Force India became one of the last teams to launch its challenger for the 2018 F1 season, pulling the covers off the VJM11 in the pitlane ahead of Barcelona testing.
Sahara Force India F1 Team
Overall, the VJM11 doesn’t deviate much from last year’s design, which netted the team fourth place in the 2017 Constructors’ Championship. The VJM10’s stepped nose section and elongated thumb-tip nose, unique on last year’s grid, have remained for 2018.
The most striking visual difference between last year and this comes from the car’s livery—still built around the “pink panther” scheme of sponsor BWT, Force India has added to the VJM11 with sections of white on the nose, cockpit and rear wing.
Sahara Force India F1 Team
But although the VJM11 shows no drastic departures from last year’s philosophy, Force India’s technical director Andy Green said the addition of the Halo meant the team couldn’t simply carry over last year’s chassis as planned:
“From an aerodynamic perspective, the work [on integrating the Halo] is still ongoing. It’s not designed to be an aerodynamic device. It doesn’t do us any favours in that department.”
Green further explained that the Halo causes “a significant downstream effect, especially around the rear wing area.
“It requires a lot of work to mitigate the issues that it causes. We’re still actively working on that, and I don’t think we’ll have a solution until Melbourne.”
Sahara Force India F1 Team
The Mercedes-powered VJM11 will have its track debut on Monday courtesy of Force India development driver Nikita Mazepin, before race drivers Esteban Ocon and Sergio Pérez take over for the rest of the week.
The team’s new reserve driver Nicholas Latifi was scheduled to drive on the final day of the test, but has had to stand down after being hospitalised by a serious infection earlier in the week.
The 2018 F1 grid is now complete, with Scuderia Toro Rosso having unveiled their new car officially in the pit-lane of the Circuit de Catalunya on the morning of the first pre-season test.
Although today was the official launch of the STR13, on 21st February the team released an image from a shakedown test at Misano in response to an unauthorised leak across social media, something that has dogged other teams’ launches over the last week.
The main talking point with the 2018 launches has, of course, been the halo, and Toro Rosso have opted to include extra aerodynamic detailing on theirs, as have most of the other teams on the grid.
The car sports largely the same livery as its predecessor, though with the addition of a red-stripe across the top of the sidepods, a chrome-effect red, blue and silver that proved to be popular with the fans last year, and again this year. already.
The STR13 is Toro Rosso’s first design to be powered by Honda, having switched from previous supplier Renault after a series of disagreements over the course of 2017. Toro Rosso will be Honda’s sole customer in 2018 after their deal with McLaren, which was supposed to last for at least ten years, collapsed after just three.
Their driver line-up for 2018 is comprised of New Zealander Brendon Hartley and Frenchman Pierre Gasly, the least experienced pairing on the grid with not even ten Grand Prix starts between them. It follows the roundabout of drivers that Toro Rosso went through in 2017. They started the year with Carlos Sainz and Daniil Kvyat, before the former defected to Renault and the latter was unceremoniously dumped from the Red Bull programme. After a series of chops and changes, Toro Rosso settled for Hartley and Gasly as their replacements, and they were ultimately retained for 2018.
The STR13’s Honda engine was fired up for the first time on Valentine’s Day, so Toro Rosso will definitely be hoping for a long and happy marriage in 2018 and beyond, and not a messy and very public divorce.
Mercedes has revealed the W09 EQ Power+, the team’s new car for the 2018 F1 season, at a special launch event at Silverstone.
The new Silver Arrow carried out its first series of laps on Thursday morning with Valtteri Bottas at the wheel, before being given an official presentation later in the day. Defending world champion Lewis Hamilton then took to the track for his first taste of the car he hopes will take him to a fifth drivers’ crown this year.
Steve Etherington/Mercedes AMG F1
Like most of its rivals for this season, the W09 isn’t much of a departure from last year’s model. It has retained the same ultra-long wheelbase that helped the W08 to dominance at 2017’s high-speed circuits, and also sports a conventionally-rounded nose cap—as yet, the only such design on this year’s grid.
However, the W09 also features plenty of less obvious refinements meant to address its predecessor’s peaky performance.
As well as an increase in rake similar to the Red Bull philosophy, the W09 also features an all-new suspension design, and what Hamilton described as “a different aerodynamic characteristic” for the floor, both aimed at improving the car’s ride.
Steve Etherington/Mercedes AMG F1
Speaking of the new car, Mercedes technical director James Allison said: “Across the board, [the W09] is more elegant than last year.
“Last year’s regulations were brand new and we weren’t quite sure which direction they would take us in.
“This year, being a little more confident of what we’re aiming for, we’ve been able to commit more fully to certain concepts. So we have the packaging much tighter and have taken things to more of an extreme.”
McLaren is pushing to introduce a “substantial” upgrade package for the MCL33’s race debut in Melbourne, although the initial design to be revealed this week will not differ much from last year’s challenger.
As seems to be the trend for 2018, McLaren has hinted that the launch and test specification for its new chassis will be more of a close evolution than a radical departure from last year’s MCL32, allowing the team to focus on the aerodynamic impact of the Halo and new engine cover regulations in early testing.
But once those initial assessments are complete, the team’s testing programme will turn towards evaluating a raft of new parts specifically for March’s Australian Grand Prix.
Glenn Dunbar/McLaren
McLaren’s aero chief Peter Prodromou told Autosport that fans “can expect something quite similar conceptually” to the MCL32 at Friday’s team launch and during testing:
“We very much hope and expect that the car will feel from the off quite similar to how it felt at the end of last year and perform quite similarly,” Prodromou explained. “Hopefully we’ve taken a step forwards and then we will try to do something a bit more substantial for Melbourne.
“That is where the major focus has been and still is—to try to deliver a decent upgrade both aerodynamically and mechanically and to put our best foot forward for Melbourne.”
Trident Motorsport will field an all-Haas junior F2 lineup in 2018, with Arjun Maini graduating from GP3 to partner Santino Ferrucci.
Zak Mauger/FIA Formula 2
Maini finished ninth in the standings in his first full GP3 campaign last year, taking his first series win at the sprint race in Spain and a further podium in Abu Dhabi. He was signed to the Haas F1 junior ranks as the team’s test and development driver in May 2017.
At F2’s post-season test in Abu Dhabi, Maini drove for both Trident and Russian Time.
“I’m very excited to be competing in the FIA Formula 2 championship,” Maini said. “I felt we were very competitive during the post-season test and given the series is using all-new cars for the coming season, I’m quite excited for the year ahead.
“Trident is a very strong team and I’m sure if we work hard we’ll be in for some strong results during the course of the season.”
Zak Mauger/FIA Formula 2
Maini’s new teammate Ferrucci will be contesting his first full F2 season in 2018. The 19-year-old American joined Trident for the final five races of 2017 after a mid-season move up from GP3, and scored points at Hungary and Spa.
Trident team owner Maurizio Salvadori praised Ferrucci and Maini as “two undoubtably valuable prospects who have all that it takes to be among the future stars of motorsports for the years to come.
“It is certainly not by chance that [Haas F1] selected them to join their junior development programme.”
Check out the newest video from Mobil 1 The Grid in which Max Verstappen reviews his 2017 season, as he looks ahead to the challenge of battling Lewis Hamilton for the title.
Renault has revealed its plans for the forthcoming Formula 1 season at a launch event focused on unveiling the team’s 2018 challenger.
The RS18—besides the mandatory addition of the Halo—features several small aerodynamic evolutions from its predecessor, including a slimmer nose section and much tighter packaging around the rear of the engine.
The team’s livery has also been tweaked for 2018, with Renault’s traditional yellow featuring more sparingly along the leading edges of the car.
Renault Sport Formula One Team
Speaking about Renault’s 2018 goals, technical chief Bob Bell highlighted improved reliability as one of the marque’s key targets:
“We need a strong reliability record,” Bell said. “That’s something we need to focus on. We need the car as reliable as we can make it.
“To improve reliability, we have to accept nothing less than perfection. Anything that ends up on the car needs to be designed and built to the highest standard; checked and rechecked as fit for purpose.
“All the issues that blighted us last year need to be eradicated by a fresh approach. That’s a huge challenge…and it’s the toughest task we face.”
Renault engine chief Remi Taffin echoed Bell, stating that having a reliable car will be the team’s “first priority”, especially with teams limited to just three power units per car in 2018.
Renault Sport Formula One Team
As well as revealing its new car, Renault also announced as part of its season launch an updated Renault Sport Academy driver lineup.
With the team’s previous third driver Sergey Sirotkin moving on to a race seat at Williams, Renault has promoted British-Korean junior Jack Aitken to the vacant reserve driver role. The 22-year-old, who has been part of the RSA since 2016, will combine his expanded Renault role this year with a maiden F2 campaign with ART GP.
Aitken will be joined in Renault’s F1 stable by fellow F2 driver Artem Markelov. The 23-year-old Russian, who finished runner-up to Charles Leclerc in last year’s F2 championship, has been named Renault’s 2018 test and development driver.
Eleanor Roosevelt once said that the future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. If there is one team that has had to dig deep to keep their F1 dream alive, it is the Sauber team. That belief and dream came to beautiful fruition with the launch of their C37 2018 F1 challenger… alongside an old friend; Alfa Romeo.
Sauber have had a tumultuous few years which have been well documented, however the new ownership combined with the re-entry of Alfa into F1 created an air of optimism which took center-stage today with the unveiling of the Halo-ed C37.
The Quadrifoglio features proudly on the side of the dark candy apple and white car, which is being rated as one of the most striking liveries of the 2018 cars revealed thus far. Following suit with the other teams, the halo has been co-ordinated to look less conspicuous on the car and hopefully not be as distracting as the prototype seen in 2017.
The C37 will have 2018 Ferrari power, a move that is welcomed by both drivers. Marcus Ericsson begins another season with the Swiss based outfit and will drive alongside the talented and highly rated Charles Leclerc.
While more specific technical details are yet to be revealed, team Principal, Fred Vasseur has gone on record to say that the team is taking a new technical direction in 2018, featured a new aerodynamic concept that has been months in the making. Fans will recall that the team all but stopped work on the C36 in order to focus on the C37 and will officially roll out at the Circuit de Catalunya tests later this month.
The winglets on the car are delicate, which seems to be the trend with the cars revealed to date and significant changes to the side-pod areas. Sauber have struggled on aerodynamic intensive tracks and hope the changes will bring about an improvement.
The team are looking forward to improving on their performance and “catching up” with the field utilising the combination of experience and youth with their drivers and the sweeping changes at Hinwil, that has now lead to a close working relationship with the Ferrari team.
Sauber have been the great F1 dream, a single dream made good. 2018 may just bring about the next chapter in their extraordinary story.
In 1955 The Grand Prix held at Le Mans marked a water shed moment in motor sport. In particular the Mercedes team featuring Juan Manuel Fangio and Stirling Moss. Pierre Levegh’s also in the Silver arrows as a factory driver crashed early in the race killing approximately 80 spectators. And injuring over 100 more.
This incident is known as motor sports darkish day. Motor racing and formula1 would never be the same again. In the immediate aftermath of the race The Grand Prix in Germany, Switzerland and Spain were all cancelled. Motor racing has to this day never returned to Switzerland.
After the last race in Monza Italy. Mercedes announced it’s withdrawal from motor racing. They would not return for almost 40 years.
Today’s tracks are a much safer environment to race in. Gone are the hay bales, replaced by Steal barriers and tyre walls that loop the tracks. Catch fences in the spectator zones protect the crowds from most incidents.
These are all in my opinion much needed safety measures. But not all improvement to race tracks are necessary. In my view modern circuits like Bahrain have used huge tarmac run off areas. These may be great for cutting down speed but does it punish a driver enough for an error?
Do we want a driver to come off and then straight back into the action with not even a time loss disadvantage? Or do we want to see them struggle back onto the track? That was the case with gravel traps, bigger errors lead to beaching and non finishing.
I know what I’d rather.
Grass is another option. But I’m disregarding this as high speed cars and wet grass are not a good mix.
We all know that gravel traps do work. Yes they have in the past flipped cars over. But that is a rare occurrence, and the modern formula 1 cars are more than capable of withstanding that, aren’t they? The drivers monocoque (French for single cell) and higher sides and the addition of Halo should be more than capable of keeping drivers safe.
We can never sit back on excuse the pun on our Laurels as regards driver and spectator safety. New ideas and innovations come along. Abrasive Tarmac surfaces could be the answer. But once again it raises the question does it punish the driver enough?
Luckily there have been very few incidents regarding spectators at the top levels of Motorsport Dario Franchitti’s career ending accident – at the Indy Grand Prix of Houston comes to mind. The catch fence did it’s job to a greater extent. 13 people in the crowd where injured by flying debris. But no one was killed
In the future maybe something better than fencing will come along. Maybe it something that won’t impair the view quite as much.
As they say at all the circuits as a disclaimer. Motorsport is dangerousness and you may get injured. Or I have even seen signs stating risk of death!
One last thing. A big thank you to all the marshals, from all us fans. Without you all, we wouldn’t have such safe racing.
Nach Haas und Williams präsentierte heute Red Bull als erstes Topteam, den neuen Einsatzwagen für die Saison 2018. Da Red Bull für ausgefallene Ideen bekannt ist, war es nicht verwunderlich dass alle Augen heute morgen vor einem ersten Shake Down in Silverstone auf den RB14 gerichtet waren.
Das erste was in das Auge fiel und ein großen Unterschied zum Vorjahreswagen darstellte, war die Lackierung: Ein mattes, futuristisches Design im schwarz/blauen Pixellook. Es ist eine radikale Änderung – doch bevor man zu sehr in Euphorie verfällt, sollte man beachten, dass das nur eine Lackierung für die Testfahrten in Barcelona ist. Der altbekannte Red Bull Stil aus Blau, Gelb und Rot wird wohl bereits nach den Testfahrten zurückkehren.
Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
Es ist nicht das erste Mal, dass Red Bull mit einem solch’ ausgefallenen Design bei den Testfahrten auftritt – bereits 2015 sorgte das Team mit dem Cameolook für Aufsehen. Ob es am Ende wirklich was bringt, dass die Details vor der Konkurrenz verhüllt bleiben, wird man abwarten müssen.
Vom Auto selbst, ist die größte Änderung natürlich das Halo, welches gut an die Lackierung angepasst wurde und somit kaum sichtbar ist. Ansonsten wäre da noch die Vorderradaufhängung. Diese wurde an jene von Mercedes und Ferrari angepasst, während das Loch in der Nase vom Vorjahreswagen geblieben ist. Aerodynamisch gesehen hat der RB mit dem Auto welches im Vorjahr präsentiert wurde, wenig zutun. Die Handschrift von Adrian Newey ist wieder erkennbar. Wirkte der Vorjahreswagen für Red Bull Verhältnisse fast schon nackt, sind nun wieder deutlich mehr Flügel zusehen. Damals startete Red Bull holprig.
Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
2017 stellte sich bekanntlich als Enttäuschung heraus. Sollte eine Aerodynamische Regelrevolution den Bullen eigentlich in die Karten spielen, verpasste man am Saisonstart den Anschluss. Erst mit einem großen Aerodynamikupdate zum Spanien GP, schaffte es die Truppe aus Milton Keynes die Lücke zu Ferrari und Mercedes zu schließen. Doch dort war es bereits zu spät.
Ein weiterer Hauptgrund für die Performance 2017 war die schlechte Zuverlässigkeit – etwas wo sowohl Red Bull als auch McLaren von Renault für 2018 Besserung erwarten. Umso höher ist die Erwartung 2018, zumindest intern. Nach außen stapelt man nach dem Lehrjahr 2017 nun tief – Helmut Marko lies bei “Auto, Motor und Sport” verlauten, dass er nicht glaube dass RB 2018 bereits um die WM fahren wird. Ob das auch in Wirklichkeit so ist, darf bezweifelt werden.
Doch in einem hat er Recht: Auf Fahrerseite ist das Team bereits WM tauglich aufgestellt. Daniel Ricciardo wird erneut an der Seite von Max Verstappen fahren. Der Vetrag des Australiers läuft am Ende der Saison aus, während Red Bull erst vergangenes Jahr den Holländer bis 2020 an sich bund. Der Vorteil dieser Fahrerpaarung ist zweifelsfrei der, dass beide vollkommene Alphatiere sind, während die Konkurrenz von Mercedes und Ferrari neben ihren Starfahrern mit Bottas und Räikkonen jeweils eine Art Nummer 2-Fahrer beschäftigen.
Interessant wird in dieser Saison auch die Motorenfrage: Renault gab laut Medienberichten bereits im Herbst 2017 der Chefetage von RB bekannt, dass man sie nicht 2019 beliefern werde – Mit dieser Frage in Hinterkopf haben die Bullen bis zum Sommer diesen Jahres Zeit, sich einen neuen Partner zu beschaffen – umso mehr hofft man auf einen Aufschwung von Honda mit Toro Rosso.
Getty Images/Red Bull Content Pool
All diese Faktoren dürften eine Rolle spielen, wie das Jahr für RB laufen wird. Wenn sie gegen Mercedes und Ferrari kämpfen, werden beide Fahrer glücklich sein.
Wird Red Bull es mit einer deutlich besseren und organisierteren Vorbereitung als im Vorjahr schaffen, von Anfang an an der Spitze mitzumischen, oder werden sie ein weiteres Jahr nur das Heck von Ferrari und Mercedes bewundern können? Die Zeit wird es zeigen.
The 2018 F1 grid is now complete, with Scuderia Toro Rosso having unveiled their new car officially in the pit-lane of the Circuit de Catalunya on the morning of the first pre-season test.
