Indholdsfortegnelse for February 2024 i AUTOSPORT

There’s a certain well-worn maxim that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. While serviceable enough in most contexts, it sits uneasily upon the shoulders of Formula 1 as we contemplate a 2024 season of almost no change – and a To-Be-Confirmed future ruleset arriving in 2026 under which not a lot will change. Late capitalism dictates a trajectory of eternal growth and it appears F1’s stakeholders have bought unquestioningly into an immediate and distant future in which the rapid growth curve (in both audience reach and commercial revenues) seen in recent years is extrapolated onwards to the stratosphere. Strap yourselves in – billion-dollar franchise values here we come! And yet there is evidence to suggest the froth is blowing off. We’ll skirt past last year’s survey which majored on…

PLASTIC FANTASTIC: THE CARBON ENGINE The first documented use of carbonfibre in motorsport was when some filaments gathered together as a light tow or string were used to reinforce the bodywork of the Ford GT40s that raced at Le Mans. The strands were laminated onto the glass fibre bodywork in a large criss-cross pattern which was very sparse since the cost of the fibres was $1,000 per kilogram. That equates to nearly $9,000 per kilogram in today’s money. At the time it was an exotic material and, while it promised much, the costs kept usage limited. Today a general-purpose fibre such as T800 is under $30 a kilogram, cheap fibres half that and high-performance materials such as T1100 only around $100 a kilogram. Properties have improved no end with those early…

“At the moment, I’m feeling very comfortable with the car.” When Sergio Pérez spoke those words he was sitting just one point off the 2023 Formula 1 standings lead. He’d just won in Jeddah, his first victory of what was a fresh season. Two races later, leaving Azerbaijan, he was still only six points adrift and had matched Max Verstappen at 2-2 in the grand prix victory stakes. Come the campaign’s conclusion, Pérez occupied the same spot in the standings. But the gap to his victorious team-mate was a Formula 1 record 290 points. Perez didn’t win again after Baku, while Verstappen racked up 17 more victories on his way to another record-setting season total. Perhaps more damningly, Max’s solo points haul would have been enough for Red Bull to…

The trailblazer for Brazilians who dreamed of racing in Formula 1, Emerson Fittipaldi dared not only to reach the top of the sport but conquered the world on two occasions with Lotus and McLaren. He paved the way for Nelson Piquet and Ayrton Senna to emulate his success as multiple title-winning countrymen amidst a wave of Brazilian racing stars. Aged 25 in 1972, Fittipaldi held the mantle of the youngest F1 world champion for 33 years, moving his great friend and rival Jackie Stewart to state: “Emerson arrived in F1 like a rocketship.” He claimed 14 grand prix victories and 35 podiums over his decade in F1. Fittipaldi then took on the challenge of IndyCar racing in America, twice capturing its greatest race – the Indianapolis 500 – and winning…

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MATT KEW Matt analyses what F1 can do to rekindle interest after a year of Red Bull domination, while avoiding making matters worse (p30) RONALD VORDING Ronald appears in GP Racing for the first time after he chatted with McLaren tester and IndyCar star Pato o'Ward (p56) CHARLES BRADLEY Motorsport.com editor-in-chief and a former Autosport ed, 'Jarv' sat down with F1 legend Emerson Fittipaldi for a long interview (p80) ERIC GILBERT Motorsport tv CEO Eric also turns his hand to photography and captured a relaxed Emerson Fittpaldi for us in Miami (p80) NEXT ISSUE ON SALE: FEBRUARY 22 Circulation queries Seymour Distribution Ltd, 2 East Poultry Avenue, London EC1A 9PT. Tel: +44 (0)20 7429 4000. Fax: +44(0)20 7429 4001. Email: info@seymour.co.uk. ISSN 2633-8157 (print) ISSN 2633-8165 (online).EAN 07713614480012. Printed by…

HOW CHINA WORKED – JUST NOT AS F1 EXPECTED… It is bizarre to consider a new season which starts on the last day of February and runs until the second week in December. Not only is it Formula 1’s most ambitious ever calendar, it’s the first to lay Covid to rest. Isn’t that in the past? Not if you live in China, a country which hasn’t hosted its Grand Prix since 2019. Notwithstanding further pandemics, when the cars exit the pitlane at Shanghai International Circuit on 21 April it will be five years and one week since Lewis Hamilton won the sixteenth running of the Chinese GP. It’s 20 years since that first event, a milestone in F1’s growth which was questioned by some and yet was undoubtedly an important…

FEATURING Smaller cars Bigger engines To DRS or not DRS? ‘Goldilocks’ tyres The Saturday question *Does it need to be fixed? The 2023 Formula 1 season was inescapably unspectacular. That was in no small part thanks to Max Verstappen and Red Bull. The champion repeatedly snared pole position, led into the first corner, then disappeared 20 seconds up the road to complete a damp squib. He humbled his runner-up team-mate Sergio Pérez by 290 points. Meanwhile, second place in the constructors’ standings fell to Mercedes, which failed to muster even half the score of Christian Horner’s clan. Amid that Red Bull monopoly, there’s reason to believe F1 is on its way down the popularity mountain. With the gripping climax to the 2021 Lewis Hamilton-Verstappen grudge match in the rear-view mirror,…

IT HASN’T ESCAPED EMANUELE PIRRO that he’s been rather popular of late. Perhaps this should come as no surprise. After all, interest in the Le Mans 24 Hours, where the charming Italian claimed five victories for Audi between 2000 and 2007, reached an all-time high in 2023, the classic race’s 100th anniversary year. But rather than his exploits behind the wheel – which in Formula 1 peaked with fifth place for Benetton in the 1989 Australian Grand Prix – his continually pinging inbox has had everything to do with his appointment last April to head up McLaren’s driver development programme. “A lot of time is dedicated to responding to people because once you become director of a programme like this, you find out your number of friends worldwide increased dramatically!”…

STEVEN TEE It’s now 40 years since GP Racing’s principal photographer first started taking pictures of F1 cars for a living. The MD of Motorsport Images subsidiary LAT, his work for McLaren means he can often be spotted around the team’s garage Page 68 Page 72 Page 74 SAM BLOXHAM Based in Edinburgh, Sam joined LAT back in 2013 and has since risen through the ranks to become a senior photographer at Motorsport Images. He has been covering Formula 1 for the company since the start of the 2021 season Page 71 Page 71 Page 74 ZAK MAUGER Zak is now an integral part of the Motorsport Images team, and last season took over the role of main photographer for one of LAT’s major commercial clients, the Silverstone-based Aston Martin…

THE SHOW MUST GO ON (A DIET) 01 Shorter, narrower, considerably lighter – and perhaps a touch slower. The FIA is putting the finishing touches to the technical regulations for the new era of Formula 1 that will begin in 2026. In terms of the contents of the engine bay it will involve the most extensive changes since 2014, when hybrid powertrains were introduced. As well as new specifications for the power units (involving the adoption of synthetic fuels and the removal of the MGU-H), the rules will alter the make-up of the cars themselves. Among the biggest changes will be a significant weight reduction. As detailed in our cover feature this month (see p30), car weight has far-reaching effects on performance and ‘raceability’. From around 640kg in the V8…

WHY F1 IS A CLOSED SHOP TO NEW TALENT The contrast of seeing 10 relatively unfamiliar driver names contesting first practice in the final 2023 race of Abu Dhabi versus an unchanged list of racers for the new season almost sums up the challenges for ambitious youngsters to step into F1. Test and reserve drivers are a crucial part of any team, and the current FIA rules insist that each car must be driven by a rookie for at least one practice session in a season. The opportunity to connect with the latest F1 machinery seems like a useful step for the newbies, yet insiders are aware that a single free practice session isn’t always meaningful. Former F1 racer Mark Blundell became a test driver for Williams in 1989 at…

CV 2019-present Chief Marketing Officer and EVP, Cognizant 2018-19 Chief Marketing Officer and EVP, CenturyLink 2013-2018 Senior Vice President of Marketing, Dell 2010-2013 Executive Director of Marketing, Dell 2005-2010 Director of Marketing, Dell 2000-2005 Brand Manager – Marketing, Dell GP Racing: Tell us about your own journey and your previous work in Formula 1? Gaurav Chand: I started in the industry about 25 years ago and spent a long time at Dell. My first stint in F1 was when we had a partnership with Caterham. At that time we learned a lot about the efficacy and effectiveness of F1 for a team partner. I came to Cognizant about four years ago and we initially started with Aston Martin to expand awareness of our brand. Cognizant is a $20bn business, employing…

This year you’ve had some Formula 1 outings again, both in FP1 and the Abu Dhabi tyre test. How difficult is it to adapt from IndyCar to Formula 1 machinery? The physical limitation in F1 for sure is the neck. I did over a hundred laps during the tyre test and my neck was a champ after that! You have no idea how much work I’ve done on my neck the past two years. I’ve destroyed it day after day to withstand what these cars are capable of. In the quick corners it’s unbelievable how much speed you can carry with an F1 car. You get onto the throttle in places where you think ‘there is no way I can do it here’ but the thing is just planted to…

Obviously it’s early days for you at Williams, but what have you made of it so far? What needs to be done? There’s clearly a reasonable amount of work to do. There’s always things that work and things that don’t. There are some bits that are ahead of where I’ve just come from and some others where we’re behind and we need to work at. I’m still putting that picture together. What is James Vowles bringing as a relatively youthful team principal?. The way I see this place developing is very much aligned with James’s view of what we need to be doing. There are four things that make a team. It’s the people, the tools, the methodologies – but most importantly it’s the team spirit, how we go about…

SO, WE GET TO ABU DHABI and everything has been sorted. Max Verstappen is likely to win and establish a record for establishing records. The only thing left to decide is P2 in the Constructors’. Since that is worth $130 million (give or take a million or two) in a business where some teams pay a legion of people in communications to communicate it’s not fair to have another team join F1 and share the loot (and sod the drivers on the reserves’ bench), I decide for once to record the race rather than watch it live. Big mistake. The usual routine is to have F1 live timing on a laptop and the TV tuned to Sky, sometimes with the volume down while listening to commentary provided by the F1…