Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Busy weekend on the motorcycle front. MotoGP at Misano with the Honda's quickest today and the Ducati's struggling. Can Pedrosa catch Lorenzo? Not without a few DNF's for Jorge, which seems unlikely given his reliability thus far. Stoner says he is not watching the Honda, but he must be dying for the season to end to get on it. Does not sound as if Dovizioso is willing to vacate the seat quietly, will Honda run three bikes? Misano was the scene of Wayne Rainey's unfortunate accident this weekend in '93.  Some days you do not forget. I had the privilege of getting to know Wayne and Shae when I lived in Spain and worked for Kenny, and then in the planning for the USGP at Laguna. A great Champion and individual.

World Superbike is at Nurburgring with Checa quickest, but good to see Troy Corser has the BMW right behind him. Troy seems to struggle over a race distance so let's hope he can hold it together this weekend for a podium. A young Australian, Mark Aitchison, is making his debut in the  Supersport class and is tenth in practice, not bad for a guy who probably never saw the bike or the track before. WSBK needs some fresh blood, Checa, Biaggi etc are a bit long in the tooth now.

AMA is at New Jersey in time to meet Earl, but it is supposed to clean up for the weekend. Tommy Hayden is quickest thus far, but with this series would anyone but the diehards notice.

Elsewhere a few series are restarting after the summer, like the F Renault 3.5 who are at Hockenheim with Australian Red Bull protege, Daniel Ricciardo, fastest in practice. F3 Euro are at Brands Hatch with the DTM and Audi leading practice. It is odd that either Mercedes or Audi dominate at a track, their characteristics must be quite different. BTCC are at Knockhill in Scotland, and F2 are at some place unpronounceable in Germany where most drivers have not been before with a Russian with an equally unpronounceable name quickest in practice. Tony George's stepson, Ed Carpenter shocked everyone with pole at Kentucky Speedway, let's see if he can make something for the race from there.

Over at F1 it is "back to the future." Korea is still trying to finish the track and the date for inspection by the FIA is Sept 21. As Tilke says, it is always tight building a track as the race date is fixed, not like a normal construction project where you can delay the opening if you get in trouble, but that has been the way since I built Adelaide, so why is that news? Korea had one go at running a GP and had to pay Bernie not to run it once before. Chandook is supposed to run a car on the track this weekend, so it will be interesting to see if he has the off road tires on it. What happened to the 90 day curing time on the track surface?

On the car front it seems we are to have 1.6 liter turbocharged cars with ground effects for 2013. Works for me, we had 1.5 liter screamers before, and ground effects and some great racing. The fuel flow to the turbo is apparently going to be regulated, and presumably the boost level, so we do not have 1000 hp grenades like before that basically made all the run off too short when the ground effects stopped effecting.

Sebastian Vettel still thinks he is going to win the Championship this year. I want some of what he is on. It is one thing to have confidence and I do not knock him for that, I guess all drivers need to think that they will win, but Webber and Hamilton have to have an amazing run of bad luck for Seb to get up from here. Bit like Pedrosa, maybe they should compare notes.

Back in Arizona we move forward on Sol Real with the land in escrow and a meeting with the City next week. Legal docs should be available this coming week so we can get serious. Membership applications will be available as well for those who want to reserve a place, with no money required until there is a track to drive on, although we are setting up a simulator, so that should be virtually very soon. Texas reconnected today, so should be making a trip there later this month. The program is out for the Forum in Cologne in November on track construction and ownership, so if you want one sent by e-mail please contact me, I can also provide a discount on the fee.