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Monday, 19 April 2010
 Three years down the line F1 may switch to 1.5 litre powerplants along with the return of turbochargers. Yes, you’ve heard it right. The years 1977 through 1988 saw the greatest times in the history of sport. It was the turbocharged era. There were the super-fast machines which were regarded the most powerful open-wheel circuit racing cars in the history of motorsport. These turbocharged super powers took motorsport at its peak. They helped the sport live up to its ‘pinnacle of motorsport’ tag. 1977 to 1988 was indeed the best period during which F1 got most of its name and fame. The F1 grid was filled with turbo engines from a variety of builders. The racing cars touched the highest level of performance in the history of motorsport. The then racing cars proved to be true missiles with even 1,100 bhp turbo engines. Forced induction really took off in 1983 to improve engine power, efficiency, and emissions without much extra weight and minimal modifications to the engine architecture. Till 1988, Formula 1 cars with those extra-wide tyres pushed over 1000 bhp each and travelled round the globe. In 1988, the turbo engine saw an end, its last gasp behind World Champion Aryton Senna’s McLaren, powered by a turbocharged Honda V-6. It now looks like that technology is going to return. The F1 team bosses are looking at switching to 1.5-litre turbocharged engines from 2013. But, if you’re expecting the same power, please don’t. The Formula 1 turbochargers will focus on efficiency and the engines are not going to develop the same power. In the new engines, only the inline-four configuration will be permitted. Earlier, we had the six- and eight-cylinder mills roaming on the racetracks. The good news is that the new engines would only need half the amount of fuel currently required to race the entire race distance. New F1 trends will now be dictated and the new cars will likely display higher performance with lower consumption of fuel and emissions too. Isn’t that great news? We would have to wait till 2013 though. With the four-cylinder engine, it sure seems like FIA is looking at re-adopting the standard Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems or KERS technology, just another element of sportiness without excess fuel. This technology is believed to be made use of. Doesn’t this sound exciting? It does. But unfortunately, the KERS technology cannot be adopted by old car manufacturers. Brands like Ferrari do not have makes that can adopt the new kind of engines. So, while most manufacturers are happy about the downsized engines, Ferrari has been largely opposing the move. If you’re wondering what is bringing about all this talk, well, don’t you think more sponsors will now get attracted towards the race? The smaller race engines would influence the opinions of sponsors and manufacturer works teams who still haven’t made up their minds completely. Rumours say promoting F1’s green credentials can work its way in getting the unnamed sponsors. Just like any other professional motorsport, the importance of sponsorship funding cannot be simple here too. We have heard that Volkswagen, long on the F1 radar, is likely to look for an entry spot if the turbocharged engines are made mandatory. The German auto maker is looking at entering into the sport. Will it come as an all new team or will it take over Williams? Let’s wait. With Bridgestone leaving the sport, Michelin is looking at coming in again and has forced several conditions, the main one being, switching to 18-inch rims to make its F1 tyres more relevant to its road and sports car programmes. Labels: Ferrari, FIA, Formula-1, Formula-1-2013, New-Cars, Turbo-Engines, Turbochargers, Volkswagen
Tuesday, 2 March 2010
The Formula 1 World Championship races are just about to begin. It is the highest class of auto racing with a set of rules to which all participants and cars must comply. The “Formula” in Formula 1 refers to these rules. This year new rules have come in. The top ten cars will be awarded points, the winner receiving 25 points. The total number of points won at each race will be added together and the driver and constructor with the highest points at the end of the season will be the World Champions. 2010 will see Mercedes Benz re-enter the sport as a manufacturer after its purchase of Brawn GP and split with McLaren after 15 seasons with the team. This will leave Mercedes, Renault, and Ferrari as the only car manufacturers in the sport and the only engine suppliers. The youngest ever Formula One World Champion, McLaren team's Lewis Hamilton thinks Ferrari will be his strongest competitor this year and is expecting a tough fight. He is not sure enough to tell which team is the most competitive, but, feels Ferrari is the fastest. Hamilton believes McLaren, Ferrari, Red Bull, Mercedes, Sauber and Force India will be the strongest teams fighting each other. Hamilton's McLaren has set impressive records and will be in good shape for the first race of the season in Bahrain on 14 March. On the first day of the qualifying trim, McLaren was slower than Ferrari. But, on the last day, they improved the car. And then, the competition was very competitive. The team has now received a boost in confidence. Jenson Button, Hamilton’s team-mate and last year’s world title recipient had the same views as Hamilton. They are heading to Bahrain very confidently, but feel the F1 is highly unpredictable with Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes in the picture. Button feels McLaren, Ferrari, Red Bull and Mercedes are the big four and the smaller teams will not be able to keep pace. Will this be the best Formula 1 season in years? Well, Button thinks it will be. With such a tough competition it will have to be the best. There’s something more interesting. After 3 years of retirement, Michael Schumacher is back with Mercedes. Wait, there’s more. Double world champion Fernando Alonso has moved to Ferrari. There is so much change this year and everybody is looking forward to having a very special season of Formula 1 racing. Hamilton is very excited about having a legend like Michael on the same track as his. He is waiting to have some good battles with Michael at Mercedes and Fernando at Ferrari. The race will be a real hard battle with a lot of fun. The ban on in-race re-fuelling is going to add more fun making the races more unpredictable. It will increase the drivers' need to manage their tyres. Some teams will have tyre stops two to three laps before their rivals and then try to jump them. The smaller teams too might try crazy stuff. They may stop after two laps and try to go the distance on one set of tyres. Whoa! All we know is that the game will be a lot of fun for spectators. Let’s watch the fun. Labels: Fernando-Alonso, Ferrari, Formula One-World-Champion, Formula-1, Jenson-Button, Lewis-Hamilton, McLaren, Michael-Schumacher
Monday, 1 March 2010
Ferrari has not taken well to the Formula One governing body, the International Automobile Federation’s decision to allow new teams to enter F1 for the 2010 season. According to a column published on the official Ferrari website, the Italian team has attacked FIA for bringing in struggling newcomers like Campos and US F1 instead of supporting old veterans such as BMW and Toyota, who have both left the sport. After Toyota and BMW withdrew from the F1 championship, in order to cut costs, International Automobile Federation was forced to bring in new players. Things have not been going too well with the F1 Championship 2010 which has resulted in Ferrari attacking the FIA. Out of the 13 teams which signed up or were induced to sign up for this year’s championship, only eleven have turned up so far. Of the few who have managed to turn up on the tracks for testing, only some of them have been able to do more than a few hundred kilometers. And others who have done more than that have done it at a relatively slower pace. The column on Ferrari official website blames the current problems of F1 to the former FIA president Max Mosley, who battled it out with established players such as Ferrari last season over his plans to bring in new teams for the upcoming season. A team official has revealed that Indian driver Karun Chandhok is very close to signing a deal with new Formula One team Campos Meta to race in the upcoming 2010 season. Campos Meta is a new Madrid-based team founded by ex-driver Adrian Campos and financed by Spanish investor Jose Ramon Carabante. If the deal works out with Campos Meta, Chandhok will become the second Indian F1 driver, after Narain Karthikeyan who represented the Jordan team in 2005. Michael Schumacher has said that the Mercedes GP Formula1 car may not be the best car on the track and they’ll have to catch up with the stronger teams including McLaren, Ferrari and Red Bull. The new season of Formula One starts at the Sakhir circuit in Bahrain on March 14. Labels: Campos Meta, F1-Championship-2010, Ferrari, FIA, Formula-1, Formula-One, International-Automobile-Federation, Karun-Chandhok, McLaren, Mercedes-GP-Formula1, Narain-Karthikeyan
Tuesday, 23 February 2010
 Good news for those who were once fans of Jaguar 24-hour Le Mans car. The “Leaping Cat” Jaguar Cars will be back in the game after a 10-year hiatus and guess who’s in charge of the revival of the Jaguar brand yet again. It’s the Tata Motors. The Indian connection for the French Le Mans seems to be right in place with the entry of Jaguar in the 24-hours Le Mans endurance race in June. Jaguar which will be celebrating 75 years on the road this year has made a mark in the motorsports, predominantly in the Le Mans where Jaguar won five straight times in the 1950s pushing the iconic and legendary C and D type models into service. Now with Tata Motors at the helm of affairs of Jaguar after buying the Jaguar and Land Rover brands from Ford Motors in 2008 will restore Jaguar’s rich image in motor racing by pumping in multi-crore investments. This way Tata Motors is pretty damn sure that it will promote the Jaguar brand to the hilt in the process. As per CJ O’Donnell, Marketing Director of Jaguar Cars Global, “Motorsports has always been important to the Jaguar brand. Our domination of Le Mans in the 1950s was the foundation on which the company was developed. Returning to Le Mans will reignite excitement for the marquee across the globe.” Le Mans is the world’s oldest sports car endurance race and has been held annually since 1923 in La Sathe, France. JaguarRSR, the professional racing team of Jaguar, will race this year in the XKR GT2. The JaguarRSR team last won Le Mans 20 years ago in the XJR-12, but after that had to keep a low profile either due to superior competition or due to inadequate funding. Le Mans is very different from other big races such as the Grand Prix as it focuses on the ability of a car company to build fast machines which are also sporty and reliable. This was done to promote the idea of fuel-efficiency while running the vehicle over a race which would last for 24-hours (with pit stops). Winning at the Le Mans will surely help increase sale of the vehicle too. The enhancement of the brand’s strength and the sales graph moving higher seem to be the major reasons behind the project. Ford had tried the same trick in 1989. It had spent an unimaginable amount over the acquisition and again spent a few more billions to bring back the brand’s rich image. To everyone’s dismay, Ford failed. Will Tata Motors succeed this time? The Ford Motor Company had miserably lost the battle then. But now, Tata Motors seems to be full of positive hope. The Formula 1 race happens to be the only recent race where the Jaguar made a successful entry. Right after that, the exit followed. Moreover, the entry too was ten years ago, in the year 2000. Ford, under the burdening financial pressure, was forced to sell the Jaguar Formula 1 team to Red Bull. Yes, the leaping cat was sold to the Red Bull. It was then re-baptized as Red Bull Racing. The Porsche has won 16 times at the Le Mans. Audi too has more number of victories than the Jaguar. It has won 7 times. Peugeot, BMW, Renault, Alfa Romeo and Bentley have been the other successful motor racing brands. Will the Jaguar make it this time? Patience!!! Only Time will tell. Labels: Ford-Motor-Company, Formula-1, Jaguar, Le-Mans, Red-Bull-Racing, Tata-Motors
Thursday, 5 November 2009
Toyota became the second major Japanese car manufacturer to quit F1. We have been anticipating Toyota's withdrawal from F1 for quite some time but were waiting for the car honcho to declare it officially.
Toyota Motor Corporation has announced its plans to withdraw from the FIA Formula 1 World Championship at the end of the 2009 season because of its 'current severe economic realities'. The latest pullout would be yet another blow to Formula One, which is already bogged down by scandals, disputes and falling number of sponsorships.
Toyota's association with Formula One began in 2002 and it had raced for eight seasons. The Toyota F1 team competed in 141 F1 races and accomplished 13 podium finishes. The team could never manage to win a race during its tenure with F1 despite having an annual budget of around US$300 million. But the Toyota F1 team was fifth in the 2009 Constructors' Championship.
Toyota’s season promised much after long-term driver Jarno Trulli finished third in the opening race of the season in Australia and followed that with another third in Bahrain, after starting race four from pole position. His team-mate Timo Glock also stood on the podium after finishing third in the rain-affected second race of the season in Malaysia. But neither driver would reach the podium again until race 14 when Glock finished second behind Britain's Lewis Hamilton in Singapore, equaling the team's best finish to a race. One week later, in early October, Trulli also came second at the Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka. Japanese driver Kamui Kobayashi joined Trulli, who finished the season eighth in the standings, for the final two races of the season after Glock.
Trulli is tipped to join Lotus while Glock is expected to move to Renault later this week but Kobayashi's future is less clear. Germany's Ralf Schumacher, France's Olivier Panis and Britain's Allan McNish have also all driven for Toyota over the years.
Toyota noted that it would actively contribute to further development of motorsports by supporting grassroots races and planning events in which it is easy for people to participate. Now, the world's largest car manufacturer will concentrate on its core business.
We guess it’s all about making hybrids and electric cars now! Labels: F1-Cars, F1-Racing, Formula-1, Toyota-Cars, Toyota-Formula-1-Team, Toyota-Motor-Corporation
Thursday, 1 October 2009
 The scenario surrounding F1 racing is quite grim. Last year, Honda abandoned F1 and soon BMW withdrew itself from Formula One with Mercedes-Benz also following suit.And now we have news that Toyota may too say “Sayonara” to Formula One racing. Toyota’s Formula 1 team principal Tadashi Yamashima warned that the world’s largest car manufacturer’s involvement in F1 could come to an end soon. The reason behind is the result of steep decline in car sales. This information must have broken the hearts of many F1 lovers. Especially, after the Toyota F1 team finished in the second place in the Singapore Grand Prix and the F1 race in Japan is scheduled over the coming weekend. The world’s number one car maker Toyota is not doing good business because of the Motown slump. Toyota is likely to cut production by almost 10 per cent in order to minimise losses due to falling demand. Moreover, the Japanese car behemoth is pulling out of a joint venture business with GM in America. It has happened for the first time that Toyota has planned to cut production to such an extent and it shows how badly it is faring in the current economic climate. Sales of Toyota in America have fallen by 34 per cent this year. Its luxury brand, Lexus, has been badly hit. In August Toyota forecast a net loss for 2009 of £3 billion, which is less than it feared but still unprecedented for the company. Another threat to all the car companies is the end of Government sponsored car scrappage schemes in many key markets including the US, UK and Germany. These have prevented a total wash-out in the automotive sector during 2009, but are set to end in many countries in the coming months. Although the company has signed up to the Concorde Agreement, it faces no financial penalty for walking away from Formula 1. It has some obligations, but nothing significant enough to prevent a walk-out if the business case for it was clear. The team has yet to set a budget for the 2010 season and will not do so until mid November, by which time many drivers will already have signed up for other teams. With Williams set to switch its engine supply deal to Renault, the company has no customers for engines in the paddock. Toyota has already informed both of its drivers that they are free to look for drives elsewhere. Labels: F1, Formula-1, Formula-One, Formula-One-racing, Japanese-Grand Prix, Singapore-Grand-Prix, Suzuka-2009, Toyota-Formula-1-Team
Thursday, 9 April 2009
Armaan Ibrahim, not many will be familiar with this name but he is one of the upcoming champions in the field of car racing. Son of renowned former F3 champion Akbar Ibrahim is already a professional race driver at the very young age of 19 years. The little champ spends most of his time on tracks practicing. In his leisure time he is off to go-karting or will be seen with playing racing video games. Hardly couple of months and we can see Armaan making his debut in Formula 2 this year. Those who are well informed about Formula One will know all about F2 or Formula 2 racing. F2 is the next step to formula one racing. There is no team in F2 unlike Formula One racing. Every one contests individually which leads to a heavy investment. But Armaan gets little luck as Reed Rooster, a state based racing team has offered a helping hand assuring a sum of Rs 25 Lakh and rest would be supported by his sponsors. With racing spirit and best wishes from his loved ones, Armaan is all set to begin his F2 journey on the tracks of Spain which includes a total of 16 races. Hope very soon we can see him on the F1 tracks. All Best Armaan! Labels: Car-Race, Formula-1, Formula-2
Tuesday, 23 December 2008
The liquidity crunch has taken a toll on major sports events including the Formula 1. Though Formula 1 is considered to be the richest sports, yet it's experiencing the pressure of economic meltdown. One of the biggest F1 spenders, Honda, has already pulled out from the team, putting his team at auction. Honda was known to invest about millions of dollars in this sports event to keep its F1 team buzzing. But, now an immediate withdrawal by the company has triggered fear that other associated car manufacturers could withdraw before the start of the F1 season. Withdrawal by Honda has further brought down the financial position of this sport. Honda F1 team is now sold out to F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone with an announcement that the company won’t even supply engines. Honda's withdrawal from the sports has put the future of winning drivers Jenson Button and Reubens Barrichello in dilemm. As a part of the cost cutting measures the old engines have been detuned to 18,000 rpm for three races next season instead of two in the current scene. Even the number of engines provided to the teams has been reduced in response to the economic meltdown. All the teams would now be provided a maximum of 20 engines, 8 for each of the two drivers and the remaining four for the testing procedure. This is amazingly almost half of what the teams used in the current season. Possibilities are there that after Honda, other car players like BMW, Mercedes, Ferrari, Renault, and Toyota will also take a backward move to save a heavy investment required to maintain a competitive team. Labels: BMW-Cars, Formula-1, Honda
Wednesday, 15 October 2008
We feel good to announce that the great Maruti Suzuki Swift is redesigned to a sports coupe. The transformation from four to two-door racing car will be gifted to the winners of F1 racing. It’s even more amazing to know that this sports coupe is sponsored by a renowned brand, Royal Challenge. You all must be aware by this big name. Recently, the company has associated itself with the India's Formula 1 team event. The company wanted a car that can emanate pace and passion of all the sports enthusiasts especially the ones involved in the Formula 1 racing. The brainchild of Prashant Chandra created a bang in the Indian car industry by introducing a sporty and high performance revamped Swift, renamed as RCFI. This sports coupe has burrowed the best of designs from the top leading and quintessential supercars available across the world. Adorned with a vibrant combination of black and red, the remodeled Swift has appealed the youth. This new invention has forced the global players to comment that only Indians can do such wonders. Labels: Formula-1, Indian-car-industry, Maruti-Suzuki-Swift
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Three years down the line F1 may switch to 1.5 litre powerplants along with the return of turbochargers. Yes, you’ve heard it right. The years 1977 through 1988 saw the greatest times in the history of sport. It was the turbocharged era. There were the super-fast machines which were regarded the most powerful open-wheel circuit racing cars in the history of motorsport. These turbocharged super powers took motorsport at its peak. They helped the sport live up to its ‘pinnacle of motorsport’ tag.
