team at the end of it. Christian, why don’t you start?

    Christian HORNER: First of all, it’s great to be back in Melbourne, good to be going racing again. It seems like a long winter this one. A positive first session for us, though obviously difficult to read too much into times but you start to get an bit of an idea. You can see Mercedes taking off where they left off; they look in great shape. I think we made good progress with the car over the winter. The drivers seem happy and I’m envisaging a quite tight battle with Maurizio but I’m not sure at the moment what the delta is to Toto’s cars.

    Toto?

    Toto WOLFF: Again, like Christian said, it’s good to get started again. We’ve had a pretty good test, much better than last year. But you’re never very sure where that will end up in the first race and the first session was OK, as expected. We didn’t see the Ferraris on the tyres that we have been running, and we need a little bit more time to understand, but I would say it’s a decent start.

    And Maurizio?

    Maurizio ARRIVABENE: I totally agree. With the weather we had in Barcelona, by the way it’s the same for everybody, but at a certain point I was a bit laughing because I saw all the engineers panicking but it was for the temperature, for the weather. One day Pirelli didn’t provide to use the winter tyres, the snow tyres, so it was quite difficult and we had a day off. Seriously, though, I think I saw Mercedes in very good shape, also Red Bull in a very good shape and I think we are in quite a good shape too.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Yianni Mavromoustakos– Talkingtorque.com.au) Just for all three team principals, how are you feeling about tyre changes for 2018?

    CH: I think Pirelli have introduced a broader range of compounds this year, hopefully better suited after 12 months of experience last year that we won’t just end up with one-stop races. I think the conditions in Barcelona… plus the new surface there made it very tricky to get a clear picture and understanding of those tyres, so it’s going to take a few race to see how things pan out.

    Toto, more strategic variation this year, do you think?

    TW: Yes, more variation I think. I think the hypersoft is going to be an interesting tyre because it has the biggest performance gap to the next hardest one, but it will be difficult to make it last during the race so that might end up in some interesting strategies. I’m looking forward to it.

    Maurizio?

    MA: As I said before, we didn’t collect a lot of data in Barcelona of course due to the weather conditions, but the target was quite clear, to have a bit more pit stops during the race, to make the race more interesting and I think we are going to see interesting races with these new tyres.

    Q: (John McEvoy – Daily Mail) Toto, a few things about Lewis: what update is there about his new deal, how do you see his state of mind on the eve of the opening race, and what do you imaging is Lewis’ view that he could equal Juan Manuel Fangio, one of the greats of racing, and what would it mean it he did it? I know there is a long way to go.

    TW: On your first question, the contract we have been discussing before going into the winter holiday and then we kind of left it there to get away from Formula 1 and picked it up again in January and these discussions are going in the right way and we finalising the last topics and there is no reason to not think that is not going to happen soon. He is in a good frame of mind, I’ve seen him coming back strong from the winter. And in terms of the record. I think whether it plays a role I don’t know but clearly with the four championship he is within a very good group of drivers and obviously the next one is to be achieved, but I don’t think it’s a good omen to discuss it or think too much about it. It’s better to look at those records afterwards.

    Q: (Phil Duncan – PA) Toto, we saw that Lewis posted a video on Instagram yesterday about a lack of diversity in Formula 1. I just wondered what your views on that are as the team principal of Mercedes and do you think he’s got a point and does Formula 1 need to do more to encourage more participation from ethnic backgrounds?

    TW: I think that is one thing that is very important not only for Lewis but for all of us. The more diversity we can get into Formula 1 the better it is. We had yesterday an event where we launched Dare to be Different in Australia. That was a good success and whether it is different ethnic backgrounds or girls getting into motor racing, overall I think this is what needs to happen. Eventually this will grow and the balance will be better in future.

    Q: (Lawrence Barretto – F1.com) A question to everybody: yesterday Lewis Hamilton was talking about the threat from Red Bull. Daniel Ricciardo has talked about how you guys could all be within half a second this year. I’d just be interested to know where you guys think you are in the pecking order. I know we’ve had just a bit of testing and on practice session but just from what you can gather, where do you think you are relative to each other?

    Maurizio, do you want to nail it down to a guess of how many tenths?

    MA: It’s difficult to calculate, because we have no clear evidence in Barcelona. I hope we are above my friends here but how I can predict exactly?

    TW: Very difficult to judge. We have seen last year with the new rules that each of the teams has certain strengths on different tracks. I think we could see a similar pattern this year. I don’t see somebody running away. But as Maurizio says, it’s very difficult to read in a glass ball at that stage.

    And I suppose, Christian, it’s a long season. At the end of the year last year, Verstappen has the same points as Hamilton in the closing stages, you finished very strongly?

    CH: Yes, it’s a long season and form will vary from race to race. Twenty-one races is a grueling calendar this year and by the time we end up in Abu Dhabi in November. It’ll be fascinating to see how teams have developed during the course of the year. The cars are effectively prototypes at each grand prix and it’s really the rate of development between now and November that will dictate the outcome of performance over the course of the season. But you have to say that Mercedes look in great shape and I guess it depends on how fast Lewis wants to go.

    Q: (Heikki Kulta – Turun Sanomat) Maurizio, every year, the same question: a lot of speculation that this season will be Kimi’s last season. How do you see it?

    MA: Kimi was driving quite well in FP1. We are at the first FP1 of the first race of the season, let him drive quietly please.

    Q: (Arjan Schouten – AD Sportwereld) Question for Christian about Max. When you’re 20 years old and you already have sixty races and three wins, are you still a ‘talent’ or are you already a more experienced driver?

    CH: Max has achieved a huge amount in a very short space of time. He’s got that benefit of those three seasons of experience now and I think he’ll put that to go effect this year. He’s already got that databank of knowledge. And last year what impressed me was how he dealt with the difficult days as well as the good days. I think that’s all part of developing your character, developing your experience and knowledge – and I think it stands him in great stead. I think there’s no further obstacles to him in terms of experience. He’s gone through that now and I think he’s in great shape. He’s trained hard over the winter and looks sharp for the season ahead.

    Q: (Dan Knutson – Auto Action / Speed Sport) Gentleman, a new season, the same story: the big three and a gap to the rest. If you could make one or two suggestions to Formula One as a whole to close up that gap, what would you do?

    TW: Difficult one. I think, we don’t want to make excuses and say it has always been like that. If you look back the last 20 or so years there’s always been two, three or four teams that have been more dominant – but clearly looking into 2021, it is something we need to address, everybody wants to see a tough fight at the front and wants to see the odd freak result, an underdog being capable of making it all the way to the front – but it’s not trivial. It is a resource game and there is one factor that you can’t change and that is time. Organisations are built-up over time, intellectual property is being created and that doesn’t happen from one year to the other, and once the wheel turns – and I guess that’s the case for all three teams being represented here – it’s quite difficult to just put something in the wheel and stop it. In so far it’s about, I guess, reducing the gap in terms of resource in a clever way – but this is not going to change overnight.

    Maurizio?

    MA: I mean I agree with Toto, you can’t change overnight the overall rules, or you can’t ask Cristiano Ronaldo to not score, because otherwise Real Madrid is too strong. It takes time, for everybody, effort. It’s quite a complex matter to create, as Christian said, a prototype every year and especially to develop this prototype during the course of the year – but it’s not impossible. Having said so, I think we have many years ago the wave of Ferrari with Michael Schumacher, than another wave with Christian, with Red Bull, now it’s a wave of Mercedes. This is a sport and you can’t stop a top team playing just to make the game fair. Because otherwise it is becoming an unfair game.

    Do you see it that way?

    CH: I’ve got a slightly different slant on it, I suppose. For me the most damaging thing over the last five years has been the introduction of the current engine regulations. I think if you look at Formula One as a whole, I think the regulations for both chassis and engine are too complicated. That drives cost, it drives complexity, it drives distance between the teams, so for me, I’d be all for simplification. Simplification of the power unit, simplification of the chassis, go back to basics of making the driver the biggest variable, whereas at the moment the driver is not a big enough variable. We want the best drivers competing against each other. I think you’re always going to get variances depending on the skillset of the teams, and even if the teams have all equal budgets, you will still have teams that will perform better than others. That’s competition. We see it in other formulas. For me, the biggest issue in Formula One at the moment is the regulations that dictate cost, performance and divergence in terms of powertrain.

    Q: (Louis Dekker – NOS) For Toto. History teaches us domination never lasts forever. So, will this be your most difficult season, the fifth season with these engines. Is there an indication of how long you will be on top, and is the climb easier than staying there?

    TW: Yeah, I tried to find to find a statistic in whatever sport of a team winning every year. There isn’t any, you’re absolutely right. At some stage, somebody else picks up the ball and runs faster. I think, coming back to your question on engine regulations, the longer you leave regulations alone, the more convergence happens. We have seen that definitely every year we have been in these regulations, the gap has become smaller. We just have to be on our toes. Every year we try to have a mindset of all points going to zero and you just need to do the same job again. We’re trying to be energised and motivated, not take anything for granted, respect the other teams and the work they are doing. We will be running around with a target on our back and everybody’s trying to get us, in so far as we’re pushing hard every year and trying to maintain the advantage for a bit.

    Q: (Phil Brannigan – Auto Action) Toto, can I take you back to the Dare to be Different programme. Would you support a similar programme being implemented to encourage diversity, as mentioned by Lewis yesterday? And if you did support that programme, should that also be part of discussions with Lewis regarding his ongoing contract with the team?

    TW: I think that… I don’t think that it should be part of his contract. I think as a general mind set we should be supporting diversity, as I said before. You’re absolutely right, more diversity in the paddock would do us good, would make us think differently and be more open-minded. For me personally and for the team, we are very supportive for whatever actions we can deploy.

    Q: (Julien Billiotte– AutoHebdo) Maurizio, before Melbourne we learned that Ferrari has hired Laurent Mekies from the FIA which doesn’t seem to go very well with other teams. Do you understand their concerns and to Toto and Christian, how did you react when you heard about the news?

    MA: First of all, there is nothing wrong with that because we were absolutely respecting the local law, the Swiss local law where Laurent was hired. And afterwards we went even further than that, because we gave him six months of gardening (leave). Having said so, normally what we discussed before the strategy group, we signed a confidentiality agreement, that means that we are not allowed to discuss or to share in public what we discussed there. Having said so, I heard comments related to us, supposedly, also called a gentleman’s agreement. I think they are comments because a gentleman’s agreement on libel law is illegal. I thought that they were comments… just comments, no more than that, I hope.

    TW: First of all, I didn’t see any gentlemen in the room when we discussed it. Second, for me the situation is completely different to Marcin (Budkowski), both intelligent engineers but Marcin was involved in issuing technical directives just a few weeks before he decided to join a team and had a lot of inside (information), and Laurent was involved in totally different activities that are not as sensitive, in my opinion, as with Marcin. He’s joining the team in seven or eight months from now and for me it’s not a big deal.

    CH: For me it is a big deal because I think the disappointing element about this is that we have a thing called the strategy group where the FIA, FOM and all team principals attended and we discussed the Marcin issue where there was great unrest about a key member of the FIA going to a team, in which case this was Renault. Renault diluted that by putting him on an extended gardening leave but then ensued a conversation about it’s unacceptable. Every team found it unacceptable. Of course you’re dealing with employment laws across different states, different countries and to try and police legally something like that, it was agreed in the room all the lawyers in the world couldn’t come up with a contract that could police it. But there was an understanding and a clear statement by the teams to say ‘right, let’s have a clear position that there should be at least a period of 12 months in the garden for a member of a team going from either FOM, FIA to a team or a team going vice versa’. Certain teams were pushing for that period to be three years but in the end it was agreed upon being 12 months. What’s disappointing is that that meeting was less than six weeks ago; arguably, discussions were probably happening at that time and it almost makes those meetings pointless if we can’t agree on something and action it. Of course you can hide behind ‘well it’s not in the regulations’ but as a group we agreed something, it hasn’t been adhered to and so one questions… what’s the point of having those meetings?

    Q: Maurizio, you’re shaking your head.

    MA: Yes, because we gave a mandate, that’s the main thing, we gave a mandate to the FIA,  to the lawyer of the FIA to check national law and to come back to us in the next strategy group and this is what the FIA is going to do in the next strategy group which is on April 17.

    CH: I think that what’s most disappointing about it was that it was Ferrari or Sergio who was pushing for a three year period. On one hand you get a team pushing for a three year gestation and then a few weeks later, we’re in this situation, so as I say, it makes discussions at that forum more or less a waste of time.

    MA: That was the discussion but then the conclusion was to give mandate to the FIA to come back… to the lawyer of the FIA to come back with a proposal.

    CH: I’ve said my piece.

    Q: (Ben Hunt – The Sun) I think that might have been Chase Carey on the phone. It’s becoming quite apparent that you guys can’t agree on anything. Are we in a dangerous situation now where we’re going into the crucial period of their ownership where we need you guys to work together to benefit the sport, but you can’t even agree on anything it seems?

    TW: I think this is as much a battle on track as much as it is off track for an advantage and it has always been like that. Certainly, I guess we’re providing some good headlines for you. And we have all the very best for our teams at heart. We have different agendas, depending on the strength in the team and how we view the future and then each of us have a holistic side and probably also very personal opinion, how we see the sport going forward. And we are going to be vocal about it and say it. It is clear that the current governance and how the rules are being made is not very functional, there is too much different opinion when the agenda’s on the table and we need to sort it for 2021, for the best interest of the sport, but it shows that the debate that we just had a minute ago is that it needs tight rules to have a common legal ground to fight on track and if there is no rules and it’s not written down in the regulations it doesn’t work.

    Q: Christian, you’ve been saying all winter that these two teams do agree with each other.

    CH: We’re about the only teams in Formula One that do agree. Look, my view on this is very simple: trying to get a consensus between teams that have got varying objectives, different set-ups, is going to be impossible, so it’s down to the commercial rights holder and the FIA to get together, come up with a set of regulations, what is the financial framework, what is the distribution that they want to have, put it on the table and it’s down to the teams whether they want to sign up to that or not. Of course, as Toto says, there will be a lot of positioning, the media will be used, it’s history repeating itself. It happens every five or six years, every time the Concorde agreement comes up for renewal, but my feeling is, Liberty, together with FIA, need to get on the same piece of paper to say this is what we want Formula One to be, this is the financial distribution surrounding it, here’s the deal and laid out to the teams.

    Q: And Maurizio, your chairman is saying that if the DNA of Formula One as he sees it is not respected, Ferrari will walk.

    MA: I’m not commenting the statement of my chairman. My chairman knows very well what he’s talking about and my only suggestion is please take him seriously.

    Q: (Mike Doodson – Auto Action) This relates to what you just said: the word breakaway has appeared in a few recent headlines and your chairman, Maurizio, has made certain threatening remarks. Subsequently, Toto seems to have asked us to take those remarks seriously but how practical, Toto, is this for you,  would a breakaway be, because 35 years ago Bernie Ecclestone tried it and he ran up against the problem that national governments have respect for and like to see established federations organising sports and do not look favourably on breakaways or rebels. How practical would it be to have a breakaway?

    TW: More than practicability, it is about responsibility for Formula One. We are all carrying the torch of a great series and a great brand that was built 40 or 50 years ago and has tremendous value and nobody is taking that lightly. Headlines are being created based on things that are being said and like Christian mentioned before, it is about the new Concorde agreement going forward, everybody’s trying to position themselves but all the time with respect for the series. And comments that are being made maybe from Mr Marchionne’s side also, it is also because he cares I guess. I don’t want to speak for Maurizio but we all care for Formula One and we all have a certain vision and perspective of Formula One and how we want to see it going forward and it needs to fit that opinion and this is why these statements are being made. They of course are being blown up in the media like it has always been the case but I can assure you that whatever is being written is that we care a lot about responsibility and we owe it to Formula One and we need to give it all. We have at least three more years together in this great sport, regulated by the FIA, owned by Liberty, run by competent men and we just need to give our input support in the best possible ways so it’s great and we’re not devaluating it.

  • F1 2017: Abu Dhabi Gp Review – Bottas Steps Up

    F1 2017: Abu Dhabi Gp Review – Bottas Steps Up

    In the blink of an eye the 2017 has flown by and the Abu Dhabi grand prix has brought the curtain down on another Formula 1 season.

    The 55 laps around the Yas Marina circuit may not have delivered the most exciting race that’s been seen this year. Still, there were several important things to take away from the season finale. Not least of all was the performance of race winner Valtteri Bottas.

    It’s nearly twelve months ago now that Bottas was catapulted into the Mercedes team following Nico Rosberg’s surprise retirement from the sport. The Finn started the season well enough but faded, dramatically, from contention in the second half of the year. His issues centered on the tyres the team said but it was evident that mentally he wasn’t on the level of the championship contenders.

    Candidly Bottas revealed that he’d finally found ‘something’ in himself that aided his mental preparation during the grand prix weekend. It came together beautifully for him in Abu Dhabi as he first beat Hamilton to pole and then absorbed everything his four-time champion teammate could throw at him. And he did so on merit too. He won’t only take an enormous amount of confidence from this win but also the knowledge that he can beat his teammate in a straight fight. All that remains now is for him to do over an entire season. No pressure Valtteri.

    64While the two Mercs cruised up front Sebastian Vettel was confined to third some twenty seconds off the pace. It was a rather lackluster performance from Ferrari who never posed any threat to Mercedes in Abu Dhabi. Nevertheless, Vettel finished a remote third and for what it’s worth takes second place in the driver’s championship standings.

    Despite Ferrari’s many mistakes and issues in 2017 they seem intent to commit ridiculous strategy calls to the very end. In a move that probably seemed like a good idea at the time a decision was made to under fuel Kimi Raikkonen’s car. Ultimately, it meant the Finn was reduced to fuel saving for almost the entire race. Besides the obvious time and focus Ferrari will have to invest in solving their reliability issues it’s clear that many other aspects of the team need to be, at the very least, rebuilt.

    It wasn’t a great day for Red Bull either as the Austrian team’s season ended with a bit of a fizzle. While Daniel Ricciardo was forced into retirement with a hydraulic failure Max Verstappen could only finished fifth. In sixth place Nico Hulkenberg ensured that Renault leapfrogs Toro Rosso to finish sixth in the constructor’s standings. It’s an especially important result considering that Renault will in the region of R170 million for sixth in the standings.

    39Elsewhere, the two Force India’s of Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon finished seventh and eighth ahead of Fernando Alonso’s McLaren in ninth. In the final race of his F1 career Felipe Massa somehow brought his sluggish Williams home in tenth place. While no points are awarded for eleventh place finisher Romain Grosjean the Haas driver delivered a brilliant drive, which a stunning overtake on Lance Stroll. Sauber’s Pascal Wehrlein was equally impressive in fourteenth.

    Although the season may have officially drawn to a close attention immediately turned to 2018 with the unveiling of a new F1 logo. The white and red logo, in use for the last 23 years, has been replaced with a more modern and dynamic design that adds some much needed freshness. Roll on 2018.

    All images courtesy of Pirelli Motorsport

  • 2017 Formula 1 Malaysia Grand Prix: Friday Press Conference – Part 2

    2017 Formula 1 Malaysia Grand Prix: Friday Press Conference – Part 2

    PART TWO: TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – Mario ISOLA (Pirelli), Toto WOLFF (Mercedes), Guenther STEINER (Haas).

    Q: Mario, let’s start with you. We’re three-quarters of the way through the 2017 season on these new, wider tyres. We can all see what the lap time improvements have been but can you give us an idea of the increase in things like the cornering speeds and any other things you’ve noticed – apart from ‘don’t’ run over drain covers’.

    Mario ISOLA: Yeah, we have seen on the corners that are grip-limited, we had an increasing speed that is 30km/h – 40km/h. We made an analysis on the quickest and most famous turn in Barcelona, in Spa, at Silverstone and it was impressive to see that Copse is now 290km/h and it is 30km/h quicker than last year, or we have Pouhon in Spa that is 40km/h quicker, so it is, in terms of performance, I believe we reached the target. Lap times, as you said, are visible for everybody. We are also analysing the data because this additional grip is generated not only by the wider tyres but also by the increase in downforce and, as an average, we have 100kg of downforce more on each tyre, as an average obviously, it depends on the circuit and layout, type of configuration and setup – but it’s quite a lot.

    Q: What can you share with us about the plans for 2018? What are you going to do with the range? Are you going to go a bit softer? What’s the plan?

    MI: We have defined the construction and we released the data to the teams on the First of September. We have a new construction front and rear, we will give some additional information soon. Obviously we are now working on our compounds – because the target is still to go one step softer compared to this year. We know that this year we have been quite conservative – but last year it was not easy to develop the new sizes with the mule cars so we decided to be on the conservative side. So the current Soft will be the new Medium next year, and we also intend to increase the number of compounds. It is still not defined but we have probably next year more compounds to give us more freedom in the selection during one event, because there are no modifications in the sporting regulations, so it still three compounds per event and the target is to have more flexibility.

    Q: And just a comment from you on the Grosjean incident. We all saw what happened but from your point of view.

    MI: Well, the tyres are not made to resist such a big impact so I cannot add anything else other than what we have seen on the television.

    Q: Guenther, coming to you, talking about Romain’s accident, we all saw what happened, what can you tell us from his point of view, and also the state of the car.

    GS: I think from his point of view, he is OK. Thank God he didn’t get hurt or anything. The car is damaged, in my opinion, things like this in 2017 shouldn’t happen on a permanent circuit, they shouldn’t happen on any circuit. This is, in my opinion, not acceptable. This is not up to the standards. So, I haven’t spoken with anybody. The next thing we need to make sure is how we can prove that it doesn’t happen in the race? Because in the race this would have been a little bit of a bigger disaster. If a few cars go over it, then the cover comes up. I’m still not through… to think completely through what happened to end up in this situation. In a few hours hopefully we know more. The damage is very big on the car. I don’t know exactly what it is because the car just came back five minutes before I had to get here, so they hadn’t taken the parts off to see if the chassis is damaged as well – but once we know that we see what we can do for tomorrow. We need to be sure that all the drain covers stay in place tomorrow.

    Q: You dropped down to eighth in the Constructors’ after the race in Singapore – big result for Renault there, of course, but it’s so tight in the midfield, it’s still possible for you to finish fifth in the Constructors’ this year – even though you’re pulling a face – are you throwing development resource at finishing 2017 as strongly as you possibly can, given the battle you find yourself in?

    GS: No. I think fifth is a little bit ambitious from your side. I think we can not finish fifth but we try to finish seventh. I think at this moment in time we would be happen with that. We stopped developing the ’17 car quite a while ago to concentrate on next year’s car. We have limited resources. We need to focus that we stay stable year-to-year, not just one year up and down because then you create a wave-effect and you never get a grip of what you’re doing. We try to do our best. We will bring a few more developments but they are small. The last one comes in Austin. We hopefully can score some points. I hope also that our worst circuits are behind us, like the slow speed, high downforce ones. Our car doesn’t like them. It’s tough, as you said, in the midfield. We just need to try to do always a perfect job – and not hit drain covers.

    Q: And a final thought. We asked Fred Vasseur in part one about the idea of a closer collaboration with Ferrari on his side, particularly on the driver aspect. Would that have any bearing on your team? How does your Ferrari collaboration develop from here?

    GS: I think our one is stable. We are doing it since now, it’s our third year since we started, and we do what we do. I have no influence what they do with somebody else and I don’t want to have one. We are happy with our contracts and our collaboration. So, if Sauber wants to work with them, I have no opinion and I’m OK with it. I can’t do anything about it any way – so why worry? We get what we want, and we are happy and we continue this.

    Q: Toto, you’re defending a 28 point lead rather than chasing down a deficit but today things looked a little bit difficult for your cars. Is that truly representative of where you were and is there that much work to do?

    Toto WOLFF: The lap time is reality, the stopwatch always tells the truth. The lap time today showed that we are not quick enough. The car seems to be unbalanced and that triggers an awful lot of consequences and it was certainly one of the worst Fridays I can remember.

    Q: Now you renewed Valtteri Bottas’s contract but only for one year rather than longer term; what does he have to do next season to stay on, or is it more about what happens with other teams’ drivers and whether they look to move?

    TW: It’s all in his hands, he just needs to drive fast and score good results. The dynamics between the drivers and the drivers and the engineer team is great so that is positive and it’s about competing on track and being fast.

    Q: It’s the final Malaysian Grand Prix, obviously, but F1 has announced the contract with China has been extended for another three years. Your thoughts on both?

    TW: It’s sad that we’re leaving Malaysia because of our partnership with Petronas it has become like a second home Grand Prix. We spend five or six or seven times a year in Kuala Lumpur and therefore I will be missing the race. On China, China is an important market for us with huge potential and insofar as extending their race there is good, good for Formula One.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines) To all of you, certainly the two team principals: a senior member of the FIA’s technical department has recently resigned. He’s got three months’ gardening leave, he’s obviously worked pretty closely with the teams during his tenure. How do you feel about the fact that he could possibly be joining an opposition team within the next… certainly by the start of next year?

    TW: Do you want an undiplomatic answer or the diplomatic answer?

    GS: They were sandbagging today just to promote comment but anyway… I was not involved in the strategy group meeting this morning but I know that a senior member has left or is leaving the FIA but I’m not sure where he’s going in the end, so I cannot accuse him of something, that he’s going somewhere if I don’t know. I guess somebody’s taking him so it’s as much as who is taking him’s fault as the guy who is going. I think a little bit in between. But first of all, we need to know if he’s going to a team and then where he’s going but I don’t know that yet, Dieter.

    TW: I don’t think it’s correct because he’s had access to a lot of information, especially from Mercedes so he will tell everybody else, so I think for sure they are not happy. It’s like Guenther said, we don’t know where Martin is going. It’s just a rumour. We’ve received an e-mail from Charlie saying that he will be leaving the FIA and he will be on gardening leave for three months. I personally get on well with Martin and we wish him success for his career, that is clear, but we need to look at the timings, we need to be transparent with the FIA and give them access and therefore, in order to have the full trust of the teams, it’s important to have a certain stability and understanding how quick somebody can leave the FIA and join another competitive team.

    MI: I don’t think I’m involved in that. For me, I was working very very well with Martin, we were co-operating on a number of things on tyres, future regulations and so on so it’s a pity that he’s leaving the FIA. I agree with Guenther on the fact that Martin obviously has a lot of knowledge and going to another team creates an issue for them but we don’t know where he is going so…

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines) Toto, if we put aside the fact that your son was obviously a member of one of the F1 in Schools winning teams on Wednesday night, you were there, very enthusiastic about it. Could you tell us from a pure Formula One team principal perspective what you think of the project, the initiative and how you think it can help Formula One overall?

    TW: I didn’t know anything about Formula in Schools before I was actually surprised to hear that my son was joining it two years ago and it was his own initiative. I find it a really nice competition because young teenagers are creating a mini Formula One team. They have to raise sponsorship, they have to make a garage, create a marketing proposition, develop a little car. They are using tools such as CFD and mini-wind tunnels and then they put it on track and it’s very competitive and the best 52 teams made it to the world final last Wednesday and out of every corner of the world. And seeing them, how capable they are, and how enthusiastic they are for the sport, it’s really nice to see, so I will be cheering for Formula One in Schools, independently of whether my son is involved or not.

    Q: (Andrea Cremonesi – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Toto, it would be fair to say that it would be one of the worst Fridays in your career. I would like to know if it’s just a question of lacking of grip, it’s just a question of heat or there is some other reason? And Ferrari put a lot of effort with new aerodynamic parts here. It seems that Mercedes is not at the same level at this event. Is that because you are thinking of bringing something more in Japan or in America?

    TW: As I said before, it feels like one of the worst Fridays. We have brought some new parts to the cars as well and now we need to chase back why it didn’t go today, independent whether it was in the wet or in the dry, on the long runs or on a single lap, we just lacked pace today and we have twelve hours to understand and then hopefully have a car tomorrow that is more stable.

    Q: (Dan Knutson – Auto Action and Speed Sport) There will be a triple header next year; Formula One has this tendency that if they get away with it once, they will do it again, so how keen are you to see triple headers and know that if it happens, everything works out once, it will happen again?

    GS: OK, I think it is… if you plan it well, I think the crew for sure are the most stressed out but the triple header is in Europe so at least we have got that advantage. We don’t have to fly from continent to continent. I think let’s see how it is but again, we need to get organised for this stuff and if it doesn’t work or if it is too stressful or if you can change something – you have to learn from it and change something for the year after because… I’m with you there, if we do it once, we will do it again. If we get spectators in front of the TV or some factor out of this, it will happen again. It’s just one of those things that you need to do and then come out and analyse and see if it is worthwhile to do again and how to deal best with it.

    TW: I think Guenther summarised it pretty well. There will be other factors such as important events in other sports or outside of sport that need to be considered and I think making a calendar is not easy so we need to wait and see how we can cope with the three races and then learn the lesson.

    MI: Yeah, we are like a small team so we have the same problems so we are organising our people and we need additional people of course to cover all this because also if it is in Europe, we have trucks moving with the new tyres or bringing back the used tyres. For overseas it will be more complicated and if it happens, we need to make a proper plan in advance. Everything is possible if it is an advantage for the sport obviously we will be ready to do that but it will have an increase in logistics and people we are obliged to use.

    Q: (Andrea Cremonesi – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Toto, today we saw an Instagram movie – if I can say – something about Trump that was posted by Lewis. Are you worried that there can be some effect coming to the USA Grand Prix for him?

    TW: This is a very controversial and polarising story. I wouldn’t want to get involved in politics. We all have our opinion. Lewis’s feelings about human rights are very strong and I think he wanted to show that and probably Instagram as the communication channel is something that he needs to rethink but I can relate to his feelings.

    Q: (Andrea Cremonesi – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Are you worried for the United States Grand Prix?

    TW: No, I think one of the most important things in the US is that you have the right to express your opinion and I would want to leave it there and not comment any more. I think we are here as sport teams and sports should unite and I’m not sure it is happening everywhere in the world so I would rather lead by example and not comment on politics.

  • 2017 Italian Grand Prix: Friday Press Conference – Part 1

    2017 Italian Grand Prix: Friday Press Conference – Part 1

    PART ONE: TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – Toto WOLFF (Mercedes), Maurizio ARRIVABENE (Ferrari), Frédéric VASSEUR (Sauber)

    Maurizio, obviously notable that you have had some very strong updates either side of the summer break, in Hungary and in Spa, which have made the car good on all circuits. Tell us how that’s been achieved and is there more like that coming in the pipeline later in the season?

    Maurizio ARRIVABENE: I mean it’s not really a big achievement. You’ve got a big achievement when you are winning the race and we are not winning the race. Having said so, Belgium and also even Monza they are not races that are good for the technical point of view for our car, we know that. Knowing that even before we were working a lot but for the type of project related to our car, we are still… these guys, they are stronger than us.

    You’ve committed to next year with Kimi and Sebastian, providing stability. Can you tell us why they work so well as a pair? And also some thoughts on your plans for your young drivers Leclerc and Giovinazzi.

    MA: The reason why I think is quite clear. They went through the last three years with great co-operating within them. They feel very good together, being part of the team and translating this spirit to the overall team, I think we don’t find any reason why not confirming them together. Talking about the young drivers, they are growing, our objective is to of course to grow up young drivers and maybe to see them in the future with us. This is the final goal. But, before that they need to demonstrate in Formula One that they deserve it.

    Thank you. Toto, following up on the first question to Maurizio, after dominating as you did at Silverstone, were you shocked or surprised the Ferrari was on a similar type of circuit, in Spa, and have you had to scale up your response?

    Toto WOLFF: Ferrari’s response in Spa was very strong indeed. I don’t think that you should be shocked by anything in Formula but we knew that the DNA of the car and the performance of the car is very good on twisty circuits and they came to Spa and they were competitive. It’s the same thing we in Monza today also. Second free practice gave a good indication that Ferrari is to be expected to be fast tomorrow and on Sunday. I think this is the narrative of the season. It’s a tough fight between the two teams. It’s rare that you can say on Sunday who has had the faster car. You have to just put it all together, and hopefully the drivers put it all together, and then you can win the race. I think this is going to go to the very end.

    Only one of the top four seats not confirmed for next year. Can you give us an update on Valtteri’s situation? And with him being 41 points off the championship lead, does he need a win here in Monza for Mercedes to maintain a two-driver challenge for the championship?

    TW: It is a no-brainer for the team to continue with Valtteri for the very same reason that Maurizio mentioned – within the team the dynamic between the drivers is important in order to extract the best possible result. We’re very happy with Valtteri. It’s his first year with the team. He had very good moments, like in Sochi, and he had more difficult races, like in Spa. But we are not manic depressive and therefore stability is important and we want to keep him in the team and it’s just down to the contractual situation – the nailing it and signing it and hopefully we can do this.

    And the second part of the question?

    TW: Which was what?

    Does he need a win here for Mercedes to feel you are maintaining a two-driver challenge for the championship?

    TW: Again, Ferrari has a situation where Sebastian has been scoring lots of points and Kimi, for whatever reasons, not so much. Therefore, for them it’s probably a little bit easier. Our boys were pretty close together, until probably Spa. The situation is a little bit different now, but we would like to keep all options open and evaluate the situation in every race and see how it develops.

    Thank you for that. Fred, your Ferrari engine deal all signed, can you tell us the benefits of that relationship? Also, Ferrari chairman Sergio Marchionne has said he would like a Ferrari junior team. Do you see it that way, with a chance to take either Leclerc or Giovinazzi, or both?

    Frédéric VASSEUR: First of all, the deal is based on the powertrain, which means it’s the engine and the gearbox and then we will discuss together the fact that we could extend the deal on another parameter for some other parts. On the driver point of view, I think that if it’s regarding Charles for example, I think he has to be focused on the Formula 2 Championship, still a couple of races to go and it’s a bit too early to discuss about this. I hope we will have the discussion at some stage! But I think, to be honest, even for Charles it’s a bit too early to put it on the table.

    You’ve had some time now – not much! – but you have had some time to assess the strengths and weaknesses of Sauber. What are you telling the owners that the team needs to move forwards?

    FV: The problem is that we are in a tough situation because we started the project very, very late last year. We are also running of the previous year, but I think our biggest weakness is on the development of the chassis, because we started very late. We decided to switch on the ’18 car quite early also. But we knew perfectly the situation before the season for the team, and before I joined. For me it’s clear that we won’t be able to change the situation before the end of the season. We just have to keep the pressure, to race and to keep the team on their motivation. That’s very important in terms of preparation for next year also. But we know that the end of the season will be difficult, it’s not a surprise.

     

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Ysef Harding – Xiro Xone News) A question or Maurizio. Coming here to Monza, if you have never been here and you are walking around this track, this place. I wanted to ask you what does Monza mean to you and to Ferrari?

    MA: Monza is the Grand Prix of Italy and we are an Italian team, so of course for us, it’s like… it’s unbelievable – the atmosphere, the tradition, the history. Even Enzo Ferrari was talking always about the Italian Grand Prix as the grand prix. This is the emotional part. The public is fantastic; we can feel the vibe. I think even yesterday, it was only Thursday but we were feeling, all the team, the drivers etc, they were feeling the vibe of the tifosi and they were pushing us. The expectation is very, very high. Despite that we need to be humble because we know the natural [characteristics] of this year’s car and we know that Monza is not really the best track for us. Having said so, our attitude will be humble, but not surrendering. This is what I can promise to our tifosi and I hope they are going to support us big time tomorrow and also on Sunday.

    Q: (Peter Farkas – Auto Motor) A question for Toto and Maurizio. Toto, regarding this engine oil-burning situation, there have been some conflicting reports in the press. Some said that you brought forward the engine so that you could adhere to the old 1.2-litre limit and others said you voluntarily adhered to the 1.9. What’s the truth and how do you see it going forward. Maurizio, what’s Ferrari’s stance on the whole situation?

    MA: First of all, we have no conflict. I don’t want to comment on this kind of thing. Mercedes introduced early one engine that have also disadvantages during the course of the season, because you have no more development and this is the end of my comment.

    TW: I think it was completely blown out of proportion. Exactly what Maurizio said, the reasons we have introduced it early was in order to bring some performance to the track, with the risk of having to do many races until the end of the season – more races than our direct competitors, number one. Number two, you lack for further development. The longer you wait for the last introduction of engine, the more you can probably add the upgrade. So these are the reasons we brought it and not in order to extract a performance advantage out of the capability of burning more oil. So, if you ask the FIA you will be quite interested to see what the results are, and they are pretty much all the same. I don’t know where that rumour came and it was nothing that was ever a problem or discussion among us.

    Q: (Heikki Kulta – Turun Sanomat) Maurizio, Kimi said that his target is a race win in the second part of the season. Do you think he is a capable of getting it?

    MA: He demonstrated that he could be capable to do it in Monaco. Also in Hungary he was nearly there. I would be happy if Kimi is going to win a race during the course of this season. For me, it could be a dream, because he was working so hard during the last three years and I think if he is going to win I can be happy.

    Q: (Peter Hartig – BMF1) A question for Frédéric. I would ask you the main difference between being a team principal at Sauber, compared to Renault. It could be internally, it could be a little close that answer, and also according to the drivers?

    FV: There is not big difference to be honest. The two teams are passionate and it’s a real racing team, in both cases. Now I am taking the team in approximately the same direction, because when I joined Renault last year, we were in a restructuring situation and it’s exactly the same with Sauber. I hope that I will have some other challenge in the future because it’s a bit tough. But, on the other hand, it’s a good challenge, it’s exciting, because we know where we are today and we know that we have a lot of work in front of us. On the driver situation, it’s also quite similar: they are young, they are doing a good job, they win a couple of races, a couple of championships in the junior series but we have to still improve – the same for the team, the same for everybody and we have to keep everybody under pressure, including drivers to try to improve and to get the best from them also.

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines) The commercial rights holder, Liberty, seems intent on introducing a cost cap of about $150 million from 2021 onwards, with a glide path through until the end of 2020. This of course has massive impact on your head count levels etc, because you would probably have to cut your head counts by 50 per cent in the case of Mercedes and Ferrari. Could you still see yourself still participating in Formula One after that has happened, to Toto and Maurizio?

    TW: It’s the first time I hear the number. It’s good that you tell us, so we are warned!

    MA: Thank you!

    TW: And the glide path until 2020. I think we are all living in the same financial reality and we have seen teams growing dramatically over the years and we are all very sensible that we want to somehow contain it. It needs to be done in a way that it is good for the sport, that it respects the structures that have been created, so it needs a glide path, and it needs to be fair. That is very important. We have all different set-ups, the way we are organised in different ways. Ferrari is a fully integrated team within the larger road car company. We are a separate entity in the UK. You look at all the teams; it’s very different. You need a governance that functions and you need a strict set of rules and then it just needs to cover everybody. The discussions that have been happening, at a very early stage, I think there is no big disagreement.

    MA: I agree with Toto. Having said so, we need to take into consideration that this year, thanks to the battle between Mercedes and us, you can see, all the tracks they are full of people and I mean, maybe Liberty have to think about that.

    Fred, any comment from you? Obviously head count won’t be an issue for you but…

    FV: I won’t have to cut my head counts first – at least that’s a good news. NO but for sure at one stage we will have to work on it but it’s also difficult. We have to find a fair way. If we want to do something like this we need to find the best way to do it and it’s not so easy to police after the decision and to be sure everybody is sticking to the decision. For sure it will be in the common interest of the championship also to have close competition and to close a little bit the gap on the grid.

    Q: (Luigi Perna – Gazzetta dello Sport) A question for Maurizio. It’s a fact that introducing your fourth power unit in the last part of the season, you will be forced to respect a lower oil consumption limit because of the rules. Are you confident you can compensate for this disadvantage with respect to Mercedes with your new upgrades?

    MA: First of all, we are not introducing out power unit number four for that reason. It has nothing to do with that. We have a plan since the beginning of the year and we would like to introduce power unit number at the right time and with the right power. This is the answer, but nothing to do with the oil consumption.

    Q: (Agris Lauzinieks – Kapitals) Question to all three team principals. According to President of International Monetary Fund Christine Lagarde in the world there is unprecedented economic situation where countries are doing really well economically – does this mean that there is also a boom time in the sponsors market that teams are having lots of demand and monies flowing into teams easily and will you have next year some new names printed on cars? Thank you.

    TW: The market is a challenging market. I think in my experience I have seen years that were more difficult but due to the intense fight between Ferrari and Mercedes at the moment and growing audiences in many territories we have a quite a good pipeline and solid interest from potential sponsors and I’m optimistic that we can close some of these discussions.

    MA: First of all, we are perfectly fine with our sponsors. Having said so, you notice on the car that some of them, they leave their spaces on the car and on driver overalls to celebrate the 70th anniversary of Ferrari and this is also a very good sign. Having said so, I can confirm what Toto said about Mercedes. We have contact every day with sponsors. They are calling us and the interest due to the battle between us and Mercedes is growing every day. Today the problem is to select the sponsor and find the space on the car – but not the other way around.

    Fred?

    FV: For sure on our side it is a little bit different. The situation is difficult for sure but I think it’s also coming from the fact that we have much more sport on the TV and proposals than we had in the past. On the other hand, I think we have much more contact for Sauber than we had in the past and I think we can be optimistic for the future.

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines) Getting back to this glide path and the budget cap. I’ve calculated that collectively the four or five teams that employ in excess of the sort-of 500 figure would have to retrench or redeploy something like 1500 engineers or staff members. How does one go about this and is that actually a responsible alternative?

    TW: Again, I think that where we are at the moment, everybody at Liberty, the FIA are pretty conscious about the structures that have been created and it needs to be a consensus about how these numbers can be reduced to a sensible level, find out what a sensible level is and discuss the glide path and, in any case, avoid any hardship for anybody involved. So, it’s early days. It’s 2017 and once we agree on a way forward, we will have three, four, five years to adapt our structures to whatever the end result will be.

    Maurizio?

    MA: I agree with Toto, every structure has a number of employees that is related to the business request, the objective and the performance and so on. I mean I’m not questioning the number of people that is working for Liberty or for FIA but of course to find an agreement we need to sit everybody around a table and we need to have a good confrontation about what is the reality of our companies today and to work on that. I’m not telling you that our intention is to do nothing but at least if they are sharing with us their thoughts we can discuss about that. Having said so, as I said before, linking my answer related to the sponsors, saying no to some of them, we are already applying a budget cut somehow.

    Fred?

    FV: Yeah, at Sauber I can’t be against this regulation for sure but on the other hand I think the most important thing for everybody is that if we want to introduce new rules we have to be sure that we will be able to monitor the point. For me this is the most important. We will introduce into the system new discussion and it won’t be good point. When you want to make a rule you have to be sure you will be able to monitor it.

    Q: (Peter Farkas – Auto Motor) Toto and Maurizio. It just occurred to me that, in the past, we have seen some really fierce rivalries between teams fighting for the World Championship. The rivalry has often gone off-track, literally, there was some animosity between the teams but to me, from the outside at least, it seems that now Ferrari and Mercedes are in a surprisingly harmonious relationship and it didn’t go off track even though there were some issues where it could have. Could you explain why your relationship is so friendly – at least it seems so.

    TW: You want Maurizio and I coming out here?

    MA: I’m always surprised when I’m hearing this kind of comments. If you want we can organise a boxing match, if you want, just to create some spectacular relation but we don’t need to. We need to get used to a kind of civil relationship between the teams out of the competition. Out of the track there is nothing wrong if you are taking a coffee together and at the track we are punching each other. Because there is the competition, it’s not out of there. I can respect Toto as a person, not as a competitor, he knows that. I’m not going to take a coffee with everybody. With certain people I get on very well, with other people not at all. This is my personal choice. Having said so, I think that a civil and a gentle education is the minimum that is requested in all sports. Otherwise instead of being team principals we can be defined as hooligans – and we’re not.

    TW: Many topics covered. First of all, I’m not going to let the sport ruin a respect that I have for a personality off-track. As Maurizio said, you get on with somebody or you don’t. Number two, I like the analogy to rugby: that you can be fierce and tough competitors and trying to punch each other during the match and win with all the necessary emotions – but you’re still able to have a beer afterwards. This is the attitude that we’ve had over the years: that we can be fierce competitors and we wouldn’t want to have a coffee during the race with each other. But it’s necessary for my third point of view, we are all stakeholders in this giant platform. And if this giant platform is successful, it makes the teams successful and it makes the sport successful and we are all benefitting from this. I think in the past – not only in the past, still today – there are individuals that are very narrow-mindedly focussed on Formula One as is there was nothing else besides it. And the truth is that there are many interests that we share besides the fierce competition on track. And Formula One is at a crucial point with new shareholders, with new management. We all want the sport to do well and it is necessary that we are capable to sit around a table and discuss the sport and be able to take our Ferrari or Mercedes or Sauber head off and say what in this particular situation is important for us to understand in terms of doing good for the sport. And this is the discussion we are having regularly and this is influencing our relationship.

    MA: We’re not only discussing sport. With certain people you can… life is not only about Formula One, we can discuss about everything: about music, art, many, many other topics like all the other human beings.

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – Racing Lines) Again Toto and Maurizio, back to the same topic, if they do actually reduce the cost of competing to around about $200million all in, would you be prepared, as the recipients of by far and away the largest slice of Formula One’s revenues to receive less – possibly half of what you’re getting at the moment, because the costs will be cut in half?

    TW: You changed the number!

    No – I said $200million including. The $150million is the basic cap excluding marketing, executive pay, drivers and engines. Adding up to about $200million.

    TW: Again, I didn’t hear the number before.

    Well whatever. If it comes in.

    TW: I think it depends on the situation. I have… you wouldn’t want to reduce your salary of what you have now. And then just smile and walk off and say “that’s great.” We are all… within our responsibility is the sporting aspect of the team’s performance and there is the business aspect of the team’s performance and we are all going to try to maximise our revenue and keep the team healthy. It’s clear what the answer to your question is.

    Maurizio?

    MA: I agree with Toto. In addition I would like to say that we… it’s the beginning of the story we were hearing many, many times. Everybody is focussed on making sure the sport is growing and so on. So, let us see the economics first: the earnings, the loss etcetera, etcetera and then we can discuss with pleasure. But we are at the early stage. We don’t have to rush that much before seeing the result and the number related.

  • F1 2017: Mid-Season Report

    F1 2017: Mid-Season Report

    The 2017 Formula 1 season ushered in fundamental change both on and off the circuit.

    One of the biggest changes to F1 came in the form of the new aerodynamic regulations that drastically changed the aesthetics and the speed of the cars. Wider and faster the 2017 cars have, mostly, brought a refreshing change to F1. While cars have been cornering significantly quicker than they ever have before the issue of overtaking has still not been solved. The wider cars, and bigger tyres, have instead made the ability of following a competitor closely a lot tougher. However, the flip of side of this has been that, when presented with an overtaking opportunity, drivers have been more aggressive in making their moves, which has led to more entertaining racing.

    While the change to the cars has been a substantial change the biggest change has been, arguably, the resurgence of Ferrari. Less we forget, up until 2017, Mercedes has dominated the hybrid era with consummate ease. The fact that Ferrari is a bona fide championship challenger has been a refreshing change that the sport desperately needed. While the championship battle will likely, and hopefully, carry all the way to the final race of the season, the most impressive aspect of Ferrari’s resurrection has been how the team has achieved it. Though it may be paying off in this season it isn’t something that’s happened overnight. The first pieces of the puzzle were put in place years ago, as noted in this column back in 2014, and is testament to an inspired dedication by all involved at Maranello.

    Nevertheless, while Ferrari has been, mostly, impressive in 2017, Mercedes haven’t exactly been slouching. Lewis Hamilton, faced with consistent pressure from Sebastian Vettel, is probably driving as well as he ever has in his career. With due respect to the deserved 2016 Hamilton always believed that he had enough to beat Rosberg and he did so two times out of three. But with Vettel it’s different as he’s now up against a four-time champ who is relentless, ruthless, and ready for title number five.

    M81131One of the most impressive drivers this season has been Valtteri Bottas. The Finnish driver has quietly made his way into the championship fight with some impressive drives. It’s never beating a master of qualifying such as Hamilton and Bottas has finally begun to fulfill the potential he entered F1 with. Many wouldn’t have easily written off his chances of beating Hamilton, over a season, at the start of the year. But this question isn’t so comfortably answered after half a season of Bottas vs. Hamilton.

    Formula 1 is a baptism of fire for any driver but even more so for rookie drivers.Williams’ newly signed Canadian rookie Lance Stroll had one such rough start to his F1 career. While he wasn’t to blame for the three retirements in the first three races of the season it was evident that he was struggling and over-driving his car.

    But the turning point came in Canada with a fine ninth place finish on home soil. Since then, he’s matured and become more comfortable which he capped, so far, with a memorable third place in Baku. While circumstances conspired to elevate him to that position he still needed to do the job in the cockpit.

    Motor Racing - Formula One World Championship - Spanish Grand Prix - Race Day - Barcelona, SpainElsewhere, Esteban Ocon has quickly found his feet in Force India and F1. So much so that he’s been more than a nuisance to his highly rated teammate Sergio Perez. Yes, he’s made a few mistakes but overall Ocon has been a brilliant addition to the team who could easily be mistaken for a seasoned F1 driver.

    As it stands Vettel leads Hamilton by fourteen points in the driver’s championship but its not a comfortable lead by any stretch of the imagination.

    And the best thing of all about the 2017 Formula 1 season as that for the first time in quite a while we have no idea which way the championship will go. The season resumes at Belgium’s Spa-Francorchamps circuit on August 27.

  • F1 2017: Hungarian Gp Review – Formation Flying For Ferrari

    F1 2017: Hungarian Gp Review – Formation Flying For Ferrari

    The Hungaroring was always a circuit slated to suit the characteristics of the 2017 Ferrari and the Italian team drove home their advantage with a controlled one-two victory.

    As in Saturday qualifying the Ferrari driver pair of Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen were line astern in first and second at light out. As the pair cleanly led at lights out the Mercedes duo, Bottas and Hamilton, had there hands full of fast starting Red Bulls. However, while the initial start went relatively well Verstappen clouted the side of his teammate Ricciardo in a clash that would ultimately come with a hefty price. The coming together put Ricciardo out of the race while Verstappen incurred a ten second time penalty for his part in the incident. While Verstappen’s move was rather silly there was, clearly, no intention on his part, which made the penalty somewhat harsh.

    Initially, pace set by Vettel and Raikkonen was much too quick for Bottas to live with who quickly fell seven seconds behind in the opening stint. Vettel too seemed to have the measure of Raikkonen in the opening laps but as the race drew towards its pitstop phase the Finn was clearly the quickest of the two Ferrari’s and easily maintained a second gap to his race leading teammate.

    048Despite the track temperature soaring in the mid fifty degree range and fears of increased tyre degradation they Pirelli compounds held up well, perhaps a bit too well. It’s no secret that Pirelli’s approach to the manufacturing and construction of their 2017 tyres has been conservative. It is this conservatism that has led to drivers being able to make one stop per race.

    It is likely that Pirelli conservative approach stems from an apprehension that the quicker, and heavier, 2017 cars needed more robust tyre construction. Here’s hoping that with all the data gathered this season that 2018 sees malleable range of compounds.

    While Vettel wrapped up the 46th victory of his career it was clear that he was not the fastest Ferrari driver on the day. For the majority of the second half of the race teammate Raikkonen ran within a second of the leader clearly illustrating his superior pace. But as the Hungaroring is notorious for lack of overtaking second is what the Finn was confined too. It didn’t make for a comfortable afternoon for Ferrari though as both Mercs of Bottas and Raikkonen started closing down the leading pair at a rate of knots.

    There was a suggestion that Ferrari swap Vettel and Raikkonen so as to ensure a comfortable victory but this move never happened. Contrary to many on social media, who slated Ferrari’s unwillingness to swap its drivers around, it was the right move. The reality of the team orders debate is that you can’t have it both ways. In Monaco, Ferrari handing Vettel the optimum strategy and ultimately the race win was rightly criticized. If this was unacceptable from Ferrari it shouldn’t have been accepted, or called for, in Hungary either.

    065While it ended well for Ferrari in Hungary Mercedes and Hamilton would’ve won a few more fans with the spirit they displayed. On the instruction of the team Bottas had let Hamilton, with better pace, through to third with the aim of catching the Ferrari pair and giving back the place if he couldn’t do so. However, by the start of the final lap Bottas was seven seconds adrift and under pressure from a recovering Verstappen.

    Nevertheless, Hamilton, in a superb show of sportsmanship, slowed significantly in the final corner to give return Bottas’ third place. While Hamilton gave up three points by finishing fourth his move has earned respect. Verstappen, apologetic after the race for the clash with his teammate, eventually finished fifth.

    Amazingly, Fernando Alonso set the fastest lap of the race and finished a solid sixth ahead of Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz in seventh. The Force India drivers continued to keep each other honest with Sergio Perez in eighth and Esteban Ocon in ninth as the second McLaren of Stoffel Vandoorne scored the final point in tenth. Williams’ Felipe Massa withdrawal from the Hungarian Gp with an inner-ear issue meant that reserve driver Paul di Resta was subbed it almost literally at the last minute. While he ultimately retired with an oil leak the Williams reserve driver did his reputation no harm with a measured performance in a car he’d never driver before.

    The majority of the 70 laps of the Hungarian Gp were nervy for Ferrari but they emerged with an important one-two finish. It allows Sebastian Vettel to stem Mercedes’ momentum and to crucially take a fourteen-point lead into the month-long break.

    (All images courtesy of Pirelli Motorsport)