Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Is anyone else tired of this nonsense with bad tyres? One of Bernie's best ideas was the three stage knockout qualifying to make teams put cars on track. Now we have the situation where they are once again sitting in the garage during qualifying to save tires. Of course it is made worse by the domination of Red Bull and to some extent McLaren. Why not just give them one or two more sets? In the race they are still going to have to use both compounds, and gamble on a two or three or four stop race. Better still make the tires better. As the editorial in this month's Motor Sport says the current gimmicks are a band aid to cover up the basic problem with the current car specs.

Then we have Lewis Hamilton admitting in the post qualifying press conference that he will not be able to challenge the Red Bulls tomorrow as he has to look after his tyres! Great racing this is. We also have Vettel admitting his KERS did not work in Q2 & 3. Good, can you imagine how much more than the one second advantage they would have? Let's hope Mark can put on a show, otherwise it will not matter how many DRS, KERS and bad tires there are, it will be very boring.

You all know I am no fan of KERS and the whole green racing deal on the basis that racing is about efficiency anyway. It is nice to read the piece, again in Motor Sport, about the new Audi for Le Mans. Dr. Baretzky, the Audi engine Chief, puts it nicely. Talking of hybrids and why they are not planning to use it he said that at the moment the extra weight on the car would need more fuel to propel it than you are gaining from its use. "The system should pay for itself...Motor Sport should be about the truth: the more efficient, quicker, better car should win, and the rules should be made according to that. The ACO says we have to encourage this technology. Why? If this technology is a better solution, it will come. If we have to encourage it and it turns out to be the wrong route, it is a waste of energy and time." Here here.

The FIA has announced that DRS is so successful we are to get two zones of it at Canada and Valencia! Personally I never saw that Canada has a problem with overtaking with Turn 1, the hairpin and the last corner being full of action in the past. Valencia now is different, it needs all the help it can get. They have also decreed that the DRS cannot be used in the tunnel at Monaco, or Eau Rouge.  It would be a very brave, and stupid, man to try it through Eau Rouge. The tunnel might entice some to try. Why all this manipulation of where and when? If it is so good then rely on the drivers common sense and self preservation to decide when to use it. Or are we protecting the drivers from themselves?

So who watched Kimi at Charlotte? I did, and was very impressed. He kept it going in the right direction unlike some of the much more experienced drivers out there, including his team owner Kyle Bush. Kimi never saw Charlotte until Friday morning and raced there that night! He certainly was not intimidated by running in close company, and the other drivers did not seem to have a problem racing around him. Great job, not that I expected anything less. So now what, Nationwide?

Back at Barcelona we potentially have the situation where the Cosworth teams could protest the engine mapped exhaust blown diffusers. This the off and then on again ruling by the FIA, which leaves the door open as they did not say its use was legal, just that the teams had a stay of when they needed to undo it. That would be a nice mess at the end of the race wouldn't it?

As reported a few months ago the success of the greens in recent German elections has made the support for the German GP unlikely to continue past 2015, two more races at the Nurburgring as it alternates with Hockenheim so that track only loses half as much!

It took Kimi to make me watch the NASCAR Camping World Series! Me and a lot of others I suspect. Watching him out on a mile and a half tri-oval for the first time I thought he did really well, although the truck was so loose it looked like rallying at times. Still, his reflexes and ability kept it on the track and tonight's race should be fun. You have to admire the guy, just like the old days when F1 drivers drove everything and raced every weekend, sometimes two races a weekend in Europe and America. F1's loss is the world's gain.

The really big news of the weekend for me is the ACO moving to live up to it's regulation on parity between the diesels and petrol cars. Petrol cars will have an air restrictor increase of 0.3 mm and can lose 10 kg, and if they cannot take weight off the car then they get a 0.5 mm increase. In addition the fuel hose for the petrol cars is increased by 10 mm, nearly half an inch, and the diesels decreased by 0.3 mm, so faster refuelling for the petrol cars. The ACO have made the changes after seeing all the new cars in action at Spa for the first time, and believe they will allow the petrol cars to do an extra 5 laps during the 24 hours. The older ORECA Peugeot benefits from a 15 kg weight reduction. It will be interesting to see how all these pan out in a few weeks time.

F1 is in Barcelona and not much has changed, Red Bull and McLaren on top with Alonso and Ferrari fifth. Mercedes big step forward has not improved their position. News is that Williams are the team that pushed the FIA to act on the engine mapping, but it seems that Cosworth are the problem in not being able to match the big guys. The top teams are of course resisting any changes, as they are the new engine for 2013. The opposition to the change to 4 cylinder turbos is growing, with Renault apparently the only manufacturer now in favor, for obvious reasons. Talking of Renault, the big rumor from Barcelona is that Kubica has signed to drive for Ferrari, the latest in a long line of drivers similarly rumored to go there. Massa must be feeling very unloved, despite Montezemolo telling the world Massa will drive for them next year. He did not look very happy with the car during practice.

The gap between the teams seems to be growing, with HRT still 7 secs off the pace, but then Lotus and Force India are around 4 secs off, and so on up the order. Alonso is a second off, and you quickly get to 2 seconds around tenth place. On these times the HRT are in danger of not making the cut at their home race, but I guess with Q1 times on hards they may make it. Lotus seem to have made the jump across the gap to the midfield teams, only to see the front of the pack just as far away as ever.

The story of today has to be the on and off restrictions by the FIA on feeding exhaust gasses to the diffuser. This "trick" has been the big idea to maintain downforce that the FIA keeps trying to reduce. As I mentioned a few weeks ago this involves keeping the engine on full song during braking to keep the gas flow constant and therefore keep the downforce. This increases fuel consumption at a time when the sport is trying to reduce it by 35%. The FIA came out yesterday and said that this basically constituted a movable aerodynamic device and the set a limit of 10% throttle opening during braking, effective Friday! Now I don't know if this is driven by green feelings, or reducing downforce, or just responding to complaints from teams that are not doing it, but like most good ideas in F1 it is eventually banned.

The FIA then had a change of heart and delayed the introduction of the measure, agreeing that changing the engine mapping might not be possible in the time. I can't see why? These engines have been around for a few years now, so just dig out the old map from before you started doing it. The problem probably is in how the FIA are going to police this. As always, it is easy to say don't have flexible front wings, it is something else entirely to write a rule and tests to police it, as we have seen. Still, with a common ECU, you would think they could control or monitor this.

No one answered my question on where the Sutil/Lux case would be heard. The story now is that Sutil had a drink spilled on him and went to throw a drink over Lux, the glass broke and he hit him in the neck. I presume he thought Lux spilled the drink on him. Still all seems  a bit odd, but more believable than Sutil doing it on purpose. Of course Sutil has the teams complete support, at least for this weekend's race.

Bernie damned the new Silverstone with faint praise as they say in the classics, "very nice, pity they did not do it ten years ago." Still, he did say he could now bring would be tracks there to see how you spend 28m Pounds on a pit building!

Barcelona Circuit is speaking out of both sides of its mouth. In one breath it is saying if the current F1 cars still cannot overtake there then they will spend money to change the track. Then they add they are still in negotiations with F1 and MotoGP about future contracts, i.e. should we spend the money to keep them, as suggested a couple of months ago the State may not view this as a good investment . The changes that were made a few years ago to the last corner complex certainly improved things, not.

That brings me to Sao Paulo and the changes proposed to the last corner there. It has been decided to wait until after the GP at the end of the year as they cannot get the work done in time! They plan to take down part of a grandstand and move the wall back. How hard is this! Just keep your fingers crossed there is not another accident there.

Bahrain says it is "ready" to have the Grand Prix back. Define ready? The troops and tanks are in place? All the ringleaders are now in jail? The question is, is the world ready to have you back. The jury is definitely still out on that question for most of us.

So Turkey turned out to be a turkey for Michael. It brought him "no big joy." Must be a German expression. Still, Mercedes say he has their complete support. I think that is what Williams said about Sam Michael about a day before he quit. In the same web site Johnny Herbert is predicting Michael will retire again at the end of the season. So take your pick. It was very strange how he was right on the pace up to the Q3 session, and then lost it.

His old mate Rubens is saying the FIA decision to allow the DRS system at Monaco is wrong. The answer is simple Rubens, don't use it. The FIA is not saying you have to use it, only that you can, and as the driver you have the choice. Talk to your mates and just agree that you won't use it, and then see who does!

Trulli picked up that the tire situation is changing qualifying. This format was put in place to make sure the punters had cars on track to watch, but now it seems teams would rather sit in the garage and conserve tires.

Poor Max Mosley lost his case in the EU Court to have the nasty media tell people before they write bad things about them so they can obtain an injunction. He is looking very bitter and twisted these days. What's he going to look like when Rupert runs F1?

D'Ambrosio is supposedly in danger of losing his drive in the Virgin as his sponsors have not paid up. I wonder why? Could it be the lack of performance of the team and lack of exposure?

So Bernie says the return of the Austrian GP is possible, and Turkey is saying talks yesterday made it 50% more likely it will stay on the calendar. Not sure if that means the price only went up 50% of what Bernie was asking or not. So who is going to miss out? Getting awfully crowded.

It's a sad day when your team boss tells you that you should not be trying to overtake on the first lap and not race your team mate. That's what Martin Whitmarsh is telling Lewis Hamilton after Turkey. "We want Lewis to attack but sometimes it does not pay off," Whitmarsh said. "If you look at Lewis's race pace it was OK later in the race but the tyres are so delicate and if you scrap with others including your own team-mate you will damage your tyres. In a race that critical you can't do that." So what is he supposed to do, just run around waiting for others tires to go off, or go back to waiting till the pit stops as we had in the refuelling days? I did not see that Button's supposed tire conservation mode worked as he finished behind his team mate even though he made one stop less. F1 is about racing, and it's a sad day when that is no longer the case, unless you are Red Bull.

A lot is being made of the amount of "overtaking" now due to the tires and DRS, and KERS. Those of us who now think this has reached a ridiculous situation where it is not overtaking but "passing," and yes there is a difference, are being told to shut up and enjoy it. I for one subscribe to the Max Mosley school, and I can enjoy one overtaking manoeuvre a year if it is Hakkinen on Schumacher at Spa. We do not have to worry about team orders any more, overtaking your team mate is easy.

Not only are we to have a small turbo engine in 2013, we are now to have a spec chassis it seems with drag and downforce targets set. The option to go back to ground effects has been dropped by the teams as unworkable when trying to meet these targets, I presume meaning there would be less drag and more downforce than allowed. I know Ferrari say we should get away from too much reliance on aero, but spec racing?

Much continues to be made of Turn Eight in Turkey, and a great corner it is, but how much better if it were not to have the "four apexes?" They are pinch points that turn it into a one line race track, especially when the marbles build up. Yes it is quick and we do not see much overtaking on such quick corners, but if the track actually paralleled the race line there would be room for someone with some large attachments to try. On Sunday I think I saw one time where a driver started to put his nose under the car in front, and then had to back off. Think of the Spoon Curve at Suzuka, or the Parabolica at Monza.

The Judge in the Lotus case must be having a hard time coming up with a decision. It was originally late March and it is now suggested that it will be later this month.

In a similar fashion the Bahrain on again/off again decision is being allowed to fester. There is a good reason things have "settled down," and it is not because the problems have gone away. As we saw in Northern Ireland you can suppress opposition, but it does not go away, especially when it is the majority being suppressed.

I think I have read every possible argument why News Corp cannot buy F1, and what they are attempting to do by saying they want to. We have the FIA saying they have to agree, the EC won't allow it says Bernie and a bunch of scribes, and now even Max Mosley is against it. Well that seals it if Max won't allow it because Rupert had the guts to show Max's little hobby in his rag. I may be wrong, but when so many people are saying something cannot be done, then it seems likely it will. "Me thinks they protesteth too much." If Murdoch does not want to buy F1 he must be having a good laugh at all these people beating themselves into a lather.