FROM AROUND THE PADDOCKS OF A1GP MALAYSIA 2007 – FRIDAY PRACTICES
Sepang, Malaysia – 23rd Nov 2007: So, the A1GP finally comes to town, after the opening 3 rounds in Europe and with winter threatening to be colder than before, it is a welcomed relieve for the teams. Here are snippets from the Sepang International circuit on a Friday where times would indicate which teams will do well and which will struggle.
PRACTICES
The rookies have run their two sessions of Practice 1/1 and 1/2 incident free but in Practice 2 with those who have been nominated to race this weekend, the red flag came out after 2 laps with New Zealand beached and Mexico spinning to a stop in turn 14. Both cars were precariously placed warranting the red flag from race control. Anyway, Great Britain looks set to walk this round as it set it’s blistering fastest lap of 1m 49.459s while the tyres were near the end of their life cycle. Switzerland and France are closest to Team GBR but I don’t think they’ll threaten Olly Jarvis much.
Team Malaysia’s performance of 17th in Practice 2 with a time of 1m 51.668s, some 2.2 seconds off the pace, surely must be cause for further concern this weekend as the pressure must be so huge on all the team members to do well after being scoreless going into round 4 and after landing more new sponsors for the team this week.
A1 IS NO STEPPING STONE TO F1
For many I’ve spoken to in the A1GP paddocks, they are all almost of the same view that it is a great surprise that A1GP managed to last into it’s third year. “All the odds were against them right from the start – not the least Bernie Ecclestone.” said one. Another gave his view that the franchise fees were too high and the consequential lukewarm response from the sponsors the teams approached due to the high demands bounced back adversely on the teams.
My view is that promoting any international racing series that traverse 6 continents was always an uphill task by any measurement. The promoters have done well to keep the series alive for 3 years and the make and break year has to be year four.
But is A1 a stepping stone to F1 or is it really an alternative to F1? I would say unequivocally the latter.
So does Narain Karthikeyan of Team India as I caught up with him at the team pit. Narain opined, “With Ferrari’s involvement, it has to be looking good for A1GP. I wouldn’t say that A1GP can propel anyone into F1 but it can certainly allows good drivers to make a decent living out of A1.”
Quite right too, Nico Hulkenburg, the champion of A1GP in the 2006/2007 season was not snapped up by any F1 team and he probably has to shine in GP2 before he makes further headway.
WHY IS THERE NO INDONESIA ROUND THIS SEASON?
Rumours have it that Ananda Mikola and the A1Team Indonesia fell out and Ananda’s dad runs the Indonesian round – so, putting 2 and 2 together, one surmise whoever is the team owner of Team Indonesia has to patch things up with Ananda’s dad who runs the only Indonesian circuit approved by the FIA near Bogor.
REASONS FOR TEAM MALAYSIA’S EARLY SEASON STRUGGLE?
From one knowledgeable observer who travels with the A1GP circus, he thinks it’s a case of too many cooks spoiling the broth. The engineering cooks, that is. He thinks four people in the team are actually involved in engineering the car, the official engineer, Greg Wheeler, the “development director”, Julian Randles, the chief executive, Jack Cunningham and of course, also the driver Alex Yoong.
The source felt that the team needs to get back to basics and not to “think” too much in engineering the A1GP car in order to salvage some old form.
The team’s last engineer, Brian Ireland, left for Team China this year. Team China seemed to have picked up speed this season while Wheeler was going great with Team USA last season. So, there doesn’t seem to be any question of engineering competency in so far as Team Malaysia is concerned.
There is another speculated possible reason which adds to not getting up to speed with the engineering aspect of the car. It seems that David Sears Motorsports which run Team New Zealand and Team Germany as well as ARGO which run Team Lebanon – both outfits being owned by David Sears – works through the off season months doing small bits of improvement on the teams’ cars while Team Malaysia starts preparation merely some weeks before this season started. While this late start may not contribute any harm to the team, surely the other teams would have a head start over those who don’t work through the off season in engineering the cars?
Max Revson – from Sepang Circuit, Malaysia.
A1GP MALAYSIA 2007 – SATURDAY REPORT
Team Switzerland and Neel Jani dominated qualifying day totally today. Right from run 1 of the total four runs, Neel was phenomenal as he rewrote the record with each run. He finally smashed his own Sepang lap record for the third time to establish an all time fastest of 1m 47.648s in his fourth and final run in (second run of the Feature race qualifying) to repeat his Sepang double pole of last season.
PRACTICE 3
Saturday started off with relatively “milder” temperature as compared to yesterday.
The air temperature 10 minutes before qualifying started was 33 deg with track temperature at 44 deg and humidity at 66%. So, the drivers were not going to suffer as much as if the humidity is at 80% with those temperatures.
Practice 3 earlier on brightened up some of the faces at Team Malaysia’s camp as Alex Yoong found more speed to get into the top 10 for the first time in any practice held so far this third season. He clocked 1m 50.466s reducing his deficit to 1.290s from the fastest time of P3.
Team Switzerland’s Neel Jani led the pack in P3 with a time of 1m 49.176s followed by Loic Duval of France 0.292 behind and India’s Narain Karthikeyan a surprising third another two-tenths behind in third. Britain’s Oliver Jarvis was fourth with a time of 1m 49.806s.
QUALIFYING – SPRINT RACE
Team Switzerland and Neel Jani swamped them all in the Sprint qualifying with two consecutive records of 1m 49.003 and 1m 48.630s.
I visited their pit box before qualifying started and there was absolute calmness demonstrated by all their crew. The silence as they went about doing their work was deafening.
Second was Loic Duval of France with a fastest of 1m 48.845s followed in third by Great Britain’s Oliver Jarvis who was also one of only three to break the 49 barrier with 1m 48.864.
Malaysia? Well, it was the start of another bad day Alex who seemed to be struggling with unknown issues again. The team finished at the wrong end of the field again in 19th spot. His time of 1m 50.653s was some 2 seconds adrift of the pole time.
QUALIFYING – FEATURE RACE
It was a repeat performance for Neel and Switzerland in the Feature race qualifying but this time, pole was already in the bag while Neel was completing his second run’s flying lap. Great Britain had been the second last car to cross the finish line for the second run with the Swiss car still in his flying lap and Olivier could only move up to second against Neel’s first run. Instead of easing off, Neel bombed out everyone to turn in that phenomenal lap of 1m 47.648s. He intimated later on that he honestly didn’t think the car had a sub 48 in it but he was delighted with the little adjustments made by his team in his last run.
Team Germany’s Michael Ammermuller and Team France’s Loic Duval qualified in third and fourth position respectively
Malaysia’s Alex fared a little better in the Feature to clock 1m 49.999s in his second run to be placed 15th but Team Malaysia just doesn’t know what or where their problem is. But surely grids of 19th in the Sprint and 15th in the Feature are not good enough to bring the spectators to Sepang in droves tomorrow. This is a calamity for the home team.
When quizzed by A1 TV after qualifying, Alex replied he had no idea where the problem is. There has to be something drastic for the team to do in order to rectify their unknown problems. You cannot just turn from a top third of the field runner for two seasons running into a bottom third team all of a sudden. Either the management team or engineering team or the driver or all of them may have to do some really deep soul searching – and if the problem is found and cannot be corrected – then perhaps the car or something or some one must go?…I mean replaced?
Max Revson – from Sepang Circuit, Malaysia.
TO A RACING DRIVER: IF YOU HAVE TO DECIDE TODAY
* footnote 1: We salute Team Switzerland and Neel Jani who dominated the A1GP Malaysia 2007 so emphatically. Two poles, two wins, two fastest laps and 3 records. Awesome.
* footnote 2: Our best hope for F1 today, Jazeman had his first taste of international competition in Europe last weekend. He finished 18th but then he is only 15. Good luck, Jazeman.
Max Revson – from Sepang Circuit, Malaysia.
TO A RACING DRIVER: IF YOU HAVE TO DECIDE TODAY
To take a drive with a bottom F1 team without pay or to drive with an A1 team with good pay – which?
Which would a race driver choose? That was what we like to know from the A1 paddock on Sunday.
Because of the unarguable status of F1 being at the very top of motor racing pyramid pinnacle, all budding racing wannabes from starting karting at 6 years of age to knocking at the doors of Europe at 16 are singular in their focus to be a Formula 1 driver.
But by the time they get their first taste of the intensely fierce competition in getting a F1 seat today, many race drivers perhaps would change their stance and re-evaluate their ambition – or so we thought.
I popped the question to Marchy Lee, A1 Team China’s rookie driver, and the response was instantaneous, “A1 drive with pay.”
But Team Switzerland’s Rahel Frey hesitated with an answer, “Today? I have to decide today? hmmm, well it has to be F1…”.
As for Narain Kartikeyan of Team India and Malaysia’s Alex Yoong, who already had their chance in F1, I already know which answer they would choose without hesitation. The latter.
The man who engineers and run Team Germany, Team New Zealand, Team Brazil and Team Lebanon, David Sears, whom I caught up with, offered his viewpoints, “If my drivers were ruled by their hearts, it would be F1 but if anyone is ruled by their head, he would say A1.”
That’s logical, so, it’s all about the romanticism that F1 offers. If one is “drunk” with the dizzying spells of Formula 1, he or she would go head on and almost blindly chasing the F1 dream, come high waters or hell. It doesn’t matter if one busts his butts or worse his father’s family fortunes to get into F1 he would be into it single mindedly. All because the Hamiltons, the Raikkonens and the Alonsos of the F1 world have shown it is possible.
But then again, to be a Hamilton, you need a big backer like Ron Dennis who gets into the act when you are still karting. Or to be an Alonso, you need big sponsors from your country as Fernando had in the form of Telefonica to fund your pre-F1 forays.
And today is much much harder than when Michael Schumacher got in with 7-Up money because Eddie Jordan didn’t need much those days when he lost his driver to a Spanish lock-up following some scuffles.
Today sees many junior series “spitting” out talented young drivers chasing the F1 dream like never before. In any of the strong F3 series in Europe and Japan together with GP2 and the Renault World Series you can safely bet there are at least 200 youngsters who are chasing the F1 dream and at least a hundred who are sighted by F1 team principals as possible candidates. That is every year we have a hundred youngsters being noticed and there are only one or two seats per year that becomes available to the most talented or to the best funded drivers!
Malaysia today is no different. There had been ZERO driver chasing this dream in not so long ago times – in fact prior to 2001, there was no one other than Alex Yoong who was on this crazy chase. Today, with the support of Petronas and BMW through the Formula BMW series, we have at least 2 dozen youngsters EVERY year emerging from karting chasing this impossible dream – or should I say, near impossible dream. It is going to cost a lot of grieve or at least a lot of money getting these boys and girls on the road towards F1.
