Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Crazy weekend, and the next few weeks with the World Cup, Le Mans, and then Tour de France, without mentioning MotoGP. F1 and NASCAR races. Made it through the Le Mans 24 Hour again! What a great race. As they said, a lot like old times with cars not running like clockwork and some great mechanics keeping the Audis, Porsches and the Toyota in the race and in the hunt. Made it a lot easier to stay awake with so much going on. Close racing in every class, and for a while a race no one seemed to want to win. Every leader ran into trouble, but then fought back.

I heard Gary Lineker has said that football, the English version, is eleven men running around after a ball for 90 minutes, at the end of which Germany wins. Watching them defeat Portugal today you would not bet against them winning it all. At Le Mans lately it seems it is a race in which 55 cars drive around for 24 hours at the end of which Germany wins. You have to admire Audi for their preparation and ability to keep cars in the race. Completely building a new car at the track in a day, to end up second. 20 minutes to replace a turbo, not once but twice, crazy stuff given the temperature it must have been at. Toyota got the 8 car back to finish third, and Porsche were unlucky for their first time back in LMP1.

So who is going to beat the German cars? Porsche will be stronger next year, but so too should Toyota. Nissan is joining them, but it better not be a gimmick like the Zeod. What a joke. They are behind the real cutting edge cars in the Audi, Porsche and Toyota. The same speed and distance with 25 - 30% less fuel. Like F1 we are the real winners in this amazing technology race.

On other matters Marquez keeps winning, as does Jimmy Johnson. The new kart track opened to the delight of the members at the Monticello Motor Club. and there are some more interesting projects in the wings.

Going back to the Canadian F1 race, I cannot get over the way in which Perez could not overtake Rosberg, but as soon as Ricciardo got passed perez he soon dispatched him to win the race. Some how this did not compute to me. Perez has the Merc engine with full power, and Ricciardo has a Renault supposedly down 30 - 40 hp. Shades of Perez not passing Alonso when he had a Sauber with a customer Ferrari engine?

Good news on Michael, let's hope it continues.

So this morning we saw the Monaco street parade, with no changes of leaders if you discount the pit stops, and Indianapolis with a record number of lead changes. Which is right? Neither. Indy was all too easy to draft past someone, and until the end was a fuel strategy race. Congratulations Dario, but can't say I enjoyed it, in fact I fell asleep on the couch for the first half of the race. I expect we will see the same multi-leader race tonight in Charlotte, although the All Star Race was pretty spread out.

Monaco may have produced the sixth winner as expected. Now Monaco is very difficult to pass on, but we hardly saw any attempt being made, it was alll about saving fuel and preserving tires. Not racing in my book. The field has certainly bunched up on performance, making passing even harder, just ask Jenson who made an un-characteristic move on Kovalianen.

So Alonso leads the drivers Championship. Not that much wrong with the Ferrari is there, even Massa managed a decent race. Perez did not cover himself in glory today, he seemed intent on hitting everyone he could. And how about Maldanado? He makes the same move on Perez in practice that he did to Lewis in Spa and Lewis was supposed to be at fault. Here Maldanado gets a ten grid place penalty for a blatant move, but Lewis gets put to the back at the last race for a team failure to fill the car. Where's the consistency?

But how is it that last race Lewis could look after his tires to do a two stop race when everyone else did a three stop, and today seemed to have to nurse them? McLaren really have not got on top of these tires or their car set up. Lewis' contract talks must be interesting, but it is hard to see where else he can go. 

The Malaysian F1 Lottery has been run and won by Alonso in the Ferrari. Hats off to him and the team for that result, but as one commentator said, they rolled the dice and it came up double six. Not my preferred way of deciding a motor race, and yes I know strategy plays its part, but this is a contest between men and machines, not weather forecasters. Team mate Massa, for how much longer is the question, had another dreadful race and finished 97 seconds behind Alonso, despite his new car. Young Ferrari driver and a nominee to replace Massa, Sergio Perez, drove the race of his life to finish second in the Ferrari powered Sauber. Who knows what he might have done if it were not for the suspicious radio message that "we need this place" when running second. In my view this was a message from their engine supplier running in front of him.

It is interesting that in all the speculation about who could replace Masssa now no one has mentioned two out of work young ex-Ferrari powered drivers, Buemi and Alguersuari. I know they lost their drives for not performing as potential champions, but as a number two to gain Manufacturer points one of these could step straight in. The next question is, if Perez goes to Ferrari, where does the Telmex sponsor money go?

An odd race really. The two supposed "rain masters," Button and Schumacher, both failed to produce the goods, with Michael being the victim of a bad start and Grosjean finding him before his solo accident put him out. Roman is looking fast but fragile, while Kimi is doing a great job. As the "Iceman" said, it will be nice to have a normal weekend so they can see where they really are at. Kimi said he had only done an installation lap on the intermediate or wet Pirelli tires so not too shabby. Rosberg faded badly again and Mercedes need to work out what is going on, it would be a better show with them competitive in the race.

Word on the street is that Mercedes is not at all happy with the way the spoils are being divided in the next Concorde Agreement and are holding out to the point of taking Bernie and the boys to the European Court for non-competitive practices. That would mess with the float methinks.

Williams had another good race, but unusually Maldanado's Renault engine let go right at the end. Don't see that often. Red Bull have lost the plot a little, which makes a change for us fans. Vettel made a mistake again, perhaps he is vulnerable to pressure, while Mark drove his now usual steady race to fourth. McLaren once again cost Lewis the race with two botched pit stops, but he took it well, and could do nothing about the two guys in front. Were McLaren set up for a dry race and the others compromised? The Sauber is soft on tires anyway, so the rain worked for them, and the Ferrari chassis also seemed happier in the wet, at least with Alonso at the wheel.

So back to Malaysia. Why do we have to run this event at the time of year, or the time of day when you know it is going to rain. Not just rain, that's OK, it is the track flooding monsoon that is the problem. Getting up at 4 am to watch is bad enough, but having to sit through a red flag is punishing. Add to that my Fromsportcom.com connection was not behaving and were forced to listen some of the time to the inane Speed commentary. I swear they get worse.

Practice for the Valencia F1 race and qualifying for the Assen MotoGP this morning. Caught the second F1 practice, but not much to excite there, can't say I like this layout. Most interesting thing so far is Schumacher's continued good form following Canada. Tomorrow will tell if the engine mapping restrictions will have an impact on Red Bull's qualifying speed. The back end of the grid is the usual suspects, HRT, Virgin and Lotus, and surprising to see Lotus still over 4 seconds off the pace, as is Kobayashi. There is a big gap to his team mate Perez of 1.5 seconds, did Kobayashi not use the super soft option?

Over in Holland the works Hondas all had crashes in the morning which left them a bit tentative in qualifying. Simoncelli had no such worries, it is the race that's his problem. Ben Spies nearly pipped him for pole in a reversal of form which saw him outqualify Lorenzo for the first time. Rossi's switch to the 2012 chassis does not seem to have done him miuch good as he is down in 11th, outperformed by Abraham on the privateer Ducati in 7th.

The news out of Austin continues to suggest ongoing problems with local politics, but the organizer's attorneys statements seem designed to scare the locals into supporting the project, so not sure how bad this really is for Tavo and the boys.

No not that great piece of British engineering, the City in Texas, where three individuals are suing the State Comptroller to stop the $25m payout to the F1 promoters. The basis of the suit is that the comptroller approved the payout before receiving official approval. As my contacts in Texas tell me, this is far from a done deal despite all the earthmoving going on.

In an amazing piece of self delusion or wishful thinking, not sure which, the Chief Executive of the Bahrain Circuit said that the cancellation of this year's race "was nothing to do with Bahrain, but there was an internal battle between Bernie and the FIA." He stated that he expected the demand for tickets for next years race will be much higher due to the disappointment of not having a race this year and intends to add more grandstands. Good luck, if you keep trying Shiites and putting them in jail then next year may also be a disappointment.

Over in Holland one of the consequences of going to four strokes made itself evident with the second three practice sessions for the MotoGP cancelled due to one Moto2 engine blowing up. IRTA were always very nervous about me running Superbike races for local competitors as part of our race program and made very sure I understood it was on my head if this happened. I wonder how they feel now, especially as it seems Assen cannot clean up an oil spill in an afternoon!

News is in that Eric Lux has filed suit against Sutil over the incident in China, and Sutil says he will fight it in court and should have nothing to do with his driving. It is interesting to me that the action is a criminal complaint for GBH in a German court when the "crime" was committed in China. Lawyers out there explain this? Both German citizens?

Tony Fernandes is having a good day in court with Justice Smith refusing Group Lotus the right to appeal, and granting Tony costs.

One of the suggestions now the engines for 2014 have been set is that McLaren will build its' own, now that it is building engines for its' road car. Martin Whitmarsh played this down as being too costly for a company producing 4500 cars a year, but what of Ferrari?

Does anyone else find Sergio Perez's illness in Canada odd? Now he is saying he will see how he feels in practice in Valencia. He is either fit or not, and the Doctors say he is, but how about mentally? Pedrosa seems to be having the same issues over in MotoGP with his shoulder, which despite being seen bowling, and riding supermotard, won't let him race in GP. This when Colin Edwards finishes third with a plate in his shoulder in the rain!