Innehållsförteckning för 22/02/18 från Autosport

OF THE 79 FORMULA 1 WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP RACES of the turbo-hybrid era so far, Mercedes has won 63 times. It has taken every single title and Lewis Hamilton has added 40 victories to his personal tally – a strike rate of 51% over the past four years. Last year, Ferrari provided the biggest threat to the Silver Arrows since the current engine regulations were introduced in 2014, but came up short. F1 needs more competition at the front and Red Bull is one of the few teams with the capability of challenging Mercedes. As usual, Red Bull’s development rate during the 2017 season was impressive, but it started too far behind. As Christian Horner tells Ben Anderson on page 18, it’s something the team is well aware of, hence the…

THE FORMULA 2 FIELD SAMPLED THE series’ new-for-2018 Dallara-built car at a snowy Magny-Cours circuit last week. The teams took delivery of the behaloed, V6 turbocharged machines at the end of last month and ran them for the first time at the French circuit, despite wet and icy conditions in the morning. Luca Ghiotto topped the times for Campos Racing with a 1m24.404s, just ahead of Carlin’s Sergio Sette Camara and Nicholas Latifi, who drove for the DAMS squad. Trident racked up 58 laps, the most of any team, ahead of Arden International and Carlin, which both completed 50 tours. Prema Racing – which has taken Pierre Gasly and Charles Leclerc to the most recent GP2/F2 titles – completed the fewest laps, 21, after encountering a technical issue in the…

PRIVATEER LMP1 CARS THAT outperform Toyota in the 2018-19 World Endurance Championship will be penalised. Exactly how, we don’t know yet, but the philosophy is based on the promise from the rulemakers to give the non-hybrid P1s lap time parity with the factory hybrids – and nothing more. The procedures are being put in place because the majority of the privateer P1 cars racing in the WEC in the superseason are new: the Ginetta-Mecachrome G60-LT-P1, the BRE Engineering BR1 with both AER and Gibson power, and the ORECA-built Rebellion-Gibson R-13 will all race for the first time at the WEC opener at Spa at the start of May. That means the rulemakers have been reliant upon data supplied by them while they were formulating the Equivalence of Technology between hybrid…

@MattJMNews ON THURSDAY MORNING LAST WEEK, THE BOSSES of Team Dynamics put out a press release announcing that Porsche star Dan Cammish had been signed as Gordon Shedden’s replacement in the factory-backed Honda squad in the British Touring Car Championship for the 2018 season. Within 24 hours the chiefs of rival BTCC team Motorbase Performance issued a terse statement, saying that they and stalwart driver Mat Jackson had “parted company”. That was quite a surprise, because 31-time race winner Jackson had been paraded at the Autosport International Show in the middle of January as a leading light of the Motorbase attack with its restyled Ford Focus RS machines alongside Tom Chilton. The team had also recently been bolstered by the arrival of former championship runner-up Sam Tordoff. Are the announcements…

Every Formula 1 team is world champion in their own heads at this time of year, before the stopwatch delivers its dose of cold hard reality to all those heady winter dreams of glory. But there is genuine reason for optimism at Red Bull in 2018. After an unexpectedly slow start under F1’s latest aerodynamic regulations, Red Bull finished 2017 with arguably the strongest chassis on the grid. Had the world championship been contested over just the final six races of last season, Max Verstappen would have tied Lewis Hamilton on points and lost the title only on second-place countback. The aim is therefore to come out firing straight from the off in ’18, avoiding the sort of slow start that has become a worrying feature of Red Bull’s development…

As we ready ourselves for the 2018 Formula 1 season, I talked through last year with Martin Brundle, as ever over lunch at a favourite Italian restaurant in Knightsbridge. It was no more than inevitable, I suppose, that we started with Lewis Hamilton, world champion for the fourth time. The time-honoured theory, I said, has been that drivers give of their best when pressured by a team-mate, but in fact both Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel seem rather to disprove it: with Valtteri Bottas, rather than Nico Rosberg, in the other Mercedes, Lewis thrived like never before, while Sebastian clearly flourishes with Kimi Raikkonen, rather than Daniel Ricciardo, alongside him. “Yes, it’s true,” said Brundle, “and although harmony’s obviously a good thing in many ways, I find it interesting that Toto…

IT WAS 1981 AGAIN. STANDING AT THE SIDE OF a frozen runway in northern Sweden, I revelled as the peace was shattered by the urgent, crisp bark of an RS1800. The co-driver jumped out and shouted: “Ten minutes, boys.” Fuel, tyres, two sips of tea, and Petter and Pernilla Solberg were back aboard the family Ford Escort and gone. Still leading, still smiling. With last year’s Rally Sweden Historic winner Mats Jonsson back in his Group A Mazda 323 and a good few other well-wheeled Audi quattros on the entry list, the Solbergs were expected to be blown away. They weren’t. In a beautiful Escort, period prepared to the final nut and bolt by Petter’s former co-driver Phil Mills and his Viking Motorsport concern, the Solbergs were well and truly…

FULL, FLUSTERED, FLECKED WITH flour. All of the above apply to Autosport’s culinary odyssey, testing out the dishes included in the recently released cookbook Marion and Romain Grosjean – Cuisine and Confidences, written by Grosjean’s journalist-and-TV-presenter wife Marion. The roots of the Haas Formula 1 driver’s passion for cooking are explained in the book’s editorial introduction, as Marion recalls that he needed to lose weight during 2009 when going from GP2 to his first, short-lived, F1 stint. When Renault dropped Grosjean at the end of that season, he used his catering expertise to help process his career reboot, which ultimately led to the 2011 GP2 title and rejoining the same Enstone-based team, by then called Lotus, in 2012. Since then, Marion writes, cooking helps Grosjean relax and spread joy among…

CONTINUING ITS UPWARD TRAJECTORY IS Renault’s focus for the 2018 Formula 1 campaign, according to managing director Cyril Abiteboul. The French manufacturer returned as a works team in 2016, but the late completion of its takeover of Lotus meant its car was a compromise and it finished ninth in the constructors’ championship. Last year was a distinct improvement, with the team improving dramatically as the season progressed. By the end of the year, it had the fourth fastest car on merit, which helped Renault snatch sixth in the standings from Toro Rosso at the final race in Abu Dhabi. On Tuesday, Renault launched its 2018 challenger – the RS18 – with a target of improving across all areas as it bids to continue its move up the grid with a…

Double Porsche Carrera Cup GB champion Dan Cammish has joined the factory Team Dynamics British Touring Car Championship Honda squad for the 2018 season. The 28-year-old will join Matt Neal in one of the team’s new Honda Civic Type Rs, which are currently under development at the firm’s workshops. He will take the place of Gordon Shedden, who has joined WRT for an attack on the World Touring Car Cup (see page 8). While Cammish will join Dynamics, Motorbase Performance issued a statement last week saying that it had parted ways with Mat Jackson, who had been scheduled to stay on for a ninth season with the team to drive one of its Ford Focus machines. Autosport understands that there had been contact between Jackson (battling Shedden, below) and Dynamics,…

THERE’S A NEW TWIST IN THE ONGOING DRIVER rankings controversy in sportscars. G-Drive Racing has entered an all-pro line-up for the European Le Mans Series and may yet get clearance to race without a silver-rated driver in the six-race series and at the Le Mans 24 Hours. G-Drive, which is fielding an ORECA-Gibson 07 together with TDS Racing, has registered Jean-Eric Vergne, Roman Rusinov and Matthieu Vaxiviere for the car. That’s a platinum-gold-gold line-up. The Russian entrant, winner of the World Endurance Championship LMP2 crown in 2015, has exploited a clause added to the sporting regulations for the ELMS and the WEC that allows a dispensation on the composition of a driver line-up. Most teams interpreted it as a means to allow a suitably qualified bronze-rated driver to race an…

WHEN IT COMES TO IN-SEASON development of a Formula 1 car, Red Bull is capable of great things. But too often it leaves itself with a mountain to climb at the start of the year. During its time as a frontrunning team, and dating back to its emergence as a contender in 2009, Red Bull has only ended a season further away from the ultimate pace than it started it once, in ’16. That’s an impressive achievement, but in the V6-hybrid era it has repeatedly given itself too much ground to make up at the beginning of the year. The graph below uses supertimes (based on the fastest single lap by each car at each race weekend, expressed as a percentage of the fastest) to show this trend. There is…

IT WAS INEVITABLE THAT DEPUTY team principal Claire Williams would be asked about running two drivers who bring financial backing when the team held its season launch in London last Thursday. She said she was expecting it. Sergey Sirotkin and Lance Stroll are both capable drivers, but there is no denying that their seats are linked to significant financial packages. Williams, unsurprisingly, defended the team’s pairing. “It’s nothing new in F1 that drivers come with money, and thank goodness they do,” says Williams. “It would be incredibly naive for anyone to make that statement, saying, ‘He’s just a pay driver’. It’s great if a driver has financial interests from partners – it’s great for the team, it’s great for the driver. This is an expensive sport, not just F1 but…

@davidevansrally For around a second, just a second, nobody breathed. During that same second Nicolas Gilsoul glanced upwards, rather than to his left, to focus on Thierry Neuville, who was briefly regarding him from a similarly unfamiliar angle. Touchdown. Another second, another note. Onwards. And for a Hyundai team transfixed by the spectacle on television, a long, loud exhale. When the i20 Coupe WRC arrived at the end of the second run through the Vargasen stage last Saturday afternoon, there was spontaneous applause from the mechanics. Team principal Michel Nandan emerged from the command centre in search of a cup of coffee. A drop of something stronger wouldn’t have gone amiss. Heavy snow had altered the line through the famous Colin’s Crest jump section of the stage, requiring drivers to…

@tomgerrington The new generation made its mark in the 60th Daytona 500, but in a way it lost out to its own exuberance. Instead, the race boiled down to a wild finale between those who’ve been around a little longer. To describe eventual winner Austin Dillon as a wily, wise veteran would be inaccurate – at 27, he is in ‘only’ his fifth full-time Cup season and had just one top-level career win to his credit before last Sunday. But the way in which he surged to the front seconds from the flag – after a last-lap scrap with fellow medium-termer Aric Almirola and long-time topliner Denny Hamlin – bore the hallmarks of experience. Dillon poignantly took the #3 Richard Childress Chevrolet combination made famous by the late Dale Earnhardt…

BILLY MONGER MIGHT BE CLOSING on his racing return, but securing a seat is just one obstacle the double amputee has to overcome as he bids to resume his single-seater career. The 18-year-old says he is not “too far away” from completing a deal to race in the BRDC British Formula 3 Championship with Carlin this year after beginning a testing programme with the team. But along with securing the final sponsorship he needs to occupy the seat, he is having to learn a new way of driving in a specially adapted car, and will face scrutiny over whether his arrangements confer an advantage. Monger suffering amputations to both of his legs following a horrific British F4 crash at Donington Park last April. “I’m doing more testing than I would’ve…

WORLD KARTING CHAMPION BRETT Ward will make his car-racing debut this season in the Ginetta GT5 Challenge. The 20-year-old won the Senior Rotax Max Challenge last season and also claimed the European IAME X30 Senior crown. Ward will now compete with W2R Motorsport – the racing arm of the company that organises Ginetta trackdays and the squad that powered Michael Crees to the G40 Cup crown last season – and has already impressed team boss Ben Hyland in testing. “That [signing Ward] is a breakthrough for the team,” said Hyland. “The GT5 Challenge will be the one-make series to watch this year. Grids are full and it’s looking exciting, so I wanted to be very much in the mix. “Brett shone immediately and on track I’ve never seen a driver…

ERICSSON JR GRADUATES IN F4 British Formula 4 series drivers Hampus Ericsson and Johnathan Hoggard will remain in the series this year with Fortec Motorsport. Ericsson, brother of Formula 1 racer Marcus, won the Challenge Cup title last season, completing seven events, while Hoggard only contested four. “Winter testing has gone exceptionally well. Fortec have given me fantastic support and guidance to ensure I am fully prepared for this season,” said Hoggard. CHATEAU IMPNEY ATTRACTS 200+ CARS More than 200 invited pre-1967 cars will take part in the fourth edition of the Chateau Impney Hill Climb over the weekend of July 7-8. Competition will centre on the 885-metre course at the Droitwich hotel, which drew 18,000 visitors last summer. Star attractions will include demonstration runs by the 1950 V16 BRM…

IT’S BILLED AS THE world’s fastest electric racing car and will be powered by motors borrowed from a Formula E car — three of them! British constructor Perrinn has agreed a deal with an undisclosed FE powertrain supplier to provide the motors for its LMP1-based 424 prototype. The motors, two powering the rear axle and one the front, will give the Perrinn 424 a power output of 750kW, equivalent to just over 1000bhp. It has been conceived as a demonstrator to prove the validity of electric technology in advance of a proposed assault on the Le Mans 24 Hours some time in the early 2020s. “We have agreed a deal with one of the existing FE suppliers to use its season-four [2017-18] powertrain, but we can’t say which one until…

@autosport THE 2018 FORMULA 1 CARS ARE BEGINNING TO break cover now, and for me the only discordant note is that all, of course, are kitted out with the halo: if one more person tells me we’re all going to get used to it in no time, I won’t be responsible for my actions… Maybe it’s a generation thing. When I first fell in love with racing, such as rollover bars and seat belts, like guardrails and runoff areas, were unknown; the drivers’ lives were seriously at risk every weekend, and they were paid damn all to do it. At school my dad’s weekly letter often contained a newspaper cutting about the death of a driver, and when my childhood hero Jean Behra was killed in 1959, I came face…

To have any chance of winning the world championship this year, Red Bull must start the Formula 1 season strongly. It threw away 2017 through weak initial performance and poor late-season reliability, but on the positive side it demonstrated that it has the infrastructure to overcome these problems. We must wait until the Barcelona test to see the rear in detail. Since the diffuser is one of the dominant components in the aerodynamic package, it will be interesting to see what Red Bull has come up with. Last year at the first test I said I didn’t see the ‘wow’ factor with the RB13, and I have to say I also expected more this year. There’s no standout component optimisation that I can see. The other worry for Red Bull…

Williams has taken a very aggressive approach towards its car, which has a completely different aerodynamic philosophy. With Paddy Lowe joining from Mercedes and Dirk de Beer from Ferrari early last year, it’s easy to see an influence from the approach that Ferrari took in 2017 and the car also incorporates some ideas from Mercedes. I would classify the philosophy change as one of ‘downforce solves all problems’. That includes getting the tyres to work and last longer, so it’s time to forget the very aero-efficient recent Williams cars and concentrate on downforce. All in all, it looks a major step forward from last year’s Williams challenger. When you put together a package of ideas from other cars it’s always difficult to get the best from them, so Williams will…

For Haas, 2018 is going to be about achieving greater consistency after two erratic seasons in Formula 1, with some great results and some very difficult weekends. To do this, you need to understand how to get the car into its working window for a range of circuit conditions, which is Haas’ challenge. The new car looks very neat and tidy. But most impressively, the integration of the halo doesn’t create too much of an eyesore. It has been housed in a carbonfibre faring, minimising the effect it has on the aerodynamics. Also, the undercut airbox/headrest section looks like it has been exaggerated to help manage the halo’s wake. As these are renderings of the car, it’s important to remember things could look a little different when the new Haas…

“THAT’S THE GAMBLE AT DAYTONA. IT CAN go so well, and it can go so awful.” So said Danica Patrick after the final NASCAR race of her career. The 35-year-old had secured her place for NASCAR’s flagship race just a month before the green flag when long-time sponsor GoDaddy returned and revitalised her bid to make Daytona in time. She made an underwhelming start to her drive with Premium Motorsports, qualifying her Chevrolet 28th on the grid. But, free from the pressure of last year, a season she described as a “grind”, Patrick relished the early laps. She made up seven places on the first lap alone, and ran as high as the fringes of the top 10. But as Patrick pointed out, Daytona is a fickle race. When Brad…

THE BRDC BRITISH FORMULA 3 Championship has announced a radical format shake-up, including a complete reversed grid for one race per weekend and points for gaining positions. The changes only affect the second of the three races held at each round. Previously, the top eight race-one finishers were reversed on the race-two grid, but all cars that finish race one – and set a fastest lap within 103% of the overall fastest lap – will now be reversed. Points will then be awarded based on the number of places gained between the start and finishing positions, as well as for the result itself. The changes have been introduced by ex-Formula 1 driver Jonathan Palmer’s MotorSport Vision company, which operates BRDC British F3, to promote overtaking. “MSV has a history of…

Reunited with his 1994 Donington Park race-winning Ford Mondeo BTCC machine, Paul Radisich finished second in last Saturday’s Historic Touring Car series finale opener at Teretonga Park’s Evolution Motorsport Classic in New Zealand. Top qualifier Phil Mauger (Nissan Primera) won the race by half a second. “I just had to wait for the rear tyres to come up to temperature,” said Radisich. “Having power steering was a nice surprise. We didn’t have that when I raced the car first time around and you had to have forearms like Popeye.” Mauger won the sequel from Bruce Miles (BMW 320i), who claimed the subsequent pair from Scott O’Donnell, driving his Wolf-built Mondeo from the period German Super Touring championship.…

BRITAIN’S MOST VENERABLE dedicated historic motorsport show, Race Retro, is marking 40 years of ground-effect Formula 1 cars. A Lotus 79 and a Williams FW07 will take centre stage at Stoneleigh’s National Agricultural Centre from tomorrow (Friday) until Sunday. The annual event also remembers Dan Gurney’s stellar career; McLaren M14A/1, the last F1 car he raced (in the 1970 German GP), will be on display. Racing great Brian Redman and rally legend Miki Biasion are among the personalities being honoured. Every element of wheeled historic sport, from racing to sporting trials, is covered in the halls, with a live rally stage outside. Last week, Historic Motorsport International moved into the main hall at the London Classic Car Show at ExCeL, albeit with fewer major exhibitors than last year. Stars included…