Apparently, since Kimi Raikkonen was unable to fenagle his way into a race seat at McLaren he won't participate next season. According to his agent it was McLaren or nothing. Kind of bad for the sport, but I think he should wait out and see if Jenson Button ends up moving to McLaren from BrawnGP, and if he does he should seriously consider driving for the new Mercedes outfit.
The current FIA entry list for 2010 : 1, Jenson Button - Vodafone McLaren Mercedes - McLaren-Mercedes 2, Lewis Hamilton - Vodafone McLaren Mercedes - McLaren-Mercedes 3, Nico Rosberg - Brawn GP Formula One Team 4, TBA - Brawn GP Formula One Team 5, Sebastian Vettel - Red Bull Racing - Red Bull Racing Renault 6, Mark Webber - Red Bull Racing - Red Bull Racing Renault 7, Felipe Massa - Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro - Ferrari 8, Fernando Alonso - Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro - Ferrari 9, Rubens Barrichello - AT&T Williams - Williams-Cosworth 10, Nico Hulkenberg - AT&T Williams - Williams-Cosworth 11, Robert Kubica - Renault F1 Team - Renault 12, TBA - Renault F1 Team - Renault 14, Adrian Sutil - Force India F1 Team - Force India Mercedes 15, Tonio Liuzzi - Force India F1 Team - Force India Mercedes 16, Sebastien Buemi - Scuderia Toro Rosso - STR-Ferrari 17, TBA - Scuderia Toro Rosso - STR-Ferrari 18, TBA - Lotus F1 Racing - Lotus Cosworth 19, TBA - Lotus F1 Racing - Lotus Cosworth 20, TBA - Campos Meta 1 - Campos Dallara 21, Bruno Senna - Campos Meta 1 - Campos Dallara 22, TBA - USF1 Team - USF1 Cosworth 23, TBA - USF1 Team - USF1 Cosworth 24, Timo Glock - Virgin Racing - Virgin Cosworth 25, TBA - Virgin Racing - Virgin Cosworth http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns21994.html Still a lot of TBAs...Manor becomes Virgin, it's official ! The Sauber team is not announced yet while Brawn isn't named Mercedes GP in this document... Side note : I still find it funny that nobody takes #13...
AFAIK, Brawn and Mercedes are still waiting for the approval of the regulatory powers that be...shouldn't be a problem but bureaucracy takes its time...
I'm still working on getting excited for Alonso in the Ferrari. I know I'll get there, but since I've only followed this sport for a short while, it'll feel a little weird not to see him in the Renault. Any word on the chassis? Will they look relatively unchanged from last year?
I'm not excited at all. I think it more my anti-Ferrari feelings outweighing any pro-Alonso feeling that I have.
No big changes for 2010, I may say unfortunately...The main difference is that refuelling won't be allowed so the fuel tanks will be bigger. The other noticeable change are the front wheels which will be narrower. I still think the front wing should be simpler with the main flap and two additional ones ; the regulation should also ban double or any complex diffuser. The FIA was completely incoherent by allowing those last year, it made the cars very sensitive to the air flow, exactly the opposite of what was aimed. They should widen the rear wing (that's for aesthetics...) even if they decrease the size of the flaps to reduce the downforce and also decrease the size of the step underneath the cars or widen that step. It is widely accepted that GP2 cars can follow themselves more easily thanks to the fact that they rely more on their floor and less on their wings to get downforce which make them less sensitive to turbulent air. It should be done wisely though because a car that relies too much on its floor is at risk of loosing too much grip when the ground clearance changes abruptly like when hitting a bump or a kerb.
Renault/Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn makes no secret that he's not a fan of F1 but boy, he's made so much harm to the Renault F1 team ! His constant hesitation and guessing game about the future of the team has not really been helpful... First in 2007, it drew Alonso to leave for Mac Laren since the fate of Renault F1 was already in the mist ; in 2008, a desperate management of the team took desperate measures at Singapore to keep the company interested. The irony being that a completely legitimate win came the race after and also the fact that Renault the car maker would have certainly traded a win at Singapore with the resulting scandal... And now, it's there again, so much mystery about their involvement in the future. I can understand that F1 is not exactly fitted to the communication of a generalist car maker which pledges to build cheaper and greener cars but this sport remains a formidable vector of institutional advertisement at the global scale. I thought they would have carried on to at least 2012 even if I know that Renault wouldn't stay for ever ; they've gone and come back already in the past. Whatever happens they can be proud of what they achieved during this spell though unlike certain of their counterparts...
Apparently Mercedes GP and Michael Schumacher have agreed on a contract for next year. Should Schumi pass the medical examination, he'll be driving again.
Nanbawan - I always thought this was some sort of Asian name but actually, when said out loud, is: "number one"... right?
Correct. Number one à la Japanese Burt beside the egotistical stuff, I found the word itself funny to write, read and pronounce. It comes from the anime Evangelion when one of the characters (Misato) says : "You are number one" but it was more like : "Yuu aa nanbawan"...