Alonso leads Ferrari one two in Bahrain. Alonso wins the Bahrain Grand Prix on his debut for Ferrari while Massa settled for second place after temperature problems in his cockpit. Michael Schumacher came home 6th on his return to F1
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Ross Brawn joins Honda F1
Ross Brawn has been the brains behind Michael Schumacher’s domination of Formula One. Brawn has played a leading role in all of Schumacher’s seven world titles, the first two with Benetton in 1994 and 1995, and then the five in a row with Ferrari from 2000. Now he is taking up the new challenge with Honda where he will take up the position of Team Principal with full responsibility for designing, manufacturing, engineering and racing Honda’s Formula One car.
Ross spent ten years with the Ferrari team where, in the position of Technical Director, he helped them regain glory in the form of six consecutive constructors’ championship titles from 1999. Prior to joining Ferrari, Ross held the position of Technical Director with the Benetton F1 Team, helping them win back-to-back World Drivers Championships in 1994 and 1995 with Michael Schumacher and take the Constructors’ Championship in 1995. In the course of his 30 year career in motorsport he has worked with a number of Formula One teams and in sports car racing.#.
Impressive. What else he can achieve in F1 in his latest position..
2006 F1 season finale
The 2006 F1 season is over and Alonso defended his World Champion title at Sao Paulo, Brazil by finishing the Brazilian GrandPrix in second. Felipe Massa drove a faultless drive from pole position to take the chequered flag at his home GrandPrix. Ayrton Senna was the last countryman to have won at Interlagos, where Massa grew up. But the day belongs to the F1 legend, Michael Schumacher who demonstrated why he is still the best out there in his final Formula one race. Schumacher, the only man who can deprive Alonso started 10th on the grid after technical problems prevented him from setting a time in important final qualifying. To win an eighth World title, he must win the race, with Alonso failing to score. Even though its tough ask from 10th on the grid, no one dared to rule out the possibility as Ferrari dominated all weekend. Read More
BMW pays tribute to Michael Schumacher
BMW and BMW Motorsport Director Mario Theissen paid tribute to the most successfull Formula 1 driver ever, Michael Schumacher on his final race of his career with Thanx messages.
The most successful driver of all time is retiring, he did a lot for the sport and because of him, especially in Germany, F1 is very popular. As a thank you to Michael Schumacher we have Thanks Michael and Danke Michael on the rear wings of our cars.
In friday’s morning practice, the rear wings of the BMW cars read retirement messages in big blue lettering “Thanks Michael” and “Danke Michael”, in reference to 37 year old Michael Schumacher’s 250th and last Grand prix in an illustrious sixteen year career. Read More
Present and future of Ferrari on front row
Kimi Raikkonen, who is going to be announced as Ferrari driver for the next season claimed the Pole Position from Michael Schumacher by just two-thousandths of a second at Monza. The crucial thing is though Alonso’s position, who qualified on 5th position. With two men between Schumi and Alonso and one of them being Massa, it’s gonna be an interesting race for Ferrari and Schumi. And with everyone waiting for Schumi’s future decision and Ferrari’s driver line up for 2007 and beyond, Ferrari has a big day ahead infront of Tifosi. It will be a shock if Schumi retires. Lets wait and see.
Ferrari on roll at Istanbul as Massa claims his maiden pole
Massa has done it, the first pole position of his Formula One carrer at Turkish GrandPrix. Michael Schumacher dominated saturday’s third and final practice session of the Turkish Grand Prix weekend, but his team mate Massa was the man who beat him in the Qualifying. It looked all day that no one can stop Schumacher and Ferrari this weekend, but Schumacher who was up all the time in Qualifying went mysteriously slow in his final lap of the session to claim 2nd behind his teammate. With Alonso and Fisichella behind Ferrari in the second row, its looks all good for Ferrari and schumacher. Mclaren who looked strong in the previous 3 races had a difficult session with Raikkonen 8th and his team mate in 12th. Ferrari lock out the front row and with their title rivals Renault behind them, it looks like the Race is going to be a fascinating one. As usual, I will try to review the complete Race tommorow.
Disaster for Schumacher as Raikkonen snatches Pole
Raikkonen snatched his second straight Pole position for tommorow’s Hungary Grand Prix with a stunning last minute lap. It was heartbreak for Massa as he was the fastest driver all day behind Michael Schumacher. Meanwhile Schumacher was given an identical penalty as Alonso for overtaking two cars after the red flags had been deployed to halt the final practice session. Jenson Button’s Honda engine had expired, putting oil down on the circuit. That means that both Alonso and Schumacher came into qualifying with two sec time penalties to be added to their best lap times. As a result Michael and Alonso were out of the final shootout lying in 12th and 15th place respectively. But as Button drops 10 places down from 4th to 14th, Schumacher starts from 11th while Alonso will be pushed back to 16th and his team mate Fisichella will start from 7th place.
Michael Schumacher will have to do everything he can to get the maximum points from 11th on the grid, but it is worth noting that Nigel Mansell started one place lower in 1989 in his Ferrari and won the race. Well Schumi, I cant think of anyone else who can do that as the Ferrari dominated all the weekend so far. As usual I will be posting the complete review of tommorow’s race, which should be an interesting one.
Surprise Pole for Raikkonen at Hockenheim
kimi Raikkonen snatched a surprise Pole position from Michael schumacher at Mclaren’s engine partner Mercedes’ home event. Michael Schumacher, Felipe Massa and Ferrari dominated the session right up until Raikkonen’s clocked in the Pole time. Schumacher starts second and is firm favourite to take the win tomorrow while Massa once again did a great job for Ferrari and starts third. The practice form suggested that a third successive Ferrari front row lock out was on the cards, and indeed the Maranello squad had things all its own way in the first two knockout sessions. But come the decisive 15-minute shootout, Schumacher had no answer for Raikkonen’s pace and wound up 0.135s adrift. But the good news is that the rivals, Giancarlo Fisichella is only fifth and world champion Fernando Alonso looking lost in seventh. It was all smiles at Honda who have Jenson Button starting fourth with Rubens Barrichello sixth.
With every one guessing that Raikkonen is undoubtedly light on fuel for the start of the 67-lap race, Ferrari and Micheal Schumacher along with Massa looks strong while Alonso has an uphill task as in Indianapolis to save his lead in the Championship. As usual, I will be posting a complete review of tommorow’s race.
Schumacher and Ferrari reigns Supreme in US GP
Schumacher and Ferrari dominated the United States Grandprix at Indianapolis with Alonso managing no better than 5th place. Schumi made 5 wins out of 7 appearances in the US GP for ferrari. Right from the first lap ferrari was on their own race with all others having a race of their own. The start itself was brilliant as, into turn 1 and Massa takes the lead from Schumacher with Alonso side by side with the german. Schumi keeps second, but there has been drama at the back of the grid with a pile up into turn one.
Safety car was deployed. A total of seven cars are in the gravel trap at the first turn. Hiedfeld, Webber, Klien, Montagny, Montoya, Speed, Raikkonen all gone. That was an amazing start for Alonso, for a moment it looked as if he was going to take the lead into turn 1. Replays showed that it was a huge accident at the back, the two mclarens made contact. They in turn touched a Super Aguri. The result was a further impact with Heidfeld’s BMW sauber which sent the german into a spectacular barrel roll. There is smoke comming from Button’s car and he retires in Honda garage. Montoya was the guy responsible for triggering atleast some of the drama on lap 1. Read More
Even Ferrari’s scooter was quick at Indy!
Everyone might have known already that Michael Schumacher and Ferrari interrupted Renault’s long run of success by dominating qualifying at Indianapolis. Alonso admitted that, tyres aside, one of Ferrari’s advantages this weekend is mammoth straight line speed. He said it felt like he was ‘driving a GP2 car’ when, at one stage at Indy, a Ferrari passed him (He was refering to Massa who overtook Alonso during qualifying.).
Ferrari are untouchable here and if they are reliable and do not crash then their race will be more or less the same as last year – out on their own. We are not going to just give up and not try but to think that we are going to beat them would be idiotic.”