I found this video published about a week ago by a local news site. You will not learn much from it but it does feature brief interviews with Red Bull boys Daniel Ricciardo, Brendon Hartley and Manor boss John Booth and it does bring some of that unique relaxed Macau GP atmosphere. So if you have about 3 minutes to spare, click on the play button and enjoy:

Macau GP video highlights, sort of

I have finally managed to sort out all the photos taken in Macau last weekend. Here is the second set featuring images from the track and from the paddock and garages. This is a mix of pictures from Formula 3, Formula BMW, motorbike race, GT Cup and WTCC. And yes, the photos of former Minardi F1 driver and current Star Sports F1 commentator Alex Yoong and his strange Bufori car are also in the mix . Click on the thumbnails to enlarge the images.

If you missed the first lot of pictures check also the Crash photos from the crash fest post.

Photos: F1Wolf.com

2009 Macau GP – Motorbikes, F3, Formula BMW, WTCC, GT Cup photos

The 2009 Macau GP provided some great racing action in all the events. It also produced lots of minor, major and spectacular crashes. Safety car was called to action in all Sunday races, two of those (the 2nd WTCC race and the Formula 3 race) were even red flagged. There were no serious injuries but lots of debris and some seriously damaged cars. Here are photos of some of the Macau crash fest action from the Lisboa bend. There were more seriously looking crashes and pile ups but those occurred at higher speed corners, away from the lense of my camera. Click on the thumbnails to enlarge the images:

For the record Edoardo Mortara (Signature) won the Formula 3 race ahead of Jean-Karl Vernay, Sam Bird, Marcus Ericsson and Valtteri Bottas. In WTCC Robert Huff (Chevrolet) won the first race and Augusto Farfus (BMW) the second one while Gabriele Tarquini (SEAT) clinched the 2009 title.

2009 Macau GP – Crash photos from the crash fest

Bits and pieces of the Lambo

The GT Cup race (part of 2009 Macau GP program) today produced a massive crash of Lamborghini Gallardo GT3 driven by Luis Artiles. The front and rear of the car was totally ripped off, debris all over the track… The driver walked away but it will take some serious repair job before that Lambo can race again … Here is a short video featuring that crash.

2009 Macau GP – Video – Massive Lambo crash in GT Cup

Mistakes are costly in Macau ...

It is less than 2 weeks to go to 2009 Macau Grand Prix. The highlight of the weekend has been since 1983 the Formula 3 race often featuring future F1 drivers. The list of former Macau GP winners includes names such as Ayrton Senna, Michael Schumacher, David Coulthard, Ralf Schumacher, Takuma Sato. Several drivers on 2009 F1 grid raced in Macau in the past – Sebastian Vettel, Adrian Sutil, Kamui Kobayashi, Robert Kubica, Kazuki Nakajima, Nico Rosberg, Lewis Hamilton, Nelson Piquet jr, Jenson Button, Sebastien Bourdais, Mark Webber, Nick Heidfeld, Jarno Trulli, Giancarlo Fisichella, Rubens Barrichello, Sebastien Buemi, Romain Grosjean and as recently as last year also Jaime Alguersuari. We can also add the 2010 F1 rookies Bruno Senna (Campos META) and Nico Hulkenberg (Williams) – both raced in Macau in 2007.

So, let’s have a look and the provisional entry list for 2009 Macau GP Formula 3 race:

(Driver, Nationality, Team, Car, Engine, 2009 Season Result)

1. Marcus ERICSSON – SWE – Tom’s – Dallara – Toyota-Tom’s – 1st Japan F3
2. Takuto IGUCHI – JPN – Tom’s – Dallara – Toyota-Tom’s – 2nd Japan F3
3. Jules BIANCHI – FRA – ART Grand Prix – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 1st F3 Euro Series
4. Valtteri BOTTAS – FIN – ART Grand Prix – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 3rd F3 Euro Series
5. Sam BIRD – GBR – ART Grand Prix – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 6th F3 Euro Series
6. Daniel RICCIARDO – AUS – Carlin – Dallara – Volkswagen – 1st British F3
7. Brendon HARTLEY – NZL – Carlin – Dallara – Volkswagen – 11th F3 Euro Series
8. Max CHILTON – GBR – Carlin – Dallara – Volkswagen – 4th British F3
9. Henry ARUNDEL – GBR – Carlin – Dallara – Volkswagen – 9th British F3
10. Kei COZZOLINO – ITA – Toda Racing – Dallara – Honda-Toda – 4th Japan F3
11. Mika MAKI – FIN – Hitech Racing – Dallara – Volkswagen – 6th F3 Euro Series
12. Wayne BOYD – GBR – Hitech Racing – Dallara – Volkswagen – 12th British F3
14. Jean-Karl VERNAY – FRA – Signature – Dallara – Volkswagen – 5th F3 Euro Series
15. Laurens VANTHOOR – BEL – Signature – Dallara – Volkswagen – 1st ATS Formel 3
16. Edoardo MORTARA – ITA – Signature – Dallara – Volkswagen – 14th GP2 Series
17. Renger van der ZANDE – NED – Räikkönen Robertson – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 3rd British F3
18. Alexander SIMS – GBR – Räikkönen Robertson – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 4th F3 Euro Series
19. Kevin CHEN – TPE – Räikkönen Robertson – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 20th British F3
20. Michael HO – MAC – Manor Motorsport – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 5th Formula V6 Asia
21. Carlos HUERTAS – COL – Manor Motorsport – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 7th British F3
22. Roberto MERHI – ESP – Manor Motorsport – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 7th F3 Euro Series
23. Yuji KUNIMOTO – JPN – NOW Motor Sports – Dallara – Toyota-Tom’s – 3rd Japan F3
24. Koki SAGA – JPN – Le Beausset Motorsports – Dallara – Toyota- Tom’s – 6th Japan F3
25. Victor GARCIA – ESP – Fortec Motorsport – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 14th British F3
26. Daniel MCKENZIE – GBR – Fortec Motorsport – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 1st British F3 National Class
27. Jake ROSENZWEIG – USA – Fortec Motorsport – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 18th F3 Euro Series
28. Stefano COLETTI – MON – Prema Powerteam – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 10th F3 Euro Series
29. Daniel ZAMPIERI – ITA – Prema Powerteam – Dallara – Mercedes-HWA – 1st Italian F3
30. Stef DUSSELDORP – NED – Kolles & Heinz Union – Dallara – Volkswagen – 2nd ATS Formel 3 Cup
31. Alexandre IMPERATORI – SUI – Kolles & Heinz Union – Dallara – Volkswagen – 3rd Japan F3 National Class

Edoardo Mortara and Stefano Colleti raced in the main GP2 series this season while several other drivers listed above are competing in the current GP2 Asia series – Max Chilton, Sam Bird, Marcus Ericsson, Jules Bianchi …

Besides the Formula 3 race the 56th Macau GP program includes FIA WTTC race (featuring Yvan Muller, Andy Priaulx, Tiago Monteiro, Alex Zanardi etc), Formula BMW Pacific, GT Cup (featuring among others also the former Minardi F1 driver Alex Yoong) as well as the Macau Motorcycle GP.

56th Macau GP is on from 19 – 22 November 2009.

Here are few 2008 Macau GP posts:

On board footage (GT Cup) , Formula 3 video highlights and some photos.

Photo: F1Wolf.com

2009 Macau GP – Formula 3 Entry List

Nico Rosberg

When I returned from Singapore to Hong Kong I spotted Nico Rosberg at the Hong Kong airport. Then I saw him waiting for his luggage at the same belt as me and it became sort of obvious he would be spending some time between Singapore and Japanese GPs here in Hong Kong. I found a video interview he did last week for South China Morning Post. Big part of the interviews focuses on Nelson Piquet’s crash last year in Singapore. Funny how he compares individuals doing stupid things in F1 and in banking world . He also spoke about his future (without giving too much away) and about his Macau GP experience that includes a crash with Lewis Hamilton.

Photo: Williams/LAT
Video: SCMP.com

Video – Nico Rosberg on Piquet, his future and more

One of the highlights of the 2008 racing year for me was the Macau GP. Thanks to our quick Nick we had the opportunity to get to the heart of the action. Nick also mounted the video camera inside his Porsche and taped good one and half hour of racing action. I played around with his footage, added few bits caught on my camera and result is this 23 minutes video edit of Macau GP onboard footage. Warning – the footage includes some explicit language here and there .

Macau GP through the eyes of the driver from F1Wolf on Vimeo.

Macau GP – The driver’s view – Video

For those who had no chance to see anyting from Macau GP, here are some video highlights from Formula 3 race:

2008 Macau GP Formula 3 from F1Wolf on Vimeo.

2008 Macau GP – Formula 3 video highlights

I am taking way too many photos … It took me over a week to go through all the pictures from Macau GP but they are all sorted out now. See the gallery inside this post, simply click on the thumbnails to enlarge the photos. You can check the Race Photos page for more photos from my F1 and other racing travels. My photos are also on Flickr and F1WolfClub.

 

2008 Macau GP photogallery finally on F1Wolf

Pedro de la Rosa in Force India car, signs of things to come ?

The winter testing has started and after months of speculations we finally got some live presenation of what the 2009 Formula 1 cars may look like. It does not look that good , and according to Christian Klien these are the worst looking F1 cars, ever …

Pedro de la Rosa appeared behind wheel of Force India car in Barcelona. This fuels fresh speculations that following the Force India McLaren technial agreements the seats of Adrian Sutil and Giancarlo Fisichella may not be as safe as they appeared to be. Spanish media are said to be sure it is done deal that de la Rosa will replace Fsichella (readers from Spain may help me on this one). De la Rosa however says that he has nothing to say and that all he has been given are 2 days of testing.

This test is also the last track appearance for quite some while for Force India. This is their last outing with Ferrari engines and they do not expect the new chassis built around Mercedes power plants to be ready till late February.

The battle for Toro Rosso and Honda seats is heating up. Jenson Button revealed that there is nothing on paper between him and Honda for next year but he (and pretty much everybody) expects to be retained by the big spending Brackley team. Rubens Barrichello, the endangered F1 spieces, is missing from Barcelona test. Instead his two younger compatriots Lucas di Grassi and Bruno Senna are trying to prove their case for Formula 1 seat. Does not look good for Rubens …

Takuma Sato is complicating the matters for Toro Rosso bosses. After his long racing break (only interrupted by few wet track laps with Toro Rosso few months back) he shows he is still quick, quicker that Bourdais and the top candidate for Toro Rosso driver Sebastien Buemi.

Over at Red Bull Racing Sebastian Vettel went fastest on day 2 of Barcelona test. After quite some time he made the RB car to run quicker than the STR. But with every car in Barcelona testing something totally different, the times mean absolutelly nothing at this moment. Sebastien Loeb claimed his prize for winning the WRC title and tested the Red Bull F1 car. He was impressively quick !

Canadian GP organizers lost the hope and gave up. Bernie Ecclestone succeeded in eliminating another great race from F1 calendar. Formula 1 will not travel to North America next year … At the same time the money bleeding Chinese GP organizers are thinking whether to renew the money loosing contract with Mr. Ecclestone beyond 2010.

McLaren continues trying to be funny. After their “serious” preparations for Singapore night race here comes Lewis Hamilton and his not so good treatment by the media in this viral ad campaign for Vodafone:

The best of the new open wheel racing and possible the future of Formula 1 was on display in Macau last weekend, Keisuke Kunimoto won the action packed race. Few photos are here, some sounds and sights here.

Bernie Ecclestone is serious about taking the points away from drivers and give them medals instead. Unconventional idea that strangely seems to be getting thumbs up from the teams, all teams, at least that’s what Mr. Ecclestone is saying.

yes, and F1Wolf.com celebrated 1000th post last week.

The Formula 1 Off Season News Round Up – Part 2