F109 Countdown: Renault

Renault:
2008 Results
Best Finish: 1st (Fernando Alonso x2)
Points Scored: 80
Championship Position: 4th
2009 Drivers: Fernando Alonso & Nelson Piquet Junior

The French team definitely feel under the adage of a season of two halves in 2008. More than any other team, Renault benefitted from maintaining development on their challenger as last season dragged on. Their car went from one that could just about make points into a race winning contender.

But the question remains – will their late 2008 push affect their opportunities in 2009. Many of the teams around them gave up focusing while Renault kept on pushing the development. For a team in Renault’s position, it might be considered an odd decision. I suppose one reason for it was to show Alonso they could take him back to the top of the podium.

A feat they achieved twice last year. The team has been quick to hum and haw about their 2009 credentials, like so many others. Will they offer Alonso a title contending car? That is always up for debate. Honestly, even if Renault had spent half a season developing the car, I would be sceptical. They have claimed in the past that they have devoted development time to the next year, only to fall flat on their faces.

If they give Fernando Alonso a car that can get a sniff of a win, you can be sure the Spaniard will take it. He may have his critics, but there is no denying his talent. At the moment, I think he is the best all round racer in the sport. While his Singapore victory required some luck, he still had to make build the gap. In Japan, Alonso looked at his imperialistic best. I expect more of the same from Alonso, who will no doubt have the hunger and desire to prove to his doubters that he is still one of the world’s best.

He will once more be partnered by Nelson Piquet Junior. The Brazilian is one of the drivers I feel is in last chance row. A late season surge in performance probably saved his career, which at one point looked like it might end before the season did. It isn’t like Renault would be troubled to find a replacement, with any number of youngsters under contract to the French team.

In some ways, it is often best to go with what you know, rather than another unknown quantity. As I have said numerous times, when there are big changes to the regulations, it is often best to try to maintain as much continuity as possible. Still, I feel that if Piquet fails to deliver in the first half of the season, he may find himself on the outside looking in.

More of the Same for Renault

Renault will retain their current driver line-up for the 2009 season.

The re-signing of Alonso is no surprise. After the surprise re-signing of Raikkonen by Ferrari for additional year and with BMW wanting a longer term commitment from the Spaniard, sticking with Renault was the easy option. Let’s be fair, Honda was nothing but a joke option, even if they think they will be competitive next year.

Alonso has resigned for two years, which of course, when all the cards fall in 2010, will make him nicely available for a Ferrari seat the end of Raikkonen’s contract. So will end what will be one of the longest courting dances in recent years.

The decision to retain Piquet is a bigger eye-brow raiser. The Brazilian looked completely out of his depth at the start of year, prompting suggestions he may not survive the year. He started his turnaround at France, picking up his first points for the team and went on to pick up a podium in Germany. His best race however would come in Japan, where came home in fourth position.

Regardless, Piquet’s results were still erratic through the end of the season. It was still up in the air whether he would be kept on. Renault are in no shortage of young talent looking to get into the seat. In an era where second chances are few and far between, Piquet finds himself with an early Christmas present. Next year, there is no excuses for him.

Lightning Strikes Twice!

I thought about sleep, especially after staying up for the Nascar race. I tried, missing most of the pre-race show, which usually isn't a loss, but Martin had control of the show today and from what I saw, it was actually more balanced! Maybe Martin is practising for the Beeb next year. But sleep wasn’t coming so I decided to continue the epic night of motorsport, even if I’m going to feel it later on today. The first few laps at least made it worth tuning in live.

Lightning never strikes twice, they say? Fernando Alonso will raise a point against that. He drove through the Ferrari – McLaren melee at turn one and hooked up behind Kubica. The Spaniard was short-fuelled and was dutifully asked to pound in the lap times to make up the gap. ITV spend all their time making up words for Hamilton and saying how he is doing stuff comparable with Schumacher, Senna et al. What Alonso did, what was asked of him – was exactly what the greats did.

Robert Kubica held off Raikkonen for the second step on the podium. The result leaves him just twelve points off Hamilton. Should a freaky set of results occur in the last two races, the Pole could still be in with an outside shot of the title. It was a day for the underdogs, with Piquet coming home fourth, Trulli in fifth. The Toro Rosso’s coming home in sixth and seventh, with Bourdais out-racing his much vaulted team-mate on this occasion. For Piquet and Bourdais, the results are important towards saving their drives.

It was a disastrous race for Massa and Hamilton. Both were reckless, silly and lacking the composure that the media continue to spew that both have in unequal measure. Schumacher must be kicking himself for not sticking around a few extra years because the way these young pups are driving, it would have been an easy two championships.

On a week where Robert Kubica highlighted his and other drivers opinions to Hamilton’s dangerous driving (which of course was fobbed off by the aforementioned and Ron Dennis), he gets a penalty for such driving. It was only a matter of time before he got penalised for his reckless acts on the track.

Funny how the same people who bitched and moaned about Schumacher’s driving style are the same people now defending Hamilton. Oh lads, get your noses out of Hamilton’s arse, clear off the brown stuff and start calling the race with impartiality!

As for Massa’s penalty, well, for sim-racing, we always say the racing track is the white lines, plus the kerbs. But in real racing, that’s different. I don’t agree with the excess that the ITV chaps were lambasting Massa for it, but he did nerf him off, so a penalty was deserved.

For the first time, I used the Formula1.com telemetry, which is great to have with the amount of breaks ITV insist on forcing on us. Not to mention, when ITV go all quiet on peoples lap times, at least I can keep track. For example, we never heard anything about Hamilton’s horrid middle run which composed of 1m21’s, 1m22’s. That sort of stuff is HELPFUL to us, the viewer!

At the end of the day, the result suits McLaren to the ground. They come out of it smelling of roses despite the dodgy driving. James Allen's dodgy maths aside (claiming that even if Lewis had a seven point lead, he would still win by finishing behind a Ferrari one-two - a Ferrari one two would be four point gain per race), Hamilton enters the final two races with a six point gap and can wrap up the title in China if he outscores Massa by more than four points. On the flip side, a Ferrari one-two in the final pair of races would see Massa the champion.

Personally, I’m getting sick of his paranoia over penalties. A driver sneezes and the ITV guys are calling for heads or there is an incident to be investigated. It is getting pretty sickening at this stage. Maybe for 2009, we should have everyone drive in bubble cars.

PC’s Driver of the Day: Fernando Alonso. Like any great driver, he meticulously drilled in the laps to make his strategy worked. That is why Alonso is a double world champion and the best racer in the sport at the moment.

All In His Stride

Lewis Hamilton had to do things the hard way at Hockenheim, but the end result was the same as Silverstone with victory for the Brit.

Crowd numbers seemed to be poor at the circuit, with plenty of empty seats and a general lack atmosphere since the departure of Schumacher. The first half the race matched that, in a dour affair that saw Hamilton run away with it. All that changed when what looked like a suspension failure sent Glock into the wall at the front stage.

Cue the safety car and a dash for an US-racing style pit race, one that Hamilton wasn’t a part of. While it worked out at the end, it was a dangerous call. They claimed they knew he had the pace to open up a gap (which he didn’t) but I’m sure the tire situation played on their mind.

McLaren were helped by the lethargic nature of the Ferraris. Offered an opportunity to seize victory, Felipe Massa pretty much pulled over and said ‘please sir, can I have some more” as Hamilton got by with ease. The Brazilian couldn’t even make a run at Piquet in a Renault. Whatever about the McLaren, not been able to pass a Renault is pretty pathetic. Raikkonen came out of the day with sixth place, but like his team-mate, was never at the races.

Piquet Junior benefitted massively from the safety car. On a one stop strategy he attained track position. Once there, he showed all the merits of the driver we expected him to be this year. Now can he build on it? Another to benefit was Heidfeld. From twelfth on the grid, he used the clean air to his advantage and opened up a sufficient margin to slot into fourth after his final stop. People continue to bash the German, but often overlook he entered Germany only twelve points off the lead.

In fifth was Kovalainen who had a quiet day, letting Hamilton by with ease when he came up behind him. (Must remember this, the next time fanboys scream about Ferrari using team order tactics to set their cars loose.) Kubica finished seventh, beaten by his team-mate for the second successive race and Vettel, who was strong all weekend to a hard-earned eight.

Ferrari needs to pull the finger out if they want to contend this championship. The last two races the team have been shockingly poor. With Hungry up next, a track that will suit the McLaren, Hamilton will have a great opportunity to make it a hat-trick.

PC’s Driver of the Day: Nelson Piquet Junior. He’s faced allot of criticism this year but if finally starting to turn it around. Points in France were a welcome boost and scoring his first podium will do his confidence no end of good. He’s driving to keep that seat and results like this help to cement his future. The job isn’t done though. He needs to continue to keep that car near the points from here on out.

Massa Leads Home Dominant One-Two

The Brazilian didn’t have it all his own way however. Team-mate Raikkonen looked odds on for a second victory in a row at the French circuit before a loose exhaust hampered him. Despite a blackened and charred side-pod, the world champion still brought his car home in second for eight valuable points. It is Raikkonen’s first point’s finish since Turkey.

Behind saw a great jostle for position with unfamiliar names up the front due to BMW and McLaren woes. Jarno Trulli survived a late scare to bring his Toyota home in third. After seemingly losing ground after the first Barcelona test, the Japanese team have turned the car around at the recent test. Both cars made the top-ten in qualifying and Trulli received his just reward for a solid race. Heikki Kovalviaen, who had to deal with a five place penalty for blocking in qualifying chased the Italian home. It took nearly half a race for Heikki to come alive, but his finish ends a recent run of poor results for the Finn.

Montreal winner Robert Kubica and and Nick Heidfeld looked in a different class than two weeks ago. The BMW struggled around the Magny Cours circuit. It took a massive effort from the Pole to keep the BMW competitive and will be happy with his fifth position.
After him came the gaggle of cars lead by Mark Webber. After a poor Canadian grand prix, Webber returned to his points scoring ways. I’ll be writing more about Mark Webber’s season later in the week. Nelson Piquet scored his first points of the year with seventh. The icing on the cake was nailing team leader Alonso as he ran wide at the Adelaide hairpin in the closing laps. Despite a great qualifying effort, Alonso looked hampered by having to run heavy later in the race.

And of course, there is Hamilton. The Brit endured a scrappy race that saw him struggle at times behind other cars. His race was compounded by straight-lining it over the kerbs to maintain a pass over Vettel in the first few laps. Common sense would dictate that he should just let Vettel by. Around McLaren as of late, common sense seems to be lacking. Even if they thought it was marginal, they should’ve told him to let off and nail him again.
It was easy to see from the vantage point that he couldn’t maintain the manoeuvre without going through the chicane. ITV’s commentary team made enough noise yesterday about Raikkonen going four wheels off the track on his qualifying effort that he would have to do it again. Of course, when Hamilton does it, it’s suspect. The white boundaries of the track are there for a reason!

I had to laugh at the post-Montreal talk from McLaren. All that was coming out was how great the car was; how they were going to mastermind a great strategy to get him into play and so forth. Yet, come Friday practice the line ‘This is a Ferrari circuit came to play.’ Why bother toot your horn before you get to the track?
Hamilton looked scrappy throughout the weekend. His race was no different. He again found his nose into the rear of a car, this time his team-mate. No damage was sustained in his incident. He followed this up later on with banging wheels through turn three with Alonso. Hamilton needs to stop focusing on the negative media attention he’s getting. (Which is a given with the British press – just ask the English football team.) Next race is his home race, enough motivation to get his championship challenge back on track.

PC’s Driver of the Day: Jarno Trulli. It could have easily gone to Massa for keeping his nose clean or Raikkonen for managing the car as he did. But, Ferrari was so dominant that nobody had an answer for them. Given Toyota’s recent woes on and off the track, it was the perfect tonic.

Let's Go Racing!

A 3.30am start, a race filled with thrills and spills and a number of curse-filled rants at the ineptitude of the commentary of James Allen. It only means one thing, Formula One is back!

I hate Melbourne starts. The time was supposedly changed to suit people getting up but I didn’t feel it all. The start been mired in the middle of the night calls on fans to make a difficult decision – whether to stay up or to catch a couple of hours and wake up for it. I chose the latter and paid for it later on in the evening with falling asleep trying to watch NASCAR.

Was it worth the hardship? Definitely. We were treated to a race that had everything with the exception of a rain shower. The race drew many parallels to Montreal last year. Hamilton avoids all the mayhem and produces a mature assured display that saw him pick up the win. The McLaren driver controlled the race and rarely found himself under pressure. Heidfeld again drove a steady race whilst all the talk was about his front-row winning team-mate Kubica to collect second, followed by a stellar drive from Rosberg. Behind that we got treated to crashes, passes and blow-ups.
Ferrari once more find themselves on the back foot and with the exception of Raikkonen’s win last year, they have not been impressive at the Albert Park circuit over the past few years. There is no point having a fast car if it won’t last the race distance. With only a week between Melbourne and Sepang there is little opportunity to rectify the problem. However Raikkonen did pick up a point following the disqualification of Barrichello and if last year is anything to go by, every point counts. Massa’s performance will be of more concern. We saw the Felipe of old out on track leading to suggestions that the loss of traction control will affect him most.

Toro Rosso looks like a team capable of springing a surprise or two. While Bourdais was quiet, he showed the maturity of a champion to keep himself out of trouble and was on the way to 4^th when his car broke down. The abnormal amount of retirements meant he picked up two points allowing the Frenchman some reward for his drive. We can only speculate what Vettel could’ve of done had he not been eliminated in the first corner scuffle.

Renault was a massive disappointment in qualifying. Piquet’s debut was the stuff of horrors, drawing some parallel’s to Kovalainen’s last year. There’s only one way up he will be thinking! Alonso drove a determined race after a poor qualifying and was involved in a great scrap with the man he traded seats with. Would’ve been interesting to see Ron’s face after Alonso re-passed the young Finn after seeing his absolute delight with Heikki getting past the former champion. Haven’t seen Ron that happy in ages!

One must feel for poor Barrichello. The most experienced driver on the grid put a torrid 2007 behind him and showed the sort of race craft that saw him drive a Ferrari. It all went wrong in the end but his performance shows a beleaguered Honda operation that there is light at the end of the tunnel.

It was great to see the embrace between Rosberg and Hamilton heading up to the podium. Usually when we are talking about emotions in Formula One, the positive stuff remains within the team and any emotions showed to another competitor is negative. For a change it’s great to see two of the sports brightest young talents so happy for each other. The result for Rosberg is the accumulation of two years of hard work by the starlet and the first of many. Of course, many can say that when you put the Ferrari’s into the equation he wouldn’t get there, but Rosberg more than had the pace to stick with the BMW’s who themselves were hardly shabby on pace.

PC’s Driver of the Day: Nico Rosberg. The young German drove flawlessly all day keeping the BMW of the vastly experienced Heidfeld honest. With the Williams lacking the financial clout of the works team it only goes to put his performance into perspective. His reward was his first podium.

2008 Season Preview - Part II

Renault

Will the return of the prodigal son returns the French team to victory lane?
It should, even if pre-season testing and words coming out of the camp say otherwise. Renault has no real excuses. They abandoned the development of their '07 car to focus work on this year’s challenger after the half way mark. The idea that they haven’t been able to put together a car that will be in some way decent would be a massive failure for the team. They could be sandbagging during testing to lull teams into a false sense of security. If they truly are five tenths off the top then someone surely will have their head rolled.

Of course if the car is the five tenths off the top, then Alonso will be asked to provide those tenths that he claimed he brought to McLaren last year. After a torrid year in McLaren he takes the step back into his comfort zone. I mirror it to moving out of home, not having it work and coming back to live with your parents. Not the best move, but the best of a bad situation. His reputation is tarnished and needs to get his head down and do what he is good at – racing. Last year is in the past and he would do well to just get on with it.

Nelson Piquet Junior – well I told you he was going to be here last year and I was spot on! It could be a case of déjà vu for Alonso because Piquet is by no means a slouchier. This is the man who finished second to Hamilton in the GP2 series. Flavio can talk all he wants about having team hierarchy but the son of the former world champion is hardly going to pass up an opportunity to highlight the show. If he can get off to good start there is no stopping him making the same sort of impact that Kovalainen produced last year. A year out of competitive racing may hamper him at the start of the year similar to Heikki but I would expect him to give Alonso a couple of scares during the year.

Williams

High expectations but can they deliver?
I’m sure that’s what Williams’s fans are thinking going into this season. People tend to forget that twelve months ago they were coming off the back of a terrible season and now people are predicting them to fight for podiums! That’s a pretty big step to take and I’m sure they would be happy to just improve on last year. Led by Frank Williams and Patrick Head there was never any doubt in my mind that Williams would eventually turn the boat around. Their biggest enemy this year will be the aforementioned high expectations of the outfit. To the media, anything short of scoring a few podiums is going to be considered a failure for the team.

Getting Rosberg to sign a new contract is probably the signing of the year for me. With McLaren flying like vultures looking for a replacement for Alonso it would’ve been easy for Rosberg to up sticks and move to the Woking outfit. His decision to stick it out with Williams and continue to work on a project he started with them two years ago shows class to me. Sure some people are saying he might have blown his chances but for me, this is a fantastic education for Rosberg for the time when he will be in a top car. There are no ‘ifs’ or ‘buts’ about that fact. He matured greatly last year and with the aid of the experienced Wurz alongside him, looked like a more accomplished driver. This year he will be the out and out team leader in terms of experience as well as talent.

Nakajima had a whacky début at Brazil at the end of last season. The latest export from Japan showed raw pace marred by youthful exuberance. His pre-season testing has shown he is not to be taken lightly so far. Then again, it is only pre-season so his current runs have to be taken with a pinch of salt. When the lights go out and the real racing begins is when we will see what Nakajima is really like. Much like Sato he appears to be a rough diamond and there are few better teams than Williams to help hone his skill. He will have to show his worth if he is to shed the tag that he is simply there on Toyota’s request in an attempt to keep engine costs down at the privateer team.

Red Bull

Will this be the year that Red Bull finally gets their wiings?
Last year’s Red Bull showed great pace at times however their season was undone by poor reliability. As the old adage ‘to finish first, first you must finish’ or in Red Bull’s eyes to ‘finish at all, build a car capable of finishing!’ Towards the end of 2007 they were mixing it up regularly for points and if they can solve the problems any Adrian Newey designed car is going to be competitive. Red Bull have been moving forward each year but the aim this year has to be score points more regularly and pick up a few podiums.

David Coulthard is the grand daddy of the grid and shows no signs of stopping. Always there or thereabouts he’s the perfect driver to help build what still is a growing team. He’s seen off a number of team-mates in the course of his Red Bull career.

I’ve never been a fan of Mark Webber. Often he’s had a mouth bigger than his talents. Many pundits talk him up but the results show that he isn’t really all that. He was pretty even with Coulthard last year and his pokes at Williams for been on the downturn left him red faced as Williams are on the up since his departure. In my books he’s yet to justify the hype surrounding him and I doubt we’ll ever see him achieve anything more than point’s finishes and the odd podium.

Toyota

A new year and a raft of new promises. Haven’t we heard all this before?
Toyota continues to spend big and deliver zero. No wonder the Toyota head chiefs are considering change at the highest level or even abandoning the failed Formula One project. Their main problem is that they believe they can apply the exact same method that works in other sports to F1. The team seems to be run by a committee as opposed to have one man in charge as is seen in most F1 teams. I could rattle off nearly every Formula One boss, except for the Toyota boss. One would think after years of shovelling money into the team and hoping for the best that a lesson would be learned. According to reports the management team has only a few years to turn it around although many people read that statement as one of Toyota’s desire to pull the plug on this money draining operation.

Unless Trulli overcomes his career long problem of switching off during races, I would expect this to be his last year. His saving grace for the seat this year is similar to Fisichella last year at Renault. Having two new young drivers isn’t ideal in a team trying to push forward. So they have gone for the tried and trusted rookie-experienced line-up. If Toyota could just have Jarno qualify the car he would be great. However points aren’t awarded for qualifying and his inability to throw together consistent race pace has always been his downfall. I honestly don’t expect him to step up to the plate his late in his career. He will achieve point’s finishes but nothing more before he heads off into the sunset like Ralf Schumacher did this winter.

Timo Glock has endured a meandering path to his full time Formula One drive. He’s already had his debut with Jordan in 2004. He then headed stateside to race in Champ Cars before a return to Europe and the GP2 series which accumulated with him winning the championship last season. A tug of war between BMW and Toyota ended up in front of the Contracts Recognition Board before he was cleared to sign for Toyota. Over the past few years the GP2 drivers making the step up have shown that they can handle the top level. His ability to shine this year will depend on what sort of car Toyota gives him. Give him half a season to adapt proper and during the second part of the season I would expect him to be putting Trulli to bed if he wants to ensure he’ll be around long term. Similar to Sutil at Force India, failure to beat a team-mate that many consider washed up and past their prime will bring the curtain down early on his Formula One career.

The Good, the Bad and the Racing

Over the last few days we’ve seen the two faces of McLaren. The good in the signing of Heikki Kovalainen to partner Hamilton. The fact that Heikki was left out in the cold at Renault was eye catching, given how he outpaced Fisichella for the majority of the year. One of the rumours going around is that Heikki was dropped because he was considered too fast for Alonso who is out to avoid a 2007 repeat. He must not remember that Piquet Junior did finish second to Hamilton in GP2 and I doubt he will be keen to lie down given the opportunity.

With the freedom of Kovalainen, he was the obvious choice for the second McLaren seat. I’m sure fans of the Finn were getting a little worried that de la Rosa, with his Spanish connections to many sponsors who joined because of Alonso would get the nod. Nice to see McLaren do the right thing and bring in a top driver who will hopefully push Hamilton and bring the most out of both drivers.

Of course we saw the bad of McLaren over the weekend as well with an admission (finally) over the Stepney-gate issue. A statement claimed that dissemination (in English – transmitting) of Ferrari data went deeper than originally though. They have stopped development on three parts that could be potentially linked back to Ferrari data. It makes the FIA’s decision to wait till February to clear the McLaren 2008 car more prudent now. It’s possible the FIA stewards found something and have given McLaren an opportunity to rectify the problem.

The statement has led to calls for the head of Ron Dennis. Personally, I would be happy if this was the end of someone who whinges anytime his team got beaten. End of the day the buck stops with him. He staked his reputation on his team been clean and playing by the rules and the statement appears to be nothing but an admission of guilt. Will he survive this? Time will tell. Hopefully this will be the beginning of the end of this spy fiasco once and for all so we can go racing clean again.

Race of Champions was on this weekend in Wembley – an event I unfortunately missed due to television issues. That was a shame because I was looking forward to the crème of racing talent going at it, especially to see Schumacher racing again for fun. If the go-kart racing in Brazil was anything to go by it would’ve been a treat. Funny thing I noted was that the Brits were selling up the prospect of Hamilton been there to race Schumacher months back. But come the event there wasn’t a peep and no Hamilton, out because of a sponsorship commitment or something similar. After all the chat about the prospect of him been there one would think they would bother to say ‘oh, he actually isn’t coming – maybe next year.’ Should be able to catch a highlights show of it somewhere.

Speaking of Schumacher, it would appear he has found a part-time hobby as a taxi driver. Running late for a plane the champ took over from the taxi driver and drove to the airport. Bloody hilarious that and decent of him to give a generous tip. The taxi driver will have a story to tell his kids. That been said, how proud of his own driving can he be when he had to give up the seat? This is one of the stories that are a bit surreal. It’s the sort of story you would think ‘I wonder what they a racing driver would do in such a situation’ and it was just great to see Schumi take the bull by the horns.

To-mato, To-mat-o

After a few weeks of relative silence in the F1 world we finally got some action both on and off the track the past week.

Spygate round two ended up with a result that has baffled many with Renault guilty but not penalised for it. This response has set many raging bias towards McLaren. Interestingly enough people seem to forget that McLaren were guilty but not penalised on the first hearing as well. Still the fact that Renault got away without penalty just adds more fuel to the fire. It’s just added to the ire of fans who claim that the FIA give Ferrari a different set of rules to the rest of the field.

The FIA aren’t making any friends right now especially with issuing a writ against Brundle for his piece in the Times. So I suppose I should be careful what I say here in case they try to lamp me up as well for expressing an opinion based on the facts put forward!
McLaren won’t have their car designs looked over till February which again is another strange decision. Why can’t the FIA delegates decide now looking at the blueprints that would be different come February when the car is built? It just once more puts questions marks over 2008 which we all hoped were to be left behind after this year’s politics.

Elsewhere Alonso finally decided to rejoin Renault, no doubt having waited to see if the team was going to be penalised over Spygate II. The choice of Nelson Piquet Junior as his team-mate I predicted at the start of the year, but not at the expense of Heikki. With more and more noise been made about de la Rosa for that second McLaren seat – due to his Spanish ties and his inability to cause Hamilton any problems – it could mean the talented Finn is going to spend a year off the grid. This is something I find baffling especially given some people that will make grid next year that really shouldn’t.

On the topic of drivers seeking seats, Ralf seems suitably unimpressed of the Force India after finishing slowest of those in the shoot-out for the second seat. Not long after the test he announced he wasn’t going to peruse the seat in what seems like salvage some pride attempt. Shame it came after he chose to drive the car and not before.

In another interesting decision by the FIA, they have released the 2009 and 2010 calendars for the WRC. With 24 events on their books all events are now only going to be bi-yearly. While it’s great to see Ireland with a place it’s an odd way to go towards the future, especially when it means that long standing events like Monte-Carlo, Britain, Finland are going to only happen once every two years. While a series should be all for expanding, it should also remember the foundations that it was built on.