Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Well is seems the summer season has woken up and we have some news to comment on. Casey Stoner is off to Honda next year in MotoGP, not a surprise really, and the other shoe to drop will be Rossi to Ducati to get away from Lorenzo.

Over at F1 at Silverstone the HRT Team have put Yamamoto in to replace Bruno Senna, only for this race they say, and only for money is what they are not saying. Yamamoto has raced in F1 before but made such an impression I cannot remember. In practice he is was not the slowest, but only because Trulli's Lotus broke after three laps! Red Bull have led both sessions today with Vettel quickest in the morning and Webber this afternoon. Times are all over the place with Ferrari struggling in the morning and second fastest in the afternoon. Teams working out the new layout. Eddie Oliver, you mentioned the bike times were slower than the simulation, can you tell us how much? It would be interesting to know the prediction for the F1 cars. Drivers not saying too much about the new section, mainly worried about the high curbs at the Maggotts/Becketts complex and are asking for them to be removed. I can understand why being a really high speed corner, and that style of curb is used for slow chicanes. Why would you put those in and why did the FIA OK them? Nice quote in one report that Rosberg was half a second quicker than his "elderly" team mate!

Bernie is calling for tire with a maximum life of 100km so the cars have to stop twice and spice up the show. You know my thoughts on that sort of idea, a circus is entertaining but that is not what we are running here. Seems that Bernie did not keep his mates at the FIA informed of the deal in Austin, with both Jean Todt and Nick Craw, head of ACCUS, and I know no one knows what that is but look it up, reported as saying they knew nothing and still do not. Todt is saying it is a "project," i.e. not yet real. This all comes from an article in the Austin Business Journal, seems they are still sceptical of the whole deal. Tavo Hellmund is reported off in South Africa, at the World Cup or raising money? Tilke say they will have a track layout in September, but no one knows where the site is yet.

Jonathon Summerton seems to have become the spokesperson for Cypher, the latest would be US F1 team. Jonathon tells us there is a lot going on and he is learning a lot from these ex F1 guys. Hard to see how they are keeping this so secret, surely someone out there knows who these guys are? Tony Dowe, you always know everthing.

Sir Frank Williams is handing over the CEO role at Williams to Adam Parr, but will remain the Team Principal and front up at the shop every day. Amazing man, it would be great to see Williams bounce back. Not that they are doing bad at the moment, but we remember the glory days and their innovations.

Over at the Rally of Bulgaria there are two headlines almost side by side, have to laugh, "Raikkonen for a podium," "Raikkonen crashes and stops special stage." Just about sums up Kimi's year. I hope you are enjoying it Kimi.

Been a long week with a lot of late nights, but very productive. Some of the sessions with the clubs turned into "the great lie telling sessions," you know "the older I get the faster I was." Projects have a life of their own if they are going to happen, and this one is certainly gaining momentum. More meetings next week including the first real test of the County's reaction and what they are going to want for a planning proposal.

Plenty to do over the weekend, mainly writing and some cash flow projections, and preparing for the County meeting. That is between the World Cup and some racing, and the Tour de France. Lance has said this is definitely his last, so he wants to go out with a win. Big ask, but with Lance never count him out, he is a role model for not giving up. I have good friend in hospital in Australia with bleeding in the brain. Out of the blue had a really bad headache! Should be dead or paralysed, but hanging in there, so get yourself well Dale! Once you're out I want to see you as trim as Lance. Dale had been waiting a year to start a new job in the US and was due to come over this coming week. You never know in life so grab every minute while you can.

Our "new" riders in MotoGP, Mr's Yoshikawa and Akiyoshi, are in a race for last at Barcelona, both 4.5 seconds off the pole man who is Lorenzo of course. Yoshikawa says he will treat the race like a test. Well I guess that's what he knows to do, but not quite sure the fans paid to see a test.

F1 is actually asking the fans what they want, what a novel idea! FOTA had a fan session, a "town hall" as we would say in the US, and let's hope they listen better than our politicians. In the end it is the fan, at the track or at home watching on TV that pays the bills, through the gate, TV audience that generates ad revenue, or the sponsors by buying product or services, so let's see what he wants to spend his money on. At some levels racing is an end in itself, people who can afford to indulge their hobby, but they should not expect people to pay to watch. At the top levels it is entertainment, and a lot of series had better relearn that if they ever knew it.

The DTM, German touring car series, believes it is doing it right, with BMW ready to join Audi and Mercedes, and talks in progress to have some equivalence with the Japanese and US series so that cars can compete in more than one. I for one would love to see more of the Japanese series with some great cars from Nissan, Honda and Lexus. Not quite sure how they fit with Grand Am, I think they would blow their doors off.

Just watched the Brazil-Holland game. Pretty ugly. It seems unfortunate that for South American teams the "beautiful game" goes out the window if they start to lose. Very sad when you know how they can really play, but as we have said many times, winning is largely in the mind. Lose control of that, and you lose.