MOTORSPORT: Red Bull hit on engine torque

Vettel claims change no big deal
Red Bull Racing has been forced to alter its engine mapping for this weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix, but its world champion of the past two years, Sebastian Vettel, reckons it will make little or no difference.

The Renault-engined RB8s of Vettel and Australian Mark Webber came under the scrutiny of stewards at last weekend's German GP but were allowed to race unchanged. The modification now will limit the way Red Bull Racing vary its torque settings to help improve the blowing of gases through its exhausts.

Attempting to offset the blown diffusers outlawed at the end of last season, Red Bull's engine maps in Germany were not delivering a torque output at mid rpm that was linear to the throttle input.

Some of the team's rivals complained that was outside the spirit of this year's engine regulations, but Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner said the rules were not meant to take into account spirit -- rather they were meant to stipulate specifications.

FIA technical delegate had noticed a difference in the torque output at mid rpm in Germany compared with earlier races this year. The world governing body of the motorsport, the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), this week has "clarified" the relevant Formula One engine rule -- although it has not issued that clarification publicly.

However, Britain's BBC has reported that teams must now supply a reference map from the opening four races of the world championship to the FIA and that the new directive states: "Above 6000 rpm the maximum engine torque may vary by no more than +/- 2 per cent [from the reference map]. And the ignition angle may vary by no more than 2.5 per cent."

Red Bull argued that the old regulation did not state that settings for other races would be used as references and that engines only had to deliver the maximum torque they were programmed to on a particular day.

Vettel has said that the differences in Hungary -- and the other GPs after the August break -- will be minor and that Red Bull's engineers don't regard the matter as seriously as those who complained.

"I think there was more of a fuss in writing and talking than in the mapping in the car," he said. "It is not as if the car does not work now any more...  Obviously we had what we had in the car in Hockenheim [German GP venue] because we believed it was quickest, so it is a little bit different for here [Hungary].

"But it is hard to give a figure. If it is two-tenths [of a second a lap], half a tenth, or nothing. We cannot measure... I am quite confident that nothing will change."

While Red Bull is on course for its third straight constructors' world title, its drivers trail Ferrari's Fernando Alonso in the drivers' championship. Webber is 34 points behind the Spaniard, with Vettel another 10 points in arrears.

While Alonso has had two wins and a second place in the past three GPs, and pole position at the two most recent races, Webber finished only eighth in Germany and Vettel was relegated to fifth -- by a 20-second penalty for going off the track in overtaking Jenson Button's McLaren-Mercedes - after crossing the line in second place.

It is more than five years since Ferrari had three poles in a row, and its team principal Stefano Domenicali and Alonso insist they still don't have the fastest car yet.

The tight, twisty and dusty Budapest circuit, renowned for producing little overtaking, traditionally has favoured McLaren, which has won at it 10 times in 26 races to Ferrari's five times, while Williams has seven wins there from its heyday.

McLaren has won in Hungary five of the past seven years -- with Lewis Hamilton in 2007 and '09, Button last year (he also won for Honda in '06) while Finns Kimi Raikkonen and Heiki Kovalainen delivered McLaren success in '05 and '08.

Webber won for Red Bull in 2010 -- one of his four victories that season.

"The Hungaroring is a good little venue, and we've had some good races there in the past," Webber said. "Overtaking has not been easy, but it will be interesting to see how the cars perform this time as it's a hot race.

"In general it's a track I enjoy, and of course we're looking forward to doing well before the [northern] summer break."

Despite the traditional paucity of overtaking, only one of the past seven Hungarian GPs has been won from pole position. It was here that Alonso scored his first GP victory nine years ago, before taking world titles with Renault in 2005 and '06.

Now he could chalk up his 31st victory on Sunday -- his 31st birthday -- although he expects the Red Bulls and McLarens to be at least as quick, if not quicker, in Budapest.

"There is more stress on the grid between all of us now," Alonso said. "You have to be close to perfection every weekend, otherwise you lose more positions than in the past."

The Spaniard is consistently closer to perfection than any driver in arguably the most talented field in F1 history.
 
Ambrose hopes for better at Brickyard
The Brickyard 400 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway has become one of the blockbuster races of NASCAR's Sprint Cup.

Australia's Marcos Ambrose is making his fifth start in the event this weekend. His best start at The Brickyard has been 11th and, even though he has completed all but three of the 640 laps in the past four races, his best finish only 21st.

Now driving a Ford for Richard Petty Motorsports, Ambrose is 18th in the championship this season -- still chasing a Sprint Cup oval victory to add to his road course triumph at Watkins Glen last year.

"Racing at Indy ranks right up there with racing in the Daytona 500," Ambrose said. "It's a race win any driver would like to be able to add to their resume."

Ambrose's crew chief Todd Parrott said: "Indy is unlike any other place we race at... It has four very distinct corners -- and we want to be able to carry a lot of speed through each of those corners."

Major discrepancy in NASCAR drug perspectives
NASCAR and former Champ Car racer A.J. Allmendinger is now suspended indefinitely from the Sprint Cup after the B sample from a drug test of him at the Kentucky race weekend in early July confirmed the positive A sample.

Former IndyCar star Sam Hornish, whose focus this year had been NASCAR's second tier Nationwide Series, will continue to deputise in Allmendinger's Penske Racing Dodge. Allmendinger has entered NASCAR's Road to Recovery rehabilitation program -- he had little option - and it's unlikely he will race again this year.

His career may even be over, at least in a race series of any great consequence. Allmendinger, 30, tested positive for an amphetamine. His camp is not saying precisely what it was, but that it's not methamphetamine or Ecstasy.  NASCAR won't name the substance either.

Allmendinger has vehemently denied knowingly taking any banned substance. His management has been in extreme damage-control mode, saying that all his medicines and supplements are being checked to see if something in them has caused the positive test.

Amid all the spin, there has been one telling discrepancy. Allmendinger's business manager Tara Ragan said he was only "nanograms" over the threshold in the test. However, NASCAR spokesman David Higdon said he was much more than slightly over the limit.

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