Category: 2009

Launch Season: BMW Sauber F1.09

BMW Sauber F1.09

Earlier this week the new BMW Sauber was launched at the Ricardo Tormo circuit in Valencia, Spain.

Like the other ’09 cars it is a much cleaner design than the ’08 car, although that wasn’t difficult in the case of the 2008 BMW! Also in common with other teams there are fewer sponsor logos on this car. Long-time backer Credit Suisse, who supported the team long before BMW supplied Williams let alone Sauber, have withdrawn their backing. Given the present condition of the banking sector globally this isn’t a huge surprise, it is maybe more surprising that RBS remains with Williams. It also looks like the Intel sponsorship has disappeared. Again in common with most other teams, BMW Sauber insist they remain on a solid financial footing.

On the whole this looks like a fairly ordinary car compared to the more radical designs of the McLaren and Renault, say. The nose is conventional albeit higher than in previous years, there is no engine cover fin, and the front wing is one of the most basic we’ve seen – particularly the endplates.

This team is widely tipped to continual their steady rise in performance and become contenders for race wins rather than picking up when McLaren and Ferrari falter. They need to be wary of Renault who had a resurgence of form towards the end of last year.

BMW are believed to be the most advanced in their development of the KERS system yet are still claiming they may not use it for the first race or two. I’m not sure I believe that.

Here’s a comparison to the 2008 car, kindly set up by BMW:

Sorry if the pics appear slightly fuzzy, I think I buggered up the upload and resizing and I’m not messing around with it any more, it is Friday night…

There are further details at www.bmw-sauber-f1.com/ – though be warned the site doesn’t work well in Firefox.

Mike Conway to IndyCar

In a surprise announcement about 24 hours ago, Dreyer & Reinbold announced Mike Conway as their first race driver of 2009. I’m guessing that wording means one or two drivers will be added to the programme, and that one of those is probably Milka Duno. It’ll be interesting to see if she does the full year this time.

I’d just like to say hi to anyone coming over here as a result of Jeff’s kind link at MyNameIsIRL.com. I commented over there about Mike Conway’s race history. MyNameIsIRL.com has been the source of most of my visitors for some time now, so thanks for coming!

Mike Conway is a fast driver who doesn’t seem to pull a decent year together. He’s one of those guys who you always think it’ll only be a matter of time before he does pull a good year together. A bit like Vitor Meira, he runs quickly but always seems to have a backmarker take him out or a little bit of mechanicals go wrong at just the wrong time. There’s never a right time, but mid-race when you’re running in the top three or four is particularly galling.

I commented on his test with Panther at the time and noted how that story seemed to come from nowhere – and this new announcement certainly did as well.
I wrote at the time:

Conway won a race at the Monte Carlo round of the GP2 Series, supporting the Monaco GP, and currently sits 11th in points. Not stellar, but respectable given the competitiveness of the midfield in GP2, and a win at Monaco is nothing to be disregarded. I saw that race and he was dominant, it was not a fluke.

Since then he put in some good performances but still only wound up 12th in points. Given his speed this is a bizarre finishing position to find himself and I struggle to explain it because he was a top 5 driver all season. Okay so his team did fade a little toward the end of the year, but not THAT badly!

I also noted how only autosport.com had the story. Clearly the ‘name’ US journos we all know and love (Miller, Cavin) must have known about the test – the guy was fastest – but I assume they didn’t take the prospect of him driving in 2009 too seriously. I didn’t either, I expected him to go for a full GP2 title assault with a top team!

I wish him well for 2009, it’ll be fascinating to see how he adapts. I have a feeling he’ll turn out to be a good oval racer but it might take him most of the year to get into it.

Launch Season: Renault R29

Renault R29

As mentioned in my previous post, the second launch in the Portimao pitlane on Monday was the colourful Renault R29.

Sporting a livery not unlike the Spanish flag (hmmm.. wonder why..!), noticeably larger branding from ING and new sponsorship from Elf’s sister (parent?) company Total, the 2009 Renault is certainly eye-catching. Last year’s livery design was a bit of a mish mash and didn’t really stick out, so although I’m not keen on these colours, at least they are distinctive!

The most noticeable feature of the car itself is the very wide nose, even wider than the widest seen so far on the Williams, yet the Renault version is much more blunt, more of a wedge-shape. Is this to punch a hole in the air? Is this to stow more ballast in the nose to counteract the weight of the KERS at the back? We’re not really sure at this stage but it is certainly a departure from their ultra-narrow noses of three and four years ago.

The front wing is relatively basic compared to the opposition, but you can expect developments before Melbourne. Remember that the front wing flaps are now adjustable by the driver, but only twice per lap. It seems Renault and Toyota have preferred to make this area uncomplicated aerodynamically for the time being.

Here is a launch pic:

This is a head-on view of the car in testing later on Monday, it really shows both the extent of the nose design and also just how far the new front wing regulations make the endplates stick out. There is a lot of potential for damaged wings this season, and you can imagine it’ll take a race or two for the guys to get used to how close they can race – they don’t run wheel-to-wheel in testing.

If I have time tomorrow I’ll post something on the BMW launched today, but I’ve a lot of college homework to get done first. I really shouldn’t have spent so long tonight watching Obama’s parade on the BBC News website stream!

By the way: Dreyer & Reinbold signing Mike Conway – excellent move for all concerned. My only regret is that they don’t appear to be replacing Milka Duno, instead Mike will take the car vacated by Buddy Rice. Let me tell you now, a Rice/Conway combination would be a great driver line-up. Don’t let his 12th place in ’08 GP2 points fool you into thinking he’s midfield, Conway is a good driver, he’s won in GP2 at Monaco and in F3 at Macau. He can push, he can overtake.

Launch Season: Williams FW31

Williams-Toyota FW31

AT&T WilliamsF1 launched their new FW31-Toyota today in the pitlane at the Portimao circuit in Portugal in a somewhat underwhelming and understated ceremony. I guess the dull and dreary weather conditions didn’t help matters, yet compare it to the Renault one held just a few yards up the road very shortly afterwards, which saw more team personnel, more media, and much more colour – although when you see the colours chosen you may wonder if this is such a good thing.

To be honest though, the big glitzy launch never suited this down-to-earth team who much prefer to get on with the business of testing and racing. I like that. Full disclosure here: Williams are my favourite team and have been since I was a kid in the late ’80s, watching Nigel Mansell do his stuff. It hurts to see this former championship team near the back of the field simply because they fell out with BMW and couldn’t hook up with another manufacturer (except in a customer deal).

Still, the launch pics do look a little… well.. pathetic. It just doesn’t look professional. Sorry guys.

This car was launched in an interim test livery which is nearly identical to the one used this time last year, the only real differences being the names on the car. Despite losing some major Iceland-based backing after that economy tanked, as well as Lenovo (which most of us know as Hewlett Packard) and the Petrobras oil company of Brazil, the team insists it is on a solid financial footing for the next two years at least, and has secured increased support from Philips. The Dutch electronics giant previously used only its’ shavers section to sponsor the team, this has now increased to cover their whole ‘Consumer Lifestyle’ division. Williams now feature the Philips logo more prominently on the sidepods and rear wing. Other partners have stepped up their involvement too.

You can read the full announcement here.

I can’t find a shot of the FW31 taken from the same angle as the Ferrari, Toyota and McLaren photos I’ve posted, which is annoying because I was going for the ‘comparison’ thing. Thankfully F1Fanatic.co.uk has done a much better job of the side-by-side comparisons!

As a fan of Williams I am slightly concerned that on the face of it this looks like an enhanced 2008 car with new-style wings, whereas the likes of McLaren and Ferrari seem to be developing in a new direction with ultra-tightly packaged rear ends. This car isn’t so tightly packaged. It is much more so than their ’08 car, but not to the extent of the leading teams. I wonder if this is a result of Williams locking their ’08 car and switching to the ’09 car early on.

The one thing I believe Williams as as an advantage is its KERS system, as the team are believed to be the only one using a mechanically-based flywheel system. This is said to already be capable of exceeding the levels allowed in the regulations. Other teams are developing chemical systems which are more expensive, heavier and with a lower potential development limit. F1 teams are not chemists, after all. There is also the matter of disposing of the batteries and flying them around the world.

Williams say they may not run KERS until the aero and tyre development is more complete, as these are each worth seconds of lap time – KERS is only worth a few tenths of seconds. It is the pragmatic approach but I wonder if it wouldn’t be better to hit the ground running and have that few tenths anyway…