What You'll Be Looking At In 2010 - Part I

So all of the teams have shown us their new liverys and we can expect these to stay the same for the coming season. So let's have a look at whats new with paint jobs and go over some of the more experimental designs, some of the safe ones and grade each car design.

LOTUS F1 - T127



The Lotus F1 car was one of the last to debut (we are still waiting for USF1, Campos and possibly Stefan GP) and has a very basic 'safe' design. It features clean lines, classic style front nose and hardly any 'experimental features. It does look like the front wing has seen a lot of design time thou and is definatly on the level of some of the better teams. Most of the new cars will be similar in design to the Lotus T127 because they haven't had the time to build on a previous chassis and have lower budgets.
The thing that sticks out about this car is the livery. Classic Lotus! It's a stunning looking car that I really hope can be at least the best of the New Class. C+

Virgin Racing - VR-01



Virgin broke away from the old Brawn and created their own team this year in the process becoming the first team to have an F1 car designed entirely using CFD computer simulation technology. The car itself looks spectacular in my opinion. Its stylish and modern looking with a great livery as well. Whats also impressive is the fact that they have picked up on some of the new design ideas that the larger teams have developed. The VR-01 features very high cresents above the front wheel suspension and also a very slim low nose. These feature seem to feature on nearly all of the ajor teams cars and if they provide an advantage I would expect all teams to feature them by the end of the season. B-

BMW Sauber - C29



The Sauber is a mess. The design looks very very basic and the livery is non existant. I imagine by Bahrain we will see some advertising on the car but it will take a alot to make it look good. The front of the car is very standard with a high flat nose and narrow front wing. They have kept the engine cover design that I beleive Red Bull introduced last year but apart from that there is nothing to really talk about here. F

Force India - VJM03



We are pretty much looking at the 2009 Force India with this years model. They have stuck with a 'safe' design and added a 2009 style engine cover that actually connects to the rear wing. This car was built for speed last year and was actually one of the faster cars in a straight line so I imagine they have kept to that design idea and not changed much. The livery stays the same and to be honest I've always liked their color scheme. C


Come back soon for PART II!

2010 Formula One Season

Well it’s about time I started writing this blog again as the 2010 Formula One season is here, well it’s near anyways!

At the moment most of the established teams have had their car launches and I’ll be looking in depth at each of the teams in terms of car designs, driver line-ups and expectations for the coming season.

The 2010 Season has a few major changes compared to previous seasons and these will change the way a race is run. Gone is refuelling. Cars are banned from refuelling during races which means they will need to carry enough fuel to finish the race plus excess in case of unforseen circumstances. This means it’s all about fuel efficiency this year and engines will have been designed to burn the least amount of fuel as possible while still putting out as much power they can. Speaking of engines Mercedes-Benz and Ferrari will both be supplying 3 teams with engines while the 4 new teams and surprisingly Williams will have Cosworth engines. The Cosworth engines look to be the weakest in terms of power and fuel efficiency and F1 insiders are already predicting they will be between two to three seconds per lap off the pace of the frontrunners.

(no more accidents and malfunctions with fuel rigs)

Along with refuelling being banned the wheel covers that Ferrari pioneerd have been banned. These covers would direct air straight into the brake pads to help cool them down and allow for heavier breaking by the drivers. The problems with the covers is that when installed incorrectly during pitstops they can become disloged and even lead to the tires not being fitted correctly.

(no more "pushing the button")

KERS has been banned this year, sort of. All teams have agreed not to use it as its costs and added weight did not end up paying off for most teams and made the racing uneven when cars with KERS stayed ahead of faster cars without it by ‘pushing the button’.

KERS however is still legal under FIA rules and it will be interesting to see if any teams turn their back on FOTA’s agreement and start to use it.

The last major change is the points system. Because of the new teams and larger grid the points system has been expanded to reward the top 10 placed cars instead of 8. The system is now as follows.

1^st 25 points

2^nd 18

3^rd 15

4^th 12

5^th 10

6^th 8

7^th 6

8^th 4

9^th 2

10^th 1

This of course is going to lead to numerous records being broken from this season forward. Michael Schumacher currently holds the record for most points scored in a calendar season at 148 in the 2004 Formula One season. If this current points system were in place for that season he would have finished with 367 points!

Check back soon for specific team previews starting with Mercedes GP Petronas Formula One Team (they could have had a shorter name, really).