4 more days to Singapore Grand prix

The containers started streaming into the F1 paddock at Marina Bay yesterday morning, with Force India, Williams and Renault ahead of the queue and the first to get their cars unpacked and parked in their garages.

By mid-afternoon, the pitlane was a hive of activity, with cranes unloading the crates of equipment and cars under the direction of Formula 1 logistics handlers, DHL.
The crew of the 12 teams can expect things to be in order when they take over their respective garages to prepare for Formula 1's only global night race at the Marina Bay street circuit from Friday to Sunday.
On the circuit, it was a picture of calm as workers put the finishing touches, giving curbs a new coat of paint and washing the track along the start-finish straight.

In and out of the paddock, there was a noticeable absence of the tension that marked the week leading to the inaugural SingTel Singapore Grand Prix in 2008 and last year's race.
"We have definitely worked out most of the teething issues after staging two successful rounds of the Formula 1 Championship. Everything is much more smooth-sailing now," Jonathan Hallett, Singapore GP's media and communications director, told MediaCorp.
"Everything this year is proceeding according to plan. Similarly, the teams have also grown accustomed to adapting to the special logistics a street circuit like ours presents."

But the lack of frenzy belies an explosive order of business that will ignite when the cars start roaring around the track.
Arriving in Singapore for the 15th stop of the 19-leg season, only 24 points separate championship leader Mark Webber and Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel.


McLaren's Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari's Fernando Alonso and defending champion Jenson Button in the other Mclaren are between the Red Bull pair and with the five drivers desperate to be at the top step of the podium at the end of 61 laps on Sunday night, tempers threaten to be paper thin.
This is in part reflected in ticket sales, which have been brisk, selling out in 10 of the 16 categories and organisers anticipate a full house for all three days of the Grand Prix.

Justin Chew, Singapore Tourism Board's executive director for hospitality, F1 and sports, is also expecting a huge contingent of overseas fans to be at the Marina Bay street circuit.
"From what we can see of the take-up rate from overseas, the European crowd is returning in force after skipping last year's edition because of the economic

slowdown," Chew told MediaCorp.
"But we won't know the exact numbers until after the race."
Unlike previous years, hotels, too, around the circuit expect to be close to capacity during the weekend despite the high room rates of $1,000 and above.
Ernawati Setijo, Marina Mandarin's director of marketing communications, said they are nearing 80 per cent occupancy and expect to pass that figure in the next few days.
Said Setijo: "Without prior experience with Formula 1 in 2008, I think everyone entered the F1 weekend blind, trying to find what package worked.

"But all of us are wiser now. For example, we used to sell a minimum of four nights' stay, but we've rebundled it to two and it is working."

Ian dacotta - todaypaper

F1 German Grand Prix

Ferrari have been fined $100,000 by the FIA for implementing team orders during today's German Grand Prix.

Team principal Stefano Domenicali, team manager Massimo Rivola and drivers Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso were summoned to face the stewards following the race at Hockenheim.
After what appeared to be a coded message from Massa's race engineer Rob Smedley on lap 47, the Brazilian then let Alonso past two laps later, the Spaniard going on to claim the 23rd win of his career.
After meeting with the stewards, Ferrari were deemed in breach of article 39.1 of the FIA 2010 sporting regulations that states "team orders which interfere with a race result are prohibited".
They were also charged with a breach of article 151c of the FIA International Sporting Code.
That relates to "any fraudulent conduct, or any act prejudicial to the interests of any competition or to the interests of motor sport generally".
The stewards have also referred the matter to the FIA World Motor Sport Council for further consideration.

Ferrari could be banned from Formula One after Sunday's German Grand Prix
The Italian team were found guilty by race stewards of 'bringing the sport into disrepute' for ordering their other driver, Brazil's Felipe Massa, to relinquish the lead to his team-mate.

The FIA hearing is expected to be held in Paris next month, when the range of options open to the Council extends to expelling Ferrari from the world championship.
Although that is unlikely, the sport's most famous marque could realistically expect to have yesterday's result expunged. A suspension for a number of races is another possibility.

Condemnation rained down on Ferrari last night. Former team owner Eddie Jordan said: 'It was unlawful and theft. They stole from us the chance of having a wheel-to-wheel contest between the drivers.Ferrari should be ashamed. This was a team order. For me it is cheating and the two cars should be excluded. It looks as if a young Spaniard acted petulantly and Ferrari have reacted.'
Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said: 'That is the clearest team order I have seen. It's wrong for the sport. The regulations are pretty clear - team orders are not allowed.'
A Ferrari spokesman said the team will not be appealing the stewards' verdict.

Hamilton wins Montreal GP

Tire gamble pays off as Brit captures Formula One race in Montreal

Pole sitter Lewis Hamilton didn’t think it was a gamble for his McLaren Mercedes team to start Sunday’s Formula One Canadian Grand Prix on softer option tires.
Few believed him, but at the end of 70 laps at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve it was Hamilton and his McLaren Mercedes team that held all the aces and the giant’s share of the pot from F-1’s only visit to this side of the Atlantic Ocean.
He crossed the finish line a full 2.2 seconds ahead of teammate Jenson Button to give the British-based team a 1-2 result.
Hamilton was 9.2 seconds in front of third-place finisher Fernando Alonso in a Ferrari.
Sebastian Vettel, who before the race had criticized McLaren’s decision to run the Saturday qualifying laps on the option tires, was fourth for Red Bull with teammate Mark Webber rounding out the top five.
To many among the 110,000 sold-out crowd at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, however, it looked early on as if Hamilton had lost his gamble when he pulled into the pits under green flag conditions to change to the harder compound tires after just eight laps.
But as the race wore on Hamilton reeled in first Vettel, then Webber, then Alonso to take control. It marks the second win in Canada for the 25-year-old Hamilton.
The victory also lifted Hamilton to the top of the world championship with 109 points, three ahead of Button and six ahead of Webber, who had held the lead going into the Canadian GP.
Hamilton called his win the toughest of his career.
“It was the toughest race I’ve ever been in,” he said. “We had great pace all the way through but we had to fight traffic all the way as well. So far this season, I would have to say it was the ultimate challenge.”
There was one moment, however, that could have ruined Hamilton’s day. On exiting after his first pit stop, he came close to locking wheels with Alonso.
“On our in-lap to change tires, I was ahead of Alonso but he had some problems and ended up coming out beside him,” he said.
“He was in my blind spot, but he managed to race us to the end of pit lane and got out in front of us.”
From that point on, Hamilton said, the race was hard fight for every turn on every lap. But he added, the hard fighting made his win all the more satisfying.
“It has been a tremendous weekend, it has been fantastic,” Hamilton said. “I got here on Wednesday and things have gone so well. I’ve had incredible support from the fans.”
Button, the defending F-1 champion, heaped praise on his younger teammate, calling his race phenomenal.
“This guy (Hamilton) was phenomenal,” Button said. “It is good to finish close to (him) and good to get some points.”
Alonso complained, however, that it was the traffic, and not Hamilton’s faster McLaren Mercedes that cost him the victory on Sunday.
“We went from getting 25 points (for the win) to 15 points (for third) because of traffic,” he said.
“Ferrari is moving in the right direction but today we kept being held up (by back markers).”
Late in the race — on Lap 62 — the McLaren engineers were urging Hamilton to ease up in order to save his tires, which were beginning to show some severe wear.
But on the very next tour of Circuit Gilles Villeneuve’s 4.61 km loop Hamilton responded with a time of one minute, 18.025 seconds — the fastest lap of the day of any of the 2X starters on the grid.
With three laps to go he had increased his lead over Button to 3.5 second before finally heeding his team’s pleas to lift of the gas, at least a little bit.

By DEAN MCNULTY

Red Bull faces biggest challenge yet in Canada

It is two years since the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal last hosted a Formula One Grand Prix.
Welcome back, to a race seemingly always packed with drama and incident.
This weekend the initial focus of attention will be less on the cars, but on the body language of the Red Bull Racing drivers. Quite simply after the “Istan-Bulls-Up”, the team faces the biggest challenge of its five year history.
Their car is the class of the field — a Red Bull has been on the front row of the starting grid for every Grand Prix this season — and their two drivers are proven race-winners and championship contenders.

Yet if their run of success is to continue, they need to reassert discipline across the entire team.
The debates will rage for months over Webber and Vettel’s respective actions. But the outbursts by Red Bull Racing driver development manager Dr. Helmut Markko inflamed rather than defused the pressures in the Istanbul paddock and undermined the authority of team principal Christian Horner.
That Markko blamed Webber for the incident and took sides with Vettel isn’t too surprising. Markko was the man who “discovered” Vettel and with the aid of Red Bull funding, assisted him into Formula One.

Frankly, having supervised the spending of millions of dollars of Red Bull money on funding a series of young drivers who largely failed to make it at the top level, Vettel’s success has probably kept Markko in a job. The term “meal ticket” springs to mind.
Markko’s comments demonstrate the most dangerous fall-out that could come from the Istanbul incident; the creation of factions within the team. Remember Alonso and Hamilton at McLaren in 2007? Their animosity created a rift which tore the team apart.

It could, heaven forbid, be even be worse. The name of the circuit which hosts this weekend’s Canadian Grand Prix reminds us of a chilling warning from history.
In 1982 Gilles Villeneuve felt that team-mate Didier Pironi had tricked him out of victory by reneging on a pre-race agreement and diving past as he was cruising to a Ferrari 1-2 in the San Marino Grand Prix.

The Ferrari drivers’ rivalry became a bitter feud. In qualifying for the next race, on a wet track at Zolder in Belgium, the pair were 1-2 on the grid, but Villeneuve set out on one final lap, determined to outqualify Pironi at all costs. In blinding spray, the Ferrari hit a slower car and Villeneuve died.
This weekend, the phenomenal speed of the McLarens may prove critical to beating the Red Bulls on Montreal’s long straights.
McLaren precedents certainly look good. Hamilton scored his maiden victory here in 2007 and before retiring after tailgating Kimi Raikkonen in the pitlane (oops!) in 2008, he had dominated the race from pole position.
Expect an equally close-fought battle between Mercedes GP, Renault and Ferrari for the next slots.
Their cars don’t seem to quite have the aerodynamic refinement of the front-runners, but their battle will be no less intriguing.
Force India seem destined to battle at the tail of the top ten and there are rumours of frustration within the team at the performance of Vitantonio Liuzzi. If the Italian were to be dropped, who would be in?
Team test-driver Paul di Resta lacks race experience, so how about Karun Chandhok, who now has plenty of race practice, but is wasted in the uncompetitive HRT car?
The rumour-mill is increasingly hinting that Karun might be given the chance. I personally hope so, an Indian in a Force India car would dominate the headlines across the subcontinent and may prove just the fillip Force India needs!

Steve Slater, ESPN

Ferrari Young Guns on the Tarmac

Ferrari got its new Driver Academy young talent programme underway in earnest on Friday when it gave three of its proteges a day of testing in its 2008 Formula 1 car.
The Italian squad has launched its most concerted driver development scheme yet, and has taken Formula 3 Euro Series champion Jules Bianchi, current and past Italian F3 champions Daniel Zampieri and Mirko Bortolotti, and star karter Raffaele Marciello under its wing.
Bianchi, Zampieri and Bortolotti are all set to get several outings in older Ferrari F1 cars this year as part of their training programme, and this started with their day in an F2008 at Fiorano on Friday.
Academy boss Luca Baldisserri said the test had been a culmination of a successful week of working with the Scuderia's young guns.

"Today was the first of five tests this year," he said on Friday evening.
"It's about physical and mental training, but we also made a physical check-up to check the drivers' health and their training level.
"On Wednesday we started working on the track with Raffaele Marciello driving in Fiorano with a Formula Abarth single-seater.
"Today's test was very intense, because three drivers took turns behind the wheel of a F1 single-seater.
"We're very satisfied, because we could see their first impressions and it was very interesting to see how young men, without real experience in F1, were doing with high-performance cars.
"The drivers gave it their all, but also had fun."
All three drivers had already experienced F1 Ferraris before - with Bortolotti and Zampieri getting prize tests after winning Italian F3, and Bianchi invited to last winter's young driver test at Jerez following his F3 Euro triumph.

itv-f1.com

Ferrari unhappy at FIA decisions

Ferrari have severely criticised Formula One governing body the International Automobile Federation (FIA) over their decision to allow new teams to enter F1 for the 2010 season.

In a column published on the official Ferrari website on Tuesday, the Italian team attack FIA for encouraging struggling newcomers like Campos and US F1 instead of supporting old hands such as BMW and Toyota, who have both left the sport.

"Of the 13 teams who signed up, or were induced to sign up, for this year's Championship, to date only 11 of them have heeded the call, turning up on track for testing, some later than others, and while some have managed just a few hundred kilometres, others have done more, but at a much reduced pace," the Ferrari column titled 'the Horse Whisperer' claimed

"As for the twelfth team, Campos Meta, its shareholder and management structure has been transformed, according to rumours which have reached the Horse Whisperer through the paddock telegraph, with a sudden cash injection from a munificent white knight, well used to this sort of last minute rescue deal.
"However, the beneficiaries of this generosity might find the knight in question expects them to fulfil the role of loyal vassal.
"All this means, it is hard to imagine the Dallara-designed car showing its face at the Catalunya circuit, with Sakhir (venue for the opening Bahrain Grand Prix) a more likely venue to witness the return of the Senna name to a Formula 1 session.
"The thirteenth team, US F1, appears to have gone into hiding in Charlotte, North Carolina, to the dismay of those like the Argentinian, (driver Jose Maria) Lopez, who thought he had found his way into the Formula 1 paddock... and now has to start all over again.
"Amazingly, they still have the impudence to claim that everything is hunky-dory under the starry stripy sky."
The Ferrari column attributes blame for the current problems to former FIA president Max Mosley, who rowed with established manufacturers such as Ferrari last season over his plans to bring in new teams.
"This is the legacy of the holy war waged by the former FIA president," the column continued. "The cause in question was to allow smaller teams to get into Formula One.
"This is the outcome: two teams will limp into the start of the championship, a third (Stefan Grand Prix) is being pushed into the ring by an invisible hand... and, as for the fourth (US F1), well, you would do better to call on Missing Persons to locate it.
"In the meantime, we have lost two constructors along the way, in the shape of BMW and Toyota, while at Renault, there's not much left other than the name. Was it all worth it?"


Copyright © 2010 AFP. All rights reserved.

Valencia Test Report - Day One

Michael Schumacher returns to the Race

Morning Report

Felipe Massa recorded the fastest lap time in this morning's session

Sebastien Buemi officially kicked off the pre-season multi-team testing days when he drove his Toro Rosso out of the pit lane at Valencia's Circuit Ricardo Tormo shortly after the track opened at 10 am on Monday, February 1, 2010. The Toro Rosso team had worked late into the previous night putting the finishing touches on the car.
Felipe Massa was next out in the Ferrari, followed by Gary Paffett driving the McLaren, Rubens Barrichello in the Williams and Pedro de la Rosa in his BMW Sauber. Massa was the first to complete a flying lap and clocked the fastest time - 1:13.088 - halfway through the day. Lap times and fuel loads will differ considerably during this and all the upcoming test days.
In all, seven teams are in Valencia. Paffett, ironically the only test driver who is scheduled to appear, is handling the shakedown duties for McLaren today.
As for the rest, de la Rosa is driving the Sauber BMW; Robert Kubica is in the Renault; Barrichello is behind the wheel of the Williams; Buemi is Toro Rosso's designated driver; Massa is in the Ferrari.

Nico Rosberg and Michael Schumacher are splitting the shakedown work on the Mercedes today, with Rosberg running in the morning. Although Mercedes had shown its new W01 to the media earlier in the morning, the car was not ready to run until 35 minutes into the session.



This morning the drivers were doing short runs punctuated by long stops in the pits for the cars to be checked over.
"The main target here is to check all the systems," said BMW Sauber's technical director Willy Rampf. "We want to get an overall picture about the car, and where we are regarding weight distribution, for example, because this will be one of the main issues this season. And then we will feed that information back so that in the next tests we can work on set-ups and preparing everything."
Buemi may have been the first out, but after two and a half hours he had only completed five laps. Toro Rosso was having teething problems with its new car, but the team said they had anticipated that.



"I am expecting mistakes because a young team makes mistakes, and this is why we are here early," said technical director Giorgio Ascanelli. "I tried to get the car on the ground as soon as I could so that we would have time to react to the glitches and the problems that for sure we are going to get."
The weather cooperated with it being sunny throughout the day and the air temperature climbing to 13 degrees Centigrade.

Dan Knutson

The new Cars for 2010 so far !

Here they are, The new cars we will be watching on the grid for the 2010 season.

Unveiled so far with much publicity were Ferrari F10 and Vodafone Mclaren MP4-25, last week Thursday and Friday.
Most of the talk however will be on the new Renault Livery - some comparing it to BumbleBee from Transformer , others more like a Jordan from the 70's... You decide.
BMW car will be quite bare to start the season waiting for more sponsors to jump onboard and Williams does seem to remain quite equal to last year.

Finally the much anticipated return of all, Mercedes GP unveiled yesterday their new car with Schumacher taking most of the cameras and reporters attention away from young Nico... Oh Dear .... Barichello did warn him though by quoting " get out of here...!" refering probably to his stint as Michael partner back at Ferrari a few years back, but placid as ever Nico remarked that it wasn't important how many cameras were on him and he'll let his driving do the talking.... Well said Mr Rosberg and good luck.

Here are some pictures to whet your appetite while we wait for the full lineup to be revealed soon.

Fernando Alonso agrees three-deal Ferrari F1 deal

Formula One finally has a rivalry to match Ayrton Senna v Alain Prost after it was confirmed that Fernando Alonso will become a Ferrari driver in 2010.

Renault's two-time world champion, the most successful driver presently on the grid with 21 career victories to his name, joins the Scuderia on a three-year deal worth in the region of £32 million a season with an option to extend.
Race fans will already be salivating at the prospect of a resumption of hostilities with his former team-mate, McLaren's 2008 world champion, Lewis Hamilton. Formula One's two best drivers, one in a Ferrari the other in a McLaren, going head to head with a bit of history between them. It does not get better.

Alonso, who described himself as "very happy and very proud" to be joining Ferrari, replaces Kimi Raikkonen at Maranello, with the Finn's return to McLaren expected to be confirmed shortly.
Raikkonen, too, will be motivated to beat Alonso, having fended off questions about the Spaniard's potential arrival for nearly two years.
Alonso almost signed for Ferrari in 2002, only to change his mind at the last minute and join Renault. It led Ferrari team principal of the time, Jean Todt, to vow that Alonso would never drive for the team while he was there.
Yet despite being Formula One's worst-kept secret, the timing of the announcement actually caught out most observers. Ferrari were expected to say something officially on Thursday, the first day of the Japanese Grand Prix race weekend, but in the end opted to send out a press release at 11pm local time last night.
"As chairman [Luca di] Montezemolo said recently, all the great champions want to come to Maranello sooner or later," Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali said.
"Of course, we wish to thank Kimi for everything he has done during his time with Ferrari: in his first year with us, he managed to win the drivers' title, thus making his contribution to Ferrari's history and he played a vital role in our taking of the constructors' title in 2007 and 2008.
"Next to Fernando we'll have Felipe Massa, who is recovering very quickly to his best physical condition, with Giancarlo Fisichella as the surrogate driver. We believe that this is the best possible couple for a team like ours: Fernando and Felipe are two victorious drivers and they integrate very well with each other and with the team."
Alonso told Ferrari's website: "I'm very happy and very proud to become a Ferrari driver. Driving a single-seater for the Prancing Horse is everybody's dream in this sport and today I have the opportunity to make this dream come true.
"We already had an agreement this summer starting in 2011, but then, in the past few days, the picture changed and we decided to anticipate my arrival in Maranello by one year."
Raikkonen, who is understood to have reached a financial settlement with Ferrari over the remaining year of his £31 million-a-year contract, said he was "very sad" to be leaving. His move to Woking is understood to be underwritten by Santander, the Spanish banking giant which now sponsors both Ferrari and McLaren.
Jenson Button's 2010 seat at Brawn-Mercedes looks a little safer with rumours that Rubens Barrichello is close to agreeing a deal to join Williams. Nico Rosberg is moving the other way as part of the deal that will see Mercedes take a controlling interest in Brawn. Williams declined to comment on the speculation.

Could Kimi make a shock return to McLaren?

With the political rows that have dominated this Formula 1 season more or less over apart from a few late skirmishes, attention in Valencia has turned to the driver market.

The key move this season is Fernando Alonso's prospective switch to Ferrari. This has not been officially confirmed yet, but it is considered a given. And it will trigger a series of swaps that will significantly change the look of the F1 grid next season.
Among the top teams, only Red Bull are not changing their line-up and there are attractive seats available at Ferrari, McLaren and Brawn.
In the wake of Alonso's move, the key men in the market place are Kimi Raikkonen and Robert Kubica.

Assuming Jenson Button stays at Brawn - which is not 100% certain, but looks very likely - they are the A-listers who will be top of most teams' shopping list.
The driver market is always complicated - but the injury suffered by Felipe Massa has made it more Byzantine than usual this summer.
Ferrari have actually got themselves into a bit of a pickle. Alonso's arrival means they have three of the top drivers in F1 for next season and only two cars to put them in, as both Felipe Massa and Raikkonen are under contract until the end of 2010.
They intended to partner Alonso with Massa, but the Brazilian has a fractured skull following his accident in qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix.
Although he is expected to make a full recovery, in terms of living a normal life, it is impossible to know right now whether he will be able to race in F1 again, even if Brawn driver Rubens Barrichello and Massa's race engineer Rob Smedley, probably the two people closest to him in the paddock, are optimistic.
Massa is talking about an emotional return for the Brazilian Grand Prix in October, but many feel that may well be over-optimistic, even allowing for the traditionally astonishing powers of recovery of F1 drivers.
And if Massa cannot drive until after the end of the season - which means he might not be able to do so until January, because of the testing restrictions in December - that makes getting rid of Raikkonen less immediately appealing.
Despite that, it does appear that the Finn will be the one to leave Ferrari, for whom one solution would be to gamble on Massa being fit and, if he isn't, take one of the experienced drivers who may be left standing after the game of musical chairs finishes.
Jarno Trulli looks certain to leave Toyota - whose entire future in F1 may be in doubt - and the futures of Rubens Barrichello, Giancarlo Fisichella and Nick Heidfeld are all up in the air. All would make a more than decent one-year stand-in.
In that eventuality, the question is where Raikkonen will end up.
There are a number of interesting possibilities. His advisors are known to have had talks with Brawn, which interests him, and Toyota, which does not. And another obvious possibility is Renault, who need a top-liner to replace Alonso.
And there is one intriguing possibility that I have not heard discussed on the paddock rumour mill - could Raikkonen make a shock return to McLaren?

It comes a bit out of left-field and might seem outlandish, but bear with me on it for a moment.
Lewis Hamilton is locked in there until 2012, but the second seat is open. Hamilton's team-mate Heikki Kovalainen is under pressure because of his unconvincing performances in races and there has been talk of Nico Rosberg moving over from Williams.
But, if you were McLaren, why replace one guy who is not as quick as Hamilton with, in Rosberg, another who isn't either but might be more disruptive?
Raikkonen, on the other hand, is well known by McLaren having driven for them from 2002-6, and he is low maintenance - he just gets in the car and drives and couldn't care less who his team-mate is.
Rosberg is known to be wary of facing Hamilton in the same car - he was his team-mate in karting and knows how quick he is - and Kubica has a reputation as hard work and demanding.
Raikkonen is the total opposite. He would not be bothered about the team's focus on Hamilton. He would just do his job and go home - just like he always has.
Not only that, but he left McLaren largely because he fell out with Ron Dennis, but the former boss has no involvement in the F1 team any more.
So a fresh link with Raikkonen could be an appealing idea for McLaren - and vice versa.
And read this quote from team boss Martin Whitmarsh after Sunday's European Grand Prix: "Kimi's really raised his game and all weekend has done a great job and Heikki has always been a fantastic team player and a good asset in our team but his race pace hasn't been good enough."
Of course, all of that might be hugely wide of the mark, in which case Raikkonen will probably end up at Brawn or Renault - at both of which Kubica must be considered a contender.
The Pole has been strongly linked with a move to Williams following BMW's decision to quit F1. But this weekend he has opened negotiations with Brawn, which would surely be a more appealing option considering the two teams' respective performance this season.

It is a difficult decision for Brawn. Given that Raikkonen has been a little off the boil in the last couple of seasons, Kubica is arguably the best driver on the market this season.
But he has a reputation for being disruptive inside a team and Ross Brawn might prefer not to disturb the equanimity of Button, the man who still looks likely to be world champion this year.
On top of that, Kubica is understood to want a one-year contract so he has the ability to move on for 2011 if a better drive becomes available, while Brawn would almost certainly want him to sign for two seasons.Traditionally, early September is the time the big pieces in the driver market puzzle begin to fall into place. But given the inherent complications, this season it could be a good deal later than that.

Andrew Benson

Victory for Raikkonen, glory for Fisichella at Spa-Francorchamps

Kimi Raikkonen became the sixth different victor in six races after putting Ferrari back in the winners’ circle for the first time in 2009, with a finely judged success in Sunday's Belgian Grand Prix, in which his KERS system played a crucial role in the opening stages. But he was dogged all the way to the flag by a gallant Giancarlo Fisichella in the Force India, who kept him honest throughout on the first medium downforce circuit of the season.

Behind them, Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel drove strongly for third, closing on them both by the finish. Raikkonen crossed the finish line 0.9s ahead, with Vettel 2.9s behind Fisichella.

Jenson Button’s hopes of adding to his points tally in the Brawn GP ended at Les Combes on the first lap when he was spun out by Romain Grosjean’s Renault, while in a separate incident Lewis Hamilton’s McLaren tagged Jaime Alguersuari’s Toro Rosso while trying to avoid the melee. The two incidents are currently under investigation by the race stewards.

After a safety car intervention, Raikkonen, who had sped up to second behind Fisichella on the opening lap, lost no time using his KERS to slingshot by the Italian on the run up Raidillon to Les Combes on the fifth lap, but Fisichella pushed him all the way.Red Bull’s Mark Webber looked strong initially until an unsafe release from his first pit stop nearly put rival BMW Sauber’s Nick Heidfeld in the pit-lane wall. A drive-through penalty subsequently dropped him to ninth.Renault’s Fernando Alonso also seemed on course for a healthy helping of points after running the longest opening stint, but a brush with Force India’s Adrian Sutil in La Source on the opening lap had damaged the left front wheel, and after a disastrously long pit stop on Lap 24 he had to come in again to retire a lap later when the left front wheel could not be secured satisfactorily.

Vettel was able to vault past a fast-starting Robert Kubica after his second stop on the 35th lap and said his Red Bull was perfect thereafter, but the Pole brought his BMW Sauber home fourth ahead of closing team mate Heidfeld. The German has passed Toyota’s Jarno Trulli for second at the start but ran wide and lost ground, allowing Kubica to nip down the inside to run third initially.Heikki Kovalainen did a one-stop strategy in his McLaren to stay ahead of Brawn GP’s Rubens Barrichello for sixth place. The Brazilian, who bogged down off the grid, was saved to an extent by the intervention of the safety car which enabled Brawn to refuel him for a longer opening stint in a fast first-lap pit stop, but had to back off at the end when his Mercedes engine showed signs of failing. He just made it to the flag ahead of a closing Nico Rosberg, who drove yet another strong race for Williams to score the final point, while Webber just missed out with ninth after a frustrating race.Toyota’s Timo Glock had a fuel rig problem in his first stop which delayed him, and could not better 10th, under pressure at the end from Force India’s Sutil. Behind them Sebastien Buemi brought his Toro Rosso home 12th ahead of Williams’ Kazuki Nakajima and an unimpressive Luca Badoer, who was the last finisher for Ferrari.

Besides Alonso and the first lap crashers, the other retirement was Trulli, whose front wing was damaged when he made contact with Heidfeld's BMW Sauber on the opening lap. That ruined the Italian’s race, as did a later refuelling problem, similar to Glock’s. He ultimately retired with a brake problem.

In the title stakes, Barrichello took two more points off Button, who still has 74 to the Brazilian’s 56. Vettel moves back ahead of Webber with 53 to the Australian’s 51.5.In the constructors’ championship Brawn have 128 points, Red Bull 104.5, Ferrari 56 and McLaren 44.

All the F1 action in Spain was off the track

It was perhaps inevitable that the European Grand Prix weekend in Valencia, Spain, was going to be a little flat. Michael Schumacher was there all right, and wearing Ferrari clothing--but not the driver’s suit virtually everyone hoped he would. Michael smiled a lot, and kept wishing Ferrari stand-in Luca Badoer well, but that didn’t really help. And as he stared at the timing screens, it was impossible to disguise his frustration at Badoer’s, er, modest pace.
During Friday practice, the hapless Badoer set a record by exceeding the pit lane speed limit on four different occasions-—as the paddock’s razor-tongued observers noted, somewhat cruelly, that no one could accuse him of excessive speed on the race track. In qualifying, the No. 3 Ferrari was dead last; 12 months ago, driven by Felipe Massa, it dominated the weekend.
You had to have some sympathy for Badoer, however, as he had not raced an F1 car since 1999, and though he is Ferrari’s official test driver, has virtually no experience of the F60 now that in-season testing is banned.
Some wondered why Ferrari did not draft a guy such as Sebastien Bourdais, whom Scuderia Toro Rosso fired recently. Bourdais may not have set F1 on fire, but he is at least very much race-fit, and fully conversant with both the Ferrari engine and Bridgestone slicks.
Though Ferrari will not make the announcement before the Italian Grand Prix at Monza next month, Fernando Alonso is to drive for the team in 2010, with Massa--assuming he recovers fully from his injuries suffered in Hungary--returning to partner him.
The suggestion in Valencia was that Ferrari reached an agreement with Kimi Raikkonen to end his contract a year early. During three years with the team, Raikkonen, despite nicking the world championship two years ago, has rarely looked anything like the driver he was at McLaren-Mercedes, and it is not known whether he will stay in F1--Renault has been mentioned--or perhaps turn his hand to rallying. During the recent summer break, Kimi took part in Rally Finland--he rolled his car--but not before impressing onlookers with his raw speed.
Given that it is now accepted that Alonso will join Ferrari, the driver market has come very much to life, and of course BMW’s forthcoming withdrawal has contributed to that: Robert Kubica, who has the measure of anyone in terms of natural talent, is unexpectedly available.
Kubica has been linked with three teams--McLaren, Renault and Williams--but the belief at the moment is that current Williams driver Nico Rosberg will join his old karting teammate Lewis Hamilton at McLaren. Renault, soon to lose Alonso, is believed to be keen to sign Kubica, but Robert himself is believed to have more enthusiasm for Williams, a team very much on the up at the moment.
Williams’ problem for 2010 could be engines, for it is known that Toyota, which has supplied the team for the last three years, is profoundly displeased by Williams’ stance in the recent FIA-FOTA battle, and may well terminate the contract. Rumors abound that Red Bull Racing will use Mercedes engines next year; if that happens, Williams and Renault could very well renew the highly successful partnership last seen in the mid-’90s.
Quite evident in Valencia qualifying was that McLaren is emphatically back on its game. Hamilton won in Hungary, but perhaps his car wasn’t the out-and-out quickest: at Valencia, though, Lewis won the pole, with teammate Heikki Kovalainen alongside him.
Only McLaren and Ferrari still use kinetic energy recovery systems, and as the teams improve their once lamentable cars, KERS can make a difference: An extra 80 hp for six seconds a lap can come in quite handy. Imagine the advantage it might provide in the next race, at Spa, up the long hill from Eau Rouge to Les Combes. Indeed, Hamilton will not retain his title this year, but he may well have a say in who takes it.

By NIGEL ROEBUCK

European Grand Prix Preview - Valencia GP

The 11th round of the 2009 FIA Formula One World Championship sees yet more driver changes. Of course, the original plan was to have Michael Schumacher making his return to Formula One for Ferrari amid much fanfare, but the multiple champion’s neck injury ruled him out.

Instead, Luca Badoer returns to the category for the first time in almost 10 years, intent on finishing the race and scoring the first world championship points of his F1 career. At the same time, GP2 star Romain Grosjean takes over from Nelson Piquet at Renault, who will be racing after the suspension handed down to them by the stewards in Hungary was overturned by the FIA Court of Appeal in Paris on Monday.

Both teams ran well here last year, and have high hopes now, but Red Bull and McLaren both fancy their chances and Brawn are desperate for Jenson Button to increase his points’ lead which has been seriously eroded in the past three events.

“The track is quite fun when it goes round the edge of the marina and over the bridge,” Button says. “It's quite challenging for the drivers with so many turns and the added factor of being surrounded by barriers means you have to maintain your concentration. There's been a lot of work going on at the factory following our shutdown and with the cars at the front being so close at the moment, it will be an interesting weekend."

It remains to be seen whether Brawn have got to the bottom of their tyre temperature issues, and the signs are that Valencia won’t be as warm as Hungary, where they struggled.

“It’s great to be getting back to business after the four-week break,” Hungarian Grand Prix winner Lewis Hamilton says. “I’m still buzzing from the win in Hungary and I’m hopeful of being able to carry that pace into the Valencia weekend - particularly with our new upgrades to the car. It’s a very demanding circuit, the kind of place that punishes any mistakes hard. It’s quite tight and relatively slow, so it should suit our package. It’s also very difficult to overtake, as we discovered last year - but, with our KERS, Mercedes-Benz has proved that anything can happen and I’m once again hoping that it will provide the difference in the race.”

The 5.419-kilometre (3.367-mile) street course uses roads that run through the recently refurbished Juan Carlos I Marina, formerly the base for the 32nd America's Cup in 2007. It features 25 corners and a minimum width of 14 metres all the way around the lap, and incorporates sufficient run-off for the expected top speeds of more than 300 km/h (186 mph). Even though it’s a street track, drivers are on the throttle 68 percent of the time, and with relatively high levels of downforce and high brake wear teams must be canny with their set-ups.

The race will mark the 150th race win for Bridgestone’s F1 tyres. “This is an interesting track,” says Hirohide Hamashima, their director of motorsport tyre development. “It has the high-speed configuration of a permanent circuit, however the track surface gives away that this is only a temporary facility. There are numerous turns, yet there are also many high speed sections and we see speeds of around 300 km/h five times during the course of a lap. There are low-speed corners too, so some heavy braking does take place. On the slippery surface that accompanies a street course it is difficult to find grip off line.

“Last year we saw a lot of circuit surface evolution over the weekend and it was very much a learning process for everyone who attended the race. We also found last year that the infamous gap between the bridge surface and the road surface presented no difficulties for our Formula One tyres. Last year our visit to Valencia was a momentous one as it was here that we celebrated our 200th Grand Prix participation since our entry in 1997.”

As in Hungary, Bridgestone will again bring their soft and super soft compounds.

Luca Badoer - Some infos...

Badoer set to race for Ferrari in Valencia

Following the news that Michael Schumacher has had to call off his planned return to Formula One racing, Ferrari have announced that test driver Luca Badoer has been drafted in to race at the European Grand Prix later this month.Schumacher had hoped to stand in for the injured Felipe Massa in Valenica, but neck pain caused by a motorcycle accident earlier this year, has forced him to abandon his comeback plans. "I am very unhappy that a problem means that Michael cannot return to racing," explained Ferrari President Luca di Montezemolo. “In the past few days, I have appreciated his great efforts and the extraordinary motivation which had spread through the team and fans around the world. No doubt his return would have been good for Formula One and I am sure it would have seen him fighting for wins again. “In the name of Ferrari and all the fans, I wish to thank him for the strong attachment he displayed for the team in these circumstances. In agreement with (team principal) Stefano Domenicali, we have therefore decided to give Luca Badoer the chance to race for the Scuderia after he has put in so many years of hard work as a test driver."Badoer has tested for the Italian team since 1998 and last raced in a Grand Prix back in 1999 for Minardi.

Luca Badoer (born January 25, 1971) is an Italian Formula One driver who has raced for the Scuderia Italia, Minardi and Forti Corse teams, and is presently a test driver for the Ferrari F1 team.
Career
Badoer was born in Montebelluna, Veneto.
Prior to reaching Formula One, he graduated through the time-honoured route of karting, in which he was Italian champion. He beat Alex Zanardi in the final round of the 1990 Italian Formula 3 Championship. In 1991 he won four races in a row, but was disqualified after a technicality concerning his tyres. For 1992 he was offered a ride with Team Crypton for the F3000 Championship, in which he emerged as champion.
His debut Formula One season in 1993 was mired by Scuderia Italia's uncompetitive Lola chassis, which, despite Ferrari engines, was the slowest car in the championship in terms of qualifying pace. He regularly beat his experienced team-mate Michele Alboreto, but lost out to him for the second drive when Scuderia Italia merged with Minardi for the 1994 season. He was retained as test driver however, and took over the drive in 1995 when Alboreto retired. In the underfunded team his best results were eighth places in Canada and Hungary and ninth in Japan. In 1996 he switched to Forti Corse, where he was only able to qualify for six of the ten races the team entered, which folded after that year's British Grand Prix.

In 1997 Badoer began his long spell as Ferrari's test driver, a role he continues to perform. He returned to racing for one season in 1999, with the Minardi team. In the July of that season, Ferrari's number one driver Michael Schumacher broke his leg in an accident at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. As Ferrari's test driver, Badoer expected to be promoted to the race seat in Schumacher's absence, but the team opted for Mika Salo instead, prompting criticism from former Ferrari driver Jean Alesi.
Badoer holds the dubious distinction of being the driver who has competed in the most Grands Prix (48) without scoring a single point. He nearly achieved his first points finish in the 1999 European Grand Prix when a strong drive saw Badoer lying in 4th place with only 13 laps remaining. Unfortunately the gearbox on his Minardi subsequently failed and television cameras showed Badoer weeping by his car.

Badoer was unable to find a satisfactory race seat in Formula One after 1999, and he became a permanent test driver for Ferrari. He covers thousands of kilometres at the Mugello and Fiorano test circuits each year and it is likely that Badoer has driven more kilometres in a Ferrari F1 car than any other Italian in history.
At the opening ceremonies of the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Badoer demonstrated one of the team's 2005 cars in the centre of the stadium, revving the engine, and performing several doughnuts, creating a large cloud of tyre smoke, and leaving circular black marks on the white platform. The event was witnessed by millions of television viewers worldwide.

Schumacher not driving after all ...

Michael Schumacher on Tuesday announced he has called off his much-anticipated Formula One comeback because of lingering injuries from a motorcycling crash earlier this year.
The seven-time world champion was to fill in for injured Ferrari driver Felipe Massa and hoped to return at this month's European Grand Prix in Valencia, Spain.
Schumacher said on his Web site he informed top Ferrari officials on Monday evening that "unfortunately I'm not able to step in for Felipe."
Schumacher, 40, retired at the end of the 2006 season. Since then, he has raced occasionally in a motorcycling series but was injured in a crash in February.
"The consequences of the injuries caused by the bike accident in February, fractures in the area of head and neck, unfortunately have turned out to be still too severe," Schumacher said. "That is why my neck cannot stand the extreme stresses caused by Formula One yet.
"I really tried everything to make that temporary comeback possible. However, much to my regret it didn't work out," he added.
"Unfortunately we did not manage to get a grip on the pain in the neck" which arose after he tested an old Ferrari at the Mugello circuit in Italy, Schumacher said.
The German won 91 races in 250 starts in an F1 career spanning 15 years beginning in 1991.
"I am disappointed to the core. I am awfully sorry for the guys of Ferrari and for all the fans which crossed fingers for me," Schumacher said.
"All I can do now is to keep my fingers crossed for the whole team for the coming races."
Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo thanked Schumacher for his loyalty to the team in attempting an F1 comeback.
"I am very unhappy that a problem means that Michael cannot return to racing," Montezemolo said. "In the past few days, I could appreciate his great efforts and extraordinary motivation which had spread through the team and fans around the world.
"No doubt his return would have been good for Formula One and I am sure it would have seen him fighting for wins again," he added. "In the name of Ferrari and all the fans, I wish to thank him for the strong attachment he displayed for the team in these circumstances."
Ferrari announced that team test driver Luca Badoer will race in Massa's place at Valencia. Badoer, an Italian, was first floated by Italian media after a crash took Massa off the race circuit.
The 28-year-old Massa underwent surgery on multiple skull fractures after he was hit in the helmet by a loose part from another car and crashed into a protective tire barrier during qualifying for Ferrari at the Hungarian Grand Prix last month.
Montezemolo said Ferrari decided to give Badoer "the chance to race for the Scuderia after he has put in so many years of hard work as a test driver."
Last week Schumacher said he was slimming down for the race, but complained of some neck pain.
"I only have to admit that my neck pinches a bit. We have to get a grip on that as health has priority — that's the clear arrangement made with Ferrari and, by the way, with my wife, too," Schumacher said.

Williams F1 against Schumacher Testing Plans

Michael Schumacher's bid to step up his comeback by testing Ferrari's current car has been blocked by Formula One rivals Williams.

Ferrari last week wrote to the other nine Formula One teams and the FIA requesting Schumacher be granted a day at the wheel of the F60 ahead of the German legend's return to racing at the European Grand Prix in Valencia on August 23.
Under current regulations in-season testing is banned, but Schumacher hasn't raced since his retirement in 2006, so Ferrari were hoping the seven-time world champion, who is standing in for Felipe Massa after the Brazilian's horrific crash in Hungary, would be allowed to practise.
Out of courtesy, the other seven members of the Formula One Teams' Association - McLaren, Renault, Toyota, BMW Sauber, Brawn GP, Red Bull Racing and Toro Rosso - gave Schumacher and Ferrari the green light.
Williams, however, see no reason why seven-time world champion Schumacher should be given special dispensation, citing the recent arrival of 19-year-old rookie Jaime Alguersuari into F1.
"While we welcome Michael Schumacher back to Formula One, the fact is any form of in-season circuit testing is strictly prohibited, a regulation clearly laid out by the FIA and adhered to by all of the teams," said Williams in a statement.
"It was for this reason Alguersuari, who drove an F1 car for the first time in Hungary, did not have the opportunity to familiarise himself with the Toro Rosso before he made his race debut.
"Williams sees no distinction between Alguersuari's situation and Schumacher's and feels any deviation from the rule would create a precedent for the future.
"For the sake of consistency and fairness, therefore, we oppose Ferrari's proposal to test ahead of the European Grand Prix."

Massa will not rush his F1 return

Ferrari's Felipe Massa insists he will not rush back to Formula 1 ahead of his return home to Brazil on Monday.
"Thank God, I'm feeling very well," the 28-year-old Brazilian said in a statement. "I've only a bit of swelling in the region of my left eye.
"It is important to be fully recovered before returning to the track."
Massa, who will undergo more tests in Brazil, had surgery for multiple skull fractures after a crash in qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

The accident appeared to be caused by a spring that had fallen onto the track's racing line from Rubens Barrichello's Brawn and collided with Massa's helmet.
With Massa no longer steering and the throttle still engaged, the car then crossed the gravel before hitting a tyre wall.
He is expected to continue his rehabilitation in a Sao Paulo hospital for another two days upon his arrival in his home city on Monday evening.
After undergoing further tests he is then likely to be allowed to go home.
Seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher has been brought out of F1 retirement by Ferrari to race in Massa's place for the European Grand Prix in Valencia.
The German, a team-mate of Massa during his final F1 season in 2006, will stand in until the Brazilian is ready to take up the seat again.

What does BMW's exit mean for F1?

BBC Business news.

BMW has confirmed that this will be its last season in Formula 1.
The team, which had been tipped to fight for the world championship, has been struggling to make an impact on the track this year.
But that's only part of the story.
Like Honda, which pulled out of Formula 1 before the season had even started, the German carmaker has seen its sales and profits tumble as a result of the global economic downturn.
In such a difficult environment, they are struggling to justify spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year on motor sport.
Before the end of the year, we will see at least one other car manufacturer leave F1
F1 analyst Christian Sylt of Formula Money
BMW's departure leaves four car manufacturers still competing in F1: Ferrari, Mercedes Benz, Toyota and Renault.
Ferrari is unlikely to leave the sport, because its image as a manufacturer of supercars is intimately tied to its racing heritage.
But there is widespread speculation that at least one of the other major brands could follow BMW out of the door.
"BMW definitely won't be the last," says F1 analyst Christian Sylt of Formula Money.
"Before the end of the year, we will see at least one other car manufacturer leave F1."
According to motorsport's governing body, the FIA, such an exodus was inevitable.
"It has been clear for some time that motorsport cannot ignore the world economic crisis," it said in a statement released after BMW's announcement.
"Car manufacturers cannot be expected to continue to pour large sums of money into Formula 1 when their survival depends on redundancies, plant closures and the support of the taxpayer."

Race against time

So will BMW's departure cause any lasting damage to Formula 1?
Ferrari is not expected to pull out of F1 - but at least one other firm is
The answer is, not necessarily.
Three new teams are due to join the series next year. Assuming they can raise enough sponsorship to guarantee their entries, there should still be plenty of cars on the starting grid.
But in the current climate raising the money is likely to prove difficult.
In addition, the new teams face a race against time if they are to be on the grid next year.
If the new entries fail to materialise, and more teams leave, a crisis could yet develop.
Some experts believe that the departure of major names such as Honda and BMW undermines F1's claim to be the pinnacle of world motorsport.
It's an argument that points towards the real problem facing Formula 1.

Spending rows

A key part of the sport's attraction is its brash, free-spending image.
It oozes high-rent glamour, and promotes itself as a hub of white-hot technology.

There have been moves to reduce spending in the glamorous world of F1
That image comes at a cost. In recent years, top teams have been spending more than $400m (£244m) a season.
Yet as the departures of BMW and Honda have illustrated all too clearly, that kind of outlay can no longer be taken for granted.
For much of the past year, the main stakeholders in Formula 1 have been embroiled in a bitter dispute over how to cut costs, without emasculating the sport.
The FIA, led by its forceful president Max Mosley, wanted to put the brakes on spending by forcing teams to cut their budgets to just $60 million a year, as well as restricting technical development.
But this was vehemently opposed by most of the teams, who believed such a move would destroy the essence of Formula 1.

'Nuclear' threat

The teams' ire was also directed at the Formula 1 Group, the network of companies run by Bernie Ecclestone, which control the commercial side of F1.
The group earns close to a billion dollars a year from trackside advertising, television rights and race fees.
But only half of the money goes back into F1, as payments to the teams.
The rest is absorbed by the F1 Group and its ultimate owner, the private equity group CVC Capital partners.
At a time when sponsors were hard to find, the teams argued, they should be given a bigger slice of the cake.
The dispute came to a head at the British Grand Prix in June, when eight teams threatened to walk out of F1 and set up their own rival championship.
That plan, widely seen as a "nuclear option" now looks highly unlikely to be carried out.
Under intense pressure from Bernie Ecclestone and the F1 Group as well as the team owners, the FIA backed down.

Uncertain future

The teams no longer face a compulsory budget cap. Instead they have agreed to work together, establishing ways to cut costs dramatically over the next two years.
The dispute with the F1 Group also appears to have simmered down.
It now looks as though the current commercial arrangements will stay in place until 2012.
These plans are to be formally set out in a new governing document for the sport, known as the Concorde Agreement - which the FIA says will be signed in the coming days.
But while the agreement offers F1 some welcome stability after a period of turmoil, it does nothing to remedy the harsh economic environment.
And as BMW's departure illustrates all too graphically, the sport's future remains far from certain.

Schumacher -Returns

Formula One has produced more than its fair share of shocks already this season but Wednesday's announced comeback by Michael Schumacher surely takes top billing.

The German F1 legend, who will fill in for injured Felipe Massa until the Brazilian is fit enough to return, retired in 2006 as a multiple drivers' world champion.

A man of achievements and unequalled statistical records, he was dogged by controversy fuelled by his most unforgiving critics.

Schumacher was 37 when he hung up his racing helmet having competed in 250 Formula One Grands Prix, 180 of them for Ferrari.

He won 90 races, 71 for Ferrari, took 68 pole positions, 58 for Ferrari, and set 75 fastest laps on his way to seven drivers' world titles, including five for the scarlet scuderia.

He retired having just fallen short of Italian Ricardo Patrese's record of lining up in 256 races.

The man from the flatlands of Kerpen in northern Germany was a Teutonic machine, a human delivery system of speed and points and glory in a sport unused to such high standards of regularity, human reliability and sheer professionalism.

Nobody trained like Schumacher. Nobody was as fit as Schumacher. Nobody raced as hard as Schumacher. Nobody won like Schumacher. Nobody worked on and on and on like he did.

Tributes poured in after he had announced his intention to retire at the season's end.

Some were warm and loving, some were barbed and tinged with envy and some reflected a failure to understand that Formula One was bringing down the curtain on the greatest and most complete driver ever to have raced in a Grand Prix.

Among his critics were 1997 champion Canadian Jacques Villeneuve who claimed he was a flawed champion, a man whose records did not justify a reputation of being the greatest of all time.

Too many controversial incidents punctuated his time at the top, too many accidents, incidents and allegations of wrong-doing, including rumours that in 1994 and 1995 when he won his first titles with Benetton, that the team had an unfair advantage.

His critics talked of his questionable racing ethics, but his admirers spoke only of his virtuoso racing. As a result, his legacy was one of magnificent achievements but with a reputation that divided the paddock.

Purists argue that he should not be included in the pantheon of greatest racing drivers alongside Juan Manuel Fangio of Argentina, Scotland's Jim Clark or Englishman Stirling Moss, widely described as the greatest driver never to win the championship.

But the records speak for themselves and Schumacher will be remembered for his competitive instincts, his professionalism, his fitness and his relentless run of successes in the era that followed the 1994 death of Brazilian Ayrton Senna who was, arguably, the man who introduced bruising and aggressive tactics to the tracks of Formula One.

Schumacher's catalogue of alleged misdemeanours included a collision in Adelaide at the 1994 Australian Grand Prix where Briton Hill was forced to retire and so Schumacher lifted his first title, another in 1997 when he collided deliberately with Villeneuve, but lost out and not only failed to win the title, but was punished for it too by the sport's ruling body.

He was also accused of cheating early in 2006 when he left his car on the fast line ahead of Fernando Alonso's Renault in qualifying for the Monaco Grand Prix.

In short, Schumacher, though gifted with speed and other sporting attributes, was considered a bad loser but one who had mellowed in his later years.

A family man, he had little to do with the so-called glamour of the sport apart from being one of the drivers' leading spokesmen on safety and playing for their football team.

A great driver, a great competitor then for whom the lure of a return to competition ensures an explosive second half of the 2009 season.

Little did those thousands of red-bedecked tifosi fans standing on the asphalt of Monza to cheer him to the end after his 90th victory in 2006 think they'd have another chance to see their man on the grid again.

German Grand Prix Preview

The real action is in the driver’s championship, not in the corridors of power

LEWIS Hamilton pulled a stunt in front of his home crowd after the last race at Silverstone three weeks ago and the fans went wild. The world champion did a doughnut, rotating his McLaren-Mercedes at high revs around the same spot, until a plume of smoke rose up from his rear tyres. It didn’t matter to his fans that their hero ended 16th out of the 18 drivers who crossed the finish. They had fun, so did the 24-yearold Briton. At Nurburgring for Sunday’s German Grand Prix, the McLaren pilot said drivers should be given more freedom to improve the Formula 1 show — just like in MotoGP, where the speed demons do all kinds of wheelies, stoppies and burnouts at the end of a race to the delight of the fans.
The powers-that-be who run F1 ought to listen to Hamilton. Not that they should push drivers to perform tricks. But they need to understand that fans watch motor-racing for fun. The bickering over the past few months between motorsport’s governing body FIA and the top eight teams has left many disturbed. They sighed with relief when both sides seemingly ended their feud in Paris two weeks ago. It was short-lived. At Nurburgring earlier this week, the eight teams walked out of a technical meeting seething after efforts to sort out rules for next year with the FIA broke down. The breakaway series they had threatened to launch resurfaced, and the mud-slinging resumed. Fans are tired, of not knowing what a bunch of men, who have made discord in F1 their life’s goal, will do next. I know I’ve tired of the off-track drama. We’ll just have to let the demons sort themselves out and not lose sight of the fun taking place between Hamilton and company on the track.That is where the real action is. That is where the grown-ups in F1 are today.
Beware the Red Bulls’ charge
Hamilton is effectively out of the running for the drivers’ championship. The real deal is Brawn GP’s Jenson Button, who has taken six of the eight races so far. But the 29-year-old Briton is facing some real opposition from others, rather than just team-mate Rubens Barrichello, who was the only one pushing him earlier in the season. It came from the Red Bull Racing pair of Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber, who knocked the wind out of Brawn GP with a one-two finish at Silverstone. They have the talent and now the car to stop the championship leader from taking any more race wins. To do this, Red Bull must come to a bold decision, starting this Sunday in Germany. They must focus the rest of their campaign around Vettel, who is better all around than Webber. The 22-year-old knows how to win races, and his three career wins, including his Silverstone victory, have been nothing short o fGe rman Grand Prix Keep your eye on the tarmac spectacular. In front of his homefans, the German will be fired up to repeat that. Though 25 points behind Button,Vettel has a long shot at the title, and that will require Webber, 3.5 points behind his teammate and who has yet to win an F1 race, riding shotgun. Button’s route to the titleis far easier. All he needs is to register three more wins and be consistently on the podium for the rest of the season.
Ferrari spoilers
The real threat to Button’s bid, however, is from within his camp. Barrichello, second in the championship and two points ahead of Vettel, is in the twilight of his career. At 37, this may be the Brazilian’s last chance to finally be crowned world champion. After playing second fiddle to Michael Schumacher at Ferrari under Ross Brawn, who is again his boss at Brawn GP, Barrichello is not in the mood to be short changed once more. There is no hint that Brawn GP has issued team orders and is forcing Barrichello to give way to his team-mate. But Button must also keep his eye on other drivers such as double world champion Fernando Alonso of Renault and the Ferraris of Felipe Massa and 2007 title winner Kimi Raikkonen. Although out of the championship reckoning, their cars are fast improving and could take precious points off him. They can turn out to be kingmakers and hand Vettel or Barrichello the title. This is where the fun in F1 is, on the track and not off it.

By Ian De Cotta ; TODAY Paper