Birthdays for Érik Comas and Mika Häkkinen

RichardsF1    Birthdays, Former F1 Figures, Formula 1     Erik Comas, Mika Hakkinen

Former F1 drivers Érik Comas (47 today) and Mika Häkkinen (42 today) are celebrating their respective birthdays today!

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Top Gear Australia S03E01 Preview

RichardsF1    Top Gear Australia     James May, Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, The Stig

The new faces of Top Gear Australia (L-R): Steve Pizzati, Shane Jacobson and Ewen Page

Top Gear Australia’s third season is set to premiere on Australian TV tonight, and the show has undergone a considerable facelift following the Nine Network’s purchase of the rights to the show from SBS.

For the third season, Steve Pizzati has been retained, while in come new hosts, comedian Shane Jacobson and Ewen Page, the editor-in-chief for Top Gear Australia magazine.

Tonight’s launch episode is an ‘Ashes Special’, where the trio travels to the UK and pairs with the hosts from the sister show, Jeremy Clarkson, James May, Richard Hammond, and what will be the final TV appearance for Ben Collins The Stig.

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Lotus Group claims Fernandes may not use ‘Lotus’ name

RichardsF1    Catfights, Formula 1     Bernie Ecclestone, Sponsors, Team Lotus, Tony Fernandes

Malaysian carmaker Proton and its parent company, Lotus Group, have declared that they will challenge Ton Fernandes’ statement that he will brand it Formula 1 team ‘Team Lotus’ for 2011 and beyond.

The airline magnate’s team has operated under the ‘Lotus Racing’ moniker, with the name officially licensed to the British-owned Group Lotus.

But with Group Lotus increasing its motor racing efforts – most notably with a tie-in with GP2 team ART next year – it is understood that the group has decided to retract the naming rights from Fernandes’ team.

In turn, Fernandes then announced he had purchased the rights to the ‘Team Lotus’ name, which was sold to David Hunt – brother of the late 1876 World Champion, James – after the original Team Lotus collapsed at the end of the 1994 season.

But now Group Lotus has come out to state it will oppose Fernandes’ planned move to rename his team in 2011.

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Sutil: ‘Force India has lost ground’

RichardsF1    Formula 1     Adrian Sutil, Force India, Technical, Williams

Force India might be ruing the departures of several of its key staff to (potential) rival outfits Sauber and Lotus, with the loss of recently-promoted Technical Director James Key proving hardest to swallow.

At least that’s certainly the opinion of Adrian Sutil, who believes the team has “gone backwards” in its performance over the 2010 season.

The squad is currently locked in a tight battle with Williams for sixth in the Constructors’ Championship, and the financial rewards for the winning outfit are huge under the Concorde Agreement in Formula 1: to the tune of $5 million in additional revenue from Formula One Management.

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Singapore GP: Alonso takes back-to-back wins

RichardsF1    F1 2010, Race Reviews    

Fernando Alonso has continued his and the Ferrari team’s late surge for the championship crown with an excellent victory on the streets of Singapore.

While a lights-to-flag victory might seem a rather dominance display when you look at it, it was anything but that, with the Spaniard withstanding race-long pressure from Sebastian Vettel in the Red Bull, winning by less than three-tenths of a second at the end of a Safety Car-interrupted 61-lap race.

Mark Webber took a seemingly unlikely third place to complete the podium, after finding himself well down in the midfield early in the race, when he bucked the tactical trend by making his pit stop relatively early in the race.

The race also dealt a significant blow to the championship hopes of Lewis Hamilton, who retired for the second consecutive race with another collision, this time popping a tyre when he collided with Mark Webber.

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Hülkenberg awarded time penalty as well

RichardsF1    Formula 1     Adrian Sutil, FIA, Force India, Nico Hulkenberg, Rules, Williams

Nico Hülkenberg has also been handed a 20-second time penalty following a protest from the Force India team after the Singapore Grand Prix.

The Vijay Mallya-owned outfit protested Hülkenberg’s promotion to eighth place after its own driver, Adrian Sutil, was bumped from eighth to tenth for having gained an advantage from using the outer track area at Turn 7 on the opening lap of the race.

Force India was successfully able to argue that Hülkenberg had gained a similar advantage from cutting a corner, and is again reminiscent of the German’s chicane-cutting antics at the last round in Italy, for which he escape without a penalty.

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Singapore GP: Post-Race Press Conference

RichardsF1    Formula 1     Fernando Alonso, Ferrari, Mark Webber, Red Bull Racing, Sebastian Vettel

Q. Fernando, another pole to flag victory but you had to work extremely hard for this one in every sense. Just 0.2 seconds the winning margin.

Fernando ALONSO:

Yeah, very good stuff. The race was long and with the safety car problems and also the people we were lapping especially at the end we found a group of five cars. They lost one lap and it was difficult to lap them. There was a yellow flag on the straight because of the Lotus problem, the car on fire, so we could not overtake there so, it was difficult to manage the gap with the guys in front. Not to overtake under the yellow, anything like that, so a lot of precaution in the last couple of laps, taking it very easy. We know how difficult it is to overtake here, so I just controlled the gap with Sebastian as much as I could and not taking any risk. read more

Finn on Fire! Kovalainen’s spectacular finish

RichardsF1    Formula 1     Heikki Kovalainen, Team Lotus

Heikki Kovalainen’s Singapore Grand Prix ended in a particularly spectacular fashion, limping his flame-engulfed Lotus onto the main straight before grabbing a fire extinguisher to put out the bonfire on his T127.

The Finn came under criticism for not venturing into the pit lane, but he argued that staying on track was the safest option.

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A fine recovery drive from Kubica

RichardsF1    Formula 1     Renault, Robert Kubica

An unexpected late-race pit stop for a puncture looked set to scupper a decent result for Robert Kubica, but the Renault driver provided some of the highlights of the Singapore Grand Prix’s closing stages with a combative charge from thirteenth to seventh.

The Pole had been running in a strong sixth position before his unscheduled stop, and the result is some consolation for him, with passes on Jaime Alguersuari, Sébastien Buemi, Vitaly Petrov, Felipe Massa, Nico Hülkenberg, and Adrian Sutil.

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Sutil demoted from eighth place

RichardsF1    Formula 1     Adrian Sutil, Felipe Massa, Force India, Nico Hulkenberg, Williams

Adrian Sutil has been demoted from his eighth place finish by dint of a 20-second time penalty from the race stewards.

The Force India driver had put an excellent recovery performance after a poor qualifying result to finish eighth at the end of the 61-lap race, but a 20-second time penalty was applied post-race when the stewards deemed he had gained an unfair advantage for venturing ‘off-circuit’ at Turn 7 – going around the outside of the corner beyond the rumble strips marking its outer edge.

The penalty demotes Sutil to tenth position, while Nico Hülkenberg moves up to eighth place, and Felipe Massa to ninth place.

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Singapore GP: Final Classification (AMENDED)

RichardsF1    F1 2010, Results    

	Driver		Team	Laps	Result
1.	Fernando Alonso		Ferrari	61	1:57:53.579
2.	Sebastian Vettel		Red Bull Renault	61	+ 0.293
3.	Mark Webber		Red Bull Renault	61	+ 29.141
4.	Jenson Button		McLaren Mercedes	61	+ 30.384
5.	Nico Rosberg		Mercedes GP	61	+ 49.394
6.	Rubens Barrichello		Williams Cosworth	61	+ 56.101
7.	Robert Kubica		Renault	61	+ 1:26.559
8.	Felipe Massa		Ferrari	61	+ 1:53.297
9.	Adrian Sutil*		Force India Mercedes	61	+ 2:12.416
10.	Nico Hülkenberg*		Williams Cosworth	61	+ 2:12.791
11.	Vitaly Petrov		Renault	60	+ 1 lap
12.	Jaime Alguersuari		Toro Rosso Ferrari	60	+ 1 lap
13.	Michael Schumacher		Mercedes GP	60	+ 1 lap
14.	Sébastien Buemi		Toro Rosso Ferrari	60	+ 1 lap
15.	Lucas di Grassi		Virgin Cosworth	59	+ 2 laps
16.	Heikki Kovalainen		Lotus Cosworth	58	Fire
	Not Classified
	Timo Glock		Virgin Cosworth	50	Mechanical
	Nick Heidfeld		Sauber Ferrari	34	Collision
	Lewis Hamilton		McLaren Mercedes	33	Collision
	Christian Klien		HRT Cosworth	29	Mechanical
	Kamui Kobayashi		Sauber Ferrari	28	Accident
	Bruno Senna		HRT Cosworth	27	Collision
	Jarno Trulli		Lotus Cosworth	25	Mechanical
	Vitantonio Liuzzi		Force India Mercedes	0	Collision

* Denotes 20-second time penalty imposed post-race for gaining an unfair advantage by cutting a corner

Some fan pictures from Singapore trackside!

RichardsF1    Features, Formula 1    

A wonderful reader has sent us some trackside pictures from Singapore, which we’re thrilled to share with you below:

Click the thumbnails to view the larger images:

View Full Album

Chandhok won’t be drawn on theories

RichardsF1    Driver Market, Formula 1     Christian Klien, Colin Kolles, Hispania Racing, Karun Chandhok, Sakon Yamamoto

Karun Chandhok has refused to join in the speculation surrounding Christian Klien’s promotion to the role of racing driver in place of Sakon Yamamoto, the very man who replaced him in the Hispania Racing driver’s seat at the German Grand Prix.

Yamamoto’s absence has been put down to a bout of “food poisoning”, according to team boss Colin Kolles, and questions were raised when the team elected to replace Yamamoto with Klien as opposed to Chandhok, who was considerably more familiar with the 2010 car.

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Happy birthday to Tim Schenken and Patrick Friesacher!

RichardsF1    Birthdays, Former F1 Figures, Formula 1    

Two former F1 drivers – Tim Schenken (67 today) and Patrick Friesacher (30 today) – are celebrating their respective birthdays.

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Fines for Sauber, Klien, Senna and Glock

RichardsF1    Formula 1     Bruno Senna, Christian Klien, FIA, Hispania Racing, Nick Heidfeld, Rules, Sauber, Timo Glock, Virgin Racing

The FIA stewards have been particularly busy this weekend, with the Sauber team and three other drivers joining Adrian Sutil on the list of parties slapped with fines for various offences at the Singapore Grand Prix.

The Swiss team was fined $20,000 for the unsafe release of Nick Heidfeld from his pit box, with the German driver joining the pit road right into the path of Michael Schumacher, who had to swerve to avoid a collision with his compatriot.

F1 returnee Christian Klien was fined twice for separate speeding offences, while fellow leadfoots Bruno Senna and Timo Glock were each issued with a single fine for their own separate speeding errors.