official F1 World Championship 2012 Thread

[TheLegendOfMart]

Please kill me, I ended up subscribing to Sky its being installed on Monday, ?30 a month just for F1 :(

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

Grosjean fastest for Lotus as testing resumes in Barcelona

Lotus declared themselves happy with the modifications made to their front suspension after setting the pace as testing resumed at the Circuit de Catalunya.

Romain Grosjean set the quickest time using soft tyres in the final half-hour of the session.

Second-fastest was Jenson Button, who did his best time in the McLaren in the morning running.

Mark Webber spent much of the day doing longer runs before setting a personal best of 1?23.380 on mediums later on in the day.

The session was stopped twice, once when Sergio Perez ran out of fuel in his Sauber, and again when Vitaly Petrov came to a stop in the Caterham. Petrov had taken over from team mate Heikki Kovalainen who is suffering from food poisoning, but is expected to be able to drive later on in the test.

Nico Rosberg was the busiest runner of the day, completing 128 laps.

There was little to choose between the drivers, with the top eight covered by little more than a second.

Source: F1 Fanatic

[simonlang]

ok folks, see it...... i put my moneyz on: 1.mclaren 2.redbulll, 3.mercedes, 4. force india 5. ferrari/rennault

cu in melbourne :)

[mps69]

Red Bull car parked in our office today

[Dan~]

Does anyone on here have sky and wants to be my bestest friend? :D

[mps69]

Does anyone on here have sky and wants to be my bestest friend? :D

If you supply the beer you can come round to mine......I think the commute to Scotland might be a bit if a pain :laugh:

[what]

ok folks, see it...... i put my moneyz on: 1.mclaren 2.redbulll, 3.mercedes, 4. force india 5. ferrari/rennault

cu in melbourne :)

So you picked the top 6 teams to fill the top 5 places. Well done ;)

[simonlang]

Red Bull car parked in our office today

wow jealous... :o

love the pre 2009 cars, with all their winglets and advanced aerodynamics.

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

Grosjean tops the times again in disrupted session

Romain Grosjean headed the testing times fos a second day in a row at the Circuit de Catalunya.

The start of the session was delayed due to fog. The morning running was repeatedly interrupted by a series of red flags.

Michael Schumacher caused two of them in his Mercedes, and Pastor Maldonado, Sebastian Vettel and Vergne all stopped on the track as well.

In addition to the fog, there was a further red flag for debris. Nico Hulkenberg caused the eighth and final red flag after the lunch break.

In between the red flags, Vergne posted a lap of 1?23.126 on soft tyres to go fastest. He had just switched to super-softs for another effort when his car stopped on the track, and after that was missing for much of the remainder of the session.

But late in the session Grosjean beat his time with a 1?22.614, also set on soft tyres.

Vettel used medium tyres to post the third-fastest time later on in the day. Fourth fastest was Fernando Alonso in the Ferrari, setting a 1?23.447 on hards, before running a race simulation in the afternoon.

Heikki Kovalainen used super-soft tyres to set the fifth-fastest time, 1.2s off Grosjean?s pace. He, Alonso and Grosjean did the most running, each completing more than 100 laps.

Kamui Kobayashi lost over an hour with an hydraulic leak. But Hulkenberg lost a significant amount of time when his car stopped with a driveline issue, limiting him to just 33 laps.

Source: F1 Fanatic

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

Perez quickest on rain-hit third day of testing

Sergio Perez was fastest for Sauber in the third day of the final test at the Circuit de Catalunya.

Perez set his fastest time on soft tyres, edging Jenson Button by nine-thousandths of a second. The McLaren driver used the same compound for his time.

Third-placed Daniel Ricciardo used super-soft tyres to set a best time just six-hundredths of a second slower than Perez.

Felipe Massa used the same rubber to set the day?s fourth-best time, with a 1?22.413 in the Ferrari.

The Italian team set tongues wagging by cancelling their media activity at the track over the weekend, meaning their drivers will not be quizzed by journalists.

A 1?22.446 for Paul di Resta, also on super-soft tyres, gave him the fifth-fastest time.

McLaren and Red Bull ran new upgrades for their cars. Button had a quiet morning and logged just XXX laps by the end of the day.

Kimi Raikkonen also had limited running as the team made changes to the steering on his Lotus E20.

Rain fell at the circuit in the second half of the afternoon session, limiting the teams? opportunity to run on slicks. However several drivers were able to do race simulations before the track became wet.

The session ended with the top nine drivers covered by less than nine-tenths of a second.

In marked contrast to yesterday there was just a single red flag during the session, caused by Bruno Senna?s Williams.

Meanwhile HRT confirmed they will not run in the final day of testing tomorrow. They are now aiming to give the F112 its first run in a filming day at the track on Monday.

Source: F1 Fanatic

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

Raikkonen leads final day of pre-season testing in Barcelona

Kimi Raikkonen put Lotus on top for the third time in four days as the final pre-season test drew to a close.

Raikkonen?s lap of 1?22.030, set on soft tyres shortly before the lunch break, was the quickest seen in either of the two tests at the Circuit de Catalunya this year.

The lotus driver was two-tenths of a second quicker than Fernando Alonso in the Ferrari. Alonso used super-softs for his lap.

Bruno Senna was fractionally slower, setting a best time of 1?22.296 on soft tyres. Once again he shared his day?s running in the Williams with team mate Pastor Maldonado.

The times remained close between the leading drivers with the fastest eight covered by nine-tenths of a second. Kamui Kobayashi, fifth-fastest, caused the first of two red flags when his Sauber came to a stop early in the afternoon with an engine problem.

The second was caused by Vitaly Petrov in the Caterham, who set the seventh-fastest time of the day.

World champion Sebastian Vettel was at the bottom of the times as Red Bull continued work on their pre-Melbourne upgrade. The car was frequently obscured by covers and umbrellas at it made its way in and out of the pits during the day?s running.

Source: F1 Fanatic

That's it in terms of pre-season testing. The next time we will see F1 cars driven in anger is the first practice for the Australian GP at Melbourne. March 16th, 02:30 CET/01:30 GMT.

[philcruicks]

Red Bull car parked in our office today

<snip>

Urm, Where do you work exactly?

[RiverCampher]

I'm ready to go... 2 weeks away from what should be a memorable year in F1 due several factors (new cars, new drivers and a return of my old fav driver Kimi). Worst thing about is Sky and their stupid F1 channel. I've subscribed to it since I got a discount but my fingers on the cancel trigger to the whole thing Sky box if they are any less than the brilliant BBC crew. I'm keeping an open mind at this point.

[mps69]

Urm, Where do you work exactly?

For the love of god don't shoot me down, or flame but I work for Sky. Not in the contact centre any more thankfully.

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

Gentlemen: There is a second car without the platypus nose: The Marussia MR01.

Shame it will be trundling around the back of the field.

[mps69]

Gentlemen: There is a second car without the platypus nose: The Marussia MR01.

snip

Shame it will be trundling around the back of the field.

It's ok, we'll see plenty of this one as all the front runners pass it :laugh:

The nose doesn't look as droopy as the McLaren.

[what]

Is it me or is that nose running extremely high off the ground?

[ybrett23]

yer looks like its too high too me also

[KiHu]

too high or not...that car looks..sexy... :blush:

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

The HRT F112:

[philcruicks]

For the love of god don't shoot me down, or flame but I work for Sky. Not in the contact centre any more thankfully.

Fancy getting us all free Sky subscriptions? :shifty:

[what]

Pedro de la Rosa reckons that his team mate doing 10 laps around Barcelona in the F112 with last year's tyres and limited revs means there is nothing wrong with the car.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/17276355

They are a total joke.

[Daedroth]

"Bernie Ecclestone says he would like to see teams at the back of the grid have the opportunity to run year-old cars from the front runners while they establish themselves in Formula 1."

http://www1.skysports.com/formula-1/news/12433/7575090/Bernie-urges-new-team-help

Good old Bernie, making **** up, spouting non-sense or throwing spanners into the works.

[what]

Did anyone watch Sky's pre-season show last night? It was awesome. You can tell they've pumped a lot of resources into the F1 channel. It makes the BBCs 'three blokes dicking around the pitlane' look immature and amateurish. Can't wait for the first live race next weekend.

[Fourjays Veteran]

Did anyone watch Sky's pre-season show last night? It was awesome. You can tell they've pumped a lot of resources into the F1 channel. It makes the BBCs 'three blokes dicking around the pitlane' look immature and amateurish. Can't wait for the first live race next weekend.

I recorded it and have watched the first hour and 20 mins - thoroughly enjoyed it. Went into far more detail and were discussing some very technical points which was nice. Will watch the remainder of it later. :) Also planning to watch some of the season reviews when I can.