Singapore swing hands Vettel the initiative

Lewis Hamilton cut a remarkably phlegmatic figure after the Singapore Grand Prix, considering his retirement from what seemed a victory for the taking left his championship hopes in tatters.

The McLaren driver said all the right things after the race about not giving up, but the sad reality is that he is 52 points behind Ferrari's Fernando Alonso with only 150 still available.

To expect Hamilton to be able to make up more than a third of the points still remaining on a man who is driving one of the best seasons in Formula 1 history is ambitious in the extreme, although it's certainly going to be entertaining watching him try.

Hamilton's performance in Singapore confirmed two things about this season - McLaren are the team to beat with the consistently fastest car and the 2008 world champion is driving superlatively well.

Lewis Hamilton

A gear box failure caused McLaren driver Lewis Hamilton to retire from the Singapore Grand Prix. Photo: Getty 

His pole lap on Saturday was a sight to behold, all controlled aggression and commitment, brushing the walls, judging the balance between risk and reward to perfection to leave his rivals breathless.

Until that point, Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel had appeared to be evenly matched with Hamilton but when it mattered the German found his car's grip had mysteriously disappeared. Hamilton found plenty, though, to go more than half a second clear of anyone else.

It was, as McLaren sporting director Sam Michael put it, a "fantastic" lap and he followed it with a controlled performance in the race, taking only as much as he needed to out of the car and tyres, confident that he had pace in reserve if Vettel upped his pace behind him.

But then the oil started leaking out of his differential, he lost his seamless gearshifts, then third gear and finally all his gears, and he sadly coasted to a halt at Turn Five with more than half the race still remaining.

It was the latest in a series of disappointments for Hamilton this year, without which he would be right up with Alonso in the championship.

For nearly all of them he has been blameless. Only in his collision with Pastor Maldonado in Valencia could you perhaps lay any small fault at his door - of course the Williams man drove into him, but ex-drivers, including Ivan Capelli, have questioned whether Hamilton might have been wiser in the circumstances to leave him a bit more space.

Despite the series of McLaren-related incidents that have cost him his best chance of the title since 2008, Hamilton's mood upon getting back to the paddock was notably different from his subdued bearing after taking pole and victory in Italy two weeks ago.

In Monza, he was downbeat, almost monosyllabic, despite his crushing performance. Here, the speed was the same, but the disposition far sunnier.

It remains to be seen whether that was to do with him making up his mind about his future one way or the other.

But it would take a brave man who gave up the pace of the McLaren for the uncertain and unimpressive form of Mercedes, whatever the difference in remuneration, real or potential, there may be between the offers.

"I think it would have been a nice result for us but we still have more races to go," he said.

"We really couldn't afford today but it is what it is. The good thing is we have good pace. I have to go and win the next races."

On his and McLaren's current form, he could easily win all of them, but if the season continues in its topsy-turvy way, with wins shared about, it is difficult to see him making up so many points on Alonso.

Vettel, though, is a different matter. The low-downforce circuits of Spa and Monza behind them, the Red Bull is likely to be competitive everywhere.

Even if it is not as strong as the McLaren, it is certainly consistently quicker than the Ferrari and in that context a 29-point deficit following the victory he inherited from Hamilton in Singapore is eminently bridgeable.

As Red Bull team boss Christian Horner pointed out, Vettel "was 25 points down with two races to go in 2010, which indicates anything is possible for all the drivers. We need to keep taking points off Fernando, which ideally means getting a few more cars between us and him."

And there's the rub.

Alonso has not won since Germany in July. A potential win escaped him in Italy two weeks ago because of a mechanical problem in qualifying, but Ferrari's poor performance in Singapore, when he had been expecting to fight for pole and victory, was a wake-up call.

On the form of this weekend, Alonso does not look likely to win in normal circumstances unless Ferrari can bring some more speed to the car.

But what he does keep doing is finishing in the points.
In the 10 races since the Spanish Grand Prix in May, Alonso has retired only once - after being hit by the flying Lotus of Romain Grosjean in Belgium three weeks ago. Of the nine he has finished, seven of them resulted in a podium - including two wins - and the other two fifth places.

No-one else has consistency anything like that, and it is in that consistency that lies his best hope.

The concern for Alonso is that if both McLarens and Vettel finish races, those podiums will be hard to come by, and in those circumstances that gap would come down quickly indeed.

So well has he been driving this year that Alonso has to still be considered a narrow favourite for the title.

But while McLaren's weaknesses have made the championship a long-shot even for Hamilton, as Alonso leaves Singapore, he will be casting worried glances over his shoulder at Vettel.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/09/in_singapore_lewis_hamilton_cu.html

Joachim Winkelhock Manfred Winkelhock Markus Winkelhock Reine Wisell Roelof Wunderink

2012 F1 season statistics part two: Stats and facts | 2012 F1 season review

2012 F1 season statistics part two: Stats and facts is an original article from F1 Fanatic. If this article has been published anywhere other than F1 Fanatic it is an infringement of copyright.

Rounding off our look at 2012 in statistics, here are the most significant stats and facts from the season.

2012 F1 season statistics part two: Stats and facts is an original article from F1 Fanatic. If this article has been published anywhere other than F1 Fanatic it is an infringement of copyright.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/f1fanatic/~3/Gkn8l5sFtaI/

Danny Sullivan Marc Surer John Surtees Andy Sutcliffe Adrian Sutil

Hamilton's tough decision

Since BBC Sport chief analyst Eddie Jordan reported on this website last week that Lewis Hamilton was on the verge of switching to Mercedes from McLaren next year, Formula 1 has been awash with speculation about the 2008 world champion's future.

McLaren did their best at last weekend's Italian Grand Prix to dismiss the story - team boss Martin Whitmarsh even joked: "Any sentence that begins, 'Eddie Jordan understands' is immediately questionable, isn't it?"

But it was noticeable that not only did McLaren not deny the story was true, they said very little to suggest Hamilton was staying with them.

From Whitmarsh, it was: "Lewis and his management have made their position clear to us", "my understanding is we're talking to him" and "I'm pretty convinced we will have a very good, competitive driving line-up next year."

None of which translates as "Hamilton is staying".

From second left - Lewis Hamilton, Martin Whitmarsh, Jenson Button

Hamilton was triumphant at Monza, but how many more races will he win with McLaren? Photo: Getty

As for the doubts cast on the veracity of the story, the source is strong and credible, and the core information - that Hamilton has agreed terms on a contract with Mercedes for next year - is based in fact.

That does not necessarily mean Hamilton will move but it does mean he is thinking about it seriously. And you can make what you will of his downbeat behaviour throughout the Monza weekend - even after he won the race.

In the paddock, the general view was that a move would be a mistake - but it is a much more complicated decision than that.

Firstly, McLaren have undoubtedly been more competitive than Mercedes in the last three years. Between them, Hamilton and team-mate Jenson Button have won 16 races since the start of 2010; Mercedes only one, with Nico Rosberg in China this season.

Over an extended period, McLaren have a winning pedigree beyond that of any other team. Only Ferrari have won more grands prix, and they have been in F1 for 16 years longer.

Hamilton, who has been nurtured by the team since he was 13, says: "I want to win." On pure performance, there's only one choice, right?

In F1, things are rarely that simple.

Yes, McLaren usually have a good car, but until this year it had been a long time since they had unquestionably the best.

It was close with Ferrari in 2007-8, although hindsight would suggest now that the McLaren was probably not quite as good then. In which case, you probably have to go back to 2005 to find the last time McLaren had conclusively the fastest car in F1.

This is known to have irked Hamilton in 2010-11, and played some part in the cocktail of issues that led to his difficult season last year, when his frustration at the car's inability to compete for the title and problems with his family and his girlfriend led to what he admitted was his worst season in the sport.

That all changed this season. The McLaren is again setting the pace. But a series of operational problems in the opening races badly affected Hamilton, costing him 40 points. Add those points to his current total and he would be leading Ferrari's Fernando Alonso, not trailing him by a win and a fourth place.

Hamilton has done well to disguise his disappointment publicly, but it was around this time that his management started approaching McLaren's rivals about job opportunities.

On top of that, McLaren are entering an uncertain period. For the first time next year, they will have to pay for their Mercedes engines - that's in the region of eight million euros they cannot spend on the performance of the car unless they find it from other sources.

Tied in with this is the question of salary. McLaren have made it clear they cannot afford Hamilton at any price. The word is they have offered him a cut in money for next season, on the basis that they cannot afford anything more. This might be offset by other compromises, such as over PR appearances, flights and so on.

Already on about half of what Alonso earns at Ferrari, one can imagine how that has gone down with Hamilton - especially as McLaren's portfolio of sponsors makes it very difficult for a driver to do personal deals elsewhere to top up his earnings. That's because almost anywhere he looks there's a clash with a company that has links with McLaren.

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Meanwhile, Mercedes are by definition a "works" team with factory engines, have the might of an automotive giant behind them. They can pay Hamilton a lot more than his current salary - believed to be about £13m - if they want to. And at Mercedes there is also a lot more freedom for a driver to do personal sponsorship deals.

The funding for Mercedes' F1 team comes entirely from external sponsors - and the budget is reputedly significantly less than enjoyed by Red Bull and Ferrari. But it is underwritten by the parent company so even if there is a sponsorship shortfall it doesn't affect the team.

Performance-wise, the team that is now Mercedes actually won the world title more recently than McLaren, when they were Brawn in 2009. Ironically, the man who won it was Button. His success - and what he interpreted as the team's ambivalence about him staying - led to him moving to McLaren.

Admittedly, Brawn's success in 2009 was tainted by the row over double-diffusers that clouded that season. Once everyone had them, the car was no longer as competitive as it had been.

Mercedes have certainly been under-performing since then, but that can at least partly be explained by the fact that Brawn, facing serious financial problems, slashed their staff by 40% in 2009. As Mercedes, they have been slowly building levels up again.

The pressure on the team to up their game is massive - hence the huge investment in terms of staffing and resources in the last 18 months or so.

And while they are a long way behind McLaren this season, they are on an upward trend, even if it is significantly slower than either the team or the Mercedes board would like.

Equally, few in F1 would disagree that Hamilton is one of the three best drivers in the world, alongside Alonso and Sebastian Vettel. Mercedes don't have any of them.

It's impossible to know how much faster the car would go in their hands than it has done so far in those of Rosberg and Michael Schumacher. Some might argue not at all. But, that's not how Hamilton, who raced and beat Rosberg in their formative years, will look at it.

Add all that up, and the decision doesn't seem so easy after all.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2012/09/hamiltons_tough_decision.html

Jo Schlesser Bernd Schneider Rudolf Schoeller Rob Schroeder Michael Schumacher

Production Version Porsche 918 Spyder Revealed in Chinese Patents


Until now, we have seen lots of images of the upcoming Porsche 918 Spyder, but all of them were images of the prototype versions. Today, however, the first leaked images of the production version have dripped their way on the internet via the leak-happy Chinese patent office.

As no surprise, the production version looks pretty similar to the concept versions, but it has finally received its door handles, mirrors, indicator lights, seat belts, a slightly different front bumper and redesigned air intakes in the front bumper. Also, the exhaust pipes are now placed in the right position and not on the car?s side as in the concept versions.

Under the hood, the 918 Spyder will combine a 4.6-liter V-8 engine delivering a total of 570 horsepower with an electric motor that adds an extra 200 horsepower.

The production version will debut in September 2013 and will be priced at about $1 million.

Production Version Porsche 918 Spyder Revealed in Chinese Patents originally appeared on topspeed.com on Wednesday, 26 December 2012 17:00 EST.

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Source: http://www.topspeed.com/cars/car-news/production-version-porsche-918-spyder-revealed-in-chinese-patents-ar141031.html

Otto Stuppacher Danny Sullivan Marc Surer John Surtees Andy Sutcliffe

Report: Next C63 AMG to get Smaller, Modular V-8 Engine

1. 1.

The current Mercedes C63 AMG is powered by a 6.2-liter V-8 engine that produces 457 horsepower. Things will change significantly for the next-generation sports sedan, as Mercedes is planning to drop the current 6.2-liter engine in favor of a smaller, turbocharged 4.0-liter V-8 powerplant, which is set to also see use in the upcoming SLC supercar.

The new AMG-built V-8 engine will share the same cylinder capacity, bore center spacing and other specific details with the upcoming turbocharged 2.0-litre four-cylinder engine set to be used in the upcoming A45 AMG. This sharing of specifications allows this engine to carry a modular format, which can help save money too.

In its standard version the new 4.0-liter V-8 engine will deliver about 450 horsepower, but it could go as high as 600 horsepower in its high-output format. The latter of the two engines is rumored to replace the non-turbocharged 5.5-liter unit that Benz uses in the SLK55 AMG.

AMG boss Ola Kallenius all but confirmed the 4.0-liter powerplant at the recently closed L.A. Auto Show, but made sure not to let the cat completely out of the bag. We definitely got a glimpse of its paw though.

Report: Next C63 AMG to get Smaller, Modular V-8 Engine originally appeared on topspeed.com on Wednesday, 26 December 2012 11:00 EST.

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Source: http://www.topspeed.com/cars/car-news/report-next-c63-amg-to-get-smaller-modular-v-8-engine-ar140991.html

Frank Gardner Billy Garrett Jo Gartner Tony Gaze Geki

Nielsen leaving Caterham

It is not a good news for Caterham that its sporting director Steve Nielsen is leaving after just one year in the job. Nielsen joined the team from Renault but it seems that there has been an offer from another team. The fact that he has decided to accept it suggests that things were not [...]

Source: http://joesaward.wordpress.com/2012/12/19/nielsen-leaving-caterham/

Shinji Nakano Duke Nalon Alessandro Nannini Emanuele Naspetti Massimo Natili