MOTORSPORT: Webber in two minds about Singapore

Previewing Formula One’s only night race a week ago, Webber said Singapore’s street circuit was one on which his Red Bull-Renault car “should work well’.

And in an interview this week, when asked to predict his result this Sunday, he said: “Champagne – and ideally the position in the middle!”

Yet in the same interview, published on formula1.com, Webber indicated that Singapore was one of two circuits in the remaining seven rounds of the world championship where he expects Red Bull to struggle.

“My prediction is that we will be very competitive in Suzuka [Japan] and Korea. In America [at the new Texas track] and Brazil we should be strong. The uncertain candidates are here [Singapore] and a little bit in Abu Dhabi, but at the rest we should be strong,” he said.

Having gone suddenly from second in the championship, 13 points behind Alonso, to fifth and 47 points in arrears (with Lewis Hamilton, Kimi Raikkonen and Sebastian Vettel between them) Webber must get back to consistently high finishes. A couple more wins to add to those he had in Monaco and Britain are essential, if it is not already too late to seriously contend for the championship.

The starting point has to be qualifying better – and then overcome the difficulties he has had recently with Pirelli’s hard-compound tyres.

“We are disappointed with our qualifying performance [lately]. But we have the chance to turn that around,” Webber said.

“If you want to challenge for the championship you need to get bigger points. We had some gearbox penalities, which doesn’t make it easier getting there. But my driving has been very consistent and right now I need to have stronger results.”

In F1, the 2009 world title-winning Brawn team that Mercedes took over still has only one win to its name (by Nico Rosberg in the Chinese GP) and is fifth in this year’s constructors’ championship – way behind Red Bull-Renault, McLaren-Mercedes, Ferrari and Lotus-Renault.

For this weekend's Singapore GP Mercedes is upgrading to an exhaust layout used by several of its rival teams.

Mercedes team principal Ross Brawn has admitted that it has concentrated too much on understanding tyres rather than what is called the Coanda-effect exhausts, which improve the flow of exhaust gases and air to the floor of an F1 car.

“The effect of the exhaust is more significant at lower speeds than higher speeds, and also brings you the balance perhaps you need for the rear tyre. We think that’s quite significant in low-speed traction,” Brawn said.

Low-speed traction is crucial on Singapore’s 23-turn circuit, the second slowest in the championship after Monaco.

Mercedes also has trialed a Lotus-style double DRS (drag reduction system, or driver-operated rear wing) but is unlikely to race it yet.

Alonso has won two of the previous four Singapore GPs and was third and fourth in the other two. He will equal Nigel Mansell in fourth on the list of GP winners with 31 victories if successful again this Sunday.

Alonso says Singapore is particularly challenging.

“Not only physically, but nearly two hours of racing and the humidity makes it a mental test too,” he said.

“The stress of not making a single mistake over the whole weekend means it is a difficult race. We [him and Ferrari] were competitive in Monaco and Canada – which is a sort of street circuit – so we hope to do similarly well here.”

Hamilton, victor twice in McLaren’s recent hat-trick, also has won in Singapore before (as has Vettel) but admits he needs to find Alonso-like consistency.

“Fernando has been incredibly consistent throughout this year – he’s had a lot less problems than others have, but that’s the name of the game. You need a team that doesn’t mess up in the pitstops, a car that’s reliable and then you need to do your job.

“Unfortunately, I have come out [DNF'd] a couple of times… and we have had a lot of pitstop problems, but no reliability problems. If we can have the fastest pitstops, the fastest car and the most consistent driver then we should be able to win the title.

Kimi Raikkonen, in his F1 comeback after two years in the World Rally Championship, amazingly is third in the title, just one point behind Hamilton and a point ahead of Vettel. This despite the greatly-improved Lotus-Renault team not yet having broken through for a win.

Consistency also has been Raikkonen’s virtue, with six podium finishes – and talk that he could yet be in demand at two of his former teams, Ferrari (in place of Felipe Massa) and McLaren (if Hamilton goes to Mercedes).

Young Mexican Sergio Perez’s future also is in the spotlight after his second place for Sauber in Italy, between Hamilton and Alonso, after his earlier second in Malaysia.

Perez has ties to Ferrari but the Italian team’s president Luca di Montezemolo has said twice that the Mexican does not yet have the experience for a Ferrari drive.

HRT runs its Car of the Future, Stones next - with Ford
Holden Racing Team (HRT) this week was the third V8 Supercar team to roll out and test its first car built to the 2013 Car of the Future (CotF) rules. Young reigning Bathurst 1000 champion Nick Percat gave the HRT Commodore its debut at Melbourne’s Calder Park.

Triple Eight Race Engineering was the first team with a CotF, testing its Commodore at Norwell on the Gold Coast and then Queensland Raceway, while Ford Performance Racing has run its first Falcon at Victoria’s Winton.

Stone Brothers Racing will be next with a Falcon, although come the start of next season it will have Mercedes engines and E63 bodywork.

Meanwhile, Stone brothers Ross and Jim have tried to pacify fans angry at seeing them switch from Ford after 15 years.

“When we first started in V8Supercars 50 per cent of the car market was Ford and Holden,” the Stones said in a social media statement.

“Now the Australian car market has really taken a dive in the large car segment and when we saw the opportunity to take on a new challenge in V8Supercar racing we decided to take it.

“Hopefully in the coming years we can really take it to FPR and Triple Eight and put SBR in the running to win another championship title.," Stone said.

SBR took out the V8Super car title with Marcos Ambrose in 2003 and ’04 and Russell Ingall in ’05, as well as winning Bathurst in 2008 with Jason Bright and Steven Richards.”

Toyota’s hybrid sportscar success jolts Audi
Toyota's TS030 hybrid has won in the World Endurance Championship at only its third race, prompting Le Mans-dominant Audi to enter a second hybrid for the remaining rounds of the championship.

Toyota’s victory, by a minute, came at the Sao Paulo Six-Hour in Brazil with Frenchman Nicolas Lapierre and Austrian Alex Wurz driving.

Audi promptly announced it would put two of its long-time drivers, Scotsman Allan McNish and Dane Tom Kristensen, in a second hybrid R18 e-tron quattro for the next enduro in Bahrain.

“With two hybrids we’re in a better position in the battle with Toyota,” Audi motorsport chief Dr Wolfgang Ullrich said.

“Our analysis has shown that we’ve got an advantage in traffic with the R18 e-tron quattro.”

Ralf Juttner, technical director of Audi partner, Team Joest, said: “In Bahrain we’ll hopefully get revenge for Brazil. We’ll leave no stone unturned to return to the top of the podium.”

Meanwhile, the revolutionary DeltaWing car that raced at Le Mans mid-year has been given the okay to compete in the American Le Mans Series and the new championship that will be created in 2014 from the merger of the ALMS and Grand-Am.

The DeltaWing will run in the final year of this year’s ALMS, the Petit Le Mans 1000-mile (1600km) race at Road Atlanta.

ALMS founder Don Panoz intends to build more DeltaWings in time for the Sebring 12-Hour early next year.

AJ clear to race again after drug ban
NASCAR has lifted the ban on driver AJ Allmendinger, who returned a positive drug test mid-year.

While Allmendinger is unlikely to regain a NASCAR Sprint Cup drive in a hurry, he is firming as favourite to replace Australian Ryan Briscoe in Roger Penske’s IndyCar team.

Allmendinger had been racing for Penske’s Cup team but was temporarily replaced by Sam Hornish Junior and young star Joey Logano will fill it full-time next year.

STOP PRESS
September 21, 2012: In late breaking news Tony Cochrane has stepped down from his role of Chairman for V8 Supercars. Mark Skaife is expected to occupy the position in Cochrane's stead. motoring.com.au will provide further details as they come to hand.