The Motorsport Thread (was the F1 thread)

The British GP is this weekend

And on a random note, I was looking at the celebrity birthdays for today and realized that today, July 4th is the birthday of Roland Ratzenberger. He would've been 48 today.

^ Wow, I mean how long have they been at Silverstone??
But hey, its a change of pace at least, and Silverstone isn't my favorite of tracks

Of course I'm not familiar with Donington, only in racing video games

First thing JJ, Silverstone hosted the very first World Championship GP in 1950 and is celebrating its 60th aniversary this year (Great features from Martin Brundle for the 60 years of Silverstone on the ITV coverage).

I'd love to see the GP go to Donington, any car going flat out through the Cranners and into the Old Hairpin is spectacular, but I just cant see it happening. We had this 10 years ago with the Octagon deal to take the GP back to Brands Hatch, only to find that it was impossible to update the track and lease it back to Silverstone. This time the tracks not the problem its the access, there's only one road into the track and its a country lane, it would take at least a decade to turn it into a duel carriegway, probably longer, so that it could deal with the traffic  (I heard the queues o get out at the Renault World Series events the lst couple of years were horrendous, and it would be similar with F1). Another ploy for more money from Bernie, ussing a tried and tested tactic.

On other news, Coulthard has anounced that he will be retireing from F1 after this year. Cant say its a surprise as its not been a great season for him. Now that Audi have let Frank Biela go, I'd like to see him at Le Mans next year.

Oh, and practice times, Ferrari are clearly sandbagging, they should be ahead of McLaren here.

1.  KOVALAINEN    McLaren       1m19.989s

2.  WEBBER        Red Bull      1m20.520s

3.  HAMILTON      McLaren       1m20.543s

4.  COULTHARD     Red Bull      1m20.589s

5.  ROSBERG       Williams      1m20.748s

6.  VETTEL        Toro Rosso    1m20.805s

7.  BUTTON        Honda         1m20.929s

8.  MASSA         Ferrari       1m20.943s

9.  NAKAJIMA      Williams      1m20.985s

10. BARRICHELLO   Honda         1m21.002s

11. KUBICA        BMW           1m21.023s

12. RAIKKONEN     Ferrari       1m21.275s

13. HEIDFELD      BMW           1m21.453s

14. GLOCK         Toyota        1m21.472s

15. ALONSO        Renault       1m21.511s

16. FISICHELLA    Force India   1m21.520s

17. BOURDAIS      Toro Rosso    1m21.634s

18. PIQUET        Renault       1m21.642s

19. SUTIL         Force India   1m21.756s

20. TRULLI        Toyota        1m22.196s

^Yeah, he's still a fast racer but his qualifying is not so good and with the grid so closs this year it leaves him with a lot of work to do in the races.

Ferrari arent sandbaging, they're just slow! Massa in 9th behind Vettel is a real surprise and I suspect Kimi had to put in a real strong lap to get that 3rd. Amzing lap from Webber, something special there definitely.

1.   KOVALAINEN       McLaren

2.   WEBBER           Red Bull

3.   RAIKKONEN        Ferrari 
4.   HAMILTON         McLaren

5.   HEIDFELD         BMW

6.   ALONSO           Renault

7.   PIQUET           Renault

8.   VETTEL           Toro Rosso

9.   MASSA            Ferrari

10.  KUBICA           BMW

11.  COULTHARD        Red Bull

12.  GLOCK            Toyota

13.  BOURDAIS         Toro Rosso

14.  TRULLI           Toyota

15.  NAKAJIMA         Williams

16.  BARRICHELLO      Honda

17.  BUTTON           Honda

18.  ROSBERG          Williams

19.  SUTIL            Force India

20.  FISICHELLA       Force India

A stunning lap from Webber just a pity that we didn't see it.

The comments about the wind were rather humourous, yes the the wind caused a few problems for drivers but I can guarantee that if they were to run at Snetterton the wind would be a lot worse. 

It was a very entertaining race, a real pity that DC couldn't do well but Heidfeld was superb, his overtaking easily makes him the driver of the day in my opinion.

Definitely got to give it to Hamilton, cracking start  and in the heavy rain was as much as 6 seconds a lap or more faster than every other inter runner, only the Honda's were faster and thats because they were on full wets (got to admit, it was crazy that Honda were the only team to change to full wets, the advantage they gained from that was amazing, they would have been second without the fuel rig problem).

Heidfeldt definitely the best overtaker of the day though.

Anyone else noticed that Kovalainen seems a bit hesitant in wheel to wheel racing?  

JJLehto wrote: Didn't notice in this race myself, but  I did notice Felipe Massa is back to his bad wet racing. I thought after earlier this year maybe he's improved a little, but he spun like 5 times....

It was 6 times, and it beats his own personal record of 4 set at the 02 British GP, a race that prompted Viellneuve to say that he couldnt drive in a streight line.

Yeah, but having said that, Ferrari had a pretty dire weekend anyway on a track thats taylor made for their car, at least on paper, and once again the strategists really mest up.

sleeper wrote: Yeah, but having said that, Ferrari had a pretty dire weekend anyway on a track thats taylor made for their car, at least on paper, and once again the strategists really mest up.

Oh, you mean when instead of changing tires they decided to stay on their worn tires???
What was the idea again? That the intermediates would wear down so much they would basically become slicks??  

And Zappa, what was Villenueve doing in NASCAR???