The Formula 1 Blog

  With Ferrari’s Wrooom event well underway yesterday it was the day when Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa were scheduled to meet with the fans. Once again it was the Miramonti Canal that provided the backdrop to the meeting between fans and the Scuderia Ferrari drivers, who as we all know are in Madonna di Campiglio for the weeklong Wrooom event.

  At the end of the day in which they took part in the customary press conferences before tacklong the snow covered slopes, Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa got up on the stage built up at the end of the 3-Tre piste that hosts one of the rounds of the Skiing World Cup.

  In a short interview session arranged for the enthusiastic spectators at the event, both Ferrari men explained that, as yet, they knew little about their new car. “For now we have only got a rough idea of what it’s like, but we can definitely expect it to be competitive, because everyone at Maranello has been working very hard,” said Fernando. Felipe underlined the importance of getting off to a good start. “If we want to fight for the title we have to be competitive right from the start,” before joking that the only certainty was the car would be red!

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Well preparations for last dance of the Formula1 for the 2011 season had a good start and the feeling was bit like the Young Drivers test were continuing in Brazil too. No less than 4 young pilots that were present in Abu Dhabi showed their skills once more in this 1st Practice for their teams. Things worth noticed were the clutch failure of Grosjean’s Renault  and Alonso’s engine as well as the new helmet cam that was on display on Sebastien Vettel brand new crash-helmet.

Here are the results of today’s 1st Practice for the Grande Prêmio do Brasil 2011:

Luca di Montezemolo Ferrari’s president  is confident that his team will win more races before the end of this season. Fernando Alonso took Ferrari’s only grand prix victory of the year at the British Grand Prix last month, but has come close on several occasions and been on the podium at five of the last six races, which showed the real progress that Ferrari has made since Australia.

After a meeting with team principal Stefano Domenicali, technical director Pat Fry and engine boss Luca Marmorini on Tuesday, Montezemolo said that Ferrari would score more victories over the remaining races.

"I can see the right spirit in the team after a very difficult start to the season," he told Ferrari’s official website. "Domenicali and his crew seem very determined, concentrating fully on their tasks for the second part of the year which I am sure will feature Ferrari in the role of a key player. I expect we will pick up wins to add to the important and historically very significant victory achieved at Silverstone."

Ferrari will continue to work at its factory in Maranello until Sunday when it will close its doors for a two week summer break.  More aerodynamic upgrades are planed and further developments to its exhaust-blown diffuser ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix Weekend 26-29 Aug. 2011.

Source: ESPN F1

Fernando Alonso says he’s happy with fourth place on the grid in Germany, despite at one stage looking like a threat to Red Bull, Alonso insists that he’s the same margin behind the blue cars as he expected to be, the only surprise being that Lewis Hamilton was able to put himself in front of him taking a wordy 2nd place on the grid.

“I think it was OK for us,” said the Spaniard. “We said yesterday we were between two and four tenths behind Red Bull, and we are between two and four tenths behind Red Bull. Hamilton did very well today. Yesterday maybe they were testing some new parts or whatever, and they were not so good in the times at the end, but they were very competitive, and today they showed it.

“No surprises, I think. To be fourth is a very good position for us, and in the race tomorrow maybe with the rain, anything can happen, so we will attack for sure.

“We’re still improving the car, the new parts we brought here are also very positive, the car feels better and better every time. It’s not that our competitors are looking at the TV in the 15 days between the two races; everyone is improving. We know McLaren brought here a big aero package, Red Bull as well. It’s a competition also outside the races which team is quicker in developing the car as well.”

Alonso says that a wet race will be all about keeping away from trouble because of the weather forecast for tomorrow.

“Tomorrow there’s a forecast of rain, and if that’s true, I think the race is very open," he said. "You never know what can happen in a wet race. Tire temperature will be an issue, because already we have problems with dry tires, and if it’s wet, with 11C ambient temperature, I don’t know how we will put some heat in the tires. It’s the same for everybody. It’s a race to survive tomorrow."

Source: Speed.com, photo: LAT Photographic

Fernando Alonso, with his Ferrari has won his first Formula 1 Grand Prix  for the 2011 season and this was the British GP at the newly upgraded Silverstone circuit.

Fernando Alonso took advantage over the some small seconds lost by Red Bull in the pits during the second stop in order to overcome Webber and Vettel,  but this was not the main reason why the Spaniard  fly to his victory today but the pace he had witch was way above the Red Bull’s.

In addition, Lewis Hamilton from McLaren helped Alonso keeping Vettel at bay.  Hamilton had  great race but due to fuel concerns he had to slow down and finished 4th just ahead of Massa which he fought to the last corner of the race.

British Grand Prix Full Results Table:

Pos.	Driver	Team	Time	Laps	Points
1.	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	1:28:41.196	52	25
2.	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull-Renault	+16.5 secs	52	18
3.	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	+16.9 secs	52	15
4.	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	+28.9 secs	52	12
5.	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	+29.0 secs	52	10
6.	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	+60.6 secs	52	8
7.	Sergio Perez	Sauber-Ferrari	+65.5 secs	52	6
8.	Nick Heidfeld	Renault	+75.5 secs	52	4
9.	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes	+77.9 secs	52	2
10.	Jaime Alguersuari	STR-Ferrari	+79.1 secs	52	1
11.	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	+79.7 secs	52	0
12.	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	+80.6 secs	52	0
13.	Rubens Barrichello	Williams-Cosworth	+1 Lap	51	0
14.	Pastor Maldonado	Williams-Cosworth	+1 Lap	51	0
15.	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	+1 Lap	51	0
16.	Timo Glock	Virgin-Cosworth	+2 Laps	50	0
17.	Jerome d` Ambrosio	Virgin-Cosworth	+2 Laps	50	0
18.	Vitantonio Liuzzi	Hispania-Cosworth	+2 Laps	50	0
19.	Daniel Ricciardo	Hispania-Cosworth	+3 Laps	49	0
20.	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	Wheel Nut	39	0
21.	Sebastien Buemi	STR-Ferrari	+27 Laps	25	0
22.	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber-Ferrari	+29 Laps	23	0
23.	Jarno Trulli	Lotus-Renault	Oil Leak	10	0
24.	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus-Renault	Gear Box	2	0

Yet another pole for Sebastian Vettel and this comes as no surprise for many many people out there, but what is is that Hispania apparently has closed the gap to Virgin and Jerome D’Ambrosio is out of the 107% time which is 1:18:989.

Here are the full qualifying results for Canadian Formula1 Grand Prix of 2011:

Pos.	Driver	Team	Time	Laps
1.	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull	1:13:014	17
2.	Fernando Alonso	Ferrari	1:13:199	19
3.	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1:13:217	20
4.	Mark Webber	Red Bull	1:13:429	22
5.	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren	1:13:565	18
6.	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes Grand Prix	1:13:814	14
7.	Jenson Button	McLaren	1:13:838	20
8.	Michael Schumacher	Mercedes Grand Prix	1:13:864	14
9.	Nick Heidfeld	Renault	1:14:062	27
10.	Vitaly Petrov	Renault	1:14:085	25
11.	Paul di Resta	Force India F1	1:14:752	19
12.	Pastor Maldonado	Williams	1:15:043	20
13.	Kamui Kobayashi	Sauber	1:15:285	21
14.	Adrian Sutil	Force India F1	1:15:287	21
15.	Sebastien Buemi	Scuderia Toro Rosso	1:15:334	18
16.	Rubens Barrichello	Williams	1:15:361	20
17.	Pedro de la Rosa	Sauber	1:15:587	21
18.	Jaime Alguersuari	Scuderia Toro Rosso	1:16:294	10
19.	Jarno Trulli	Lotus F1	1:16:745	12
20.	Heikki Kovalainen	Lotus F1	1:16:786	10
21.	Vitantonio Liuzzi	Hispania Racing	1:18:424	10
22.	Timo Glock	Virgin Racing	1:18:537	12
23.	Narain Karthikeyan	Hispania Racing	1:18:574	11
24.	Jerome d` Ambrosio	Virgin Racing	1:19:414	13

  Luca di Montezemolo, Ferrari president has admitted the Italian team are currently in a bad shape in the wake of their disappointing start to the season and they now must strive to turn their form around in the shortest time.
  Formula 1’s most successful team head back to Europe after the early trio of flyaway rounds having yet to claim a podium finish, the squad and their drivers already cut adrift of Red Bull in both championship standings.
Montezemolo, who saw the team show stronger race relative to the competition in Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix yet still fade to sixth and seventh places, made clear on Monday that Ferrari could not continue with their current level of form.
  “This cannot and must not be the team’s level,” the Ferrari president said in a statement on the team’s website.
“It’s a very delicate moment, I expect our engineers to act with determination and know-how, unleashing the maximum of their capacity to improve the performance of the car in a short time.” 
  Stefano Domenicali and several engineers went straight back to the team’s Maranello factory on Monday after arriving back in Italy from Shanghai in order to immediately start work on analyzing the squad’s current development programme.
Montezemolo, who was also in attendance at the factory, hopes Ferrari are soon back at the front of the field he also added: “I want Ferrari to be at the level that both we and our fans demand it should be,”

News: ITV.com

  Busy morning and afternoon in Melbourne, with almost all the team get out there in track, minus one, HRT, yes you guess right, they were unable to make any laps in the first practice and Tonio Liuzzi only made 1 lap in the second session. And while they were optimistic before Melbourne I thing that I a great chance that they along with Virgin which managed to get out there and do some testing will be unable to beat the 107% rule. So if this goes on I guess this year will see less cars on the track than last year. Keep in mind for now this are only speculations but they were fueled by Timo Glock declarations who has admitted that Virgin might struggle to qualify for the Australian Formula One Grand Prix now that the FIA has reintroduced the old 107 percent qualifying rule for 2011, and, based on the times we see on the board, it means cars must be within about 6 seconds of the Q1 pole time on Saturday to qualify for the Melbourne grid, Timo concern is very real because according to the time table both Virgins were 2 seconds behind the 107% time, and to set an even bigger setback for HRT, it appears that front wing of their car did not meet the mandatory crash test and they will be forced to use the 2010 nose, and almost everyone is believing that they will be unable to qualify.

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  Alonso was pushing hard today and with 108 laps made he was able to set the fastest time for today 1.13.307. Second was Sebastian Vettel with 1.13.614, so those 13.000+ Spanish formula1 fans present today at the Ceste circuit had what to see, hundreds of laps made by all 12 formula1 teams.

  On the first part of the day the RB7 was faster then F-150 while Vettel was improving his time from yesterday Ferrari was making test with different set-ups, with one of those set-ups Alonso was able to make a full run on just 1.13.614 a time which no pilot was able to beat. Only Di Rest and Vettel were in the same second as the Spaniard while the rest of the drivers were at 1.046 second and more (Lewis Hamilton).

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  Busy day today at the Ceste, Valencia were three teams presented their new cars and lot of driving action was seen on the track. More than 8500 formula1 fans saw what new cars have planed for us for the upcoming season. Red Bull was well prepared today and Vettel made a strong impression setting the fastest lap today. Nico was not that lucky and only made a few laps before he retired.

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