Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Well no cows on track yet, but watch out for those curbs, they jump out and destroy your supension! Well it did to Massa. Very strange why he is the only one the way they have all been grass cutting and curb hopping. I would have thought they would have done something with that second corner of the chicane, concrete it overnight at least. Still, what's a bit more dust.

Unlike most Tilke tracks this one seems to lack any distinctive architectural features, it could be anywhere. Except for the air polution and dust that is. Not a great advert for travelling to India. "Delhi belly" has of course struck with McLaren flying in new troops to replace those effected. Ferrari are in trouble with the tobacco police here in India. With all that air polution I would not have thought smoking was a big issue.

The Massa front wing is drawing some attention, as it should, and Mercedes suddenly found a few seconds a lap overnight, so what were they up to? Still did not help Michael get in to Q3. Toro Rosso did well though. Qualifying was not the usual exciting session, with three cars choosing not to set a time and Vettel clearly quicker. I like Button on the radio telling the crew he has no grip, and he is running around fourth. There are a lot of drivers who would like to have similar levels of no grip. I guess it is down to expectations. How does someone like Ricciardo drive around at the back in the HRT without being mentally destroyed?

Rumors abound that Kimi has signed for Williams. If he is watching this he must know something we don't about next year's car. Still it will be great to have him back and I don't care if he mumbles, it's his driving I want to see.

Finally we have the riot at the cancelled concert by Metallica. Let's hope the race is not red flagged! Still there were a lot more people at the scheduled concert than the track yesterday.

So here we are again in lovely Korea, where nothing has changed, not even the weather. Friday practice took place in pouring rain with no one watching and the track as awful as last year. Nothing has been built of the new city, it is still a track in a swamp in the middle of nowhere. The teams must be wondering what are we doing here? It certainly cannot be promoting Korea, just one look at the place puts me off ever going.

The inevitable accident occurred at the pit exit, and now they all want it fixed. The time to fix it was after the last race! How could Tilke design the pit in and out this way, and how could the FIA approve it? I guess you could ask that about most of this track. So what is the solution for the pit exit you ask? Run it around the back of the run off? NO, put in lights. So when a driver is coming down the main straight at 180 mph plus he sees a nice white light telling him that someone is exiting the pits. So now what? Do not misjudge your braking, stop trying so hard? Really. I guess you could tell the guy exiting with a blue light to make sure he waits until the other car goes by, but that's about all. And this is the top class in racing. And we have not mentioned pit in yet.

Of course it is a rhetorical question to ask what we are doing here, making money for Bernie and CVC. 

The McLarens had it all their own way in the rain by over 1.8 seconds, and Hamilton put in a lot of laps around the same time so it was not a one-off quick lap. Saturday is supposed to be dry, so we will see who really has the set up. Forecast for Sunday anyone?

Stoner is having it all his own way at Phillip Island, despite complaining about the bumps in the track. Maybe the V8s are the problem. Lorenzo is running in third so unless he has a problem in the race it is unlikely Casey will wrap up the title here, which would have been nice for him and Oz. 

Toyota have announced they will be back at Le Mans next year with a hybrid LMP1 car! When I was there in 2008 Toyota had Dome running an LMP1 car which was obviously a test bed, run under the banner of a university if I recall. I was told quietly then that this was the basis of a hybrid car and it has taken four years to come to fruition. If it can give the diesels a run then we are in for great racing, shades of the late nineties when they last raced that fabulous prototype and nearly won.

Superleague has cancelled its Asian races after cancelling its South American rounds. I never understood the point of this series and maybe no one else can either. Indycar is going back to Detroit, courtesy of Roger Penske I presume, who along with his mate Chip Ganassi is highly critical of races outside the US, or Canada and Mexico anyway. As he says, their sponsors get nothing out of it and no one watches. Bit like taking V8Supercars overseas. It is only done for the check to the series promoter, just like Bernie. 

Lewis is sending mixed messages at the moment, saying that he is committed to McLaren and likes Button as his team mate etc. Then we hear the radio transmissions, and read that he thinks McLaren is not taking enough risks, and he fears that they will take a step backward when the blown exhaust is severely restricted. Then we read that he would take less money to drive a winning car, well it is relative when you make that much, it's not as if he is offering to drive it for nothing. He does not look or sound happy, and why would he be? It is interesting to compare his situation with Alonso. Both fierce competitors in cars that cannot win, but Alonso says he is very happy as he knows in his mind he is driving at his best at the moment. Kovalainen said something similar despite being in a car 4 seconds off the pace, but you can't see Lewis being happy with anything less than winning can you?

Seems the media were very unhappy about the race in Valencia, F1 is boring again, and the track is getting a lot of stick. Kids with a scalectrix kit could do better is the consensus. Ouch! As I understand it Bernie had a lot to do with how this is laid out, so Tilke can't have all the blame. As I said to my wife during the race I would not rush off to Valencia based on what I see on TV. Interesting that there were no DNF's for mechanical reasons or crashes, which I think is only the third F1 race in history. On a street circuit? That tells me that despite what it looks like the boys are not pushing ten tenths, as Moss would say. Of course the lovely asphalt run-offs let you make mistakes without penalty.

The circuit owners are going beyond the threatened 4 cylinder boycott and are demanding an engine that revs to 18,000 rpm as now. "The noise is part of the brand," says Ron Walker, and the brand is what we signed on for. Is this the beginning of a brave new world, has the worm turned? Ron assures us that he is not Bernie's mouthpiece. Let's wait and see shall we? Bernie can pick them off one at a time over the fees, but if all of them stick to their guns then he would be hard pressed to replace 20 tracks.

If possible it is even quieter today than yesterday, so I will keep this short. Besides, I am producing the business plan for my latest ventures. Watch this space.

Turkey is the latest Government to say "enough" or actually more than enough. After letting Bernie take over the track, which he just sold to himself for a dollar, that sets the price for an F1 track, they continued to pay him to bring the race there! What a turkey that event turned out to be. Sorry about that. Now the fee is to be doubled for next year, so the message is no GP in 2012. Not that many will miss it, although it probably is the best Tilke track, well some of it. It is probably a negotiating ploy, but it shows the worms are turning. Between the Government revolt and the new Concorde Agreement it is probably a good time for CVC to sell.

Say it isn't so! Virgin are going wind tunnel testing to try and find out what's gone wrong with this year's car.

And as I always say, if it's Good Friday, it's good any day! Don't forget to listen to Radio Le Mans on the web for the test day on Sunday.

Well that was fun, not. Web site and blog hacked this morning so late in writing this up.

We keep hearing that the DRS wing is going to make overtaking easy in Malaysia, but it is raining. Even if intermediates are on the car the wing cannot be moved, so it has to be totally dry for us to see if it works better than Oz. With less than twelve hours to first practice there is little to stir the emotions.

It seems the financial writers are no better at working out what is going on with F1 finances than I am. Pit Pass web site points out that the increase in the gross income does not jibe with the extra that should have been generated by the addition of Canada and Korea, so it would seem the race fees went down last year for all, or some. Pit Pass promises to give us the real story soon. There are stories that the teams are going to push for a 75% share of the gross in the next Concorde Agreement due shortly. That will put a dent into an already bad situation for CVC.

Jean Todt is cranking up the rhetoric. My friend Allen Petrich actually may have hit on what he is up to, make the F1 name so devalued that the 100 year rights are not worth having, and the FIA can start another Championship. Jean was talking down the audience numbers today, saying no one is watching because the tracks are boring and racing is bad. Pushing the 1.6 l Turbo down Bernie's throat could also be part of the plot. Does anyone know what GP2 is going to run when that happens? Is GP2 going to stick with the current engines, and will they be more powerful? I see that Renault has come out and said that they are increasing fuel usage due to the need to keep feeding the exhaust driven diffuser, about 10% more per race. That's really green isn't it?

Abu Dhabi is also looking to make changes to the track layout to help overtaking, and make it suitable for MotoGP. That is not going to be easy, but who do they have doing it? Why Mr. Tilke of course. Now, isn't it the definition of stupid to do something the same way twice and expect a different outcome?