Bob Barnard Track Engineering

I commented the other day that if Boullier wanted Grosjean in F1 then he should give him a seat at his team, so what does he do? He hires Fauzy, a 28 year old Malaysian who has shown nothing in his previous trip to F1. Must be the long arm of Proton the Malaysian car maker backing Lotus cars, and they need some backing. Joe Saward in his blog today presented their latest earnings (losses) figures and the need for $64 in finance with a $700m loan being sought. These are the guys who intend taking over the world?  The naming court case is due to start Monday, so they had better get talking if they want to settle this as Bahar says.

While the Canadians are expressing concern over the Lotus fag packet livery Marlboro confirms it will continue to sponsor Ferrari and Ducati. How does that work? Are the Canadians color blind. Do they not sell Marlboro in Canada so it's OK? More power to Marlboro, if it is legal to sell them then it should be legal to advertise, or is the tax too convenient? I am no fan of smoking, in fact if cigarettes were banned it would suit me just fine, but I have been on the receiving end of this hypocrisy.

Qatar seems to be quietly taking over motorsport, along with some of its Gulf friends. Qatar Holdings LLC. is buying more of Porsche, and strengthening links with Williams. Joe again believes that this is a move to bring in VW-Porsche to F1, but that was countered by Porsche saying today that Le Mans is more interesting, affordable and a lower risk of failure than F1. I am old enough to remember the last time Porsche ran in F1, and it was not pretty.

The Mayor of Rome now says he wants the Olympics in 2020 rather than the F1 race, so I guess that is over. Can my Italian friends keep an eye on Flammini's land deal?

A1GP is to be resurrected it seems as A10 World Series, whatever that is. Never quite understood what A1GP was about except losing bucket loads of money. This has to rely on a big series sponsor and the promoters paying lots of money to have a race, without any "name" drivers, at least none that the general punter would know, and in spec cars. "The ethos is completely different in terms of the business model." a spokesman for A10GP said. It had better be. The series will run in the off season in non-European countries, so perhaps these racing starved people will not care who is driving? Now I know there are a bunch of Englishmen who just love "Our Jens," but I have never bought in to the jingoistic "our nation is better than yours" concept in motor racing. I, and I would believe most fans, like drivers and cars from wherever. Drivers I admire because of their ability and character, not nationality, and cars for their engineering and style. I can admire both the Peugeot and Audi equally at a Le Mans race without being French or German, and in the case of A1(0)GP we do not even have the difference in nationality of the cars, other than the color, and who really cares about that? We already have the Superleague based on soccer teams, which probably has more chance of motivating followers, although despite the success of my soccer team's car, Tottenham, I personally am unlikely to walk across the street to watch it. Good luck.

I loved yesterday"s quote from Lotus Renault designer James Allison who said the design of this year's car "would be on the brave end of brave." That's what we want to see, and Chapman would be proud. Or was it Lotus drivers who were the brave ones?

So Martin Whitmarsh believes that Abu Dhabi needs to make changes to the track to correct the "flawed" design. I think I may have been saying that from the start, but most people were blinded by the hotel and marina and all the other pieces of the development that have nothing to do with the quality of the race track. Apparently Whitmarsh saw the problems from the beginning and presumably said nothing or no one listened. As he said "There is a massive commitment here to make this a great venue, so in the scheme of things priority should be given to looking at the circuit." My emphasis. Richard Cregan the circuit boss says that "we are looking at different circuits..and we will pick the best bits and improve the circuit." Seeing as how Yas Marina is almost the last track built I would ask why they did not do that before they built it? As I said in Germany, we are being left with a legacy of a generation of bad tracks.

We enter the dark days of winter, well for most of you anyway, it is still sunny and 70 degrees here, so finding interesting items to comment on may be difficult, but there will be driver changes and team news, so I will endeavor to keep you amused and thinking. Congratulations to Jimmy Johnson for his fifth Sprint Cup Championship, not that I watched much of it, and I was surprised that Homestead had empty seats given the three way title fight. Taking nothing away from Jimmy, and obviously he and his crew chief do a great job, but it is difficult for me to reconcile the number of very good drivers in that series who cannot beat Jimmy to the title.

The Porsche hybrid cleaned up at the awards dinner in Cologne last week. Williams won for their KERS system which is fitted to the Porsche GT3 which won the car of the year and was designed by the person who won the engineer of the year. Is that a full house or royal flush?

In the absence of much else, and after reading Murphy The Bear's latest missive, my thoughts turned to Audi. Now Audi ran in the ALMS for most of the last decade under various guises of teams, mostly Champion from Florida. Audi now say that it is not likely to race in ALMS next year as it needs Audi North America to step up with some money. I can understand Peugeot not bothering with anything but Sebring or Petit, they have not sold cars here for years, mores the pity. It is only when these two turn up that ALMS really draws a crowd.

Now stop me if I'm wrong, but Audi seems to sell a  lot of cars in the US. So why is Audi NA not interested? They can sell enough without using racing as advertising? Maybe now they are one company they do not want to compete with Porsche? Americans do not like diesels? They should, and perhaps showing a diesel winning is the best advertising. Anyone from Audi NA saying anything publicly? It seems we are not even to see the Audi R8 in GTC next year.

We have the Portugese MotoGP to look forward to this weekend and Capirossi is to ride. These guys are tough. Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo breaks his collar bone and it sounds like he is out for most of the season. GP riders would just plate it and be back in a couple of weeks. It's not his throwing arm. I know, he will get hit and hurt it again, but so could the GP rider. Doohan rode with a broken leg for most of a season, shades of Bret Favre.

Curious that the second most important sportscar race is on and Autosport web page does not mention it, not even under the ALMS tag? We have Peugeot and Audi going head to head with two cars each, unlike Silverstone, and they covered that race. I know the ALMS is not seen as it once was. Quoting Gary Watkins in the September 6 Autosport, "The harsh truth is is that, despite the rhetoric from the series bosses, the ALMS is a pale imitation of its former self." As Gary says, "should Audi return and be joined by another big gun in LMP1, the ALMS can return to its former glory." That is what makes the absence of news from this weekend mystifying, we have just that scenario, and it has drawn the fans to the track by all accounts. Even SPEED has opted to show us all ten hours! Must not be a truck race on.

Practice is showing how close the race is going to be. Yes the Peugeots are fast, 204 mph at the end of the main straight, and lap times in the 1 min 8 seconds. Audi are about a second behind with the "young guys" car, who have less experience here than McNish and company. Maybe Audi know the race is not won in practice. In fact many teams opted to sit out the wet second practice to install their race set up and engine, saving the mechanics sleep last night. They commented that getting the race set up was more important than qualifying.

In LMP2 the Highcroft Honda is just in front of the Cytosport Porsche, and the GT2 class is its usual close run thing, but with the Patron Ferrari with its nose just in front. All drivers were commenting on the amount of traffic so the race is going to be fraught for the drivers and interesting for us. Luck and patience is going to determine who comes out on top, just ask Pirro.I liked Anthony Davidson's comment that Road Atlanta is a "proper mans track."

The Porsche Hybrid is performing extremely well, as you would expect from a car that almost won the Nurburgring 24 hours. Even though it is racing itself the comparison with the GT2 cars will be inevitable, and should it beat them, what then? Porsche are making statements about rejoining F1, and Audi staying with LMP1. It has been a long time since Porsche ran its own F1 car, without much success, but supplied engines to help McLaren win world championships in the mid eighties. It seems that is likely to be the way they will return, although probably not with McLaren. I think we can look forward to McLaren making their own engines when their deal with Mercedes runs out.

Talking of McLaren, Lewis says he will hold nothing back in Japan, that will be something to see! Look out world, I'm coming through. Poor Massa has finally been told what he already knew, he is there to help Alonso win the championship.

Over at MotoGP at Motegi, Pedrosa has helped Lorenzo win the championship by falling off and breaking his collarbone in two or three places, depending on what you read. He is out this weekend, so maybe they can plate it and get him back for later rounds, but what's the point? Valentino topped practice today and was surprised by the lack of shoulder pain and his speed. Let's hope he can keep it up and give us a race Sunday. Lorenzo only needs to cruise around, but if he is any sort of racer he will want to beat his team mate.