Author: Pat W

IZOD IndyCar Series

Congratulations to the Indy Racing League for securing a new sponsor for the IndyCar Series, which will henceforth be known as the IZOD IndyCar Series.

From all reports IZOD sound like a fantastic partner to work with, and not just reports from yesterday’s announcement but also from during this season where they were a personal sponsor for Ryan Hunter-Reay. I like the attitude and marketing style they appear to bring to the series. I say ‘appear’ because living here in the UK I had never heard of them before they came to the IRL.

The announcement was webcast live last night, unfortunately the usual gremlins crept in and the feed was very quiet at first, then lost sound before dying completely. This is not unusual for IndyCar.com live streams, either pressers or races, and Allen makes a fantastic suggestion on how to fix it – the IRL team have some really good ideas but their tech and implementation don’t seem to ever catch up, so imagine mixing those two groups of people.

So yeah, good news for the series which is finally starting to heal some of the old wounds of the past. First the reunion, now the sponsor, next.. the car?

Some have attempted to spin this as Tony George doing good. Ha. No. He is the cause of the mess we are only just crawling out of. We haven’t quite got to the ‘standing up and dusting ourselves down’ bit yet, but we will.

Anyway, good to have some positive news after what has been a bit of a negative week for the rest of motorsport.

Presumably this means the series acronym will now be IICS – for those not following closely, i.e. most reading this I presume, over the last 18 months or so they’ve been redefining ‘IRL’ to refer to the sanctioning body rather than the championship, so the series has sort of started to be called the ICS, for IndyCar Series. So we now have IRL IICS. Not catchy.. needs work.

Jeff Olson has a good piece over on AUTOSPORT.

EDIT – IndyCar.com has a nice landing page explaining it all, though unfortunately the main site underneath is still a mess and has auto-run video (it is video of the announcement though, so check it out).

F1 2009 for Wii and PSP

I’m getting excited about the new F1 2009 game coming out for the Wii.

I know, I know, it isn’t a ‘proper’ gaming system and F1 2010 for the PS3 / X-Box will be far better – but I don’t own either of those things and that game isn’t out in two weeks’ time.

This is the first officially-licensed F1 game to launch on a non-Playstation system for years (damn that Sony and their exclusivity deal) and even the last PS game was some 3yrs ago, so you can imagine a lot of us are getting quite excited!

Check out this video which explains how the game will appeal to novices and the experienced alike:

(that’s Anthony Davidson, BAR/Honda/BrawnGP test driver, alongside David Croft of BBC Radio 5 Live, and also quotes from a game developer)

I know, the Wii graphics are not stellar. I.Don’t.Care. I get to play an F1 game online without needing to bother spending hours on car setups, a pricey console or a proper wheel, or in the case of the PC I don’t have to worry about graphics cards and drivers and ‘will it run on my system?’. How cool is that?!

Of course, I almost certainly will spend hours on car setups and if they release a proper wheel I’ll probably get it… but that’s not the point. If I just want to pick up a controller and have a quick race against Button and Hamilton around Interlagos, I can. In 2 weeks time, I will.


Just to say this hasn’t been a paid piece or something done for a PR company, I did this off my own back because I’m genuinely looking forward to it.

Weekend Preview: 7-8 Nov 2009

Pretty much all of the major events of the 2009 season are now in the history books so this series is winding down. I’ll keep going in a reduced format as long as there is something notable going on.

Feature Events

MotoGP

– GP Generali de la Comunitat Valenciana
– Circuit Ricardo Tormo
– Valencia, Spain
– (17/17)
– www.motogp.com
– 250cc (last ever), 125cc, etc

Valencia is the traditional finale to the MotoGP season and this year is no exception. Reasonable circuit, seems to me MotoGP is the only series to actually produce decent racing at this track. The title having been won, the only thing of note that I can think of is the demise of the 250cc support class, to be replaced by the new Moto2 category in 2010.

UK: LIVE on BBC Two at 12.30pm
US: DELAYED on SPEED at 6pm ET

Other Events

Single Seater:

Superleague Formula

– Jarama
– Jarama, Spain
– (6/6)
– www.superleagueformula.com
– Eurosport: Race 1 live on E2 at 9am Sunday // Race 2 live on E2 at 11.30am Sunday // Shootout live on E2 at 12.30pm

The only open-wheel action this week outside of SudamF3 is the SF finale at Jarama, which could be fun. I’ve never seen a race at Jarama and apparently these cars make the frankly ridiculous concept of the series worth checking out.

Stock Car:

NASCAR Sprint Cup

– Dickies 500
– Texas Motor Speedway, Forth Worth, Texas, USA
– www.nascar.com
– UK TV: SKY SPORTS XTRA at 8.30pm Sunday
– US TV: LIVE on ABC at 12.30pm ET Sunday

I can’t make sense of this. I’ve double-checked and Sky says 8.30pm is live. ABC says 12.30pm is live. There is not an 8hr time difference between ET and UK and I can’t believe there is a 3hr pre-race show.


NASCAR Nationwide Series

– O’Reilly Challenge
– Texas Motor Speedway, Forth Worth, Texas, USA
– www.nascar.com
– US TV: LIVE on ESPN2 at 12pm ET Saturday (not covered in UK)


NASCAR Camping World Truck Series

– Winstar World Casino 350
– Texas Motor Speedway, Forth Worth, Texas, USA
– www.nascar.com
– US TV: LIVE on SPEED at 8.30pm ET Friday (not covered in UK)

Sports Car / Touring Car:

V8 Supercars

– Phillip Island
– Phillip Island, Victoria, Australia
– www.v8supercar.com.au


Super GT

– Twin-Ring Motegi
– Motegi, Japan
– www.supergt.net/en

Also for those in the UK I believe the new series of Top Gear begins on Sunday.

* * * *
Sources
FORIX (sub req.)
Live Sport on TV
RadioTimes.com
Series websites as mentioned
Autosport magazine

Race Notes: Brazilian Grand Prix 2009

Formula 1 Grande Premio Petrobras do Brasil 2009
Date: 18 October 2009
Circuit: Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace
Location: Interlagos, São Paulo, Brazil
(PitlaneFanatic) (AerialF1)
Distance: 71 laps
Tyre choices (red): SS / S / M / H

Coverage: BBC One with BBC Radio 5 Live audio
Anchor: Jake Humphrey
Analysts: David Coulthard (DC) and Eddie Jordan (EJ)
Interviewers: Ted Kravitz and Lee McKenzie

R5 commentary: David Croft (Crofty) and Anthony Davidson (Ant)
R5 interviewer: Holly Samos

Coverage begins at 4pm UK time.

NOTE – My notes will be shorter than usual because this race happened the day before I moved to a new address, so the time I hoped to watch a replay to catch the quotes was actually spent moving all my stuff. Also, I’ll be honest, I thought I’d posted this already. Apologies.

Points situation:

– Button only needs to finish 3rd or better to secure the title today, no matter what Barrichello or Vettel do.
– Barrichello needs to win the race with Button scoring no higher than a single podium position from the last two races.
– Vettel can mathematically win but he needs to win both races and hope the Brawn team has a nightmare.

71 lap race.

Grid

Barrichello, Webber
Sutil, Trulli
Raikkonen, Buemi
Rosberg, Kubica
Nakajima, Alonso
Kobayashi, Alguersuari
Grosjean, Button
Vettel, Kovalainen
Hamilton, Heidfeld
Fisichella
Liuzzi took a 5 place penalty for a gearbox change and he’s at the back

Rubens spoke to Jake after qualifying:
“My engineer Jock Clear was so loud on the radio, it is the first phase of acheiving the dream. I have [the chance] to win the championship but also I’ve tried for years to win the Brazilian GP.”
Says he’s relaxed.

Big focus on Rubens and his guys at the moment from the BBC. Talking with Jock now.

Switching to Button. [I’ll be honest again… I mentally tuned this out in the live show because we’ve heard so many interviews with JB this season, and I was hoping to pick up the quotes later in the week. Oops.]

Felipe! He’s recovering and looking forward to next season, he’s looking for a good race from Ferrari but also from Rubens.

Half an hour to the start.

Martin Brundle joins us to talk about recovering from accidents, replays of Interlagos some years ago when Jos Verstappen’s Benetton hit him on the head.. Ouch.

Lee caught up with Vettel:
“We are ready to fight and to attack today. Let’s see what happens today, it’s a very long race here and the last two years have been exciting. Right now the sun is shining but maybe later we’ll see some showers, we have some good pace. I am motivated, I know it’s not an easy position to start from, we will see.”
Says he’s aiming for 1st or 2nd – he needs to or he’s out of the title fight.

Replay: Something has come off Vettel’s car as he made his way to the grid, DC says it could be dry ice or the drinks system.

Martin’s Gridwalk
He’s on the start line.
Rubens, he waves at the crowd, can you do it? “Yeah, I can. I have a great car in these conditions. If it does rain we need to get it correct at the time, it’s a lottery. My feet are on the ground, we push as hard as we can.”

Mark Webber, a race you can win? “Yep, we’ll give it us our best shot and quiten down the fans who want Rubens to win. The crowd up there are very passionate and emotional but they are racers too and we’ll give them something. After quali I said to Rubens, 8 points will be enough, give me 10! We’re in good shape.”

Martin trying to get down seven rows on the grid, which he’s not done before, to speak to Button and Vettel. En route he spies Kobayashi.
Kamui: “Yesterday was difficult conditions, our performance was really good. Today is another day in dry conditions.” Just a quickie..

Interrupts Tanya yet again! Running theme for the season has been Martin interrupting German TV’s gridwalk.
Vettel: “It’s a long way from the bottom end of the grid but we’ll see what we can do from here.”

Button is not on the grid! Neither are the McLaren guys. No interviews so Martin bails out.

Brazilian National Anthem
Terrible sound quality! We can hardly hear the singer. This may be a blessing.

Button with Lee: “I’m feeling good, a circuit I enjoy racing on, nice and hot. It’s gonna be a challenge. We’ll make the best of it.”

The BBC track guide with Mark Webber went in here somewhere. At this point before the race I’m busy getting myself a drink to consume during the event, so I don’t usually see the track guide.

Ted, fuel weights:
[I think I was still getting a drink because I have no notes and Ted does this at rapid-fire pace, making it hard to follow even if you aren’t trying to transcribe]

Both David and Eddie say they don’t think Button will win this race.

Grid

Barrichello, Webber
Sutil, Trulli
Raikkonen, Buemi
Rosberg, Kubica
Nakajima, Alonso
Kobayashi, Alguersuari
Grosjean, Button
Vettel, Kovalainen
Hamilton, Heidfeld
Fisichella
Liuzzi took a 5 place penalty for a gearbox change and will start from the back or pitlane or something.

Live Notes

I’m now on 5Live coverage. 5 mins to go.

Engines fired.

Formation Lap

All drivers on hard tyres apart from Kimi, Lewis and Nick.

Grid. Tense yet? I am!

1.2.3.4.5.. Go!

Rubens leads, crash! Ferrari and McLaren. Kovalainen. Now Sutil and Trulli crash!
SAFETY CAR
Alonso hasn’t come through. Trulli and Sutil out of their cars, a fight nearly breaks out!
oh FIRE in pitlane, fire in pitlane. Kovalainen pits and takes the fuel hose with him which spills fuel all over Raikkonen, it catches light briefly. Heikki stops and then rejoins. Not sure who got the hose off him. [it was Brawn apparently]

Replays:
Vettel taps Kovalainen into a spin forcing Fisichella wide.
Sutil and Trulli come together, Trulli tried going outside and ran out of road, he should have backed off.

RESTART

Barr, Web, Ros, Kub, Buemi, Naka, Koba, Gros, But, Alg, Vet, Heid, Fisi, Ham, Rai, Kov

Kubica passes Rosberg on the restart.
Button vs Grosjean! Jenson takes him at last, good racing.

Button is straight up to the back of Nakajima and passes him! He’s now 7th, worth 2pts.
Hamilton passes.. someone.. lots of passing all over the field.

Trulli talking to Holly – he says they should ban Sutil for the next race, immediately! Crofty says he should look at a replay and I agree.

Kovalainen passes Grosjean

Action all the way, I haven’t had time to mark a lap counter! This is lap 9 of 71.

L9 – Fastest lap from Webber. Button has got bottled up behind Kobayashi.

L11 – Things have settled a bit, I can get my breath back. Barrichello leads Webber by 1.8sec with Kubica 3rd and Rosberg 4th, Buemi 5th, Kobayashi then Button.

L14 – Laps tick by quickly here, only 1m14s.
Button radio: “Kobayashi is 2 laps longer”

L16 – Pitlane incident involving Kovalainen is under stewards’ investigation
L17 – Stewards will investigate Trulli/Sutil incident after the race.
Holly reports from McLaren that Heikki was released early by the team (i.e. he didn’t take off by himself).

L19 – Tweet from @OfficialBrawnGP: #F1 Third fastest lap in a row for RB.
L20 – Heidfeld is the first of the scheduled stoppers.
L21 – Barrichello pits from the lead, where will he come out.. he’s behind Nakajima and ahead of Vettel for 9th – but Vettel passes him immediately.

L22 – Heidfeld has stopped by the side of the track. That long run of no-DNFs and now they are all coming at once. Teammate Kubica pits, he’s out behind Vettel who has pulled a gap on the heavier Barrichello.

L24 – Button passes Kobayashi! Off-screen while we watched Rosberg pit.. We get a replay, sold him a dummy! Ducked right then left to fool Kamui, nice move.
L25 – Great stuff between Nakajima and Kobayashi, side by side!

L26 – Webber pits and he’s ahead of Barrichello by some way, Rubens has a problem? Rubens’ problem is he’s back in traffic!

L27 – Rosberg is slowing, that’s another top 5 car for Button not to worry about.
Holly: “No fuel went into Heidfeld’s car at his stop, he pulled over because he’d run out.”
Oops.

L29 – Button pits from 2nd place, Kovalainen also in from 8th.
Button is out between the Toro Rossos of Buemi and Alguersuari.

L30 – Kobayashi pits, so does Alguersuari.

Big crash from Nakajima at turn 4!

L32 – Ah bugger, looks like Kobayashi just moved over on Nakajima, took his wing off.. Kamui is good but he weaves a bit, that was completely his fault.

L33 – Button dives under Buemi at turn one, committed move, nicely done. Jenson is getting a lot of passing done today.

L35 – Holly update: Rosberg retired due to gearbox failure.

The track is still dirty where Nakajima went off. Mud everywhere.

L37 – Vettel pits from 2nd place. He’s out behind Button for 7th. Took the hard tyre. Fisichella was also in, from 9th.

L40 – After the first stops, Webber leads by 6.3 over Kubica, who is 6.3 ahead of Barrichello and a closely-following Hamilton, then 13.1 to Raikkonen and 1.5 to Button and Vettel who are together.

L42 – Hamilton pits, he’s off Barrichello’s tail and out behind Liuzzi in 8th.

L43 – Raikkonen pits and is out in clear air.

L44 – Steven Roy in the Sidepodcast comments has noticed on the live timing screens the humidity graphs are going vertical – is rain approaching?

L45 – We can see dark clouds approaching.

Button radio – “Hamilton is fuelled to the end, we need 14.4s.”
Jenson needs to stop again but Lewis pitted under the Safety Car.

L48 – Webber is pulling a lead on the field.

L50 – Barrichello pits from 2nd, he’s in clear air ahead of Hamilton.

51 laps completed, 20 to go

L52 – Webber pits from the lead, he takes the softer tyre for the final stint.

L53 – Vettel took another set of hard tyres but may have enough fuel to make the end.. when will he use the soft tyres? Splash and dash or hoping for rain?

L55 – Button pits, and he’s out alongside Kovalainen…. Heikki beats him!
L56 – Vettel pits for those softer tyres, and he beats Kovalainen and Button!

L57 – Order: Webber, Kubica, Barrichello, Hamilton, Vettel, Kovalainen, Button, Raikkonen, Buemi, Fisichella.

L59 – Raikkonen is catching Button.
L60 – Kovalainen pits! That releases Button into clear air.

Kubica is having an anonymous run to 2nd, we’ve barely seen him.

L61 – Hamilton passes Barrichello into the front straight! Lewis 3rd, Rubens 4th.

L63 – Noo!! Rubens has a puncture! It’s all over. congratulations to Jenson Button who will win the title – and he put in a good drive for it too.

L65 – Rubens is now running 8th. Such a crap way for this to end – if he’d lost the title by finishing 3rd that’s fine and that’s the way it was going, but to lose it to a puncture… If Webber DNFs, that puncture would have made all the difference.

L67 – Button radio: “Chance of a few drops of rain near the end.”
Replay of Kobayashi diving by Fisichella! Great move! Fisi does seem to go to sleep near the end of races.

L69 – Two laps to go. Kobayashi has impressed everyone with his drive today, and Kubica is having a great run too.

L70 – Final lap

L71 – Felipe Massa waves the chequered flag as Mark Webber wins!!
Jenson Button is the Champion!! BrawnGP are the Champions!!

Congrats to all concerned, a great effort.

Button on the radio: “We Are The Champions!”

Barrichello applauds his team-mate as they circulate the cool-down lap together.

Parc Ferme

Button and Barrichello congratulate, Hamilton comes over too.

Jenson is running around to different people to celebrate!

Podium
Advance Australia Fair for Webber
Austrian anthem for Red Bull
Trophies. It seems drivers have been presented with the logo of the Klingon Empire as a trophy? What we do know is that they have been recycled from local rubbish. No, really. I’m struggling to find a link but it was plastic reused and remoulded to make the trophies.

Champaaaagggneee!

BBC crew in the middle of the Brawn garage with Jenson, the only thing I’ve got from it is:
“Kobayashi is absolutely crazy!”

The world’s media is surrounding the BBC interview, cameras and bodies everywhere. Scenes of all the mechanics and engineers celebrating with a beer (whoever got that one-race sponsorship deal on the sidepods of the cars for the Brazilian beer company was a GENIUS).

Sebastian Vettel isn’t in a very good mood at all and reportedly isn’t talking to anyone.

Meanwhile, lots of celebrating and interviews with all from the Brawn team. Yes they’ve been the focus of a lot of attention this year and it has been a little annoying at times, but let’s just remind ourselves that this team almost ceased to exist last December. The turnaround in fortunes is astonishing so well done to them.

Race Result

Driver Gap Pts
1 Webber 71 laps 10
2 Kubica 7.6sec 8
3 Hamilton 18.9sec 6
4 Vettel 19.6sec 5
5 Button 29.0sec 4
6 Räikkönen 33.3sec 3
7 Buemi 35.9sec 2
8 Barrichello 45.4sec 1
9 Kobayashi 63.3sec
10 Fisichella 70.6sec
11 Liuzzi 71.3sec
12 Kovalainen 73.4sec
13 Grosjean 1 lap
14 Alguersuari 1 lap
DNF Nakajima Accident
DNF Rosberg Gearbox
DNF Heidfeld Fuel
DNF Sutil Accident
DNF Trulli Accident
DNF Alonso Accident

Nice to see Mark pick up another win, shame nobody will remember it with the focus on the title win! Robert seemed to go completely unnoticed in the broadcast and yet finished second.
Vettel did manage to out-finish Button despite starting behind him, but it wasn’t enough as both put in great drives. Despite the puncture Barrichello still picked up a point for 8th.
A good result for Buemi, too.

Drivers’ Championship

Driver Prev BR Total
1 Button 85 4 89 C
2 Vettel 69 5 74
3 Barrichello 71 1 72
4 Webber 51.5 10 61.5
5 Hamilton 43 6 49
6 Räikkönen 45 3 48
7 Rosberg 34.5 34.5
8 Trulli 30.5 30.5
9 Alonso 26 26
10 Glock 24 24
11 Massa 22 22
12 Kovalainen 22 22
13 Kubica 9 8 17
14 Heidfeld 15 15
15 Fisichella 8 8
16 Sutil 5 5
17 Buemi 3 2 5
18 Bourdais 2 2

Congratulations to Jenson Button, the 2009 F1 World Champion!
Vettel’s efforts see him overhaul Barrichello in the table, a valiant chase towards the end of the season but let down by poor reliability earlier in the year.
Webber manages to jump himself out of the clutches of the chasing duo of Hamilton and Raikkonen who cannot now beat him.
Kubica moves up a position and Buemi joins Sutil on 5 points.

Constructors’ Championship

Constructor Prev BR Total
1 Brawn 156 5 161 C
2 Red Bull 120.5 15 135.5
3 McLaren 65 6 71
4 Ferrari 67 3 70
5 Toyota 54.5 54.5
6 Williams 34.5 34.5
7 BMW 24 8 32
8 Renault 26 26
9 Force India 13 13
10 Toro Rosso 5 2 7

Congratulations to BrawnGP, the 2009 F1 World Champions!
Red Bull’s chase came strong in the end but the points lead built up earlier on was good enough for Brawn to hold on.
McLaren and Ferrari switch positions again in the fight for 3rd.
BMW jump Renault with a strong haul of points.
Toro Rosso put some more on the board too, I can’t remember when the last-placed team scored as many points as this. Perhaps I’ll check for the season round-up.

Next Event

Abu Dhabi. (Blogger deleted what I had here and I can’t be bothered to fix)

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