Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Had a great audience for our presentation last evening, room was full and buzzing. Nice to see the interest level, and it spurs a good performance by us presenters. The lap record for the Rahal BMW on the simulator was lowered to 2 minutes dead, and the ultimate record lowered in a BMW Sauber F1 car, which seemed easier to drive on this layout than the touring car for some reason, to 1 minute 50 seconds. Top speed was where I thought it would be at over 180mph, and saw over 170 at several other points. The average lap speed is now up to 111 mph even with some very tight and slow sections. I am sure that this time will be lowered as the driver was no expert, but drove surprisingly well. It will be fun to upgrade the model with the cross-falls and elevation changes I have designed.

Otherwise we are moving on with the permitting process, which seems to be going well, but it is early days. It is looking like next April/May to break ground, so end of 2011 to run on.

Been making the final arrangements for my travel to the International Circuit Owners Forum in Cologne (Koln) Germany in November. Some great sessions covering all aspects from conception, design and construction through operations and how to make money, the hard part. If you want to see the program log on to:

http://www.professionalmotorsportcircuit-forum.com/downloads/2010_programme.pdf

I can arrange a discount on the forum fee, so if you are interested in going contact me via a comment and I will respond.

Elsewhere the F1 circus is setting up camp in Singapore. Singapore says it wants to be a "must have" F1 race. Good luck with that, ask the French who invented this stuff, and Spa, Imola and other great tracks how that works and they will tell you it's all about the money. So, as long as your Government is happy losing megabucks every year then you probably can be a "must have" with CVC.

Rumors resurface about Kubica to Ferrari. As I have asked before, why would he want to do that? Alonso is not going to relinquish his number one status, and certainly not welcome someone as quick as Kubica. I can't see Kubica going there a number two, can you? I know he says all drivers want to drive for Ferrari, but is that correct, and under what situation? I can't quite see Lewis at Ferrari can you?

I thought the announcement of a new Russian sponsor for Renault would have secured Petrov's seat for next year, but it turns out they are only in for the remaining races this year, so maybe Kimi can still spring it. Or is Kimi replacing Kubica? The plot thickens.

It seems the boys in Austin are not getting the smooth ride through the planning process as they probably expected, bringing all that economic benefit to Austin after all. Seems the road system needs $15m spent on it to allow for the huge crowd that's going to turn up, and the State DOT wants to know who's paying. The Planning Board is also saying they do not have enough information to even start considering the project. I liked the lawyers comment, "We heard loud and clear … the information flow is going to open up." As they want to break ground by the end of the year you would have thought it would have been flowing thick and fast by now. You can read the whole story on ESPNF1 web site.

So Nick Heidfeld has gone from reserve driver at Mercedes, to Pirelli tire tester, and now Sauber driver. Is Peter getting a jump on the opposition with the experience Nick has with the tires? I thought the point of using Nick was he was not driving for any of the teams? Pedro de la Rosa has done a decent job, if a bit up and down, but for a guy who was test driver for McLaren for many years he did better than Luca Badoer. Must have been a shock for Pedro, but it is a smart move by Peter Sauber. Will make Singapore even more interesting.

Martin Whitmarsh says we should all be very happy with the racing this season, and he is actually right. No team has dominated, even though Red Bull probably would have if they did not shoot themselves in the foot so often. They have more issues with brakes than all the rest put together, why is that? It has been interesting how car and driver combination have suited different tracks, and the technical side has been up to par. The remaining tracks are all different. A street track with little passing, Suzuka, one of the great tracks, Korea and unknown but looks like a street circuit which might break up, Brazil, always a good race, and the Abu Dhabi. Martin says it will be great to have a finale there with the championship on the line, but at a track where there was no passing and very little action I'm not so sure.

So Kimi is looking to come back to F1 with Renault. I'm not surprised. He might enjoy rallying, but has crashed so many times you must wonder if he has a future. It would be good to have him back. I know I say we need to make room for young guys, but Kimi will add to the show and make the driver line up even stronger.

A friend sent me a piece from the Isle of Man local Radio which is questioning the future of road racing, on real roads, as they do on the Isle and in Ireland and parts of England. They lost another rider last weekend in Ireland. It takes enormous courage to race a motorcycle around these roads, but common sense says it is not the smartest or safest thing to do. It mentioned insurance. How do you insure something like that? Sure, the riders all sign a waiver, but the insurer must know that sooner or later a spectator is going to be seriously hurt or worse. The question is, if you want to keep doing this how do you make it safer, and if it is do these guys still want to do it?

You may think I've lost it, but the most interesting thing today is an article on paint drying.  If you go on the ESPN F1 site, en.espnf1.com, there is an article there about how McLaren save a couple of kilos in weight from the paint, while keeping the car looking fantastic. Presentation has always been Ron Dennis' thing, and how he got the Marlboro money and McLaren in the first place. He ran a F2 or F3 team back in the early eighties called Project 4. That is why the McLarens since he took over are all MP4's. While running on a very tight budget he always made sure the cars and team were all immaculately presented. Marlboro were sponsoring the McLaren team which was going through a slump, and put Ron and McLaren together in a sort of shotgun marriage, and as they say in the classics "that was the start of a beautiful friendship."

I have read before that Ron had the cars stripped of paint after each race rather than just repainted so that the weight does not increase, so when you read about what they do today it all makes sense. To me it is what makes F1 so incredible. The attention to every little detail is what adds up to success, and obviously costs lots of money.

That is apparently what the new boss at Renault F1 has found out. There are rumors of Renault buying back a larger share in the team now business is better and the team are obviously doing well, so the two stories add up to a possible outcome. Not really sure what a venture capital group was doing buying an F1 team anyway, except as a fun business for the manager. Yes the teams make money under Bernie's arrangement, but it is an expensive sport and high risk if you are not winning.

August was a busier month for the blog, despite the F1 hiatus, with nearly 3000 visits from 59 countries! Thank you all for reading and responding. It puts the pressure on me to keep finding interesting stories to comment on.

Showed my partners the Ascari club in Spain, which is one of the few outside the US. Certainly sets the standard we are looking for, even though the track is a bit odd in places. Facilities are great so check it out, this is what we are looking to build here in Arizona, without the nice scenery of course.

Off to look at a building to use as a base and display area till we get on site, somewhere to bring prospective members with a few "toys" around.

ART have announced they are not pursuing the last F1 team slot for 2011. This is Jean Todt's son's team, and was thought a front runner for the place. Can't raise the cash it seems, and as a very successful team in the lower categories that must tell a tale. Time is getting late for the FIA to make a decision if we are not going to see a repeat of this years scramble to be ready by a new team.

The mysterious US group, Cypher, that is supposedly putting an F1 team together and has a bid in, has kept very quiet of late. Not that this is a bad thing, we saw way too much horn blowing from Mr Windsor last year, but it would be nice to know something. They are apparently talking to  a young American driver, which would be good, just not sure he is the right one.

Kubica has resigned for Renault for the next couple of years, no surprise there, and as I predicted, the drivers market will be very quiet this year.