Saturday, June 30, 2012

Marussia bringing “first proper wind-tunnel upgrade” | F1 Fanatic round-up

Marussia bringing “first proper wind-tunnel upgrade” is an original article from F1 Fanatic. If this article has been published anywhere other than F1 Fanatic it is an infringement of copyright.

Timo Glock, Marussia, Valencia, 2012In the round-up: Marussia are bringing a major upgrade package for the British Grand Prix, which was designed with the benefit of a wind tunnel.

Links

Top F1 links from the past 24 hours:

Home asphalt (Marussia)

John Booth: “We have a fairly significant upgrade for this race, comprising a new rear wing, exhausts, floor and side pods. I would have to describe this as our ‘first proper wind-tunnel generated upgrade of the season’; we’ve had some smaller parts in Malaysia and China, and a few small iterations recently, but this is the first fully developed package that is not just a modification of existing elements.”

Hamilton still battling for title (The Telegraph)

“It doesn’t really alter the way I go racing because I race to win, and that’s what I’ll be doing, especially at my home Grand Prix. And we can still compete for the championship. I feel what happened is just a blip in what can be a great year.”

Glass Half Full For Horner, Red Bull (Speed)

Christian Horner: “We effectively ran Mark [Webber's] race in reverse, so we started on the hard [tyres]. He had two new sets of option tyres available to him. We wanted to make use of those in the back end of the race. He was unlucky not to get [Michael] Schumacher at the stop, and then he really made use of those tires as others ran into trouble. Given a few more laps, we were looking like a Montreal situation.”

Daniel Ricciardo – street fighting man (Toro Rosso)

“To be honest you really don’t pay too much attention to reputation when you’re in that sort of situation. When you’re out there it doesn’t matter who it is you’re racing. You see a car: you try to attack or defend. Beyond that you really don’t take too much notice. It was a good little fight though, taking those guys on.”

London Grand Prix: The £35m fantasy stoked up by an under-fire Ecclestone (Daily Mail)

“What better way to divert attention away from a rather damaging £28m tax inquiry than to lend his support to a £35m London Grand Prix.”

Ecclestone backs Grand Prix on the moon (Sniff Petrol, satire)

“When asked if in fact he was endorsing a shallow publicity stunt to distract from the bribery allegations levelled at him, Mr Ecclestone was less forthcoming.”

InDetail: Williams FW34 (ScarbsF1)

“Firstly notice how the step in the nose is very abrupt, the 12cm area to merge the nose into the step does not appear to have been exploited, leading to this sharp step. From this angle we can also see why teams want the chassis as high as possible; the space below the raised chassis creates the least obstruction for the airflow passing through the front wheels and onwards towards the diffuser.”

Toto Wolff: The return of Williams (Autosport, subscription required)

“[The 2011 season] was very hard, because on the one side the company was doing OK commercially, but on the other side you had these awful weekends. From a commercial sense and a business view the company is doing very well. It makes a lot of sense to be there from the pure perspective of an investor.”

European Grand Prix video edit (F1)

Highlights from the last race, including a highly frustrated Heikki Kovalainen.

Giuseppe ‘Nino’ Farina: the man who set the ball rolling (The Formula 1 Formula)

“By today’s racing climate many would have thought Nino was too old to be starting in F1, at the time of his first race he was 43, but in the days of fifties racing when fatalities were common and the machinery regularly broke experience was a very important trait, and Farina had it in droves, he’d won his first major race in 1940 in Libya and was even a doctor of engineering.”

Comment of the day

Yesterday’s comment of the day on the subject of grid girls and grid guys inspired considerable debate. Here’s Tim Katz’s view:

As an openly homosexual man (gay, queer, poof – whatever you like), grid guys would be just as offensive to me. It’s the objectivisation of a human being that gets me down; the expectation that some kind of titillation or desire response can be elicited by the display of an attractive body in a totally irrelevant situation.

Sexual response has got nothing to do with racing. Racing has got nothing to do with sexual stimulation. Don’t try and create a response from irrelevant stimuli.

Grid candy (male or female) is as relevant to a grid of racing cars as a display of beautiful food would be to a football match.

And anyway, how many grid guys would you include with the girls – 50%? One in ten?
Tim Katz

From the forum

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday to Rhys!

If you want a birthday shout-out tell us when yours is by emailling me, using Twitter or adding to the list here.

On this day in F1

Happy birthday to former F1 driver Ralf Schumacher who’s 37 today. Unlike his brother, he insists he is not considering a comeback.

Image © Marussia

Marussia bringing “first proper wind-tunnel upgrade” is an original article from F1 Fanatic. If this article has been published anywhere other than F1 Fanatic it is an infringement of copyright.


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Gerhard Boll Jacques Bolle

Thursday Summary at Assen: It’s Not As Close As It Looks

The times were close after the first day of practice, closer than they have been for a very long time. Just 0.471 seconds separates the top 11 MotoGP prototypes (Karel Abraham is barely fit enough to ride, after breaking fingers in his left hand, and is way off the pace), with Ben Spies leading Cal Crutchlow by just 0.006, just a tenth separating Nicky Hayden in 3rd from Dani Pedrosa in 6th, and less than ...

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/AsphaltandRubber/~3/wJIyp9lTUnE/

Rudy Allison Pedro Alvarez

2012 Aragon WSBK FP2 Results: Biaggi Tops Practice Again

Max Biaggi set an early fast lap alongside his Aprilia team mate Eugene Laverty but Tom Sykes split the pair at the flag. Marco Melandri is fastest BMW and Jonathan Rea finally puts in a decent time ahead of Leon Haslam.

The Ducatis of Davide Giugliano and Carlos Checa have also gathered some pace in time for Superpole.

Results:

Race Details
Round Number: 
8
2012

read more


Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MotoGPMatters/~3/j84eV9-pABw/2012_aragon_wsbk_fp2_results_biaggi_tops.html

Christian Boudinot Roy Boughey 

Three cars, 18 tyres: F1 six-wheelers at Goodwood | 2012 Goodwood Festival of Speed

Three cars, 18 tyres: F1 six-wheelers at Goodwood is an original article from F1 Fanatic. If this article has been published anywhere other than F1 Fanatic it is an infringement of copyright.

March 2-4-0, Goodwood, 2012

There’s a trio of especially unusual F1 cars on display at this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed. They all have one thing in common – or, rather, two things: a pair of extra wheels.

The Tyrrell P34, Williams FW08D and March 2-4-0 are among the few F1 cars ever to be built with six wheels.

Tyrrell P34, Goodwood, 2012Of the trio, the Tyrrell was the only one which was ever raced. It was also unusual in that it had its extra pair of tiny wheels at the front of the car.

Tyrrell campaigned the P34 in 1976 and 1977. Although driver Jody Scheckter never liked the car, he did score its sole win in the 1976 Swedish Grand Prix at Anderstorp. He took over the lead when Mario Andretti’s Lotus failed and led home team mate Patrick Depailler for a 12-wheeled one-two.

Tyrrell dropped the P34 after 1977, partly because of difficulty obtaining suitable tyres for the four tiny front wheels that were of similar specification to the latest rubber available to teams with conventional cars.

In its final race, the 1977 Japanese Grand Prix, Depailler finished third but team mate Ronnie Peterson was involved in a terrible crash with Gilles Villeneuve which killed two spectators.

Late in 1976 March seized on the six-wheeled concept but put the extra tyres at the back of the car, intending to improve traction. The resulting car, dubbed the 2-4-0, was tested by Howden Ganley.

A shortage of funds meant March never raced the car in Formula 1, but it did compete successfully in hillclimbs. The 2-4-0 is the only one of the trio being driven up the hill this weekend.

At least one other team experimented with a six-wheeled configuration around this time. In 1977 Ferrari bolted two pairs of front wheels onto either side of the rear axle of one of its F1 cars, calling it the 312T6, but never raced it.

Niki Lauda and Carlos Reutemann tested the car. The latter crashed it at Fiorano, the car bursting into flames. The design was most likely an exercise to evaluate the viability of the concept – in the configuration it was built it likely would have exceeded the maximum width restriction introduced in 1976.

Williams FW08C, Goodwood, 2012Williams seized on the ‘four at the rear’ idea and built two six-wheelers along these lines in the early eighties.

The first was based on the FW07 and the second, the FW08B, set some impressive times in testing. The team intended to race it in 1983 but the FIA introduced rules banning six-wheelers ahead of the season.

That the configuration is no longer allowed is probably for the best: having two extra tyres to contend with would reduce McLaren’s chances of completing a successful pit stop to zero.

Read more about these unusual creations here:

Six-wheeled F1 cars at the 2012 Goodwood Festival of Speed

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Goodwood Festival of Speed

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Carlo Bellotti Jean Pierre Beltoise