Renault F1
Chassis: Renault R30
Engine: Renault RS27 -2010
Drivers: Robert Kubica (11), Vitaly Petrov (12)

Renault has been on a downward spiral since the Crashgate scandal broke. Team boss and resident F1 paddock pimp Flavio Briatore is gone, Fernando Alonso moved to Ferrari, and Renault sold 75% of the team to Genii Capital. Testing did not fare any better, with the team failing to come close to the front runners, slotting them between Toro Rosso and the new teams of Virgin and Lotus. There were many updates to the car, most notably the W shaped rear wing, but it’s hard to tell if they have problems understanding and finding a proper setup, or if it just doesn’t work together. On a related note, Chinese driver Ho-Pin Tung signed on as a 3rd driver (he will be competing in GP2 as part of the deal), we may see for the first time a Chinese Formula One driver.

AT&T Williams
Chassis: Williams FW32
Engine: Cosworth CA2010
Drivers: Rubens Barrichello (9), Nico Hülkenberg (10)

Like McLaren, Williams toyed with the blown wing idea, but their shark fin does not have a feed for the rear wing slot. Replacing the Toyota powerplant with the new for 2010 Cosworth engine, the team fared well in week 4 testing, putting them on equal footing as the Saubers. There were rumors that the team will be running a flywheel-based KERS (technically legal this year but not used under the FOTA gentleman’s agreement), but there was no evidence of such a device. A flywheel based KERS system does not have the large cooling requirements of battery based systems, so it’s fesible that Williams could introduce such a system mid-season. Of course, that would cause a lot of drama and controversy within FOTA, and as seen last year, Williams has no problems with going against the group even though it risks losing their membership.

The Calgary Police Service Bait Car Program has been successful since it launched about 18 months ago and now the program is expanding to the Calgary Transit LRT parking lots as well as the Park and Ride lots.

The campaign is a highly visible one with signs posted at LRT lots warning thieves that Bait Cars are being used. Ads for the Bait Car program are also running on buses and on bus shelters. Calgary Police are confident that the expansion of the Bait Car program will further reduce car thefts which had already dropped by 29% over the last year and by over 50% since 2007.

“The message is simple. Steal a bait car and we’ll catch you and you will go to jail.

“We have a lot of success with this program as part of the overall auto theft strategy,” police Staff Sgt. Colin Adair said.

No details of the Bait Car program were released to ensure the program remains effective but the bait vehicles will be placed randomly in lots where auto thefts are a problem. I really hope they release the videos from the Bait Cars.

Scuderia Toro Rosso
Chassis: Toro Rosso STR5
Engine: Ferrari Type 056
Drivers: Sébastien Buemi (16), Jaime Alguersuari (17)

2010 is a significant fresh start for this young team, as the ban on customer cars for this year means that STR has to build their own chassis instead of using the Red Bull chassis. Oddly enough, the front wing of the STR looks nearly identical to the Red Bull car. Week 4 testing showed promise, as the team was able to show performance better than Lotus, Virgin and Renault, putting them at the tail end of the front runners. With the refuelling ban, some clever strategy coupled with a safety car could see the Red Bull Jr team scoring some big points.

Force India F1
Chassis: Force India VJM03
Engine: Mercedes-Benz FO 108X
Drivers: Adrian Sutil (14), Vitantonio Liuzzi (15)

Force India continues to impress the F1 paddock, with a strong 2nd place finish last year at Spa, which in my opinion should’ve been a win, the team continued to impress during testing this year. Although the team missed the week 1 tests, week 4 testing put them (Sutil, specifically) right smack in the middle of all the front runners. There were only a few small updates to the car compared to 2009, which goes to show how strong the car was aerodynamically in the last half of the 2009 season.

HRT F1
Chassis: Hispania HRT
Engine: Cosworth CA2010
Drivers: Karun Chandhok (20), Bruno Senna (21)

What’s there to say about this team. Started off as Campos, ran into money troubles, majority shareholder takes over the team, gets renamed as Hispania Racing Team (HRT), and the car is officially launched 1 week before the first free practice without a single mile on the chassis. It’s unfortunate that the great Senna name is coming back to F1 like this. We’ll be lucky to see the team run at the first race. If they do, expect them to use the first few races as a testing session.

Lotus Racing
Chassis: Lotus T127
Engine:Cosworth CA2010
Drivers: Jarno Trulli (18), Heikki Kovalainen (19)

Even though the name has been around with a huge F1 legacy, the 2010 version of Lotus Racing is essentially a brand new team. Chassis work was done by Fondtech on a very short schedule, with wind tunnel work not having started until late 2009. The car was completed and ran through testing with all the other teams. Surprisingly, the car was very reliable. Unfortunately, several crashes during testing cut down on the much needed laps for the car. Pace wise, it’s not quick, but it’s a step ahead of the Virgin cars. With 2 drivers that are usually overshadowed by their F1 teammates, don’t expect to see the Lotus name back on top.

Virgin Racing
Chassis: Virgin VR-01
Engine: Cosworth CA2010
Drivers: Timo Glock (24), Lucas di Grassi (25)

This team is one of several new entries to Formula 1 in 2010. 80% owned by Richard Branson’s Virgin Group (who was a minority sponsor in BrawnGP last year), the team designed their car entirely using CFD simulations, without the use of a wind tunnel. Winter testing proved that this did not work as envisioned, with the car struggling to stay on pace with everyone during the last week of testing. Expect the team to be the backmarkers this year.

BMW Sauber Ferrari
Chassis: Sauber C29
Engine: Ferrari 056
Drivers: Pedro de la Rosa (22), Kamui Kobayashi (23)

BMW, one of the teams to pull out of F1 last year, sold the team back to founder Peter Sauber. What’s funny is that the team will be keeping the BMW Sauber name so they can keep the 2009 money for their 6th place standing. What’s even funnier is that they’ll be using Ferrari engines, so the team name ends up being BMW Sauber Ferrari. Now, if the team does better than last year, that would really be a marketing nightmare for BMW. And you know what? It may happen. The car has performed well over winter testing, and in the last week of testing, ran similar laptimes to the big teams. De la Rosa, McLaren’s ex-test driver has not missed a beat, and Kobayashi continues his impressive 2009 debut with times close to 7 time world champion Michael Schumacher. This is definately 2010 Formula 1 dark horse team that will have some surprises this year.

Much like last year’s double diffuser debacle, two teams have asked the FIA for clarification on McLaren’s rear wing. There is a good description of the system in this thread from our forums.

Red Bull Racing’s team boss Christian Horner has stated that his team, along with Ferrari, are looking at the design of the system, and asking to ensure that it’s legal. The design of the system bypasses the slot-gap separator rules introduced years ago that were put in place to ensure that the rear wing can not be stalled on high speed straights, therefore reducing drag, allowing for much higher top speeds. McLaren has been topping the trap speeds during all 4 weeks of winter testing.

McLaren’s response? It’s perfectly legal. The team has even talked to Ferrari, and they’re not aware of any lodged protests. Regardless, the FIA has confirmed that at this time, they have no concerns over the car, and have accepted McLaren’s invitation to view their 2010 challenger, the MP4-25 up close.

Let’s hope that this will be handled a lot better than last year, where BrawnGP, Toyota and Williams were running their double diffusers for the first 3 races under protest, and potentially, under the threat of disqualification months after the races are wrapped up. Stay tuned for updates.

*update* Charlie Whiting, the FIA’s technical delegate did not visit the McLaren headquarters as expected on Friday. As it turns out, his flights out of Brazil were delayed.

There are only 7 days left until the Formula 1 circus fires up their engines for the first Friday free practice of 2010. Much has happened over the winter, and we’ll try to cover it all in our F1 preview this week.

The big news is that when the cars start rolling on the track, 2 teams will not be there at the first race. USF1, the much hyped outfit from Charlotte, NC has effectively shut down operations this week. There was much speculation over the last 4 weeks, with insiders at the company spilling the beans on missed payroll, lack of organization, lack of funding, and most importantly, lack of an actual car. Why did USF1 fail? Money, according to team boss Ken Anderson. A key sponsor failed to deliver promised funding to the team, and without money, supplies thinned out, and development came to a complete halt. This caused the team to ask for a 4 week no-show, and now, complete withdrawl from 2010 competition.

Out of all this turmoil, a new team, Stefan GP, was waiting in the wings expecting the imminent failure of USF1 and to take over their 2010 grid slot. Team owner Zoran Stefanović had purchased the rights for Toyota’s 2010 car after Toyota officially pulled out of Formula 1 in November 2009. 2 drivers conditionally signed with Stefan GP, Kazuki Nakajima, and 1997 F1 Champ Jacques Villeneuve. Unfortuantely, to the dismay of Villeneuve fans in North America, the FIA has released their official 2010 entry list, where Stefan GP was not a part of. The FIA stated that it was simply too late for a team entry to be changed, with the first race weekend in a little over a week. Funny, because Campos, which changed their name to Hispania, didn’t even unveil their car until this morning.

Bad news for North America, as we will not be seeing a North American team, nor a North American F1 Champion race. At least we have Montreal…

A few weeks ago we posted Audi’s “Friendly Competition” ad spot where they made fun of BMW by pointing out they always fall short when compared to Audi’s vehicles. Today we have BMW’s response. You can judge for yourself if this was a great response, but in our opinion we think Audi wins this round.

“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 game and began capturing medals (mostly gold). Almost as if to spite the COC, Canada began its climb towards the top of the medal standings. We may not have been able to own the podium based on the original goal, but in the end we really did end up owning the podium.

Sidney Crosby celebrates after scoring in OT to win gold

The Canadian Men’s hockey gold over USA was the giant exclamation point on Canada’s record 14 gold medal haul and 26 total medals which put us in third place on the overall medal standings. The 14 gold medals won by Canada sets a new Winter Olympics record (Previously 13, Norway 2002) and is also a new record for most gold medals won by the host country.

As we celebrate Canada’s strong finish at the 2010 Winter Olympics, we must also not forget that the Vancouver games began on a very sad note. The death of Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili on a training run during the opening day will remain in the hearts of everyone. John Furlong, head of the Vancouver organizing committee expressed his hope that Kumaritashvili’s death will never be forgotten and instead be an inspiration to youths everywhere to be champions in life.

We may not be as loud and boisterous as our neighbors to the south, but we are just as patriotic. For the past 17 days, visitors from around the world got a taste of our patriotism and as they return home they will forever be reminded that Canada is not a giant slab of frozen tundra, that Canadians don’t live in igloos, or travel by dog sleds. They will never forget our hospitality, Tim Horton’s and of course they will never forget that Team Canada won gold in overtime when Sid the Kid scored. Hopefully, after the sting wears off they will return to visit Canada again.

Now you know us, eh?

Mirror, signal, shoulder check, change is the chant that we all know to follow for a successful lane change. We also use our rearview mirrors to give us a better view than our eyes alone when we are backing up. Is this all that mirrors are used for and are these the only times that we use them?

Most of us do not give the rear view mirrors the attention that they deserve. A defensive driver will scan ahead to see what they are approaching, to the sides to see what is around them, to the rear to see what is behind and finally check the instrument panel to monitor their speed and vehicle condition. This cycle repeats every five to eight seconds, so their mirrors do get a regular workout.

The rearview mirror must be consulted before you put your foot on the brake. This may be the only way to decide if you will be hit from the rear if you slow or stop. Being aware of vehicles following you too closely or overtaking you too quickly may make you change your mind about braking or show you that you need to take evasive action.

One last thought concerns moving back into the lane after passing an overtaken vehicle. You should not do this until you can see all of the vehicle you have passed in your rear view mirror. Failing to do this will put the overtaken driver in the position of unintentionally tailgating you.

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