Nithin Kamath’s Weblog

Todays Australian GP was again taken by F. Alonso, but it was a fun filled and exiting race, what do you all say, here are my funny moments of the GP:-
* Schumi’s Pitboard showing the info as he climbs the pitwall.
* Schumi walking into the Toyota Pit Garage.
* Barichello being warned before the warmup lap on radio about Rosberg being a hot headed person who took almost tookout his teammate in the previous GP.
* Montoyo Spining at the end of warmup lap.
* Alonso making the so called ‘Spanish Donkey’ flapping its ears action.

What were the exciting moments, well:-
* Massa crashing into Rosberg and someone else in the 1st lap.
* Button being overtaken immediately after the initial two SC period by Alonso and Kimi.
* The midland cars blocking the whole lot of cars behind them after one of the SC period.
* Schumi hitting into the wall while trying to catch upto button
* Montoyo coming to a halt after trying too hard to catch up junior schumi
* and many more, but out of time so can’t write more.

Alonso took the race, closely followed by kimi and Ralf. All in all a great race, one of the best this season, but i still feel the numerous safety car periods in this race is still a concern. Next race is on 23rd.

”I would be surprised if Jenson did not win a race. He needs one and I think he would deserve it,”

said Sir Frank Williams, who engineered a $30m deal to let Honda keep their man.
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Yeah! Yeah! First ask Button to keep his mouth shut and show results. I believe he is too outspoken to be concentrating on what he is doing in the race. But hey! he may prove me wrong this year, lets see, i would personally like all the top teams to be on equal footing and see some real racing this season.

Another piece of the ‘Super Aguri’ puzzle has fallen into place, with news that the Japanese team will wear Bridgestone tyres in 2006.

Although engine supplier Honda’s works team is Michelin shod, Bridgestone - the Japanese tyre supplier - confirmed on Monday that a multi year contract has been penned. (Source: F1 Central)
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Well this should be in expected lines since Michelin has already mentioned that they will be out of f1 soon, it is no suprise that Super Aguri has chosen Bridgestone tyres. Well the last & the year before’s tyre problems that marred the teams were real sick. Hope this year atleast all the teams will be free of tyre related performance hits.

Narain Karthikeyan will test for Williams in 2006, the Grove based team confirmed on Friday.

Just hours before the 2006 ‘FW28′ car is unveiled, it was finally announced that the 29-year-old would be the team’s fourth driver, distinct from Alex Wurz’s role as the ‘Friday’ and reserve nominee for grands prix. (Source: F1 Central)

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Finally, after more than 4 months of gossips, which initially included a seat in Midland F1, then a seat in Williams, then a seat in Aguri and finally as many expected a fourth driver in Williams. I believe this is the right decision for Narain, since he will be test driving a resonably good car with a crossworth engine and can show everyone what he is capable of in a good car by putting up some nice timings similar to the ones he had done in the two test runs he had done with williams earlier.

A sign of Renault’s attitude towards the value of F1 came in a press statement this morning giving details of the firm’s sales figures in the last 12 months. The results show that the firm dropped 4.1% in Europe but made up for this with a 21% hike in international sales, which meant that overall the company increased sales by 1.7% to 2.53m vehicles….

Read Full at: http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns16081.html

Finally i am reading something which says car manufacturers actually gaining sales by being in F1, earlier all that i read was how compaies spent so much money on F1, but the current trend seems that the manufacturers are gaining a lot of advantage by being in F1, as can be seen by more car manufacturers already taking over some teams and fresh ones coming in.

Ferrari have officially confirmed the speculation that Felipe Massa will be their second race driver partnering the best in the business Michael Schumacher for 2006, and Rubens Barrichello will part ways with the Scuderia at the end of the year. This after Massa’s manager who happens to be the head of Ferrari Jean Todt’s son Nicolas Todt renegotiated Massa’s 2001-2005 Ferrari contract which included a year teasting for the Scuderia. Rubens is likely to join B.A.R Honda next year.