MOTORSPORT: F1 set to fire up next week

Formula 1 is about to kick into gear, the first images have appeared of one of the new cars and Daniel Ricciardo has donned Renault yellow and black.

The official launches start next Monday, with Red Bull-owned, Italian-based Scuderia Toro Rosso having now pipped Renault for 'pole position'.

STR will reveal its STR14 the day before Renault shows the RS19 for Ricciardo and his German teammate Nico Hulkenberg at the British base of the French manufacturer's team.

Mercedes-Benz, world champion the past five years, will follow with its W10 and Red Bull Racing its RB15 (with Honda instead of Renault power) on Wednesday.

Ferrari will unveil its new model, on which it is investing more heavily as it strives to end Mercedes' domination, next Friday (Feb 15).

The first of two four-day pre-season tests starts in Barcelona on Monday, February 18.

Ferrari-powered American team Haas this week posted images of its VF19 car online, while it displayed its new livery on one of last year's VF18s. The new Haas look reflects sponsorship from Rich Energy, a competitor of Red Bull in the drinks market.

The 2019 F1 cars will have wider front and rear wings (the fronts will be simplified) as well as the bargeboards further forward on the sides and simplified front brake ducts.

The changes are intended to improve overtaking and encourage closer racing.

F1's sporting boss Ross Brawn predicts a "tangible difference" (F1 says a 20 per cent greater opportunity for a driver to attack a car in front) but teams, especially Red Bull and Renault, say the development for the revised aerodynamics has been enormously expensive and may not make much difference to the 'show'.

F1's major problem, five years after the vocal protestations of late Australian Grand Prix Corporation chairman Ron Walker, remains that its V6 hybrid power units are too quiet for purist fans.

And the competing manufacturers, Mercedes, Ferrari, Renault and Honda, have "rolled" Brawn on a major overhaul of the engine rules from 2021.

Meanwhile, images have been released this week of Ricciardo in a yellow Renault polo shirt and black and yellow driving suit as he embarks on a two-year contract with the French squad after five years at RBR and a decade in the Red Bull 'family'.

The season-opening race in Melbourne is now five weeks away, with the pecking order among the teams likely to be little changed, although Sebastian Vettel's success for Ferrari in Australia the past two years at least provides some hope to combatting the silver arrows and Lewis Hamilton, the five-time world champion fast closing on Michael Schumacher's records.

The field this year will have three rookies: Lando Norris at McLaren, George Russell at Williams and Alexander Albon at STR. We note too that Antonio Giovinazzi at Alfa-Romeo (nee Sauber) has driven only two GPs (in 2017, including the Melbourne race).

The big moves, apart from Ricciardo, are Monaco youngster Charles Leclerc from Sauber to Ferrari after just one season in F1 and Spaniard Carlos Sainz Junior from STR to McLaren.

The creator of one of the most important safety advances in motorsport died this week.

American Dr Robert Hubbard (75) was the 'father' of the HANS (head and neck safety) device now mandatory in all major forms of car racing.

The collar and yoke-shaped HANS over shoulders and is tethered to each side of the driver's helmet. In frontal-impact crashes the driver remains secured by the belts as the head is carried forward by the momentum. The HANS limits this movement.

It is thought that HANS would have saved NASCAR legend Dale Earnhardt Senior in the 2001 Daytona 500 crash that claimed him.

"I don't think there's been a basal skull fracture fatality since the HANS became mandatory," said Dr Terry Tramell, another American safety pioneer specialising in the treatment of leg and foot injuries.