Chaotic But Unusual Season Opener At Melbourne

It was an unusual start to the 2013 Formula One season at Melbourne. Not the usual chaotic race, with safety car playing a role in bunching up the race field. Not the surprise strong showing a midfield team that rubs shoulders with the resource glutted front runners. So what we had today F1 circus returning where they left of at the end of 2012 season. Of course, it shouldn't be a surprise, since 2013 is a transitional year with minor tweaks to the 2013 regulations, where teams are already running with an eye on the 2014 season. 

Red Bull, Ferrari, Lotus all had a strong weekend. Ferrari looking as the strongest front runner on the combined performance of its two cars, with both Alonso and Massa having strong outing. Massa showed good pace, throughout the weekend, in fact, was the leading Ferrari car, until Alonso outsmarted both Massa and Sebastian Vettel by going for an undercut on his second pit-stop. Massa tried to return the favor on his last stop, but it wasn't enough to emerge ahead of Alonso/Vettel. 
Red Bull cars that locked the front row after the chaotic qualifier which concluded on Sunday morning(in Melbourne), seemed to struggle when running in traffic, in the wake of dirty air of the cars ahead. Of course biggest weakness RedBull has in their car is in form of their Australian driver, who inspire of running in better condition, than his teammate on Saturday was not able to beat Sebastian Vettel to the pole. He was his usual self, when he baulked on the race start and soon had cars behind him swoop past him.
McLaren with their decision to develop pull rod suspension on their 2013 car, with an idea of possibly perfecting it for the 2014 car, are where Ferrari was this time last year. All the hype surrounding Jenson Button of him being able to read chaotic conditions around him, proved as good as the car under him, where he struggled in the qualifiers, chewed up his tyres in the qualifier, resulting in running compromised race. Perez must be repenting the decision to go for slick tyres in qualification, which eliminated him out of Q2 and sealed his fate for rest of the weekend.
Mercedes' duo showed a lot of promise pace wise, and I was expecting strong showing from both the cars, but reliability took the toll of Nico Rosberg, while Lewis hustled his car around to finish fifth behind his friend Massa. My highlight of the weekend was how he quietly relinquished his position against faster Massa, and the contrast in which he gave hard time to Alonso before letting the Spaniard through, while in the latter case, he was any ways headed for his pit stop. So there is no love lost between the 2007 McLaren team-mates, and their mutual admiration club in media, is just a backhanded way of undermining Sebastian Vettel, who has been dominant force since the 2010 season.
Coming to Lotus, Kimi won places on the opening lap, and then driver running in front combined with good Lotus car, that is kinder to its tyres meant his Lotus could  run on two pit stop strategy as compared to rest of the front runners. This pretty much was the difference between the Ferrari of Alonso that finished second and Kimi Raikkonen who won the season opener. Of course, Kimi was his usual self when leading the race, totally in control. Probably that's the reason, his pitwall asked his opinions rather than giving him instructions :-)
Romain on the other hand did a Mark Webber. He probably is still smarting from all the agressive starts he had last season, invoking the ire of critics and regulators. He fell in the clutches of the mid-field, and the fact that Lotus put new parts on his car only Saturday morning, that Kimi had already acclimatized on Friday free practices meant; he was fighting both the competition and the car during the race. He still managed to finish in the final point scoring position. Hopefully, he gets stronger as the season progresses and fights regularly for podiums and wins.
My driver of the week, Adrian Sutil was destined for greatness, and didn't show any rustiness, given his year away from the circus due to legal reasons. He made lots of places at the race start. His Force India car showed good pace as compared to the RedBull, Ferrari and Lotus cars around him, but the mandatory pit stops to comply with the tyre compound rule, resulted in him losing places after he emerged on the Super-soft compound after his last pit stop, but he still finished ahead of his teammate,  who has been in the car for two seasons now. Given that I have always considered Adrian as a fast but inconsistent driver, my rating of his Paul Di Resta took further beating. Paul continues to be another pilot who I think will last in F1 only due to good back scratching from the English-speaking  media,  just like Jenson Button and Mark Webber.
Finally, my team Williams, they were in Melbourne on back of loss of Sir Frank Williams' wife, and the team was determined to put a strong performance for Lady Williams, unfortunately both Pastor and Valteri had bad qualifiers and never recovered from that point. The street circuit in Albert Park every year takes toll of one driver who drifts slightly from the racing line and steps on the artificial grass; Pastor did the honors, in the corner which has seen race ends for Barichello and massive shunt for David Coulthard, in earlier editions of the race.
Valteri Bottas qualified 16th and end 14th, but two retirements ahead of him, were probably the reasons for higher finishing. Pastor has been downcast about the driveability of the car. Hopefully, his concerns were specific to the conditions this weekend and not the car in general.

McLaren Honda Reunion?

With all the buzz around possible McLaren-Honda tie up for F1 engine project. I still can't help but wonder why Ron Dennis is shown toying with Cosworth in the tooned episode. Given Ron and his penchant for attention to details ( or control freak nature, as some like to put it), that revelation is not just a slip for entertainment.
  At that point, I was suspecting that Ron was now focusing on the McLaren sports car projects, and he has never masked his aspirations to be a British Supercar Marquee like Ferrari in Italy and he might have been exploring options of using Cosworth F1 personnel ( who will be done in F1 yet again) for his project. That way, he will have more control of McLaren's future. 

Collaborating with Honda while good on paper, has same issues that he had with Mercedes, or that Sir Frank had with BMW collaboration. In these collaborations, the bosses of big car manufacturing company want to be in control, which has normally never gone well.
 
Even when McLaren was the works team of Mercedes in F1 there were strenuous periods, when Ron was heavily focused on the McLaren technology center project and later when Ron launched McLaren MP4-12C in 2009.
 
Of course, the examples of F1 team and car manufacturer relation going sour that I have listed above are always British/European team and European car manufacturers. Whenever the Japanese car companies tied up with F1 teams in Europe, the results may have not come through, but the F1 team bosses in Europe have been in control. Part of it can be attributed to the cultural aspects of Europe and Asia and part of it has to be with how F1 personalities like Bernie, and Ron always make their financial backers feel that F1 or the F1 team is doing these sponsors a favor by letting them be part of the gang.

So McLaren Honda may not be a bad idea, and may not be as bad for Honda as their previous F1 experience with some British bosses at Brackley, who turned the F1 project into a sinkhole.  

Bridgestones Demise

FYI entire Merc Board was in Abu Dhabi over the race weekend and guess what whose guest they were - Brawn GP, they were in Brawn GP hospitality area the whole weekend. I am not a big Button fan, but somehow it is imperative for Ron/Martin to pull some scoop and get Button On board, A british team, with two brit drivers (WDCs for that matter) may make some Brit sponsors to open their purse. If indeed Merc go for 75% stake in Brawn, Macca is heading Williams way.
Rumors making round few weeks ago were Ron was planning to buy the Engine plant of Defunct BMW F1 team for the power units for the new SLR that Ron has developed after Max forced him out of McLaren F1 after Australian Scandal.
Ross Brawn knows the "Real value" of Button and hence not game to give the Brit 8 Million pound retainer. If Ron/Martin can steal Button, it would secure future of McLaren ( that is if British Sponsors follow Button Hamilton Duo to McLaren)

-----Original Message-----From: RacingForIndiaSent: 02 November 2009 To: Unsui Subject: RE: Bridgestone Withdrawal
Why would ron go to abu dhabi to pacify the mercedes board? If he wanted to do that he could have gone to stuggart.I find the reason why bridgestone left very interesting more than the timing. Its more in line with what bmw said their reason was.

-original message-Subject: Bridgestone Withdrawal From: Unsui Date: 03/11/2009 Isn't the timing of the announcement interesting , on back of Max(benefactor) leaving office. Just like Spotting Ron Dennis on McLaren Pitwall.
I am sure Ron was not in Abu Dhabi only to pacify Mercedes Board (and wooing Arab Sheikhs to buy their new sports car from McLaren)

McLaren, a mystery!

This is probably the first time that McLaren haven’t made any significant progress during the season and what makes it more difficult is that there has been an unusual silence from the top honchos about the "updates in the pipeline". The testing ban isn’t helping either, and there are more off track activities to keep them occupied.
Is this a policy change at McLaren, where they access their season upfront and take a decision to scrap the season if their performance is not up to the mark in the first couple of races or is this a genuine engineering problem with the team.
I think the fans deserve to know more and how I miss Ron speak at times like these.

Too long in the tooth

Practically everything about F1 is stale. The dominance of Brawns (yawn), FOTA Vs Mosely, FOTA Vs Bernie, Bernie Vs Mosely, Mosely Vs Dennis the list goes on.

F1 has ceased to be a sport I once loved and followed like an ardent addict. Instead it’s a lesson for all aspiring Management students under the head of "what not to do" when running a multi million dollar sport.

Latest is that the FOTA have approached MOTOGP boss Carmelo Ezpeleta for a possible break away series. I am certain this is just to send a inconsequential message to Max, who seems intent on leaving a legacy of confusion and mismanagement behind. Having said that, I am not sure he intends to leave anyways.

More to follow...

Season Summary - Stats Talk !!!



While the results that matter are out and well “fought over” .Some statistical data of how the season panned for various teams.

Thanks to Nico (Crash)berg & Technical issues Williams finds itself having dubious record for the years maximum DNF. Point to be noted is
Engine was never Achilles heel for Williams team most of their DNF were due to other technical reasons ( fuel pressure, gearbox, transmission, cooling to name a few) and Ni(Comet) always fell upon the other Williams , unlike the good old days when Pizzonia, Klien took out rivals ( Klien did take out DC once in 2005)
Another interesting stats : While Ferrari-Renault engines did 19500-19700 rpm in races , and Hondas and Mclaren did 19000-19300 rpm, only engine on grid that would do 20000 rpm during race was Cosworth V8.

Sir Frank has a lots of repairs to do if he wants to see the glory days of 90’s.

Honda has done most testing in the season; it’s a mystery that all their work on test track never reflected in Races. (other than when rain-gods played dice at Hungary)
With teams agreeing to testing restrictions agreed upon by the teams for 2007 the onus is back on the Sunday Drivers to make most of the Friday free pracs to work with their engineers to get best setup for Sunday ,like they did in days of Prost & Senna.

Honda (Read Button) has challenge from their sister team Super Aguri ( and Sato), if Taku San’s performance at Interlagos is reflection how much the Aguri team has evolved in course of 9-10 months. Next year Taku will be driving car which Button drove at Brazil and best part is the car will be setup as per his preference,unlike the BAR Honda Days when Taku suffered silent humiliation on 2005 grid with Car Designed as per Jenson’s preference

End of 2005 season ,buoyed by 2005 success, Toyota wanted to implement the Japanese Quality principle of Kaizen in their F1 program and as such was the first team to release their 2006 contender ,but that “Continuous Improvement” never took place. They also start 2007 with a big deficit in as they lose services of Mike Gascoyne.

BMW was in a way most progressed team of the season : The BMW campaign of 2006 season reminds me of Japanese way of keeping the fishes transported to make Sushi fresh ( As per the talks they keep the fish in company with bigger fishes who prey upon them ).While personally the way Dr. T culled Newton ( JV) was a sore point , the Polish replacement of Canadian has shown lots of promise having started late in 2006 , and now Quick Nick finds himself in Canadian’s position. As long as Dr. T is honest about the car he gives to his pilots ,his expectation for the pilots to deliver is valid one . Interesting point with the team was the Driver who was delivering better than Quick nick got the boot and now with even faster rookie in team , the incumbent German Pilot has to be alert on performance ,and if Mario T doesn’t follow double standards in this case ,nobody should complain

Red Bull decided to keep all their eggs in same basket,as they shut the shop on 2006 car and are focusing on 2007 car designed by Adrian Newey, hope their gamble pays off , as it is almost final that they will be running Renault engines in 2007 , lets hope that Renault are as professional to their customers as they are with their own teams needs. It would be an interesting battle to see Renault Vs Renault powered Redbull on the grid.

Interesting story from reliability perspective is STR the Jr. Redbull team(Another Cosworth client), which completed more race laps than likes of Mclaren and Toyota who have done more testing than the Faenza based squad. While Renault is expected to be more professional with their clients ,History of Ferrari doesn’t reflect that , never ever have Ferrari Customer Cars run on same revs as Ferrari in races , maybe its time Ferrari Clients put those Service Level Agreements clauses in their contracts and get fair bang for the buck they pay. Else it will just be story of Ferrari using customers as guinea pigs to keep themselves at top of the game on Engine Reliability front

Midland-Spyker – All through the season the team was more of talking point on whether Alex Schnaider will sell Midland or not , after all the denials ( typical F1 style) ,finally they were bought by Spyker and now they are to become Spyker F1 , Biggest coup was Spyker acquiring services of Mike Gascoyne. Personally Trevor Carlin- Gascoyne would have been right combination to take the team in right direction in 2007 . As such how Colleen Kolles lets Mike to have free reins in team matters would be an interesting point to track in 2007 . On Engine Front Ditto as STR, Ferrari Guinea Pigs part - ii

Mclaren – This Corporate house on the Grid (Greed) needs a mention as we summarize the 2006 season. For the team who was ahead of Renault at end of 2005 something went terribly wrong over the winter , was that terrible thing the lost focus amidst frenzy to woo new sponsors and world champion driver ,where the basics were overlooked ,existing drivers destabilized. The results (especially on speed front) in 2006 should bring them to ground reality. Looking at their 2006 results, personal opinion here is Mclaren 2005 pace was Michelin’s success story of making peerless tyres to last 300+ miles, which now it looks like was one main weapon missing in Ferrari’s armor in 2005.
For Ron Dennis:, End of the day racing is all about building reliable and fast car ,and having fastest drivers to drive them. Mr. Dennis you had two of those for better part of two year. Now you have one. So the ball is in your court, back to basic of building reliable and fast race craft

With FIA reverting back to changing tyres in race rule – Ferrari was immediately in groove in 2006 , but had forgotten the race winning ways in early part of season, after a slow start ,they connected the dots after Imola , and Schumacher and Massa didn’t miss a beat for better part of 2006 , When we discuss Ferrari ,inadvertently topic drifts to FIA and hence controversy , While Ferrari did every thing needed to comeback strong after dismal 2005 campaign,FIA did come to aid by pestering Renault at crucial juncture of campaign with Mass Damper controversy ,For a lay person who is new to sport its difficult to understand how a part that was legal for better part of 2005 and 2006 season suddenly was illegal from FIA perspective. How Alonso who had only one lap to qualify after being forced out of track at Monza gave him puncture, and when he was more that 2 car lengths ahead of Massa could be penalized for blocking Massa , For someone whose priority is to put a timed lap ,it was difficult to judge why “Blocking Opponent” can become more important task .

In last two instances , roles of Technical committee , and stewards becomes important and its high time FIA brings about some transparency and neutrality on this front.

For Lay followers the last two instances were driving factors when taking sides , it was a movie plot of fight of good vs evil and defeat of Renault would have been loss of side which was treated wrongfully.

And like it happens in the Holly wood dramas , fate played its role at Suzuka and Interlagos to ensure the Renault who have showed the paddock a good demonstration how to balance Professionalism ( departing driver effect, restricted finances of parent company for the project , result based support to the project) and love of racing & yet deliver the results. Briatore has a new project in hand in form of Heikki Kovalainen & to produce yet another World Champ in him. While Fisichella had some sympathy in 2005 for all Renault mishaps happening to him, this year departing Alonso beat him fair and square in straight fight, infact in a lesser spec car in final race.

Alonso apart from the final outbreak against his own team showed thorough professionalism, to meet personal and organizational goals (as they say in the corporate jargon)


I

Two hours of Madness.

How historic is this victory?

1. A team that traces its roots back 35 years, to 1971, just won its first race since 1983, when Alboretto won the Detroit GP in a Tyrrell


2. Honda just won its first race as an F1 chassis manufacturer since Surtees won the 1967 Italian GP.


3. I was going to say that the first Polish driver in F1 history scored points, and in his first race, but an inconsequential 2kg of unexpected tire wear nixed that.


4. And of course, Jensen Button won his first GP (and might well have done it on pace even without FA's mechanical mishap).


5. The first ever-wet race at the Hungaroring.


6. BMW’s first podium with the Sauber Team.

Driver of the race:
Jenson Button

Overtaking Move of the race:
Heck there were so many that its hard to pin down a single one, but Alonsos move on MS, during the first few laps was amazing. He drove on the outside of MS and gambled on a wet track and it paid off.

Congratulations to Jenson Button on his first ever race victory. Honda has tasted blood and they will be unstoppable very soon.