February 2010

Zoran Stefanović Waits His F1 Chance

F1 has been bleeding big players. BMW have gone, Toyota have gone, Honda have gone. Really and truly, Renault have gone, even if their name lingers on like the Cheshire Cat’s smile. Nobody who has studied the sport’s history has been surprised by any of this. It has always been the case that mass-market car makers come into F1 and drop out again. Only Mercedes remain of the volume car makers, at least for now, and they are not so foolish as to think they can build a successful F1 car.

After a long association with McLaren, they now have their name pasted on the car built by Ross Brawn’s team and have brought Michael Schumacher back into F1 to drive it. Should we F1 fans mourn the loss of the big boys? I don’t believe so, but we do need their places on the grid to be filled. To me and to other F1 traditionalists, independent teams are the heart of the sport. By independent, I mean not controlled by and bearing the name of a mass-market car manufacturer. Which is why I extend a cautious welcome to the new 2010 F1 teams.

How To Launch a Formula One Car

It’s February, the beginning of a motorsports season (unless, of course, you’re A1GP, which you’re not, because you actually exist) F1 car launch and test season, and in this year more than ever, the strategies for launching a car are many and varied.

If you’re an F1 fan, or even a general racing fan, you’ll be familiar with launches.

They generally consist of drivers, and more occasionally team principal, pulling back a cover, normally of a colour corresponding to the car beneath or the sponsors there on, and revealing a car that looks like it’s been polished to the point just before the paint gets rubbed off.

We get treated to a tidal wave of stories and press releases about how the whole team has been locked in the factory over the winter, designers forced to spend Christmas poring over the front wing design, engine technicians fighting surviving on Pro Plus as they squeeze that extra horsepower out of an old block, simply to get the car finished on time.