The full 2008 Formula One World Championship entry list:

Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro
1. Kimi Raikkonen
2. Felipe Massa

BMW-Sauber F1 Team
3. Nick Heidfeld
4. Robert Kubica

ING Renault F1 Team
5. Fernando Alonso
6. Nelson Piquet Jr.

AT&T Williams
7. Nico Rosberg
8. Kazuki Nakajima

Red Bull Racing
9. David Coulthard
10. Mark Webber

Panasonic Toyota Racing
11. Jarno Trulli
12. Timo Glock

Scuderia Toro Rosso
14. Sebastien Bourdais
15. Sebastian Vettel

Honda Racing F1 Team
16. Jenson Button
17. Rubens Barrichello

Super Aguri F1 Team
18. Takuma Sato
19. Anthony Davidson

Force India Formula One Team
20. Adrian Sutil
21. Nog niet bekend

Vodafone McLaren Mercedes
22. Lewis Hamilton
23. Heikki Kovalainen

 

http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.aspx?PO_ID=41535



Toyota team principal Tadashi Yamashina has revealed he has been given until 2010 to turn around the fortunes of the Japanese manufacturers' under-performing Formula 1 team.
Toyota has increased the pressure on the team to succeed following a disappointing season when it scored just 13 points, 22 less than in 2006.

Toyota's season also represented a stark downturn in the team's performance since its high watermark of 2005 when it scored 88 points under the technical direction of Mike Gascoyne, who was fired in the early part of '06.
And while Yamashina stands by the company's decision to implement 'the Toyota way' management structure to the team, which depends more on group dynamic than figure-head leadership, he admits changes need to be made if the team is to make any progress in 2008.
"To become stronger it is more important to improve the level of organisation in general rather than to rely on the power of one person," he said in Toyota's annual motorsport report.
"And my job is to mobilise the resources to achieve that. I have been given two more years.

"So, we will work and fight to make sure we prove ourselves in the 2008 season."
Yamashina blamed several factors for Toyota's failure to perform in 2007.
"I think the biggest factor was aerodynamics, as it can be developed even further," he said.
"Another important factor this year was that we failed to adapt to the change of tyres efficiently.
"Looking back over the season, we can see that our car was not hard enough on the tyres. It is better to be tough on the tyres and be faster," he added.

"Perhaps our car was too unstable because of the big change in downforce under braking, or we were too focused on aerodynamics and suspension design was compromised, and so on.
"By using tyres with very different characteristics this year, our sixth in Formula 1, we were able to learn a great deal to help make a step forward toward the future."
Yamashina also refused to blame the team's drivers Jarno Trulli and Ralf Schumacher despite both having poor seasons by their own standards and the German's career effectively coming to an end when he was replaced by Timo Glock as a result.
"We are not in the position to question our drivers' performances, because we couldn't provide them with the best cars," said Yamashina.
"During the first half of the season we couldn't set up Ralf's car to suit him and from mid season, we couldn't prepare the brakes to suit Jarno.
"Obviously it is true that the drivers made some mistakes, but we had a great deal of work to do before we could question their performances."

 

http://www.motorsport.com/news/article.asp?ID=277222&FS=F1



By Nancy Knapp Schilke - Motorsport.com
After 11 seasons as a Formula One driver, Ralf Schumacher is well aware that 2007 might have seen his final F1 race. He started the new year by parting with his personal manager Hans Mahr, who only held the position for one year, and finished it with only five points to his name, three less than his Toyota teammate Jarno Trulli.

Ralf Schumacher, Force India F1 Team, looks at the times. Photo by xpb.cc.

And with only two teams left to confirm their F1 driver lineups for this coming season, Schumacher looks to be left without a ride. The former Spyker team, now Force India, has one seat open and the German is no longer a possible candidate for the seat. Instead, the front runners are Giancarlo Fisichella, Christian Klien, Tonio Liuzzi and Roldan Rodriguez. The team plans to make their announcement around January 11th.
That leaves the two seats still available with Super Aguri, the second Honda team, and as of today, it appears that the rides may end up going to the 2007 pairing of Anthony Davidson and Takuma Sato. According to the team's managing director, Daniel Audetto, Davidson is 100% certain to stay, and Sato's position is also considered secure.
Schumacher appears to accept the fact that he will be left out in the cold, as the 32 year-old racer is already is taking steps toward his future. It appears that he will leave F1 with six victories out of his 108 starts.
Earlier today, he confirmed to the German portal motorsport-total.com that he will not race in 2008. "Until now it has been my life, and motor sport is certainly a big part of my future," Schumacher said. "In which form, remains to be seen."

Ralf Schumacher, Toyota Racing, TF107. Photo by xpb.cc.

In his interview with Motorsport-Total.com, Schumacher ruled out racing on American ovals so he will not follow in the footsteps that many open-wheel starts have done by taking NASCAR rides. Of course that also shuts the door in the IndyCar Series. However, it does leave open the door that other F1 drivers have walked through, and one where racers have moved over to Europe to take on the challenge of F1. So might Champ Car be a possibility?
Apparently, he would prefer to remain in Europe, though not in sportscar endurance events such as the Le Mans Series or even the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Of course, it is possible that the German might be looking at the hotly-contested German touring car championship (DTM).
At this time it is unclear when he might race, if he even decides to continue in motor sports in 2008. Plus there is the possible return to F1 in 2009; however, Schumacher was very up-front on that prospect: "Theoretically that may be possible, but practically you have to wait and see what happens. Formula one waits for nothing and no-one."

 

go redskins!, down with the Seahawks

 

My Grand Prix-dictions for 2008:

1) Kaz Nakajima will be asked to make way for Nico Hulkenburg (FW's new tester) ala JV/ Kubica '06

2) Nelsinho will be quicker than Alonso more than a few times in '08... The Alonso-Flavor Flav love fest intervenes just in time preventing Alonso from having Melt-Down v2.5 and joining the Hare Krishnas

3) Max Mosley will continue his haughty f#ckery leading to a thow down btw him & Sir Jackie during Monaco week-end. Finally Sir Jackie will show him what the Black Watch is all about. This will be my personal highlight!

4) Some dude with a big chin and the initials M$ will be back in a car by year-end

5)Night races will be a snoooz

6)Even w/o traction control Jenson Button will not contend for the WC (my apologies to James Allen & Martin Brundle)

 

what does this have to do with redskins...

 

Thanks for the update.

 

Any race in the rain without TC will be very interesting to watch...

 

I haven't heard any complaints about the spec ecu in a while. There was a lot of complaining last fall.

 

^ Stay tuned the '08 Ferrari and Mclaren s/b testing on track by mid-week. If there are any performance issues on the Ferrari I'm sure it'll be all over the press.

IMO the new geabox rules are the toughest obstacle. I think the gearbox has to last 4 races this year. The popular "seamless shift" boxes can be pretty fragile and all the top teams ran it in '07. I wonder if they'll have to go back to a regular squential set-up for reliability

 

Is Mercedes going to take over control of McLaren and leave Ron Dennis out in the cold?
http://www.worldcarfans.com/9080116....claren-f1-team
Mecedes refuses to answer that question.
http://en.f1-live.com/f1/en/headline...16151107.shtml

 

^ IMO Ron Dennis has been catching way too much media stick over the past year.
- Yeah the guy may be cold
- Yeah he may have stolen Honda from Frank Williams years ago
- Yeah the Alonso and Hamilton thing may have benefited from a firm stance early on

Bottom line... his organization has been winning races and championships in F1 for over 20 years now. They've managed to produce very competitive cars under under a number of designers. The Mclaren F1 road car still rocks 10yrs on! They've arguably attracted the deapest driver talent bank in racing. IDK the guy must be doing something right.

 

should be a very interesting year this year. i can't wait!

 

He hardly stole Honda from Williams, Frank didn't want to have his race drivers dictated to him by his engine supplier. So Honda dropped Williams and went to McLaren.

In his defense, he has built a super successful team, and had to deal with some of the most prima donna drivers ever.

 

i hope to see hamilton win this year. also looks like he has a good team mate this year also. unlike last year with alonso (whinner) no offense to alonso fans btw

 

Hamilton did have a good team mate last year, he basically stole all Alonso's setups. Their relationship did fall apart as the year went on, but he sure learned a lot from 'Nando.

 

Stolen set-ups led to his success...not buying on that one. Ok I think for the 1st three races of 07 Alonso's experience was key but after all Hamilton was a rookie and hadn't raced on those circuits before. (note in race#3 Bahrain Hamilton was faster in every session). On the flip side there's no explanation for Alonso's lack of relative pace at Canada, France, Silverstone, Istambul. Their driving styles are very different, does that mean Hamiton as a rookie better adapted to maximize Alonso's set ups? Again not buying it.

I guess this year with Hammy being the virtual team leader we'll see exactly how much technical ability he has.

Testing times times are all over the place so far...It s/b a good year.

 

The problem is how much will the penalties, from the spy saga, affect the team. Ham may be good, but his performance may suffer from the team.

 

In the news today:

Ralf Schumacher has signed a deal to race in the DTM for Mercedes next year.

Lewis Hamilton has signed a new multi-year deal with McLaren for about $20M /year (source BBC).

 

Well, now that Ralf is gone, we should see a large reduction in the amount of accidents. Hopefully Toyota will be able to sign a new talent with some of the stupid salary that Ralf had going.

 

I think people were a little hard on ralf. He still does have more wins then a big majority of the grid.

 

When you try and blackmail F1 racing to have them stop talking bad about you, then you deserve all the **** in the world.

 

haha oh im only talking about on track stuff, not off track.

 

Well for this season im thinking that the mclarens are not going to be as competitive, not slower per se but not faster and i think the ferraris are going to be even faster due to the fact that the f2008 is an evolution of the f2007as opposed to a revolution. they shrunk the wheelbase back down as well. Renault is not going to be spectacular either. Alonso is a good driver but i think the alonso factor is still not enought to get renault back on track like it was. I think bmw will improve to take mclarens position as a front runner.

 

Ferrari and McLaren will be at it again, I think Renault will come back to have a better year than last year, BMW may contend for a win, but I don't think that will happen a ton. Hopefully Williams makes another step towards the podium. Cheap and cheerful FTW.