Fernando Alonso and Nelson Piquet, team mates for one more year

ING Renault F1 team made their 2009 drivers line up announcement today. As widely expected Fernando Alonso will stay on after agreeing 2 year extension to his deal with the Enstone team. In Alonso’s case it was more about the driver wanting to stay than the team wanting to retain him. But with all the other potentially competitive seats occupied and Renault steadily progressing towards the front of the grid there was very little doubt about Alonso staying on.

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Kazuki Nakajima, Williams

We entered the last month of 2008 Formula 1 season and after a short period of silence the drivers market there seems to be a lot happening on drivers market.

Williams team confirmed yesterday their 2009 drivers line up will remain the same as this year - Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima. Rosberg’s drive has been confirmed for a while already, Nakajima being the Toyota boy doing a decent rookie job was expected to continue. No real surprises here.

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Nick Heidfeld

Back in July I posted my prediction for the 2009 drivers line up. At that time I did not predict too many changes. Since then there was no announcement that would contradict my prediction. There were few that confirmed it - McLaren will keep both their drivers, Ferrari semiofficially stated that both Massa and Raikkonen will race for them next year, “sources” also say that BMW Sauber took up their option on Kubica and will keep him for another year.

There however have been some summer developments and several drivers may be in danger of loosing their current Formula 1 seats.

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Nico Rosberg, Williams

Nico Rosberg has confirmed that he is staying with Williams in 2009:

“The future is here (at Williams). Well, for next year. Then we’ll see. I feel very comfortable at the team. Of course I feel good. I’ve been with the team a long time, I get on with everybody so it’s very nice. It’ s just the car isn’t fast enough.”

While this pretty much settles it for 2009 Rosberg’s words seem to indicate yet again, that he is ready to move on if an opportunity to drive better car presents itself … Well, who would not be.

You can follow the 2009 Driver Line up on this page

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This is the first 2009 drivers posts that does not have rumours only. One 2009 F1 seat was confirmed last week - Mark Webber’s contract with Red Bull was extended for another year. He will however have new team mate following David Coulthard’s retirement announcement. Sebastian Vettel is everybody’s candidate …

There are reports that Toyota will confirm their current drivers Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock for next season. It hasn’t happened yet though. This would mean that Kazuki Nakajima may stay with Williams for a while longer.

Same as last year a lot seems to depend on the next move by Fernando Alonso. He is not planning to make any announcements before Italian Grand Prix in September and some teams may wait for his situation to clear up before making any moves.

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It has been a bit quiet on the rumour front since the third edition but but still not a total radio silence. And surprise surprise, Sato has been talked about again.

This time not in connection with the “future Honda North America Team” but an existing one - Force India. The rumour has it, as Swiss publication Motorsport Aktuell reports, Force India F1 may be thinking about changing their engine supplier. Some meetings are reported to have taken place in Montreal between Force India and Honda. While Force India have a contract with Ferrari at the moment, the sweetener that allegedly makes Honda deal more attractive is inclusion of Honda’s KERS system in the package. After collapse of Super Aguri Honda currently do not not supply customer engines to another F1 team. The Honda engine / KERS package would come at a discount (the rumoured sum is EUR10 mil a year less than what Force India pays to Ferrari) under condition that Force India would also take care of Honda’s headache and give a race seat to ex-Jordan/Honda, ex-BAR/Honda and ex-Super Aguri/Honda driver Takuma Sato. Sounds to me like pay driver deal on offer … I do not know why but this does not feel like a deal Mallya would do …

The other rumour connects Bruno Senna (currently 2nd in GP2) with BMW Sauber.
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All we need is 2 weeks break between races and the rumour floodgates open. Let’s have a look what’s new since the second edition.

Robert Kubica has been doing well and so it comes as no surprise his future has been talked about quite a bit. Few innocent remarks to Italian paper La Stampa created two contradictory rumours. First linking Rosberg with BMW Sauber (as Kubica’s team mate) and then linking Kubica with a move to Ferrari. Sounds interesting but whom would Kubica replace ? Massa is under contract till 2010 and doing well right now (after shaky start to the season). There has been lots of talking about Raikkonen’s retirement but if I am not wrong that is part of the post 2009 future. All I can say about Kubica and Ferrari is that Kubica’s helmet matches the Ferrari colour scheme quite well as the picture above shows .

Fernando Alonso has dismissed the rumours about him signing for Ferrari, so now it is time to link him to BMW Sauber, now also a race winning car. It may help that Robert Kubica does not seem to mind having Alonso as a team mate. The question for me however is if Alonso would be OK with Kubica in the other car. At the moment all that is sure about Alonso’s future is that he has not made any decision on it, at least that is what he says.

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I know, it is too early to think about 2009 when are yet to go to Monaco in 2008. But some teams and drivers can’t wait to get things going, so here is the first overview.

First to Red Bull - Mark Webber is eager to stay with Red Bull. The talks between Webber and Red Bull have begun already according to Webber himself:

“We are talking now. I am free next year but I am massively keen to stay here, obviously.”

He is massively keen … Given his performances this year I would be surprised if Red Bull were not to retain him. No news on talks between Coulthard and Red Bull yet, but rumours of Sebastian Vettel replacing Coulthard from next year have appeared already. At the moment that is all they are, rumours …

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