Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Exhaust blown diffusers employing fuel ignited in the exhaust pipes are to be banned in F1 from Silverstone onward. It has only recently been explained to most of us mere mortals that there are two types of blown diffusers. The original one cut the fuel and ignition on braking but kept the engine turning over so gas flow remained over the diffuser. Otherwise the extra downforce went away during braking which is not a desirable outcome. This is "cold blown" and as I understand the FIA stance is acceptable. What someone, probably Adrian Newey, worked out was that hot gas worked way better, so cut the ignition but keep the fuel flowing which now ignites in the hot exhaust and gives a large increase in downforce. This uses a lot more fuel, not very green, and can only really be used freely in practice and qualifying as the cars do not have enough to waste like this in the race, which might explain why Red Bull has a big advantage in qualifying which disappears in the race.

I think the FIA were struggling to find a way under the current regulations to ban this and so have come up with the "movable aerodynamic device" deal, the movable piece being the drivers right foot when he takes it off the throttle. Stretching a bit here I think, as does Red Bull who are not happy. They say they need the fuel flow to cool the valves. Funny they did not need it till now? Like all smart ideas it is very expensive and once discovered will be banned.

Lewis is off today playing car swaps with Tony Stewart who was a great open-wheel driver before switching to NASCAR and should enjoy the McLaren around Watkins Glen. Not sure Lewis will enjoy that tractor called a NASCAR. Let's hope they are not on track at the same time, they are likely to run into each other. Lewis' management denies looking for a new ride for Lewis, but this reminds me of Senna leaving McLaren because Williams had a car he could win in. Some odd characters in the McLaren garage and hospitality by all accounts, as one journo said "you can see where Lewis' head is at right now." What does Ron make of all this?

In all the excitement of the Le Mans 24 Hour a couple of things went unsaid. Aston Martin put on a worse display than the Jaguar last year and heads should roll for it. I don't know if the Audi engine guy is right in saying the engine configuration is all wrong, but something is badly wrong at Aston when you cannot do more than three laps in a 24 Hour race! They came out before the race and said that they would probably not last beyond 12 hours, what a great ambition. I know everyone will say its a new car, but both the Audi and Peugeot were new cars this year, the Audi only running one 6 hour race prior to this, and they managed very nicely thank you. It is not as if the Aston was ever on the pace when it was running, which for an engineering company is a sad indictment.

The other story is the ongoing problem of equality between petrol and diesel. The petrol cars were never in the race, way off the 2% and the faster refueling did not help much as the gravity fed flow could not match the increased size of the hose, nice one ACO. Now the diesel guys will keep saying it is because there is no one running a petrol car as seriously as they are, and if there was you would see it up there with them. There is some truth to this, we have not seen a similar effort with a petrol car, but just maybe it is because they know the current rules make it a waste of money?

The quote of the weekend was "it is a week's holiday at the end of which they run a race." And what a race we were treated to this year! Xan and I both had no trouble staying awake for the 24 hours. Fourteen seconds separated first and second, Audi and Peugeot, at the end of 24 hours. There have been closer finishes, but all staged. A slow down lap was added after the 24 hours were up as the last lap was full out racing, not the usual parade for the cameras.  You could say the race was won by the length of the pit lane, as that is what it came down to with both cars stopping with about 30 mins to go, the Peugeot just for fuel, the Audi for a dash of fuel but then new tires, so a longer stop and he got out 6 seconds in front, thanks to the Peugeot being at the opposite end of the pit and Audi being close to pit out.

All four classes saw some great tussles, most of them cleanly fought. I'm not sure I am happy about the antics of the Peugeot drivers, despite their claims they were innocent and it was down to bad visibility out of the closed cockpit cars. Davidson and Gene knew all too well where the Lotterer Audi was and being laps down on the Audi should have have had more respect for the leader. It is one thing to make things hard for the overtaking car, it is another to deliberately move over on him on a straight piece of road after you have just collided in the second chicane on the Mulsanne Straight. We had already seen all to graphically what happens when a car moves over on another at those speeds, and I for one expected better from Gene. I still have not forgotten Davidson putting the Corvette into the wall at the Porsche curves.

Yes the Audi guys were aggressive too, they had to be, and the changes to the rules had an unintended consequence. The ACO reduced engine size and air intake size to slow the LMP1 cars down, but in the usual fashion the engineers worked out how to recover some of that speed by reducing drag, and therefore downforce. So the cars were more on the limit when it came to cornering and avoiding traffic, and needed to keep up the momentum, so they took chances and had less control when they did not work out. We saw two massive accidents to the Audis which thanks to the design of modern cars both drivers survived with virtually no injuries. As I said a week or so ago, car design is where safety has improved. The walls and tires did their job too, especially for McNish's accident where there were a lot of marshals and photographers. We had two long safety car periods to repair damaged guard rail, and great job by the track to get it fixed, but it showed why I prefer concrete as the hits in the Porsche Curves with the Corvette and Ferrari required no repairs at all. Guard rail is made to give, and is probably a bit better for the drivers in that respect, but McNish almost went over the guard rail perhaps due to the fact it did give and provided a ramp?

Unlike almost any other form of racing Le Mans does not red flag a race except for exceptional rain or fog, so we saw a one hour and a two hour procession. They have three cars due to the length of the track, and this makes for some interesting strategy. The race goes on, albeit at a reduced speed, and a lot happens. Drivers make mistakes due to cold tires or boredom, teams with a slower driver take advantage of this time to put him in, therefore meeting the time requirements for drivers but not losing any time. Refuelling stops have to be made and tire changes can be done without the normal loss of time, but who is behind which safety car has to be considered, and when to stop. At the start of the period, yes if you are low on fuel, or at the end to maximise your next run and if you actually wait until the final moments you can actually make time as you can leave under green without waiting for the next safety car. Great strategy games.

The strategy between Audi and Peugeot was fascinating. This year Audi were the fast cars but used more fuel, so more pit stops. So which was better, a fast pace and more stops or a slower pace, relatively, and less stops? As it turned out there was no difference. 14 seconds in 24 hours, 0.016%! Tire wear also played a part. Audi, despite running faster could run four or five stints between tire changes, and the poor drivers did those stints too! The Peugeot although slower could only run three and sometimes four stints. Either way they ran about twice the distance on one set of tires as F1 does on three or four, so who's green?

The standards applied by the Stewards both here and at Montreal make me scratch my head. Robert Kaufman who made contact with Rockenfeller in the Audi in the dark and when taking the racing line, as the slower drivers were told, is ejected from the race. Gene who deliberately moved Lotterer over almost to the barrier in broad daylight while racing with him and on a straight does not even get called to the Stewards! Hamilton gets called to the Stewards in Montreal and Button who took him and Alonso out while winning the race does not? Now, that is probably due to the past problems of Hamilton as much as anything, but it is still inconsistent.

I did not see too much of the Canadian GP. After getting up at 5:30 on Saturday and staying awake until 7:30 Sunday and being emotionally wrung out by the Le Mans race, I went to sleep and set the alarm for Montreal. Speed had given the race over to Fox who dd their usual stellar job, starting the coverage as the race started despite a paid for ad being on the half hour prior, and thankfully for them it was behind the pace car due to the rain. I got up for this? We had the usual BS from Bob Varsha and the boys. This is network so we must have a whole lot of new viewers who know nothing about F1 so we have to talk to us like we are children. Then we start, and it is all crazy, Hamilton more than most, and the outcome was all too predictable. I personally thought Button put him in the wall, but I guess his explanation stands up, that would have been out of character. Then we had the red flag, so I gave up and went back to sleep. I wrongly thought Fox would give up after the mandatory two hour broadcast but apparently no. I'm glad I did not wait up though. I have read it was an exciting race, but from what I have read it was a crap shoot. Give me Le Mans every weekend.

The coverage of Le Mans was great. I had Radio Le Mans on one computer so had all the action and information on what was happening, not a load of infomercials, FromsportCOM.com live streaming on the TV via the other computer, and SPEED if I needed it, when they were actually on and following the action. The Eurosport Director went to the same school as the SPEED guy, he would at times rather show someone asleep in the pits or media center rather than two cars racing their hearts out.

Needless to say I did not watch the MotoGP or the WSBK, both predictably won by Casey Stoner and Carlos Checa respectively. Great gutsy ride by Colin Edwards though.

Finally a word about Lewis who is reported to have met with Red Bull's Christian Horner at the weekend. A very smart man, Warren Willing, told me years ago that when a rider or driver is struggling with a slow machine one of two things will happen. Either he will get depressed and stop trying, or drive over aggressively and crash. This seems to be the consensus for Lewis' problems at the moment. The McLaren is almost there, but never quite there when it comes to beating the Red Bull, so he tries to make the difference up by driving harder. It cannot be easy to watch Vettel in that car and know you could be there too.  Something needs to change before his career will be remembered as a great talent wasted. Maybe a change of team is it?

At last the Bahrain Government has seen sense, or at least the writing on the wall, and voluntarily withdrawn for this year. That was the sensible thing to do all along and hope that by 2012 they will have come to some reasonable agreement with the opposition. They are on the 2012 calendar as the first race, but realistically that should be a provisional like Turkey depending on things getting sorted out there. Nice that Jean Todt is now throwing Bernie under the bus, "the commercial rights owner should have sorted this out." Gutless the lot of them. Interesting that Martin Whitmarsh says there's a lot of things he would like to say once the politics have settled down, Can't wait for that. There is certainly enough blame to go around in this farce. India must be wondering what it got itself in to.

Talking of 2012, Bernie is supposedly waiting for an election in Turkey to renegotiate the deal. One suggestion is Bernie gets the admission money as well! Where is this nonsense going to end?

Over in Montreal, where various Government agencies chipped in to pay Bernie's fee, our world champ added another name to the "Champions Wall" in first practice. Still he did that in Turkey and it did not slow him down one bit and is doing well in the second session so far. Rosberg is not slowing down either being fastest in this morning's session by over half a second from Alonso and then his team mate Schumacher. Early days, but this could be interesting. I started to watch the live streaming on SPEED.com, but work got in the way so I saw very little of it, and I'm probably not going to see much of this afternoons session. Still, got to keep my strength up and eyes rested for the 24 hours!

In England it is raining, shocking I know, but it is not raining on Casey Stoner's parade. He is well clear of Simoncelli with Nicky Hayden  and Cal Crutchlow both doing well. It looks like a lot of the guys played it safe, otherwise they are in trouble if the race is wet. The way Stoner and the Honda are going they are in trouble whatever the weather.

Day off in Le Mans, WSBK at Misano with Checa in his usual spot on the time sheet. Looks like all three championships will be decided early at this rate.

Great pictures and commentary on www.fromsportcom.com of the first free practice and qualifying. Pictures are Eurosport with very few and short ads, and commentary is out friends from Radio Le Mans. They have 24 hour coverage of the race itself so I know what I will be watching. Peugeot just on pole at the moment from the three Audis. Top seven all diesels and the best petrol is Pescarolo 5.5 secs off the pace of the slowest diesel. The ACO intent is for the petrol cars to be within 2%, which would be around 4 secs, so getting closer, and they have some breaks which in the race may even things out. Lets hope so. Still, the times between the diesels is close and we should have another cracking battle.

Some big accidents, especially the Straka which leads the LMP2 class again this year, but all are repaired I believe. BMW's leading the way in the GT Class which is a big improvement on last year. Fisichella stuck in a quick lap at the end in the Ferrari 458 to split them, and then the Corvettes who had a bit of a fraught session. Let's hope all their problems are sorted.

Meanwhile, back in Bahrain the head of the Tourism Board called Bernie a hypocrite for changing his stance on staging the race this year. That's pretty rich for a group who say all is peaceful while they put 47 medical staff on trial in a secret court behind closed doors. Adam Parr, CEO of Williams, has come out and said we cannot change India's date, all his neighbors have booked their holidays. Nice way of saying we are not going to Bahrain without actually having to say it, no guts. So, if the FIA needs to 100% agreement of the teams to change the calendar then they are now officially in trouble.

Joe Saward can always be relied upon for some  good sensible comments and today is no exception. Read his two pieces about the situation:

http://joesaward.wordpress.com/

Can it be that Jean Todt has been set up over Bahrain? It is the Bernie and Max double act in a reprise of their previous performances. Bernie has done one of the fastest U Turns in history and is now saying it is "of course not on" and reiterating Max's statement that the WMC cannot change the calendar without FOTA's agreement. He is now saying he will send his own man to go check out the situation which might have been a good idea in the first place. As I said Todt looked inept at best in the TV interview, and is now isolated. The FIA is being likened to an "old boys club, where cash - in this case the Bahraini royal family's - can buy you anything." It is now being pointed out the Todt's son's GP2 Team is co-owned by the Bahrain authorities, not that anyone is suggesting that is a factor, but as I said the other day these guys have put themselves in the Middle east money's pocket, and are now reaping the "benefits."

Gracia is trying to justify his visit and report, which smacks of an episode of a send up of the Sydney Olympics, "The Games." If you have not seen it try and find it, it is both extremely funny and extremely true. In this particular episode about Y2K, remember that, a Spanish Olympic rep is sent to make sure Sydney has the problem solved. After a brief discussion in the board room and receiving some dubious guarantees that all is well he decides to go eat.

Well I guess Bahrain has given us something to talk about for a few weeks because there is not much else going on. Le Mans free practice is on at the moment with the first qualifying late tonight France time. Remember you can listen in on the web at radiolemans.com and there is some coverage on fromsportCOM.com from 6 pm Le Mans time.