F1 MID-SEASON REVIEW

INSIDELINEMEDIA

PLUS... ALL THE LATEST FROM FE TESTING

INDY GP REACTION

ULSTER GP NEWS

AND MORE!

In this debut issue, you can find our team-by-team F1 mid-season review, all the latest MotoGP news and an exclusive look into the FE paddock at testing!

WHAT’S IN THIS ISSUE?

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SCUDERIA TORO ROSSO2015 HUNGARIAN GRAND PRIX

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MARC MARQUEZ2015 MOTOGP INDY GPPICTURE FROM REPSOL HONDA

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GUY MARTIN2015 ULSTER GPPICTURE FROM ULSTERGRANDPRIX.NET

Earlier this year we might not even have been talk-ing about what is now known as Manor Marussia. They looked to have been beyond the point of no return, with the auctions taking place selling off the assets of the team. The Formula One factory had al-ready been sold to the new Haas team, along with a reasonable amount of equipment.

Thanks to British businessman Stephen Fitzpatrick an eleventh hour deal was done to secure the teams position on the grid. Armed with the 2014 car, and the 2014 Ferrari engine the team made their way to Melbourne with new drivers Will Ste-vens and Spaniard Roberto Merhi. It wasn’t even a weekend for them in Melbourne with them unable to even start the car. They didn’t have the software

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“CONSIDERING WHERE THEY HAVE COME, IT HAS BEEN AN AMAZING FIRST HALF OF THE YEAR”

MANOR - SLOW REBIRTH OF 2015

ASHLEY JAMES@SPEEDMAJOR

which wasn’t the best look to have on their comeback.

Malaysia was an improvement with at least getting one car into the race, and Roberto Merhi finished it. They had come a long way by this point, but the conspiracy theorists were still out there saying that they couldn’t run two cars at the same time. China was even bet-ter, and the season could now really start, but the question marks remained over the second driver, with Merhi only confirmed for the flyaway races.

Merhi remained, and by the Canadian Grand Prix we were starting to see some more sponsorship come to the car. The most innovative included a partnership with TV and Radio person-ality Chris Evans who was promoting the one off return of TFI Friday. On a serious note they signed a deal with AirBnB in Canada, and at the British Grand Prix announced a deal with stor-age specialist Flex-Box. Their home race was also the best result of the first half of the season, coming home in 12th and 13th even after getting the tyre call wrong at the end of the race when it started to rain.

With Fabio Leimer coming on board as test driver we could see a change of driver at the team towards the end of the season, with Merhi bringing little fi-nancial support.

It has been tinged with sadness with the death of Jules Bianchi last month, which has had a profound effect on the current grid of drivers. It also had an effect on the team considering two of their drivers had died from head inju-ries while driving their car. It has been tough, but the closeness of the sport really showed in the week leading up to the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Considering where they have come, it has been an amazing first half of the year and it will be interesting what they will be able to do in the second half.

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FOLLOW OUR SOCIAL MEDIA ACCOUNTS!

Winter testing can throw up some interesting re-sults, and Sauber did that at Jerez by topping the timesheets. With a car which looks at least very similar to the 2014 car it was fastest, but with Fer-rari also quick at the same test it was easy to put the improvement down to the new engine in the back. With no Manor around, and no other team running the Ferrari engine it was difficult to tell if it was really the case or not.

Heading to Melbourne it was expected that they would do well at the first round of the World Cham-pionship, but things would go wrong very quickly. The team had drivers Felipe Nasr and Marcus Erics-son signed at the end of 2014, but it was heavily ru-

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SAUBER - AN UNEXPECTED SURPRISE

ASHLEY JAMES@SPEEDMAJOR

“LOOKING AHEAD IT LOOKS TO BE A SETTLED TIME FOR THE TEAM AFTER A COUPLE OF SEASONS OF UPHEAVAL”

moured that Guido van der Garde had done the same in the summer. That was true and he decided to excursive his right to drive at the opening race of the season which ended in a court case on the eve on the Grand Prix. He didn’t get the drive, but instead got a huge paycheque from the team as a settlement.

Despite what was going on behind the scenes it would be the best result of the season for the team with an excel-lent 5th and 8th right on the bat of not getting a single point in 2014, with Manor beating them at the end of the season.

Malaysia wasn’t such a great race for the team, but it was a return to the points in China with both cars finishing in the points again in 8th and 10th. It hasn’t been that great since though with the team at the bottom of the mid-field runners on a regular basis, and just skirting the points on the Sunday afternoon. A 9th at Monaco would be a highlight for Felipe Nasr, while Marcus Ericsson scraped into the points in what was an entertaining afternoon in Hungary.

Looking ahead it looks to be a settled time for the team after a couple of sea-sons of upheaval including that of driv-ers and a limited budget. Such is the confidence that they have resigned the same drivers for 2016 bringing much need stability back. As great as it is, more speed is needed.

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Peter Hickman emerged as one of the 'stars of the future' after ending his first Isle of Man TT as the fastest ever newcomer at just shy of 130mph in 2014. Since then he has set the roads ablaze, and in the second Superbike race of the 2015 Ulster Grand Prix it all came good for the Briggs Equip-ment racing rider after he mastered the wet condi-tions that befell the Dundrod circuit to take his first international road racing victory.

The conditions were so poor that it prompted dou-ble Superbike race winner Bruce Anstey and triple 2015 UGP victor Lee Johnston to sit out. Ian Hutchinson also intended to do the same, but de-cided to contest the event instead. The Bingley rider's race didn't last long, however, as his PBM Kawasaki gave up at the end of the opening lap.

 

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HICKMAN EARNS FIRST INTERNATIONAL WIN IN WET SUPERBIKE RACE

LEWIS DUNCAN@LEWIS__DUNCAN

“THE CONDITIONS WERE SO POOR THAT IT PROMPTED DOUBLE SUPERBIKE RACE WINNER BRUCE ANSTEY AND TRIPLE 2015 UGP VICTOR LEE JOHNSTON TO SIT OUT”

Hickman's race seemed pretty much sorted, but Connor Cummins mounted an attack in the closing stages of the four-lap race. The Honda Racing rider earned a podium in the opening 1000cc race on Thursday and was de-termined to better that on Saturday. In the end the Manxman was unable to overhaul the BMW, the gap just 0.028s across the line.

Rain is a great leveller, but the Lincoln-shire rider's win came on a Superstock S1000RR and he was able to see off the fully-fledged Superbikes around him. A podium in the opening race, run in the dry, further proved that this result was no fluke.

Michael Dunlop ended his Ulster Grand Prix on a positive note with a 3rd place finish. The Northern Irish-man will be glad to see the back of a very difficult 2015 campaign which has seen him switch from Yamaha to BMW, to mixed results, and struggle with injury at the TT.

Keith Amor, Russ Mountford, Dan Kneen, Derek Shiels, Dean Harrison, Daley Mathison and William Dunlop completed the top 10.

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When the news broke out last year that Honda would be reuniting with McLaren we naturally harked back to the mid- to late-80s when the McLaren-Honda was tearing the field apart in the hands of two great World Champions. They’ve at least got half of that.

It was obvious that Honda would struggle to get their power unit up to scratch in the early part of the season, but even they have admitted that they didn’t expect it to be such an uphill climb. A severe lack of power from the internal combustion engine itself and the inability to run their ERS at 100% (oth-erwise it will blow up), combined with a lack of reli-ability and you have one formerly great team scram-bling at the back of the grid with frustrated team

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MCLAREN - GLORY DAYS NO MORE

CHRIS STEVENS@CSTEVENS_JOURNO

“HONDA INSIST PROGRESS IS BEING MADE, BUT INITIAL TARGETS WERE PASSED A LONG TIME AGO”

members, frustrated drivers and frus-trated fans.

That’s not including the constant talk in the media concerning Jenson Button and Fernando Alonso and where their futures lie within motorsport.

But McLaren have done their part of the job well. The chassis and aerody-namics of the MP4-30 have been its re-deeming feature, helping it to points finishes in Monaco and Silverstone, as well as a double points finish in Hun-gary.

Honda insist progress is being made, but initial targets were passed a long time ago; saying the power unit would be at 100% in Spain, then by mid-season, and now there are talks say-ing McLaren could be struggling still come the start of the 2016 season. For their sake, let’s hope not.

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#FETESTING

Last year there were the sceptics, could a 16 year old really race with the best of them given he only had one year of car racing experience?

Exceptional is not a word you often use when de-scribing a midfield team, but that is what this sea-son has been for Toro Rosso, despite the lack of core points to back it up. Max Verstappen was highly in demand last year with Mercedes and Red Bull after the youngster, but he chose to go with Red Bull as that was where the seat in F1 was set to open the quickest. You could say it was a gam-ble, and it was in a way, but one which has put his name in the spotlight.

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TORO ROSSO - A DELIGHT FOR RACING

ASHLEY JAMES@SPEEDMAJOR

“THINGS COULD HAVE BEEN BETTER FOR THEM IF THEY HAD RELIABILITY ON THEIR SIDE”

To partner him was supposed to be Dany Kvyat, but he was shuffled up to the main Red Bull team following the departure of Sebastian Vettel. It fell to Carlos Sainz who had impressed in the Formula Renault 3.5 series in 2014 to take the second season, again fol-lowing in the tradition of hiring young drivers at the team.

They have both really impressed, with Sainz often quietly out-qualifying Ver-stappen, but that has been where their forte lies. We saw this last season with the car doing really well in practice and qualifying before dropping off in the race. So much so that they have even beaten the Red Bull team on a number of occurrences. The highlight would be the damp practice session in Monaco where Verstappen was sec-ond, highlighting his natural ability straight out of the blocks.

Results wise, where points matter Toro Rosso are only seventh in the champi-onship with a best finish of forth at the Hungarian Grand Prix for Verstappen. That could have easily been a podium if it had been a clean race for the Dutchman, again mixing it with the Red Bull main team. Things could

have been better for them if they had reliability on their side, but have fa-voured better with the uncompetitive Renault engine despite a couple of ma-jor failures. It has also been described as the second best car on the grid be-hind the Mercedes, and that is quite an achievement for a midfield team

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Marc Marquez continued his unbroken record in the United States with a fifth victory at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway after a race long duel with Jorge Lorenzo.

The start was to be crucial as it was widely thought that Marquez would be able to shoot off into the distance. Lorenzo practised a move on the final sighting lap and got the hole shot at the start to lead his compatriot on the opening lap. From there began a real cat and mouse game.

 Lorenzo and Marquez were setting a real hot pace in the opening few laps and broke away from the chasing pack immediately. Both too were setting near identical times. Surprisingly 17

MARQUEZ' BRICKYARD MASTERCLASSLEWIS DUNCAN@ILMMOTOGP

“THEN THE FUEL CAME DOWN AND THE BIKE LIGHTENED UP, WHICH ALLOWED DANI TO REALLY WRING ITS NECK”

it was the Yamaha who was able to keep the much faster, at least going off practice performance, Honda. By the eight lap Lorenzo had extended the gap to four-tenths, managing to countermand the grunt of the RC213V by using the M1's cornering strengths to punch out of the final corner.

Two laps later and Marquez had closed the gap over the line to just 0.064s, but Lorenzo responded on the next tour and opened it back up to 0.2s. To throw a spanner into the works, two laps later the rain flag was flown. This prompted Marquez to mount his charge just in case the rain did fall. A new lap record followed – 1:32.625 – before a lunge for the lead at T1 with just three laps to journey.

The Spaniard pulled the pin and darted off into the distance, putting five-tenths of air between him and the Yamaha.

This marks Honda's 700th Grand Prix victory, the first coming back

in 1961. But it'll be the implication on the championship fight that this result yields that will interest the reigning champion more. This win reels the gap to Valentino Rossi to 56 points – a not so insurmountable gap with eight races still to run.

Rossi will rue another missed opportunity as a result of a bad qualifying. The Italian was running similar, if not faster at some stages, times to the leading duo, indicat-ing that had he gotten onto the second row on Saturday then maybe he'd have left with the win.

Nonetheless, this result sees him still nine point ahead of Lorenzo in the standings and maintain his tally of finishing every race so far on the rostrum. But despite his pace, this was not an easy race for the Yamaha rider.

Dani Pedrosa struggled in the early stages; the 2015 RC213V a difficult beast to manhandle on heavy fuel. And this allowed Rossi

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to close in and pass the former Indy winner at the second corner on lap 16.

Then the fuel came down and the bike lightened up, which allowed Dani to really wring its neck. Five laps later he re-passed the Italian at turn one, using the brute force of the Honda engine to tow his way past and edge ahead on the brakes. A small error on the following circulation at turn 10 allowed Rossi back through. 3rd place swapped hands again on the final lap, Pedrosa stealing it back at turn one once again.

 

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Rossi, determined not let his championship lead be totally obliterated by Lorenzo, swooped by at turn nine and held on for the final third of the lap.

Andrea Iannone was the big mover at the start, climbing from 7th to 5th. There he remained, albeit not comfortably as Bradley Smith hounded him in the latter stages. The Tech 3 rider ended the day as top satellite rider once again.

 

He was followed home by his team-mate, Pol Espargaro, who spent much of his afternoon in the close attention of LCR Honda's Cal Crutchlow. The Briton briefly lead the Spaniard after the pair diced over 7th in the opening sequence of corners. Espargaro was quick to react and held the Honda at bay.

Behind them was the second GP15 of Andrea Dovizioso who was in damage limitation mode following an off-track excursion at the second corner on the first lap.

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Danilo Petrucci completed the top ten to cap off a sterling weekend for the Pramac rider.

Suzuki's afternoon will be one to forget after Maverick Vinales and Aleix Espargaro finished a lowly 11th and 14th. In a weekend expected to be tough, Suzuki did show a small glimmer of hope for a top 10 finish after qualifying, but it was not to be. They will have their eyes firmly fixed on the Czech round next weekend at a circuit

which may favour them a little more.

Hector Barbera rounded out the points and finished top open rider, whilst Toni Elias made it to the end of his one-off Grand Prix appearance in last place.

Jack Miller was the only non-finisher. The Australian crashed out of proceedings on lap seven but was unhurt.

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F1 MID-SEASON QUIZ1) WHICH 2 DRIVERS HAVE A 9-1 QUALIFYING

LEAD OVER THEIR TEAMMATE?

2) WHICH DRIVER WAS THE FIRST TO RETIRE IN THE 2015 SEASON?

3) WHEN WAS THE FIRST SAFETY CAR IN 2015 AND WHY WAS IT DEPLOYED?

4) WHICH DRIVER HAS THE MOST FASTEST LAPS OF 2015?

5) HOW MANY DRIVERS HAVE NEVER BEEN ELIMINATED IN Q1 IN 2015?

7) WHAT WAS THE FIRST RACE IN WHICH NEITHER MCLAREN RETIRED?

8) WHO WAS THE FIRST PERSON TO GET A TIME PENALTY IN 2015?

9) BOTH BUTTON AND ALONSO RECEIVED A GRID PENALTY IN AUSTRIA. COLLECTIVELY, HOW MANY PLACES DID THEY HAVE TO DROP?

10) WHO CONDUCTED THE PODIUM INTERVIEW FOLLOWING THE AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX?ANSWERS AT THE BACK!

Former world champion, Fernando Alonso, is considering leaving F1 in favour of a driver in endurance racing, according to a recent interview.

The Spanish driver, who achieved a 5th place finish in last weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix has endured a difficult season in 2015, spending much of his time at the back of the grid of having suffered from technical failures.

 While he has acknowledge that the chal-lenge of developing the McLaren Honda

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ALONSO CONSIDERING SWITCH TO ENDURANCE RACING?

TOM SPENCER@APEXRACINGPR

“THERE IS THE TEMPTATION FOR OTHER CATEGORIES.”

presents new opportunities for him, he confirmed in an interview with Autosport that the limitations of the ‘pinnacle of motorsport’ may lead to a career change in the near future.

 “I love motorsport, all the categories. But it’s true Formula 1 is not exactly the same or as ex-citing as it was in the past, for me, to drive the cars just two or three seconds faster than a GP2 car.”

 “I’m enjoying this process of starting from zero and getting competitive. But with no testing, with these tires, with these limitations, with the [21-race] calendar for next year, there is the temptation for other catego-ries.”

 It is widely expected that Alonso would head to Le Mans Prototypes should he leave F1, having been in protracted talks with Porsche over a driver for this

year until he signed for McLaren. The path to Le Mans racing is becoming well-trodden for F1 drivers, with the likes of Mark Webber and Nico Hülkenberg amongst the star attractions of the 2015 event.

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There were true concerns for Force India over the winter. We had already lost Caterham, and Marus-sia was on shaky ground at the time, the Force In-dia said they were going to miss out on the Jerez test completely. It was known later that they we asked by their suppliers to pay earlier, at time where there is little income through the winter, com-bined with a move to the Toyota windtunnel in Co-logne filling a gap which was once filled by Cater-ham.

The car was late, very late. It only made its track de-but at the last Barcelona test and seemed reliable on its first run despite looking similar to the 2014 car. It came with somewhat of surprise then, when at the first race in Australia the scored a double

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FORCE INDIA – IMPROVING AFTER A SLOW START

ASHLEY JAMES@SPEEDMAJOR

“THEY PROMISED A BETTER SECOND HALF OF THE YEAR THAN THE FIRST AND THEY LOOK ON TRACK TO DO THAT”

points finish, despite having little track time with the car. It was clear that the reliable Mercedes engine was helping them iron out the deficiencies in the car. It wasn’t until Bahrain they scored their second points paying position of the year, a circuit which was fruitful for Mercedes runners.

With many teams bringing large up-grades to their car at Barcelona, the team fell backwards but scored points in both Monaco and Canada. This is where the season has started to turn around for them. Nico Hulkenberg was given leave to race at Le Mans for Por-sche, which gave him the win, the first active F1 driver to win the race since the early 90’s. That really turned around the season at Force India, given him a good boost in confidence heading back into Europe.

Their home Grand Prix at Silverstone was the first full outing of their new aero package which included innova-tive holes in the front of the nose. It put them right back up the order again with their first double points finish since the opening race in Melbourne. Hungary was a different story though with a double retirement, including a

dramatic looking crash for Sergio Perez on Friday caused by a broken suspension and a another crash dur-ing the race on Sunday for Nico Hulkenberg which saw a failure of the front wing.

They promised a better second half of the year than the first and they look on track to do that, but as always it really depends on the development of the other teams. Especially for the midfield teams it will be the progress of McLaren who could push the likes of Force India out of the points if they find a small upturn in speed

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#HUNGARIANGP

There are sometimes relationships which sour in sport, it can only be natural when success isn’t a forthcoming as it previously was. However, there possibly isn’t as a public condemnation of a sup-plier than between Red Bull and Renault. That really is their story so far in 2015, poor results fol-lowed by a public airing of their frustration with their engine supplier.

It comes at a time when their Chief Designer, and extremely highly rated designer Adrian Newey is working on other projects including the Americas Cup, and a rumoured road car. The performance hasn’t come, and with the team running the third best engine in the field, and a car which isn’t quite as good as in previous seasons it has meant a slump in form. So much so that the sister Toro

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RED BULL - AGAINST THE MACHINE

ASHLEY JAMES@SPEEDMAJOR

“THERE POSSIBLY ISN’T AS A PUBLIC CONDEMNATION OF A SUPPLIER THAN BETWEEN RED BULL AND RENAULT”

Rosso team has been snapping at their heels.

Things haven’t been disasterous though, and they have still be in the points on regular occurrences, just not as high up the order as they would be expecting. The highlight would be at the last Grand Prix in Hungary with the unusual race provided a chance for them to get their first podium, and in fact double podium of the season.

Quite rightly they have been upset with Renault, with them quickly going through five engines in the first half of the season. The first penalty came at the Austrian Grand Prix, their home race which Daniel Ricciardo masterly faught back to claim 10th place, on a track which isn’t overly suited to their strengths.

As regards to the championship, the team are in no mans land. They are a long way of ahead of the midfield teams – Force India, Toro Rosso and Lotus, but still a long way behind the leading three teams of Mercedes, Fer-rari and Williams.

The next two races at least look to be somewhat of a challenge, but who

knows what the future holds. We might even see a new engine supplier

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It has been a tough couple of years for Lotus. However, with the Mercedes engine they were hoping for a large jump up the order. That hasn’t really materialised as they hoped, but it is still a major improvement from last season.

Lotus clearly missed Kimi Raikkonen last sea-son, but they also missed James Allison who moved to Ferrari which saw a dramatic slump in form at the back of the midfield. Having the Ren-ault engine didn’t help, but neither did arriving at testing late as well, especially with a new for-mula coming into the sport. It was all down to money though and they hired Pastor Mal-donado, who had already won with Williams, but the relationship soured.

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LOTUS - ALL IN AN ENGINE?ASHLEY JAMES@SPEEDMAJOR

They were talking up 2015, with them suggesting that having the Mercedes engine would mean they would be able to challenge Williams, the highest placed Mercedes customer team. That hasn’t happened, and it has been Ro-main Grosjean who has claimed the points for the team, despite having a handicap. The team have employed the services of GP2 champion Jolyon Palmer to drive the car in Free Prac-tice, however so far he has only ever driven Romain’s car. He has been the master of seventh places, getting the position in China, Bahrain and Hun-gary, with further points positions in Spain and Canada.

Pastor Maldonado in contrast has only two points paying positions to his name, again both seventh positions in Canada and Austria. It is the number of retirements though which is most alarming, six out of ten races and also quite possibly the most number of pen-alties issued during a race in Hungary, where he also picked up a set of pen-alty points.

Although they have clearly made pro-gress, which could be flattered by the better Mercedes engine, they are not

attacking Williams. In fact, they are closer to Force India with just four points separating them in the construc-tors championship.

With development coming through for the end of the season for its competi-tors, it is going to be an interesting end to the season, with the added spice of the rumoured take over by Renault.

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An extra knock-out round in qualifying looks set to be introduced in Formula E for 2015/16.

The current format for the all-electric championship has four qualifying rounds of five drivers with the order decided on a random draw.  This new format would see the fastest driver from each of the four sessions take part in a final “superpole” session.

“It is something we are studying, but we won’t be able to talk about it until the sporting regulations are published.” Said Formula E sporting manager Benoit Dupont, speaking with AUTOSPORT.

The FIA World Motorsport Council will meet at the start of the October to ratify any changes to the sporting regulations before the second season opening in Beijing.

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QUALIFYING CHANGES PLANNED FOR SEASON 2

FRANK PARKER@FORMULA_FRANK@ILMFORMULAE

Four-time F1 World Champion Alain Prost has ex-pressed his frustration over the reception that the sport’s new efficient engine regulations have not won over fans.

Talking to Motorsport.com, the Frenchman spoke out about the perceived lack of interest from fans for the new hybrid turbo power units, which have been broadly criticised due to their lack of noise.

However, Prost believes that F1 needs to work harder to engage fans and help them understand the benefits of the new engine format, as show-cased in Formula E: “In F1 it’s a bit different and what is happening is a bit frustrating.”

“We have an engine whose technology is incredibly advanced, but people have not bought into it. Maybe people expect something very different

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PROST FRUSTRATED AT F1 ENGINE PERCEPTIONS

TOM SPENCER@APEXRACINGPR

“FORMULA 1 REMAINS A BIT DISTANT, AND YOU’RE ALWAYS A BIT FAR AWAY FROM F1. YET, THIS TWO-YEAR-OLD ENGINE WHICH IS AS POWERFUL BUT CONSUMES 30% TO 40% LESS FUEL, YOU FEEL LIKE THE FANS DON’T REALLY CARE ABOUT THAT”

from F1. At the end of the day, they don’t really care about the chassis, or about outright pace – they want on-track battles, because they want it to be interesting; it’s a real drivers’ cham-pionship.”

“Formula 1 remains a bit distant, and you’re always a bit far away from F1. Yet, this two-year-old engine which is as powerful but consumes 30% to 40% less fuel, you feel like the fans don’t really care about that.

“You also need to understand it ac-cording to the series, according to the approach, according to the customer base – and they’re real fans, rather 40 to 60 years old.

“But we in [Formula E] are aiming at another category, notably for younger people. You shouldn’t have the same marketing positioning on both, that’s obvious.”

The power of perception

Prost is certainly right to highlight that F1 has not done a good enough job of demonstrating the advantages of the current engine format.

While the noise produced by the power units has caused a rift amongst fans, the sport has made it clear that it is investigating opportunities to im-prove the sound to add to the show.

However, the media and F1’s key stakeholders must work harder to showcase why the changes are so im-portant to the longevity of the sport and its relevance to the wider world. With the G8 leaders committing to eradicating dependance on fossil fu-els by 2100, F1 must continue to move forward and pertinent not only to the audiences of today but also the near future.

Formula E has taken a bold step for the development of electic powertrain development, which will gain pace over the coming years. But its greatest success to date has been getting its audience to not only buy in to the tech-nological advances but in truly under-standing societal significance of elec-tric vehicles on a global scale. F1 must follow suit if it is to keep its place in the modern world and, as ever, ef-fective communication is key.

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FORMULA E SEASON 1 BEST SHOTS FROM FIAFORMULAE.COM

xxxvi

Lee Johnston took his third win of the 2015 Ulster Grand Prix after victory in the sec-ond 600cc Supersport race of the meeting.

Johnston fought with SSP race 1 podium finisher Glen Irwin and the Yamaha of Ian Hutchinson for much of the truncated race. The Northern Irishman led across the line on lap three when the red flag was flown on the following tour.

This was timely for Ian Hutchinson who had been passed by Dean Harrison on the fourth lap, but because of the countback rule Hutchy held onto 3rd.

William Dunlop completed the top five.

The race was due to be restarted but never was as race direction pushed to get the remainder of the programme completed.

The following Supertwin race saw Derek McGee take victory over James Cowton and Dan Cooper.

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JOHNSTON TREBLES UP IN SUPERSPORT 2

LEWIS DUNCAN@LEWIS__DUNCAN

Similar to Moto3, the rain fell between the conclusion of the Moto3 race and the start of Moto2 but dried sufficiently for all riders to change to slicks before the lights went out. Defending champion Tito Rabat made a great start from second and took the lead into turn 1 but an even better start from Julian Simon who rocketed from 17th to 3rd on the first lap. However, that was not the end of the position changes on lap 1 as Hafizh Syahrin took a shock lead before pole sitter Rins got back through but then Syahrin re-took the lead to cross the line at the end of the first lap out front.

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THRILLING MOTO2

RACE SEES RINS TAKE FIRST WIN

JASON HARVEY@ILMMOTOGP

RACE RESULT

1) RINS2) ZARCO3) MORBIDELLI4) AERGERTER5) RABAT6) LUTHI7) PONS8) SIMEON9) NAKAGAMI10)MARQUEZ

The continuous changes carried on through lap 2 with Simon leading, Aegerter up to third and then Lowes taking to the front. Meanwhile, championship leader Johann Zarco sat a relatively comfortable 6th whilst title rival Rabat dropped down to 11th. Simon's great start was short lived and fell from P4 as the front-end washed out into turn 9. Simon returned to the race but later suffered a second crash and retired from the race.

Zarco then hit the front as Rabat started to make his way back through the leading group of 10 riders. Syahrin continued in 2nd ahead of Aegerter, Lowes and Rins. Aegerter then took the lead from Zarco with a great move into turn 1 whilst Rabat passed Syahrin for third and Rins moved ahead of Lowes for 5th. Cortese and Kallio appeared to come together at turn 2 ending both their races and Kallio indicated the former was to blame for their exit.

Syahrin dropped to 8th as the lead changed numerous times between Rins, Zarco and Aegerter with just 8 laps remaining. Lowes crashed out from 6th at turn 14 and Thomas Luthi somehow managed to avoid colliding with both Lowes and the bike as man and machine slid back across the track at the final corner. With just 3 laps remaining, any of the top 4 (Aegerter, Rins, Zarco and Morbidelli) could win the race before Rins took the lead with a great move on Aegerter on the penultimate lap.

Rins established enough of an advantage to hold on for his first ever Moto2 victory ahead of Zarco and Morbidelli. Aegerter despite leading a large proportion of the race could only settle for 4th. It was an truly enthralling race with lap after lap of overtakes and is definitely the best Moto2 race this year so far. 

 

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The result means Zarco now leads the championship by 71 points from Alex Rins who moves ahead of defending champion Tito Rabat (who could only manage a 5th place finish).

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Williams looked to be the second fastest team at the end of last season, even though Red Bull had got those lucky wins in Canada and Hungary. They could have won themselves had they capitalised on the front row start in Austria, which only netting them a podium, something they were doing a lot of last season. Abu Dhabi also looked like it could have been a great race for them, possibly even get-ting the win, which in the end went to Lewis Hamil-ton.

Fast forward to 2015 and little has changed. Ferrari has got faster, and has really overtaken them in the championship battle, but Red Bull has subsided into a distant forth place. No more has that been ap-parent than at the British Grand Prix in July when al-

41

WILLIAMS – A LIFE OF LIVING CAUTIOUSLY ASHLEY JAMES

@SPEEDMAJOR

“WE MAY HAVE SEEN MORE THAN JUST THE TWO PODIUMS THIS SEASON IF THEY HAD BEEN MORE AGGRESSIVE IN THEIR STRATEGY.”

though they wasn’t the fastest car in qualifying they got a much better start than the Mercedes to get themselves a 1-2 in the early stages of the race. It was however a masterclass in the problems within the team, where Valt-teri Bottas, who at the time was quicker than Felipe Massa wasn’t al-lowed to overtake. Later when the rain came they just fell down the field, with a car which is still not suited to the wet conditions.

The season didn’t start too well for them either, just as it did in 2014. Valt-teri Bottas injured his back aggravated during qualifying which ruled him out of the race, with extensive work be-tween the Australian race and Malay-sia they managed to patch him back together, but he has since revealed that it is likely he will have to do certain exercises throughout his motor racing career to minimise the effects of the in-jury.

High speed tracks remain their forte, getting podiums in both Canada and Austria, although lost out at Silverstone in the rain, while struggling at both Monaco and Hungary. There are a few fast tracks coming up including Spa,

Monza, Suzuka and Mexico, so the end of the season could be better than the start for Williams. We have heard that they are going to be more aggres-sive, but so far have seen little action on how that can be achieved. We may have seen more than just the two podi-ums this season if they had been more aggressive in their strategy.

There has also been the constant dia-logue around the move of Valtteri Bot-tas moving to Ferrari for 2016, and this could be the story for the end of the season. It really is the hinge on the driver market for next year, otherwise we could see a status quo at the top of the order next year.

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Andrea Iannone leaves the United States disappointed with a distant 5th place finish in yesterday's Indianapolis Grand Prix.

The Ducati rider made a pretty decent start, jumping from 7th to 4th by the second corner. The Italian was demoted to 5th when compatriot Valentino Rossi got passed on the second lap.

Hindering the Desmosedici this weekend was the tyre choice. Ducati were unable to run the more durable hard tyre, and this left them vulnerable to attack from those around who could use it. For Iannone that attack

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IANNONE DISAPPOINTED AFTER ANOTHER DIFFICULT RACE FOR DUCATI

LEWIS DUNCAN@ILMMOTOGP

“I GOT A REALLY GOOD START, BUT UNFORTUNATELY I DIDN'T HAVE THE PACE TO STAY WITH THE LEADING GROUP ”

came from the Tech 3 Yamaha of Bradley Smith, who closed down the GP15 rider in the latter stages of the race. Iannone was just able to hold off the Briton, but he acknowledges that Ducati have got to dig deep to discover the problem causing this recent slump in form.

“I got a really good start, but unfortunately I didn't have the pace to stay with the leading group. I tried everything I could to push hard right from the start, but I wasn't as quick as the top four, so I did my own race and it was not easy to keep Smith behind until the end. With the harder tyre we knew that the leading four were a bit quicker, but in any case we held our own and I think that we took home the best result that we could obtain today. Now we have to respond to fighting for the podium like we were doing at the start of the season.”

Things were no better for team-mate Andrea Dovizioso. He out-braked himself at turn two on the opening lap and dropped right to the rear of the field. Desmo Dovi managed to salvage 9th, which will be of some relief given his three DNFs in the last four races and a lowly 12th in Assen.

With the Czech round just days away it seems unlikely that Ducati will make substantial gains, though Brno may suit them a little more.

44

As an aspiring motorsport journalist, I am com-pletely aware that I should remain impartial and not have my favourites when writing my articles and that it is unprofessional to do otherwise – but I am not a journalist yet. I am merely a regular fan of For-mula 1 who is utterly devastated by the news of Ju-les Bianchi’s passing and I can’t write this piece without making it plainly obvious that Jules was, and will remain to be, an absolute hero and inspira-tion of mine.

I believe this might be one of the hardest things I have ever had to write – because Jules was taken far too soon, because he fought so hard for so long and because, I believe like all of us, I clung onto the hope that he’d surprise us all like he did in Mon-

JULES BIANCHI: 1989 - 2015

45

LUCY MORSON@LUCYMORSON

aco and recover. It’s taken so long to write this because it’s impossible to know what the right thing to say is, be-cause I can’t say anything different to what’s already been said hundreds of times since Saturday morning and be-cause the stories of his career and his talent and his powerful personality should be left to those who knew him.

I never met Jules – but I was lucky enough to experience some of his kind-ness last year at the post-Grand Prix Silverstone test, where he took time out of a meeting with Ferrari to sign the flag I’d been waving for him all weekend. This is a memory personal to me, but reading through all the tweets over the last few days, it seems that he was able to create hundreds of these moments for his fans and this is one of the many things he must be re-membered for – not for what hap-pened on Sunday October 5th 2014. Remember Brazil 2013, when his early season performance secured Marus-sia their first precious 10th place in the constructors. Remember Monaco 2014, the surprise, the skill, the jubila-tion and the fact he helped save a team. Remember all of the times he

gave us someone else to root for, drag-ging more out of his Marussia than any-one thought possible. But most of all, remember him as he was, happy, smil-ing and living his dream.

It would have been fantastic to be able to watch him race in a Ferrari and who knows what he could have achieved, although they were surely destined to be great. Though we will never know what might have been, we know what was and we know that Jules leaves us with another achievement to add to his impressive list, because he has in-spired so many to persevere, to keep going and keep fighting however big the challenge and however small the chances – to push and to never lift.

Tu nous manques et nos pensées et nos prières sont avec vous et votre fa-mille toujours.

Au revoir Jules et merci beaucoup.

#CiaoJules

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SEE WHAT THE TEAMS & DRIVERS HAVE BEEN SAYING FOLLOWING THE FIRST PRE-SEASON TEST AT DONINGTON PARK!

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After a dismal 2014 season, the most famous manu-facturer in the world underwent a massive overhaul. Maurizio Arrivabene took over from Marco Mattiacci as team principal, Ferrari president Luca di Mon-tezemolo left the team, and Fernando Alonso was replaced by Sebastian Vettel. But perhaps most im-portantly, James Allison, one of the top car design-ers in the paddock, would have a significant im-pact on the design of the 2015 car. Heading into testing was a complete unknown.

Low and behold, the post-revolution Ferrari team was a quick one. Vettel settled into his dream team immediately; straightaway looking as though he was where he belonged. And that came through in the results; a podium in his first race with the team,

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FERRARI - THE ITALIAN REVOLUTION

CHRIS STEVENS@CSTEVENS_JOURNO

“FERRARI ARE NOW IN A PRIME POSITION TO TAKE THE CHAMPIONSHIP FROM RIGHT UNDER MERCEDES’ NOSE”

and in the second he took victory over a squabbling Mercedes team.

Although the Mercedes has looked to be the superior car, Ferrari have been the ones picking up the pieces when the Silver Arrows trip over themselves. Kimi Raikkonen very nearly took vic-tory away from Lewis Hamilton when both Mercedes cars encountered a brake issue on the final two laps, Vettel managed to split the two Mercedes when they called Hamilton’s strategy wrong in Monaco, and was the man on a mission in Hungary where he took his second win of the season.

But the season has not run entirely smoothly for the team dressed in scar-let. A gamble on a supposedly better wheel nut system, for quicker pit stops, has cost them many times, with Raikkonen leaving the pits with only three wheels on his wagon in Austra-lia, and Vettel losing the podium to Fe-lipe Massa in Austria thanks to a pro-longed pit stop.

Reliability has hit both drivers; Vettel in Canada, and Raikkonen in Austria. On both occasions the car didn’t pass Q1. But Raikkonen has also been strug-

gling with traction issues, much like he did last year; with spins in Canada, Austria (which caused him to crash out of the race, and Britain, losing him positions and points.

But, after their heroic display in Hun-gary, Ferrari are now in a prime posi-tion to take the championship from right under Mercedes’ nose. Vettel cur-rently sits 42 points back from champi-onship leader Hamilton, and the team are very excited about the upgrades they have planned for the next few races. Certainly, they have given Mercedes cause to keep checking their mirrors.

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Bruce Anstey added to his Superbike win tally with victory in the second race for the class of the 2015 Ulster Grand Prix.

 The Kiwi rider was embroiled in a titanic scrap with Ian Hutchinson for the entire contest – their pace so hot that they'd cleared off very early on. Hutchy took the lead on lap four and led at the start of the fifth lap when disaster struck. The red flag was brought out, ending the race and declaring a result. To his dismay it was the Padgetts Honda rider that was declared the victor as a result of the countback rule which states that the leader at the start of the previous lap was the leader at the time of the red flag.

The PBM rider protested, with his argument being that a result cannot be declared because 2/3 race distance had not been achieved. The result stood and Hutchy had to make do with 2nd best.

Lee Johnston continued his great day with a 3rd place finish.

Peter Hickman wasn't far off a podium in 4th on his Superstock BMW S1000RR, whilst Connor Cummins rounded out the top five for Honda 50

ANSTEY WINS, HUTCHY FURIOUS IN SUPERBIKE RACE

LEWIS DUNCAN@LEWIS__DUNCAN

Valentino Rossi lamented yet another foul qualifying in which he placed his YZR-M1 Movistar Yamaha 8th.

With the men setting the big pace throughout the weekend – Marc Marquez and Jorge Lorenzo – starting on the front row, Rossi had a mammoth task ahead if he was to chase them down.

A good start saw the Italian up to 4th by the second lap, and onto the back of the second Repsol Honda of Dani Pedrosa six laps later. But by then the damage had been done. His pace was identical to the guys at the front and

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QUALIFYING HANDICAPS ROSSI ONCE AGAIN

LEWIS DUNCAN@ILMMOTOGP

“THE PROBLEM IS THE QUALIFYING, WE STRUGGLE TOO MUCH IN THE PRACTICE AND WE ARRIVE (AT QUALIFYING) WITH A LITTLE BUT TOO MUCH OF A DELAY ”

that meant he was unable to make any inroads.

To make matters worse, Dani Pedrosa had found a bit more confidence with his RC213V as the fuel loads came down. This meant Rossi had to really fight for that final rostrum. Despite a last-gasp attack from the Spaniard on the final lap, he was able to slip back through and take a crucial 16 points.

At a track where Rossi really struggles this weekend was all about damage limitation, and he leaves the US with a nine point gap to team-mate Jorge Lorenzo after he finished 2nd. But, had he made a better job of things in qualifying, the outcome could have been vastly different.

“At one moment Jorge was in front and I was fourth, so I would have lost twelve points. I had to try at the maximum because these points for third are more important for me than for Dani. I gave my all

and it was very difficult because this track, with this temperature and humidity is very demanding, but I'm happy at the end because it was a good race and I had a good pace.

“The problem is the qualifying, we struggle too much in the practice and we arrive (at qualifying) with a little but too much of a delay before finding a good setting. Starting from the third row is always difficult. I started well and I was fast on the first laps so, if I would have been able to start from the second row, I would have been able to stay with Marc and Jorge until the end of the race. We have to work hard on this starting from Brno.”

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Berlin ePrix winner Jerome D'Ambrosio will remain at Dragon Racing for Season 2 of the all-electric Formula E Championship.

In its inaugural season, D'Ambrosio finished fourth in the drivers championship and achieved three podiums.

 Speaking to FIAFormulaE.com, D'Ambrosio said, “It is with great excitement that I will be at the wheel of the Dragon Racing entry for the second season of the FIA Formula E Championship,” 

 “I have watched the entire Dragon Racing or-ganisation produce race wins and podium finishes, and I feel that we have the opportunity to build on

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D’AMBROSIO RETAINED BY DRAGON

FRANK PARKER@FORMULA_FRANK

the knowledge and experience we all gained in season one.”

 Jay Penske, the Founder and Owner of Dragon Racing added,  “I am so pleased to have Jerome continue to pi-lot the #7 Dragon Racing entry,” 

 “After watching Jerome’s perform-ance on track and the way that he worked with his engineers and crew in the first season, I feel that season two will produce more podium finishes, and hopefully more results like in Ber-lin and London.”

 The second Formula E season begins in Beijing on the 17th October, and pre-season testing begins at Doning-ton Park in August.

Formula E Season 2 entry list revealed

The finalised names for the Formula E season two entrants for have been an-nounced as follows:

 ABT Schaeffler Audi Sport

 Andretti Formula E Team

 Dragon Racing

 DS Virgin Racing Formula E Team

 Mahindra Racing Formula E Team

 NEXTEV TCR Formula E Team

 Renault e.Dams

 Team Aguri

 Trulli Formula E Team

 Venturi Formula E Team

 DS Citroen and Renault join the series as the sole car manufacturers.

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IMAGES FROM FIAFORMULAE.COM

Having dominated the 2014 season, it seemed that Mercedes were untouchable going into the new season. They knew they had the speed, so the entirety of testing was spent focusing on reli-ability – the one weakness of this car’s prede-cessor. Indeed, they finished the first race in Australia with a 1-2 finish, some 30 seconds ahead of third placed man Sebastian Vettel.

However, at the following race in Malaysia, Mer-cedes revealed to the paddock that they bled. Calling the strategy wrong gave the race to Fer-rari; a result that very nearly repeated itself in Bahrain when both cars suffered a brake failure with two laps to go. A similar scenario reared its head in Monaco when the team pitted Lewis Hamilton and left him stuck behind Vettel.

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MERCEDES - AIMING FOR PERFECTIONASHLEY JAMES@SPEEDMAJOR

Mercedes have had the quickest car on the grid in this first half of the sea-son. But the Hungarian Grand Prix showed just how much they can strug-gle when things go against them; fin-ishing just 6th and 8th, and once again handing the race over to Ferrari.

The team have also been struggling with poor starts in recent races which, with restrictions on start procedures beginning at the next race in Belgium, has given them more cause for con-cern going into the second half of the season. As if Ferrari’s upgrade pack-age for the second half of the season wasn’t enough.

If Mercedes are to hold on to this championship, they need to keep a cool head. Recently they have been shooting themselves in the foot, and it has cost them points and allowed Vet-tel to close in in the driver’s champion-ship. Only time will tell if they can fend off the prancing horse

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COMING NEXT MONTH...!

lvii

F1 BELGIAN GRAND PRIX

F1ITALIANGRAND

PRIX

MOTOGPCZECH REPUBLICGP

MOTOGPBRITISH GRAND

PRIX

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F1 MID-SEASON QUIZ ANSWERS

1) LEWIS HAMILTON AND ROMAIN GROSJEAN

2) PASTOR MALDONADO (NO SURPRISE THERE!)

3) AUSTRALIA, AND GUESS WHO CRASHED... (YES IT WAS MALDONADO)

4) LEWIS HAMILTON

5) 6

7) CHINA

8) PASTOR MALDONADO

9) 50 (25 EACH)

10) ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER