Latest F1 news in brief – Friday (Update)
 |
| Ricciardo has to prove himself at Red Bull |
02/07/14
- Hospital denies Schumacher death
- Other Renault teams to 'observe' Lotus debut
- Ricciardo to make own way at Red Bull – Vettel
- F1 set to change qualifying for 2014
- Honda F1 engine making 'steady progress' New
Hospital denies Schumacher death
(GMM) The French hospital treating Michael Schumacher has denied wild rumors the seven time world champion is dead.
The rumors spread on social networking sites including Twitter, but a spokesperson for the Grenoble hospital told the French-language news agency AFP: "The hospital denies that Michael Schumacher has died."
The online edition of Le Point, a French newsmagazine, said the rumors of Schumacher's death prompted dozens of media representatives to flock to the hospital.
Other Renault teams to 'observe' Lotus debut
(GMM) Representatives of the Red Bull, Toro Rosso and Caterham teams will reportedly be present when Lotus does its 'filming day' at Jerez on Friday.
With the Enstone team having sat out the first official test in southern Spain, Brazil's Globo claims troubled engine supplier Renault has invited its other customers back to Jerez as the E22 makes its track debut.
The report said that while Lotus was not keen on the idea, Renault wants all of its V6 customers at Jerez "to monitor" the E22 rollout, presumably to get to the bottom of the technical problems that marred the official Jerez test.
To sweeten the deal for Lotus, who preferred that the 'filming day' remain private, Renault has reportedly vowed to pay for the outing.
Globo said the new Lotus will "debut some of the changes" devised by Renault since Caterham, and particularly Toro Rosso and Red Bull, struggled to merely run their new 2014 cars at Jerez last week.
Ricciardo to make own way at Red Bull – Vettel
(GMM) Daniel Ricciardo will have to make his own way at Red Bull, champion teammate Sebastian Vettel has declared.
24-year-old Australian Ricciardo, with just 50 grands prix with HRT and Toro Rosso under his belt, has arrived at the reigning title-winning team to replace Vettel's retiring teammate, the highly-experienced veteran Mark Webber.
German Vettel and Webber, who like Ricciardo is Australian, endured a notoriously strained relationship at Red Bull, and now Vettel has made clear he will not be actively helping Ricciardo get up to speed.
"Obviously there's a lot of new things this year that everybody will have to adapt to," he said.
"But I'm sure (Ricciardo) will find his way quickly: to give advice is difficult because everybody has his own style.
"He doesn't have the experience Mark had but he's earned his place and I'm sure he'll give me a hard time," said Vettel.
Ricciardo, on the other hand, said he is hoping to "learn as much as I can" from quadruple world champion Vettel, "and hopefully challenge him of course".
David Coulthard, a former Red Bull driver, said he thinks Ricciardo has less pressure on him this year than Vettel.
"If he (Ricciardo) matches him, people will say 'well, he's really got some pace'. If he beats him, then people are going to really sit up and take notice," the Scot told AAP news agency.
"So I think the pressure is off Daniel in many respects," Coulthard said.
F1 set to change qualifying for 2014
(GMM) F1 looks set to introduce an eleventh-hour change to the qualifying rules for 2014, according to media reports.
Just five weeks ahead of the Melbourne season opener, team bosses, Bernie Ecclestone and the governing FIA will meet in Bahrain on February 21, coinciding with official testing in the island Kingdom, to discuss the issue.
Britain's Mirror newspaper said the changes would be to ensure drivers cannot sit out the decisive 'Q3' segment of qualifying, in order to save tires and for other tactical and reliability reasons.
"Some believe a return to the free-for-all hour long sessions of the past is the answer because the current three-part formula has added nothing to the Saturday spectacle," said correspondent Byron Young.
The Telegraph's new F1 correspondent Daniel Johnson added: "To try and maintain the spectacle, (the) strategy group has asked the teams and the FIA to come up with ways of forcing drivers to go for the best grid positions in Q3.
"Plans likely to be discussed are believed to include supplying drivers with an extra set of qualifying tires, specifically for the final part of the session," he added.
Not likely to get voted through in Bahrain, meanwhile, is an extension of Bernie Ecclestone's highly unpopular new 'double points' concept.
To keep the title alive until the end, drivers will score twice as many points at the season finale in Abu Dhabi this year, but F1's chief executive has written to the teams asking they vote for the concept to also include the preceding two races.
Red Bull's Christian Horner, no fan of the concept initially, indicated he would support extending the scheme to three races because that would "take away an element of lottery over that last race".
But because the proposed change is occurring so late, it would require an unanimous vote, and there are reports the Mercedes-powered teams have no mind to support it.
Other teams are reportedly also not keen, a mischievous Lotus spokesman telling the BBC: "The best thing would be to make all the races double points."
The British media report added: "More than one top team believes it would be wrong to change the rules a month before the start of the season."
Honda F1 engine making 'steady progress'
Honda says it is making "steady progress" with its Formula One program and will have its dynamo and assembly facilities up and running in the UK by June this year.
The Japanese manufacturer is set to make its return to Formula One with McLaren next year and has been developing its V6 turbo power unit at a new facility in Sakura City, Japan. The company released a brief statement on its progress on Friday.
"For the FIA Formula One World Championship, which Honda will rejoin in the 2015 season, the company is making steady progress in developing the power unit," read the statement.
"In January 2014 Honda moved its motor sports development base from the Automobile R&D Center of Honda R&D Co., Ltd. (at Haga-machi, Haga-gun in Tochigi Prefecture) to a newly situated area in its facility in Sakura City (also in Tochigi), in a move to further strengthen its development organization for F1 and other races.
"At Honda's European base for F1 activity in Milton Keynes, UK, installation of the dynamo and assembly facilities will be completed in June 2014 to further reinforce the already solid setup in preparation for racing."