OFF SEASON, TIME FOR EARLY FORECAST
Usually the off season is nice and quiet. Not this year so here are some of the stories and my personal thoughts about them.
Alonso - The multimillion musical chairs
With the announcement that Alonso has left McLaren, the 2008 driver market has gone into overdrive. With all the rumors flying around right now it seems that any driver contract is not worth the paper it’s written on. So here is my guide to where I think Alonso will end up. Please note that 70% of what is written is all paddock gossip, with 10% facts and 20% of my reasoning…
Renault.
The favorites but I would be surprised if any announcement will be made before December 6th when the new spy story (see bond rejects part 2 below) hit the courts. The whole issue is that apparently Renault aren’t interested in having just a 1 year deal which is what Alonso wants, according to the press, so he can join Ferrari in 2009. He knows the team and would probably find his comfort zone that he is after here.
Pros - Renault want him back and have made no secret of it, Alonso could get the team how he wants.
Cons - Want him longer than a year, will Renault lose points in spy controversy putting Alonso off the idea?
Chances of a deal - 8/10 I think the new spy story is the only delay on this announcement, the verdict could be crucial.
Honda.
Rumors persist that despite Barrichello being under contract to 08 Ruben’s seat is not safe. Honda was rumored to be unhappy with Barrichello, and even that the car was awful (my description of the car, not theirs) they felt he had past his peak. Like I said the 2007 Honda has been awful this season but there is now a shining light in Ross Brawn now joining the team.
Pros - Now have Ross Brawn to take them up the grid.
Cons - there so far down the grid it’ll be years before the Brawn affect takes any hold.
Chances of a deal - 4/10 As both drivers are contracted and the team isn’t competitive. I can’t see it.
Toyota.
They have the money and Trulli has said he’d welcome Alonso after being teammates with him at Renault. With Ralf now out the team that means there would be no contract disputes. That’s about all that is going for Toyota.
Pros - Money.
Cons - Team have gone nowhere since being in F1 in 2002, after spending billions.
Chances of a deal 2/10 - Unless Alonso wants to commit career suicide I doubt we’ll see him here.
Other plan.
A year out – 1/10 Alonso won’t voluntarily have a gap year, already stating that he doesn’t want to miss the 2008 season with it being the first year without traction control. 1/10
New team in F1.
Spyker is dead, long live Force India! Well I hope it lasts longer than Spyker did and Midland F1 before it for less than one season. Indian billionaire Vijay Mallya bought the team and hopes to move it up the grid.
Also whilst I welcome Force India to F1 and hope they are able to invest in the team. But Force India? Couldn’t you think of a better name? All I have had in my head since I heard this awful name is the music from the movie Team America, every time I write it I seem to add “Force India (f$ck yeah!)” Maybe they should have a theme tune like this,
“Force India f$ck yeah, coming to win from the back of the grid yeah; Force India f$ck yeah, winning is the only way yeah, it’s the dream we all share though were not going to achieve it by tomorrow…
Tyres **** yeah
Spark plugs **** yeah
Engine **** yeah
Chassis **** yeah
Sponsors ****yeah
Pay drivers um ah **** yeah???”
Speaking of drivers, during the recent test at Barcelona, Red Bull refugees Christian Klien and Vitantonio Liuzzi were the drivers. But there are just 2 of several drivers aiming for the seat, Adrian Sutil and India's Karun Chandhok also hoping for a drive.
Bond Rejects part 2.
As welcome as Marilyn Manson to date your 16 year old daughter is the news of another F1 spy scandal involving McLaren again. Only this time they are the ones that have had data taken from them back in September 2006. This was found out during McLarens own investigations into Stepney-gate. It is reported that up to15 team members at Renault have seen the data that was transferred when engineer Phil Mackareth left McLaren to go to Renault with some floppy disks (what they still exist?) of McLaren data; Renault hired an outside investigation company to look into it as did McLaren, McLaren got their disks back and Flavio gave McLaren’s investigation team permission to go through Renaults computers to look for any McLaren data. They declined to.
Now it has all gone to court and the hearing will take place on December 6th. The FIA has opened up a can of worms it probably regrets. If any engineer that left a team took information in disc, papers, or smoke signals (no idea how that would work) then how many more cases will take place? After all, Newey left McLaren for Red Bull, Mike Gascoyne left Toyota for Spyker, at the end of 2005 20+ aero dynamists, engineers etc left McLaren. One team alone, people move all the time in F1. Now this isn’t like Stepneygate, where two employees of different companies passed on information to the other. It is a case of team members leaving, so again how many more trails will there be?
I would like to take the opportunity now then to congratulate 2008 world Champions Force India, being the only constructor not thrown out. You laugh now…
Testing News November Schumi returns!
 Michael Schumacher had his first competitive drive since retiring from F1 during the 3 day test at Barcelona. He did the first two days and was quickest on both, beating McLarens and both BMW drivers Kubica and Heidfeld. His reasons were half technical feedback for running the car without traction control and half fun. Massa joined the team on the final day and set fastest time of the test, but one thing for sure, Schumi is still quick, wonder if he’s on Brawns shopping list?
This was a major test for the teams who were all running without traction control for the first time to comply with the 2008 regulations, first impressions are positive that it should spice up the action next year, Schumacher preferred the v10 engine however,
“Feels worse than when we last ran without TC, it's not similar; its worse. Because you have different engines compared to that time. Then you had 10-cylinder engines. Then you could change and play with the gears and now you cannot.”
Other testing news was that Force India (f$ck yeah) unveiled their new livery which was mainly white, Honda dropped their planet earth livery and ran a white car, Super Aguri ran with a few new sponsors and was predominantly white, BMW’s also usual white livery. No traction control and no paint other than white. Lets hope someone finds the paint box otherwise 2008 is going to be a bland looking grid.
Honda Signs Brawn as Jenson gives the hurry up.
 Honda proudly announced the signing of former Ferrari technical director Ross Brawn. Brawn spent 2007 on vacation and was generally thought to be returning to Ferrari as team principle taking over from Jean Todt. This didn’t happen though and has instead given himself the challenge of making Honda successful. His reason being that there wasn’t much to do at Ferrari as they were already winning.
"The fact that Ferrari wasn't in crisis made it less attractive to me,"
I’m sure that was a sort of compliment to his former team whilst a frank admission of what lies ahead for him, this year has seen Honda beaten by their B team, Super Aguri. In the 2006 Honda which is never good for publicity. Also Jenson Button also told his team that he wants a competitive car in 2008 or he’s off to find another team.
"The car was a complete dog and I'm just not interested in racing like this anymore”
He told a British news paper, a fair description of the RA107 chassis to say the least, but with Brawn on board now maybe he can hope for a brighter future. Trouble is it usually takes a couple of years for any team to feel the full effect of someone like Brawn (see Red Bull with Adrian Newey) and Button isn’t prepared to wait any longer, though where he would go is a mystery to me, two “Button gate” sagas hardly make him the most appealing driver in the market.
There’s not enough Glock to go round you know.
2007 GP2 champion and former Jordan driver had to wait on the Contract Recognition Board on who he could drive for in 2008. BMW had a test drive deal with him, whilst Toyota are rumoured to want him for a race drive. Toyota lodged their contract with the CRB to establish who had first pickings on Glock, The conflict being on what BMW’s contract states long term. It didn’t take long, however, for the CRB to rule in favour of Toyota, who are rumoured to give him a seat if they don’t get Alonso. Glock scored 2 points on his debut in 2004 and 4 races under his belt.
Some lawyers show up in London, make idiots of themselves, go home.
Thursday 16th November saw McLaren appeal against the stewards’ decision to not penalise BMW or Williams for the cool fuel in Brazil. In the build up to this we heard from McLaren this was nothing to do with winning the title, but it was all about clarification of the rules. Martin Whitmarsh stated,
“'victory', for us, would be a clarification of the rationale behind the FIA Stewards' decision at the 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix - a clarification, indeed, that we regard as essential not only for us but for all our competitors, to enable all teams to race in compliance with the regulation regarding fuel temperatures throughout the 2008 Formula One season.”
Lewis Hamilton who stood the most to gain from this said,
“I don’t want to win the title in court”
So McLaren don’t want the title, they want clarification and nothing more. So no one told McLarens lawyer,
"The principle is clear," he told Reuters, "If there was a breach, it was performance-enhancing. The sanction, I'm afraid, has to be disqualification. I ask you to address this as though it was any team at any stage of the season. Whenever in the past there has been a disqualification, there has been a re-classification... All we ask you to do is what normally happens."
Did you get that? It is about the title McLaren and Lewis said they don’t want,
Between McLaren’s lawyer Mr. Mill and Ferrari’s who was Nigel Tozzi then produced some great comments, firstly Mr. Mill when discussing why both driver and team not just constructor points he said,
"The driver may be entirely innocent... but he has the benefit of the infringing car,"
Excuse me? Did you really say that, maybe he didn’t notice that McLaren was thrown out but the drivers were allowed to race in a car deemed illegal? For all the wrongs of spy-gate some people think nothing should happen, but when the team you’re representing has just escaped that season the same way you’re denying, he did add however,
“It must be right that if the team is disqualified, the driver loses the points as well. In the other case, the drivers were offered immunity if they assisted the FIA."
That other case you refer to did, but there are other cases when this happens, Brazil 1995, and Hungary 2000, With Brazil it was fuel samples and the drivers kept their points, Benetton and Williams didn’t. Hungary Hakkinen kept his points while McLaren lost their due to a missing FIA seal on the cars electric box that was mandatory.
The next top quote came from the Ferrari’s lawyer, who said,
"It would be highly damaging for the sport if the title were to be won this way with the fans probably feeling it was more about grubby manoeuvring by the lawyers than by skill behind the wheel," said Tozzi.
"As McLaren have always said, the championship should be decided on the racetrack and not in the courtroom."
What about the constructors’ championship guys? Remember that? Whilst what is said is true, I just don’t think that McLaren and Ferrari should be commenting on it.
The FIA however threw the case out stating,
“Having heard the explanations of both parties and having examined the various documents and other evidence, the Court decided that the appeal lodged by Vodafone McLaren Mercedes is inadmissible.”
As for the cars, that this actually involved the Williams and BMW’s waited until after the verdict was given the Williams press realise stated,
"Williams F1 today welcomed the findings of the ICA," the team said. "The outcome of the hearing means that the Steward's decision in Brazil in relation to this matter remains in force and valid.
The team did not transgress the regulations, demonstrate any intent or gain any competitive advantage in relation to the management of its race fuels.
In order to respect the Court of Appeal process, Williams has refrained from making any public statement until a conclusion had been reached.”
I like the last part “Williams has refrained from making any public statement until a conclusion has been reached”. Translation “Ferrari and McLaren shut the hell up would you, and let the council do their thing?!” As for BMW there statement read, well nothing. At the time or writing this they haven’t said a word. Maybe that’s a lesson to all of F1. Don’t BS…
This now just leaves one more important story to finish with.
KIMI Raikkonen is 2007 world champion. (Ha... sorry Mclaren/Lewis and Mr. Mill)
Which nobody can change now, no court case can take it away so here’s to you Kimi after a shaky start that had us all wondering where you had gone you’ve come back and shown your still the Flying Finn. I raise my glass of vodka to you well done!
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