Bob Barnard Track Engineering

If you think racing runs on gasoline then you are gravely mistaken, it runs on money, and always will even if the cars are electric. There used to be an honest team in F1 called Moneytron. A couple of pieces yesterday reinforce this, both involving Bernie.

He came out yesterday and said he did not think all the three new teams would survive to Abu Dhabi, the last race. HRT and Virgin were the two he really meant, and we can see HRT's problems as they have Yamamoto, Mr. "see the size of my wallet," driving again in Hungary. I commented the other day that Sir Richard Branson would get tired of paying for an under-performing business. To quote Bernie;

"All we ever want is 10 teams," he said. "Lotus is a good name. I wouldn't want to lose them. But in general this year has been a bit of a nuisance because it has cost money to keep these teams in. It has cost a lot of money to pay for them to compete. The bottom line is they haven't really and truly given us value for being there. If suddenly these teams don't turn up at races then I don't think the crowds will get any smaller, or the TV sets will turn off, or the newspapers will stop writing, will they?"

As always brutally honest, but that is what F1 is, brutal on new boys. Unlike US sports where the bottom teams are given a break through the draft system to try and even competition, and money is equalized, Formula One rewards success. Those that succeed will survive, but those that struggle disappear. Survival of the fittest. Not sure what Bernie is on about with the new teams costing money. No team in its first year can receive money, in fact they used to have to put up a huge bond, a practice Bernie wants to revive. Money to teams is based on where you finished in the Championship last year, and if you score no points then you get no travel assistance, that's why you hear that even scoring one point in a season is absolutely critical. The new teams were brought in by the FIA on the premise that there was to be a spending cap of 40m, not sure if dollars or euros, but that never happened, so good luck competing with Ferrari or McLaren. As they say, like bringing a knife to a gun fight.

So, we will see. There are at least three teams trying to get in next year, so maybe they will all make it, but bring your check book.

Despite his contention only last week that he could do without a Monaco GP, Bernie signed a new deal with them yesterday, without of course revealing any details except it is for ten years. Seems the teams and sponsors had a different view, or Bernie was using his negotiations skills. Usually it is take it or leave it. He is an absolute master at knowing just how close he can push it, and as he has said, it is the thrill of the deal that keeps him going. He also said last week that he liked lighting fires so he could put them out.

My Australian mate, Marcus Ambrose, who has done well for an outsider in NASCAR, has decided to leave his team at the end of the year. Let's hope he does not go home and can find that rumored drive with a top team.

Don't know if you have followed the "flexi wing" saga from Germany. Seems Ferrari and Red Bull have a front wing where the end plates "seem" to flex during the race from photographs, but the FIA have deemed them legal. McLaren say they can see it, but do not know how they are doing it, so cannot copy it. Reminds me of Honda in 1992 with the "Big Bang" engine when I was with Kenny's team and we could not work out what they had done, and when we did we could not copy it with the Yamaha.

Well Ferrari have done it again. I must say I thought they did it very tactfully, but obviously Massa did not think so. He could have staged it better, but chose to make it very clear to everyone. Loved the press conference, and the atmosphere inside the team must rival Red Bull. I hope Ferrari thinks it was worth $100,000 to get 7 points more for Alonso, that works out at about $14,000 a point. Probably cheap compared to what they spend on the cars. It will be interesting to see what the World Council does about it.

Personally I think the rule is silly, everyone knows that it happens, and as Mark Hughes said the other week in Autosport, as long as it is not done in a way that disrespects  the sport and the fans, as it was in Austria in 2002.

Race itself was actually all over at the first corner, not as interesting as those of late. McLaren are still not as quick as Red Bull, although they finished in front of Webber, so what does that tell us. It will be interesting to know where Ferrari found the extra pace, and whether it translates into future races. The gearbox woes of the new teams continue. It's hard to understand why they cannot work this out. I can only presume it is in the hydraulics and not in the box itself. Sir Richard Branson must be wondering what he has got himself into.

Interesting that the race did not sell out with six German drivers. It seems to go against my theory that the US needs a top driver to really make a US F1 GP "work." Maybe it is a wealth of riches, the Germans have got used to winning with Michael, but it is probably more to do with the cost of the tickets. Overseas, i.e. not in the US, the cost of F1 tickets is very expensive, $300 +, at a time when a lot of people are hurting for money.

Not a good weekend for the US drivers in GP3, but it is all a learning experience, and they are at least in the show.

Over at Laguna Lorenzo stole pole at the death, but it should be a good race.

Sad to see the Tour finish and Lance retire from it. I'm sure we will see him at the Tour with his team, and he will continue his amazing work for cancer victims.

Don't know which lagoon to comment on first, the one at Lime Rock or the one in California. Qualifying at Lime Rock could not have been fun for the ALMS boys, but David Brabham showed his class with pole for the Highcroft Honda. Watching the race today two of my pet peeves come to mind, gentlemen racers who should not be out there, and running races at tracks that do not showcase your product well. Lime Rock is a lovely little track, but too short and too narrow for a full field of ALMS. I say full field, but it is actually far from it. Good job the prototype class is so depleted. Speed TV did its usual job of running an infomercial for 2 hours plus. I guess Don has to make money somewhere. If you want to know who makes the money then check the archives at Last Turn Club, they did a three part examination of the money trail. The Jaguar actually ran the whole race, not the quickest car, but it did at least run. Pity about the puncture to Brab's car, spoiled a good finish.

On the other side of the country it was good to see Casey Stoner fastest in Friday practice, let's hope he can keep it up today and stop the Lorenzo show. Roger Hayden has been thrown in the deep end on the LRC Honda, and was slowest, but not by a lot compared to the geriatric Japanese test riders we have been seeing lately. Perhaps with yesterday's sessions under his belt he can qualify OK. Good to see a young guy getting a break though.

At Indianapolis a couple of ex F1 drivers are at opposite ends of the field after Friday practice. Montoya was fastest and Villeneuve 42 nd! Looks like Jacques has his work cut out to qualify that car, pity after his run in the Nationwide car at Road America. I'll admit to being a Montoya fan and would love to see him break through with an oval win, especially at Indy. Wrap up an amazing season for Ganassi.

Over in Germany McLaren has decided to stay with the blown diffuser for qualifying and the race. At some point if you think it is the way forward you have to stay with it and get it to work. Like a lot of things in life, make a decision and go with it, it is better than not making one at all. You rarely, if ever, get the chance to do the exactly the same thing twice, so you never ever know if the decision was right, so live with it. Seems to have worked OK, not on pole but not too shabby. Great qualifying session with Ferrari pushing Red Bull all the way. Button obviously happier with the car in qualifying after some very bad practice times. So sad to see Michael not making it into Q3, not! Mercedes obviously struggling at their home GP, cannot be happy with that. Rosberg commented that the basic car is not good this year, and though they are working hard on making changes it is hard to make a big difference if the base is off. Times are so close it is still anybodies race tomorrow, and if it rains? The Virgin cars are still suffering gearbox problems, which seems to have plagued them since the start of the season. Hard to see why they cannot get on top of this. Nick Worth is under a lot of pressure, but this should have nothing to do with the aerodynamics, which is what Nick and CFD is about, but I guess if you are responsible for the cars design then you have to carry the can for whatever is going wrong. Still, the gearbox is a bolt on piece, unless the hydraulics and the way they are built into the car are at the heart of the problem.

Tour de France going out with a bang. Great time trial today and watch out for Andy Schleck next year, he really put it to Contador who looked totally wiped afterwards. Roll on 2011. Got to go and see this race one year. As an event organizer the logistics of making this happen are amazing. It is one thing to put an event on at a track over three or four days, but to do this for three weeks and move it every day, that is some organization! It is one of those things that to start now would be a real challenge, but these guys have been doing it for a hundred years and building it every year.

I am a very fortunate man, a wonderful wife and so many great friends. My Mother once said that I had no friends, what she meant was where I was living at the time, and it was true, but I told her I had hundreds of great friends, they were just spread all over the world! Facebook tells me I have visited over 650 cities on five continents, so you get the picture.

What is truly great is that in the way of good friends we do not need to talk every day, or see each other for years, but we can reconnect as if we have never been apart. I first met Steve Hallam when he was working with Ayrton Senna in Adelaide in '85, and we have reconnected now we both live and work in the US.  And I continue to make new friends courtesy of the internet, with this blog connecting to people in over 45 countries.

Apparently Mark Webber is happy he and Vettel can be friends and will now have parity of equipment and strategy. We will see as we are in Germany this weekend and who would you want to win? Rain made for an interesting first practice with Sutil quickest and some of the big names making mistakes, especially Hamilton who took all four corners off the car. Button struggled with the new diffuser, but apparently was running on full tanks to look for a race set up and finished fifteenth fastest. Alonso ended up just in front of Vettel, with the Mercedes boys going well with Nico just in front of Michael yet again. McLaren will have a lot of work to do Saturday to make up for today's problems, and are still deciding whether to keep the exhaust diffuser for the race. As usual rain has made for an interesting weekend, except for Mr. Yamamoto who is a second slower than his team mate and last, nice one HRT.

Lots of racing this weekend, ALMS at Lime Rock, MotoGP at Laguna, and the end of the Tour de France. NASCAR is at Indianapolis with Jacques Villeneuve making a cameo appearance. It took them a few days but NASCAR has finally penalized both Edwards and Keselowski for their contact last weekend, about time.

On the Arizona front we now have a logo and I will share it with you when we go public in a week or so. Waiting on the promo video and we can now finish the web site with the logo, but it will evolve with the project.

German F1 GP starts tomorrow. With Schumacher back and a quarter of the field German drivers they still can't sell it out, sold 61,000 of 75,000 and do not expect to sell them all. But they do hope to cover expenses! Nice, build the track and do all the work and hope to cover expenses. Are you reading this Tavo? Let's hope we have another good race, although I prefer the old layout, funky as it was with the long forest section.

You have to love Bernie, stirring up FOTA again, and Monaco. He says he sees himself as a "fireman" putting out fires, and if there aren't any he starts them!

Red Bull have dropped Brendon Hartley from their support, not surprised, Brendon came on strong when he was younger but seems to have stalled lately. Maybe if he had a haircut he might go quicker? Vergne has been rewarded for his driving in F3 with a step up to FR 3.5 alongside Australian Daniel Ricciardo. Great article in Autosport the other week, still catching up after the move, on why the current crop of drivers are so strong, and the programs like the Red Bull junior drivers are given a lot of the credit.

Here in AZ things are heating up, and not just the temperature. Logo almost there and lots of great ideas being thrown around. At this stage of a project there are always more things you can do than there is time, the trick is to know what to do first and what to wait to germinate further. You want to tell the world, but that is not smart until we have things sorted and locked in. In a way what we are planning is unique, so we have to develop our own ideas and see what works.