Anarchy in F1?

A secret meeting of the team bosses, negotiations taking place in the dark reaches of un-disclosed locations and plenty of cloak and dagger to cover it up.Welcome the F1 in 2013.

So what is all this about then? Apparently several journalists have spotted Christian Horner, the Red Bull team boss, heading into the Ferrari factory recently, and rumours started to circulate immediately, that either he or Adrian Newey, the wizz behind the Red Bull car´s design success, was contemplating a move to Maranello. However, this is not the case.

A German journalist, Michael Schmidt, was also at the meeting and reported that Horner, Martin Whitmarsh, Niki Lauda and Bernie Ecclestone was having a talk with Ferrari supremo Luca Cordero di Montezemolo, regarding the 2013 Concorde Agreement, which has still not been signed by the FIA.

The only deal already signed is a financial package, which gives the teams 60% of the revenue for the season. Ferrari, McLaren, Red Bull and Mercedes receives a bigger slices than the rest of the teams. The FIA is yet to sign and the governing body is reportedly asking for $40m slice of the pie. But until then, the “processes for agreeing and enforcing rules are currently up in the air,” as one website said.

Ecclestone was heard mention, that he did not think it was necessary to sign the Concorde Agreement…

Preview of Ron Howard´s “Rush”

As many of you may know, Hollywood filmmaker Ron Howard is in the process of making a movie about James Hunt and Niki Lauda, called Rush.

In the preview below, Howard talks about the movie and what he hopes will be something that lives up to the expectations.

Have a peak:

Exclusive video: Re-creating Lauda´s fire scene in the movie “Rush”

Ron Howard’ s much anticipated movie “Rush”, about the rivalry between Niki Lauda and James Hunt.

The movie chronicles one of the most fierce rivalries in F1 history, and the Oscar-winning director (Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind), says that though he wasn´t a die-hard F1 fan, he is certainly converted.

“these are fascinating characters — ballsy, masculine guys. It was a very dangerous era in racing, and here are two absolute individuals at the height of their powers. It makes for great drama and very exciting action. I wasn’t a die-hard Formula One fan before I read Peter’s script, but I’ve been immersing myself in this world. I think the excitement I feel as a fresh convert may be infectious.”

Below you can see a video form Youtube. This is the part, where Niki Lauda has crashed and flames are engulfing the car, making any rescue attempt almost impossible.

Though this is meant to be a precise and accurate account of what happened in the 1976 season, I´d rather see the, alleged, meeting between James Hunt and the 33 stewardesses from BA, just before he won the race that made him champion. But that´s just me, I guess…

35 years ago, Lauda nearly died

The German Grand Prix is right around the corner. It is once again being hosted at Nürburgring, after Hockenheim held the event last year. 35 years ago the championship was as exciting as ever, as well-known names such as Lauda, Hunt, Scheckter, Mass, Regazzoni, Fittipaldi, Brambilla, Peterson, Amon and Reutemann took on the mighty Nordschleife.

In 1975, Niki Lauda was the first and only driver to break the 7-minute mark at the then 22.8 kilometre track, but since then the rules had changed – what else is new? The very high airboxes, see picture below, was banned, and it was a new game all over again. Before the race, Niki Lauda looked comfortably in the lead with 61 points, 31 more than second placed Jody Scheckter. Lauda won the championship the previous year in great style, as he took home 64.5 points to emerson Fittipaldi´s 45. But 1976 was about to become a whole different season.

A week prior to the event, Lauda had advocated to ban the race on safety issues, but the mayority of drivers voted against him, and the race went ahead.

James Hunt, the aristocratic-sounding, smooth-talking playboy, took pole in his McLaren-Ford – yes this was back when Ford was a mayor player – and Niki Lauda second for Ferrari. His team mate Clay Regazzoni qualified fifth, so the Ferrari´s looked to be very strong this weekend. Patrick Depailler third in the odd Tyrell P34, the only six-wheeled car to ever win a race and Hans-Joachim Stuck started fourth, Clay Regazzoni, Jacques Lafitte, Carlos Pace, Jody Scheckter, Jochen Mass and Carlos Reutemann.

All drivers bar one, Jochen Mass, started on wet tyres as the rain had started to engulf the massive circuit before the start. Mass had a huge amount of experience driving here, so he took a well-thought gammle and started on slicks. At the start, Regazzoni was flying past Lauda and Hunt and took the lead. Hunt settled in second place, while Lauda fell further back. Mass made a great start and was third.

Regazzoni spun on lap 1 and fell to fourth, but at the end of the lap the weather had changed from wet to dry, which of course played into the hands of Jochen Mass, who was on dry tyres. At the end of lap 1, most pilots pitted for dry tyres, except a few including Mass and Ronnie Peterson, who was now leading Mass. Peterson must have thought, that if Massa could benefit from dry tyres in the wet, then he could benefit from wet tyres in dry conditions.

On lap 2, Mass was leading the race ahead of another Swede, Gunnar Nilsson, who also stayed out, and Hunt in third. And then disaster.

Niki Lauda had pitted after the first lap, and it was clear he was battling hard to make up for lost time. The Ferrari 312T was very powerful, it was a 3000 cc engine with a V12, which gave the car around 510 bhp, but Lauda had lost too much time. Just before a fast left kink before the Bergwerk right-hand curve, the car snapped to the right suddenly and spun straight into a fence and hit an earth bank. It bounced back on track and caught on fire immediately. Guy Edwards, Hesketh-Ford and the man who replaced Hunt as he switched toMcLaren, avoided Lauda´s Ferrari, but both Harald Ertl and Brett Lunger smashed into the car. All three drivers stopped to try and get Lauda out of the burning wreck.

Inside the Ferrari, Lauda was fighting to stay alive. His lungs was filled with black and toxic smoke, his visibility was none and he could feel his skin sizzle, as the fire engulfed his face. Eventually Lauda was rescued out of the burning car, he was conscious and could stand by himself, but later went into a coma. He was flown by helicopter to a hospital with burn-victim facilities, at which he fought for his life for the next couple of days.

Lauda showed he was a survivor. The doctors insisted that he had reconstructive surgery to most of his face, his eye-lids had burned away, his right ear was hardly more than a crumpled up piece of skin, and most of his face showed burn marks. But Lauda said he only wanted to save his eyes, so the doctors made new eye-lids for him and that was it. The 1976 race was the last race ever at the old Nordschleife.

Six weeks later Lauda returned to racing, in what is without a doubt the most unbelievable and amazing comeback in racing history. James Hunt had closed the gap to Lauda, after winning the German Grand Prix, and three more wins for Hunt, in Holland, Canada and United States, meant that he was now just three points behind Lauda.

At the final race, Lauda withdrew from the race on lap 2, because he felt it was too dangerous to drive. James Hunt famously won the championship that year with one point ahead of Niki Lauda.

Niki Lauda had a difficult 1977 season, because the decision to withdraw from the Japanese GP did not go down well with Ferrari. He announced he was to leave Ferrari at the end of 1977, but took another title, this one much easier than his first. In 1978 he had signed with Brabham, but he struggled for two seasons and retired.

He concentrated on setting up his airline, Lauda Air, but needed money so in 1982 he convinced McLaren to sign him. He won two races that year, finished fifth, but 1983 was even worse. 8 retirements, 1 disqualification and only 12 points. He wanted a third championship, but it looked is if McLaren wa running out of patience.

Thankfully Mclaren had build a strong car, the MP4-2. Lauda retired in the first race, but won in South Africa, retired twice more, won i France, retired again only to win in Canada. Then two more retirements, until he finished the season with three wins and three second places, to claim his third and final title. After another year in Formula One, Niki Lauda retired for good.

The essence of racing

82 times the small principality of Monaco has hosted a grand prix. 82 times the streets have had celebrities, movie stars and music performers crowning the event. And 82 times, thousands of horsepowers will be released with a roar.

Every single year you can read on the internet and in magazines, that the time has come for the FIA to find somewhere else to have a glamour race. The streets are too narrow, the barriers are too close, the speed is too high. Excuses are plenty, but the reality is that there is no place which can replace Monaco. And why? Because Monaco is the essence of racing.

First of all, Monaco is silly. It is silly, admitted, to have a circuit on the calendar that makes it almost impossible to overtake the car in front, or when it rains, turns into a slippery slide, with cars falling off the track like model cars on a childs bedroom floor. Sure, it´s completely nonsense to even think about hosting the event in the first place, what with the safety standards of Formula One today.

Drivers are being covered in cotton, carried to the races by super-comfortable luxury jets, whisked away to their hotel by an air-conditioned limousine, have their luggage brought up by a bell-boy and all is accompanied by the clink of champagne glasses in the bars overlooking the harbour.Monaco is the place to be seen, and the event is not so much about the race anymore. Or is it?

It wasn´t always like this, you know. Back in the days, there were drivers who wanted to be part of the best drivers in the world so bad, they would live from hand to mouth to get in. One of those were three time champion Niki Lauda. Born into a wealthy family, the young rebel wanted to race, but that did not suit his parents. He started racing without their knowledge, but had no money to spend. he came up with an idea.

Lauda had a wonky plan: get the drive, drive fast enough to get noticed by the big teams, and get paid. Problem was, that he started driving a fantasticly slow March 721X. And his situation didn´t improve. For 1973 March wanted to retain him, without pay, but the team soon went belly-up. No money, no drive, Lauda was desperate. He agreed terms with BRM, based on air. He invented an investor, his Austrian bank-friend who didn´t speak English at all. “The money will come,” he said. And all the while he drove as fast as he could. He impressed the team so much, and convincingly lied enough, so they offered him a new contract. No pay, but he didn´t ned to bring money. After qualifying his car ahead of the Ferrari´s in Monaco, Enzo Ferrari called him to a meeting. And the rest is history, as they say. Well, not quite.

It shows that drivers then were willing to take a lot more risk, to put themselves first instead of relying on the team or the car. Sure, you need a good team, and a good car, but if you´re not fast enough, or enough of a player to convince everyone, then you´re out. Lauda´s story has little to do with Monaco, agreed, but the determination and grit he showed, is what the sport as a whole needs to survive longterm.

We have all heard of Ayrton Senna´s amazing drive in Monaco for Toleman. It´s even more amazing when you take into account, that the world could easily never have heard of Senna, if it wasn´t for his tenacity. He had just moved to England to pursue his dream and he won the Formula Ford 1600 championship, but money were sparse. And without money, there were no way he could make it into F1. Senna said that a bad driver with money, could always get a drive, but a good driver without a penny, was helpless. So he announced he was retiring from racing, moved back to Brazil and took up working in the family business.

He found the money to continue his career, and the next three years he dominated everything he entered. He attracted the attention of several teams, he even tested for them, but they didn´t have space for him. Only Toleman, a relative new team, signed him. He scored his maiden F1 point in his second race, and then it was time for Monaco.

Monaco GP 1962

He qualified an amazing 13th on the grid, and the race actually was postponed 45 monutes because there were so much water in Tunnel. Pole setter Alain Prost lead the way from the start. René Arnoux and Derek Warwick hot each other and both crashed into Patrick Tambay´s car. Both Warwick and Tambay suffered leg injuries. On lap 9,Nigel Mansell passed Prost for the lead and pulled away from the Frecnhman two seconds faster per lap.

Six laps later Mansell went off on the run up toasino Square and retired. Prost was back in the lead, but suddenly the rookie Ayrton Senna was second. Lap after lap, Senna ate huge chunks of Prost´s lead, the heavy rain was not only hammering down on the drivers, it was in every sense suicide to even drive. Every single lap there were cars sliding or going off, but Senna persisted.

29 laps into the race, the rain were relentless. Prost passed the start/finish and waved to the officials to stop the race. he signalled again on lap 30 and on lap 31, the officials took notice. At rhe end of lap 32, the race was stopped. At the same time, Senna passed Prost´s McLaren, and would have won the race. However, the rules stipulated that the positions counted are those from the last lap completed by every driver – lap 31 , at which point Prost was still leading. Incidentally, if the race had been completed, Prost would have got 6 points from his second place, instead of the 4.5 points awarded. Prost lost the championship to Lauda by half a point…

The circuit we know today is the fourth re-make of the classic track. The first re-design came in 1973. Tunnel were added, and a new section of track around the new Swimming Pool between Tabac and the a new corner called La Rascasse. In 1976 Nouvelle Chicane were added at Swimming Pool. Other changes has been made, but it still favours the driver, not the cars.

Setup of cars is highest fownforce settings possible, not to increase cornering speeds, but to shorten brake times and keep the cars stable during acceleration. Many of the corners are taken at such low speeds, the aerodynamic benefits are minimal, if any.

Monaco is, as I said in the beginning, a silly track and would never have been permitted ontothe calendar if it were to apply for it today. But if Silverstone is the heart of racing, Monaco is the brains. A smart and somewhat aggressive driver can win here. Fernando Alonso won here twice, so did Hamilton and Mark Webber and Juan Pablo Montoya won here in 2003. And until Ayrton Senna took six victories here, five of them consecutive between 1989 and 1993, Graham Hill were the King of Monaco with five wins.

So what is the attraction? The enormous yachts in the harbour? The models and the moviestars? The answer is of course, simple. It´s the reputation a driver gets from winning here. It´s all the hard work a driver and team has suffered in their effort to become the best on the planet, and taking a win in Monaco, is for some better than winning a championship. And we watch it, not to spot a celebrity, but because we like to think back to a time where drivers crashed and they fought tooth and nail to get ahead. We are watching because it´s the best spectacle all year. And we watch because Monaco is Monaco.

Monaco as a race event, is hopelessly old-fashioned, but just because of that,we can trace the bloodline back to the very beginning. back to a time where men were men, they took chances, they fought, really fought, and they all were the best drivers in the world. Sunday you can watch the best drivers in the world, perform an age-old ritual. Get it on.