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Archive: Damon Hill

Bluffer's guide — Part 3: teams and drivers

15 June 2008 21:07

At last, bluffer’s guide makes its return. For the past couple of months I’ve been too busy to continue the series, but now I have some more free time. Previous bluffer’s guides have looked at the rules and aspects of strategy. This guide will look at issues around teams and drivers: how they enter, why they enter and what their job is.

Entry requirements

At present there are ten constructors (the posh word for teams) in Formula 1. Each team enters two cars, meaning that 20 cars are entered into each event. There is nothing set in stone about these numbers. It is thought that according to the Concorde Agreement (which will be covered in a future bluffer’s guide) a minimum of 20 may enter. According to the FIA Sporting Regulations, a maximum of 24 cars may start a race.

Teams normally stick with the same two drivers throughout the season. However they may use up to four different drivers in one season, or more at the FIA’s approval.

In addition to the two race drivers, every team employs test drivers. These test drivers may be used during the Friday Practice sessions, although each team is still limited to running two cars. For this reason, teams tend to use their race drivers anyway.

A driver must be awarded an FIA Super License before he may compete in Formula 1. To achieve this, a driver must show consistent form in a lower category. Failing that, a driver may get a Super License with the unanimous approval of… whoever makes that decision — provided he has tested for at least 300km at racing speeds in a current car.

This is basically to prevent rubbish but rich drivers from paying loads of money to achieve his childhood dream of entering a Grand Prix. However, it hasn’t stopped the occasional bad egg from slipping through the net!

The decision to enter

Unlike some other sports, there is no promotion or relegation in F1. The decision to enter Formula 1 is essentially little more than a business decision. Once a team has met the FIA’s requirements, all a team has to do is be able to fund itself in order to keep going.

The huge costs involved in running an F1 team are enough to keep the list of potential entrants low. There is space for 12 teams in the Championship and only ten of them are taken. One of those teams is currently up for sale. There is little point in setting up a new team if you can easily buy an existing one.

This season began with 11 constructors. But when Super Aguri ran out of funding it had to pull out.

Similarly, drivers have few requirements to meet. They must have a Super License (as outlined in the section above). But apart from that, all they have to do to get a drive is basically to persuade a team to give them a drive.

This does not depend on talent alone, although that is of course a huge factor. Many drivers get a slot at a poorly-funded team by bringing sponsorship money. Such drivers are known as ‘pay drivers’ because they effectively pay for their drive at a team.

Some pay drivers have gone down in history as being notoriously awful. Ricardo Rosset had lots of cash as he was the heir to an underwear business. Fittingly enough, his performances in F1 were, indeed, pants.

The 2008 season is said to be the first year for a very long time (perhaps ever) when the grid did not contain any pay drivers. However, it is also thought that Nelsinho Piquet and Adrian Sutil bring substantial sponsorship moneys to their respective teams.

A team sport or an individual sport?

Formula 1 (along with most other forms of motor racing) is rather unique among sports because it is both a team sport and an individual sport. A good driver would be nowhere were it not for a team of hundreds working tirelessly to provide him with a good car. On the day of the race, an army of people analyse the race as it happens to try and come up with the best strategy for the conditions. And the efforts of the pit crew cannot go unnoticed, as they must be relied upon to ensure that pitstops are carried out smoothly.

In this sense, you can say that Formula 1 is a team sport, but one that places a huge amount of the responsibility on one individual. Once the driver is on the track, there is not much more the team can do to help him, and it is up to the driver not to make a mistake. For this reason, there are two championships in F1 — one for drivers and one for constructors.

Each team enters two drivers and these are often referred to as “team mates”. However, often there is nothing “matey” about the relationship between these two individuals. Indeed, they might hate each other because the one person they want to beat more than anyone else is their team mate, who is usually racing with equal equipment. Comparing team mates with each other is an important barometer of a driver’s skill, so it is usually in a driver’s interest to undermine his team mate.

However, pragmatically a driver has to remember that he is an employee of his team. If a team decides that it is in their best interests to help one driver more than another, they are within their rights to do this. This is known as “team orders” and is part of racing. (Team orders will be discussed in more detail in a future bluffer’s guide.)

Testing

Teams spend a lot of time testing their cars to make sure that their developments work properly before racing with them. Such tests must be held at an FIA-sanctioned circuit. Testing is limited to 30,000km per team per calendar year. This limit excludes promotional events and young driver training. A young driver is defined as a driver who has not competed in a Formula 1 event for 24 months or has not tested an F1 car for more than four days in the past 24 months.

Teams often employ test drivers whose specific job is to test the car. Often race drivers are used at test sessions in addition to test drivers. Some drivers become highly regarded for their ability to give feedback to their engineers and for their knowledge of how to set up a car. Examples of such drivers include Pedro de la Rosa, Alexander Wurz and Anthony Davidson. These drivers are all highly regarded as test drivers but struggle to get a race drive.

Car development

F1 teams do not just launch a car at the beginning of the season and race with it all year. Teams work throughout the year to improve their performance and developments are made to the cars several times per year as the teams see fit. In most cases, the car at the end of the season is completely different to the car that began the season. Check out Formula1.com’s excellent technical section to keep up with the main car developments throughout the year.

Logically, though, the largest leaps are made over the winter when there is no racing going on. Usually each car is an evolution of the previous year’s car. Sometimes cars are re-designed almost from the ground up each year. This used to happen fairly often, but is increasingly rare these days — unless a team hires a new chief aerodynamicist or some other radical team structural change.

Every time there is a major change to a chassis, its name changes. Usually the name changes in a predictable way for the start of each season. For instance, in 2007 Ferrari’s chassis was the F2007 and McLaren’s was the MP4-22. This year those teams’ chassis are the F2008 and the MP4-23 respectively.

Of course, there’s nothing to stop a team from using the same chassis for two years in a row (although this usually doesn’t happen because the pace of development is such that running a two year old chassis would be a serious disadvantage to any team) or from running two different chassis in one season — just as long, of course, as the chassis met the technical regulations. It is quite common for a team to use their old chassis for the first few races of the year if the development of the new car has been delayed for some reason. This happened to Toro Rosso this year, whose new STR3 was not used until the Monaco Grand Prix, six races into the season.

Liveries

Historically, teams ran traditional liveries with each nationality having a traditional colour. Britain, of course, had British Racing Green, and Italian cars ran in the deep scarlet colour (‘Rosso Corsa’) made so famous by Ferrari. Of course, with the introduction of sponsorship in the late 1960s, this was never going to last and now teams appear in whatever colours take their fancy. But is it true that F1 cars are “glorified cigarette packets”?

The arrival of sponsorship does not mean that the history has gone forever. McLaren (Mercedes) run with a predominantly silver livery and red car numbers, a reflection of the Silver Arrows’ history. BMW run with their corporate colours of navy blue, though the majority of the car is white, Germany’s traditional racing colour.

Honda and Toyota have also run in Japan’s traditional white and red (although today Honda runs in a white, green and blue ‘Earth’ car to highlight environmental concerns). When tobacco sponsorship was still allowed in F1, Honda cleverly used the Lucky Strike logo to double up as the traditional ‘red sun’. Ferrari, of course, are famous for running their traditional ‘Rosso Corsa’ colour. However, in recent years this shade has become lighter, more similar to the shade of red used in Marlboro packets (Phillip Morris still heavily fund Ferrari even though tobacco sponsorship technically does not exist in F1).

Ligier / Prost used blue until the team’s demise in 2002. When Jaguar briefly participated in F1 at the start of this decade, it ran in a deep green. However, it was slightly lighter than British Racing Green, apparently to make sponsor logos stand out better on television. The team that Jaguar bought, the (Ford-powered) Stewart team ran in white and blue, the American racing colours.

Of course, there is nothing in F1′s rules that dictates that teams should use traditional colours. These rules were relaxed in 1970. But clearly many F1 teams still value their heritage enough to run colour schemes that are inspired by history.

Some aspects of the livery are restricted though. The two cars of each team must look “substantially” similar at every event in a year. In 1999, the new BAR team (owned by British American Tobacco) wanted to advertise two of its cigarette brands, one on each car. However, the FIA would not be moved. BAR’s compromise was to advertise one brand along the left side of the car and a different brand on the right. The resulting livery was a real mess and widely derided. From 2000 onwards, BAR’s ditched the ‘dual livery’ scheme.

Each car must display the badge of the car make on the front of the car. The name and national flag of the driver should be displayed on the side (usually just behind the driver’s helmet on the engine cover). The car number should also be visible from the front and the side. However, many spectators complain that the numbers are so small that you cannot see them.

Nowadays, a different way of telling apart the two cars of each team is to look at the ‘T-cam’ (the onboard camera that appears on top of the rollover structure just above and behind the driver’s head). For the lead driver, this is a fluorescent red. For a team’s second driver, it is fluorescent yellow.

Of course, another way to tell drivers apart is to look at their helmets. Traditionally, drivers design their own helmets although these days they are covered in sponsor logos just like the cars are. A good helmet design can become as famous as a historic car livery. Just think of Ayrton Senna’s yellow helmet, Graham Hill’s deep blue helmet with white tabs around the top (an adaptation of a London Rowing Club design, and also used by Graham’s son Damon) or Jackie Stewart’s white helmet with a tartan band around the top.

Car numbers

A minor, but interesting, point is how car numbers are allocated. Car numbers are published by the FIA before the start of each season and remain the same all season.

The current World Champion always races with the number 1. His team mate is allocated number 2. In instances when the World Champion is not participating in the race, it is probable that the Constructors Champion would use the numbers 0 and 2.

Under the old system of allocating car numbers (which ran until 1995), this happened in 1993 and 1994 when Damon Hill ran with the number 0 for two years running. The first time was because of the retirement of Nigel Mansell and the second time was due to the retirement of Alain Prost.

After the numbers 1 (or 0) and 2 are allocated, the following numbers are allocated according to the finishing position in the previous year’s Constructors Championship. So, ignoring the Constructor bearing numbers 1 (or 0) and 2, the highest-scoring constructor will carry the numbers 3 and 4, the next highest-scoring will carry the numbers 5 and 6, and so on. The number 13 is skipped for unclear reasons, though it’s safe to assume that this is due to superstition.

Not all superstitious numbers are removed though. In 2005 Japanese driver Takuma Sato was allocated the number 4 which is an unlucky number in Japanese culture (ominously being closely associated with death). True enough, his season was riddled with bad luck and strange mistakes.

This season McLaren are racing with the numbers 22 and 23 because they were excluded from last year’s Constructors Championship. Super Aguri were allocated numbers 20 and 21. Although Super Aguri no longer participates in F1, McLaren’s numbers remain 22 and 23 for consistency throughout the season.

7 comments

BMW Sauber grab historic 1-2 while Hamilton slips up

8 June 2008 21:53

Categories: Report

Wow, what another incredible race! This year’s Canadian Grand Prix was always going to be exciting. The Circuit Gilles Villeneuve usually provides excitement and unpredictability and pre-race reports of the possibility of rain threatened to add even more uncertainty into the mix. Then when the circuit started breaking up even more than normal during qualifying, another element of chance was added.

Well, the Canadian Grand Prix was highly exciting — but not, as it turned out, for the reasons expected. As the race drew nearer predictions for rain became vaguer and in the end it was not a threat. And overnight repairs to the circuit appear to have done the trick — the repaired tarmac held up better during the race than it did for the qualifying sessions.

But you can always rely on the tough pseudo-street circuit to throw the cards in the air. The barriers are almost as close as Monaco, but the Montreal circuit is much faster. This means carnage, safety cars and above all it means you need to skill to win the race.

Lewis Hamilton showed he does not have this skill — not this time round. He was mesmerising during qualifying, but a schoolboy error put paid to his hopes to repeat the feat this year. Pitting during the safety car period, Hamilton failed to notice that the red light was on at the end of the pitlane. While Kimi Räikkönen and Robert Kubica waited diligently for the light to turn green, Hamilton just ploughed straight into the back of the red car.

Nico Rosberg wasn’t much better, as in turn he hit Hamilton on the rear for good measure. The damage to Hamilton and Räikkönen’s cars was extensive enough to end their races immediately. As the pair climbed out of their cars, Hamilton looked sheepish and turned away from Räikkönen to avoid the inevitable ear-bashing. No so easy Lewis — Räikkönen tapped him on the shoulder so that Hamilton could not avoid paying attention. The Finn wagged his finger like a school teacher. Even with their helmets on, the emotions were clear to see from their body language.

Some will say that this is payback for Räikkönen taking out Sutil in Monaco. Indeed, what goes around comes around. Now all we need is for someone to ride up Hamilton’s jacksy for things to really even out…

Hamilton’s many supporters quickly began to complain about the rules surrounding the red light at the end of the pitlane, but this is no excuse. The red light is not a new rule. Pitlanes have always had red lights at the end — certainly for as long as I can remember, and probably for a much longer time than that. There is a very sensible reason for that.

The fact is that a safety car period means that there should be no overtaking on the race track. You can’t have cars re-joining the field in the middle of the queue because of the confusion it would cause. Where in the queue to re-join? It’s like barging your way to the front of the queue at the post office: it’s just not on. Plus, such an eventuality would lead inescapably to overtaking — therefore racing — taking place. You simply can’t have cars re-joining the middle of the train during a safety car period.

Hamilton should know the rules. He does know the rules. He was just too late to notice the red light. That means game over. It is now up to the stewards to decide if he will be penalised for ending Räikkönen’s race. The three protagonists in the pile-up — Hamilton, Räikkönen and Rosberg — are being investigated by the stewards as we speak and we await their decision. My gut instinct is that if that was a Piquet Jnr or a Nakajima that ploughed into the back of the World Champion in the pitlane, that young driver would be facing a ban.

(Update: It has been announced that both Hamilton and Rosberg will face a 10-place grid penalty at the next Grand Prix in France.)

It could all have been so very different. Sitting next to Räikkönen at the end of the pitlane waiting for the lights to change was Robert Kubica. In a parallel universe, Hamilton would have ploughed into the back of Kubica. In this instance, the luck went the Pole’s way. It’s a classic Montreal win — get a bit of luck, then use your skill to capitalise on it.

Robert Kubica certainly has the skill. He had plenty to deal with during the race. Being among the first to stop during the first Safety Car period, meaning that he had to trundle around in the midfield. He spent a portion of the race being held up by a Toro Rosso. He was the leading driver of those who had made a stop, but it was beginning to look like Nick Heidfeld had the upper hand up front. The German had pulled out enough of a lead to make a pit stop and still come out ahead of Kubica.

However, Heidfeld was on a one-stop strategy and was advised by his team to let through the lighter Kubica, who would need to make an extra pitstop. The race became a classic battle of pitstop strategies: the one-stopping but heavier Heidfeld and the two-stopping but nimbler Kubica.

It was tough for Heidfeld to keep his patience while his team mate steamed into the lead. At one point he got sucked into a battle with the (probably two-stopping) Alonso, when in reality the pair weren’t really racing at all. His engineer wisely advised Heidfeld to forget Alonso and let him past in an attempt to ultimately save him time.

In the end, Kubica had the speed to capitalise on the situation. When it was time for Kubica to make his second pitstop, he was over 25 seconds ahead of his team mate — enough to retain his on-track advantage. He would go on to take the win.

The victory is historic for a number of reasons. Firstly, Robert Kubica is the first Polish driver ever to stand on the top step of the podium. For this, he must be immensely proud.

This is also BMW’s first ever win as a constructor (although the won races in the past with Williams as an engine supplier). And of course, the BMW team has grown out of the Sauber F1 team. It is worth remembering that, despite the temptation to shorten the team’s name to ‘BMW’, officially this is still ‘BMW Sauber’. I did not find Sauber to be very likeable, but under the guidance of BMW and Mario Theissen, I now have an immense amount of respect for the team.

So a first-ever win for BMW and a first-ever win for Sauber. And for that win to be a 1-2 as well makes the victory sweeter. It’s the first time a team’s first win has been a 1-2 as well for ten years. Jordan did it way back in the 1998 Belgian Grand Prix with Damon Hill and Ralf Schumacher.

This is a signal that BMW mean business. McLaren may have laughed off the possibility that they could sustain the pace of development across the entire season, but commendably BMW have got on with the job and come up with the goods. You can’t ask for more than a 1-2, and BMW have provided it. It is a testament to the leadership of Mario Theissen and the great driving skills of Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld.

I can’t help but be reminded of the steady progress that Renault made with Fernando Alonso. Renault’s performances improved throughout 2003 until that first win came. In 2004 some another win came along with more strong race showings. Then in 2005 and 2006 back-to-back World Championships came. Can BMW repeat the feat? I wouldn’t bet against it.

Just as Alonso led the charge for Renault, Kubica is the promising young star who is threatening the big guns. I wouldn’t say that this win was overdue. But we certainly knew it was coming. And for that first win to come at the scene of his horrendous accident last year — one of the most violent-looking accidents I can ever recall seeing — speaks volumes about the man’s positive character, mindset and approach. Is Robert Kubica a future World Champion? Put it this way: I’m excited for him in the same way as I was excited for Alonso about five years ago.

But does this mean that Nick Heidfeld is the tired, past-it, lost talent that Trulli represented in the Renault days? I am a big fan of Quick Nick. But this season he has just not been on it at all. Perhaps the car doesn’t suit him.

Whatever the problem with Heidfeld is, by anyone’s book 2nd place ought to be a reassertion of his authority. However, Nick Heidfeld looked thoroughly dejected in parc fermé. No doubt he feels that the win should have been his had he been able to hold up Kubica during the race as he perhaps feels he had the right to. All I can say is, Kubica had the speed to win the race and Heidfeld didn’t. The decision to let Kubica pass was the only sensible decision for the team to make. In the end the race was won on raw pace, and Kubica had it while Heidfeld didn’t.

Nonetheless, 2nd place represents a titanic effort from Heidfeld. Yes, he had a bit of luck. But he still had to wring the performance out of his car to take the advantage. He started from 8th on the grid, which is the kind of performance we have come to expect from Heidfeld this season. But today he came alive and played a vital part in BMW’s maiden 1-2. He should be proud, not dejected.

And, as he pointed out in the press conference, Heidfeld has played a major part in the development of the BMW Sauber team. He has been there with BMW since the start of the BMW-Sauber relationship. He raced with BMW engines when he was at Williams. And before that he spent a number of years at Sauber. Heidfeld can be happy with the doubtlessly valuable input he has provided the BMW Sauber team over the years, and today was payback day. Hopefully one day soon — as much as I am a huge fan of Kubica — it will be Heidfeld on the top step of the podium in navy blue and white overalls.

My race report will be continued tomorrow.

4 comments

The Time in a Shed theory

10 April 2008 19:04

Categories: History, Opinion

In the post I wrote about Lewis Hamilton a couple of days ago, there was an interesting tangential discussion in the comments that I would like to share on the front page. Kathryn S suggested that one of the reasons Lewis Hamilton may be struggling now is that he hasn’t spent enough time in a “shed” of a car:

I think there is something very educational about driving, what I believe Mark Webber once referred to as, a shed around for at least your rookie year in F1. How do you hone skills in a beautifully balanced car? I can only imagine a great driver who learns how to unlock performance from a “dog” car can transfer those skills to even get better performance from a great car. I’ve heard people comment that Lewis has only driven the top cars on the grid for many, many years. Maybe the result of that is what we’re seeing now.

A few other people, including myself, ran with the concept. When you look back through the list of recent World Champions, few of them started their careers in a car that was as good as the McLaren MP4-22. Here is a list of recent World Champions and the team with which they made their début.

Thanks go to 4u1e for building parts of this list.

Kimi Räikkönen — Sauber in the midfield
Fernando Alonso — tail-enders Minardi, then moved to Renault when they were in the midfield
Michael Schumacher — tail-enders Jordan, then moved to Benetton when they were in the midfield
Mika Häkkinen — tail-enders Lotus, then moved to McLaren while they were in a slump
Jacques Villeneuve — the one anomaly, began his career in the dominant Williams
Damon Hill — the lacklustre Brabham team
Alain Prost — McLaren in a slump
Nigel Mansell — Lotus in a slump
Ayrton Senna — midfield Toleman
Nelson Piquet — started off in an Ensign for one race then a privately-entered McLaren
Keke Rosberg — “a variety of complete dogs”

This is by no means scientific. For one thing, we haven’t seen how common it is for World Champions to start their careers in a top car throughout history. This list only goes back roughly to the start of the 1980s.

Another point is that we are ignoring part of Kathryn’s original hypothesis which was that Lewis Hamilton has driven the top car throughout his entire motor racing career. Looking at the start of a driver’s F1 career is only the tip of the iceberg. What cars did these people drive in lower formulae?

Another point that goes against the “Time in a Shed” theory (as Pecker coined it) is the fact that top teams seldom hire rookies anyway! When have, say, Ferrari ever given a race seat to a rookie driver? I can’t think of an instance since I started watching F1 in the mid-1990s.

Even if, say, Fernando Alonso was the perfect driver when he first entered an F1 race in 2001, the chances that Benetton / Renault (or, indeed, Ferrari) would have hired him are very slim indeed. In fact, since Alonso was one of the Flav’s drivers, this is effectively what Benetton / Renault did — give Alonso some experience in a Minardi, out of harm’s way, before committing fully.

Nonetheless, it is an interesting theory to think about. If Hamilton has never learnt how to get good results out of a bad car, can he be getting the maximum out of a good car or a mediocre car?

9 comments

The Max Mosley allegations

31 March 2008 01:00

Categories: News, Opinion

It cannot have escaped your attention that yesterday The News of the World ran an extraordinary story about the FIA President Max Mosley. The paper has alleged that Mosley was involved in a “sick Nazi orgy with 5 hookers”. If the allegations are true, it could have big consequences in the political world of F1.

Like many F1 fans I am no fan of Mosley. Many have pointed out that there will be a fair few people — Jackie Stewart, Ron Dennis, Damon Hill, Martin Brundle — who must have been chuckling to themselves as they read the story. I chuckled as well. I would dearly love to see Max Mosley leave the FIA Presidency for any reason, and this looks like a pretty good opportunity.

Then again, what Max Mosley does in his private life should remain private. He is entitled to have whatever sex life he wants among consenting adults. I am not a fan of the News of the World brand of journalism which mainly involves secretly prowling around people’s bedrooms, where journalists really shouldn’t be.

Nevertheless, the “Nazi” connotations really take these allegations over the top. My impression is that the Nazi element of the story has probably been exaggerated by the News of the World. We all know how the whiff of Hitler sells papers. And Max Mosley’s connections with fascism are well-known and have not been hidden. He is the son of Oswald Mosley, Britain’s most infamous fascist. It is not too hard to imagine someone in the towers of News International concocting this story. The allegations are almost cartoon-like in their extremity.

It is useful to point out here that Max Mosley is apparently engaged in legal action with another News International newspaper, The Sunday Times, over an article written by Martin Brundle. So News International has an interest in undermining Mosley.

Nevertheless, there is seemingly damning video evidence. The footage is blurry and at no point do you get a truly clear view of “Max Mosley’s” face. The stills on the News of the World website are more convincing. But it wouldn’t be the first time a tabloid newspaper has faked such a video.

Nonetheless, the allegations in themselves are damaging to Mosley’s credibility. While everyone has the right to a private sex life, making light of Nazism and concentration camp victims in this way is rather different. A lot of people will be ready to make a connection with Mosley’s autocratic approach to ruling F1. Then there is the suggestion that the FIA is increasingly filled with Mosley lackeys and yes-men suppressing debate.

What is interesting is the fact that so few news outlets are covering this story. As F1Fanatic points out, the fact that so few dedicated Formula 1 websites are even mentioning this story is telling in itself. There has been not a peep on this massive F1 story from any of the biggest F1 websites. Look on Autosport, Pitpass, Grandprix.com, Planet-F1, ITV-F1, Crash.net — you’ll draw a blank.

This is becoming an all-too familiar reality. Remember last year when the FIA failed to properly censor sensitive documents? Not a peep from any of those websites either.

Mosley effectively controls the F1 media, even “independent” websites such as Pitpass. This is yet another reason why the F1 blogs and podcasts are becoming more important than the mainstream media. We do not need to bend over backwards to please the powers-that-be to get accreditation or even avoid an ear bashing.

The media should be able to stand up to Max Mosley’s bullying attitude. The fact that they don’t even appear to attempt to counter it any more makes me despair. The sooner Mosley is gone, the better. And if it takes a sex scandal to do it, then so be it.

17 comments

Why F1 is in such a mess

6 October 2007 15:37

Categories: Current affairs, Entertainment, Formula 1, Newspapers, Politics, Radio, Television

Despite what I have written about Lewis Hamilton’s actions behind the Safety Car over the past couple of days, I think the FIA’s decision was the correct one (it’s not often I say that!). Hamilton broke the rules, but it was not the sort of thing that merited a serious punishment. A slap on the wrists or a fine perhaps, but not points deductions or anything like that.

But I don’t like the implication from the biased British media that Hamilton was found “not guilty”. Remember that Sebastian Vettel’s punishment was taken away from him. There has only been one major piece of new evidence since Sunday, and we all know what that shows.

Of course, the British media is absolutely unbearable when it comes to this sort of thing. Mark Blundell was on ITV this morning criticising the fact that the stewards have never driven a Grand Prix car before, so they’re bound not to know what it’s like. That’s funny, I don’t remember him making such a criticism before, but there you go.

It’s also quite amusing because Blundell would know a lot about not being qualified for your job. He is, after all, a broadcaster who has a shockingly poor grasp of the English language.

Funny also how all of the other Grand Prix drivers seem to have been criticising Hamilton as well. Mark Blundell conveniently ignored this point. After being grilled by his colleagues, Hamilton said:

It was a bit disappointing because I knew a few of the drivers there and I didn’t expect them to say certain things.

Perhaps it’s time to admit when you are in the wrong.

In a way, the FIA couldn’t really have risked giving Hamilton a larger penalty because they would have been accused of manipulating the championship. It’s a sign of the sorry state of affairs that the FIA has found itself in. It is constantly being accused of bias one way or another and of manipulating this and that.

There are a few measures that I would like to see the FIA bring in to help prevent this.

When the race result is announced, it should not be changed

I think there should be a time limit on when the race result can be changed. This is not to say that teams should not be able to appeal or that stewards should be unable to punish bad driving. But there should be a time limit for when a team can appeal a result. Something like six hours for instance. This does not even necessarily mean that the result has to be set in stone — just that we know what is going on. For a race result to come under question several days after the event is simply unacceptable.
(This would be the case for drivers breaking the rules, but should be different in case a car is found to be illegal. But illegal parts on a car ought to be caught during scrutineering anyway.)
Stewards in one race should not rule on something that happened in another race

For the second time this year, the stewards have found themselves ruling on something that happened in another race. This week the Chinese GP stewards had to discuss something which had already been discussed by the Japanese stewards. This is not on really. It is like a referee at a football match giving someone a yellow card for something a footballer did in his previous match.
Make penalties more sensible and predictable

Whenever somebody is in trouble, you simply do not know what kind of punishment they are going to get. I once saw somebody referring to ‘The FIA Random Penalty Generator’ and it really is true. Disqualification? 10 place grid penalty? Drive through penalty? Start the race from the pits? Points docked? Seconds added to your time? We just don’t know which of these punishments will be used at a particular time. The stewards appear to award penalties in a completely arbitrary manner. It is no wonder people wonder about possible FIA bias. This must be sorted out, as a matter of priority.

What happened during the Japanese Grand Prix is actually a good case in point. Robert Kubica was given a drive-through penalty for being involved in an accident with Lewis Hamilton. Now, Kubica’s move was quite ambitious and he was unlikely to be able to pull it off, but did it really merit a drive-through? After all, other drivers crash into each other all the time and never get so much as a slap on the wrists. It’s kind of seen as part of the territory of motor racing.

You have to wonder when Fernando Alonso got whacked pretty hard by Sebastian Vettel. Unlike Hamilton, Alonso sustained quite bad damage to his car. Did Vettel get punished? Of course not — the FIA is biased against Alonso and in favour of Hamilton.

I know some people don’t believe me when I say that the FIA is biased in favour of Hamilton and that he is the successor to Michael Schumacher in this regard. To me, it is clear in the FIA’s eyes that the departure of Schumacher has left a void, and they have decided that Wonder Boy Britain’s Lewis Hamilton shall fill that void. (I believe it is actually illegal to say ‘Lewis Hamilton’ without prefixing it with ‘Britain’s’.)

There is a resentment about the fact that Alonso was able to beat Michael Schumacher fair and square, when Schumacher had no excuses. Alonso is the only driver ever to have managed this (apart from possibly Mika Häkkinen, and he only did it once, not twice like Alonso did).

But don’t ask me if the F1 establishment favours Hamilton. Ask the F1 establishment itself.

Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone has hailed Lewis Hamilton as the saviour of the sport…

“Lewis Hamilton has been a real breath of fresh air and has resurrected Formula One,” Britain’s Guardian newspaper quoted commercial rights holder Ecclestone, who is not in Shanghai, as saying…

“We lost a big hero in Michael Schumacher but in Lewis we have another. But for him, I’m not sure where the sport would be heading.”

Straight from the horse’s mouth.

There is no doubt that the mess that the FIA and Formula 1 as a whole currently finds itself in is directly the fault of its power-mad President Max Mosley. A lot of people have been criticising the FIA’s bad management recently (not just the Hamilton investigation, but the bungled email to the teams about tyres at Fuji).

Max Mosley seems to do business on the basis of personal vendettas and the FIA’s institutional pro-Ferrari bias rather than anything to do with notions of fairness or merit. This year’s witch-hunt against McLaren is a case in point — all to do with Max Mosley’s personal dislike of Ron Dennis.

Then there are the extraordinarily offensive comments he made about Jackie Stewart, somebody who had the cheek to criticise the FIA’s handling of the Stepneygate row. Doesn’t he know that people are not allowed to criticise Mosley?

Mosley said: “There’s one particular ex-driver who because he never stops talking, never has the chance to listen — so he doesn’t know what’s going on.

“He said the FIA’s decision would not have worked in a civil court. He has no qualification to say that.

“Then he starts saying this is personal between me and Ron Dennis, at great length, because everything he does is at extreme length.

“It’s annoying that some of the sponsors listen to him because he’s won a few championships. But nobody else in Formula One does — not the teams, not the drivers. He’s a figure of fun among drivers.”

Mosley, presumably alluding to the tartan trousers and cap Stewart wears to races, added: “He goes round dressed up as a 1930s music hall man. He’s a certified halfwit.”

The comment about Jackie Stewart being a “certified halfwit” is seen as a reference to Stewart’s dyslexia. Damon Hill says all that needs to be said in his letter to Autosport magazine.

Update: Pitpass also has a good article on Max Mosley’s comments about Jackie Stewart.

With such contemptuous regard for his fellow inhabitants, one has to wonder what Mosley really feels about the diminutive former second-hand car salesman who not only facilitated his entry to Planet Paddock but has allowed him to enjoy the sort of totalitarian power trip his name prevented him enjoying in the real world.

You don’t often see professional media outlets referring to the fact that Max Mosley is the son of fascist leader Oswald Mosley. Some believe that Max Mosley really wanted a career in politics, but was advised against it due to who is father was. So rather than fucking up the country, Max Mosley decided to go into motor racing politics instead so that he could fuck up motor racing.

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