First laps in the new R29

Mon 19 Jan, 05:37 PM

Renault officially launched its 2009 season today as the new R29 was unveiled to the world’s media at the Algarve Motor Park near Portimao in the south of Portugal.

Both the team’s race drivers, Fernando Alonso and Nelson Piquet, were on hand this morning to take the covers off their new challenger as they joined Managing Director Flavio Briatore for a photo call with the R29 in front of the team’s pit garage. They were joined by Frenchman, Romain Grosjean, who was announced as the team’s third driver for 2009, and the latest recruits from Renault’s Driver Development Programme: Davide Valsecchi from Italy, Charles Pic from France and Marco Sorensen from Denmark.

With radical revisions to the sport’s technical regulations introduced this year, the R29 incorporates a new design philosophy and looks very different from its predecessor.

Great attention has been paid to maximising the new rules and the team is optimistic about its chances for the year ahead, as Flavio Briatore explained: “We began our preparations for the R29 project early and I am proud of what the team has achieved. There are lots of new things to deal with this year, which could shake things up, but we intend to continue fighting at the front. We will now concentrate on our final preparations for the start of the season so that we can arrive in Australia hopefully fighting for the podium.”

Both Alonso and Piquet were happy to get their hands on the R29 so early in the year. Having followed the car’s progress closely over the winter, they paid tribute to the work done by the staff in the factories in Enstone and Viry. “The team has had a very busy development programme to allow us to be ready for the first January test with the new car,” said Alonso. “Now we are all looking forward to seeing the result of all that effort on the racetrack.”

Team President Bernard Rey also confirmed the commitment of Renault to the sport ahead of the new season. “This team is the proof of the ability of the Renault Group to obtain results and success at the very highest level,” said Rey. “The team will therefore be supported by the whole Group throughout the challenges that lie ahead this year.”

After the photo call, the R29 made its track debut as Nelson kicked off the team’s winter development programme at the Algarve Motor Park. “It feels great to be in the R29, even though the weather was not great,” said Piquet after his first day in the car. “Today was all about adding miles to the car, collecting data and learning as much as we could. Hopefully the rest of the week will allow us to build on the progress we have made today.”

The car featured a fresh new livery in the colours of the team’s principal partner ING, as well as 'eye-catching' Total branding following confirmation of a new three-year technical partnership with Total Group.

"We're very pleased to continue our sponsorship and Technology Partnership with ING Renault F1 Team," said Total CEO Christophe de Margerie. “It's a great partnership for Total group to be aligned with Renault in a legacy of excellence, as well as providing a good global venue for our brand presence. For Total, another key benefit – apart from winning Formula 1 races with a truly outstanding motorsports team – is to use our on-track research and testing to develop and deliver new and more efficient products that benefit everyday drivers under the most demanding driving conditions."

The team will remain in the Algarve until Thursday to continue with its testing programme. Piquet will be in the R29 for a second day tomorrow before handing it over to Alonso for the final two days.

McLaren present the MP4-24

Fri 16 Jan, 11:15 AM

With an unprecedented series of rule changes introduced ahead of the 2009 season, the new Vodafone McLaren Mercedes MP4-24 represents a significant departure from its world championship-winning predecessor.

Incorporating new bodywork regulations and the much-heralded return of slick tyres, the team's new challenger not only looks radical but also incorporates a host of new innovative features under the skin, such as a sophisticated kinetic energy recovery system (KERS).

While still retaining the distinctive family look established with both the MP4-22 and MP4-23, this year's car is visually very different from its predecessors as a result of two main factors:

AERODYNAMICS

This year's aerodynamic regulations were framed by the FIA and the Overtaking Working Group (helmed by McLaren Mercedes engineering director Paddy Lowe, Ferrari's Rory Byrne and Renault's Pat Symonds) which met throughout 2007 in order to address the issues affecting passing in Formula 1.

The OWG's influence can be most clearly seen around the front wing, which has been widened, and the rear wing - which is now more compact. Other factors affecting aerodynamics include the banning of ancillary appendages, the addition of driver-adjustable front-wing flaps and a heavily revised diffuser.

KERS

The MP4-24's KERS device has been developed in collaboration with McLaren and Mercedes- Benz HighPerformanceEngines, which has been developing and refining the system for almost two years. The device enables the car to recover energy under braking, store the energy for a lap and release it when the driver presses a button on the steering wheel.

With a fully optimised KERS device's output capped at 400kJ (discharging 80bhp boost for 6.7s per lap), the development team's primary focus has already shifted to further improving the unit's integration within the chassis in order to minimise performance loss elsewhere within the package. An optimised KERS package can be expected to deliver a 0.3-0.5s gain per lap.

WINTER TEST PROGRAMME

With in-season track testing now prohibited, the MP4-24 will undergo an intensive winter programme at the following venues prior to the season-opening Australian Grand Prix on March 29:

Jan 19-22 Portimao Group test one

Feb 10-13 Jerez Group test two

Mar 1-4 Jerez Group test three

Mar 9-12 Barcelona Group test four

Week 12 Private test ahead of transportation to Melbourne

Ferrari run the new F60

Mon 12 Jan, 03:21 PM

Ferrari on Monday became the first team to reveal its 2009 car.

The 'F60', named in celebration of the fact the Italian marque is the only to have contested all sixty seasons in the sport's history, was launched with a low-key event at Ferrari's Maranello headquarters.

Explaining the name, team boss Stefano Domenicali said: "It was our desire to combine the history of F1 and the fact that Ferrari has always been present."

The car was originally scheduled to be track debuted at nearby Fiorano, but Felipe Massa instead took to the cockpit of the F60 for the first time at Ferrari's other circuit, Mugello.

Massa said he was pleasantly surprised about the appearance of the F60. "With all the new regulations I was expecting something else, like ten years ago with huge wings, but I was surprised."

"I find the new F60 to be nice, small like a F3 car but nice looking," the Brazilian said.

Following an initial shakedown lap, the new car was back on track with Massa at the wheel and is 'happy and excited to take the Ferrari out for its first ride.'

Honda pulls out of Formula One

Eurosport - Fri, 05 Dec 16:57:00 2008

Honda Motor Co has announced that it is pulling out of Formula One motor racing, although next year's Japanese Grand Prix at the Suzuka circuit will still go ahead as planned.mid slumping car sales triggered by the worldwide downturn, Honda are no longer willing to bankroll the Formula One team and its estimated annual budget of $500 million.

Honda Motor Co Chief Executive Takeo Fukui told said a return to the sport could take time, and that there were no plans to continue as an engine supplier.

"This difficult decision was taken recently and was made in light of the quickly deteriorating operating environment facing the global auto industry," Fukui said.

"Honda must protect its core business activities and secure the long term as widespread uncertainties in the economics around the globe continue to mount.

"We will enter into consultation with associates of Honda Racing F1 and its engine supplier Honda Racing Development regarding the future of the two companies. This will include offering the team for sale."

Fukui, who told Reuters this year that he would "spend a trillion yen" if he could to make Honda a Formula One winner, said there would be no speedy return to the sport.

"At this stage we have no plans to return to F1. We have no plans to supply engines to other teams," he said. "We do not want to be half in and half out of the sport."

Honda would in any case have little time to find a buyer with the 2009 season starting in Australia on March 29.

"We would love to be able to continue in Formula One but we're simply not able to in the current financial climate," Fukui said.

"At testing in Barcelona last month we were still positive about racing in F1 next season.

"But we have to use our resources sensibly. As far as potential buyers go, our criterion would be that they continue to employ the hundreds of engineers who work for the Honda team."

Honda, like all of its rivals suffering from a sharp fall in global car sales, saw its sales in the United States, its biggest market, slump 32 percent last month.

"Pulling out of F1 will have a big impact in terms of cutting overall costs," said Fukui. "The most important thing for Honda is to see where we are in the next three to five years."

With Formula One's power-brokers desperately seeking cost-cutting measures to ensure its own survival, Honda's departure will have serious implications for the glamour sport.

It also leaves Britain's Jenson Button without a drive for 2009, although some teams have yet to confirm their lineups.

Brazilian Bruno Senna, the 25-year-old nephew of the late triple world champion Ayrton, had also been tipped to take the place of compatriot Rubens Barrichello at Honda next season.

Honda's exit leaves the multi-billion dollar sport facing a depleted grid of 18 cars if no buyer can be found in the extremely tight time-frame available.

It will also prompt fears that other major manufacturers, with their factory production suspended and thousands of staff laid off, could follow Honda's example.

Honda and Toyota Motor Corp have been the big spenders in Formula One in recent years.

Ross Brawn, the former Ferrari technical director who won multiple world championships with Michael Schumacher, was hired to run the Honda team at the end of last year.

Despite its huge resources, Honda had a dismal 2008 season and was pinning its hopes on next year's new rules levelling the playing field.

Button, a winner for Honda in Hungary in 2006, scored just three points and Barrichello took 11. The team finished ninth overall.

Honda's best finish in the constructors' championship was fourth, in 1967 and 2006, although they powered McLaren and Williams to a string of titles in the 1980s and 1990s.

The last team to leave Formula One was Honda-backed Super Aguri, the tail-enders who folded for financial reasons in April.

The sport's governing body said on Friday that Cosworth would provide Formula One teams with a low-cost engine option from 2010.

FIA president Max Mosley said the body was in exclusive negotiations with Cosworth, Xtrac and Ricardo Transmissions (XR) to provide a complete powertrain (engine and gearbox).

"We can get the cost down from the current £200 million ($293.4 million) plus [per team] down to about £30 million at which point the income from television and the income from sponsors covers it and you don't need these huge subsidies from the car industry," Mosley said.

McLaren to unveil car next month

Eurosport - Tue, 02 Dec 13:13:00 2008

The car Lewis Hamilton will use to defend his Formula One title next year will be unveiled by McLaren on January 16 at their Woking factory.

McLaren are the third team to announce a launch date.

Toyota will be revealing their new car on January 15 while BMW-Sauber take the wraps off theirs in Valencia on January 20.

While McLaren and Mercedes engineers busily prepare for the 2009 season in Woking, Brixworth and Stuttgart and the test team readies two cars for December outings at Jerez and the new Autodromo Internacional do Algarve circuit in Portugal, Hamilton and team-mates Heikki Kovalainen, Pedro de la Rosa and Gary Paffett will head to western Finland for a five-day pre-season training camp at the Kuortane Sports Institute.

The centre has helped train some of the world's top athletes and Hamilton acknowledges that, not only does it provide the McLaren team with a useful distraction from the usual pressures of F1, but it also acts as a useful team-building exercise with mechanics and engineers joining the drivers for group exercises and tests on the Kuortane campus.

"Travelling to Finland for our winter training camp is one of the best weeks of the year for me," the Briton admitted.

"It feels like you're miles from anywhere and totally cut off from the outside world. It allows me to focus solely on my training, which is great.

"It's certainly not an easy week. Finland in the winter is cold and icy and we're pushed hard for day after day. We spend the first part of the week doing tests to monitor our core strength and flexibility and spend the rest of the time building on specific exercises that will help us once we're back in the car.

"After Brazil, it's good to get a proper rest because it's the one time of the year when you can relax your training a little - but Finland is when it all starts again in earnest."

Ballon d'Or will make me better, vows Ronaldo

Tue 02 Dec, 11:10 PM

MANCHESTER (AFP) - Cristiano Ronaldo believes winning the Ballon d'Or will only increase his drive to improve on the level of performance that earned him one of football's biggest individual prizes.

Ronaldo beat Barcelona's Lionel Messi and Liverpool striker Fernando Torres to the honour on the back of a phenomenal 2007-08 season in which he scored 42 goals for his Premier League and Champions League-winning club.

The 23-year-old dismissed suggestions that achieving one of his lifetime ambitions so early in his career would lead to him becoming complacent or increase the pressure on him to perform at the highest level every time he appears.

"I always play with pressure because people always expect a lot from me and I don't think that will change," Ronaldo told United's website, www.manutd.com.

"Winning this award makes me feel very happy inside because it's one of the best days of my life.

"But my responsibilities are still the same; I want to continue to play well for my club and my country and try to do as well as last season.

"Of course I can improve - there are many things I still need to learn.

"You can never let yourself think you know everything. I am still very ambitious and I will continue to work very hard every day. I know it will be very hard to better last season, but I will try - if you don't try you win nothing. A new season means a new challenge and I want to help the team win more trophies."

Ronaldo becomes the first United player to win the award since the late George Best in 1968. Denis Law and Sir Bobby Charlton were also honoured in the 60s and the Portuguese winger was proud to follow in the footsteps of three of Old Trafford's all-time greats.

"It's amazing that only four players in the club's history have won it, I didn't know that until yesterday," Ronaldo said.

"So it's special for the club and obviously for me and I feel very proud to be part of the history of the Ballon D'Or and the history of this club. You work hard to win team awards and personal awards, but to win this one is very special."

Barcelona captain Carlos Puyol congratulated Ronaldo, but insisted he would have plumped for Messi, judging the latter a better player.

"I think that the best player in the world in Leo Messi, and I say it because I see him play every day and I have never seen anything like it. Sooner or later, Messi will win the Ballon d'Or," Puyol said, according to Barcelona's website late Tuesday.

Ronaldo travels with United - Champions League

Eurosport - Mon, 24 Nov 17:04:00 2008

Cristiano Ronaldo has travelled out with the rest of the Manchester United squad to Spain ahead of the Champions League match against Villarreal.

The Portugal winger was considered doubtful after suffering a leg injury in the draw at Aston Villa on Saturday.

However, he trained with the group on Monday morning and showed no ill effects from his knock and looks likely to feature at some stage in the match.

Darren Fletcher also trained after missing the game against Villa because of a knee problem.

But goalkeeper Edwin Van der Sar stayed in Manchester - it was understood he was rested and either Ben Foster and Tomasz Kuszczak will play instead.

United will be without Dimitar Berbatov (hamstring) and Wes Brown (ankle) as well as long-term injury victims Paul Scholes and Owen Hargreaves.

Villarreal's top scorer Joseba Llorente has joined Turkey striker Nihat Kahveci on the injury list which leaves former United frontman Giuseppe Rossi and Guillermo Franco to lead the line.

At the back Uruguay's Diego Godin is also out injured.

Carter: Will Rossi stay or will he go?

Eurosport - Fri, 21 Nov 17:31:00 2008

If you've never seen the excellent World Rally Championship before, preferring instead to concentrate on two-wheeled motorsport, would the defection from one to the other by Valentino Rossi make you switch?

Or at least, have a passing interest in an arena you might not have had a look at before?

I ask because, this week, Valentino himself has dropped some pretty big hints at what might be next for him, career-wise.

The eight-times world champion has been putting a Ford Focus rally car through its paces in a test in Cumbria, part of his preparation for the Rally of Wales next month.

He's also been out in the Monza Rally, where he finished second. Considerably higher up the ranking than the rest of his motorcycle peers managed (and quite a few of them took part too, like Loris Capirossi and Marco Simoncelli>).

Second place would indicate, it is fairly safe to assume, that the still-youthful Italian is taking the matter of sliding around the dirt on four wheels very seriously indeed.

So when, whilst talking to La Gazetta dello Sport, Rossi said: "Yes, I like rallies very much. I think it is possible when I finish with bikes. I have another two years, after that we will see," it sparked a bit of interest around the world.

Is this the clearest indication yet that we've got another couple of years of watching Rossi on the bikes? Is he really going to switch to four wheels for good at the end of 2010?

If he does, what will happen to the MotoGP world? Will Rossi's departure mean that Casey Stoner becomes a results machine, rolling off World Championship after World Championship in a similarly devastating way to that which we last saw at the hands of Mick Doohan and his five crowns?

Or will it spur the others in the MotoGP pack on? Seeing the Alpha male leave suddenly encouraging them all to try and move into the vacant spot of all-time number one?

It is another two years before we know what will happen. Will Valentino find enough interest to carry on with motorcycle racing at all at the end of these next two years? We know he switched from Honda to Yamaha because he needed a fresh challenge and that the arrival of the 800s further sparked the grey matter too.

Two more years isn't a very long time at all, certainly not in racing terms and if all we do have is 36 more races to enjoy Rossi at this, the very top of his game, then we'd better relish it while we can.

And then take note of the WRC calendar, set the video and see how well our boy does in that world.

World champion in two seasons there too, I reckon.

Webber "back for start of season"

Eurosport - Mon, 24 Nov 15:38:00 2008

Surgery to pin the broken right leg of Australian Formula One driver Mark Webber has been a success, his spokesman said on Sunday.

Red Bull driver Webber, 32, was riding a mountain bike when he collided with a four-wheel drive while competing in his own multi-sport charity event in Tasmania on Saturday.

Geoff Donohue, spokesman for the Mark Webber Pure Tasmania Challenge, said Hobart Private Hospital doctors had inserted rods to mend the breaks in his lower right tibia and fibula.

It was not known at this stage when Webber would be able to leave hospital, he added.

"He's feeling sharp and spritely, all things considered," Donohue said.

Police said no charges would be filed over the accident.

Donohue said Webber was expected to fully recover in time for the start of the Formula One season in Melbourne on March 29 but he is likely to miss the start of the testing in Europe.

"He may miss some early testing in the car - it's a setback but it's a minor setback," Donohue said.

Rossi: I could have been F1 star

Eurosport - Fri, 21 Nov 11:20:00 2008

MotoGP world champion Valentino Rossi has said he could have been a good Formula One driver if he had made the switch three years ago.

Rossi tried out Ferrari's 2008 F1 car at the Mugello circuit as a gift from the Italian team after his eighth motorcycling world title.

He had serious tests for Ferrari in 2005 and 2006 but decided to stick with two wheels.

"With a lot of work I could have become a good F1 driver. It is hard to say if I would have become a winner or not, but the potential was there," he said after a strong test.

Rossi managed a fastest lap of one minute and 22.5 seconds, less than two seconds behind recent times recorded by Ferrari drivers Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen on the same track.

Wearing his distinctively-coloured helmet, he was roared on by around 1,000 fans and could have gone faster had his 51-lap run not been cut short by an approaching thunderstorm.

The chances of Rossi ending up in Formula One look to have gone but the 29-year-old has talked about the possibility of moving into rallying permanently when he finishes with MotoGP.

The Italian was second in the Monza rally last weekend and is due to race in the British round of the World Championship next month.

Ferrari's seven-times champion Michael Schumacher has entered occasional motorcycle races since retiring in 2006 while rally champion Sebastien Loeb tested for the Red Bull Formula One team in Spain this week.