Formula One 2016

[Lineker]

Quote

RADIO - WHAT IS LEGAL IN 2016:

The FIA's radio clampdown is aimed at drivers receiving as little information from the pitfall as possible during grands prix.

The following is the full list of the permitted messages for 2016, with anything else regarded as a breach of article 20.1:

1. Indication of a critical problem with the car, e.g. puncture warning or damage.*
2. Indication of a problem with a competitor's car.*
3. Instruction to enter the pitlane in order to fix or retire the car.*
4. Marshalling information (yellow flag, red flag, race start aborted or other similar instructions or information from race control).*
5. Wet track, oil or debris in certain corners.*
6. Instructions to swap position with other drivers.*
7. Acknowledgement that a driver message has been heard.
8. Lap or sector time detail.
9. Lap time detail of a competitor.
10. Gaps to a competitor during a practice session or race.
11. "Push hard", "push now", "you will be racing xx" or similar.
12. Helping with warning of traffic during a practice session or race.
13. Giving the gaps between cars in qualifying so as to better position the car for a clear lap.
14. Tyre choice at the next pitstop.
15. Number of laps a competitor has done on a set of tyres during a race.
16. Tyre specification of a competitor.
17. Information concerning a competitor's likely race strategy.
18. Safety car window.
19. Driving breaches by team driver or competitor, e.g. missing chicanes, running off track, time penalty will be applied etc.
20. Notification that DRS is enabled or disabled.
21. Dealing with a DRS system failure.
22. Change of front wing position at the next pitstop.
23. Oil transfer.
24. When to enter the pits.
25. Reminders to check for white lines, bollards, weighbridge lights when entering or leaving the pits.
26. Reminders about track limits.
27. Passing on messages from race control.
28. Information concerning damage to the car.
29. Number of laps remaining.
30. Test sequence information during practice sessions, e.g. aero-mapping.
31. Weather information.

*Indicates these are the only messages that may be passed to the driver whilst he is in the car and on the track, from the time the car leaves the garage for the first time after the pit lane is open on the day of the race until the start of the race.

Canadian Nicholas Latifi has joined Renault as a Formula 1 test driver and will have the opportunity to take part in at least one Friday practice session this season. Renault says Latifi, who will combine his duties with a campaign in GP2 with DAMS, has been given a "long-term development programme". The 20-year-old completed a full season of Formula Renault 3.5 last year with Arden, finishing 11th having scored a best finish of fourth. He also did a handful of races for MP Motorsport in GP2, on the back of two campaigns in European Formula 3.

Sauber has announced technical director Mark Smith's departure from the Formula 1 team, on the eve of the new season. A former Red Bull and Caterham technical director, Smith joined the Swiss F1 outfit last July. The timing of his arrival meant his influence on the Sauber's new C35, which missed the first pre-season test, was limited. Ahead of this weekend's Australian Grand Prix, Sauber has announced Smith has left the company, noting he "has decided to go back to the UK for family reasons".

[Chris2K]

Renault have unveiled their livery:

I for one am happy to see some yellow on the grid again.

[Adam]

Aside from the Alonso title-winning blue & yellow livery, that is my favourite of Renault's colour schemes. Reminds me of Robert Kubica putting the cat amongst the pigeons of the front drivers a few years ago.

[JasonM]

2 hours ago, Chris2K said:

Renault have unveiled their livery:

I for one am happy to see some yellow on the grid again.

Love the look of this, very striking and will help up liven up the grid filled with dark cars.

[Lineker]

It's so pretty! It has the same weight-saving matte finish as the Red Bull, too.

Ferrari has emerged as the biggest spender of power unit development tokens over the winter ahead of the new Formula 1 season. For this season each of the four manufacturers - Ferrari, Mercedes, Renault and Honda - has 32 tokens to use to develop its 1.6-litre V6 turbocharged hybrid system. In line with the discussions that unfolded last year, and subsequent regulation changes, no area of the engine is now closed off to development. However, the four manufacturers are each restricted to a certain number of tokens to spend on areas of the power unit, which for this season is set at 32.

TOKEN SPEND AHEAD OF AUSTRALIAN GP

Ferrari 23 (9 remaining)
Honda 18 (14 remaining)
Mercedes 19 (13 remaining)
Renault 7 (25 remaining)

Aston Martin will return to Formula 1 this season with Red Bull in a partnership linked to a road car project collaboration. Red Bull chief technical officer Adrian Newey is working with Aston Martin chief creative officer Marek Reichman on a hypercar codenamed "Project AM-RB 001". As part of the deal, the Aston Martin name will appear on the rear of the Red Bull's sidepods and its iconic logo on the nose from the season-opening Australian Grand Prix. The move brings the British sportscar manufacturer back to F1, over half a century after its previous brief foray in 1959 and 1960.

However, Red Bull team principal Christian Horner says the squad's partnership with Aston Martin should not be seen as the precursor to an engine deal.

[JasonM]

Tag-Heuer-Renault-Aston Martin powered!

[Lineker]

PRACTICE ONE TIMES

Pos	Driver	Car	Time	Gap	Laps
1	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1m29.725s	-	14
2	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull/TAG Heuer	1m30.146s	0.421s	14
3	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull/TAG Heuer	1m30.875s	1.150s	13
4	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India/Mercedes	1m31.325s	1.600s	8
5	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	1m31.720s	1.995s	14
6	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1m31.814s	2.089s	11
7	Fernando Alonso	McLaren/Honda	1m33.060s	3.335s	11
8	Jenson Button	McLaren/Honda	1m33.129s	3.404s	16
9	Sergio Perez	Force India/Mercedes	1m33.370s	3.645s	6
10	Kevin Magnussen	Renault	1m34.060s	4.335s	13
11	Valtteri Bottas	Williams/Mercedes	1m34.550s	4.825s	6
12	Felipe Massa	Williams/Mercedes	1m34.679s	4.954s	6
13	Felipe Nasr	Sauber/Ferrari	1m34.796s	5.071s	7
14	Jolyon Palmer	Renault	1m35.477s	5.752s	12
15	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber/Ferrari	1m37.956s	8.231s	6
16	Pascal Wehrlein	Manor/Mercedes	1m40.401s	10.676s	6
17	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1m40.754s	11.029s	10
18	Esteban Gutierrez	Haas/Ferrari	1m41.780s	12.055s	8
19	Rio Haryanto	Manor/Mercedes	1m43.372s	13.647s	7
20	Romain Grosjean	Haas/Ferrari	1m43.443s	13.718s	6
21	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	-	-	8
22	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	-	-	3

 

PRACTICE TWO TIMES

Pos	Driver	Car	Time	Gap	Laps
1	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1m38.841s	-	7
2	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India/Mercedes	1m39.308s	0.467s	8
3	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1m39.486s	0.645s	7
4	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull/TAG Heuer	1m39.535s	0.694s	9
5	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	1m39.694s	0.853s	16
6	Fernando Alonso	McLaren/Honda	1m39.895s	1.054s	16
7	Jenson Button	McLaren/Honda	1m40.008s	1.167s	13
8	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1m40.761s	1.920s	7
9	Sergio Perez	Force India/Mercedes	1m41.256s	2.415s	8
10	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull/TAG Heuer	1m42.411s	3.570s	10
11	Esteban Gutierrez	Haas/Ferrari	1m42.891s	4.050s	10
12	Pascal Wehrlein	Manor/Mercedes	1m43.401s	4.560s	25
13	Romain Grosjean	Haas/Ferrari	1m43.731s	4.890s	8
14	Rio Haryanto	Manor/Mercedes	1m44.304s	5.463s	22
15	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1m47.356s	8.515s	4
16	Kevin Magnussen	Renault	-	-	2
17	Jolyon Palmer	Renault	-	-	5
18	Felipe Massa	Williams/Mercedes	-	-	2
19	Valtteri Bottas	Williams/Mercedes	-	-	2

Rain heavily affected both sessions. Rosberg aquaplaned and sent himself into a wall, wrecking his nose and front wing. Formula 1 teams' spare parts shortages were a major factor in the lack of running in Australian Grand Prix Friday practice, drivers have admitted.

Quote

The halo cockpit protection device is on course to be introduced for the 2017 Formula 1 season, the FIA has confirmed.

Ferrari trialled the system during the second pre-season test in early March.

A thorough risk assessment is to be conducted, and to that end a working group has been formed, headed by Mercedes and Ferrari.

Although Red Bull has developed its own canopy device, FIA race director Charlie Whiting feels the halo will almost certainly be on all 22 cars next year.

[Katsuya]

Hard to tell with the way the weather played a part, but that's looking encouraging for the McLaren.

[Katsuya]

This is awful so far. It really is a case of "watch the clock, ignore the laps".

[Chris2K]

I hereby renounce my support for the qualifying changes in their current format. Q3 was abysmal.

[Katsuya]

Well that was abysmal.

[MJB]

On 23/02/2016 at 23:04, MJB said:

Qualifying is fine. It's probably actually one of the only things that DOESN'T need to change. Leave qualy alone!

 

Oh and congratulations to Lewis for his 50th Pole in Formula 1.

[EddieG]

Max!

[Lineker]

Embarrassing. I think this format could only work with major tweaking and even then, only in Q1. How are fans watching live from the grandstands meant to keep abreast of what's going on!? All signs coming from all parties seem to point towards an extraordinary vote on Monday which will likely see us revert back to last year's quali format.

[JasonM]

HAM-ROS-VET, new quali, same results. And infinitely more unsatisfying because the quali was over with 4 minutes left to go... It's kinda fun in Q1 with all the cars going out and driving their tits off, but it all falls apart in Q2 and Q3 with the tyres dying a painful death.

Another idea I heart Brundle mention was to give drivers a special set of tyres that can put Super Soft times whilst being able to go 10 or so laps, and make it quali-only. And at the same time allowing teams to refuel in the pitbox rather than having to wheel it into the garage, because the current way wastes too much time and it'll mean drivers are just sitting on their hands watching themselves get eliminated.

Also, be able to finish the lap after the 90 seconds are up, that'd be a lot better because that way you can fly out with 90 seconds on the clock and still be able to set a time...

But yeah, TL;DR - Fun action, unacceptable finish. If I was a fan at trackside i'd be fuming.

In other news, Verstappen the best non constructor driver on the grid! And the STR's made the Red Bull's look silly with their 1 year old Rari engines. So i'm absolutely hype for Verstappen to hopefully rock the applecart a bit tomorrow!

[Lineker]

FP3 TIMES

Pos	Driver	Car	Time	Gap	Laps
1	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1m25.624s	-	24
2	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1m25.800s	0.176s	25
3	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1m25.852s	0.228s	25
4	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	1m26.257s	0.633s	28
5	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1m26.435s	0.811s	23
6	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	1m26.701s	1.077s	26
7	Valtteri Bottas	Williams/Mercedes	1m26.730s	1.106s	28
8	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull/TAG Heuer	1m26.768s	1.144s	22
9	Felipe Massa	Williams/Mercedes	1m27.151s	1.527s	28
10	Sergio Perez	Force India/Mercedes	1m27.242s	1.618s	22
11	Fernando Alonso	McLaren/Honda	1m27.263s	1.639s	20
12	Jenson Button	McLaren/Honda	1m27.341s	1.717s	20
13	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull/TAG Heuer	1m27.430s	1.806s	22
14	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber/Ferrari	1m27.659s	2.035s	26
15	Kevin Magnussen	Renault	1m27.871s	2.247s	24
16	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India/Mercedes	1m27.988s	2.364s	22
17	Jolyon Palmer	Renault	1m28.117s	2.493s	24
18	Esteban Gutierrez	Haas/Ferrari	1m28.284s	2.660s	21
19	Romain Grosjean	Haas/Ferrari	1m28.292s	2.668s	11
20	Felipe Nasr	Sauber/Ferrari	1m28.293s	2.669s	26
21	Pascal Wehrlein	Manor/Mercedes	1m29.046s	3.422s	18
22	Rio Haryanto	Manor/Mercedes	1m29.272s	3.648s	23

QUALIFYING RESULT

Pos	Driver	Car	Time	Gap
1	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1m23.837s	-
2	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1m24.197s	0.360s
3	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1m24.675s	0.838s
4	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1m25.033s	1.196s
5	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	1m25.434s	1.597s
6	Felipe Massa	Williams/Mercedes	1m25.458s	1.621s
7	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	1m25.582s	1.745s
8	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull/TAG Heuer	1m25.589s	1.752s
9	Sergio Perez	Force India/Mercedes	1m25.753s	-
10	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India/Mercedes	1m25.865s	-
11	Valtteri Bottas	Williams/Mercedes	1m25.961s	-
12	Fernando Alonso	McLaren/Honda	1m26.125s	-
13	Jenson Button	McLaren/Honda	1m26.304s	-
14	Jolyon Palmer	Renault	1m27.601s	-
15	Kevin Magnussen	Renault	1m27.742s	-
16	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber/Ferrari	1m27.435s	-
17	Felipe Nasr	Sauber/Ferrari	1m27.958s	-
18	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull/TAG Heuer	1m28.006s	-
19	Romain Grosjean	Haas/Ferrari	1m28.322s	-
20	Esteban Gutierrez	Haas/Ferrari	1m29.606s	-
21	Pascal Wehrlein	Manor/Mercedes	1m29.642s	-
22	Rio Haryanto	Manor/Mercedes	1m29.627s	-

Bernie watched on television (he's not in Oz) and described the new format as "pretty crap", but warned against simply reverting back to the old system.

Lauda: "To introduce this was totally wrong. It was like digging in the toilet."

Post-qualifying press conference: 

DRIVERS
1 - Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes)
2 - Nico ROSBERG (Mercedes)
3 - Sebastian VETTEL (Ferrari)

TV UNILATERAL
Lewis, your 50th career pole, only Senna and Schumacher have gone beyond that mark, on top of it all weekend it would seem, through practice and qualifying, you must be delighted? 
Lewis HAMILTON: Absolutely. First, I really have to... I'm not going to take my hat off, but really take my hat off to this team. What they've done to raise the bar once more in our third year to be fighting the rest, it's just... truly for me, it inspires me, it motivates me and I really enjoyed driving the car today in qualifying. We got the set-up just right. There were some sexy laps. They felt so good. Just flowing and no real mistakes and that's really all you can hope for as a driver is to always improved and that's what we did today. Really happy.

Nico, turning to you, the heat was on you, certainly towards the end. A couple of mistakes in Turn One, both on your first run in Q1 and also in Q3, just not your day today? 
Nico ROSBERG: No, the last lap was good, just Lewis did a better job, that's it. But mainly it's impressive to see how the team in the third year running now, it seems, of course it's very early days, so let's be careful but for sure this weekend we seem to be the quickest out there by a good margin. It's amazing to see that. Because the risk is always when you're dominating that you start to become complacent and that's a big risk always, everybody has experienced that, but it seems that we're able to push through and so that's really awesome. Of course, not happy with second place but still a lot of opportunities for tomorrow starting from second.

So Sebastian, we now have a bit of a picture: it looked close in free practice three, you split the Mercedes after the first run in Q3 but ultimately the margin is still pretty large to Lewis. You used up your tyres earlier on than they did as well, so is your feeling sitting here now one of disappointment?
Sebastian VETTEL: Not really. I think I said many times that we have done a step forwards, which I think we have. I think especially tomorrow we should be quite a bit closer. We expected them to be strong in qualifying, which they were. I think we had a bit of a rougher start to find a bit the rhythm, certainly I had, and it was just getting better throughout qualifying. Very happy with the lap I had in the end, so we called it there and saved the set of tyres for tomorrow. Surely we're not on the front row but we still have high hopes for the race and it's going to be a long year, we know this car has a lot of potential, so I think as a starting out third and fourth, locking out the second row, is a good achievement. The team's been pushing very hard and as I said we have a long year ahead of us.

Back to you again Lewis. Obviously the race tomorrow, you're looking for your third Australian Grand Prix victory. Do you do so with a bit of calmness this evening as you prepare? 
LH: I'm generally, quite often, mostly calm, but there is a lot of work to do tonight. Obviously with these radio changes and less communication there's a lot more studying that goes on for all of us in terms of remembering the sequence, things like we can't be told if the strategy is changing throughout the race, so you kind of have to anticipate what happens. If they give us a different tyre we kind of have to guess it - could be a two, three, whatever stops we're doing. I'm excited. I think it's a new thing; we're all in the same boat. I hope that it adds to the spectacle tomorrow, I highly doubt it, but we shall see.

Q: Lewis, your fifth pole in Australia, you talked a moment ago about having done some sexy laps. What is the key to a really good lap here in qualifying and did the format with the elimination and particularly all the traffic there at the beginning, did any of that put any more pressure on you today?
LH: Not really, it was very much the same as usual. You have to go out and get your clear laps. Maybe there was a little bit more pressure on us as a team, and the way we operated but generally we just did the normal in terms of getting the laps. What I mean by sexy laps, they were just, when you finished... the car felt good, moved, it was like a beautiful rhythm. Felt like James Brown at the end of the lap.

Q: Nico, coming to you, obviously we've got a bunch of new rule changes this year, Lewis just referred to the radio change in his previous answer. The third one of course is the option of more tyres going into the race. Now, clearly that's a strategic thing, you're the guy who needs an extra something to work with. Do you see it giving you an opportunity to do something on strategy tomorrow?
NR: For sure, because there are going to be more unknowns in the race tomorrow, definitely. If Lewis gets a start, after that, if they have to change his strategy because of traffic behind or something, that he's going to drop out into, he won't know about it. So, that's for sure, there's scenarios where you can lose out quite a lot. And, of course, starting second, I like that. It increases the chances, y'know?

Q: Essentially the same question to you Sebastian. You mentioned earlier on about your tactic in terms of the tyres. You've got more variability, there is less information coming to you from the team, are you sitting there thinking you have a chance to get among these guys tomorrow?
SV: I do. Not because of the changes in rules but in general I think in the race you can always creating something. Tomorrow we try obviously to push very hard and create something. Everybody knows roughly what to do. It's not the first race that we're going to do. Bottom line is that the regulations haven't changed so the cars are similar to drive compared to last year. Hope that we can put definitely more pressure than today on both of them in the race tomorrow.

QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

Q: (Ralf Bach - Auto Bild motorsport) Question to Matteo, how does it feel to drive a Mercedes car? 
Matteo BONCIANI: Next question

Q: (Daniel Johnson - The Telegraph) To all three of you: so we had the new qualifying system today and for most of Q3, what we saw on the TV was guys sat in the car and then getting out without going and doing a lap. Nico and Lewis, the two of you went out and did some laps and then with three minutes left, came in the garage and nothing more happened and the chequered flag waved with no one out there. Christian Horner's already said that he thinks F1 should apologise to the fans for the show it's put on. Toto, your boss, said it's rubbish. It's difficult when you're in it but I wondered what you thought of it, whether F1 should apologise and whether we should go back to the old system as soon as we can? 
LH: Well, we've not seen it so we don't really know how it worked for the others. We said at the beginning that it wasn't the right way but it's like you can't knock it before you try it. We tried it and all the engineers were right. It doesn't make no difference to me at the end of the day. I did what I had to do. 
SV: I had time to get changed...
NR: It's good that F1 tries but it's the wrong way so we should go back to the other system, for the fans. 
Q: For the whole three sessions or just the final part? 
NR: For the last one especially, I'm not really able to judge for the previous two, but especially for Q3. 
SV: Well, I think it's very easy. I don't see why everybody's surprised now. We all said what's going to happen, it happened so obviously we were told to wait and see but now we saw and I don't think it was very exciting. It was a bit crazy in the beginning with all the cars pushing and trying to do a lap before they get potentially kicked out so managing traffic... it's quite busy but for no reason because the time is there in the session to do it and in the end, also for the people in the grandstands, I don't feel it's the right way to go. There are no cars to watch. In the end they want to see Lewis, Nico, Kimi, whoever, pushing it to the limit at the end of the session when the track's supposed to be at its best etc. I don't know we need the criticism now, we had the criticism already but it's surely the wrong way to go, that's what we said. 
LH: The good thing is that they tried something new and ultimately that is a good step, that we're actually trying something new but it's trial and error so maybe not just go back to the old way...
SV: There's a certain responsibility as well. We can't just try things that many of us criticise, us included. 
LH: But why can't you...
SV: You can't just turn around and say it was the wrong thing, we need to be sensible and try to do the right changes. 
LH: But that's what they tried to do even though everyone told them it was the wrong one. 
SV: Yes. 
LH: Let's leave it there.

Q: (Michael Schmidt - Auto, Motor und Sport) Sebastian, did you sit in the pits at the end because you didn't have any more supersoft tyres or because you said you wanted to save a set of tyres? But when we went through the sessions I think you have already consumed three before. 
SV: Yeah, it's true, we had to go out again in Q2 so I think the fact that we called it off in Q3 was due to the fact that I had a good lap on the first try and we wanted then to save a set of tyres for tomorrow. Obviously, we would have liked to do it with only one run in Q2 but it wasn't strong enough so I had to go out again, so that's a fact, it was not due to the new format but I think in general, as I said earlier, it's just wrong when the clock's ticking and nobody's on track.

Q: (Heikki Kulta - Turun Sanomat) Nico, did it ever cross your mind that the chain of six pole positions was broken today and does it means anything to you? 
NR: No, I hadn't thought of that but yes, a pity but that's not on my mind when I'm going out and qualifying for the first race of the season, for sure not.

Red Bull has released images of its Formula 1 canopy head protection device as an alternative to the favoured halo concept. The jet-fighter style design wraps around the driver's helmet and has two pillars on the side, rather than a central pillar like the halo.

[Gazz]

The 90 second window was never going to work anyway, what happens at tracks where flying laps take longer than 90 seconds. 

[MJB]

You would have to predict that might be eliminated about four and half minutes in advance at Spa.

[Lineker]

It won't be a thing by Spa. Don't worry. 

Despite there being four more cars participating in qualifying for this race compared to 2015; there were 51 less laps completed today.

Ted's Qualifying Notebook

[Katsuya]

Tell you what, that McLaren could be a beast around Monaco too...