Sidepodcast

Light at the End of the Tunnel

The debut Abu Dhabi Grand Prix weekend seems to be progressing nicely. Personally, I have found the sessions to be slightly on the dull side, although the track is very good looking and the facilities appear to be top notch. One thing I have found curious is the lighting situation.

Back when Singapore was announced as the first ever F1 night race, the topic of just how the organisers would light the event was a talking point for weeks. We wanted to know whether they had a backup, what would happen in case of a power cut, if the bulbs went out, if there was some epic disaster that ruined the weekend.

The FIA took the safety of the event very seriously, and monitored the plans at every opportunity. Mika Hakkinen took time out of his busy schedule to head to a short stretch of track weeks before the event, to test out the visibility and viability of the lights. Although it seemed as though everything was in hand, there were still concerns.

One member of each team was sent over to the track to have a look, and see if they could find any potential problems. The drivers spent plenty of time deciding on which visors they would be running with, and whether tinted or clear tear-off strips were the best. In short, there was plenty of fuss, it was the most exciting thing of the year, and we talked about it at great length in advance.

This year, F1 turned up in Abu Dhabi, it got a bit dark, and they switched the lights on. Where was the fuss?

It does make sense that Singapore did such a great job with the lighting, that Abu Dhabi would just be able to copy their setup and be ready to go, but I can't believe there were no worries or thoughts about the lighting before the event got underway.

The twilight aspect of the race has me slightly concerned, only because driving into the sunlight is quite possibly the worst thing I know about being behind the wheel, and I only drive at 70mph. If there was a contingent sent over to Abu Dhabi from each of the teams to investigate the situation, we didn't hear about it. If the track has the same sort of backup system as Singapore, I haven't seen any news reports about it.

To me, the lights don't look as bright, and they don't look quite as consistent as the system in Singapore. However, none of the drivers have complained, and they seem to be quite comfortable driving once it gets dark.

The whole thing strikes me as a bit odd, but perhaps Singapore was so good that all the lessons have been learned already?

Daily: 14th April 2009

It's not long now until the Sidepodscience meetup gets underway in London. However, before we get there, we've got a few news stories to discuss first:

• BMW have confirmed that they're designing a super light-weight car for Kubica, hopefully in time for the Spanish Grand Prix. The weight factor has meant Kub can't run KERS, but the team are banking on some weight-saving techniques to sort it out. If there are such savings to be made, though, why haven't they done them before? And does this prove that KERS really is worth having?
• Surprise, surprise, the organisers at Sepang have become less resistant to the idea of a night race. Given what happened last weekend, and the fact that Bernie always gets his way, this is hardly a completely radical step. However, will they be able to compete with the Singapore spectacle?
• Ferrari are undergoing a major reshuffle to try and spice up their championship campaign. Luca Baldisserri is being given a factory-based role, whilst Chris Dyer takes over his duties trackside. Presumably this is a step down for Luca, regardless of how Ferrari try to portray it as a sideways move. It also turns out that Marc Gene undertook some straightline testing to evaluate a new front wing that will appear in China. Does this testing count under the FIA's restricted straightline days? Why don't we get to hear about it in a more public fashion?

That'll do it for now. It's always good to return from holiday and be cast straight back into the thick of some F1 news. It should keep us going for a while, and as usual, I'll see you in the comments.

Singapore Confirm Circuit Changes

This article was originally written for BellaOnline, but is republished here for posterity.

Organisers of the Singapore Grand Prix are more than happy with how their first event went, it was considered a great success, and the introduction of a night race to the F1 calendar has spiced things up.

However, there were just a few little things that niggled at the teams and drivers, so for the 2009 season, Singapore have confirmed they will be making a few changes. Organisers have talked it through with both the FIA and the teams to make sure that this second year in Singapore will be more to their liking.

Reduce Bumps
Although the sparks kicked up by the cars in 2008 just added to the overall spectacle of the first night race, the teams were not impressed with how bad the road surface was in Singapore. Turns 5, 6 and 7 are due to be resurfaced to try and reduce the problem areas.

Corner Alterations
Many of the corners will face slight alterations to try and improve the chances of overtaking. Although it was a good race in 2008, the addition of a safety car and a surprise winner added to the success of the weekend. Without a safety car intervention, the race could have ended up a procession. To solve this, a number of corners are going to be looked at. The first corner will be made sharper and kerbs added, which will see the first lap made more exciting and hopefully harsher braking for overtaking during the race. Turn 13 is being made faster, and therefore braking into Turn 14 will also be affected.

Pitlane Entry
The original plans for Singapore were that the race should go in the opposite direction. These changed relatively near to the Grand Prix, so there were massive concerns that the pit lane entry and exit were just not suitable. Both fed drivers in and out of the racing line, meaning traffic would come across drivers slowing to make their pit stop, or exiting full of fuel. For 2009, organisers intend to build a dedicated pitlane entry to avoid the problem, and will move the exit away from the racing line.

This last point is the most important and definitely needed some attention before we go racing in Singapore again. They haven't mentioned whether the marshals will be trained up better, as there was a noticeable lack of marshalling ability in 2008. If something serious had happened, it could have been disastrous. However, if this is sorted, Singapore will be something to look out for in 2009.

Ancillary F1 - Series 1 Omnibus

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• Transcript: ancillaryomnibus1.pdf 
• Torrent: ancillaryomnibus1.torrent 

The omnibus edition of the Ancillary F1 series, looking closer at companies that help Formula 1 operate but never get any of the glory.

Here are the links to the individual show notes:

1. Bridgestone
2. McLaren Electronic Systems
3. Tilke Engineering
4. Mercedes Support Vehicles
5. Météo-France
6. Philips Lighting
7. RTV

This is the first series of Ancillary F1, I hope you enjoyed it. If you have any suggestions for future companies or feedback about the ones covered above, I'd love to hear from you.

Ancillary F1 - Philips Lighting

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• File: ancillary6.mp3 
• Transcript: ancillary6.pdf 
• Torrent: ancillary6.torrent 

Welcome to Ancillary F1, the mini series from Sidepodcast that takes a closer look at supporting companies, those that are involved in the sport but not directly competing. Today we’re looking at Philips Lighting.

This year saw the introduction of Formula 1’s first ever night race, and Philips Lighting got the chance to illuminate the event. The company has great experience in brightening up sporting events, with their first foray into stadium floodlights about 60 years ago. Philips, based in the Netherlands, but a multinational corporation, are involved in all aspects of technology, including healthcare, electronics and as we now know, lighting. The company already has some involvement in Formula 1, as Philips Shavers are a prominent sponsor of the Williams team. They have recently announced an expansion of the sponsorship, meaning the entire Consumer Lifestyle section will be on board, their name will appear on the teams clothing, and they’ll have promotional rights with Rosberg and Nakajima. However, the company has more to offer the sport than money alone and thus Philips Lighting took the next step.

For the Singapore race, the company supplied almost 1,500 lighting projectors, a brand new concept, specially designed and produced to reduce glare and be super bright. They lit the entire 5 kilometres of track and the pitlane. Philips wouldn’t let slip how much the project cost but the CEO would only say it was “some millions.” The manufacturer also supplied the corporate boxes in Singapore with massive flat-screen televisions, but that’s just showing off.

The Singapore race organisers appointed Valerio Maioli as official consultants regarding the lighting, and the Italian company partnered with Philips to design the new projector, a custom-made solution to tackle the unique problem of Formula 1 night racing. Maioli also wouldn’t comment on how much it cost to bring Philips on board, but said theirs was a competitive tender. One of the other advantages Philips projectors had over their rivals was a solution that was 16% more energy efficient.

That’s pretty surprising, actually, because the new lights are a long way from Philips first stadium job half a century ago. These lamps are four times brighter than a normal football stadium, not for the drivers, as you might expect, but for the High Definition television camera’s. An F1 driver doesn’t need bright, he just needs consistent lighting, so the 3,000 lux provided by these projectors was for those TV viewers lucky enough to receive race broadcasts in HD. In comparison, a football stadium is about 800 lux, and your regular street light is about 30.

The lighting system took just a few months to put in place, once developed, and lined only one side of the track. Projectors were raised 10 metres above the ground and spaced 4 metres apart. Any pre-race fears about backup generators failing remain unfounded.

That’s it for this penultimate ancillary company. Please leave your feedback on Sidepodcast.com or the voicemail at 0121 28 87225. I’ll be back tomorrow with the last episode for this series.

Theme music: Porter Block, Second Wind.

Episode 79 - A Certain Team Fluffed a Certain Pitstop

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• Transcript: Coming soon 
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The anticipation for Formula 1's first ever night race has been building since Singapore was announced. Now we rake over all that happened, take a couple of calls, and get feedback from the circuit.

Intro

Doing a show on a full stomach may just calm the hyperactivity.

Good Week / Bad Week

A good week for David Croft and Richard Cregan who have both secured jobs, but a bad week for, well, everyone.

Qualifying

So many incidents, which highlighted issues with the marshals and intrigue about the safety barriers. Also, we discuss Trulli driving the wrong way round the track, and why Ferrari's can't turn circles.

The Race

It was a brilliant race, there's no disguising the fact. We look at who did well, who was anonymous, and who throws like a girl. Plus, we hear from a couple of callers, and get two voicemails from trackside.

Feedback

Two emails, one with some fantastic Singapore stats, the other about F1 on the internet, leading to some discussion of embedding video.

Linkage

• Inside Sport
• Sidepodcast's Drop.io

F1 Digest - Singapore GP

• Length: 11:22 
• Size: 10.4 MB 
• File: digest60.mp3 
• Transcript: digest60.pdf 
• Torrent: digest60.torrent 

What was already an exciting weekend has culminated in a stunning race with more incidents than we've seen for a long time. We also got yet another new race winner.

The Race

A much cleaner start than we were expecting, but the action was just saved for later as first Piquet and then Sutil brought out the Safety Car. All the pit stop action meant that Hamilton lost time, Massa lost his dignity, and Alonso lost his losing streak.

Conclusions

Everyone felt like it was a difficult day, especially because it was hot, it was long, and tiring. Really, everything boiled down to where you were at the pit stops, and our drivers tell us how they're feeling after a lottery of a day.

F1 Digest - Singapore Qualifying

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• Transcript: digest59.pdf 
• Torrent: digest59.torrent 

We're back to a hot and humid race, so qualifying is all important to try and make Sunday that tiny bit easier. Listen to today's F1 Digest to catch up with who was in the wall, and who was out in front.

Free Practice 3

Raikkonen and Fisichella both struggle to get to the end of the session, with the Force India mechanics having a lot of work to do. Meanwhile, Alonso showed that Renault are heading in the right direction.

Qualifying

What qualifying session would be complete without a championship contender almost failing to get through to Q3, a pit lane controversy and a couple of drivers in the wall? These three Singapore sessions had it all.

Conclusions

It seems there were three specific problems today: tyres, traffic, and the kerbs. Every driver was affected by at least one of these things, and they're not afraid to tell us how they feel about it.

Live Commenting: Singapore - Qualifying

So far, we've had three sessions of Free Practice, four hours of on-track action, and many, many incidents. Singapore has already far surpassed what I was expecting, so I don't see how it can't live up to the hype. Who knows what Qualifying will bring, but this is the place to find out.

The only thing letting the side down at the moment is the abysmal performance of the marshals. On the one hand, it's incredible to see so many drivers struggling, hitting the walls, and generally having issues. But every time someone goes off, we have to endure the painful sight of incompetent marshals. They look like they're not quite sure what they're supposed to do, or as Neil said in the comments, whether they're even allowed to touch the cars.

Hopefully this isn't going to be too big a problem, because it's the only blight on what is already turning out to be a stellar weekend. The scenery continues to be stunning, and I can't wait to see what qualifying brings.

Alonso looks completely on it so far this weekend, but we'll have to wait and see what happens with fuel loads. Hamilton is also showing well, as is to be expected, whilst Kovalainen struggles down in the mid-field. Kovi has also used his joker engine change for this race, so hopefully he can pull his socks up a little bit. Raikkonen and Fisichella both saw early ends to their Free Practice session today, and it's worth keeping an eye on them to see if it affects their qualifying performance.

It's all about your predictions now, then, with the Live Commenting Live... Thing ready and waiting to hear your thoughts. Tell us where you are, how you're watching, and who your money is on for pole. Thankfully, ITV do know about qualifying so we will be watching that, whilst looking at the live timing, assuming it is working. 5live were mysteriously not on for FP3, but they should be up and running for qualifying. I will see you in the comments!

Live Commenting: Singapore - Free Practice 3

I don't know how the drivers are faring, because my body clock is all messed up, and this is a relatively normal race! Presumably they are all still coping with the European time adjustments (or non-adjustments, as it should be) but we will be able to tell once they jump back into the cars for Free Practice 3.

At the moment, the weather looks to be hazy, the humidity is about 60% and there's a bit of a wind. My weather source says there's a chance of a thunderstorm on Saturday night (Singapore time) but it also said that yesterday and we had nice, clear track action.

Talking of which, there was plenty to behold. I imagine Webber will want to get some more running in this morning, as he was limited yesterday following his crash. I don't think the track will be empty though, as all the drivers hit the streets of Singapore to get a feel for what it will be like. Today will see the track at it's closest to what it will be in qualifying, and they need to get all the data they can.

If I can tell the time right, which I'm not sure I can, the gap between FP3 and Qualifying is shortened, although not as manic as yesterday's simple hour between sessions. We're hoping to see a bit more organisation between the marshals, as it looks like they could really slow things down. It also appears the drivers had a really long briefing with Charlie Whiting yesterday with a whole host of complaints (my guess is Bourdais was particularly vocal) about the track, so it will be interesting to see if anything is done.

As ever, ITV aren't aware there is a third session of Free Practice, so we will be scouting the web and posting any video streams we find in the comments. I can't see that 5live are covering it, either, so we are really struggling for information. We'll have the Live Timing up, and will be posting things to drop.io. I hope you can join us in the Live Commenting Live... Thing. Follow that link or click the triangle in the corner.