New Motor Sport Magazine article: Prost's greatest drives in Formula 1

By StuSeeger - photo taken by StuSeeger. Source: Flickr,
CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/
w/index.php?curid=1058979

Today Formula 1 legend and four-time drivers' champion Alain Prost reaches his 65th birthday.

His F1 career of course had no shortage of high points. And to celebrate Prost's personal  landmark today, I have for Motor Sport Magazine looked at five of what were even his finest races from his decade-plus time in F1.

You can have a read of it all here: https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/articles/single-seaters/f1/alain-prosts-greatest-drives-in-formula-1

Inside Line F1 Podcast - Wake Me Up When September Ends...

In this episode, we discuss of the delay in announcing the 2021 regulations, the possible headlines you could still read come 2021 and how Mercedes can achieve even more greatness in Formula 1.

Photo: Octane Photography

Formula 1 unanimously decided to defer the announcement of its 2021 regulations 'til October this year. The WEC announced its 'hypercar' regulations from 2021 just a few days ago. Basically, everyone is leading fans to believe that 2021 is the year when motorsport will undergo a revolution.

In this week's episode of the Inside Line F1 Podcast, we talk of the possible headlines you will still read come 2021. What else could Mercedes do to prove its superiority as a Formula 1 team? If Ricciardo and Hulkenberg had wet dreams of a Ferrari power unit in their Renault car when Fiat Chrysler was talking up Renault and finally, will Formula 1 teams hire 'gladiators' instead of drivers for 2021? Tune in!

(Season 2019, Episode 23)
Subscribe to the Inside Line F1 Podcast on iTunes, audioBoom (RSS feed) and Google Podcasts for your weekly dose of Formula 1 humour

Here's what's in store for you in this episode:
0:00-3:00: Five headlines we could still read come the 2021 Formula 1 season. Also, how Christian Horner pulled off a massive stunt to prove why he should replace Chase Carey (if at all)

3:00-6:00: Formula 1 teams to hire gladiators come 2021?

6:00-9:00: Mercedes is controlling Formula 1, alleged Helmut Marko. But Red Bull Racing is controlling Formula 1's Raft Race

9:00-12:00: Three audacious things that Mercedes could do to prove their greatness and superiority as a Formula 1 team

12:00-15:00: If you're a budding Formula 1 racer, here's some advice for you and it is probably better than what Jacques Villeneuve has been telling you

15:00-end: The possible Fiat Chrysler-Renault merger, did Ricciardo and Hulkenberg have wet dreams of a Ferrari power unit in their Renault for at least a few nights? Finally, Ferrari should promote the race strategists from their Le Mans operations to Formula 1!

Inside Line F1 Podcast - Strange Start To F1 2019 - Agree or Disagree?

NEW EPISODE: The start to the 2019 Formula 1 season has been strange. For starters, we were almost on course to see Ferrari and Mercedes' (supposed!) number two drivers win the opening two races while their superstar drivers were have been found lacking. Okay, more so for Sebastian Vettel than Lewis Hamilton, but we still stand by our assessment.    

Photo: Octane Photography

In this week's episode, we also discuss the strange form, pace and events at Renault, Red Bull Racing and most other teams on the grid. Will Fernando Alonso's next target be to race and win the Bathurst 1000? We tell you why Alonso believes that Lando Norris is more suited to race the 2019 McLaren car and of course, should Ferrari favour Charles Leclerc over Sebastian Vettel already? Tune in! 

(Season 2019, Episode 12) 

Here's what's in store for you in this episode: 

0:00-3:00: The 2019 Formula 1 Season seems like the 2018 Formula 1 Season; and this is not just for Sebastian Vettel alone  

3:00-6:00: Is Renault testing Daniel Ricciardo's overtaking skills? Renault are going a long way to proving equal treatment to both their drivers  

6:00-9:00: What Ferrari-Mercedes might ask for to participate in the Netflix-F1 show season 2. Any guesses? 

9:00-12:00: From being paid to drive, is Sergio Perez being paid to speak...?  

12:00-15:00: How did Ralf Schumacher get himself to be one of Formula 1's top-earners? And did you know that Romain Grosjean is one of France's highest paid sportsmen?

15:00-end: Could Fernando Alonso be racing in the Bathurst 1000 any time soon? Should Ferrari favour Charles Leclerc over Sebastian Vettel?

F1 2019 Betting Preview - Time to strike?

With Formula 1 pre-season testing, annually the tropes are aired. Don't read much at all into the lap times; it won't be until qualifying in the opening round that we really know what's going on.

The story remains the same as it has for a while -
how is Mercedes to be toppled?
Photo: Octane Photography

But it's true also what they say also about risk and reward. With the risks of making calls at a time such as now when testing is going on, there also are opportunities for the F1 gambler to make hay.

I've heard stories about windfalls from 2009's pre-season, which indicated the new Brawn team would have the year to itself and betting odds hadn't yet caught up with the point. Same goes for McLaren creaming the season in 1988. In other words if there's serious money to be made in F1 betting, now is the time to lay your stake.

Sadly it often feels that grand shifts between seasons such as the two I've cited are something left firmly in F1's past. Particularly with Mercedes having won every world championship since the hybrid formula started in 2014, plus with the 'big three' teams of Merc, Ferrari and Red Bull notoriously on a different pace and resource planet to the rest.

New Motorsport Week article: Ricciardo to Renault, a road to redemption or regret?

Photo: Octane Photography

It's like the previously-stale F1 drivers' market is making up for lost time. When the 2019 season gets underway next March there'll be no shortage of unfamiliar faces, nor of familiar faces in unfamiliar places. But even so one move trumped them all for shock value.

In my latest for Motorsport Week I look into the probability of success of Daniel Ricciardo to Renault - will it be a road to redemption or regret? With, you may be glad to hear, an added absence of appealing alliteration...

You can check out the fruits of my investigating here: https://www.motorsportweek.com/news/id/20877

Abu Dhabi Preview - The sun goes down

So the sun goes down on another F1 campaign. And providing the visual metaphor, the season-closing round is the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. F1's only day-to-night event.

In an appropriate place, the sun goes
down on another F1 season
Photo: Octane Photography

The sunset on this 2018 season has been slow, and we enter this finale with remarkably little at stake. Both titles are decided of course, but even further down the tables there is meagre potential for change at the last.

Underlining the point the most conspicuous bone of contention at the Yas Marina track this weekend is that Valtteri Bottas and Max Verstappen are separated by three points in the 'battle' for fourth in the drivers' standings. Either theoretically could leapfrog Kimi Raikkonen for third as well - Bottas is 14 points behind and Verstappen 17 - though that outcome will likely require a no-score for Raikkonen.

Even in the all-important constructors' order - all-important as that's what they base the money on - just about all teams look well ensconced in their places. The most likely shift is that a good weekend for Sauber - and it looked quick in Brazil - combined with a meagre one for Force India may allow the Swiss team to vault over the six-point gap between them. Conversely a sixth and seventh place for Force India combined with no McLaren points will get Force India up a place.

The Day Schumacher Drove a Ligier, by Ibrar Malik

The upcoming book details what is learnt about the Benetton controversies when Michael Schumacher tested a Ligier for one day in December 1994. For instance was the German as impressive when not driving a Benetton?

Before we answer this let us remember the background surrounding this test. In early 1994 the Ligier team was in financial trouble following its team owner, Cyril de Rouvre, having been jailed on fraud charges. Benetton directors, Flavio Briatore and Tom Walkinshaw, bought the struggling French outfit in May 1994 following months of conveyancing. Within this transaction, they were partly acting for the Benetton family - their paymasters - who wanted Ligier's prized supply of Renault engines having failed to acquire them via more conventional means during 1993. This was because their rivals, Williams, had stopped Benetton advances towards the French engine supplier by giving Ligier assistance with gearboxes etc throughout 1993. Williams' strategy was to keep Ligier competitive enough to maintain Renault's interest in it rather than Benetton. Following the 1994 acquisition, Walkinshaw owned a minor stake in Ligier but dreamt of owning the whole team and bringing it Grand Prix success with Ross Brawn. While Briatore, another stakeholder, was simply happy to be a sleeping partner and saw the Liger purchase as just another of his investments.

Walkinshaw (left) and Briatore of Benetton. Neither were strangers to controversies, therefore many people consider Benetton guilty of the 1994 accusations simply because of their association.

Mexican GP Report - Doing it all over again

And so it is now done. As always seems the way when Lewis Hamilton has a title to claim, things in this Mexican Grand Prix weren't entirely straightforward. But fortunately for him he was by now in a place where he almost couldn't lose. In fact as it turned out he literally couldn't lose as his pursuer Sebastian Vettel didn't get the race win he needed to have a chance of keeping the title open. But whatever was the case in this one, using the worn phrase, 'the history books will show' that Hamilton's fifth world championship is unequivocal. Level with Juan Manuel Fangio and only Michael Schumacher ahead. For all that it has long seemed inevitable, and the conclusion inaptly messy, the magnitude of the achievement should not be understated.

Lewis Hamilton sealed his fifth title -
though it was not straightforward
Photo: Octane Photography

The 2018 championship fight has had plenty of parallels with that 12 months previously and it continued that way in its conclusion. Again it was resolved in Mexico. Again Hamilton did just about enough. Again his chaser Vettel battled hard but did not quite get the result he needed. As again the deciding race was dominated by Red Bull. Or rather, again, by Max Verstappen's Red Bull.

He was the fastest out there all weekend, his only partial stumble missing out on pole position at the last against expectations, to his team-mate Daniel Ricciardo – Verstappen complained afterwards about excessive engine braking. Whatever he swiftly righted things with a better start to lead. And was never seen again.

United States GP Report - Going off script

It was supposed to a coronation. In this United States Grand Prix a result of the sort we'd got used to lately repeated would secure Lewis Hamilton's fifth world championship. And Austin is just about his happiest hunting ground. Plus Ferrari, his closest challenger, was imploding.

Kimi Raikkonen won for the first time since early 2013
Photo: Octane Photography

But Formula 1, despite some convincing impressions otherwise, has a nagging tendency not to follow its predetermined scripts. This one instead turned out to be an improv show.

It went off script early too. Ferrari somehow rediscovered its pace that had gone missing since the Italian round. Although with it the team stuck firmly to its recent lines of going a way to scupper itself nevertheless. Or rather Hamilton's title rival Sebastian Vettel did. He didn't slow sufficiently under a red flag in practice and had three added to his qualifying slot in advance. Hamilton got the pole, like he always seems to somehow, but the red cars were right on his case.

It all left Vettel's Ferrari stable-mate Kimi Raikkonen starting alongside Hamilton on the front row – a man who in his second Scuderia spell has tended to fumble the rare opportunities for glory tossed his way. Plus among the front-runners he alone started on the ultra-soft tyre rather than the the more durable super-soft. But in the race we immediately got our latest evidence that this one was indeed diverging from what was written, and in a conspicuous way as Raikkonen for the first time in 37 races made up a place from his starting slot on the first lap. The ultimate one of taking the lead from Hamilton by seizing the inside of turn one.

US GP Betting Preview - Lone Star State

Appropriate to the Lone Star State, F1 therein has a lone star. Lewis Hamilton tends to be untouchable in his visits to Austin, Texas.

F1 races at Austin are usually about one man
Photo: Octane Photography

The numbers pay testimony. He's won five of F1's six Austin races. Taking it back further he's won six US Grands Prix of the last seven. Taking it instead to the most recent general form he's also won six of the last seven rounds anywhere. This weekend for the latest US Grand Prix he'll have the scent of a fifth world championship in his nostrils, so there'll be no shortage of motivation. He beams throughout his Austin weekends and it shows in his driving.

For the race win at least backing him seems what they call a no brainer. His odds are appropriately short, but still the 8/13 you can get on a Hamilton victory looks worth your wager.

Inside Line F1 Podcast - In F1, Ferrari = Google, Mercedes = Apple

The Ferrari vs Mercedes battle in the current Formula 1 season is like the Google vs Apple battle in the world of smartphones. There's little doubt why Mercedes have managed to come out on top for two consecutive seasons. Tune in to hear more on this analogy.

Also in this week's episode, we have Lucien's 'Moments in Time' section where we remind our viewers that there is more to our Russian Grand Prix memories than Daniil Kvyat's torpedo moment. Will Daniel Ricciardo's haste with Renault turn into waste? Is it cheaper to pay for a young driver's seat elsewhere than run a third car altogether? And have we seen the first signs of a crack in the otherwise strong relationship between Sebastian Vettel and Ferrari? Tune in!

A summary of this episode and what is discussed when:

00:00-3:00 - Hello & Welcome! :D

03:00-05:00 - Why Ferrari is like Google and why Mercedes is like Apple…

05:00-09:00 - Will we have a USA vs. Russia in Formula 1 too? Or will it be a USA vs. China? And how is it that Mr. Putin isn’t doing a demo run in a Formula 1 car to promote the upcoming Russian Grand Prix?

09:00-11:00 - RIC-Renault, let’s hope haste doesn’t make waste

11:00-13:00 - VET, VER, LEC and GRO on sports psychologists.

13:00-16:00 - BOT’s ambitions & aspirations, can he win a race before the end of this season? OCO-KUB pairing at Williams? VAN to Formula E?

16:00-18:00 - ‘What Wolff Said This Week’ section!

18:00-21:00 - Moments in Time with Lucien

21:00-23:00 - A first visible crack in the VET-Ferrari relationship?

23:00-25:00 - VER-RBR talking like McLaren-ALO did in 2017? Did RBR talk to ALO behind VER’s back for RIC’s seat in 2019?


(Season 2018, Episode 33)

Subscribe to the Inside Line F1 Podcast on iTunes and on audioBoom (RSS feed) for your weekly dose of Formula 1 humour

Italian GP Report - Come together

After Spa last week we thought things would be different. But in its back yard the chief theme of 2018 reasserted - that Ferrari for all its stunning speed isn't beginning to make good on it where it really matters. That something insists on coming along to trip it up. Sometimes of its own doing.

Lewis Hamilton against all expectations
defeated Ferrari to win
Photo: Octane Photography

Matters in the Italian Grand Prix weekend started just as expected though. Continuing the Spa pattern Ferrari on Monza's rapid circuit had a clear pace advantage, including on its title foe targets Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton. After qualifying the grid's front row was all red. But a day later things were scarcely recognisable. Hamilton had won and left Ferrari's homeland with an extended 30 point lead in the championship table over the Scuderia's Sebastian Vettel.

And with the talk of big themes this shift was not down to just one thing. Rather a lot of - often ostensibly minor - things came together. Lenin reminded us that everything is connected to everything else. It's especially the case in F1.

Mighty oaks from little acorns grow. The acorns that grew into the mighty oak of Ferrari's defeat were planted the day before the race, in that very same qualifying session. There was one fly in Vettel's Saturday ointment, that his team-mate Kimi Raikkonen took pole position ahead of him. The Finn was aided by that he ran behind Vettel on track and thus got the benefit of his slipstream on Monza's many lengthy straights. Vettel meanwhile had been fed out by his team a little late and therefore didn't really benefit from the car ahead in the same way (Hamilton's, as it happened).

Spa Preview: Back with a bang

It's not true what they say. Not everything about modern F1 is bad.

There's nothing quite like Spa
Photo: Octane Photography

This weekend it returns from its summer holidays and could not pick a better place to reconvene.

Spa-Francorchamps, the inimitable longtime host of the Belgian Grand Prix. Its mere mention brings many associations. The speed. The mighty turns. The undulations. The organic feel. The picture postcard Ardennes scenery. The link to the very beginnings of road circuit motorsport. Little wonder that when you ask F1 drivers, engineers or fans for their favourite modern venue this is the one commonly said, often without the slightest hesitation.

You can add too that F1 races at Spa almost always are diverting. I'm sure there have been dull Sundays here, but it's not all that easy to cite them.

Inside Line F1 Podcast - McLaren Approached Lewis Hamilton Too?

Lewis Hamilton, Formula 1's reigning World Champion and super star, recently admitted that a 'rival' team attempted to sign him for 2019 and 2020. In this week's episode of the Inside Line F1 Podcast, we speculate if this 'rival' was McLaren indeed. Given their love for PR and attempts at signing high-profile drivers, should we be surprised?

Also in this episode, we discuss the ONLY pitfall of the double and triple headers in Formula 1, the driver sillier season which could see Esteban Ocon at Renault while Lance Stroll's bankers and Sergio Perez's sponsors fight for a seat at Force India. Should the Mexican driver race for the all-American Haas F1 Team, what could Donald Trump's reaction be? And of course, we talk about the Neymar and Jesus Christ of Formula 1. Basically, there's a lot of banter, humour and stories from the world of Formula 1. Tune in!

(Season 2018, Episode 25)

Subscribe to the Inside Line F1 Podcast on iTunes and on audioBoom (RSS feed) for your weekly dose of Formula 1 humour

Hungarian GP Betting Preview - On the other hand...

Working out who is best to back for this weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix may be a matter of balancing a set of scales. Each of the big three teams have reasons to back them. And not to back them.

Will Red Bull be repeating its Monaco celebrations?
Photo: Octane Photography

We can start with Red Bull. The twisty Hungaroring track looks like it could be designed for its car, including that it will show up its horsepower deficit less than any other circuit on the calendar Monaco aside. Red Bull won in Monaco which is a track plenty liken to this one and likely would have had a one-two there without Max Verstappen binning it in Saturday morning practice.

The team clearly thinks this is a conspicuous chance to win too given how it stockpiled engine part penalties for Daniel Ricciardo in Germany to avoid the need to have anything like that here. The only trouble is its actual record at this track which is oddly poor. The team has only won here twice and one of those was a crazy rain-impacted race in 2014 wherein Ricciardo took the lead late on. Otherwise its solitary triumph was back in 2010.

Inside Line F1 Podcast - The Nico Hulkenberg Interview Podcast

Nico Hulkenberg, one of two German drivers racing in the 2018 Formula 1 Season, joined us on this special episode of the Inside Line F1 Podcast. We discussed Hulkenberg's career prospects, relationship with Renault and Carlos Sainz Jr, the possibilities of racing for either Ferrari or Mercedes and even about his elusive podium.

Hulkenberg also expresses his positivity on the changes being introduced in Formula 1 from the 2019 Formula 1 Season and who he would choose between an easy-to-beat and a competitive team-mate. Tune in!

(Season 2018, Episode 24)

Subscribe to the Inside Line F1 Podcast on iTunes and on audioBoom (RSS feed) for your weekly dose of Formula 1 humour

German GP Betting Preview - Home where the hurt is?

We again start our betting preview with a lament. The usual one that F1, particularly at the front, has lately been both close and unpredictable. Even in the last round, at Silverstone, where we thought that it was obvious Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes country. It didn't work out that way.

Sebastian Vettel looks well poised - but his record
at Hockenheim is poor
Photo: Octane Photography

This time for the German Grand Prix at Hockenheim taking place this weekend we can add the lament that it's been two years and one major regulation change since F1 cars were last here. So there's not even much useful previous when seeking to identify betting value.

Still if recent rounds have taught us anything it is that Ferrari will be in the mix pretty much anywhere. It's gone well recently on similar tracks to this one, made up mainly of straights separated by short and sharp turns (such as Montreal and the Red Bull Ring). It possibly has the strongest engine these days too which will matter here as a large proportion of the lap is full throttle

There's only one problem, that homeboy Sebastian Vettel's record here is weirdly poor - his best (official) Hockenheim result is third and he's only ever led three laps at this circuit.

British GP Report - Red ratification?

The British Grand Prix was about coming to a realisation. Martin Brundle called it in Friday practice - that in 2018 we have to get used to the idea that Ferrari will be quick everywhere. And if this one was the red car's ultimate test then it passed it triumphantly.

Ferrari and Sebastian Vettel passed their toughest
test with flying colours
Photo: Octane Photography

In every sense - literal and metaphorical - Silverstone is Ferrari's away fixture. Not only as one of a small minority of teams not to have a base a short drive away, it also is a track that we thought could have been designed for its chief rival Mercedes. Results say this too with the silver team winning the previous five here - most dominantly - and Lewis Hamilton in Nigel Mansell-esque style being particularly happy at home, taking the last four.

Yet this time Sebastian Vettel and Ferrari won, and deservedly. On that basis they can win anywhere. Maybe it's the car to beat this year.

Granted there were some adventures in getting there, but the bottom line is that Ferrari - armed with a new floor which seemed to electrify the red cars and straightline speed that rival Daniel Ricciardo described as '"insane" - looked at least as fast as Mercedes throughout on the latter's happiest of hunting grounds. Only Hamilton pulling a rabbit out of the hat - again Mansell-esque on his home ground - denied Ferrari pole. Otherwise the Scuderia was never denied.

Silverstone Preview - Challenging your inner Nige

Every year at around this time I experience conflict. I'm not one driven by patriotism, particularly not in F1. But even I cannot deny that there is something about the British Grand Prix.

Even to the non-patriotic, there is
something about Silverstone
Photo: Octane Photogrpahy

It can't even be said that its hardy host Silverstone has universal appeal. It's not glamourous, nor picture postcard. Instead rather exposed and windswept.

Yet still few refute that the Northamptonshire circuit bows to almost none in being part of the F1 furniture. And this is for a number of reasons.

Chiefly it is F1's home gig. Seven of F1's ten teams are based (or in Haas's case has a base) in Britain, and six of these are within a few miles of the Silverstone track. As are a myriad of companies that supply them in the F1 equivalent of silicon valley.

The venue also is among F1's most ubiquitous. It was at Silverstone that it all started in 1950, and despite sometimes extensive changes it retains much of its character - flowing, rapid and with many long and mighty turns.

Austrian GP Report - The hills are alive

As the sage Mark Gallagher noted after this one, "Ferrari will be waking up this morning dazed by how they are leading both the drivers' and constructors' championships; Mercedes at how they are not."

Max Verstappen was an unlikely - and worthy - winner
Photo: Octane Photography

Gallagher's assessment indicates that this Austrian Grand Prix was no ordinary Grand Prix - indeed it was one of those wherein advance expectation and actual outcome barely were on nodding terms.

It started though looking like it would be extremely ordinary - Mercedes armed with a technical upgrade strode a way clear and locked out the grid's front row. All spoke of two races in one with those not in silver aiming for third place at most. Then when Mercedes maintained its one-two after some first lap frolics, Lewis Hamilton ahead and poleman Valtteri Bottas boxing his way back to second after a poor get-go, that indeed looked like that.

And yet. Mercedes's empire fell within a single lap.