[anachronix]

Bye Bye Felipe, he did stay longer than I expected with Ferrari. Videos from the Finali Mondiali at the Mugello circuit.

EDIT: There are some tweets doing rounds about Felipe being announced as the Williams driver for 2014 by today or tomorrow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyGgr...layer_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfP2T...layer_embedded

[deetjohn]

Nice to see Ferrari giving Felipe the farewell he deserves. Both bigwigs, Luca and Sergio were there. Thank You Felipe for everything.

Enjoy the pictures.

[sajands]

Race engineer Rob Smedley is expected to follow Felipe Massa from Ferrari to Williams for the 2014 season.

http://www.planetf1.com/driver/18227...o-follow-Massa

-Sajan

[zenren]

Originally Posted by sajands

Race engineer Rob Smedley is expected to follow Felipe Massa from Ferrari to Williams for the 2014 season.

http://www.planetf1.com/driver/18227...o-follow-Massa

-Sajan

If that happens, Mark Slade could move from Lotus to Ferrari.

[naveenroy]

Very nice to see a nice sendoff for Massa. Any other team alignments that we can look forward to?

[deetjohn]

It seems Lotus failed in a sensational attempt to persuade Michael Schumacher to stand in for Kimi for the last 2 races this year.


And more drivers drop out of last two races.

Following news that Kimi Raikkonen is to miss the last two races of the Formula 1 season due to ‘back problems’, several other drivers have revealed that they too will be sitting out the remainder of the year.

First to drop out were Ferrari drivers Fernando Alonso, who gave the excuse that his back was ‘still a bit hurty’, and Felipe Massa, who claimed that after signing for Williams he had accidentally ‘thrown away’ all his Ferrari overalls.

Not to be outdone, Lewis Hamilton announced he was missing the last two races on account of having ‘no one to look after the dog’ whilst team mate Nico Rosberg said he mistakenly thought Abu Dhabi was the last race of the year and had ‘booked a two week non-refundable holiday at Center Parcs’.

Other absentees will include Pastor Maldonado, who claimed his seat had got jammed too far toward after the team adjusted it ‘to let Massa have a go’ and Sergio Perez who will be unable to drive on account of ‘crying too much’.

Meanwhile, over at Red Bull Mark Webber will not complete the season because he ‘just can’t be ****ing arsed’.

In total, 20 of the current 22 drivers have elected not to compete in the final two races. As a result, the only entries in this weekend’s US GP will be Sebastian Vettel, who will win as usual, and Marussia’s Max Chilton, who will somehow finish 19th.

Source

[sajands]

Originally Posted by deetjohn

It seems Lotus failed in a sensational attempt to persuade Michael Schumacher to stand in for Kimi for the last 2 races this year.

Lotus confirmed on Thursday that Heikki Kovalainen will replace Kimi Raikkonen at the Enstone team for the final two races of the Formula One season.

http://www.planetf1.com/news/3213/90...-On-Kovalainen

-Sajan

[mayankk]

Originally Posted by sajands

Lotus confirmed on Thursday that Heikki Kovalainen will replace Kimi Raikkonen at the Enstone team for the final two races of the Formula One season.

http://www.planetf1.com/news/3213/90...-On-Kovalainen

-Sajan

Why him?
He sort of broke the perception, and let us know that not all finns fly.


But i suppose there's no one left?

[StarrySky]

Originally Posted by mayankk

Why him?
He sort of broke the perception, and let us know that not all finns fly.

But i suppose there's no one left?

It's not easy jumping into an unknown car with zero testing. An active F1 driver like Fisi could not manage to perform when he moved to Ferrari mid-season in 2009. I guess very few will want to risk career suicide, even someone like Hulk, who is essentially a free agent and who is looking to join Lotus for 2014.

[sajands]

Meanwhile at camp Ferrari, Kimi visits maranello for a seat fitting, his first visit after 09 met with team principal Stefano Domenicali I assume that couple of lotus design inputs have been shared.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/24871804

-Sajan

[deetjohn]

Originally Posted by sajands

Lotus confirmed on Thursday that Heikki Kovalainen will replace Kimi

I really don't get it. Then, what is Davide Valsecchi and Jerome_d'Ambrosio for? They are Lotus' own Third driver and Reserve driver.

The last time Jerome filled in for Romain at Italy, he didn't do too bad. Wouldn't they have better knowledge on the car than Heikki?

[zenren]

Originally Posted by mayankk

Why him?
He sort of broke the perception, and let us know that not all finns fly.

Maybe Lotus wanted to break another perception about Finns after all the retorts from Kimi over the radio

Originally Posted by StarrySky

It's not easy jumping into an unknown car with zero testing. An active F1 driver like Fisi could not manage to perform when he moved to Ferrari mid-season in 2009. I guess very few will want to risk career suicide, even someone like Hulk, who is essentially a free agent and who is looking to join Lotus for 2014.

Hulk knows very well that his 2014 seat could be at risk if he took Kimi's seat for last 2 races and didn't perform as well as Grosjean, which is why he turned down the offer.

Originally Posted by deetjohn

I really don't get it. Then, what is Davide Valsecchi and Jerome_d'Ambrosio for? They are Lotus' own Third driver and Reserve driver.

The last time Jerome filled in for Romain at Italy, he didn't do too bad. Wouldn't they have better knowledge on the car than Heikki?

The actions from Lotus camp seems to make Kimi's actions more sensible.

They've just proved that the reserve driver at Lotus is the last place someone should opt for! Are they trying to say Caterham has better reserve drivers than Lotus. If so, I don't see why they are still holding onto these guys. I'm sure Valsecchi and d'Ambrosio might be equally pissed off and looking for a way out with this denied opportunity where they could prove themselves and possibly a chance for a 2014 race seat.

#3 in WCC is out of reach after Kimi's first lap retirement in Abu Dhabi unless something dramatic happens in last 2 races. If Lotus still thinks they have a shot at #2 or #3 with a car that is not as quick as RBR, they are out of their minds. Their 4th position is already assured. I don't see any reason for such desperate moves like trying to bring back Schumi or trying for Hulk to move across early. This is probably the best opportunity for them to give a chance to the reserve drivers.

Its just Kimi's WDC #3 that might get toppled to #5 or even #6 with Kimi pulling out and Hamilton, Webber and Rosberg behind him having a chance at #3. That's probably lost earnings for them, but they can't say anything since they asked Grosjean to race Kimi for position in the last couple of races. Hiring a better driver is not going to prevent that from happening too.

Unlike Alonso at Ferrari, where the team needs to look at short term and long term about Alonso's injury, Lotus need not worry about Kimi's long term prospects since he is anyway leaving the team at the end of the season. Kimi's surprise decision could have something to do with team's over-ambitious and unrealistic last minute push for remaining races.

[Maky]

Originally Posted by deetjohn

I really don't get it. Then, what is Davide Valsecchi and Jerome_d'Ambrosio for? They are Lotus' own Third driver and Reserve driver.

The last time Jerome filled in for Romain at Italy, he didn't do too bad. Wouldn't they have better knowledge on the car than Heikki?

I too found it odd they chose not to give their reserve 2 races worth of experience.
It's either they don't want to risk, in their opinion heikki being more experienced, their WCC position and/or some backstage politics as usual.
Also, A distant possibility being that Heikki has found some sponsorship for next year.

Either way! The driver changes have made the end of the season more interesting than it would have been otherwise, having Vettel runaway with the title earlier.

[zenren]

Expecting some drivers to be disobeying team orders and battling with team mates for the next couple of races.

Hulkenberg, Perez, Maldonaldo, Sutil and diResta should be interesting to watch.

Ferrari-Mercedes battle should also be interesting, now that all 4 drivers have their 2014 seats confirmed, though I don't see a strong chance for Ferrari given where they stand now.

If Webber can outpace Vettel, he has a chance of finishing his F1 career with a 3rd in WDC. Win for Webber in US GP can make things interesting.

Anything else to hope for?

@Pavan,
Where is the US GP thread?

[Maky]

I usually watch F1 on internet stream or download if I've missed it live.
Just subscribed to Tata Sky HD, as I bought a big screen TV, a few days ago. I'm surprised to see that they are broadcasting FP1 live on Star Sports HD2 right now.
Do they usually broadcast all FP sessions or is the US GP an exception? For some reason i always thought it was only Qualy and the races that were broadcast on Indian television.