35-year after winning the Le Mans 24 hour race with the 2 litre turbo V6 Renault Alpine A442, Renault's Alpine brand is returning to Le Mans 24 hour race with a brand new LMP2 car. Its LMP2 contender that will contest the 24 Hours of Le Mans and European Le Mans Series this season. It will be called the Alpine N36.
The Alpine N36 was unveiled during at an event in Paris last week, the Signatech team will race under the Alpine brand, it will use the Nissan-powered 4.5 litre V8, it will also use a re-branded Oreca 03 chassis despite it is not a fully Alpine chassis, Michelin tyres, the Alpine-Oreca will be raced by Nelson Panciatici, Pierre Ragues and Tristan Gommendy for the re-branded team this season. The Alpine-Oreca-Nissan will make its race debut in next month's Three Hours of Silverstone, the season-opener for the European Le Mans Series.
Fernando Alonso (DNF, Alonso clipped his front wing on the back of Sebastian Vettel's Red Bull on the first lap. But on lap 2, the front wing broke off and sent Alonso off the circuit at turn 1. Despite, it his 200th Grand Prix in F1)
Jenson Button (DNF, lost wheel nut in the pits which included a DNF with a Wheel problem)
Pastor Maldonado (DNF, KERS failure)
Daniel Ricciardo (DNF, Exhaust)
Force India (Paul di Resta, DNF wheel nut; Adrian Sutil, DNF wheel nut)
Overall, the race was an OK race to watch. Until twelve laps to the end, we all thought that Mark Webber going to win after the pit-stops are finished. Unless your name is Sebastian Vettel that is. Sebastian Vettel took the lead to win this seasons Malaysian Grand Prix and his first win of the season. But after the race, that wasn't the case, there was team orders to let Mark Webber win the race from the last twenty laps telling both drivers to turn down the engines.
So was Sebastian Vettel greedy, disobeying orders or ruthless. My opinion he was disobeying orders which he said sorry afterwards but mainly ruthless. I am not defending Vettel's actions, but this is ruthless, similar ruthless if you see with Michael Schumacher winning races and world championships in the past and also similar to Ayrton Senna's ruthless to win races and championships as-well.
Also, he was looking at yesterday's results, DNF for both Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton only managing third place. And last weeks race winner Kimi Raikkonen only getting seventh place in the race when we all think he be in the top three once more. And now Sebastian Vettel leads the drivers championship, for now that is.
But, what I didn't notice until I re-watched the highlights on the BBC on Sunday Afternoon that Vettel was on the medium tyres on his last stint. While, Webber was on the hard compound on his last stint, which was around 0.6s per lap slower than Vettel. I would question why Red Bull did that strategy, if the team were in place to do the team orders, why not give both drivers the same medium/hard compound tyre's because I doubt that Lewis Hamilton would have finish no higher than third place, due to he was saving fuel at the end of the race.
As for Mark Webber, I can't blame him for throwing his toys out of the pram at this moment of time. I would have done the same as him if I was in that same position. I wouldn't be surprise either if he quits the team after this and we see a new driver at Red Bull at the next race at Shanghai. But, I doubt it it's more than possible it's his last season at Red Bull. A possibility of musical chairs at Red Bull, Ferrari, Lotus and Mercedes next season is very possible in my opinion. Possibly at Ferrari for 2014 teaming up with Fernando Alonso.
To finish off with a lighter note, despite he finished third (from a little team orders from Ross Brawn) at last weeks Malaysian Grand Prix. Lewis Hamilton forgot which team garage to pit in for his first pit stop.
Despite the DeltaWing had a bad weekend at last weeks 12 hours of Sebring, only managing nine laps until an engine below up. Despite that, last week the DeltaWing team have showed off the coupe version of the DeltaWing experimental racer.
The coupe will be built around a tailor made monocoque developed at Panoz's Elan Motorsports Technologies facility that will replace the old Aston Martin AMR-One tub of the original car. The coupe DeltaWing will keep the Mazda 1.9 lite in-line four turbo which will be producing 345 brake horsepower and 350 pound-feet of torque. Also, it will stay on Bridgestone tyres as-well.
In my opinion I always like the original DeltaWing as a race car since it raced at La Mans last year. I do like the coupe version from the images we've seen, looks like the Batmobile from the early 1990s in the Tim Burton Batman films. But, the only thing I hate about it is the livery, if it was last years livery it would have worked better.
The coupe version will possibly have a race debut for round three of the ALMS at Laguna Seca in May. Personally, good luck to the DeltaWing team for this season coupe or old car, like I said in a pervious post.
During last weeks Australian Grand Prix weekend. There was a speed comparison on the Albert Park race track between a Mercedes AMG SL63 driven by five time 500cc champion Mick Doohan, a V8 Supercar spec Holden VF Commodore driven by double MotoGP champion Casey Stoner and a 2011 Red Bull RB7 driven by former Williams, McLaren and Red Bull driver David Coulthard.
The facts: Mick Doohan's Mercedes AMG SL63 has a 6 litre twin turbo V12 producing 621 bhp. While, Casey Stoner's Holden VF Commodore race car has a 5.0 litre V8 producing around 600 bhp. And David Coulthard's Red Bull RB7 has a Renault 2.4 litre V8 producing around 750 bhp. Who gonna win the race around one lap at Albert Park?
Review of the first round of the 2013 12 Hours of Sebring for the American Le Mans Series. The Audi Sport Team Joest team won the race overall and P1 class too. With the drivers of Marcel Fässler, Benoît Tréluyer and Oliver Jarvis giving the Audi R18 e-tron quattro its first win of the 2013 season. Menawhile, the other Audi Sport Team Joest team of Allan McNish, Tom Kristensen and Lucas di Grassi finished second place in their Audi R18 e-tron quattro to make an Audi one-two and possibly their last win at the 12 hours of Sebring (Both ALMS and Rolex Sports Car Series are merging next season, which means no P1/LMP1 class). While, the Rebellion Racing team of Nick Heidfeld, Neel Jani and Nicolas Prost took third place in their Lola B12/60-Toyota 3.4l V8.
Meanwhile, the DeltaWing team had a race to forget. Retired with an engine failure within the first nine laps, not a good weekend for the DeltaWing team to remember.
In P2 class, the Level 5 Motorsports team of Scott Tucker, Marino Franchitti and Ryan Briscoe in their OrecaHPD ARX-03b with a Honda HR28TT 2.8 L Turbo V6 won in P2 class and 6th overall. Meanwhile in PC class, PR1 Mathiesen Motorsports team of David Cheng, Mike Guasch and David Ostella won the class and finished 9th overall. While in GT class, was won by Corvette Racing of Oliver Gavin, Tommy Milner and Richard Westbrook won in their Chevrolet Corvette C6.R, finished 15th overall as-well. While in GTC class, was won by Alex Job Racing team of Cooper MacNeil, Jeroen Bleekemolen and Dion von Moltke in their Porsche 997 GT3 Cup car and finished 24th overall.
Overall, I thought it was very good race to watch, seven differnt race leaders in the race (Alonso, Vettel, Räikkönen, Sutil, Massa, Hamilton and Rosberg). It was going to be either Kimi Räikkönen, Fernando Alonso and Sebastian Vettel for the win with 20 laps to go, until Kimi Räikkönen step up and took the win on a cleaver two-stop strategy ahead of Alonso and Vettel to win this seasons Australian Grand Prix and Kimi's 20th race win in Formula 1 as-well.
So this weekends Malaysia Grand Prix at Sepang outside of Kuala Lumpur. Predictions for the race, Fernando Alonso win in the Ferrari, Sebastian Vettel second in the Red Bull and Filipe Massa 3rd in the other Ferrari. Don't forget Mark Webber, McLaren drivers, Mercedes drivers or the Lotus drivers as well for a podium place.
There will be five drivers will make their Formula 1 debut in 2013 starting at this weekends Austrian Grand Prix, as follows Esteban Gutiérrez at Sauber, Valtteri Bottas at Williams, both Max Chilton and Jules Bianchi at Marussia and Giedo van der Garde at Caterham. This post will be a top six Formula 1 debut/rookie seasons since the year 2000, starting with at number six:
Number 6: Mark Webber, 2002 Story: Got the Minardi (nowadays Toro Rosso in 2013) drive for the 2002 season. In his first grand prix at his home grand prix the Australian Grand Prix, took an underpowered Minardi to fifth place after a first lap crash that took nine F1 drivers out . Which took Mark Webber to sixteenth in the drivers standings and took Minardi to ninth in the constructors standings ahead of all-mighty Toyota that season.
Number 5: Kimi Raikkonen, 2001 Story: Only had 23 car races to his credit before his career in F1. Kimi Raikkonen was the surprise choice for driving for Sauber in 2001. Took a point in his first race at the Australian Grand Prix. Best results that season was taking two forth place finishes at the Austrian Grand Prix and the Canadian Grand Prix. Which took him to tenth place in the drivers standings that season and took 10 points that season and a McLaren drive for the 2002 season as-well replacing Mika Hakkinen.
Number 4: Juan Paulo Montoya, 2001 Story: Very unreliable Williams car for the former Champ Car champion for his debut. When the car was reliable he was impressive, should have won the Brazilian Grand Prix that season only for Jos Verstappen crashing into him. Took three pole positions' that season and a race win at the 2001 Italian Grand Prix. took 31 points that year and sixth in the drivers standing as-well.
Number 3: Fernanado Alonso, 2001 Story: Despite taking no points that season, Fernando Alonso was very impressive that season. In a very underpowered Minardi that season, Alonso was the third-youngest driver ever to start a Formula 1 race when he made his debut for Minardi. Best result was a tenth place finish at the German Grand Rix that season. Also, at the final round of the season at Suzuka he finished in eleventh place, ahead of likes of Heinz-Harald Frentzen in the Prost, the BAR of Olivier Panis, the two Arrows and his team-mate Alex Yoong, even Minardi team manager Paul Stoddart, described his race as "53 laps of qualifying". Now that's an impressive season with the worse car on the grid that season.
Number 2: Jenson Button, 2000 Story: Got the Williams drive, despite only having only two season before that in Formula Ford and Formula Three. Almost score a point before his engine failed 11 laps from the finish on his debut race at the Australian Grnad Prix. Meanwhile a sixth-place finish at the next race in Brazil made him, at the time, the youngest driver ever to score a point. Best finish was at the German Grand Prix finishing in forth place. Took 12 points that season to finish in eighth in drivers' standings for that season.
Number 1: Lewis Hamilton, 2007 Story: His rookie season was at McLaren in 2007 teaming up with double world champion Fernando Alonso that season. He almost won the Drivers' World Championship despite only one DNF that season, only losing the championship by a single point to Kimi Raikkonen. Scoring 109 points, second in the drivers' standings, six pole positions and four race wins in that season.
