Motorsports Thread

[Shorty]

Even more remarkable was that second place went to Nissan Sigmatech driver Lucas Ordonez, who won the first Nissan GT Academy.

[Grubdog]

Webbers looking good this weekend so far, faster than Vettel in every practice session. I'm optimistic for qualifying in an hour.

[Lazlow]

copypasta :cool:

Webber fatest in P1 & P2, and second fastest behind Hamilton in P3.

But the teams are still bitching and moaning that the Red Bull's wings flex giving them an advantage, despite passing all of the FIA's tests. Horner has put it down to having a higher rear ride height, giving the illusion that the wings are closer to the ground.

There's an article on Autosport where Brawn says that teams may need to copy the Red Bull design, but the article is still full of snide insinuations that Red Bull is running an illegal car.

Nevermind Adrian Newey, a man two teams went to court over for his services, designed the car.

There's also increasing talk of Hamilton leaving McLaren for Red Bull. Horner says Vettel/Hamilton wouldn't work (a la Hamilton/Alonso) but Hamilton says he'd have no problems.

[Grubdog]

Hamilton / Webber confirmed then. :P

Is there another thread we're discussing F1 or is that just from another forum?

[Lazlow]

Just posted that on UYAC

[enrique]

Webber doesnt even make it to Q2 today for China, no KERS (again ffs) and they put him on hards, meanwhile the wunderkid is on pole whilst Webber starts 18th. :mad: :mad:

[Lazlow]

Pretty sure they're playing the long game.

I think the plan going around is this race is a two stopper. Webber had KERS die on him during the formation lap of the Malaysian GP, and still managed a 4th with 4 stops.

So at least they seem to be prepared this time for the potential of another full race without KERS. If he gets a clean start, and can put in a good long first stint he can possibly leap frog the mid-field.

[Lazlow]

I think teams are conserving tyres.

I thought they had to start on the tyre they qualified on, but it seems they're switching between compounds mid-session.

Hamilton apparently comprised his qualifying to save tyres for the race. (http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/90763)

Red Bull were possibly doing the same thing, however apparently the second set of Primes they put on Webber's car weren't up to temperature (http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/90761).

[enrique]

Hope Vettel has problems today so there might actually be a race for the lead.

On a brighter note I watched American Le Mans Series at Long Beach this morning courtesy of the stream from their website. Great move on their part, it looks like its for the whole season. :D

[Lazlow]

Fantastic race all over. Just wish they didn't neuter the DRS zone.

[enrique]

Fantastic drive from Webber, from 18th to 3rd, so laughed after he passed Button when the BBC guys had written him off for a podium, that last stint was in another league, if he had've started near the front he couldve beaten Vettel.

[Lazlow]

If he had started near the front, his strategy would have been different and he would have had less fresh tyres.

Hamilton sacrificed pole to save a set of soft, and thats what won him the race.

[Lazlow]

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Steve Owen okay, Karl Reindler with superficial burns to his hands and face.

[Lazlow]

Technical director Sam Michael and chief aerodynamicist Jon Tomlinson have resigned from Williams, effective at the conclusion of this season. And they've hired Mike Coughlan to be Chief Engineer, who you may recall received a two year ban for his involvement in Stepneygate (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Formula_One_espionage_controversy)

[enrique]

Vettel bins it in practice at Turkey.

I just hope he doesnt pull the same crap on Webber that he did here last year.

[Lazlow]

Dallara 2012 IndyCar concept (http://www.autosport.com/gallery/index.php/id/2414)

Hideous. Looks like an aborted cross between an Le Mans prototype, and an winged open wheeler.

However the idea is Dallara is supplying a base chassis (calling it the IndyCar Safety Cell) with teams being able to apply customer aero kits, supplied by any manufacturer who wishes to for a maximum price. Hopefully Lotus or Chevrolet can come up with something prettier.

[Lazlow]

EDIT: f***ing Dorna, put the boots to the youtube video

Here's a link to a Dailymotion vid of the crash (http://www.twowheelsblog.com/post/6362/video-why-marco-simoncelli-got-a-ride-through-penalty)

Don't know if giving Simoncelli a penalty was fair. Looks to me that Pedrosa straightened up and did himself in.

Oh well, another broken collar bone, another year the championship will go begging.

[Lazlow]

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Damn she's lucky to get out with only burns to her hands.

[Lazlow]

Carl Edwards wins the Sprint All Star race.

Fang his car onto the infield grass for some circle work

Hits a ditch/manhole cover, ripping the front end up and nearly tipping the car over.

[Lazlow]

Also, Indy 500 pole day

Pos Driver Team Speed
1. Alex Tagliani Sam Schmidt 227.472mph
2. Scott Dixon Ganassi 227.340mph
3. Oriol Servia Newman/Haas 227.168mph
4. Townsend Bell Sam Schmidt 226.887mph
5. Will Power Penske 226.773mph
6. Dan Wheldon Herta 226.490mph
7. Buddy Rice Panther 225.786mph
8. Ed Carpenter Sarah Fisher 225.121mph
9. Dario Franchitti Ganassi
10. Takuma Sato KV 225.736mph
11. Vitor Meira Foyt 225.590mph
12. JR Hildebrand Panther 225.579mph
13. James Hinchcliffe Newman/Haas 225.572mph
14. Bertrand Baguette Rahal Letterman Lanigan 225.285mph
15. Davey Hamilton Dreyer & Reinbold 225.250mph
16. Helio Castroneves Penske 225.216mph
17. John Andretti Petty/Andretti 224.981mph
18. EJ Viso KV 224.732mph
19. Bruno Junqueira Foyt 224.691mph
20. Justin Wilson Dreyer & Reinbold 224.511mph
21. Jay Howard Rahal/Schmidt 224.483mph
22. Tomas Scheckter KV/SH 224.433mph
23. Tony Kanaan KV 224.417mph
24. Simona de Silvestro HVM 224.392mph

Yet to qualify:

Paul Tracy Dreyer & Reinbold 224.353mph
Charlie Kimball Ganassi 224.262mph
Ana Beatriz Dreyer & Reinbold 224.258mph
Ryan Briscoe Penske 224.134mph
Marco Andretti Andretti 224.074mph
Danica Patrick Andretti 223.831mph
Graham Rahal Ganassi 223.822mph
Alex Lloyd Dale Coyne 223.564mph
Pippa Mann Conquest 223.070mph
Ryan Hunter-Reay Andretti 222.951mph
Raphael Matos AFS 222.786mph
Mike Conway Andretti 222.247mph
James Jakes Dale Coyne 221.846mph
Sebastian Saavedra Conquest 221.526mph
Ho-Pin Tung Schmidt/Dragon

Good work from Simona to make it through with two burnt hands (one with 2nd degree burns). Here's hoping Briscoe can get through on Bump day.

[enrique]

Junqueira qualifies and then a deal between his team owner (AJ Foyt) and Michael Andretti sees Junky dumped and replaced with Ryan Hunter Reay (who didnt manage to qualify for the race). What total bullshit! Hats off to Simona too, thats some real guts and pain control to qualify with two burnt hands, I hope she does well in the race, she seems to be driving better then Danica this year ;).

Briscoe made it and although qualifies 27th says he has a really good race package so look for him to storm from the back.

BTW Le Mans is just over two weeks away, can this fortnight go slow enough? :D

[Lazlow]

She drove better than Danica last year, the results just didn't reflect this.

And in all fairness, Junqueira is moon lighting whereas Hunter is a championship contender.

Also; nice to see tall poppy syndrome is alive an well in Australia (http://www.foxsports.com.au/motor-sports/formula-one/mark-webber-becomes-the-first-person-in-ten-years-to-lose-the-spanish-grand-prix-from-pole/story-e6frf3zl-1226060895719). If you're not first, you're last.

[Lazlow]

Was also pretty funny to see Baird's concerns that Catalunya's immense DRS zone would make passing too easy, seeing as it had little effect because by the time they were half way through it they were on the rev limiter.

[Lazlow]

Despite Simoncelli getting a ride-through penalty, and an official warning, Pedrosa continues to bitch and moan (http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/92065)

I now hate Pedrosa, mostly because he's so f***ing protected by Puig its not funny, also because he's making it sound like Simoncelli broadsided him or kicked him off his bike, when he just put on hard ballsy pass and Pedrosa shit himself.

[enrique]

Pedrobot's just pissed that he'll miss Silverstone as well. Bye bye for another year. And your spot on about him being protected by Puig, its happened his whole career, it hasnt hepled him as a person being wrapped in cotton wool by those around him.

Silverstone should be interesting as should Montreal and Le Mans, sleepless weekend awaits.

[Lazlow]

I hope the two DRS zones make Montreal a cracker.

[Lazlow]

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[Grubdog]

WILL POWER just won his first ever oval race today! Extends his championship lead. :D

[Lazlow]

Just like 1940, Germany > France :D

[Lazlow]

Also, for some reason that godawful Ken Block is getting a run in Pirelli's test Toyota F1 car.

[Lazlow]

Been watching this F1 telecast for 2hr & 45min... I've seen 20 laps. They're now saying they'll be no more racing for a further 30 minutes.

F***en rain. :(

Thank christ for the public holiday tomorrow.

[Lazlow]

They're firing up the engines!

[Lazlow]

It's 7am, it was red flagged for 2 hours, but that race was well worth the wait.

Button just tore up the track. 6 pit stops, fell back to 21st, and managed to tear his way up to 0.9sec behind Vettel on the last lap, and made Vettel blink. Awesome win.

[Lazlow]

Problem is of course Button has to face the stewards twice, once for the Hamilton incident, and once for the Alonso tangle.

[enrique]

WILL POWER just won his first ever oval race today! Extends his championship lead. :D

:D:D:D If he can keep this up he'll be unstoppable.


Just like 1940, Germany > France :D

Haha. Great to see the lone Audi hold off the three Pugs, was wonderful to see the Audi team let loose at the finish, it had been a turbulent 24hrs, I managed to stay awake for all of it-and then fell asleep during Canada F1. :p That McNish crash was incredibly scary-I remember looking up at the tv to see it happen live and a shiver went up my spine, I really was concerned about McNish and the crowd. The slo-mo replays show how lucky some people were. Amazing.

[Lazlow]

I'll be honest, I thought we had another 1955 on our hands.

[HiredMan]

Also, for some reason that godawful Ken Block is getting a run in Pirelli's test Toyota F1 car.

Goddamn. He's so shit.

[Lazlow]

Rallying equivalent of Milka Duno

[Lazlow]

Milka Duno is a Venezualan former model who got into automobile racing at a late age. She ran in the IndyCar Series last year and was so shit she got black flagged out of an oval race for driving too slow.

[Lazlow]

Simoncellli takes out Lorenzo :D

Hope Spies wins this.

[enrique]

Great for Stoner not so good for Lorenzo, sideshow bob isnt winning any respect with riding like that, oh well at least he hit Lorenzo and not Stoner or Spies lol.

Well done to Spies for his maiden MotoGP win! :)

[Lazlow]

One thing I can't figure out; both Crutchlow and Edwards have come back from broken collarbones within a week. Pedrosa has now missing 3 (?) races.

Is there something dramatically different about his injury or is he being a big girl?

[Lazlow]

Simoncelli/Lorenzo is a racing incident, I'll be disappointed if they appease Lorenzo by banning Simoncelli.

Afterall, he wasn't the only rider to go down on that first lap.

[Grubdog]

One thing I can't figure out; both Crutchlow and Edwards have come back from broken collarbones within a week. Pedrosa has now missing 3 (?) races.

Is there something dramatically different about his injury or is he being a big girl?
Probably being a big girl. Crutchlow used Mark Webbers technique of freezing himself and standing naked in -100 degree temperatures to speed up the healing. I can't see Pedrosa doing that.

[Lazlow]

This is why no one respects NASCAR (http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/92707)

[enrique]

Come Silverstone next weekend we will have two Aussies in F1!

Ricciardo steps up to replace Karthikeyan in his HRT seat. Looks like Red Bull threw a bit a cash their way. He'll be in one of the worst cars on the grid but still be interesting to see how he goes.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/92740

Oh and btw Porsche are back in LMP1 at Le Mans in 2014. :D

[Lazlow]

Awesome, just hope they make a go of it like Audi and Pug. Need to make it a 3 way dance.

Also confirmed, F1 moving to boosted V6 engines in 2014, rather than I4 engines by 2013. Expecting Renault to be dominant again.

Couldn't find a worse car for Ricciardo to make his racing debut. But hey, Webber started in the same place, and its a good test of talent. I'll be ecstatic if he can finish and stay on the lead lap.

[Lazlow]

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@dariofranchitti hey princess thanks for that nice tap today--appreciate it


Hey @12WillPower check out the replay then give me a yell....

@dariofranchitti I did watch it and could not have raced you any cleaner----PISSED

Also;

@12WillPower Isn't accidents part of racing? U win some & u lose some. Dario didn't take u out, Alex did. U should b mad at him not Dario.


@TBPVEL you're obv a wanker @dariofranchitti took me out and put me in the position to get taken out by Tag


@12WillPower @dariofranchitti If u would of given him room, you wouldn't of been put in that situation. U blame him, nothing changes.


@TBPVEL well you are obviously a Dario fan and there's no point talking to a wanker like you


and;

@12WillPower @tagliani @dariofranchitti Hey WILL, i think you acted like a big, in your terms, "wanker" in your post race interview.


@U2Mike hahaha you are obviously a wanker that doesn't understand racing


Aussie racers; straight shooters you don't **** with (h)

[enrique]

Wow. Twitter=actually interesting for once lol.

Good on Will for not sugar coating it, probably the upside of not being in f1.

[Lazlow]

F1 last night was a frustrating affair. Partly because OneHD cut to ads every 5 laps, seemingly every time something crucial happened, and partly becuase Red Bull ordered Webber to stay behind Vettel. Awesome that he ignored them and raced to the end, sucks he still couldn't get passed.

[Lazlow]

wwould love to be a fly on the wall at Red Bull, Horner was not happy.

[Grubdog]

Will Power is amazing. I'm glad I didn't wake up at 5 to watch that one.

[Lazlow]

Saw today that Ashley Judd had chimed in on twitter by pretty much calling Will sexist for using a female engendered term (ie Princess) as a slur.

[Grubdog]

She's a dumb bitch

[Lazlow]

So it looks like MotoGP is going to suffer even less factory involvement. With Kawasaki gone, and Suzuki only running one bike, Honda are apparently reducing their supply from 6 bikes to 4 next year; two for the factory team and two for the satellite team. As is stands Dovizioso will lose his factory ride, while Simoncelli will lose his works bike.

Good thing those Moto2 teams were given some entries.

[enrique]

Not to fussed about Doviziozo losing his ride but Simoncelli deserves a good ride, he might be the crash king of motogp but he is a genuinely talented rider-with a few screws loose..

It remains to be seen how these Moto2 teams will go next year, Moto2 is pretty hard fought but motogp itself is another step and a big one at that.

[Clift]

They need to have riders with balls in MotoGP. It'd be boring as bat shit (moreso than it's already becoming) if the grid was full of riders like Stoner and Lorenzo that bitch if someone rides within two feet of them.

In short, Simoncelli would be good to see on a factory bike.

[enrique]

Spa 24hrs is on, Audi leads btw and none of the official streams are working for me at all. :( . Only one McLaren MP4-12C GT3 out of the three factory entered remains in the race, of the other two, the lead pro car crashed heavily near pitlane and the other burst into flames. Not a good debut.

[Lazlow]

Man, you'd think Autosport would have an hourly update :(

[Lazlow]

Also;

Vettel on pole :(
Webber 6th :( :(
F1 split between BBC and Sky from 2012-2018 :mad:

Ch10 has F1 in Australia until 2015, but I'm not sure if that means for the next 3 years they'll only get the BBC portion, and therefore only broadcast half a season.

Autosport forums are full of angered poms, pissed off they'll have to cram in pubs or subscribe to Sky to get the other half of the season. A lot of the F1 teams don't give a shit as long as they get more cash out of the deal.

Given how shit FTA is getting lately, even with all the multichannels, and how bad ONE's coverage has been lately (Silverstone had more ad's than racing), PayTV might be the only way to go in future. That or adopt a MotoGP style online stream subscription service.

[enrique]

Man, you'd think Autosport would have an hourly update :(

Better then that the audi tv stream is up with just under seven hours to go!

http://tv.audi.com/portal/#/01

Live timing here: http://static.sportresult.com/federations/fia/gt1node/index.html?class=Blancpain

Atm Audi leads from the Schubert BMW Z4 and the Ferrari 458 of Vitaphone.

[Grubdog]

This is why Will Power is awesome http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gAYqW3uUCA

[Lazlow]

Kanaan's crash took out a portaloo. Too bad no one was in there.

[Lazlow]

Ambrose finally gets his Sprint Cup win, monster crash on the final lap though.

QatPWKxbPzA

[enrique]

Fantastic to see Ambrose win his first in the top tier, its been six years but well worth the wait. Would love to see him win on an oval IMHO that would be even bigger.

Boris Said, what a character both in and out of the car. Skip to 1.20 for the interview

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[Clift]

Pretty serious crash in the MotoGP just now. Simoncelli's helmet coming off mid-way is a tad worrying. :(

-EDIT-
Holy ****, Simoncelli has passed away... Wow, that's really disappointing to hear... Wow.

[Knuckle Children]

Shocking crash. It was horrible seeing him sliding motionless down the track without a helmet. It looked like Rossi dealt the death blow.

[Lazlow]

A tragic shame, he would have been a real threat next year with the 1000cc bikes.

I've read that the 800s are on a real knife edge with their power delivery and Simoncelli had to push it even harder due to his larger frame.

Now we'll never know :(

[Ad-Rock]

Very sad. I imagine it's traumatic for Rossi and Edwards, too.

[Clift]

For something as simple as a lowside too. 99% of the time once you lose the front end it won't regain traction (more-so when the bike is already on it's side). In this instance when it did, it cost a life.

Reminds me of when Daijiro Kato died. :(

[enrique]

I remember watching this last night when on the second lap they cut straight to when he was hit by Rossi and Edwards which was horrifying to watch. :( You could tell by watching the impact that he was in a bad way and the head of Dorna started walking down pitlane talking to each of the riders and then those words rolling across the bottom of the screen that confirmed the worst......:(

RIP Marco you will be hugely missed for the excitement you brought to MotoGP.

[Lazlow]

http://i.imgur.com/2Gbgi.gif

[Clift]

Provisional 2012 MotoGP entry list is out. Field is a bit bigger this year which is good to see, it was quite barren out there last year. Hopefully a sign of good things to come in the next couple of years.

[Lazlow]

It's larger but there'll be a fair bit of a performance gap between the factory bikes and the CRT bikes. It'll definitely be a two tier championship.

[enrique]

Formula One 2012 starts tomorrow, shame about Webber's KERS problems. Epic qualifying from Grosjean, Kimi must be kicking himself. The new World Endurance Championship also starts tomorrow with the Sebring 12hrs, which Audi will win? :(. Toyota cant come soon enough after the withdrawal of Peugeot.

[Lazlow]

"I cannot ride this Ducati" - Rossi (http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/98678)

Meanwhile Hayden bags 6th place.

[Lazlow]

Hayden qualifies 3rd. Rossi 13th, behind a CRT bike and 2 customer Ducatis.

Starting to think the crash in Malaysia last year has shattered his confidence.