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F1 2021

Andretti tipped to take majority stake in Sauber’s F1 team​

An acquisitions company headed by CART Indycar champion and former Formula 1 driver Michael Andretti is understood to be pursuing a takeover of Sauber, which runs Alfa Romeo’s team. Andretti is closing on a deal to buy 80% of shares in Islero Investments at a price of €350 million (£296.86m), putting it in control of the Sauber Motorsport and Sauber Engineering divisions.

Andretti formed the Andretti Acquisition Corporation in March with a target of raising at least $250 million (£183.49m) through an initial public offering. The Andretti operation already includes a successful IndyCar team, which won the Indianapolis 500 on three out of four occasions between 2014 and 2017, and recently hired ex-F1 driver Romain Grosjean. They also have a Formula E team, which until this year was linked to BMW, and entered the inaugural season of Extreme E this year.

Andretti’s interest in Sauber has been long rumoured. The F1 team was purchased by Swedish investment firm Longbow Finance in 2016. Under the Alfa Romeo brand it has scaled up in recent seasons, doubling its F1 workforce to over 500 employees, and hired Valtteri Bottas to join it from Mercedes next year. The team is yet to announce its second driver for 2022. Although Alfa Romeo has fallen to ninth out of 10 teams in the championship this year, it has reduced its deficit to the front runners since its 2016 takeover. Having languished 4.3% off the pace on average in 2017 it has cut that deficit to 1.5% this year.

An Andretti spokesperson declined to confirm the company was making a move to buy Sauber. “As is no secret, Formula 1 has been of interest to Michael and the team for some time, we’ve explored and come close on many options over the years, but we have nothing new to report. Our passion is racing, in all forms. Should a proper opportunity come along to take the Andretti name back to F1, we’d jump at it. But as of now, that opportunity has not fallen in our laps and our focus remains on our seven current disciplines of competition.”

An Alfa Romeo F1 team spokesperson declined to comment when approached.
 

Ecclestone’s wife could be FIA vice-president​

The Ecclestone name could return to prominence in the governance structure of Formula 1. According to La Gazzetta dello Sport, Fabiana Ecclestone the current wife of 90-year-old former F1 supremo Bernie has thrown her hat into the ring as a potential FIA vice president in the December elections.

The report suggests Brazilian Ecclestone, a lawyer who previously worked with the Brazilian GP organisers, will be on the ‘ticket’ in support of FIA presidential candidate Mohammed ben Sulayem in the South American jurisdiction.

She would be the first female FIA vice-president in history. “My experience of working in sport and in mobility is a plus as I can take a broad view of the issues and look for long-term, innovative solutions,” the 44-year-old said.
 
1%er said:

Andretti tipped to take majority stake in Sauber’s F1 team​

An acquisitions company headed by CART Indycar champion and former Formula 1 driver Michael Andretti is understood to be pursuing a takeover of Sauber, which runs Alfa Romeo’s team. Andretti is closing on a deal to buy 80% of shares in Islero Investments at a price of €350 million (£296.86m), putting it in control of the Sauber Motorsport and Sauber Engineering divisions.

Andretti formed the Andretti Acquisition Corporation in March with a target of raising at least $250 million (£183.49m) through an initial public offering. The Andretti operation already includes a successful IndyCar team, which won the Indianapolis 500 on three out of four occasions between 2014 and 2017, and recently hired ex-F1 driver Romain Grosjean. They also have a Formula E team, which until this year was linked to BMW, and entered the inaugural season of Extreme E this year.

Andretti’s interest in Sauber has been long rumoured. The F1 team was purchased by Swedish investment firm Longbow Finance in 2016. Under the Alfa Romeo brand it has scaled up in recent seasons, doubling its F1 workforce to over 500 employees, and hired Valtteri Bottas to join it from Mercedes next year. The team is yet to announce its second driver for 2022. Although Alfa Romeo has fallen to ninth out of 10 teams in the championship this year, it has reduced its deficit to the front runners since its 2016 takeover. Having languished 4.3% off the pace on average in 2017 it has cut that deficit to 1.5% this year.

An Andretti spokesperson declined to confirm the company was making a move to buy Sauber. “As is no secret, Formula 1 has been of interest to Michael and the team for some time, we’ve explored and come close on many options over the years, but we have nothing new to report. Our passion is racing, in all forms. Should a proper opportunity come along to take the Andretti name back to F1, we’d jump at it. But as of now, that opportunity has not fallen in our laps and our focus remains on our seven current disciplines of competition.”

An Alfa Romeo F1 team spokesperson declined to comment when approached.
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Hope he’s better at owning an F1 team than driving in one. I remember his calamitous year at McLaren.
 
spitfire said:
That’ll shake things up!
Click to expand...

Turkey is a track where places can be made up. Especially since it's a high wear track, 2 stop has been mooted as a possible strategy; differences in strategy lead to less time running in trains of traffic so even from relatively low down on the grid there will be opportunities for the Merc to run at full pace. Red Bull will have to get Perez' race right to disrupt Hamilton's progress, Mercedes will want Bottas to prevent Verstappen from driving off into the distance.

Damage limitation, a 2nd or 3rd even behind a Max win would be nowhere near fatal for the championship.
 
Zapp Brannigan said:
Turkey is a track where places can be made up. Especially since it's a high wear track, 2 stop has been mooted as a possible strategy; differences in strategy lead to less time running in trains of traffic so even from relatively low down on the grid there will be opportunities for the Merc to run at full pace. Red Bull will have to get Perez' race right to disrupt Hamilton's progress, Mercedes will want Bottas to prevent Verstappen from driving off into the distance.

Damage limitation, a 2nd or 3rd even behind a Max win would be nowhere near fatal for the championship.
Click to expand...

As 1%er says, I would never bet against Hamilton but will be interesting to see how fast he carves through the field and what happens at the end, assuming Max is in the fight. Merc would have taken the engine hit knowing he can make up places but it certainly adds some spice to the mix.
 
Its interesting that Mercedes have decided to only change the Internal Combustion Engine and none of the ancillaries, its a risk but means only 10 place drop. I'm sure they know what they are doing.

I'd guess they will go with the hard tyre to start and see if they can do a 1 stop.
 
I'd be tempted to change the whole package, if I were Hammy.

But Mercedes have been making some strange race-strategy choices this season.

They could probably improve their results by buying a Magic 8-Ball.
 
spitfire said:
As 1%er says, I would never bet against Hamilton but ...............
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I'm ready to put my hand in my pocket this Sunday, but still hopeful I may get a free lunch. The thing with F1 is you can be too sure of the result, the last couple of races show that.

I've got Lewis for 2022 and that is already locked in, but may well change for 2023 as Lewis may not be driving then, so I have the next season to decide who I'll have in 2023. I can't see my mate changing from Max for a few years but if he does will be drawing lots.
 
Limejuice said:
I'd be tempted to change the whole package, if I were Hammy.

But Mercedes have been making some strange race-strategy choices this season.

They could probably improve their results by buying a Magic 8-Ball.
Click to expand...
I'm guessing they have had a very close look at stuff like the MGU-k, MGU-H etc. and feel they will hold on, I just hope they are right :)
 
Never got a reply from Mercedes about my email "Whinger Spice", I don't have Insta or twatter but if anyone here does please @ Lewis, Toto and everyone who does the Sky coverage I'd love to here someone call him Whinger Spice on air, I think it would be a knockout blow in the off track gamesmanship, Horner would really hate it :)
 
Lewis looking good and for sure his new ICE for the race will give him 5/10 to a second in the race. The good news is Max isn't doing great and may make him over drive in the race, but they have lots of time to fix him.
 

FP2 result​

Lewis Hamilton has topped the second free practice session ahead of the Turkish Grand Prix. The seven-time World Champion completes the Friday double after topping the morning's FP1 on the day Mercedes confirmed they installed a new ICE in Hamilton's car. His World Championship rival Max Verstappen finished fifth after understeer issues played a part in his fastest laps. At the start of FP1, Mercedes confirmed Hamilton will get a new ICE and therefore drop back ten places from his qualifying position. But the Brit is in fine form ahead of the meaningful sessions on Saturday and Sunday. His teammate, Valtteri Bottas rounded out the top three on a weekend where the team desperately need him to perform. Red Bull Racing sat over half a second behind Hamilton on the leaderboard, with Sergio Perez finding himself ahead of his teammate. Meanwhile, Charles Leclerc produced a strong lap early in the session. His 1:23.970 was enough to go second and almost challenged Hamilton's P1 time. On his fastest lap, Hamilton experianced some traffic in sector two.

Busy track
As is the norm in 2021 with practice sessions reduced to just 60 minutes, an early exodus out of the pits created a busy circuit. Ferrari's Charles Leclerc set the first fastest lap but was bettered by Sergio Perez, and then Leclerc again. An Alpine and an Aston Martin car virtually stopped out on the circuit in the final sequence of corners as they looked to create a gap to the car ahead. It caused a dangerous situation as Hamilton emerged on a hot lap. On the team radio, Verstappen reported that he had minor balance issues. He found himself down in P8 after the first 20 minutes. Drivers continued to burn off the soft tyres, firmly suggesting that they won't be used much during the race. Just ahead of the halfway mark, Hamilton moved to the top of the timesheets. The Brit went purple in the final two sectors but had some traffic in the middle sector around the long turn eight. At almost the same time, Verstappen had some understeer on his fast lap, and he sat a full second behind Hamilton. On a second attempt, the Dutchman improved but still sat 0.635 seconds behind.

Long runs
The long runs dominated the second half of the session as usual in FP2. Perhaps the highlight of the session came when Kimi Raikkonen's frustrations boiled over on the team radio because Alfa Romeo struggled to fix his water issue. The Finn lost valuable time on the circuit. Pierre Gasly had a moment at turn six and ruined a set of tyres. He touched the exit kerb with the rear-tyre and spun around. He demonstrated that understeer was a common problem up and down the grid. The live race pace leaderboard also made good reading for Hamilton. His on-track pace sat at 1:27.7, four-tenths faster than Verstappen which will be helpful for the Brit who needs to fight his way through the field. Bottas was a further two tenths behind Verstappen. All drivers used the medium compound.

FP2 - CLASSIFICATION​

  1. HAM 1:23.804
  2. LEC +0.166
  3. BOT +0.410
  4. PER +0.569
  5. VER +0.635
  6. NOR +0.721
  7. ALO +0.856
  8. OCO +0.868
  9. GAS +0.952
  10. GIO +0.992
  11. TSU +1.078
  12. SAI +1.099
  13. STR +1.216
  14. RIC +1.256
  15. RAI +1.339
  16. VET +1.425
  17. LAT +1.503
  18. RUS +1.554
  19. MSC +1.676
  20. MAZ +1.894
 
Looks like rain all day in Turkey.

On Sky - Ted: "When in doubt, ask a local. So I asked our bus driver this morning. He said 'rain all day.'"

Simon: "That'll be the same driver who aquaplaned the bus on the way in..."

Ted (pointing): "And there are our colleagues on Turkish television, and as you can see they've battened down the hatches..."
 
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