MOTORSPORT: Formulas for change – perhaps

Ferrari is fast and Mercedes already 'bullet-proof', with speed up its sleeve, after the first of Formula 1's four-day pre-season tests with its new cars, while Daniel Ricciardo's Red Bull RB12 is thereabouts – but probably not in the same league.

Honda has changed the leader of its F1 project after its shocking season on its return with McLaren last year but, after a promising start to testing in Barcelona, Fernando Alonso didn't get to record a lap time last night because of a water leak.

Volkswagen, which is thought to have come close to taking over Red Bull Racing last year before its emissions scandal erupted, has ruled out an entry to F1 because of uncertainty over the sport's rules and ownership.

Powerbrokers have been trying to thrash out future rules this week, in the wake of supremo Bernie Ecclestone's extraordinary bucketing of the sport in its V6 hybrid incarnation, but – while there will be a tweak to qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix in three weeks – nothing beyond this season will be finalised before the end of April.

Meanwhile, the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport (CAMS) is trying to foster participation in Formula 4 by offering 10 $50,000 'scholarships' in the second season of the category here this year.

And 53 entries are paid up for Bathurst's new six-hour production car race at Easter, with event director James O'Brien – the man who sold his half-share of the February 12-hour GT race to V8 Supercars last year – confident it will be 55 by event time at Easter.

Honda's new approach, VW not tempted by F1
Honda's departing F1 manager Yasuhisa Arai admits his replacement, Yusuke Hasegawa, will bring "more realism" to the Japanese manufacturer's quest to return to the top of grand prix racing with McLaren.

After record grid penalties in its first year of competition with the V6 hybrid power units and finishing ninth of 10 teams in the constructors' world championship, Hasegawa will replace Arai officially next Tuesday.

Hasegawa says he's "a very conservative person" compared with Arai, whose optimism about Honda's 'size zero' hybrid – introduced a year later than those of Mercedes, Ferrari and Renault – repeatedly proved misplaced.

Arai will remain with Honda for a few months until his retirement at age 60, while Hasegawa has some experience of F1 from the days of the company's association with the former British American Racing and Jordan teams.

Admitting that Hasegawa would change the way Honda goes about F1, with the once-so-mighty McLaren now winless in the past three years, Arai said: "He has a different personality, the approach is a little bit different. This year we know how big the gap is to the top teams ... so we don't say such optimistic words. More realism."

Meanwhile, the Volkswagen group – forever touted as an entrant to F1, although its senior management has not been fond of Bernie Ecclestone – has ruled out adding grand prix racing to its participation in the World Endurance Championship with its Porsche and Audi brands, the World Rally Championship with its VW Polo R and GT Racing with Audis, Bentleys, Lamborghinis and Porsches.

"The [F1] situation is not predictable enough to make the kind of investment required," the VW group's motorsport boss Wolfgang Durheimer told Britain's Autocar.

"Before you commit the kind of money needed you must see five years of rules stability.

"There can't be the possibility of rule changes, or more or less engine cylinders coming in, or the hybrid system changing away from technology you are developing on road cars.

"[And] if you are a big business making a big investment you expect to have some influence on the set-up, with an assurance the present ownership will last.

"In F1 it seems the owners [the major one being CVC Capital Partners] will not be there forever and that creates some instability."

Tweak not on the day that matters
While the qualifying format will be slightly different for the Australian GP in Melbourne in mid-March and the cars a little louder, although still short of the traditional screech, there's nothing to indicate the racing will be greatly different.

Ferrari topped three of the four days of testing in Barcelona this week with its new SF16-H model, while Mercedes – winner of 32 of the 38 GPs so far in the hybrid era – concentrated on reliability runs and hasn't yet used the softest compound among Pirelli's latest tyres.

Mercedes-powered Force India topped the sheets the one day Ferrari didn't, courtesy of Nico Hulkenberg, but the F1 paddock knew all week that the Mercedes factory team had plenty of speed in reserve as it pounded out massive mileage.

Daniel Ricciardo seemed relatively pleased with Red Bull's RB12 and was third and second fastest in his two days in the cockpit, but well aware that his power unit – again a Renault, although now badged TAG Heuer – is still well short of Mercedes and Ferrari.

The qualifying tweak to be introduced in Melbourne will see cars eliminated, after a few minutes of group running in each stanza, at 90-second intervals, with a final two-car contest for pole position.

While it may make the Saturday of GPs a little more interesting, it's unlikely to have any great impact on the quality and outcome of Sunday's racing.

F1's powerbrokers met in Geneva this week and discussed ways of making GP racing more entertaining, with wider tyres and bigger wings, but finalisation of any major rule changes for 2017 have been delayed for another two months.

Ecclestone, who said this week that F1 was unwatchable now and that he wouldn't pay to take his family to see a GP (not that he'd have to), has welcomed the qualifying change as a move in the right direction.

However, almost inevitable compromises in the coming weeks may leave the rules well short of what he wants to restore the sport to anything like genuine entertainment.

Triple world champion Lewis Hamilton has made it clear he's not happy that drivers are not getting a say in F1's future direction.

Scholarships, with a catch, for F4 youngsters  
CAMS claims the first season of Formula 4 in Australia was "an unprecedented success" yet has felt the need to offer up to half a million dollars in "scholarships" to entice competitors for the second season starting in April.

While little more than half the 20 French-made Mygale wings-and-slicks open-wheelers that CAMS bought were on the grid in the initial season, it claims that five of the young drivers from last year's series competing overseas this year is evidence of the category's immediate success.

Champion Jordan Lloyd will race in the US F2000 series with the aid of his $150,000 prizemoney, while runner-up Thomas Randle and three others – including Luis Leeds, now a Red Bull junior – will compete in F4 in Britain.

CAMS is offering up to 10 $50,000 "scholarships" for drivers to race in this year's Australian F4 Championship – now comprising six rounds, after the dropping of the scheduled New Zealand finale.

"Drivers must be aged 21 or under at the commencement of the competition year, and must commit to a financial return to CAMS over their professional racing career," it said.

CAMS chief executive Eugene Arocca said "the strong financial position of the organisation has allowed CAMS to do more for young driver development in Australia".

"CAMS recognises the importance of the F4 teams in the role of driver development, which is why we are working with the F4 teams to award the 10 scholarships," Arocca said.

"They are very positive about the scholarship program. They were able to confirm a number of drivers for 2016 within the first 48 hours and we expect more drivers to commit in the near future."

13 brands in Bathurst's Easter enduro
The bumper entry for Bathurst's new Easter six-hour enduro could be a pointer to a resurgence of production car racing in Australia.

The field of 53 cars includes 13 brands and more than 20 different vehicle models.

They range from the Mitsubishi Lancer Evos that will contend for outright honours to the Toyota 86 coupes in Class D, while BMW is the best represented marque with 12 cars – including a two-time Bathurst 12-Hour winning 335i turbo.

There are nine Mitsubishis entered, seven Holden Special Vehicles, six Toyotas and five Renaults. Classes A1 and A2 for extreme performance machinery have a combined 21 entries.

The race, on Sunday, March 27, will be streamed live via the website with highlights to be screened later on SBS Speedweek.

Where there's Smoke there'll be Fords
Big news from NASCAR since last weekend's Daytona 500 is that the Chevrolet team of Tony Stewart and Gene Haas will switch next season to Ford – which has not won a Sprint Cup title since 2004.

Stewart-Haas Racing has been a Chevrolet team since multiple champion driver 'Smoke' Stewart joined industrial tools tycoon Haas as a co-owner in 2009.

Stewart, now in his final year of Sprint Cup driving but temporarily sidelined by a back injury, won his third title in 2011 and teammate Kevin Harvick won the Cup in 2014.

The Ford Fusions that Stewart-Haas Racing fields next year for Harvick, Kurt Busch, Danica Patrick and newcomer Clint Bowyer will get its engines from Roush Yates, as do Roger Penske's team for Joey Logano and Brad Keselowski's cars, Roush Fenway Racing and Richard Petty Motorsports.

While Toyota and Joe Gibbs Racing are on top in NASCAR at the minute with Denny Hamlin winning this year's Daytona 500 after Kyle Busch's Cup title last season, the 40-car field will still have 20 Chevrolets next year and 11 Fords.

Rallycross trial for Kiwis, with a couple of Aussies
Attempts to revive rallycross in Australia last year failed, but New Zealand is giving it a go this weekend – with a couple of Australians, Steve Glenney and Marcus Walkem, competing.

Ron Dixon, father of NZ's Indycar champion Scott Dixon, is staging the 'international rallycross' event at Mt Maunganui's Baypark stadium on the east coast of the north island.

Dixon has prepared a purpose-built track combining parts of the clay-surface speedway oval and stadium infield with the concrete and tarmac surfaces of the speedway pit area.

Grids of six cars will compete in quick-fire heat races and semi-finals leading to eight-car class finals.

Despite threatened rain, Dixon has vowed the event will go ahead.

South Australian Glenney, a Targa Tasmania tarmac rally winner and accomplished but only occasional gravel rally driver, won Australia's first and only Extreme Rallycross event last year and has taken his Mitsubishi Lancer Evo VIII across the Tasman.

Tasmanian Walkem, an Australian 4WD Rally champion, is running a Lancer Evo IX.

Dixon is hoping to stage bigger international rallycross events at Baypark after talks in the US in May, when he will watch his son race in the 100th Indianapolis 500.

Meanwhile, Scott Dixon will partner Australian Ryan Briscoe and Briton Richard Westbrook in one of Ford's sleek new GTs at Florida's Sebring 12-Hour on March 19.

Frenchman Sebastien Bourdais has been added to the line-up in Chip Ganassi's other Ford in that race, joining American Joey Hand and German Dirk Muller.