Yesterday Toyota pulverised the electric car lap record around the legendary Nürburgring Nordschleife with its TMG EV P001 driven by Jochen Krumbach (via Axis of Oversteer). Peugeot’s old record of 9:01.338 is in the bin. The new benchmark is 7:47.794. To put it in perspective, the official lap record for any car round the Nordschleife […]
What do Williams need to change?
Over the past week or so, rumours that big changes are afoot at Williams have been ramping up. Last week when I saw that a German website had written about this, I prepared a simple but telling graph looking at the form of Williams over the years. But I refrained from publishing it in case […]
What might have been for Timo Glock
I wonder what Timo Glock is thinking just now. Following an impressive early career, and after showing flashes of talent at Toyota for two years, Glock faced a difficult decision prior to the 2010 season. Renault or Virgin? Once upon a time it was a tough choice His first option was to take a risk […]
The bad and ugly sides of the new F1 teams
Yesterday, I began looking at this year’s new F1 teams. This was following Ferrari’s controversial blog post and the news surrounding some of the new teams that has dominated the F1 news websites. Yesterday I looked at the good aspect of the process — the relative success of Lotus and Virgin. Today, I turn my […]
The watering down of Formula 1
This week Ferrari caused a ripple when it published a provocative article on its blog, The Horse Whisperer. The final paragraph is worth quoting in full, not only because it makes an interesting point, but because it elegantly quotes Adam Smith. (Motorsport, economics and my home town of Kirkcaldy all in one little paragraph!) This […]
2009 driver rankings: top ten
10. Timo Glock Timo Glock has started to show real signs of improvement this year. While the Toyota team may have bizarrely liked to have criticised Glock for the car’s poor performance, the fact is that Glock put in some great performances in 2009. Particularly notable was his heroic performance in Singapore, where he finished […]
2009 driver rankings: #25-#11
25. Nelsinho Piquet I don’t think there is much need to justify why I have placed Piquet at the bottom of the list. Suffice it to say that I hope he never races competitively again. 24. Sébastien Bourdais Sébastien Bourdais spent the 2008 season explaining that we should wait to judge him until the return […]
Mercedes Schumacher move – crass marketing stunt
After weeks of speculation, it is set to be revealed today that Michael Schumacher has signed a three year deal with for Mercedes. The rumour first surfaced when Eddie Jordan opened his notoriously big mouth. Everyone laughed at the time, but as the weeks went on it became clearer that the prospect was serious. By […]
Au revoir Renault?
On top of the exits of Bridgestone and Toyota came news that Renault had held an emergency board meeting to discuss their future in Formula 1. According to Andrew Benson at the BBC: The French car company was considering whether to remain in the sport with its own team, switch to simply being an engine […]
Sayonara Toyota
The day after Bridgestone announced that they would be leaving Formula 1, it emerged that Toyota were poised to do the same. This was not as much of a shock as Bridgestone’s exit, but it is nonetheless major news. Toyota are the third major manufacturer to leave F1 in just twelve months, and now rumours […]