There were heavy clouds around and above the Sepang track but no rain felt down during the Friday practice. The session 1 was dominated by Felipe Massa (on pole position here last year). The session 2 was all about Ferrari as well until the last few minutes when Lewis Hamilton stole the show.

The reliability problems continued for Ferrari engines - Sebastien Bourdais Ferrari engine expired … Kimi Raikkonen’s car stopped on the track during the practice one, but according to the news reports he simply run out of fuel … The action highlight of the day should probably go to David Coulthard and his suspension failure after hitting the kerbs at Turn 13 during practice 1.

Ferrari and McLaren look like the best packages for the Malaysian GP. But Vettel in Toro Rosso, Button in Honda, Rosberg in Williams, Trulli in Toyota were all impressive at least in one of the sessions. And do not forget BMW Saubers - They did not have the quickest Friday last week in Australia, but once the times started to count on Saturday afternoon, they were right there with McLarens and Ferraris. Red Bulls do not seem to be as comfortable on this track as they were in Melbourne.

Nelson Piquet must be happier than he was in Australia. He pretty much matched Alonso’s times in both sessions. Giancarlo Fisichella impressed again in session 2 with a top 10 time, let’s see if he has more luck that last week during qualifying and the race. The performance gap between him and Adrian Sutil must a bit too big for Sutil’s comfort…

The Friday practice times in the article

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F1Wolf

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The F1 news sites and blogs are still full of Australian GP reviews and comments but we are only 2 days from the start of the 10th Malaysian Formula 1 Grand Prix weekend. It is time for Malaysian GP preview.

The race in Melbourne was unusually hot. In Sepang the drivers can expect the race to be as hot as usual . The tropical climate also brings the high humidity and always a possibility of sudden storm. The weather forecast for Kuala Lumpur suggests that the chances of rain for the coming weekend are not exactly low

But one never knows. The chances for rain were high last year too, it actually did rain the night before the race. On Sunday it rained all around, but not a single drop felt on the race track during the race

So there are 2 possible scenarios ahead. Sunny and hot (and humid) weekend or rainy and relatively cool (and humid) weekend.

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F1Wolf

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Only about a week ago an annoucement finally came from Super Aguri. The unofficial Honda B-team has been acquired by the Magma group. No details have been made public yet but the news emerged that major staff reshuffle and change of the name for the team is planned shortly.

Today Dietrich Mateschitz confirmed what newspapers have been speculating about for months - the Scuderia Toro Rosso, the Red Bull’s junior team is up for sale.

“It is not a big secret that we have put Toro Rosso on the market. For the start of 2010 there will be a rule change and there will be no more synergy regarding design and construction of cars between Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Toro Rosso. There I see the necessity that we continue with one team only. We will not sell Toro Rosso during the 2008 season, but it will be before 2010.”

Other than saying that he would sell only to a quality buyer he did not reveal much. In the past the team was linked to A1 chairman Tony Teixeira and even Michael Schumacher . The sightings of Roustam Tariko and Gerhard Berger in Melbourne sparked rumours the Russian businessman may be the one looking to buy.

This along with the Prodrive fiasco means the end of customer cars and the B-teams era in Formula 1 is near.

F1Wolf

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As you may have realized from my few previous posts and from the photos I came to Melbourne to see the opening race of the 2008 Formula 1 season. Last few years I went to Sepang, 5 hours shorter trip, but this time I decided to go to Melbourne and see how Aussies do it.

First I was a bit disapointed with not too much information about and promotion of the Grand Prix in Melbourne. But that is where for me as a fan the disapointments ended.

The biggest issue I usually face when coming to the race is the logistic of actually getting to the race. That is not an issue in Melbourne at all. Of course the location of the track in the city helps a lot but you still have to get there somehow. Over the whole course of the F1 weekend there were special tram services to and from the Albert Park. And as I found out from a very talkative taxi driver and got confirmed by the tram people, the F1 ticket was all that was needed to ride on public transport …

The races in Shanghai and Sepang may have excellent purpose built facilities, but try to get something decent to eat or drink there … That is not an issue at all in Melbourne. All over the F1 venue there are plenty of places serving all sorts of food, 5-6 different beers, wine, Lavazza coffee. In direct contrast with the greed of Mr. Ecclestone there is free drinking water all around the Albert Park. And that sure came very handy during the hot F1 weekend this year.

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F1Wolf

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What a race. When I posted a video from the most exciting Australian GP race start I did not really expect we will see something similar this year. At the end, we had a spectacular race that so many cars did not finish, that the last 2 cars that broke down actually scored points.

It has to be said, Lewis Hamilton deserved to win this race. He qualified on pole position, avoided most of the mess that plagued many cars behind him and never looked back. He did not lead the race only during the brief periods after his pit stop. Importantly, same as Heidfeld and Rosberg behind him, he had luck on his side during the safety car periods.

Many were wondering how will the new rules affect the racing, especially what impact they will have on race starts. Well, now we now . Five cars were out after lap one, and Felipe Massa was lucky guy not be the sixth.

Hamilton quickly pulled away, Raikkonen made up several places and climbed to 8th. Sato also made the most out of the mayhem - he was running at 10th for quite a while. Raikkonen’s progress have been stalled by Barrichello, it took Kimi 19 laps to overtake the former Ferrari driver in Honda.

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F1Wolf

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The results of the round one are here. It took some time to count them, we have quite a lot of players here … These results are also the current standings.

20
Steve Robertson
17
Klokan, brabhamburger
16
Ben, Kotenok, mcw3, stew, igi
15
deaddogsmoking, f1 portal
14
Kaylen, Queen Bee, zblkhwk, fantoci
13
F1Wolf, Chobi, Ozzi,
12
Rob The Flying Dutchman, Rich, blazena, fatfish,
10
nieuwe

Congratulations to Steve. This looks like a very deserved win, Steve was the only person expecting Heikki Kovalainen to clock the fastest lap ! The new 2008 bright orange Lewis Hamilton cap is ready. Please get in touch with me so I can send you the cap. I may however only be able to send it out after Easter as first I need to get back from Australia .

I apologize for a mistake in points calculation, all the scores were supposed to be 2 points higher than originally listed out. All corrected now.

F1Wolf

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Here are the results from the mad race in Melbourne, with only 7 cars finishing the race, and even one of those (Rubens Barrichello) later disqualified for exiting the pitlane under red light:

1. Lewis Hamilton – McLaren Mercedes– 1:34:50.616
2. Nick Heidfeld – BMW Sauber + 5.478
3. Nico Rosberg - Williams + 8.163
4. Fernando Alonso – Renault +17.181
5. Heikki Kovalainen – McLaren Mercedes +18.014
6. Kazuki Nakajima – Williams + 1 lap
7. Sebastien Bourdais – Toro Rosso + 2 laps
8. Kimi Raikkonen – Ferrari + 3 laps

Race report will follow later today.

F1Wolf

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The first racing weekend of 2008 season is finally here. This also means we have here round 1 of the 2008 Prediction Game. MUMM (3 bottles) is waiting for the winner of the Season 2.

Simply leave a comment below this post with your prediction of the top eight drivers (in the order from 1st to 8th), plus your prediction for the pole position and the fastest lap of the race.

Only predictions placed before start of the qualifying will count.

Click here for the summary of the rules.

Do not leave your predictions for the very last moment…

Since December you had opportunity to make your prediction for the 2008 Champion and to get a chance for 25 bonus points. The voting is now over. However, as I am in Australia at the moment, in case you are in a time zone that still reads March 13, I will still accept the entry. To see the current status click here and check the comments.

F1Wolf

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It was much more pleasant today. The temperatures dropped by more than 10 degrees. But season seems to be off to hot start .

The free practice was unlike any I have seen or heard of as far as I can remember. There were at one stage 20 cars within 1 second … Only two Super Aguris lagged behind. At the end the timesheets looked strange - Kubica fastest, no Ferrari, no McLaren top ten. Heidfeld and Webber were quick to dismiss any possibility of two front running teams being in trouble. Webber said something like “it is only practice, they simply do not need to practice as much as we do”.

More Photos here 

Then the qualifying began .

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F1Wolf

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The sun was too strong and unfortunately I was facing it most of the time, so taking good pictures from my position today was quite tough. Here is the initial collection showing all 22 Formula 1 drivers on their first outing in 2008 Formula 1 season:

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F1Wolf

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