Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Well the two events on this weekend produced some crazy action. If you have not seen it look at the youtube of the start of the LMS race.

There is so little news the web sites are making it up with the excuse it is April Fools Day. What are they going to do tomorrow? What is not a joke is the announcement that the Victorian Government is going to audit this years race. I would have thought they would have audited every years race. Ron Walker says he is confident it will show they did not lose more than last year, and he hopes a bit less. I'm sure the good people of Victoria are glad to know that they only tipped in about the same $50m as last year, and not more!

It's good to see that the DTM have dropped that crazy street race in Shanghai as the last round of their series, both because the track was awful, and second, why would you end your major Championship half way around the world? Send the TV signal instead if you want to sell cars there.

In what must be an April Fools joke there is reported to be ongoing discussions to put Bahrain back on the calendar. I'm sure we could squeeze in Libya while we are in the area.

In Jerez the Stoner/Pedrosa/Honda show goes on where they left off in Qatar, swapping fast times in the two practice sessions. Lorenzo managed to get himself up to third in the second session, and Valentino is showing much better form in the sense of grid placings, but is still a long way off the time of Stoner. Ben Spies seems strangely off the boil.

You would not think the LMS race is on at Paul Ricard, or whatever you want to call it today. The only news I see is from Guy Smith's Linkedin. Still, I suppose if Audi and Peugeot are not there, nor the Aston, then why bother? Is this how ALMS is going to go?

On a final note this "fools day" Bob Varsha believes it is a "joke" that Kimi is going to race in NASCAR. The only joke is you Bob

This is getting very boring, news is hard to come by obviously. Helmut Marko says Hamilton is a "topic" of interest to Red Bull, presumably once they think they have got all they are going to get out of Webber. Eyebrows are raised over at NASCAR about Raikkonen's choice of financial partner for his Truck racing debut, one of the Gillette family of Richard Petty Motorsport and Liverpool Soccer Club "fame." The Gillett's still owe some money around the paddock, so is it payback time on track when Kimi hits it in May?

Charlie Whiting says the Red Bull front wing is still legal, even though it drags on the ground at speed. Damn clever these F1 engineers. What is interesting is that elsewhere in life these ideas are patented and no one else gets to use them for a long time. In F1 if you can work out how to copy it, then good luck. Adrian Newey is bemoaning this fact as he now fears McLaren is going to beat them with their own version of the Red Bull exhaust.Timo Glock is finally worried about the Virgin car not being good enough. Where have you been Timo, you've driven that dog for a year?

MotoGP will kick off in Jerez tomorrow as will the first round of the European LMS at Paul Ricard, minus the big boys.

Thank you for asking but my allergies are subsiding after a visit to the Doctor. In the middle of an amazing exercise to assemble a team of experts in every field involved in the design, construction, and operation of a motorsport facility. Just wait till you see who is going to be available from one source!

The only thing running this weekend seems to be sports cars, although we do have BTCC at Silverstone, which I am sure is fun to watch, but we do not see it here in the US. The most interesting thing from them is that they are going to a common body shell, and one made by Toyota at that, even though Toyota does not compete in the series. Other manufacturers, if there are any works teams left, or privateers can add their own or the series motor and accessories, with presumably a silhouette body shell, a la "the car of tomorrow" from NASCAR. Makes the racing more affordable for the teams, but is it any more than another one make series?

Le Mans Series is at Hungaroring this weekend, but practice is starting today so no results yet. Big news is the return on "El Leone", and the Mansell boys. Let's hope they get a better run than at Le Mans.

ALMS is at Road America with private testing yesterday. The Dyson car, fresh off it's win at Mid-Ohio, is quickest, with the Cytosport Porsche, with Timo Bernhard added to the driving line up, is second. That car could be the potential winner now they have an all pro driver team. Corvettes quickest in GT2 with BMW and Porsche right behind them. The Risi Ferrari did not get a mention, did they not test? Anyway, we do get to see it live this time on Speed at 3 pm Eastern.

That's all folks.