Innehållsförteckning för 03/05/18 från Autosport

What a crazy start to the Formula 1 season we’re having. You could easily argue that all four of the 2018 grands prix held so far have been won by the ‘wrong’ driver. It’s dangerous to make assumptions, but without the safety-car interventions and strategic blunders the world championship standings would look rather different. Lewis Hamilton would have won in Australia, Valtteri Bottas could have won in Bahrain and should have been victorious in China, while Sebastian Vettel probably deserved to win in Azerbaijan last weekend. If the races had gone this way, the drivers’ world championship would be even closer than it is now. As it stands, Hamilton leads on 70 points, with Vettel second on 66. Kimi Raikkonen is third on 48, with Bottas next on 40. But…

FORMULA 1 Aerodynamic modifications to promote overtaking in Formula 1 in 2019 were voted through on Monday, the last possible day for any changes to next year’s technical rules to be agreed. Enough teams voted at the F1 Commission to allow the plans tabled by the FIA and FOM to be rubberstamped by the World Motor Sport Council. It’s believed that five or six teams voted no. The decision is also a victory for both Liberty and the FIA as they work towards 2021 and the full package of changes to technical, sporting and commercial aspects of F1. The changes agreed for 2019 are as follows: • a simplified front wing, with a larger span, and low outwash potential; • a simplified front brake duct with no winglets; • a…

WHEN YOU WATCH ONE OF YOUR RIVALS LOCK UP AND SLIDE OFF THE TRACK ON ONE LAP, and the other drop out with a right-rear blowout a lap later, you know fortune is on your side. Lewis Hamilton understands what it takes to win grands prix better than any other driver on the grid; this was his 63rd grand prix victory, and after winning a race he described as “a lottery” the Mercedes driver was quick to pick holes in a performance that he felt fell short of his usual high standards. This wasn’t an undeserved victory, far from it, but – as race engineer Pete Bonnington said over the radio after Hamilton took the chequered flag – lady luck was with them in Azerbaijan. But to capitalise, Hamilton had…

Williams driver Sergey Sirotkin squeezed two collisions into a race that lasted only until Turn 3 on the first lap, earning a three-place grid penalty for the upcoming Spanish Grand Prix for hitting Sergio Perez. Sirotkin, who started 11th, punted Perez into the back of Kimi Raikkonen’s Ferrari at Turn 2, but survived the incident. He then got squeezed by Nico Hulkenberg into Fernando Alonso on the run to Turn 3 and retired with the resulting damage. “I think it was Kimi slowing down a lot and then Checo [Perez] slowing down and I just touched him,” said Sirotkin. “Up to this point it was still looking perfect because I didn’t even get a scrape on my front wing. Then I was squeezed in the middle of the sandwich in…

There are various ways to say it. There’s ‘Ert’ or ‘Oy-T’ or even ‘Huyt’. But when Kris Meeke reached the end of the Las Bajadas test on Friday afternoon, he cared nothing for pronunciation or enunciation. Running second, the time he most wanted to know about wasn’t there on the board. Before he’d even got his balaclava off, the Northern Irishman leaned out of the door of his Citroen and offered one word, sounding surprisingly like a London cabbie who’d been asked what was the opposite of cold. “Ott?” shouted Meeke. “Where is he? What’s his time?” Going into the stage, Meeke had been just 3.1 seconds down on Tanak’s Toyota and he knew any kind of issue would have played nicely into his hands. Unfortunately for Meeke, the Estonian’s…

It’s hard to have imagined a worse weekend for WSR and its trio of drivers Colin Turkington, Andrew Jordan and Rob Collard. The first problem for WSR was the weather. The mixed conditions on Saturday were never suited to the rear-wheel-drive BMW 125i M Sports, which prefer either full-wet or full-dry asphalt. But it was Jordan’s woes that were the worst, with a scavenge-pump failure on the turbo (below). When a replacement was fitted for qualifying, that broke too. Turkington rescued some pride by qualifying 11th with a stellar lap given the circumstances, and took 10th in the opener despite being spun down the order halfway through. That was as good as it would get for him: in race two a water pump failed, which cooked the engine, and there…

Can Toyota be beaten by the new wave of privateers to enter the World Endurance Championship for the 2018-19 superseason? The answer has to be no – and not just because, as the only manufacturer still standing in LMP1, it has more resources, the best drivers, a higher level of organisation and a proven three-year-old design in the TS050 HYBRID. P1 privateers running non-hybrid machinery were promised lap time parity with manufacturer hybrids when the WEC and promoter the Automobile Club de l’Ouest outlined their bold vision for the future of the series last September. Saving LMP1 was an important tenet of the rescue package announced at the Mexico City round, which includes the 14-month superseason that straddles two editions of the Le Mans 24 Hours. Something had to be…

What is your first motorsport memory? PIERRE FILLON Sitting on my grandfather’s shoulders at the Le Mans 24 Hours in 1966. He was very passionate about motorsport and was supposed to have driven in the first 24 Hours in ’23, but my grandmother stopped him because she said it was too dangerous. I’ve been to Le Mans every year since, even when I was studying for some very important exams. I had decided not to go in ’77, but I heard the story of how Jacky Ickx had changed cars at Porsche and I had to go to the track. GERARD NEVEU It is from Paul Ricard. I was only 15 and it was difficult because I had to find someone to bring me from my home in Toulon. We…

SERIES ELITE A new championship has been launched for drivers aged over 50, using the new Jaguar F-type GT4, and will run to a 12-race calendar in 2019. Series Elite, set up by Graeme Glew of Totally Motorsports, will begin with a prologue event at Brands Hatch on October 27-28, running with the British Automobile Racing Club. It will then visit Silverstone, Donington Park, Brands Hatch and Rockingham in 2019, and the organiser is hoping to attract up to 20 entries. “Currently there is no series that caters specifically for older drivers who want to compete at a high level with like-minded racers,” said Glew, father of 2009 Renault UK Clio Cup champion Phil. “We’re filling this gap with Series Elite supported by Jaguar. Our competitors will own their cars,…

HISTORICS One of the earliest-surviving TVRs will be back racing next season after Kevin Kivlochan bought one of three 1955 models known as the Open Sports. This was the first tubular-chassis design from TVR, which started producing cars in 1947. Kivlochan’s car, registered 223 EMA, has been stored in a barn in Scotland for more than 30 years, but should be racing in the Woodcote Trophy next season. The Open Sports was built by TVR founder Trevor Wilkinson and was raced, including at Brands Hatch in 1955, with a 1500cc Coventry Climax engine. Wilkinson also used 223 EMA as a road car. Of the three 500kg cars thought to have been built, one is missing and the other is in the US. The design was sold to the US where…

CARRERA CUP GB Over the previous two seasons of the Porsche Carrera Cup GB only three different drivers won races. But there’s been a very different story in 2018, with four different winners in the first four contests – and three of those have been first-time victors. The first of those at Donington was Tio Ellinas, but it was far from straightforward for the Cypriot. First he lost out to fellow front-row starter Lewis Plato through the Craner Curves on the opening tour. Ellinas swiftly dealt with that setback, when he got his Slidesports car back ahead at Coppice three laps later and started to build a gap. But the next problem was points leader Dino Zamparelli. The Redline driver was closing fast, having also dispatched Plato early on. Zamparelli…

ROCKINGHAM BRITISH GT APRIL 28-29 Lee Mowle had a pretty unique view for qualifying. It was a place where few others are allowed to stand. But he wasn’t standing at all: he was sitting in a slough of despond, staring at a barrier. In the pouring rain. Mowle had just lost his Mercedes-AMG GT3 on the exit of the last chicane on his out-lap and nudged into the barriers. Stranded on the wet grass, he couldn’t get going again and instead had to just sit and glumly regard the vista beyond. Come Sunday, though, he had a more joyful viewpoint – overlooking his team from the podium’s top step, celebrating his first British GT victory alongside Yelmer Buurman. How did they do it? “I have literally no idea how we…

ROCKINGHAM BRSCC APRIL 2 8-29 With five different winners (from four teams) in the first five races, the 2018 BRDC British Formula 3 Championship is proving to be one of the most hotly contested series in the UK. Swede Linus Lundqvist put himself at the top of the standings after occupying every step of the podium across the Rockingham weekend, in the process becoming the first double winner this year. Double R Racing driver Lundqvist was pipped to pole for race one by Tom Gamble – the Fortec Motorsports racer set the fastest time with his last lap of the session on a wet but gradually improving track. It remained wet for the race and Lundqvist was unable to overturn Gamble’s lead, in what was a clean battle. In their…

DTM The DTM kicks off this weekend at Hockenheim, and much of the focus will be on 2015 champion Pascal Wehrlein as he returns to the Mercedes tin-top fold after two seasons in Formula 1. This is the final year for Mercedes in the DTM before it turns its focus to Formula E. So this represents just one opportunity for Wehrlein to get back to winning form after two inconclusive years in F1 with Manor and Sauber, and reboot his stalled career. There is no doubt that expectations are high within the Mercedes camp heading to Hockenheim. “I want him to win on Saturday, win on Sunday, lead the championship on Monday!” the marque’s sports boss Toto Wolff told Autosport. “It’s not easy, but he performed well in the tests,…

WORLD RALLY CHAMPIONSHIP Rally GB organisers have revealed a ground-breaking route, to include competition on closed public roads for the first time in the October 4-7 event. Link roads and lanes will be used to build longer forest stages in North Wales, but it was the final day’s flat-out test through the centre of Llandudno that took centre stage at the event launch on Monday. Used twice on the Sunday, the Great Orme Llandudno stage will make history as FIA World Rally Championship competition comes to town-centre roads on mainland Britain for the first time. The five-mile stage will come off a clockwise run around the Great Orme headland and steer down one side of the A456 before going around a roundabout, up the other side, turning right to South…

IT’S ALL BECOMING A BIT REPETITIVE FOR KIMI RAIKKONEN, but at least he’s getting closer to sealing the deal and taking a pole position in 2018. In Bahrain he was on top after the first runs in Q3, but didn’t deliver on his second set of tyres. In China he was ahead for much of the lap before slipping behind Sebastian Vettel late on. And in Azerbaijan he made it all the way to the final proper corner, the Turn 16 left-hander, before the rear got away from him and he fishtailed his way onto the long drag to the line. Until that point, he looked nailed on for pole position. “I took it easier on the entry because obviously it’s been a bit tricky with the wind all day,”…

Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo were both given formal reprimands for their collision during the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Ricciardo hit the rear of Verstappen’s Red Bull while challenging for fourth place on lap 40 after the Dutchman jinked right then left in the braking zone. The stewards deemed the pair shared the blame. “Both drivers contributed to the collision,” said the stewards’ statement. “The driver of car 33 [Verstappen] made two moves, both of which were relatively minor. The driver of car 3 [Ricciardo] admitted he left his move to overtake on the left too late. “It was obvious to the stewards that although the incident had its origins in the moves by car 33, the driver of car 3 also contributed to the incident. Both drivers expressed regret about…

McLaren continued its tendency to qualify poorly and race slightly better in Azerbaijan, with Fernando Alonso seventh and Stoffel Vandoorne ninth after both qualified outside the top 10 again. Alonso started 12th, but took the restart 17th and ahead only of Marcus Ericsson after pitting under the safety car with right-side punctures after contact with Sergey Sirotkin, who had been squeezed by Nico Hulkenberg on the run to Turn 3 on the opening lap. Despite floor damage, Alonso continued to show good pace and recovered to seventh, passing Lance Stroll on the final lap. Alonso did not shy from bombastic statements after a strong race. “I think it was the result of persistence and pride, because I think no-one [else] would have reached the pitlane, first of all,” he said.…

Unfortunately for Felix Rosenqvist, it looks as though the 2017/18 Formula E title fight has turned into a two-horse race. After picking up just 20 points in the last four races – six for taking two poles in races he led before retiring – compared with Jean-Eric Vergne’s 76 and Sam Bird’s 55, the Mahindra Racing driver is now 61 points adrift of the top spot. Rosenqvist was extremely strong in Berlin – when FE heads next – last year; only a penalty denied him a double weekend triumph. He also shone in the championship’s first visit to Rome last time out, which suggests he won’t be fazed by the new track in Zurich. So all is not totally lost. But, in the championship reckoning, things look very tough for…

FORMULA 2 BAKU (AZ) APRIL 28-29 ROUND 2/12 Sixth. That’s the championship position of arguably the fastest driver in the Formula 2 Championship this year. George Russell has been lightning quick, but the reigning GP3 champion has endured bad luck in spades. Despite his best efforts, Baku wasn’t the place for a full turnaround, but a heroic Sunday win could be the launchpad for it. At the opening round in Bahrain, a failed start and a botched getaway – common phenomena thanks to the new-for-2018 F2 car’s tricky clutch – wasted Russell’s second place in qualifying, but there was hope in Azerbaijan, with third on the grid for the feature race. The Mercedes Formula 1 junior must have started to believe that his season was finally on the correct track…

WORLD RALLYCROSS MONTALEGRE (P) APRIL 28-29 ROUND 2/12 Johan Kristoffersson extended his championship lead by heading the snowhit final in Portugal all the way for his second win of the season in his PSRX Volkswagen Sweden Polo Supercar. Kristoffersson put himself on the front row for the final by making a crucial first-corner move on the EKS Audi Sport machines of Andreas Bakkerud and Mattias Ekstrom at the beginning of his semi-final. He then led the factory Peugeot of Timmy Hansen in the final, before Hansen crashed into the Armco at the final corner on lap two. Hansen’s team-mate Sebastien Loeb was on the move, passing Bakkerud at the start of lap four to take second place. Bakkerud then took his joker lap, promoting Petter Solberg to third. This was…

BMW is making a belated return to world championship sportscar racing this season. You have to go back 40-odd years to its short-lived campaigns in the World Championship for Makes with a variety of Group 5 machinery to find the direct predecessor of its new-for-2018 programme with the M8 GTE. That’s not counting its time racing in the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup, the precursor of the WEC, with the E92-shape M3 GT, which incorporated BMW’s most recent forays at the Le Mans 24 Hours in 2010 and ’11. Even if you do, it’s been a long road back to the forefront of international sportscar racing for BMW, which is making a full-factory entry in the 2018-19 WEC with a pair of GTE Pro entries run by the MTEK squad. The…

LMP3 CUP Ligier UK managing director Richard Dean has suggested that the LMP3 Cup and GT Cup should combat the issue of low entries by combining to become a World Endurance Championship-style multi-class event. LMP3 Cup, while commended for its high quality of cars and cost-effectiveness, has struggled with small grids. In its inaugural 2017 season numbers varied between five and 10, while in the ’18 season opener at Donington Park last month there were eight cars present, seven of which were Ligiers. Both the LMP3 Cup and GT Cup are run by the Bute Motorsport concern. “Everybody’s saying, ‘Isn’t it fantastic that LMP1 in WEC has taken off’, and they’ve got eight cars,” said Dean, who is also co-owner of United Autosports, which entered three cars in the LMP3…

BRANDS HATCH MGCC APRIL 28-29 Rob Spencer survived a nervy off-track moment in the first BCV8 Championship race and a late charge from Ian Prior in race two to claim a double triumph at Brands Hatch to maintain his unbeaten start to the season. With slippery conditions in qualifying contributing to a jumbled grid, hopes for two intriguing races were high. Spencer made light work of his third-row start in the opener, blasting into an immediate lead in his MGB GT V8 ahead of the similar cars of James and Jonnie Wheeler. At the end of the opening lap, though, an off at Paddock Hill for reigning champion Russell McCarthy brought out the safety car. Spencer continued to lead once racing resumed, but Neil Fowler was the man on the…

BOOK THE FIRST THREE SHELBY COBRAS RRP £30 Putting an original spin on motorsport history can be tough, particularly if the subject is as well-known as the Shelby Cobra. But that is something Gordon Bruce achieves with his new book, The First Three Shelby Cobras. The Porter Press Exceptional Cars and Great Cars series are now well established. They focus on the story of individual chassis, charting the lives of specific (often legendary) cars. When done well, this approach adds new stories and interest while also covering off the basics of a given famous model. In this case, Bruce achieves this by looking at three cars – the first Cobras produced in 1962. Once you get past the early hyperbole about the Cobra and its creator, Carroll Shelby, this work…

FORMULA 2 Formula 2 organisers are to use their test car this week in a bid to improve the troublesome clutch on the new 2018 machine, after 14 stalls in four races. Drivers have called for the clutch to be improved on the grounds of safety. The difficulty comes in engaging the clutch, with drivers labelling the ability to get off the line a ‘gamble’, and series leader Lando Norris has called for changes before next week’s Barcelona round. “People are just swerving everywhere and eventually you [are going to] get a guy at the back who has built up some speed and can’t avoid anything, and it’s going to be a big crash,” said Norris (above). F2 organisers refused to comment on any impending tweaks, but race director Charlie…

Writing was on the wall for Red Bull crash I said it last year and I’ll say it again, Mercedes needs to run the softer compounds during winter testing so it can get a better handle on them… Another manic and exciting race, with various drivers suffering bad and experiencing good luck (particularly hard on Valtteri Bottas). As for the Red Bulls, the writing was on the wall throughout the race as to the outcome. We don’t know what was said by their race engineers during the race, but whatever it was, it wasn’t strong enough or listened to. Apologising to the whole workforce may bring it home to both drivers for the future (but I doubt it in the heat of battle). Paul Hewitt Luton, Beds A Formula 1…

Sauber rookie Charles Leclerc has endured a difficult start to his grand prix career, but the Ferrari junior underlined his potential with a starring drive to sixth in Azerbaijan to net his first points in Formula Leclerc made it into the second part of qualifying, and a strong first lap, allied with the frenzy around him, lifted him into the top 10. A blend of pace, strong driving and a swathe of incidents involving others helped him score Sauber’s best result since the 2015 Russian Grand Prix. Leclerc’s opening stint was the highlight, when he passed Lance Stroll’s Williams and was in touching distance of the squabbling Red Bulls and Renaults. Later he passed and kept Fernando Alonso’s McLaren behind. “It was quite a big surprise in the car, seeing…

After colliding during the previous race in China, the Toro Rosso drivers were supposed to be on their best behaviour. But when Pierre Gasly happened upon a touring Brendon Hartley during Q1 in Azerbaijan it almost resulted in a massive accident. Gasly was on a hot lap and on target to set a time good enough to make Q2 when he came across Hartley, who had a front-left puncture after glancing the wall. Hartley was in the middle of the track at the flat-out Turn 14 kink on the approach to the Turn 15 left-hander. Gasly jinked to the right just in time to avoid hitting Hartley and, after running across the Turn 14 kerb, ended up taking to the Turn 15 escape road. “It was really scary, the scariest…

At the start of the 2018 British Touring Car Championship campaign, Power Maxed Racing boss Adam Weaver said that he wanted his Vauxhall Astras to win races on genuine pace to show what a threat they had become. The team had sampled podiums before, but that didn’t bother him. He wanted a non-reversed-grid win. At Brands Hatch’s opening round three weeks ago, he got one when Senna Proctor claimed victory in race two. But the wet-but-drying nature of that topsy-turvy race had left him yet to be fully satisfied. After race one at Donington last Sunday Weaver was beaming, and so was driver Josh Cook, who had powered from his maiden BTCC pole on Saturday to victory in the opener, and then backed that up with a narrow second place…

WTCR HUNGARORING (H) APRIL 28-29 ROUND 2/10 Had Norbert Michelisz carried his one-lap pace advantage into either of the two World Touring Car Cup races he started from pole at the Hungaroring, the local hero would have won at a canter. Michelisz spoke after Sunday’s final race – his second defeat in the space of 24 hours – about no longer feeling the pressure of performing in front of his home fans and, even if there was an additional weight this year of being in Hyundai’s much-fancied machinery, from the get-go he was head and shoulders clear of the rest in Hungary. His first flying lap in practice? The fastest of FP1. His first lap in Saturday qualifying? Make that pole by quarter of a second. His shootout effort in…

HISTORICS The Austin A40 in which Cambridge GP George ‘Doc’ Shepherd won the 1960 BRSCC British Saloon Car Championship is to race again having been laid up for 48 years and restored by the enthusiast who bought it in ’67. Supplied by Marshalls of Cambridge, the car was prepared for the 1959 championship by tuner Don Moore, with engine work by Harry Weslake. Shepherd won his class and finished second overall to Jeff Uren in John Willment’s Ford Zephyr. Modifications to the new-for-1960 ‘Supa Tura’ regulations – a freer silhouette formula for cars with a maximum capacity of 1000cc – brought greater success. Shepherd won six rounds, clinching the crown despite crashing in the Brands Hatch finale. “We’ve prepared it to current safety regulations,” said new owner Trevor Parfitt. “With…

Repetition isn’t always a bad thing. If you find a winning formula, then it’s probably best practice to stick to it. That was exactly what HHC Motorsport did when it pulled off the same tactic that had brought it glory at this race in 2017. Last year Will Tregurtha and Stuart Middleton overcame a stubborn McLaren by running an alternative pit strategy. This year Patrik Matthiesen and Callum Pointon followed in their wheeltracks to achieve exactly the same result in their Ginetta G55. The fleet of McLarens were absolute weapons around Rockingham. Being mid-engined the car enjoys great traction, so it was little surprise that the brand locked out the front row in the soaked qualifying session, thanks to great efforts by factory junior drivers Charlie Fagg/Michael O’Brien and Lewis…

The three Ginetta GT5 Challenge races may not have featured a single safety car or stoppage like the majority of other races during the weekend, but to suggest they were not action-packed would be thoroughly inaccurate. Featuring Ginetta G40s, the one-make series is proving to be one of the most popular championships of 2018 with its relatively low running costs and close, competitive racing. Thirty-one drivers were on the grid at Rockingham, representing a blend of experience and youth. With the championship supporting British GT at five rounds, it’s becoming more and more of a proving ground for prospective GT3 and GT4 teams looking for the next generation of sportscar drivers. “It looks like it’s going to be a tough year [to win],” said returning champion James Kellett. “GT5 seems…

THE WORLD ENDURANCE CHAMPIONSHIP KICKS off at Spa this weekend, so we thought it was a good time to look back at the most prolific winners of the series’ previous world sportscar championship era. Earl Bamber, Timo Bernhard and Brendon Hartley are currently the top WEC winners on 11, so it’ll be a while before anyone threatens Jacky Ickx’s remarkable tally. 5 MAURO BALDI, 17 WINS Baldi was one of the few drivers to win in Lancia’s fast-but-fragile LC2 and added privateer Porsche victories before joining Sauber-Mercedes. In 1990 he shared the drivers’ crown with Jean-Louis Schlesser, but he had to wait until the post-world championship ’94 Le Mans to add a victory in the 24 Hours. 4 HENRI PESCAROLO, 21 WINS With one Le Mans win fewer than his…

WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN? WHO IS THIS? From the city of the mountains to the top of the world, this charismatic racer recovered from an enormous knock to have a wide and varied career. He left home to make the grade at a famous finishing school, which led to grassroots success and then to a voyage on a mythological ship. In the second tier he gained international acclaim at a Hampshire speedbowl, which led to a two-year stint at the top that ended when he lost his teddy. He headed west for his greatest triumphs but also his hardest hit. He recovered to lead the way over the bricks but suffered a very public embarrassment. When a schism erupted he backed the winning side before turning left into a dead…