Pictured above is the traffic circle located in Mackenzie Towne. While most of the “traffic circles” in Calgary are of the miniature single lane traffic calming variety, this one is a dual lane version connecting five roads together. The traffic circle was built not only to move traffic more efficiently than intersections with traffic lights, [...]
“Canada will not own the podium” - Chris Rudge, the chief executive of the Canadian Olympic Committee (February 22, 2010)
In the wake of disappointing results by Canadian athletes, Chris Rudge declared that Canada would not meet its goal of taking home the most medals. However, as the COC declared defeat, Canadian athletes stepped up their [...]
Now is your chance to help find a cure for diabetes and win a pair of Harley Davidson Motorcycles while doing it. The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) is the leader in setting the agenda for type 1 diabetes research worldwide. Our mission is to find a cure for diabetes and its complications through the support of research. JDRF is passionate about its commitment to raising funds to drive world-class research towards a cure. Our progress towards a cure, plus advancements in science and management tools, has improved the lives of children and adults living with this complex disease.
The JDRF is raffling off two Harley Davidson Motorcycles, a 2010 883 Low and a 2009 Dyna Street Bob. Total prize value is over $27,000!
Only 2500 tickets printed
Total prize market value $27,222
No cash alternative
Tickets can only be sold in Alberta
Raffle license number: 297774
Draw to take place October 16, 2010 at the Rev it Up for Research Gala
All proceeds go to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation Charitable License Number: 11897 6604 RR0001. Tickets can be purchased online: www.jdrf.ca/harleyraffle
Tickets also available at: JDRF - Suite 204, 1608 - 17 Ave SW Kane’s Harley Davidson - 914 - 11 Street SW by phone - 403-255-7100
Visions Calgary presents: Bass so Loud, it’ll Wake the Dead! Come out and hear the loudest car stereos on the planet and check out the coolest manufacturers demo vehicles. We’ll have a booty full of giveaways, a lip smackin’ M&M Meats BBQ, a charity car wash and a show & shine to complete your day.
If any beyond members would like to enter the show & shine, please check out the official thread on our forums and let everyone know you’re interested. Visions is providing some space for any members that would like to show off their cars. There is no charge to enter, and all participants will receive some free beyond gear :)
For all the stereo guys, this event will be an official sanctioned dB drag/USACi event. Points and trophies will be awarded so be sure to register
The tenth annual Driven car show will be rolling into Calgary on June 12th. This year it is returning the Olympic Oval after last year’s break due to the Olympic trials for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic games. With capacity of around 300 vehicles, the show organizers are extremely excited to be back at this venue and they promise that this year’s show will be better than ever.
If you are interested in showing off your vehicle, check out the exhibitor info page
If you are interested in becoming a model at the show, more information can be found at the model registration page.
Not something you expect to see when you’re at the beach in the Dominican Republic, but Red Bull is not known to put on stuff we all expect! If you recall, this is from the same guys that brought us the F1 car on ice to celebrate the return of the Canadian Grand Prix.
For many of us a car is a sign of personal freedom. When we were teenagers, the two ultimate acts of freedom and responsibility are moving out and getting your own car. So to be told that it is better to give up your car (at least around town anyway) because of its impact to the environment and your health is usually met with much scepticism and negativity by most drivers. However, in Boston there is hope. It is projected that the US city will have the country’s largest bike sharing program this year, after Canadian company Bixi was announced last August as Boston’s cycling partner.
Some 2500 bikes are earmarked for the beginning of the project with that number hoping to rise to 5000 once it catches steam (if it ever does). Why would thousands of Americans ditch their car and don a cycling helmet? The cost for one: an annual membership to the scheme costs around $40 and when you consider that the average bus journey is $1.35 then you can see the potential savings.
There have been success stories elsewhere with Paris being the most obvious example, as the French capital has 20,000 bikes for hire. The craze is also set to spread to Asia, and more specifically China, as they try to combat an ever growing congestion problem on the roads.
Will it be a success? It is hard to tell. A similar scheme was implemented in Washington DC last year and currently there are only around 100 bikes zipping about the city. Even given the population difference it is still enough evidence to suggest that it hasn’t really caught on in car-loving America. Britain tried a similar scheme in the early nineties in the University town of Cambridge however it had to be abandoned after a day because many of the 300 bikes for hire were stolen.
Perhaps we shouldn’t have such a negative view of the bike sharing program; while it may take a while to convince the majority of the population it could be the answer to solving the problem of road congestion and, in the meantime, our CO2 emission.
Imagine if you will a machine that almost anyone can buy and operate. You read the training manual, practice it’s use under the supervision of someone who is also a user and has some proficiency of it’s operation. Finally, you take a test to see if you too have basic proficiency in it’s operation. If you pass, the supervisor lets you use the machine with minimal oversight as you see fit.
Over time, the machine is upgraded with new functions and capabilities. The circumstances that you use it in also change gradually. More machines are present in the area where you work and others use them to do more work more quickly.
Some safety rules are developed for your protection, but they are not always fully communicated to you so that you learn them. In fact, you are allowed to make mistakes or deliberately misuse the machine with only minimal consequences. If you really mess up or make a large number of mistakes you may have to quit using the machine for a while. You don’t lose your job or even have to upgrade your skills.
These machines kill one person a day and injure hundreds of others. No one gets too upset unless these people are friends or family, after all, the costs for this are spread over us all and we pay an amount for it each year regardless of whether we cause the problem or not.
If I were actually describing a machine in your workplace you might refuse to use it or go on strike until your employer made safety improvements. Why don’t we get excited when the machine is our own motor vehicle?
It was a dissapointing qualifying session for Lewis Hamilton as he failed to make it to Q3 lapping just 0.138s behind Adrian Sutil who rounded out the top 10 that made it to Q3. Perhaps the little incident with the Australian Police had him looking in the rearview mirrors a little too much. Red Bull takes the front row for the Australian GP with Vettel’s amazing run breaking into the 1:23s.
Here are the final qualifying results:
1 Sebastian Vettel - RBR-Renault - 1:23.919
2 Mark Webber - RBR-Renault - 1:24.035
3 Fernando Alonso Ferrari - 1:24.111
4 Jenson Button - McLaren-Mercedes - 1:24.675
5 Felipe Massa - Ferrari - 1:24.837
6 Nico Rosberg - Mercedes Benz GP Ltd - 1:24.884
7 Michael Schumacher - Mercedes Benz GP Ltd - 1:24.927
8 Rubens Barrichello - Williams-Cosworth - 1:25.217
9 Robert Kubica - Renault - 1:25.372
10 Adrian Sutil - Force India-Mercedes - 1:26.036
After a long winter, Formula One is officially back! The cars got back on track early this morning, and as usual, we are not any closer to understanding the pecking order between the teams. FP1 saw all the teams run their installation laps and start cranking out a few laps, with HRT running their first ever laps in the brand new car. Having missed all of winter testing, the car was suffering problems and sat on stands until the last few minutes of FP1. Senna had a chance to run 3 installation laps to shake down the car and returned to the pits without running an actual timed lap. Teammate Karun Chandhok had it worst, watching from the sidelines as his car was not ready to run. His car has not hit the track for either sessions today.
The big news today is that the FIA has given McLaren the go ahead on their driver controlled blown wing system, which has given Hamilton the top trap speeds for both sessions at 311km/h. There were many vocal opponents to the system, mainly, Bob Bell from Renault, who ranted live on the BBC broadcast. He believes McLaren is cheating, even though he also admits that the system does adhere to the regulations. Ross Brawn from Mercedes was also critical of the system, complaining that the teams now have to invest a huge amount of money to research, copy, and develop a competing system. Funny he wasn’t complaining last year when his Brawn GP car had the radical double diffuser, which was also approved, and led to the exact scenario for the other teams that had to copy the idea.
Red Bull has given up on protests, and knows they have to copy the system. It started off right at the photo shoot before FP1, where Webber and Vettel were sneaking around the McLaren chassis and looking inside whenever possible.
As teams struggle to copy the system, some interesting tidbits has come to light. For 2010, the monocoque is homogolated, therefore you can not change the tub to accomodate the system. McLaren has a hole in their tub in front of the driver for the snorkel to draw air into the cockpit control system, so other teams can not simply drill in a new hole there. They have to use existing holes, which will be hard to come by. F1 engineers do not like holes in the tub, as it weakens the stiffness of the tub. An option is to run it through the nosecone, with the inlet at the tip, but trying to get the airflow from there, to a driver control system, to the rear wing will prove difficult with a lack of access holes. F1 engineers are most likely the smartest engineers on this planet, so expect the teams to find and copy the system a few races in.
Renault, being off the pace as predicted, has asked the FIA to allow them to make changes to their engines. The team feels that they are 30hp behind the front runners, and has asked for special permission to modify their engines to catch up. If this gets approved, Red Bull will benefit huge, as a boost in power will bring them closer to the front runners. Even though Red Bull was a heavy favorite in pre-season testing, they did not make a big impression in either practice sessions.
Free Practice 2 saw most teams doing long run simulations, where Hamilton somehow managed to destroy his rear tires in only 4 laps at the beginning of the session. As tire wear management will be the key to winning races this year, Lewis has a bit of work to do to catch up to Button’s superior tire management skills. Because most teams were doing long runs, there were no blistering times, and again, we’re still just as lost as we were 2 weeks ago when winter testing wrapped up as to where the teams stand. At Mercedes, Rosberg clocked the fastest time, which means he beat out his teammate, seven time World Champion Michael Schumacher, in both sessions. Awesome.
Back to HRT, how did they end up doing? Senna got a few timed laps in, and ended FP2 with the car stopped as the rear wheel almost fell of the car. Ouch.
FP1
1. Sutil 1:56.583
2. Alonso 1:56.766 +0.183
3. Kubica 1:57.041 +0.458
4. Massa 1:57.055 +0.472
5. Button 1:57.068 +0.485
6. Hamilton 1:57.163 +0.580
7. Liuzzi 1:57.194 +0.611
8. Rosberg 1:57.199 +0.616
9. Webber 1:57.255 +0.672
10. Schumacher 1:57.662 +1.079
FP2
1. Rosberg 1:55.409
2. Hamilton 1:55.854 +0.445
3. Schumacher 1:55.903 +0.494
4. Button 1:56.076 +0.667
5. Vettel 1:56.459 +1.050
6. Hulkenberg 1:56.501 +1.092
7. Massa 1:56.555 +1.146
8. Petrov 1:56.750 +1.341
9. Alonso 1:57.140 +1.731
10. De La Rosa 1:57.255 +1.846
Mercedes GP Petronas Chassis: Mercedes MGP W01
Engine: Mercedes-Benz FO 108X
Drivers: Michael Schumacher (3), Nico Rosberg (4)
Yes, you read that correctly. 7 time world champion Michael Schumacher is back in F1, racing for the all German Mercedes GP team. As you all know, I’m not the biggest fan of MS, so I’m glad he’s back, so he can be finally challenged by the world’s best drivers in similar cars. Rosberg and Schumacher were neck and neck during testing, lapping times as one of the top 4 teams. Expect some surprised by the first race, as the team, even during week 4, was still using their 2009 diffuser. The 2010 aerodynamic package will be unveiled at the first 2010 F1 weekend. Unfortunately, we don’t know if this is due to running behind schedule, or if they’re hiding something revolutionary until the absolute last minute, so it’s really tough to figure out where they stand.
Vodafone McLaren Mercedes Chassis: McLaren MP4-25
Engine: Mercedes-Benz FO 108X
Drivers: Jenson Button (1), Lewis Hamilton (2)
Save the best preview for last. All the cards are in McLaren’s favor for 2010. A blown wing that’s raised questions amongst other F1 teams, the 2 most recent World Champions piloting the cars, and of course, winning the winter championships by clocking the fastest laps in 3 of 4 weeks of testing. McLaren spent their 4 weeks gathering tons of data, as they have a huge development program throughout the season. They proved last year that they are the best at mid season developments now that testing is banned, so they are in a good position to leapfrog other teams, even if they aren’t the fastest at Bahrain this weekend. But from testing, they look like they are about to lead the charge, with Lewis Hamilton on the final day of testing showing what the MP4-25 is capable of in a long run, with the tires in excellent shape after each stint. Go McLaren!
Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro Chassis: Ferrari F10
Engine: Ferrari Type 056
Drivers: Felipe Massa (7), Fernando Alonso (8)
The first of the top 4 teams, Ferrari continues to run impressive pace during all 4 weeks of testing. Felipe Massa has shown that he’s lost none of his speed after his terrifying near death accident at Hungary last year. Alonso, joining the Scuderia after swearing years ago that he would never drive for the red team, ran several impressive long run stints, which was only bettered by the final race simulation by Lewis Hamilton on the last day of week 4 testing. There are signs that the Ferrari are the best at managing their tires, enough so that they may be running 1 stop strategies quite often. With gentle tire use comes temperature warmup problems over a single qualifying lap, which was quite evident in testing as they were slightly slower than Red Bull and McLaren in a single lap. An interesting technical change are the Ferrari wheels, which feature fins lined up in a concentric ring, which are used to recover some of the brake cooling loss and aerodynamic wake from the banning of wheel covers.
Red Bull Racing Chassis: Red Bull RB6
Engine: Renault RS27
Drivers: Sebastian Vettel (5), Mark Webber (6)
Expected by the paddock to be one of the top 2 teams this year, Adrian Newey’s RB6 was impressive throughout testing, especially week 4. Continuing from their successful 2009 campaign, Vettel and Webber set blistering single lap as well long run laptimes. Week 4 introduced their ultra-low exhaust outlets, where the flow will help drive flow from the floor to the diffuser exit. This may affect downforce sensitivity when backing off the throttle, so it’ll be intersting to see how well this concept works. Expectations are high for this team, and we will most likely see them on the top step of the podium more than once this year.
The JDRF is raffling off two Harley Davidson Motorcycles, a 2010 883 Low and a 2009 Dyna Street Bob. Total prize value is over $27,000! 
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