Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Quiet day news wise, at least nothing worth my time talking about.

The biggest issue is in Australia at the moment, Bathurst NSW to be precise. Now if the world knows of Bathurst at all it is because of the V8Supercar race once a year, but along with Phillip Island it is an historic track in Australian motorsport on two and four wheels, with particular attachment to the motorcycle brigade. The track is public road and has never been "safe" even before the walls were put in principally for a round of the short lived World Touring Car Championship. The track is now only used for "tin tops" and there has been a push to build another circuit to allow other forms of sport, especially the motorcycles to compete there again. The track is owned by the Bathurst Council being public roads, but I believe parts of the infrastructure have been owned by the ARDC who ran the 1000 km race for a long time. So what does the Government do? I presume it was the NSW Gov't, still trying to find that out, commissioned the Homebush Bay Motor Racing Authority, HBMRA, the body they set up to manage the V8Supercar event at the old Olympic site, to do a study. They in turn commissioned a consultant, and guess what, it is too expensive and cannot make enough to justify that cost. How is HBMRA funded you ask? And does it make money? No it is justified on the basis of economic benefit, but it seems poor old Bathurst must pay for itself, and the $57m in infrastructure improvements! What are we building? Phillip Island, home of the motorcycle GP has no infrastructure but manages somehow. When I proposed rebuilding it the traffic guys said the two lane bridge will not cope. I doubt that they have widened it in the last twenty years, and still they come. This is a classic political manoeuvre. ask the question the right way and you get the answer you want, look at the referendum on the Queen. Who wrote the brief for this study and what were they looking to build. And why ask the HBMRA to do it and not Bathurst Council? As the report correctly states this track would not get the F1 GP, and why would you want it at a loss of $50m a year,  and is unlikely to steal the MotoGP from the island, so it should be a safe, good standard national track, not some $47m monument to some politicians or consultants ego, and should be capable of running all year on a closed track so it does generate economic benefit and income. Not sure what things cost in Australia, but that could be built for around $12m here in the US, depending on earthworks, but my guess this is not going up the mountain.

Of course you could spend the money making the existing track safe, but I doubt the macho V8's would like that. The trick is always to make a track safe without gutting it of the character. I would recommend looking at Phillip Island, which I rebuilt for $5m including the pits and tunnel, and Road Atlanta here in the states.

In an interview with England's Guardian newspaper Bernie was in great form. "I don't think democracy is the way to run anything." That goes without saying, you just have to look at how he has run F1 these last thirty years or more. Speaking about job satisfaction he said,"You look back at the end of the year and you see what you've achieved by working out how much money the company has made. That's it." That tells us all we need to know. No sentimentality about famous old tracks being lost, and unapologetic about the spate of "cookie cutter" tracks replacing them, blaming it on the need for track safety. In my mind safety and a great track are not mutually exclusive, on the contrary, a safe track allows drivers or riders to take chances they would not normally take if they thought the track unsafe. I think Phillip Island is a great example of this. Anyway, I do not believe Bernie is quite as hard bitten as he likes to make out. Don't get me wrong he loves winning the deal, but he started as a racer don't forget, then a driver manager and team owner. He does love the sport, just loves the deal more. Asked about retirement he repeated what he has said before that basically they will carry him out of the office in his coffin, and said they needed a car dealer to replace him. Not quite sure if Flavio Briatore was a car dealer, but he was a wheeler and dealer so I guess that counts. One very true statement Bernie makes is in respect of the money wasted by Governments on the Olympics compared to investing in say Silverstone. "The worst thing is that they have wasted a fortune on the Olympics which will come and go, and be forgotten in a few weeks, when they could have supported Silverstone and made sure the British grand prix is there forever. The only good thing about the Olympics is the opening and closing ceremony. They do a lovely showbiz job. Otherwise, it's complete nonsense." Well said Bernie.

I read yesterday that Korea is spreading cement dust on the asphalt to soak up the oil seeping out of it because it is so freshly laid. That's high tech right there, you want to be the first driver to find that slick spot.

There is a lot of comment about the bad weather at Phillip Island last weekend and why can't they pave the parking or move the race to earlier in the year? Paving the parking would be extremely expensive for just that race, even if the farmers would sell the land and the Council would let you. I always planned that the race would be one of the first of the season so even though the weather can still be iffy in the fall at least the ground would have dried out over the summer. As it is in September it has rained all winter on volcanic soils, not a good mix. The argument is that the F1 race is early in the year and you do not want to clash. Well it wasn't when it ran in Adelaide, and only runs early in Melbourne to avoid the Melbourne Cup horse race, Australia's Derby, which is run the first Tuesday in November if I remember correctly. So what if the GP  ran that weekend prior? What an experience, you don't think the sum of the two is bigger than the parts in terms of a tourist draw?

Four in a row for Casey Stoner at The Island, and he made this one look so easy. Lorenzo showed the way to his current teammate Rossi who had a great dice with his future teammate Nicky Hayden. The interest was all in the 3-6th places as unusually for this track the first two were able to break away. Still a great track though after 20+ years. Decent crowd too considering the weather.

My apologies to my followers but it is all very quiet on the racing scene. Nice crash on the first lap at Hockenheim for the DTM cars, and looking at that corner I'm not surprised. Given the different configurations at that track, and even that corner, it is hard to see why they chose that one. You'll find it on Youtube. Grand Am announced that they were delighted with the likely link up with DTM, and who wouldn't be? What is that going to mean for their GT class though?

Things should liven up soon as the teams arrive in Korea for their first GP, so let's look forward to an interesting week.

Saturday morning and it is pretty quiet on the motorsport front apart from Phillip Island. Must be the end of the season. Weather sounds wonderful down at the Island, cold, wet and windy. Did not stop Stoner from capturing the pole from Lorenzo and Ben Spies doing a great job in third despite not running much Friday. Capirossi having a bad day despite the fact he won his first 125cc Championship on such a weekend in 1990. Rossi is down in eighth and not happy, and Pedrosa has thought better of it and stopped racing this weekend. Could be a race between Stoner and Lorenzo. Gone are the days when five guys were duking it out, how sad. Lookout though, some new blood is coming, Carlos Checa is making a return at age 38! Can they really not find anyone under thirty to ride these bikes?

Elsewhere our would be F1 driver, Danica, had her best Nationwide Series finish. "Danica Patrick finished 21st on her ninth NASCAR Nationwide Series outing at Charlotte, taking her best career finish in the the series thus far." The fact that she started 18th should not spoil a good news story.

Is this about Bernie? No, he already has that with his latest signing of the agreement in Russia with Putin present no less. No it is about the DTM. BMW have finally got off the fence and announced their commitment to what has been a two horse race series between Audi and Mercedes, and no worse for it in the vein of the V8Supercars in Oz. Rumors have abounded about tie ups with both the Japanese Super GT series and Grand Am, but now it seems it will go further than that. The Japanese are to adopt the DTM rules for car preparation, so presumably manufacturers can compete in both and would not that be something to see. Nissan, Lexus and Honda mixing it with Mercedes, Audi and BMW, and with some of the best drivers in the world. What a show! It gets better. The plan is not to run in Grand Am, but to run as a separate series of twelve races in the US, six with Grand Am events and six with NASCAR events. Look out ALMS, we're coming through, and BTCC and WTCC are going to look a bit sick. No spec cars here with the same chassis and engine. Could even give NASCAR a run in the US as the DTM guys biff and barge as the old NASACAR boys used to do. Did you see Dijon last year?

Down at Phillip Island the conditions were the talking point among the riders and the spectators. Rain delayed practice and wind was another big problem. A racetrack next to the sea looks great on a nice day, but when there is nothing between you and Antarctica it can be awful, I know I lived there. For once I am glad I am not promoting that race. Pedrosa was in more pain than most with his freshly plated shoulder, but the wet conditions made it a bit easier for him. Very courageous men these riders. Lorenzo celebrated his World Championship with fastest time in Friday practice. He has vowed to put on a show now he does not need to worry about points, so it should be fun. Casey Stoner was next with his teammate Hayden third. Most riders saw little point in pushing it in the conditions, with Ben Spies presumably just touring around seventeen seconds off the pace.  The weather can change several times a day there, so tomorrow can be quite different, although running the race this time of year is always going to be a gamble. It is promoted by the Government who presumably do not want it to compete with the F1 GP, but a race early in the year is really the way to go.

A couple of nice articles to read. Last Turn Club has a review of the Petit which is right on the money, and ESPN  F1 discusses the never ending march of Bernie through more and more countries and asks where will it end?

"If the promised races go ahead, then the real losers are likely to be the established venues, mainly in Europe. Bernie deals on the back of massive financial guarantees from the tracks. The new venues he has unveiled - some good, some appalling - have almost all had the benefit of huge funding from local or central government. The older circuits simply cannot match the money being thrown at Ecclestone.

When Bernie faced with sentimentality, or even public opinion, against cash, there will only be one winner."