The ING Renault F1 team have been summoned to appear before the World Motor Sport Council in Paris on the 21st September. This afternoon the FIA put out the following statement:
Representatives of ING Renault F1 have been requested to appear before an extraordinary meeting of the FIA World Motor Sport Council in Paris on Monday, 21 September 2009.
The team representatives have been called to answer charges, including a breach of Article 151c of the International Sporting Code, that the team conspired with its driver, Nelson Piquet Jr, to cause a deliberate crash at the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix with the aim of causing the deployment of the safety car to the advantage of its other driver, Fernando Alonso.
The hearing will take place the Monday prior to this year's Singapore Grand Prix.
Updated: Renault have responded to the FIA's request to appear before the WMSC:
The ING Renault F1 Team acknowledges the FIA's request for representatives of the team to appear before the FIA World Motor Sport Council in Paris on the 21st of September 2009.
Before attending the hearing, the team will not make any further comment.
Joe talks F1 from Paris, and topics under discussion in this post Silverstone podcast include a look at what makes the Northamptonshire track special, as well as the best way to get in and out of the circuit.
Additionally, questions from the comments ask is Sebastian Vettel overrated and what does Joe do during the build up to a Grand Prix? There's the full low-down on Manor Motorsport, along with what the future of f1 simulation might look like.
All of this and much, much more in this episode of An Aside With Joe.
As part of our end of year round up, we like to take a look back at our year through the eyes of our camera lens. Usually, all the good photos are posted to our Flickr account, but this is the place for those photos with history, but that aren't visually up to scratch. If you haven't read Part 1 yet, take a look here.
Goodwood FOS
Goodwood was a complete disappointment for me this year, but not because anything Lord March did or didn't organise. I was still living in the misery of some serious Silverstone germs, and could only manage to attend half a day, despite having three day tickets. What I did notice of that half day though, is the massive attention the Bugatti Veyron got.
The Formula 1 paddock was full of people, and they were meandering around. If a team opened their marquee and allowed a glimpse of the car, or if any notable person made an appearance, then you'd get a crowd gather. But the Veyron was a static display, and was hugely popular all the time.
In fact, there were three of the supercars side by side, and you had to elbow through the crowd to get near enough for a good photo. We met up with Lou and her friend Emily at Goodwood, and the first place we went was to see the Veyrons. It surprises me that this car, three years old now, is still such a fascination to the population, myself included.
Sidepodtour: Paris
This view, the Obelisk of Luxor next to a Paris Eye style big wheel, is what Max sees when he looks out of his office window. Situated in the Place de la Concorde, the two features are particularly popular. Having taken enough photos of the front door of the FIA building, we headed around la Place to see what else was going on.
We were told off by a security guard, and warned not to take photographs of the American Embassy, an embassy we didn't even know was there. Then we crossed over a couple of roads and snapped some shots of the Obelisk instead. I say crossed the roads casually, like it's a simple task to make it across the Paris streets in one piece. It isn't.
There are tons of cars going in all different directions, and a swarm of people crossing in both directions. Which makes it all the more odd that by only waiting for a few moments, we could take photographs of the features of Place de la Concorde with no people in them. In London, this is almost impossible.
Sidepodtour: Williams Grand Prix Collection
The final stop on our Sidepodtour for 2008 was a visit to the Grand Prix Collection housed at the Williams F1 Conference Centre. The centre itself was great, with a nice guide talking us through the hall of champions, and into a short promotional video for the team. Then we were allowed through to the collection, where a detailed video looked at each era of cars in turn. They were grouped by engine supplier, and allowed us to be guided from Williams humble beginnings through to F1 as it is today.
My favourite bit though, was when the video told me there was a red Williams. The above picture should show that this is in fact the case, although it was very dark for our poor camera to try and capture the moment. I don't know about anyone else, but a red Williams just isn't right to me. I'm glad they went back to the more favourable blue and white instead.
With the Sidepodtour only just beginning, I wonder what photos will be featured next year.
A quick dash through all the questions that Honda's exit from the sport has raised, including why, where the drivers will go, what implications it has on the other teams, and what's changed about the standard engines.
Intro
It's an emergency show, despite our assurances that we'd be taking a week off.
Bad Week / Bad Week
It's been one of those weeks - Credit Suisse, Hockenheim, Pantano and fans of big launches (yes, them again) are all suffering.
News and Views
No prizes for guessing the main topic of conversation this week, it's all about Honda. Why did they leave? Who had the scoop first? What does it all mean? We try and look into these questions, as well as looking at what the various members of the team could do next, and who might also be about ready for the chop. Plus, of course, Max saw it all happening and had just the right letter for the job.
Housekeeping
We visited Paris this weekend, and actually saw more than we bargained for due to our inability to print out an actual map. Nevertheless, we got to see the FIA Headquarters in all it's glory. Also, don't forget to send in your audio season reviews via Skype (0121 28 87225) or email (christine at sidepodcast.com).
Even when I finally relent and tell the man that he can have a holiday, the F1 gods say no. All manner of news descended on the motorsport world this weekend, and all of it was intensely important. Therefore we are scratching around for a spare couple of hours to put out an emergency show covering all the implications of Honda's exit from the sport.
Would it surprise you if I said we were running late? The calendar says we are due on air at 8pm GMT, but we're not ready yet. If you're around, please say hi in the comments, but if not, we'll be a little while yet. I'll try and update you as we go. Also, apologies to everyone who can't make this live stream, we are having to shoehorn it in where we can.
This weekend we planned to not podcast because we intended to kick off the first part of our post-season tour, whereby we fill in the downtime with trips to a variety of motorsport related locations. As with everything we do, it's an ad-hoc affair, we don't expect to plan anything more than a week in advance.
The first location on the agenda was Paris, France. The lovely capital city houses basecamp for the motorsport governing body Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile. Ideally the trip would have seen us leave on Friday, spend a quiet few days figuring out how we make all of our equipment work on the continent, and return late on Sunday.
That was before Honda announced their rather unexpected exit strategy on Thursday evening.
Friday was a write-off given the amount of news bouncing around, and suddenly this wasn't a good week to skip a show. Instead we compressed all the above plans into two days as best we could.
There was no way we could drive to France, visit Max's pad and return in time for a live show on Sunday evening, so we've bounced that over to Monday for the first time in a long time.
As for the tour, well, we got lost... a lot. More than you could possibly imagine in fact. Aside from navigational issues, there's much to be sorted in terms of keeping in contact with the site too. The important thing, however, is we survived our first continental Sidepodcast outing.
We'll likely chat in more detail on Monday, and while peering at the outside of a locked door isn't the most auspicious start to a tour, we feel we've made a successful sidepodstep this weekend.
This article was originally written for BellaOnline, but is republished here for posterity.
The FIA World Council met at their headquarters in Paris recently, and discussed some important matters regarding F1, how it is run, and what we should expect next year. Here is a breakdown of some of the more important details to come out of that meeting.
Provisional 2009 Calendar The calendar was released for next year, still subject to change, and it's caused a bit of a stir. The entire season has moved back, starting at the very end of March and running right through November. The last race on the calendar is the only new circuit featured - Abu Dhabi. Turkey has returned to its later slot in the year, after this season's race caused all manner of problems as the weather was not anticipated. Personally, I thought that was a good thing, as it mixed up the race, but obviously the FIA do not agree. Finally, after all the rumblings from Bernie Ecclestone, France, Britain and Australia all survive this first round of negotiations. Disappointingly, there is still no US GP.
Tyre Warmers Ban The FIA have decided to scrap the banning of tyre warmers, for next year at least. The potential ban was to come in and coincide with the reintroduction of slick tyres, but teams and drivers were concerned about safety issues. The FIA decided it would be best to push back the ban until more was known. Bridgestone have said the only safety issue is that the teams weren't listening regarding their optimised tyre pressure advice, and are now annoyed that they've had to change the compounds of the tyres to adapt to the tyre warmers once again.
Entry Fees The team entry fees looked set for a price hike up until recently, but the World Council have opted to keep the rise in line with inflation rather than bump up as proposed. The idea was to include things that the FIA pay for, such as weather information, and digital flags. It looks like this all ties in with the Concorde Agreement as well, so I'm sure this isn't the last we'll hear on the matter.
Formula 2 F2 was a feeder series for F1 a long time ago, and was scrapped. Now, the FIA want to bring back the name and make a new series to promote young drivers. They want it to be seriously budgeted though, and the low price of the cars is making a lot of teams think it isn't going to either be viable or worth looking at. It's not entirely clear if this is to replace GP2 or sit alongside it, and at the moment details are scarce. As before, I'm sure there's more to come on this, as well.
Those are the main points covered. We may return and look at any that crop up again in the future, perhaps in more detail.
We’ve had a look at all the good stuff about F1, the speed, the races, the cars. Now it’s time to take a look at the flip side to that – the rule enforcers.
Your boo’s and hiss’s should be aimed at the FIA, who represent the interests of the majority of motorsport worldwide. I’d tell you what it stands for but it’s in French and I probably wouldn’t do it justice. They are based in Paris, y’see.
The FIA’s main remit is to increase motorsport safety, manage championships, specify regulations and set calendars. Basically this means they have to make all the important decisions. They’re also heavily involved in everyday road safety.
Other than Formula 1, they also preside over the World Rally Championship and the World Touring Car Championship. F1 is their highest profile sport though – the one that gets them in the news all the time, for both good and bad reasons.
Within Formula 1, the FIA face a constant battle with the manufacturer’s who wish to spend more money more often, whereas the FIA continue to try to reign in excess spending by introducing restrictions such as two-race engines, and single tyre suppliers. The idea behind the cost-cutting measures is to make sure that the sport can include independent teams such as Williams – a team who’s sole reason for being is to race in F1. Manufacturer’s come and go but it’s the independents who really stay on in people’s hearts.
When a team is doing something a little bit dodgy, that perhaps another team wants to complain about, they take it to the race stewards. These are the people who make the decisions about particular races, including safety cars, flags, and they have the power to start and stop the race. They can be compared to the referee’s in a football game or the umpire in a tennis match. If teams disagree with the steward’s decision, they can escalate their complaint to the International Court of Appeal. This is run by the FIA, and is more like a court case with lawyers and such like. The ICA decision is final.
When it comes to safety, the driver’s get to have their say in the form of the Grand Prix Driver’s Association. This is basically a union for Formula 1 drivers, chaired by a nominated current driver. The GPDA was formed after the death of Ayrton Senna, as a way for drivers to air their views over the state of Formula 1 safety. Often, they don’t agree with the FIA decisions, but with their only power being access to the media, they rarely make a difference.
One final thing that the FIA do which affects us all, is research into motorsport and the environment, including cleaner fuels, and renewable energy. They are involved in several carbon neutrality schemes, for example reforestation projects. This way, they can keep Formula 1 safe and secure for the future.
We mentioned safety briefly today. Our next instalment of the Sidepodcast Guide to Formula 1 will look at safety in more detail.
