Follow the race on Twitter

I have previously been doing updates on my Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/FormulaOneUpdate, but ever since Timeline was introduced some time ago, the updates I posted there clogged up everyone´s timelines as well.

So instead I have chosen to separate articles and race updates. Articles will continue to appear here, on Facebook and on Twitter, but the race updates will only be on Twitter from today and onwards. To follow me during the race, simply log on to Twitter and seach for @jakethedane.

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Have a good race.

Bernie Ecclestones excuses about Force India are nonsense

Force India opted not to participate in the second practice session on Friday, saying they much rather preferred to be able to leave the track while it was still daylight. As a result, FOM, the company in charge of broadcasting the event, controlled by Bernie Ecclestone, somehow ‘forgot’ to show any live footage of the two Force India cars, arousing suspicions that there is a lot more to it.

Ok, so besides the fact that Force India said they wanted to leave the track earlier on Friday to be able to get back to the hotel in daylight, which is understandable, I fail to see the logic behind the move, since the team left the track 2 hours after the second practice session was over. I was searching for answers to this conumdrum, but came up short. Force India issued a statement, just before they decided to pull out, in which deputy team principal Bob Fernley said:

“We’re going to limit it. We are looking at it from the point of view of the well being of everybody, and the comfort of everybody is in place, and that’s the key objective for us.

“But the team is absolutely fully committed to racing here. We will be there for qualifying and the race. We’re just going to look at the programme of what we’re going to do now. It’s possible we may not run at all, or just do half a session or whatever it is.”

Right, so it´s a safety issue. Not a problem, and everyone seems to be fully aware of the decision. It´s all good then, right? Not quite. What we know is that Force India pulled out entirely from FP2 on the grounds of safety issues, but when the team was participating in the qualifying round on Saturday, not a single TV frame was shown of Force India. The only glimpse came when Mark Webber´s on-board camera showed the Aussie driver driving past Paul di Resta.

Since then Bernie Ecclestone has been looking into his little book of excuses, unfortunately he has picked the book of bad excuses to bring this weekend.

Bernie said:

“I was busy and didn’t notice Force India were not on. I will look into it. It could be technical, but I suspect it was more to do with the Bahrain laws on no alcohol advertising. They have a whisky company prominently on the car. They should have taken it off. TV could not show that.”

“Our people were more or less concentrating on who was going to be on pole, rather than somebody going to be 10th. Nobody cares if someone is ninth or 11th. Only the people who are watching a particular team. None of the other teams seem to have a problem.”

Let´s dissect this: According to Bernie no one wants to see some cars drive around in 10th place. Of course, other than the many fans of the teams, the sponsors paying a huge amount of money and the team itself. Bernie also says that ‘our people was more or less concentrating on who was going to be on pole ‘. Here he is basically saying that ‘our people’ are the TV crews. The feed is owned by FOM, controlled entirely by Bernie Ecclestone. He decides what goes out, ie. he made the decision, so to say he has no control of it, is nonsense.

Bernie also said: “For those asking, we have no control over who is being shown on the world feed, sorry you didn’t get to see any of Di Resta’s lap.”

That is a blatant lie. Sure he too must conform to rules by the government, and if they say you cannot show alcohol ads on the cars, then of course. But to say that they have no control over it, is nonsense. Bernie owns the right to broadcast the event, and he decides what goes out. Especially if you look at the next paragraph.

The other part of the bad excuse, is that Force India ran with prominent alcohol advertisements on the car, and that they should have taken those off, because of the alcohol laws in Bahrain. But Bernie fails to notice that in 2010, the last time we had a race in Bahrain, Force India drove arund the circuit, and was shown on TV a lot, with plenty of alcohol commercials on their cars. I present exhibit A:

Whyte & Mackay is a huge sponsor of the team, but one of the explanations to the black out by the TV crew, is that every team has to have their liveries approved in countries with restrictions, and apparently the pictures shown in the first practice session, depicting alcohol advertisements, was too much. That is the reason, some says. However, a team insider has said, that “everyone knows what happened. Bernie is giving Force India a slap on the wrist for missing Friday’s second practice session.”

 

 

Schumacher penalised five places

Michael Schumacher will drop another five places on the grid for the race in Bahrain, the Mercedes team confirmed on Sunday morning.

After a poor qualifying session for the former seven time world champion, who ran into trouble with the Mercedes Super DRS system and had to settle for 18th on the grid, after being bumped out of Q1 by Heikki Kovalainen, Schumacher will now drop a further five places down the grid because of a gearbox change.

Initially, Schumacher received a place up, since Williams´ Pastor Maldonado, who qualified 17th also changed his gearbox, but unfortunately we will see Michael Schumacher start from almost the back of the grid, at 22nd.

Schumacher disappointed with 18th

Mercedes´ Michael Schumacher is disappointed after only being able to secure 18th on the grid for tomorrow´s race at the Sakhir Circuit in Bahrain.

Schumacher will receive a little help, as Pastor Maldonado is dropped five places because of a gearbox change, so the German starts from 17th instead. Schumacher ran into trouble with his DRS system, which stopped working during qualifying, sending Schumacher into the pits, where he could only watch as he dropped through the field. But the strength of the brilliant W-duct system, also referred to as the Super DRS, is also a weakness. Mercedes is so reliant on the system, that when it´s not working, the result is disappointing.

“I am obviously very disappointed to have qualified in 18th position on the grid for a race which looks to be quite competitive for us,” said Schumacher. “Unfortunately on my fast lap, which was looking quite good, my DRS broke in the last sector. We tried to fix it in the garage but were not able to go out again.

“Trying for a lap without DRS on different tyres would not have made sense. We now have to try to see what we can do from here and push as much as possible.”

 

Vergne reprimanded

Toro Rosso´s Jean-Eric Vergne was reprimanded after the qualifying session on Saturday in bahrain, as he missed the weighbridge.

Vergne was knocked out of Q1, and will start tomorrow´s race in 19th place, but as he entered the pitlane after his qualifying stint, he did not see the officials waving him down to enter the weighbridge. Vergne was facing a grid penalty, but because his mechanics realised the error quickly, he escaped with a warning.

 

Jean Todt comments on Bahrain

FIA President Jean Todt has spoken about the situation in Bahrain, saying he does not believe the critical media coverage will damage the image of F1.

Talking to Autosport on Saturday. Todt said he was ‘saddened’ to read the many reports form some media, about what was going on in the desert kingdom.

“I am sorry about what has been reported,” he said. “I am not sure that all that has been reported corresponds to the reality of what is happening in this country.

“I feel F1 is very strong. I think it is a very strong brand, and I think all the people among the teams to whom I have been speaking are very happy. I was even told it would have been a mistake not to come. Again, you speak to those people. That is what I have been told by most of the team principals here.

“Unfortunately I did not see so many of those quotes in the media. But I respect the media, I respect what they write, but it is not what I have seen and what I was told by a lot of people to whom I have been talking.”

Todt talked about how he did not receive all the details concerning the death of a protester during the clashes between a large group pf protesters and police on Friday evening, and that he could therefor not be commenting on that issue.

“I cannot comment on something where I do not have all the details, and I do not have all the details. So it would be completely [wrong] on my side.

“In any democratic country, protests are allowed. It allows people who want to protest to give their voice – and it happens all over the world. There are some protests in our county where we live, and sometimes we don’t feel comfortable to go – because there can be some protests.

“What I have seen so far, is a good security control on the roads. And you know, very often, protest does mean damaging and hurting people – it is one possibility of expressing yourself.

“What is important is to be accurate and to assess properly what is happening. Yesterday, if you look at the media, some are talking about 4,000 people [at the protest], some had 10,000 people. So again, what I was told. I was not there, I did not count the people and I was told by official sources that it was 4,000 people protesting quite quietly, and only three people were slightly hurt out of that. And that is something you can avoid.”

Todt ends the interview by saying that these events can, will and is happening everywhere, where large groups of people are gathering.

“If you go to any football field, if you have a protest you will have a minimum of three people who can be hurt. I don’t want to take any kind of example – but it has happened in Britain, in Germany, in France, all over the world. It is something that can happen, but it does not mean we have to stop sport moving along.

“When you talk to people about the sport, they are very happy and very excited about what is happening. Again talking to people who facilitate that – the marshals: they are delighted and very happy. And for me it is a very good message from the sport.”

Vettel takes stunning first pole of the season

Sebastian Vettel took everyone by surprise, by stealing the coveted pole position away from Lewis Hamilton, at the Sakhir Circuit in Bahrain.

After a lacklustre start to the season, and expectations extremely high to see if the youngest double world champion could dominate 2012 as he did last year, Red Bull did not have the cars they needed to defend their positions in the first three races. But hard work and an incredible run from Sebastian Vettel in the dying seconds of the qualifying session on Saturday, means that the German takes his 32nd pole of his career, and he is now par with Nigel Mansell´s fifth place in the all-time pole takers.

Vettel set a final time of 1:32.422, which were a tenth faster than Hamilton´s best time of 1:32.520. Webber in third with 1:32.637 and Button in fourth with 1:32.711.

Nico Rosberg managed fifth today, with 1:32.821, and Daniel Ricciardo impressed us with sixth place and a time of 1:32.912. Romain Grosjean is showing us he has the talent in 7th place, ahead of Sergio Perez, Fernando Alonso and Paul di Resta in the final three places.

Kimi Raikkonen did 11th, ahead of Kamui Kobayashi, Nico Hulkenberg, Felipe Massa and Bruno Senna. Heikki Kovalainen is 16th, Pastor Maldonado 17th. Michael Schumacher shocked everyone as he was pushed out of Q1 by Kovalainen, and he starts 18th tomorrow. Jean-Eric Vergne is behind Schumacher, Petrov, Pic, de la Rosa, Glock and Karthikeyan.

Over at Force India a simmering controversy started about halfway through the qualifying session. For the entire session, not a single TV shot was filmed or shown on the official feed, depicting the Force India team, and one could suspect….oh, let´s just say what´s going on: Since Force India pulled out of the second free practice session yesterday, Bernie Ecclestone´s FOM has decided not to show ANY footage of the cars, drivers, team garage or anyting related to Force India. If this continues into the race, we don´t know at the moment, but it´s all the rage on Twitter. Force India is simply being showed what will happen if you play with Bernie. The reaction from Bernie Ecclestone is, of course, extremely childish and shows a man who has lost the last bit of self-respect and clearly has no grasp on things anymore.

Shock as Schumacher is out of Q1

Michael Schumacher was bumped out of Q1, after a brilliant performance from Heikki Kovalainen in the final stages of the first qualifying round in Bahrain.

Mercedes has just comfirmed that there were technical issues with the Mercedes of Michael Schumacher, as team mate Nico Rosberg, who won the Chinese GP last week, finished tenth. Schumacher has confirmed that he encountered a problem with the DRS system.