dessiato
🇪🇸 my spirit is crying for leaving
It's gone up to 8€. But my basic package is expensive. It is 600 mbps broadband, two mobiles, fixed line, and 150 TV channels for about 100€
F1 2021
- Thread starter 1%er
- Start date
Limejuice
Well-Known Member
That sounds pretty good.
I pay about £70 a month for Sky Sports, which comes with 50 or 60 (utterly useless!) channels. BT broadband, BT Sport and fixed line combined cost the same (ish). Amazon Prime costs £79 a year. My BT broadband stumbles along at about 60 mbps (when the stream is downhill). My two mobiles are less than £30 a month with EE.
I make that about £175 a month, so 100 € for a much faster service sounds like a fair deal.
I need to shop around. Inertia marketing!
ETA - We also pay £160 a year for the TV licence, so the 'free-to-air' stuff technically isn't.
Last edited:
cybershot
Well-Known Member
If you have an Amazon Fire Stick and use the Telegram messaging app, I can put you in touch with some IPTV provider people. £45 for the year. Everything on Sky and then some including all the F1 helmet cams and what not. Private Message me rather than discussing on here. I ain't available for 24/7 tech support though.
1%er
Well-Known Member
Mercedes first to hit trouble in opening session of Bahrain F1 test
Mercedes suffered an early setback in the opening session of the Bahrain Formula 1 pre-season test after being forced into a gearbox change in the first hour. Valtteri Bottas was due to rack up the laps in the Mercedes W12 on Friday morning at the Bahrain International Circuit, completing the early session before handing over to Lewis Hamilton for the afternoon. But Bottas could only manage an initial installation lap for Mercedes before the team discovered an issue with the gearshift on the transmission. Mercedes put up the sight screens in front of the garage, only permitted when there is an issue on the car and confirmed in a short statement that it was a gearbox issue.
“We have a gearshift problem and are swapping the gearbox to get back out on track, then will diagnose the problem with the original box,” the team said. It is expected that it will take around 45 to 60 minutes for Mercedes to complete the change before Bottas can get back out on-track, marking an early setback given the limited testing time this year. Teams have been limited to just three days of pre-season running in 2021 following the carryover of the cars in the regulations, meaning drivers should get a maximum of 12 hours of running each. Friday morning also saw Mercedes break cover with the floor design of the W12 car that fuelled intrigue at the launch event when it moved to hide its concept.
All 10 teams were able to hit the track for at least one lap during the first hour of running in Bahrain, with Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Raikkonen setting the early benchmark with a lap of 1m34.686s. Charles Leclerc notched the most laps in the opening hour for Ferrari, racking up 17 with a variety of rakes and aero sensors attached to the rear of the SF21 car. A number of drivers had lock-ups at the heavy braking points, with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen having the only major moment when he had a half-spin exiting Turn 2. The Dutchman was able to catch the car and avoid touching the gravel before continuing.
Mercedes trick floor revealed as Bahrain F1 testing starts
Mercedes has revealed the trick floor that it wanted to stay hidden from other teams before the start of Formula 1 testing. The world champion outfit had launched its W12 earlier this month but been open that it was not fitted with a real version of the floor that it would be running in 2021. With F1’s aero rules having changed this year in a bid to cut back on downforce, teams have been forced to rework the designs they had in this area of the car. In particular, the removal of an area of the floor ahead of the rear tyre, plus a ban on holes and slots, was aimed at robbing teams of around 10 percent of downforce. Teams are well aware that how well they recover the downforce in this area will be key to their fortunes in 2021, so they have devoted a lot of effort to trying to make gains.
Mercedes technical director James Allison explained that his squad decided to hold back on showing the floor because it did not want other teams to get a head start in being able to copy its idea. "The bit we're not showing you is down along the edge of the floor," he explained at the car launch. "That area is the area that was most affected by the new regulations, where they tried to pull performance away from the car by changing the floor regs. Down there, there's a bunch of aerodynamic detail that we are not quite ready to release to the world. Not because it's not there, but because we don't want our competitors to see it. We don't want them starting to try and put similar things in their wind tunnels. It just buys us a couple of weeks extra. I think we all look very closely at what our competitors do, so we know our competitors will be looking. And we don't have to show it yet, so we're not."
Ahead of the start of pre-season testing though, all the 2021 cars were rolled out on to the track for a photo opportunity forcing teams to finally show off their current designs. The Mercedes floor has an intriguing arrangement with the floor edge rippled as it runs back from the front of the sidepod area. The floor section ahead of the cutout is much busier than we’d ordinarily expect, with five upturned scrolls placed on its edge in coordination with the supports for the bold flap mounted above them. As we’ve seen from some of the other teams during their reveals, the floor also has the small notch at the point where the floor cutout begins. But rather than there being a cluster of winglets or a change in floor geometry to coincide with it, this area remains clear of clutter, at least for the moment.
Ahead of the rear wheel is where the action really ramps up though, as Mercedes has opted for a really bold design on the floor’s edge. Not only do we find what is the largest piece of aerodynamic furniture we’ve seen so far, but it’s also split into multiple sections, all of which have their own curvatures to entice the airflow in very specific ways. Furthermore, the final section of floor has been tilted upward with a downward facing Gurney tab providing an abrupt surface for the airflow to clash with (blue arrow below). Inboard of this wing cluster, Mercedes has three floor strakes, all with their own intricate geometries that look to force the airflow between the tyre sidewall and edge of the diffuser in a more controlled manner.
It’s also interesting to see that Mercedes appears to have forsaken the maximum volume available in the diffuser, with the upper floor bulge clearly much taller in the mid section than it is in the outer section. This is further exaggerated by the cavernous trench that’s been created in the central portion of the floor and gives the airflow more space to operate in within the coke bottle region (red arrow).
Mercedes suffered an early setback in the opening session of the Bahrain Formula 1 pre-season test after being forced into a gearbox change in the first hour. Valtteri Bottas was due to rack up the laps in the Mercedes W12 on Friday morning at the Bahrain International Circuit, completing the early session before handing over to Lewis Hamilton for the afternoon. But Bottas could only manage an initial installation lap for Mercedes before the team discovered an issue with the gearshift on the transmission. Mercedes put up the sight screens in front of the garage, only permitted when there is an issue on the car and confirmed in a short statement that it was a gearbox issue.
“We have a gearshift problem and are swapping the gearbox to get back out on track, then will diagnose the problem with the original box,” the team said. It is expected that it will take around 45 to 60 minutes for Mercedes to complete the change before Bottas can get back out on-track, marking an early setback given the limited testing time this year. Teams have been limited to just three days of pre-season running in 2021 following the carryover of the cars in the regulations, meaning drivers should get a maximum of 12 hours of running each. Friday morning also saw Mercedes break cover with the floor design of the W12 car that fuelled intrigue at the launch event when it moved to hide its concept.
All 10 teams were able to hit the track for at least one lap during the first hour of running in Bahrain, with Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Raikkonen setting the early benchmark with a lap of 1m34.686s. Charles Leclerc notched the most laps in the opening hour for Ferrari, racking up 17 with a variety of rakes and aero sensors attached to the rear of the SF21 car. A number of drivers had lock-ups at the heavy braking points, with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen having the only major moment when he had a half-spin exiting Turn 2. The Dutchman was able to catch the car and avoid touching the gravel before continuing.
Mercedes trick floor revealed as Bahrain F1 testing starts
Mercedes has revealed the trick floor that it wanted to stay hidden from other teams before the start of Formula 1 testing. The world champion outfit had launched its W12 earlier this month but been open that it was not fitted with a real version of the floor that it would be running in 2021. With F1’s aero rules having changed this year in a bid to cut back on downforce, teams have been forced to rework the designs they had in this area of the car. In particular, the removal of an area of the floor ahead of the rear tyre, plus a ban on holes and slots, was aimed at robbing teams of around 10 percent of downforce. Teams are well aware that how well they recover the downforce in this area will be key to their fortunes in 2021, so they have devoted a lot of effort to trying to make gains.
Mercedes technical director James Allison explained that his squad decided to hold back on showing the floor because it did not want other teams to get a head start in being able to copy its idea. "The bit we're not showing you is down along the edge of the floor," he explained at the car launch. "That area is the area that was most affected by the new regulations, where they tried to pull performance away from the car by changing the floor regs. Down there, there's a bunch of aerodynamic detail that we are not quite ready to release to the world. Not because it's not there, but because we don't want our competitors to see it. We don't want them starting to try and put similar things in their wind tunnels. It just buys us a couple of weeks extra. I think we all look very closely at what our competitors do, so we know our competitors will be looking. And we don't have to show it yet, so we're not."
Ahead of the start of pre-season testing though, all the 2021 cars were rolled out on to the track for a photo opportunity forcing teams to finally show off their current designs. The Mercedes floor has an intriguing arrangement with the floor edge rippled as it runs back from the front of the sidepod area. The floor section ahead of the cutout is much busier than we’d ordinarily expect, with five upturned scrolls placed on its edge in coordination with the supports for the bold flap mounted above them. As we’ve seen from some of the other teams during their reveals, the floor also has the small notch at the point where the floor cutout begins. But rather than there being a cluster of winglets or a change in floor geometry to coincide with it, this area remains clear of clutter, at least for the moment.
Ahead of the rear wheel is where the action really ramps up though, as Mercedes has opted for a really bold design on the floor’s edge. Not only do we find what is the largest piece of aerodynamic furniture we’ve seen so far, but it’s also split into multiple sections, all of which have their own curvatures to entice the airflow in very specific ways. Furthermore, the final section of floor has been tilted upward with a downward facing Gurney tab providing an abrupt surface for the airflow to clash with (blue arrow below). Inboard of this wing cluster, Mercedes has three floor strakes, all with their own intricate geometries that look to force the airflow between the tyre sidewall and edge of the diffuser in a more controlled manner.
It’s also interesting to see that Mercedes appears to have forsaken the maximum volume available in the diffuser, with the upper floor bulge clearly much taller in the mid section than it is in the outer section. This is further exaggerated by the cavernous trench that’s been created in the central portion of the floor and gives the airflow more space to operate in within the coke bottle region (red arrow).
1%er
Well-Known Member
What we learned from day one of Bahrain testing
One third of Formula 1 teams’ entire pre-season testing allowance is already over. While the carry-over tech takes some pressure off the winter running this year, there were still clear winners and losers on Friday and some real surprises. Here’s what we learned from the opening day.
MERCEDES ISN’T PERFECT
Mercedes is still overwhelming favourite for the 2021 world championship and may well cruise imperiously through the rest of the testing weekend either topping the outright times or producing race pace that leaves the rest reeling. But the rivals it’s pummelled for the best part of a decade could still take a little comfort from the fact Mercedes was the team that was sat in the garage for nearly the entire morning session while everyone else got on with proper running. The immediate gearshift problem that prompted the gearbox change came “out of nowhere” according to team principal Toto Wolff, and the cause wasn’t immediately obvious.
A rueful Valtteri Bottas admitted that the issue might’ve cropped up in advance had Mercedes joined the other nine teams in doing a shakedown at a filming day first. Though he did rejoin for the final half-hour of the morning session, his “six total laps, all with aero rakes on the car” was an unfulfilling start to his 2021 season. Though team-mate Lewis Hamilton covered 36 more laps than that in the afternoon, the body language of his car suggested his running wasn’t very satisfactory. Radio calls asking for pedal changes, low key times and multiple trips over the run-off areas hinted that things weren’t smooth for the world champion which was corroborated by Bottas suggesting Hamilton’s running was “compromised as well”. With two more days of testing plus the full complement of practice sessions at the start of the Sakhir race weekend in a fortnight, the chances of Mercedes being on the back foot when it actually matters remain slender. But it was kind of the team to give its rivals a little glimmer of hope as the year began.
SHORTENED TEST IS BITING HARD
“The programme these three days is fully packed. The last thing you want is losing track time with an issue. It’s more crucial than ever before to have three smooth solid days.” McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl could say that from the comfortable position of his cars covering 91 smooth laps on day one, but even the teams whose machinery ran smoothly had the headache of the opening hours of the afternoon being compromised by an almost surreal sandstorm.
The fact so many cars pressed on regardless and even set competitive times amid the dust showed how precious every minute of track time was in the shortened pre-season, which isn’t just a matter of teams being reduced to three days of running but each driver getting a maximum of a day and a half. Mercedes’ problems were most headline-grabbing, but the champion team and its drivers have the experience and resources to recover. The person for whom a Friday delay was probably most costly was Mick Schumacher. He also needed a gearbox change in his Haas, and that meant just 15 laps of running in the session that’s supposed to make up one-third of his entire running before his F1 debut.
Though Schumacher’s time loss early on was the most obvious disruption among F1 2021’s rookie contingent, it’s worth noting that AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda had a less prominent setback. He completed just 37 laps in the afternoon because of a fuel system issue that was giving him inconsistent running. Though Tsunoda has had ample testing time in 2018 and 2019 Toro Rosso machinery to help get up to speed, having a compromised first half-day in the 2021 car has cost him some important acclimatisation time he won’t get back. The hour Sebastian Vettel lost to a “small” Aston Martin problem wasn’t ideal either as he gets up to speed in his new surroundings.
Honda dispels reliability rumour
A rumour emerged during the off-season that Honda was really struggling with its new engine’s reliability. It was even suggested this could be behind Red Bull’s ultra-secretive filming day with the RB16B. While it may yet come to pass that Honda’s turned its engines down massively to rack up the mileage, its impressive first day earns it the benefit of the doubt. Despite Tsunoda’s problems, Red Bull and AlphaTauri both cleared 100 laps with Red Bull’s new car, driven by Max Verstappen, leading the way on 139. It’s a very encouraging start for an overhauled engine Honda has brought forward from 2022 to give Red Bull everything it can in a bid to finally challenge Mercedes for the world championship. Operating under the usual uncertainty of fuel loads and engine modes, it is impossible to say if Verstappen’s day-topping lap time is great, good or underwhelming. But Red Bull ended the day fastest and with more mileage than any other team and that was something both Verstappen and the team were keen to lean on.
“We aimed for this number of laps and when you can complete a full programme like this the team can also be pleased with the information we have,” said Verstappen, who reported the car was “nice to drive” despite some early-morning signs of understeer and a half-spin. “We don’t need to talk about pace yet and it isn’t really a discussion until we get to Q3 at the first race weekend it’s only then you see the real pace in all the cars.” Red Bull’s head of race engineering Guillaume Rocquelin echoed Verstappen’s sentiments, confirming the team was “really pleased” as it hit its objectives for the first day. “We had a target in terms of the number of laps we wanted to get through and a fairly busy run plan and we were able to stick to both,” he said. “Lap time is not what it’s about at this stage and I don’t think Max will be getting too pumped up about being at the top of the timesheet on day one. What’s more important is that we were able to follow the plan and do the laps.”
McLaren’s Mercedes reunion has started well
Though all four Mercedes-engined teams were, coincidentally or not, restricted to fewer than 100 laps each, the manufacturer’s newest customer was very satisfied with its first day’s work. McLaren’s last two ‘new engine eras’ haven’t started so well. With Honda in 2015, McLaren had a disaster – completing just 79 laps across four days of running at Jerez. And its Renault switch in 2018 came with other problems across the first three days that severely restricted running. Not so with Mercedes, as McLaren’s reunion began with “no issues” according to team boss Andreas Seidl. “There was a lot of boxes to tick on our test list, which we could complete as planned in the morning,” said Seidl when asked by The Race how the Mercedes side had gone. “I would say, so far, so good. But at the same time, we still have a lot of work to do the next two days. I’m confident that we will be ready for Bahrain when it counts.”
That will include more performance running and race simulations over the next couple of days as McLaren seeks to cover all bases before the season begins properly in two weeks’ time. McLaren has been keen not to undersell the challenge of switching engine suppliers, especially as the rules governing car carry-overs from 2020 to 2021 mean it has been restricted in what it was allowed to change on its car to accommodate the different engine. That has been a partially compromised process as a result, and while McLaren could be encouraged by the absence of problems on the dyno it is a relief for the team to clear the first proper on-track hurdle after a two-day shakedown at Silverstone without drama.
“We will try to use these next days in order to make sure that we train as soon as possible with race weekend specifics together with Mercedes,” added Seidl. “We are fully aware that when we go into the race weekend in two weeks, there will be the qualifying first time under pressure and the first race together under full pressure. That’s something we try to be as prepared [for] as possible in order to make this start of the new partnership with the first race weekend as smooth as possible.”
One third of Formula 1 teams’ entire pre-season testing allowance is already over. While the carry-over tech takes some pressure off the winter running this year, there were still clear winners and losers on Friday and some real surprises. Here’s what we learned from the opening day.
MERCEDES ISN’T PERFECT
Mercedes is still overwhelming favourite for the 2021 world championship and may well cruise imperiously through the rest of the testing weekend either topping the outright times or producing race pace that leaves the rest reeling. But the rivals it’s pummelled for the best part of a decade could still take a little comfort from the fact Mercedes was the team that was sat in the garage for nearly the entire morning session while everyone else got on with proper running. The immediate gearshift problem that prompted the gearbox change came “out of nowhere” according to team principal Toto Wolff, and the cause wasn’t immediately obvious.
A rueful Valtteri Bottas admitted that the issue might’ve cropped up in advance had Mercedes joined the other nine teams in doing a shakedown at a filming day first. Though he did rejoin for the final half-hour of the morning session, his “six total laps, all with aero rakes on the car” was an unfulfilling start to his 2021 season. Though team-mate Lewis Hamilton covered 36 more laps than that in the afternoon, the body language of his car suggested his running wasn’t very satisfactory. Radio calls asking for pedal changes, low key times and multiple trips over the run-off areas hinted that things weren’t smooth for the world champion which was corroborated by Bottas suggesting Hamilton’s running was “compromised as well”. With two more days of testing plus the full complement of practice sessions at the start of the Sakhir race weekend in a fortnight, the chances of Mercedes being on the back foot when it actually matters remain slender. But it was kind of the team to give its rivals a little glimmer of hope as the year began.
SHORTENED TEST IS BITING HARD
“The programme these three days is fully packed. The last thing you want is losing track time with an issue. It’s more crucial than ever before to have three smooth solid days.” McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl could say that from the comfortable position of his cars covering 91 smooth laps on day one, but even the teams whose machinery ran smoothly had the headache of the opening hours of the afternoon being compromised by an almost surreal sandstorm.
The fact so many cars pressed on regardless and even set competitive times amid the dust showed how precious every minute of track time was in the shortened pre-season, which isn’t just a matter of teams being reduced to three days of running but each driver getting a maximum of a day and a half. Mercedes’ problems were most headline-grabbing, but the champion team and its drivers have the experience and resources to recover. The person for whom a Friday delay was probably most costly was Mick Schumacher. He also needed a gearbox change in his Haas, and that meant just 15 laps of running in the session that’s supposed to make up one-third of his entire running before his F1 debut.
Though Schumacher’s time loss early on was the most obvious disruption among F1 2021’s rookie contingent, it’s worth noting that AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda had a less prominent setback. He completed just 37 laps in the afternoon because of a fuel system issue that was giving him inconsistent running. Though Tsunoda has had ample testing time in 2018 and 2019 Toro Rosso machinery to help get up to speed, having a compromised first half-day in the 2021 car has cost him some important acclimatisation time he won’t get back. The hour Sebastian Vettel lost to a “small” Aston Martin problem wasn’t ideal either as he gets up to speed in his new surroundings.
Honda dispels reliability rumour
A rumour emerged during the off-season that Honda was really struggling with its new engine’s reliability. It was even suggested this could be behind Red Bull’s ultra-secretive filming day with the RB16B. While it may yet come to pass that Honda’s turned its engines down massively to rack up the mileage, its impressive first day earns it the benefit of the doubt. Despite Tsunoda’s problems, Red Bull and AlphaTauri both cleared 100 laps with Red Bull’s new car, driven by Max Verstappen, leading the way on 139. It’s a very encouraging start for an overhauled engine Honda has brought forward from 2022 to give Red Bull everything it can in a bid to finally challenge Mercedes for the world championship. Operating under the usual uncertainty of fuel loads and engine modes, it is impossible to say if Verstappen’s day-topping lap time is great, good or underwhelming. But Red Bull ended the day fastest and with more mileage than any other team and that was something both Verstappen and the team were keen to lean on.
“We aimed for this number of laps and when you can complete a full programme like this the team can also be pleased with the information we have,” said Verstappen, who reported the car was “nice to drive” despite some early-morning signs of understeer and a half-spin. “We don’t need to talk about pace yet and it isn’t really a discussion until we get to Q3 at the first race weekend it’s only then you see the real pace in all the cars.” Red Bull’s head of race engineering Guillaume Rocquelin echoed Verstappen’s sentiments, confirming the team was “really pleased” as it hit its objectives for the first day. “We had a target in terms of the number of laps we wanted to get through and a fairly busy run plan and we were able to stick to both,” he said. “Lap time is not what it’s about at this stage and I don’t think Max will be getting too pumped up about being at the top of the timesheet on day one. What’s more important is that we were able to follow the plan and do the laps.”
McLaren’s Mercedes reunion has started well
Though all four Mercedes-engined teams were, coincidentally or not, restricted to fewer than 100 laps each, the manufacturer’s newest customer was very satisfied with its first day’s work. McLaren’s last two ‘new engine eras’ haven’t started so well. With Honda in 2015, McLaren had a disaster – completing just 79 laps across four days of running at Jerez. And its Renault switch in 2018 came with other problems across the first three days that severely restricted running. Not so with Mercedes, as McLaren’s reunion began with “no issues” according to team boss Andreas Seidl. “There was a lot of boxes to tick on our test list, which we could complete as planned in the morning,” said Seidl when asked by The Race how the Mercedes side had gone. “I would say, so far, so good. But at the same time, we still have a lot of work to do the next two days. I’m confident that we will be ready for Bahrain when it counts.”
That will include more performance running and race simulations over the next couple of days as McLaren seeks to cover all bases before the season begins properly in two weeks’ time. McLaren has been keen not to undersell the challenge of switching engine suppliers, especially as the rules governing car carry-overs from 2020 to 2021 mean it has been restricted in what it was allowed to change on its car to accommodate the different engine. That has been a partially compromised process as a result, and while McLaren could be encouraged by the absence of problems on the dyno it is a relief for the team to clear the first proper on-track hurdle after a two-day shakedown at Silverstone without drama.
“We will try to use these next days in order to make sure that we train as soon as possible with race weekend specifics together with Mercedes,” added Seidl. “We are fully aware that when we go into the race weekend in two weeks, there will be the qualifying first time under pressure and the first race together under full pressure. That’s something we try to be as prepared [for] as possible in order to make this start of the new partnership with the first race weekend as smooth as possible.”
1%er
Well-Known Member
The floor is the key development battleground
Teams went out of their way to keep their floor designs under warps during launch season, so it was no surprise to see a wide array of approaches to tackling the aerodynamic rule changes for this year. With the floor now having to taper inwards from the middle of the floor back to the rear wheels, and the slots in it banned, teams have taken a big hit in terms of downforce generation. But that’s simply by removing those aspects, so with redesign and re-optimisation plenty of that loss has been clawed back. Mercedes technical director James Allison said at the launch that he had no intention of letting rivals get an early start of aerodynamic testing of its floor concept. So it was no surprise that on the first morning the Mercedes floor caught the eye, with its undulating forward section and detail work around the rear tyre. That’s an approach Aston Martin has also taken.
But the floor designs are by no means ubiquitous with others having ostensibly more conventional versions. We even saw a little experimentation during the day with some teams running versions with slightly different vane configurations. And we can expect to see plenty more evolution in this area over the coming months.
Carryover cars don’t preclude innovation
While this year’s crop of cars are built around much of the structure of the 2020 machines, there has been no lack of innovation. While this mainly focuses on detail work rather than grand new concepts, it still shows that even when the constraints are tight, F1 teams find a way. As well as the floor innovations, ever-more intricate bargeboards were on display with McLaren among those who had gone to great lengths to hide them previously. The bargeboards have been tweaked to work with the modified floor regulations, so will remain a critical part of managing the car’s airflow.
Alpine’s bulbous airbox/engine cover is innovative in that it’s moving in the opposite direction to most others with more being housed a little higher in the car. But it’s an outlier when it comes to that approach and drew comparisons with mid-1970s Ligiers! There were also different interpretations of the modified diffuser regulations on show as teams sought to claw back every piece of downforce lost to the rules tweaks. While none of these add up to a revolution, it proves there are still new ideas and fresh approaches in F1 and you can be certain personnel in all 10 teams will be intently studying their spy shots of rivals.
Teams went out of their way to keep their floor designs under warps during launch season, so it was no surprise to see a wide array of approaches to tackling the aerodynamic rule changes for this year. With the floor now having to taper inwards from the middle of the floor back to the rear wheels, and the slots in it banned, teams have taken a big hit in terms of downforce generation. But that’s simply by removing those aspects, so with redesign and re-optimisation plenty of that loss has been clawed back. Mercedes technical director James Allison said at the launch that he had no intention of letting rivals get an early start of aerodynamic testing of its floor concept. So it was no surprise that on the first morning the Mercedes floor caught the eye, with its undulating forward section and detail work around the rear tyre. That’s an approach Aston Martin has also taken.
But the floor designs are by no means ubiquitous with others having ostensibly more conventional versions. We even saw a little experimentation during the day with some teams running versions with slightly different vane configurations. And we can expect to see plenty more evolution in this area over the coming months.
Carryover cars don’t preclude innovation
While this year’s crop of cars are built around much of the structure of the 2020 machines, there has been no lack of innovation. While this mainly focuses on detail work rather than grand new concepts, it still shows that even when the constraints are tight, F1 teams find a way. As well as the floor innovations, ever-more intricate bargeboards were on display with McLaren among those who had gone to great lengths to hide them previously. The bargeboards have been tweaked to work with the modified floor regulations, so will remain a critical part of managing the car’s airflow.
Alpine’s bulbous airbox/engine cover is innovative in that it’s moving in the opposite direction to most others with more being housed a little higher in the car. But it’s an outlier when it comes to that approach and drew comparisons with mid-1970s Ligiers! There were also different interpretations of the modified diffuser regulations on show as teams sought to claw back every piece of downforce lost to the rules tweaks. While none of these add up to a revolution, it proves there are still new ideas and fresh approaches in F1 and you can be certain personnel in all 10 teams will be intently studying their spy shots of rivals.
spitfire
Walty McWaltface
RIP Murray Walker.
www.urban75.net
Murray Walker has died, RIP
The voice of F1 has died. He was a major influence in my falling in love with F1. RIP Murray
www.urban75.net
beesonthewhatnow
going deaf for a living
Oh noRIP Murray Walker.
Murray Walker has died, RIP
The voice of F1 has died. He was a major influence in my falling in love with F1. RIP Murray
Buddy Bradley
Pantheistic solipsist
Just came to post that too. The voice of Formula 1 for so much of the time I watched it.
1%er
Well-Known Member
Bahrain F1 test Day 2
Valtteri Bottas set the quickest time of pre-season testing so far as Mercedes enjoyed a more productive second day at the Bahrain International Circuit. After troubles on the opening day of the three-day test, Bottas posted 58 laps in the afternoon on his way to the quickest time of the day. However, the Finn needed to bolt on a set of the softest tyres on offer, the red-banded C5 compound Pirelli, to dislodge AlpahTauri’s Pierre Gasly from top spot on the timesheet. Gasly too had used the C5 for his best time of the day and finished just 0.124 behind the Finn. Earlier in the day Bottas’ team-mate Lewis Hamilton also enjoyed a more productive outing with the seven-time world champion also getting through 58 laps of the desert circuit in the morning session, despite an early off.
Hamilton, though, restricted himself to hard tyres during his running and finished the day in 15th place on the timesheet. A number of drivers moved to soft-tyre running in the latter part of the afternoon session. Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll took third place on the timesheet with a late run on C5 tyres, posting a best time of 1:30.460 to finish 0.171s behind Bottas. Fourth place also went to a Mercedes-powered driver, with McLaren’s Lando Norris as little over a tenth behind Stroll with a best lap of 1:30.586. While the top three used the C5, Norris’ best time was delivered on the C4 compound. Norris was followed by C5 runners Antonio Giovinazzi of Alfa Romeo and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, while Williams’ Nicholas Latifi finished seventh thanks to a C5 time of 1.31.672. That was one thousandth of a second ahead of the eighth–placed Red Bull of Sergio Pérez, though the Mexican’s time was set on tyres three steps harder than those on the Williams man’s car.
Pérez spent the bulk of his running on the C2 hard tyre as day one’s quickest team focused on longer runs and an afternoon race simulation. Pérez’s 117 laps weren’t without issue, however, and after briefly being restricted to the garage by a technical issue in the morning he was sidelined for a longer spell in the afternoon when the left side engine cover of his car blew off while on track. With debris strewn across the start-finish straight the session was red-flagged. Pérez later rejoined the action and completed his race run. McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo finished in ninth place, while Fernando Alonso, making his return to F1 with Alpine, finished in 10th place as he too focused on the C2 hard tyre. AlphaTauri rookie Yuki Tsunoda was 11th on the timesheet ahead of Haas’ Mick Schumacher, the second Ferrari of Carlos Sainz and the second Haas of Nikita Mazepin. There was trouble though for Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel as gearbox problems restricted him to just 10 laps in the morning and he finished in 16th and last place.
Formula 1 Pre-Season Testing, Bahrain – Day Two
1 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 58 1:30.289
2 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri 87 1:30.413 0.124
3 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 71 1:30.460 0.171
4 Lando Norris McLaren 52 1:30.586 0.297
5 Antonio Giovinazzi Alfa Romeo 125 1:30.760 0.471
6 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 73 1:30.886 0.597
7 Nicholas Latifi Williams 132 1:31.672 1.383
8 Sergio Perez Red Bull 117 1:31.682 1.393
9 Daniel Ricciardo McLaren 52 1:32.215 1.926
10 Fernando Alonso Alpine 128 1:32.339 2.050
11 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 57 1:32.684 2.395
12 Mick Schumacher Haas 88 1:32.883 2.594
13 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 56 1:33.072 2.783
14 Nikita Mazepin Haas 76 1:33.101 2.812
15 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 58 1:33.399 3.110
16 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin 10 1:38.849 8.560
Valtteri Bottas set the quickest time of pre-season testing so far as Mercedes enjoyed a more productive second day at the Bahrain International Circuit. After troubles on the opening day of the three-day test, Bottas posted 58 laps in the afternoon on his way to the quickest time of the day. However, the Finn needed to bolt on a set of the softest tyres on offer, the red-banded C5 compound Pirelli, to dislodge AlpahTauri’s Pierre Gasly from top spot on the timesheet. Gasly too had used the C5 for his best time of the day and finished just 0.124 behind the Finn. Earlier in the day Bottas’ team-mate Lewis Hamilton also enjoyed a more productive outing with the seven-time world champion also getting through 58 laps of the desert circuit in the morning session, despite an early off.
Hamilton, though, restricted himself to hard tyres during his running and finished the day in 15th place on the timesheet. A number of drivers moved to soft-tyre running in the latter part of the afternoon session. Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll took third place on the timesheet with a late run on C5 tyres, posting a best time of 1:30.460 to finish 0.171s behind Bottas. Fourth place also went to a Mercedes-powered driver, with McLaren’s Lando Norris as little over a tenth behind Stroll with a best lap of 1:30.586. While the top three used the C5, Norris’ best time was delivered on the C4 compound. Norris was followed by C5 runners Antonio Giovinazzi of Alfa Romeo and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, while Williams’ Nicholas Latifi finished seventh thanks to a C5 time of 1.31.672. That was one thousandth of a second ahead of the eighth–placed Red Bull of Sergio Pérez, though the Mexican’s time was set on tyres three steps harder than those on the Williams man’s car.
Pérez spent the bulk of his running on the C2 hard tyre as day one’s quickest team focused on longer runs and an afternoon race simulation. Pérez’s 117 laps weren’t without issue, however, and after briefly being restricted to the garage by a technical issue in the morning he was sidelined for a longer spell in the afternoon when the left side engine cover of his car blew off while on track. With debris strewn across the start-finish straight the session was red-flagged. Pérez later rejoined the action and completed his race run. McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo finished in ninth place, while Fernando Alonso, making his return to F1 with Alpine, finished in 10th place as he too focused on the C2 hard tyre. AlphaTauri rookie Yuki Tsunoda was 11th on the timesheet ahead of Haas’ Mick Schumacher, the second Ferrari of Carlos Sainz and the second Haas of Nikita Mazepin. There was trouble though for Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel as gearbox problems restricted him to just 10 laps in the morning and he finished in 16th and last place.
Formula 1 Pre-Season Testing, Bahrain – Day Two
1 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 58 1:30.289
2 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri 87 1:30.413 0.124
3 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 71 1:30.460 0.171
4 Lando Norris McLaren 52 1:30.586 0.297
5 Antonio Giovinazzi Alfa Romeo 125 1:30.760 0.471
6 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 73 1:30.886 0.597
7 Nicholas Latifi Williams 132 1:31.672 1.383
8 Sergio Perez Red Bull 117 1:31.682 1.393
9 Daniel Ricciardo McLaren 52 1:32.215 1.926
10 Fernando Alonso Alpine 128 1:32.339 2.050
11 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 57 1:32.684 2.395
12 Mick Schumacher Haas 88 1:32.883 2.594
13 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 56 1:33.072 2.783
14 Nikita Mazepin Haas 76 1:33.101 2.812
15 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 58 1:33.399 3.110
16 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin 10 1:38.849 8.560
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Murray Walker obituary
Several generations of fans grew up listening to his voice describing the exploits of the likes of Jackie Stewart, James Hunt, Nigel Mansell, Damon Hill and Jenson Button. To the wider public he was best known for his occasional gaffes and the “trousers on fire” commentary style so famously described by Clive James. In fact at heart he was a hardworking and hugely knowledgeable enthusiast, who was admired and respected by the drivers and team bosses he talked about, and by everyone who knew him in paddocks across different motor sporting disciplines.
His fame extended well beyond the UK, since his commentaries went also to Australia, New Zealand, Canada (and thence much of the USA) and South Africa. More people listened to him in Holland and Belgium than followed their local broadcasters. He came into broadcasting in the slipstream of his famous father. The name Graham Walker figured large in his life, and Murray made no secret of the fact that he always tried to live up to his dad's legacy. “I was born into a motorsport family,” he explained. “My father was a professional racing motorcyclist from round about 1920 to '35. I was born in 1923, and I used to go on the continent with him and my mother, attending races. It struck me as being quite normal, because it's what my father did. But while I was going to Germany, Holland, Belgium and Italy it was quite unusual for people in England to have been to Scotland, or Wales, or Clacton - never mind a foreign country!' He won the TT, and was the equivalent of World Champion before the war. I suppose, and this is probably a masterpiece of over simplification, he was a Graham Hill rather than an Ayrton Senna. But by a combination of natural ability, bloody hard work and application, he got the job done. He had a gigantic personality. He was a wonderful man, he was a decent, honest, likeable person. He was very good with words, and a brilliant after dinner speaker. He would stand up without any notes and genuinely hold the room in thrall for an hour.”
On retiring from the saddle, it was only natural that Walker Sr should turn to broadcasting, and he became the BBC's voice of motorcycling. In those days, the TT was a major national event. “They used to have a team of five commentators around the course,” Murray recalled. “But the main point was back at the grandstand. He masterminded all that lot, and he did it brilliantly well. I've got recordings of him at home which I listen to with admiration and gigantic respect.”
In September 1939 the Walkers were at a trials event in Austria, where Graham was managing the British Army team. Warned by a coded telegram, they escaped hours before war was declared. As soon as he was old enough, Murray was in the thick of the action. It's hard to imagine the Walker of his commentary days issuing orders with his head sticking out of a tank turret, but his war service was serious stuff. “I went through Sandhurst, and I became God's gift to the British army, because I now had a Second Lieutenant's pip on my shoulder! The Royal Scot's Greys was a very much a cavalry regiment – Princess Di's father was one of my officers. To be honest I was a round peg in a square hole because I'm not a horsey person, but they weren't mechanical people, and it suited them very well that I was. I joined them in Normandy from Sandhurst. I fought through Holland and Germany, did the Rhine Crossing, and my regiment did the link-up with the Russians. Then I was promoted and became technical adjutant of the British Army of the Rhine Armoured Fighting Vehicle School at Belsen, the concentration camp which had been turned into an army establishment. I'd gone into the army as a boy, and I came out a man. It's a bit of a cliche, but it's true.”
It was perhaps inevitable that the de-mobbed Captain Walker should try to emulate his dad's two-wheeled achievements. “To be honest at first I wasn't particularly interested in the sport,” he admitted. “It was just something that was part of my life. My real interest didn't begin until after the war. I did get the bug then, and started racing motorcycles, but I wasn't very good. I won a race, had a few places, but I was better at trials riding. It slowly became clear to me that the flame wasn't burning brightly enough. I suppose I realised I would do better at business, and riding became a hobby as opposed to something I had to do better at.” Business meant spells in advertising for Dunlop and Aspro before “I got headhunted to change direction in the advertising business from being a client to being on the agency side. That was really my forte I had at last found something that suited me. By then I'd also started broadcasting.”
The family connection kickstarted Murray's part-time BBC career in 1949, initially with cars rather than bikes. His first radio outing was at the British GP at Silverstone, alongside Wimbledon guru and future Panorama host Max Robertson (“he knew as much about racing as I did about tennis!”), and the same year he made his TV debut at a rather more obscure hillclimb event in Kent. He also joined his dad to form a unique pairing for bikes. “I carried on broadcasting motorcycles with my father from 1949, when I started, to 1962, when he died. We were more like brothers than father and son. We had a great rapport and had a telepathic thing going. There was never any need to do this, 'Over to you Murray' stuff, because I knew when he was going to stop, and vice versa. I was also doing what I call the crumbs from the rich man's table in motor racing, which was the things Raymond Baxter didn't want to do or wasn't able to do.” Baxter was the anchorman of BBC's motor racing coverage, and Murray waited patiently in his shadow for two decades. “He did the big ones and I did the little ones. I did the F3, rallycross when it started, but also the odd Grand Prix. I was doing quite a lot for radio on cars, and I also worked for years for ITV, doing motorcycle scrambles, while working for the BBC. On two occasions I had commentaries going out on both channels simultaneously on a Saturday afternoon!”
Murray wasn’t frustrated that Baxter got priority: “You've got to remember that from Monday to Friday, I used to get in the office at 8am, and work a very long day. Every year I was with the agency was a record year. And that was my life. The broadcasting was my hobby. So it wasn't very frustrating, because I was doing a lot of travelling for the company, and I was very heavily occupied.” Walker was a huge success in advertising, where he looked after clients such as British Rail, the Co-Op, Beechams, Vauxhall, Kitekat, and, most famously, Mars Confectionery. He didn't dream up the slogans, but as account director he got them into the memories of millions.
One consolation was that Baxter wasn't getting much F1 work either. The BBC had never shown more than a handful of Grands Prix each year, and in the mid-seventies, the sport all but disappeared from British screens. It was largely a delayed reaction to the proliferation of cigarette sponsorship, while the arrival of Durex contraceptive backing at Team Surtees in 1976 didn’t help. BBC coverage of James Hunt's classic championship-winning '76 season was restricted to the finale in Japan and even that was shown first by ITV. Then in 1978, there was a massive turnaround. ITV threw its hat into the ring by showing three races live, and the BBC responded by experimenting with highlights on Sunday evenings. Thus Grand Prix was born, and Walker, not Baxter, got the job. The latter's star had waned since a Monaco GP four years earlier, when he was commentating in the London studio and Murray was at the circuit to send information back to the great man. The line failed, the crash-strewn race was chaotic, and an ill-informed Baxter floundered helplessly. Despite that disaster, the studio trickery continued in the early days of Grand Prix. Murray would do his research during practice, travel back to London on Saturday, watch the race arrive via satellite at the BBC, wait as the highlights package was cut together, and then add his commentary as it was broadcast that night knowing exactly what was going to happen next.
Even after Grand Prix gave him regular work, Murray continued with his day job. “I had an absolutely enthralling business life. I helped to build a company that when I joined in 1959 had one office in London, and by '82 was a 54-office business, in 26 countries, with about a $1.5bn turnover. I didn't do all of that, but I did a lot of it. And it was pretty stressful. I reached a point when I was 59 and a half when I thought, ‘Bugger this, I've got to stop something.' So I stopped the job a bit early. They gave me my full pension, bless 'em, and I thought I'd have a few broadcasts to occupy me.”
Several generations of fans grew up listening to his voice describing the exploits of the likes of Jackie Stewart, James Hunt, Nigel Mansell, Damon Hill and Jenson Button. To the wider public he was best known for his occasional gaffes and the “trousers on fire” commentary style so famously described by Clive James. In fact at heart he was a hardworking and hugely knowledgeable enthusiast, who was admired and respected by the drivers and team bosses he talked about, and by everyone who knew him in paddocks across different motor sporting disciplines.
His fame extended well beyond the UK, since his commentaries went also to Australia, New Zealand, Canada (and thence much of the USA) and South Africa. More people listened to him in Holland and Belgium than followed their local broadcasters. He came into broadcasting in the slipstream of his famous father. The name Graham Walker figured large in his life, and Murray made no secret of the fact that he always tried to live up to his dad's legacy. “I was born into a motorsport family,” he explained. “My father was a professional racing motorcyclist from round about 1920 to '35. I was born in 1923, and I used to go on the continent with him and my mother, attending races. It struck me as being quite normal, because it's what my father did. But while I was going to Germany, Holland, Belgium and Italy it was quite unusual for people in England to have been to Scotland, or Wales, or Clacton - never mind a foreign country!' He won the TT, and was the equivalent of World Champion before the war. I suppose, and this is probably a masterpiece of over simplification, he was a Graham Hill rather than an Ayrton Senna. But by a combination of natural ability, bloody hard work and application, he got the job done. He had a gigantic personality. He was a wonderful man, he was a decent, honest, likeable person. He was very good with words, and a brilliant after dinner speaker. He would stand up without any notes and genuinely hold the room in thrall for an hour.”
On retiring from the saddle, it was only natural that Walker Sr should turn to broadcasting, and he became the BBC's voice of motorcycling. In those days, the TT was a major national event. “They used to have a team of five commentators around the course,” Murray recalled. “But the main point was back at the grandstand. He masterminded all that lot, and he did it brilliantly well. I've got recordings of him at home which I listen to with admiration and gigantic respect.”
In September 1939 the Walkers were at a trials event in Austria, where Graham was managing the British Army team. Warned by a coded telegram, they escaped hours before war was declared. As soon as he was old enough, Murray was in the thick of the action. It's hard to imagine the Walker of his commentary days issuing orders with his head sticking out of a tank turret, but his war service was serious stuff. “I went through Sandhurst, and I became God's gift to the British army, because I now had a Second Lieutenant's pip on my shoulder! The Royal Scot's Greys was a very much a cavalry regiment – Princess Di's father was one of my officers. To be honest I was a round peg in a square hole because I'm not a horsey person, but they weren't mechanical people, and it suited them very well that I was. I joined them in Normandy from Sandhurst. I fought through Holland and Germany, did the Rhine Crossing, and my regiment did the link-up with the Russians. Then I was promoted and became technical adjutant of the British Army of the Rhine Armoured Fighting Vehicle School at Belsen, the concentration camp which had been turned into an army establishment. I'd gone into the army as a boy, and I came out a man. It's a bit of a cliche, but it's true.”
It was perhaps inevitable that the de-mobbed Captain Walker should try to emulate his dad's two-wheeled achievements. “To be honest at first I wasn't particularly interested in the sport,” he admitted. “It was just something that was part of my life. My real interest didn't begin until after the war. I did get the bug then, and started racing motorcycles, but I wasn't very good. I won a race, had a few places, but I was better at trials riding. It slowly became clear to me that the flame wasn't burning brightly enough. I suppose I realised I would do better at business, and riding became a hobby as opposed to something I had to do better at.” Business meant spells in advertising for Dunlop and Aspro before “I got headhunted to change direction in the advertising business from being a client to being on the agency side. That was really my forte I had at last found something that suited me. By then I'd also started broadcasting.”
The family connection kickstarted Murray's part-time BBC career in 1949, initially with cars rather than bikes. His first radio outing was at the British GP at Silverstone, alongside Wimbledon guru and future Panorama host Max Robertson (“he knew as much about racing as I did about tennis!”), and the same year he made his TV debut at a rather more obscure hillclimb event in Kent. He also joined his dad to form a unique pairing for bikes. “I carried on broadcasting motorcycles with my father from 1949, when I started, to 1962, when he died. We were more like brothers than father and son. We had a great rapport and had a telepathic thing going. There was never any need to do this, 'Over to you Murray' stuff, because I knew when he was going to stop, and vice versa. I was also doing what I call the crumbs from the rich man's table in motor racing, which was the things Raymond Baxter didn't want to do or wasn't able to do.” Baxter was the anchorman of BBC's motor racing coverage, and Murray waited patiently in his shadow for two decades. “He did the big ones and I did the little ones. I did the F3, rallycross when it started, but also the odd Grand Prix. I was doing quite a lot for radio on cars, and I also worked for years for ITV, doing motorcycle scrambles, while working for the BBC. On two occasions I had commentaries going out on both channels simultaneously on a Saturday afternoon!”
Murray wasn’t frustrated that Baxter got priority: “You've got to remember that from Monday to Friday, I used to get in the office at 8am, and work a very long day. Every year I was with the agency was a record year. And that was my life. The broadcasting was my hobby. So it wasn't very frustrating, because I was doing a lot of travelling for the company, and I was very heavily occupied.” Walker was a huge success in advertising, where he looked after clients such as British Rail, the Co-Op, Beechams, Vauxhall, Kitekat, and, most famously, Mars Confectionery. He didn't dream up the slogans, but as account director he got them into the memories of millions.
One consolation was that Baxter wasn't getting much F1 work either. The BBC had never shown more than a handful of Grands Prix each year, and in the mid-seventies, the sport all but disappeared from British screens. It was largely a delayed reaction to the proliferation of cigarette sponsorship, while the arrival of Durex contraceptive backing at Team Surtees in 1976 didn’t help. BBC coverage of James Hunt's classic championship-winning '76 season was restricted to the finale in Japan and even that was shown first by ITV. Then in 1978, there was a massive turnaround. ITV threw its hat into the ring by showing three races live, and the BBC responded by experimenting with highlights on Sunday evenings. Thus Grand Prix was born, and Walker, not Baxter, got the job. The latter's star had waned since a Monaco GP four years earlier, when he was commentating in the London studio and Murray was at the circuit to send information back to the great man. The line failed, the crash-strewn race was chaotic, and an ill-informed Baxter floundered helplessly. Despite that disaster, the studio trickery continued in the early days of Grand Prix. Murray would do his research during practice, travel back to London on Saturday, watch the race arrive via satellite at the BBC, wait as the highlights package was cut together, and then add his commentary as it was broadcast that night knowing exactly what was going to happen next.
Even after Grand Prix gave him regular work, Murray continued with his day job. “I had an absolutely enthralling business life. I helped to build a company that when I joined in 1959 had one office in London, and by '82 was a 54-office business, in 26 countries, with about a $1.5bn turnover. I didn't do all of that, but I did a lot of it. And it was pretty stressful. I reached a point when I was 59 and a half when I thought, ‘Bugger this, I've got to stop something.' So I stopped the job a bit early. They gave me my full pension, bless 'em, and I thought I'd have a few broadcasts to occupy me.”
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Well-Known Member
(continued)
Grand Prix's audience grew, especially after James Hunt came on board to provide unexpurgated expert opinion. Walker was wary of Hunt at first, but they became firm friends. Together, they began to cover most of the races in situ, a practice which increased after Sunday Grandstand created a new live slot on BBC2 in the mid-eighties. Budget constraints meant that as late as 1993 Murray didn't get to some events outside Europe, although he tried to maintain the illusion (‘We can't see the pits from here, but...’). Live broadcasts added to the pressure, and increased the possibility that something might go wrong. Part of Walker's enduring appeal was the prospect that he might trip over his tongue, or congratulate someone on their winning drive just before they slid into a barrier. Millions of armchair fans liked to catch him out, but he claimed that it didn’t bother him.
“No, it doesn't actually, although I don't wish to sound complacent. First of all I'm a human being, and all human beings make mistakes. But my consolation is that what people say are mistakes are, in my eyes, a slip of the tongue or a failure to observe something because I wasn't watching the screen, because I had to do something else. Which explains it - it may not excuse it, but it explains it. If people were getting at me for cocking it up because I didn't know enough about it, hadn't done my homework, hadn't applied myself to it, then I would be extremely worried. But happily for me, it seems to have become a loveable trademark and that gets me off the hook to a certain extent. I have to say, a bit cynically I suppose, that it's better they say something about you than say nothing.'
Murray had the last laugh. He took full advantage of the jibes and ritual humiliation on BBC Sports Personality of The Year to become a well-paid after dinner speaker, and a much wanted name in the TV advertising world that he knew so well. Many viewers didn't know how difficult his job was, especially after pit stops became standard and made races infinitely more complex. “I think it's more frustrating with my sport than most others,” he explained. “Football, for example, is a fairly simple sport. You can see there are 11 blokes on each side, and what they're trying to do is kick the ball between these two posts. But even I don't know the half about what goes on inside a Grand Prix team, and I've been observing it and trying to find out about it for years. So I am talking from the point of view of somebody who doesn't know it all, to somebody who knows infinitely less than I do, who probably isn't particularly interested in the sport, and who has just had his lunch, taken his dog for a walk, and turned the TV on. I'm talking here about most of the viewers, not the anoraks. And somehow we have got to tell them what it's all about.”
And then there was the constant knowledge that drivers could get hurt, or worse. When Gerhard Berger sat helpless in the remains of his burning Ferrari at Imola in 1989 Walker said simply and with dignity that nothing he could say could add to what the viewer was seeing for himself. “I thought Berger was dead and his body was being cremated and we were live on television,” he admitted. “But you can't say, ‘My God he's been killed and he's being burnt to a cinder.’ But nor can you say, ‘Oh he's alright. Don't worry, they'll soon put it out and he'll be right as rain tomorrow.’ Because you don't know that either. This is the difficult bit. You are live, talking to millions of people worldwide. In these stressful situations it is a big problem to get it right, not be too extreme one way or the other. It becomes instinct, or feel for what you should say or what you shouldn't say, rather than consciously thinking about it. If you thought about it you probably wouldn't find the right words, or get them out at the right time.”
Thankfully Berger was not seriously hurt. Five years later Ayrton Senna crashed at the same corner. His Williams looked barely damaged as the TV helicopter lingered above it, but as the seconds ticked away it became apparent that something was seriously amiss. Murray had to keep talking, at least until the BBC director cut back to the studio. "The blackest day whilst I've been commentating and someone has been killed. There's never been a situation where such a gigantic and charismatic personality has been involved, and where it was literally happening in front of millions of people, to whom you were having to convey the facts responsibly, without going over the top too much emotionally. It was an extremely difficult experience.”
In contrast two years later Walker experienced one of the highs of his career, famously saying that he had to stop due to a lump in his throat as Damon Hill crossed the line in Suzuka to clinch the 1996 World Championship. He also received an OBE for services to broadcasting that year. A few months earlier the news that the BBC had lost its F1 deal to ITV for 1997 came as a huge shock. “I had been doing an after lunch speech," he recalled. "I got into the car to drive the 20 miles home, turned on the radio for the four o’clock news, and the top item was ‘The BBC has lost the Grand Prix rights to ITV. I thought, ‘Well bugger me!. It was a complete bolt from the blue. Nobody knew about it. Even Jonathan Martin, the head of sport, didn't know about it. So yes, it was a bit of a choker, to put it mildly. Shock, alarm, despondency, concern, outrage, worry... But then on reflection, I said to myself, ‘Well, I've been doing it a bloody long time, I'm at the end of my career rather than the beginning. If it stops here that's my hard luck, but I couldn't have gone on very much longer anyway, so maybe this isn't a bad time to stop.”
It was far from end of his career. It soon became apparent that ITV wanted to retain Walker’s services, and he duly signed up. He would continue as lead commentator for five seasons, forming a brilliant new team with Martin Brundle, before finally calling time at the end of 2001. “There's a lot to be said for getting out on the top,” he noted a few years earlier. “It's the sort of decision that Jackie Stewart made so well, and that others, like Graham Hill, made so badly. I could go out on top with whatever reputation I've got intact, or I can try to make a contribution to them doing it properly. I'll know when I'm not doing it as well as I want to do it, before anybody else does. And I like to think that I will have the sense to say, ‘That's it.’ I don't want to be a bloody old has been.”
However even after 2001 he didn’t stop, continuing to contribute to features and interviews on ITV, BBC Radio 5 Live, Sky and Channel 4, and writing a hugely successful autobiography. Health issues slowed him down in his nineties, but he always kept himself up to speed with the latest F1 gossip. He didn’t have time to pursue any other hobbies – simply because he didn’t have any. “I'm a one-track mind. My wife says if it hasn't got an engine, I'm not interested. I'm incapable of remembering the minor things of life, like going to the shops and getting something, if it hasn't got an engine noise attached to it! But I'm working at my hobby. Most people, when they finish their working life, look forward to developing their stamp collection or whatever. Well, I'm doing that.”
Grand Prix's audience grew, especially after James Hunt came on board to provide unexpurgated expert opinion. Walker was wary of Hunt at first, but they became firm friends. Together, they began to cover most of the races in situ, a practice which increased after Sunday Grandstand created a new live slot on BBC2 in the mid-eighties. Budget constraints meant that as late as 1993 Murray didn't get to some events outside Europe, although he tried to maintain the illusion (‘We can't see the pits from here, but...’). Live broadcasts added to the pressure, and increased the possibility that something might go wrong. Part of Walker's enduring appeal was the prospect that he might trip over his tongue, or congratulate someone on their winning drive just before they slid into a barrier. Millions of armchair fans liked to catch him out, but he claimed that it didn’t bother him.
“No, it doesn't actually, although I don't wish to sound complacent. First of all I'm a human being, and all human beings make mistakes. But my consolation is that what people say are mistakes are, in my eyes, a slip of the tongue or a failure to observe something because I wasn't watching the screen, because I had to do something else. Which explains it - it may not excuse it, but it explains it. If people were getting at me for cocking it up because I didn't know enough about it, hadn't done my homework, hadn't applied myself to it, then I would be extremely worried. But happily for me, it seems to have become a loveable trademark and that gets me off the hook to a certain extent. I have to say, a bit cynically I suppose, that it's better they say something about you than say nothing.'
Murray had the last laugh. He took full advantage of the jibes and ritual humiliation on BBC Sports Personality of The Year to become a well-paid after dinner speaker, and a much wanted name in the TV advertising world that he knew so well. Many viewers didn't know how difficult his job was, especially after pit stops became standard and made races infinitely more complex. “I think it's more frustrating with my sport than most others,” he explained. “Football, for example, is a fairly simple sport. You can see there are 11 blokes on each side, and what they're trying to do is kick the ball between these two posts. But even I don't know the half about what goes on inside a Grand Prix team, and I've been observing it and trying to find out about it for years. So I am talking from the point of view of somebody who doesn't know it all, to somebody who knows infinitely less than I do, who probably isn't particularly interested in the sport, and who has just had his lunch, taken his dog for a walk, and turned the TV on. I'm talking here about most of the viewers, not the anoraks. And somehow we have got to tell them what it's all about.”
And then there was the constant knowledge that drivers could get hurt, or worse. When Gerhard Berger sat helpless in the remains of his burning Ferrari at Imola in 1989 Walker said simply and with dignity that nothing he could say could add to what the viewer was seeing for himself. “I thought Berger was dead and his body was being cremated and we were live on television,” he admitted. “But you can't say, ‘My God he's been killed and he's being burnt to a cinder.’ But nor can you say, ‘Oh he's alright. Don't worry, they'll soon put it out and he'll be right as rain tomorrow.’ Because you don't know that either. This is the difficult bit. You are live, talking to millions of people worldwide. In these stressful situations it is a big problem to get it right, not be too extreme one way or the other. It becomes instinct, or feel for what you should say or what you shouldn't say, rather than consciously thinking about it. If you thought about it you probably wouldn't find the right words, or get them out at the right time.”
Thankfully Berger was not seriously hurt. Five years later Ayrton Senna crashed at the same corner. His Williams looked barely damaged as the TV helicopter lingered above it, but as the seconds ticked away it became apparent that something was seriously amiss. Murray had to keep talking, at least until the BBC director cut back to the studio. "The blackest day whilst I've been commentating and someone has been killed. There's never been a situation where such a gigantic and charismatic personality has been involved, and where it was literally happening in front of millions of people, to whom you were having to convey the facts responsibly, without going over the top too much emotionally. It was an extremely difficult experience.”
In contrast two years later Walker experienced one of the highs of his career, famously saying that he had to stop due to a lump in his throat as Damon Hill crossed the line in Suzuka to clinch the 1996 World Championship. He also received an OBE for services to broadcasting that year. A few months earlier the news that the BBC had lost its F1 deal to ITV for 1997 came as a huge shock. “I had been doing an after lunch speech," he recalled. "I got into the car to drive the 20 miles home, turned on the radio for the four o’clock news, and the top item was ‘The BBC has lost the Grand Prix rights to ITV. I thought, ‘Well bugger me!. It was a complete bolt from the blue. Nobody knew about it. Even Jonathan Martin, the head of sport, didn't know about it. So yes, it was a bit of a choker, to put it mildly. Shock, alarm, despondency, concern, outrage, worry... But then on reflection, I said to myself, ‘Well, I've been doing it a bloody long time, I'm at the end of my career rather than the beginning. If it stops here that's my hard luck, but I couldn't have gone on very much longer anyway, so maybe this isn't a bad time to stop.”
It was far from end of his career. It soon became apparent that ITV wanted to retain Walker’s services, and he duly signed up. He would continue as lead commentator for five seasons, forming a brilliant new team with Martin Brundle, before finally calling time at the end of 2001. “There's a lot to be said for getting out on the top,” he noted a few years earlier. “It's the sort of decision that Jackie Stewart made so well, and that others, like Graham Hill, made so badly. I could go out on top with whatever reputation I've got intact, or I can try to make a contribution to them doing it properly. I'll know when I'm not doing it as well as I want to do it, before anybody else does. And I like to think that I will have the sense to say, ‘That's it.’ I don't want to be a bloody old has been.”
However even after 2001 he didn’t stop, continuing to contribute to features and interviews on ITV, BBC Radio 5 Live, Sky and Channel 4, and writing a hugely successful autobiography. Health issues slowed him down in his nineties, but he always kept himself up to speed with the latest F1 gossip. He didn’t have time to pursue any other hobbies – simply because he didn’t have any. “I'm a one-track mind. My wife says if it hasn't got an engine, I'm not interested. I'm incapable of remembering the minor things of life, like going to the shops and getting something, if it hasn't got an engine noise attached to it! But I'm working at my hobby. Most people, when they finish their working life, look forward to developing their stamp collection or whatever. Well, I'm doing that.”
1%er
Well-Known Member
Results third day of testing
Fast times in a winter test don't mean much of course, but they do look good. Especially for Yuki Tsunoda, who on his debut this weekend set the second-fastest time of the day, just behind Max Verstappen. All the others didn't come close to these two. This is partly because AlphaTauri offered their new driver the chance to do some qualifying laps on the softest tyre (C5). We can therefore assume that his lap was at the limit. Nevertheless, Max Verstappen, who drove on the harder C4, was one-tenth faster than the Japanese. Just like Friday, he ended the test as the fastest. He did drive a few laps less than the competition today, but that's probably because the rest of the test went so well for Red Bull Racing. Lewis Hamilton is in fifth place, just over a second down. We have no idea how much fuel he was carrying on that lap. Just like on Saturday, Hamilton had a hard time keeping the W12 on track and spun when starting his fast lap.
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 64 1:28.960
2 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 91 1:29.053 0.093
3 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 79 1:29.611 0.651
4 Kimi Raikkonen Alfa Romeo 166 1:29.766 0.806
5 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 54 1:30.025 1.065
6 George Russell Williams 158 1:30.117 1.157
7 Daniel Ricciardo McLaren 76 1:30.144 1.184
8 Sergio Perez Red Bull 49 1:30.187 1.227
9 Fernando Alonso Alpine 78 1:30.318 1.358
10 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 80 1:30.486 1.526
11 Lando Norris McLaren 56 1:30.661 1.701
12 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri 76 1:30.828 1.868
13 Esteban Ocon Alpine 61 1:31.310 2.350
14 Nikita Mazepin Haas 67 1:31.531 2.571
15 Mick Schumacher Haas 78 1:32.053 3.093
16 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 86 1:32.406 3.446
17 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin 56 1:35.041 6.081
18 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 80 1:36.100 7.140
Fast times in a winter test don't mean much of course, but they do look good. Especially for Yuki Tsunoda, who on his debut this weekend set the second-fastest time of the day, just behind Max Verstappen. All the others didn't come close to these two. This is partly because AlphaTauri offered their new driver the chance to do some qualifying laps on the softest tyre (C5). We can therefore assume that his lap was at the limit. Nevertheless, Max Verstappen, who drove on the harder C4, was one-tenth faster than the Japanese. Just like Friday, he ended the test as the fastest. He did drive a few laps less than the competition today, but that's probably because the rest of the test went so well for Red Bull Racing. Lewis Hamilton is in fifth place, just over a second down. We have no idea how much fuel he was carrying on that lap. Just like on Saturday, Hamilton had a hard time keeping the W12 on track and spun when starting his fast lap.
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 64 1:28.960
2 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 91 1:29.053 0.093
3 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 79 1:29.611 0.651
4 Kimi Raikkonen Alfa Romeo 166 1:29.766 0.806
5 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 54 1:30.025 1.065
6 George Russell Williams 158 1:30.117 1.157
7 Daniel Ricciardo McLaren 76 1:30.144 1.184
8 Sergio Perez Red Bull 49 1:30.187 1.227
9 Fernando Alonso Alpine 78 1:30.318 1.358
10 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 80 1:30.486 1.526
11 Lando Norris McLaren 56 1:30.661 1.701
12 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri 76 1:30.828 1.868
13 Esteban Ocon Alpine 61 1:31.310 2.350
14 Nikita Mazepin Haas 67 1:31.531 2.571
15 Mick Schumacher Haas 78 1:32.053 3.093
16 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 86 1:32.406 3.446
17 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin 56 1:35.041 6.081
18 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 80 1:36.100 7.140
Lord Camomile
Yipchaa!
This video (Day 1) just disappeared about five minutes into watching it! Apparently it's been removed by the uploader
Plenty of reasons it might happen, I guess, just weird to see it happen while I'm watching!
Limejuice
Well-Known Member
I've just finished the third one. Quick, watch the Murray Walker tribute that forms the first half before it vanishes!This video (Day 1) just disappeared about five minutes into watching it! Apparently it's been removed by the uploader
Plenty of reasons it might happen, I guess, just weird to see it happen while I'm watching!
Limejuice
Well-Known Member
I've just finished the third one. Quick, watch the Murray Walker tribute that forms the first half before it vanishes!This video (Day 1) just disappeared about five minutes into watching it! Apparently it's been removed by the uploader
Plenty of reasons it might happen, I guess, just weird to see it happen while I'm watching!
1%er
Well-Known Member
Sabine Schmitz passes away
Sabine Schmitz has passed away (she was only 51). The only female winner of the 24 Hours of Nürburgring died of a rare form of cancer.
The queen of the Nürburgring
Schmitz became famous in 1996 when she became the first woman ever to win the 24 Hours of Nürburgring. She achieved this victory together with Johannes Scheid and Hans Widmann in the BMW M3. A year later, she did it again and won the VLN- championship. Later, Schmidt impressed with her own team Frikadelli Racing, which she had founded with her husband Klaus Abbelen. However, Schmitz had to deal with a rare form of cancer in 2017. The woman received several chemo treatments, but cancer kept coming back. In 2019, Schmitz still crawled behind the wheel, but she had to quit in 2020 with pain in her heart. In the United kingdom, she perhaps is best known for her role on the BBC show Top Gear. She briefly joined Jeremy Clarkson on the show back in 2004. When Chris Evans revamped the show in 2015, she became part of the presenting team.
Sabine Schmitz has passed away (she was only 51). The only female winner of the 24 Hours of Nürburgring died of a rare form of cancer.
The queen of the Nürburgring
Schmitz became famous in 1996 when she became the first woman ever to win the 24 Hours of Nürburgring. She achieved this victory together with Johannes Scheid and Hans Widmann in the BMW M3. A year later, she did it again and won the VLN- championship. Later, Schmidt impressed with her own team Frikadelli Racing, which she had founded with her husband Klaus Abbelen. However, Schmitz had to deal with a rare form of cancer in 2017. The woman received several chemo treatments, but cancer kept coming back. In 2019, Schmitz still crawled behind the wheel, but she had to quit in 2020 with pain in her heart. In the United kingdom, she perhaps is best known for her role on the BBC show Top Gear. She briefly joined Jeremy Clarkson on the show back in 2004. When Chris Evans revamped the show in 2015, she became part of the presenting team.
beesonthewhatnow
going deaf for a living
RIP Sabine.
This is one of the most incredible bits of driving you’ll ever see.
This is one of the most incredible bits of driving you’ll ever see.
spitfire
Walty McWaltface
Sabine Schmitz passes away
Sabine Schmitz has passed away (she was only 51). The only female winner of the 24 Hours of Nürburgring died of a rare form of cancer.
The queen of the Nürburgring
Schmitz became famous in 1996 when she became the first woman ever to win the 24 Hours of Nürburgring. She achieved this victory together with Johannes Scheid and Hans Widmann in the BMW M3. A year later, she did it again and won the VLN- championship. Later, Schmidt impressed with her own team Frikadelli Racing, which she had founded with her husband Klaus Abbelen. However, Schmitz had to deal with a rare form of cancer in 2017. The woman received several chemo treatments, but cancer kept coming back. In 2019, Schmitz still crawled behind the wheel, but she had to quit in 2020 with pain in her heart. In the United kingdom, she perhaps is best known for her role on the BBC show Top Gear. She briefly joined Jeremy Clarkson on the show back in 2004. When Chris Evans revamped the show in 2015, she became part of the presenting team.
That's really sad, she was a real character. And a great driver.
beesonthewhatnow
going deaf for a living
She once made a friend of mine throw up in the ring taxi 
Going on various forum/YouTube comments he wasn’t the only one either
Going on various forum/YouTube comments he wasn’t the only one either
1%er
Well-Known Member
Here’s the Jeddah street circuit
F1 has revealed the new street circuit located in Jeddah’s Corniche district on the Red Sea, approximately 12km north of the city centre, on the country’s west coast. The locals hope that a spectacular coastal backdrop and a night race will provide an exciting new event for F1 fans, if they are allowed to attend. Developed in partnership by Tilke Engineers and F1’s own motorsports division, the circuit design uses the long, sweeping roads along the Corniche, using existing roads as much as possible. An atypical street circuit with fast flowing with high speed esses and chicanes as well as long full throttle sections, the Jeddah Street Circuit is designed to deliver spectacular racing.
Fake Ferrari & McLaren F1 cars seized
The Ferrari SF90, created to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the Scuderia designed and built by Enzo Ferrari, was the Prancing Horse’s last competitive car in Formula 1, winning a few races with Charles Leclerc and Sebastian Vettel before its decline with the 2020 car, the SF1000. Now, the SF21, the car created to redeem a bad year, will be driven by Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz. However, an unauthorised fibreglass replica of the SF90 from Brazil was confiscated in La Spezia by the Guardia di Finanza and the Customs Office at the port of La Spezia.
The 1:1 scale single-seater was without mechanical and electrical parts and was discovered in a container which arrived in Italy directly from Brazil and was then sent to a car dealer in Tuscany. Investigators sent photographic evidence of the reproduction to Ferrari SPA, which in turn confirmed that the reproduction was of a protected model registered as a Community design. The livery is devoid of any kind of sponsors or logos, but the reference to the SF90 is quite clear, which is why the seizure was made by the police led by Major Luigi Mennella.
The car is not the only unauthorised reproduction that has been seized by the police, in fact, alongside the Red Ferrari, a McLaren MP4/4, one of the most extraordinary Formula 1 cars in history, was recovered. The car that raced in the 1988 season and gave rise to one of motorsport’s greatest rivalries, that between Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna. It was also the first car to give the late Brazilian driver, who died in Bologna on 1 May 1994, his world championship title.
F1 has revealed the new street circuit located in Jeddah’s Corniche district on the Red Sea, approximately 12km north of the city centre, on the country’s west coast. The locals hope that a spectacular coastal backdrop and a night race will provide an exciting new event for F1 fans, if they are allowed to attend. Developed in partnership by Tilke Engineers and F1’s own motorsports division, the circuit design uses the long, sweeping roads along the Corniche, using existing roads as much as possible. An atypical street circuit with fast flowing with high speed esses and chicanes as well as long full throttle sections, the Jeddah Street Circuit is designed to deliver spectacular racing.
Fake Ferrari & McLaren F1 cars seized
The Ferrari SF90, created to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the Scuderia designed and built by Enzo Ferrari, was the Prancing Horse’s last competitive car in Formula 1, winning a few races with Charles Leclerc and Sebastian Vettel before its decline with the 2020 car, the SF1000. Now, the SF21, the car created to redeem a bad year, will be driven by Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz. However, an unauthorised fibreglass replica of the SF90 from Brazil was confiscated in La Spezia by the Guardia di Finanza and the Customs Office at the port of La Spezia.
The 1:1 scale single-seater was without mechanical and electrical parts and was discovered in a container which arrived in Italy directly from Brazil and was then sent to a car dealer in Tuscany. Investigators sent photographic evidence of the reproduction to Ferrari SPA, which in turn confirmed that the reproduction was of a protected model registered as a Community design. The livery is devoid of any kind of sponsors or logos, but the reference to the SF90 is quite clear, which is why the seizure was made by the police led by Major Luigi Mennella.
The car is not the only unauthorised reproduction that has been seized by the police, in fact, alongside the Red Ferrari, a McLaren MP4/4, one of the most extraordinary Formula 1 cars in history, was recovered. The car that raced in the 1988 season and gave rise to one of motorsport’s greatest rivalries, that between Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna. It was also the first car to give the late Brazilian driver, who died in Bologna on 1 May 1994, his world championship title.
