SofaF1

Whilst our focus has been taken up with the tyre and engine regulations, we have seemingly overlooked another introduction this year: new safety car rules. From now on drivers will not be allowed to pit for fuel from the moment a safety car period is announced until all the cars are lined up behind it and the message ‘Pit Lane Open’ is displayed. This rule seems deliberately designed to take the fun out of safety car periods. Now teams will get a few minutes to decide if it’s worth pitting or not. It will be a calculated affair. There’ll be no more do or die decisions – lone backmarkers deciding to stay out there and see how far up the grid they can get, or brave midfield runners being the only ones to pit and hoping it pays off by the end. Now, I suspect, either everyone will pit or no one will pit. It won’t be a contest of strategies and scheming, but one of science. Also introduced this year is the idea that lapped cars will overtake the safety car and rejoin at the back of the train. Is this good or not? Certainly it frees up the front runners to race with each other rather than battling for the first laps of a restart to overtake slower cars. But I always slightly agree with whoever it is that says blue flags should be banned and the art of lapping cars reintroduced to the sport. If they can’t overtake them, what hope is there that they’ll come close to their real rivals?

Here there will likely be a different situation. Unlike at McLaren and Ferrari where the four drivers are reasonably secure emotionally and contractually there is very much a feeling of last chance saloon over at Renault for Fisi. The tragedey of the once promising driver who had never been bested by his team mate only to have him destroyed by Alonso. A lesson for Hamilton here?

Fisi had been saying that this is going to be his season before he got into the car but now he’s not so sure. He feels the Renault are behind from the start and that’s one of those things that seems to really knock the wind out of his sails.

I’ve always got the impression with Fisi that if at the begining of the season he won the first three races on the trott (sometging that certainly seemed possible before the testing round) he would feel invincible and on the top of his game and so good that he would stop having to try. But that if he lost the first three races then he would write his chances off by suggesting that the team had sabotaged him and so there was basicaly no point trying. Either way he gives up much too easily.

And the problem is with such a hot young gun in the sister car Fisi won’t be able to slow down for a second. I think Fisi could retire this season.

Perhaps the biggest surprise of winter testing was the vitriol that was leveled at Kimi. It was either that or that Massa outpaced him.

So what’s going on? Massa has been at the team, got used to the tires and has always been a much more natural tester than Kimi so should it even have come as a suprise? Add to that that Michael really likes Massa and Kimi has been seen by some (wrongly I think) to be stealing Michael’s seat.

This rivalry will be an interesting one to watch. Massa vastly improved last season and will be perhaps Kimi’s toughest team mate. And there couldn’t be more difference between the effusive Massa and quiet Kimi.

But the other side of this is that even with Ross and Michael (almost) out of the picture Jean Todt is a smart cookie. I have a feeling that off the track the two of them might bond.

From a racing point of view perhaps the biggest change at Ferrari is the one people have been talking about least. The end of team orders. Even though many see Kimi as the de facto number one, I truely believe that Ferrari will let the drivers fight at least at first. At least until a clear leader emerges. That’s got to be the way they go. Kimi is quick but we don’t know for sure he’s quick at Ferrari. We also know that Massa has a special place in Todt’s heart. Not as special as his place for Michael but certainly stronger than that for Kimi.

Lets just hope that an indulgent Father allows both of his sons to flower. And doesn’t just leave one feeling neglected.

And now that Bernie has come out on the side of Massa saying that he thinks it will be Massa not Kimi this year who wins the championship it will be an interesting pressure that Kimi feels ringing in his ears as he’s landing in Australia to start the season.

It looks so far like young Lewis is going to be trying hard to keep up with his famous rival. But it would be hard to bet against Alonso in this one. The man is so fast and so consistent and is also already a two times world champion. He’s going to be a tough cookie to crack. The big question is will all of this crack Hamilton?

He is very young but he’s also very experienced. I think Ron played a very shrewd game by getting Lewis down to those races last year. That really helped expose him to the media storm in a small controlled way. He’s now had some time to think about that and should now be prepared for what’s coming this year.

He’s a rookie, he’s bound to make mistakes. But he’s also fast. It almost comes down to the order that these come in as to what people make of him. Mistakes first speed second people will start predicting race wins before the end of the season. Fast first, the honeymoon is over, and when the mistakes come people will be writing that Ron is thinking of dropping the inconsistent Hamilton. And completely fabricated rumours have a habit of becoming reality in Formula One just by being repeated so often.

Personally I don’t think there will be much team mate rivalry here unless Hamilton wins a race before Alonso does. Alonso knows how good he is and doesn’t have to prove it to Hamilton. Also I think Alonso is a good bloke and will look to support Lewis. Whether this support neuters Hamilton’s ability to beat Alonso as it did to Fisi before him remains to be seen.

One of the most difficult relationships in Formula One to navigate is that of team mates. They tend to resist the urge, unless they were Jaques Villeneuve – thanks Jaques, to trash talk their closest rival. But why?

Formula One is a sport of giant contrasts and complexities and none of them is more fascinating than the dichotomy between the sports moments of individualism and team work.

The drivers are driving for themselves in the drivers championship and driving for the team in the constructer’s championship. But which one is more important? Well it depends on who you ask but normally consensus is on the side of the drivers competition. (Unless ITV are desperately trying to drum up interest at the end of the season).

But, as the saying goes, to win the championship first you must beat your team mate. With so many new team mate parings this year it is certainly going to be an interesting thing to watch develop in the next few months.

What is it that autosport has against Bernie Ecclestone? A clear editorial decision has been made over there to mention a certain something every time they write about him. His age.

I’m not exactly sure when I first started noticing it but I think it’s in the last year that his name has changed from “Bernie Ecclestone” to “Bernie Ecclestone, 76”.

Presumable he
a) doesn’t care about it and
b) the journalists would claim that it was factual reportage assigning no motive.

But you don’t see it saying, “Jenson Button, 27” so couldn’t he do them under the age discrimination act? Although it would probably just make them dislike him more.

It just seems like a kind of cheap trick. And I’m not sure what they are trying to achieve? Do they want Matt Bishop to become head of FOM? I think we should be told.

The votes are in and it looks like our readership is tied between staying up and going to sleep.

But clearly Bearded Stew didn’t vote because if the man isn’t drinking John Smiths during the Grand Prix then I’m a Dutchman (maybe I should drive for Spyker)!

Anyway, a new week, a new poll, Why did Honda go green?

I wanted to say, “What on Earth” but Autosport beat me to it.

My favorite thing about this story is that in their presentation to the FIA (before the public presentation) Honda said, “We want Formula 1 to be carbon neutral by 2015”. And Max Mosley said, “Urm it already is innit?”

Apparently since 1997 the FIA have been offsetting all of the carbon emissions of the cars and all of the flights to the races by building forests in Mexico, but they just kind of forgot to tell anyone.

So Honda had to take that bit out of their presentation. The only sad thing is that Honda Racing itself isn’t carbon neutral (all of the manufacturing of the cars etc) and that despite this Earth Car marketing campaign they haven’t even pledged to do that themselves.

Willy Rampf of BMW has been talking about trying to make his cars more reliable before Australia.

The BMWs do seem to be running very well at the moment. Reliability is the achillies heel for these cars. We could be looking at a McLaren from two years ago situation very fast but easy to break. But like everything it is very difficult to judge.

One of the most positive things about BMW seems to be their own low expectations. Unlike Honda of recent years (and even this year) where they don’t seem to be able to contain their desire for the win – and seem to kid themselves into it every year – BMW seem to be playing a more level game. Mainly they seem to be doing quite well in the tests, impressing everyone else but refusing to impress themselves. And this makes me feel quietly confident in them.

How’s that for some backwards logic. I rate their chances specifically because they don’t.