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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Toro Rosso search for their 2009 drivers has been on for weeks. The team does not plan to make any decisions until late November early December but the drivers evaluations are going on. Sebastien Buemi tested the STR03 in Jerez on Wedndesday, Thursday saw the Formula 1 return of Takuma Sato, his first F1 drive since the demise of Super Aguri. Sato may not be the greatest driver F1 has ever seen but he has definitely been very popular, especially in Japan. Here is a little photogallery of Sato’s return behind the Formula 1 wheel. I think this the first time I see him driving a F1 car that is not powered by Honda …

Click on the thumbnails to enlarge the photos.

See also - Toro Rosso and Takuma Sato - Can that go wrong ?

Photos: Red Bull/GEPA

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Takuma Sato ready to test for Toro Rosso

Not surprisingly there has been renewed talk about the future of Toro Rosso following their maiden F1 win last weekend. There are basically 2 questions:

a) Who will drive for Toro Rosso next year
b) What will happen with the team after 2009 season

Not much has changed with the drivers situation. Although the Sebastien Bourdais has been doing better recently, especially in qualifying, his future is still very uncertain. On one hand the team bosses sound a bit happier about Le Seb’s performances, on the other hand Bourdais himself does not see much point in continuing with the team if he can’t get a car that would suit his driving style. So let’s see. For the time being Toro Rosso are looking at the Sebastien Buemi and Takuma Sato. Both are with the team in Jerez for the final test session of the season. Buemi was behind the wheel yesterday, today (Thursday) will be Sato’s turn. There hasn’t been much said about Bruno Senna recently though …

What is more interesting is what lies ahed of the team itself. I was wondering whether Dietrich Mateschitz would change his mind about selling the team. But what the media say this week is right, he never put the team up for sale in the first place:

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Sebastian Vettel Toro Rosso

When the FIA first announced the plans to freeze the engine development back in 2006 the first thing that came to my mind was - “How can that be ?” The logic of saving huge money by not having to spend millions only to gain few horsepowers more than the theguys in the next garage made some sense. But, if some engine was superior in 2006 that would mean the same engine being superior for the whole of 2007 … Hm … Well, somehow the teams managed to get their powerplants on sort of equal level, the 19,000 rpm limit probably also having something to do with that. But how about if someone has reliability issues ? Will they be for a year(s) stuck with engines that blow up in every race ? No, they wwould not. For this reason there was a provison made allowing manufacturers to change parts at the FIA’s discretion if it reduces costs or improves reliability (creating the future loophole).

Then however came end of the 2007 season and FIA announced that the engine freeze would last for 10 years. What ? The pinnacle of motorsport stuck with the same engines for the entire decade ? That did not make much sense to me and I think few believed this would seriously happen. It is not happening, the freeze has been to reduced to 5 years only. Now it looks that the freeze is not really a freeze …

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Adrian Newey

Adrian Newey did it again. After winning races and titles with both Williams and McLaren he ended his winless streak and added another race win to his already impressive tally of Formula 1 race wins.

Williams raced Newey built cars between 1991 and 1997 winning 59 races in the process (Red Bull’s website says 58, I counted 59). McLaren relied on Newey car design between 1998 and 2005 winning 41 races in that period. I am not sure if all these 100 race wins can be contributed to Newey’s design or not. I haven’t found any source that would state this high number of race wins for Newey built cars, most sources say “over 80″. What we can say for sure now is that he has won one more.

Many people believed that it is only matter of time before Newey designed Red Bull car wins a race. But I think no too many expected that it will be STR instead of RB …

The STR03 first appeared in April test in Barcelona and scored first points on its race debut in Monaco. Then came it’s ninth race weekend, the pole position and the win.

Photo: Red Bull/GEPA

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Sebastian Vettel, 2008 Italian GP

This was a funny Formula 1 weekend. Rain in Monza turned this classic but recently often processional race into a grand theater. As expected, we have a first time Monza winner. But few would have expected that this would be Sebastian Vettel - now the youngest ever Formula 1 race winner (and pole position holder). This was also the first time since 1957 German GP (win for Maseratti) that Italian team other than Ferrari won Formula 1 race.

It is often the case that when we have a surprise winner it is a fluke result. Just look back at Fisichella’s win in Brazil with Jordan or Panis’ win in Monaco with Ligier. Vettel’s Monza win doesn’t fit into this fluke category though. Yes, Vettel had luck on his side during the qualifying. But his and his team’s race performance was well worth the race win.

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It was a big day for both Sebastian Vettel and Scuderia Toro Rosso today in Monza. Here is a selection of photos (in high resolution if you click on the thumbnail and then again on the photo in case in does not show up large enough).

Photos: Red Bull/GEPA

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Sebastian Vettel, Monza 2008

Today for the first time since Shanghai 2006 the German / Italian national anthem combo played after Formula 1 race. It was not for Michael Schumacher, it was not for Ferrari. It was for Sebastian Vettel and Toro Rosso (formerly known as Minardi).

It was in November 2006, right after Sebastian Vettel was announced as 2007 BMW Sauber test driver, when I first time paid attention to this guy in Macau during the GP. It was summer 2007 when he scored his first F1 point after standing in for Robert Kubica in Indianapolis. It was in Japan last year when this guy cried last year after smashing into Mark Webber behind the safety car while perhaps set for the podium finish. It was in Shanghai 2007 where he scored his first Formula 1 points for Toro Rosso, it was also there in Shanghai where he almost crushed my hand while shaking it after the race .

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Sebastian Vettel became yesterday the youngest ever pole setter in Formula 1 history beating the previous record set by now 2 time world champion Fernando Alonso back in 2003 (Malaysian GP). This is also the very first time Toro Rosso car will start the race from the P1, a feat that the team never achieved in its previous life as Minardi. This is also only the first time any Red Bull car is on pole position. Here is the photogallery from the remarkable day for Scuderia Toro Rosso. Click on the thumbnails to open the high resolution files:

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Pole position for Sebastian Vettel

This has been one of the most thrilling qualifying sessions I can recall. The water kept coming down on the track and some big names got themselves in trouble. There were not too many surprises in Q1, except Fisichella taking Force India to Q2 for the first time ever. But then Q2 and the fun started. Several drivers got their laps together before the weather deteriorated, some left it too late … Lewis Hamilton, Kimi Raikkonen, Robert Kubica were the big casualties. Felipe Massa was the last driver to actually do a lap that was good enough for top ten after Q2. For the second race in a row Nick Heidfeld outqualified Robert Kubica, for the 3rd race in a row both Toro Rosso cars advanced to Q3. And that wasn’t the end of the story …

Sebastian Vettel was the fastest guy on track in Q3 claiming his maiden Formula 1 pole position. Sebastien Bourdais completed the best day yet for Toro Rosso team with P4. Mark Webber, another member of the extended Red Bull family will start from P3.

The best placed driver from the top teams will be Heikki Kovalainen who will start from the front row, next to pole setter Vettel. Felipe Massa only qualified sixth.

Rain or shine it promises to be very exciting Sunday in Monza tomorrow…

Italian GP qualifying results:

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