Bob Barnard Track Engineering

It's terrible to see what is happening in Japan and let us hope it does not get worse, one Chernobyl in this world is enough. If you want to read a great book about Chernobyl read "Wolves Eat Dogs" by Martin Cruz Smith, the guy who wrote Gorky Park. Japanese MotoGP is postponed for a second year due to mother nature.

Trouble of a man-made kind in the Middle east with the situation in Libya beyond description. As I said, why do troops do these things to their own people? Bahrain is getting there with a "peacekeeping" force from their neighboring states, particularly Saudi Arabia, coming in to help the Royal Family keep hold on power. That is never going to work in the long term. We need to look no further than Northern Ireland to see what a suppressed people will do when desperate. So, a rescheduling of the F1 race is impossible with a  three month "State of Emergency" being declared. More to the point, does F1 want to be seen in a country that so obviously is repressing its own people? Silly me, we are already doing that aren't we?

On a happier note, it is great to see the HPD LMP1 car doing so well in practice for Sebring. Despite only turning a wheel this last weekend the Highcroft run car is mixing it with the Peugeots and Audis. We are still off last years times, but not by much and that could be down to the restrictions placed on the diesels. Are we to see a level playing field at last? Looks like being a good race, if only it was televised live.

In what must rate as one of the most outrageous pieces of spin ever Colin Kolles, when asked if he thought HRT would feature in the top 10, he said: "I think so yes. I think that others are more desperate than we are to be honest with you." Colin was responding to Bernie's opinion that F1 really only needed ten teams, and of course the media had to ask HRT where that left them. Colin supported the idea!!!

Nice to see Daniel Ricciardo setting the pace in FR3.5 testing. Let's hope he can win the Championship this year and continue his progress to F1. That other Aussie, Casey Stoner looks on course to be the favorite for this year's MotoGP Championship with another chart topping test session in Qatar. But it gets real this weekend when the first race is run under lights. Ben Spies is not far off on the Yamaha and capable of mixing it with the Hondas on paper. Strange it is de Puniet on the private Ducati that is leading the way for the marque. Rossi had another get off and ended up thirteenth. If this is sandbagging it is world class.Sorry to hear Cal Crutchlow lost the tip of his finger, but he is in some illustrious company there. Let's hope it is a good omen.

In other news, Jean Todt in Melbourne for the GP says Australia should keep its race, but he is not paying for it is he? Horner is stirring the pot suggesting Lewis Hamilton will be looking to drive a Red Bull if he has another disappointing season. Is this to replace Vettel? Lewis meanwhile has a new manager and is reported to be open to "music and film" to expand his career. Whatever.

I am surprised at the lack of response to yesterday's blog, but for you guys in Australia the Mercedes World Drive is headed your way after the US leg, so check the map above.

Bernie's World Tour continues to grow would be stop overs with Croatia the latest to throw it's hat in the ring with a $420m track, to be built by Mr. Tilke of course. Do these would be track owners not read comments like Sir Jackie Stewart and now Martin Whitmarsh on Herman's tracks?  And these guys must know something about high finance that I do not. How do you invest $420m in a venture where the main event loses money every year? Even as a promotion surely you can find something a bit cheaper to put on, or just buy loads of air time. So who is going off the calendar to make way for this one? In a twist, there are protests in the streets of the capital this last weekend, so now we are having protests before we even get a race to cancel.

Martin Whitmarsh was also asked about McLaren building its own F1 engine, and he declined to rule it out. I would have thought that this was a totally logical step now they have divested the Mercedes ownership and started building its own road supercar and engine. McLaren clearly want to take on Ferrari, so their own engine is a necessary step.

There is an interesting news item on Autosport today about the winner of this year's USTCC getting a drive in the WTCC. Now I have not heard of a US Touring Car Championship since the year I first got to the US in 1997, so they have been keeping this a very big secret. Why would the WTCC team up with this unknown series and not the SCCA Pro Racing World Challenge, or either of the GT series which do after all run BMW's and other "Touring Cars?"

F1 testing resumes tomorrow or Wednesday, depending on which team you are in, and supposedly we will get some better picture of how the Pirelli's will perform. Hamilton is the latest driver to come out about how they "will make F1 slow." Melbourne will be interesting, or maybe not?

Checked out actually. That is what Carlos Checa did in both WSBK races at Phillip Island today, with Biaggi settling for second in both in front of Haslam Jr. and Melandri in race 1 & 2 respectively. Greg Sarni scolded me for calling Checa and Biaggi geriatrics, and as he rightly points out they can still beat the youngsters, so why should they stop? It is a sad reflection on the state of racing that they can still beat the field. Where are all the next great riders?

There were a few in the race of course, just not at the sharp end other than Haslam. Australian Mark Aitchison started his first WSBK event after limited time on the bike, and as Kenny would tell him, stayed on it and improved. In race one he was over a minute behind the winner, but halved that deficit in the second. Now there may be reasons for that but as we in the US do not actually get to watch the races until this afternoon I guess I will have to wait and see.

Not much else going on. More quotes from Bernie's story, "No Angel," about Alonso who sounds like no angel himself, but most of us knew that already. Not to be outdone by Jenson running a V8Supercar around Bathurst it now seems Lewis is going to swap cars with Tony Stewart at Watkins Glen later this year. Has Lewis ever driven something with a roof?

So Bernie is going to let the Crown Prince decide whether it is safe to stage the Bahrain GP. At least he is not asking the opinion of a cameraman. Maybe Bernie is playing the politics and "letting" the Prince look like he made the decision, or hoping the Prince will cancel so he does not sue Bernie for breach of contract. There are suggestions that the teams have agreed not to go, but do not want to say so for fear of breaching the Concorde Agreement. Insurance is apparently a problem when there are travel advisories by the UK Foreign Office and other like bodies, so there is a "force majeur" situation there that could resolve the teams issue. It looks like a situation where no one wants to make a decision in case they are held in breach of contract, they are all dancing around the subject. The FIA, apart from a couple of inane comments a week ago, are missing in action on this one, afraid of upsetting the Arab voting block I guess. The only people with the courage of their convictions are the demonstrators.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the teams are continuing their Barcelona test. It is hard to read anything into fast laps, especially between different drivers on seperate days, but AT&T Williams keeps a running tally of all drivers on all days, which is interesting if nothing else. Check out http://www.attwilliams.com/test-timings

Rosberg is quickest overall with Vettel, Petrov, Alguersuari, Hamilton and Alonso and Barrichello within one second. Trulli in the Lotus is 2 plus seconds off the pace, which is much better than last year, with HRT and Virgin both over 3 seconds off thanks to Luizzi. Without Luizzi HRT would have been nowhere so they had better sign him up. The consensus is still Red Bull in race trim, but it is still any one's guess.

For those who like to see pairs of cars run around nose to tail for 4 or five hours then Daytona is on today, and yes they changed the rules again making the radiator slot bigger this time, just so they can last 500 miles? Can you imagine F1 doing this, or Le Mans? Just cut a bigger hole in a piece of tin plate boys, all sounds like amateur hour.

Yesterday Nico Rosberg was concerned about the lack of pace with the Mercedes, and today Michael tops the timesheets at Jerez, go figure. It seems he had no less fuel than Massa when he did his quick time, so did they find something in the car or is Michael back? Two of the new boys had big offs and bent their toys. Perez and Maldonado both hit something hard, so Maldonado in particular is having a baptism of fire. Alguersuari took note of Helmut Marko's comments that Torro Rosso was not a boarding school, whatever that means, and he is more than ready to replace one or both of the current drivers. Strangely it is not Ricciardo he is favoring but Vergne, but most of what Helmut does is strange. No one answered my question about two Australian drivers by the way.

Button had his go in the new McLaren, but they are still basically doing systems checks, albeit fast ones. Lewis declared he found the car better, which you would hope he would say after all the time and effort gone into it. Lotus had another troubled day, but at the moment the field is covered by just over two seconds, so better than last year. Way too early to judge anything though. Heidfeld gets to drive tomorrow, and Boullier says if he is quick he will sign him. He needs to do something, Petrov is not setting the world alight at the moment. The news on Kubica continues to be encouraging, with Robert vowing to be back before the end of the season, but you would have to wonder why, unless his replacement is not doing well.

Ron Walker, the Australian GP boss is softening everyone up for Melbourne losing the race. Bernie is apparently upset by the remarks of the Mayor. A man not easily upset by personal comments I would have thought. Now Ron did throw in a more telling line that Bernie is concerned that for the first time in 40 years someone is questioning the value of his product. The King's new clothes comes to mind.

Over in Abu Dhabi Ferrari protege Jules Bianchi beat Grosjean off the line in the Asia GP2 race, and kept him there for a maiden GP2 win. He beat a class field, so despite being the winter series this is for real. That other series, Superleague, the one with the soccer team cars, says that it is the best alternative to F1 because it has so many ex F1 stars. Narain Karthikeyan, Sebastien Bourdais, Antonio Pizzonia and Robert Doornbos? Not exactly a stellar cast, and all cast offs. Yes they can drive much better than I, but that is not the point. Let's see someone come through this series to F1, not from it.