Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Those of you who have followed my blog will know my views on the English Autosport weekly magazine as the best there is. It turned 60 this week, nearly as old as me, and celebrates with a whopping 330 page issue looking back on those 60 years, the cars, the drivers and the tracks. It is a keeper. Have not read it all yet of course, but a look through is enough to see the quality of what they have produced, so make sure you get a copy wherever you are.

The article on iconic tracks is interesting, and they did a great job on Adelaide, but then again I am biased. I'm sure Ron Walker from the Melbourne GP is getting ready to sue them over their comments that Melbourne has yet to reach the standard Adelaide set. It is interesting to see the other tracks from each decade. I would have got them wrong. 50's Pescara, 60's Suzuka, 70's Paul Ricard, 80's Adelaide, 90's Texas Motor Speedway!, and 00's Algarve. Of course the word "iconic" does not necessarily translate to the best, but there are some interesting omissions.

I forgot for instance that Suzuka was built in the sixties. You tend to think of it in terms of its' F1 life. What a track it must have been when built, quite unique, and still is. Paul Ricard is a good choice for the seventies, but Texas for the nineties? I am trying to think of its place in the development of the 1.5 mile tri-ovals of that period, and why that one is particularly special. Guess I will have to read that article. Then the noughties. I would have picked the Chinese F1 track for sheer extravagance, and the grandstand/pit complex is certainly iconic. But there you are, we each have our own opinions, and thank goodness for that.

Of course these are tracks built in those decades, so Spa, Monza or Monaco pre-date the magazine.

Talking of Spa, it is raining, imagine that. Spa is notorious for rain. It is one of those places where that old saying, "if you can't see the hills it's raining, if you can see the hills it is going to rain" is most apt. Makes for interesting races on an already amazing track. Hamilton is still confident there is more to come out of the McLaren, and he had better be right if he and Button are going to maintain a challenge for the Championship.  The real interest is still going to be the fight inside the Red Bull team, and the FIA's latest moves to beef up the testing of the front wings and floors. There are heavier test loads at Spa, and apparently even more stringent tests to come at Monza, especially on the floor. It will be interesting reading when someone finally explains how they did this.

In a previous issue of Autosport they had a half year review of how the F1 teams were doing, and of course the RB6 was the class of the field. Gary Anderson makes the point that it is just better everywhere, it is not just the exhaust blown diffuser or the front wing, it is the skill of Newey. I have a 90/10 rule that works for lots of things, and Gary uses it here. He believes Adrian understands 90% of what makes a car work, because no one can know 100%, where others only know 80%. So the 90/10 rule, you can calculate 90%, but the last 10% is instinct, experience, call it what you like.

Roll on tomorrow when we have F1 and MotoGP practice to get our teeth into. Can Valentino win at Indy, or does Yamaha want Lorenzo to be the new hero?

Furniture arrived this morning so a day or two unpacking. Won't unpack it all as we will be moving again when the actual track construction starts, need to be closer as the days will be long. These first months are for planning and selling, so need to be here in Mesa. Did this in Georgia, and it is hard as we always need something we did not unpack, so we have to start guessing which box it is in.

Still working with the webmaster to finalize the site. It is my 90/10 rule again, it takes 10%of the effort to get it to 90% finished, and 90% of the effort to finish the last 10%. Always tempting to go public with something close to finished, but that would be a mistake.

Well done Valentino with fifth fastest in qualifying for the German MotoGP. His team "mate" Lorenzo is on pole, and pole is looking very familiar in every class. Vale is aiming for fourth in the race, and who would bet against him?

Le Mans Series in Portugal at the Algarve circuit. Big guys missing so Oreca is on pole in the private Peugeot, but not by much from the petrol brigade. Good field, but it does not seem a real LMS event without the big teams.

Interesting that Jacques Villeneuve has submitted a bid to be the next team to join F1. He has kept that pretty quiet. Not saying if he plans to drive or just manage. If you recall he has done this once before with his manager Craig Pollock when they set up British American racing that morphed into Honda and then Brawn. So do  not write him off, he is apparently collaborating with Durango, a GP2 team, in the bid. The decision is supposed to be the end of this month. I am amazed that none of my readers has any scoop on who Cypher is.