Archive for the ‘Motorsports News’ Category

• Jenson Button has more than just Formula 1 in mind

  Date: 2011.09.10 | Category: Motorsports News, Sports News, Wags | Response: 0

  When McLaren Mercedes driver is not in behind his MP4-26 steering wheel he spends time with his girlfriend Jessica Michibata.

  2009 Formula 1 champion Jenson Button has found a new love in Jessica Michibata, a beautiful Japanese-Argentine model with a vast experience in the island nation in East Asia working on TV shows. It is very common to see them holding hands prior to races or in the streets of London, where the English driver had a pretty odd happening this week. While taking a walk with his new love he found his former girlfriend Florence Brudenell-Bruce on their way.

  For one year and a half they had a relationship that was broken in 2008 with the promise of keep on being good friends, promise that apparently they forgot, since they didn’t even say hello to each other during their most recent and unexpected encounter.

  Besides becoming renowned for dating Button, Florence added more fame to her name with the brief relationship she had with Prince Harry, the youngest son of Charles, Prince of Wales and Princess Diana.

  That space left by Florence in Button’s life was filled by 26-year-old Jessica around two years ago, period in which they only had a brief split during the summer 2009. If you are wondering about whether the couple is expecting to have children the answer is no, because according to Button “’I don’t want to have kids while I’m racing. It’s not worth the risk.”

  31-year-old Button occupies the fourth place in the 2011 F1 season with 149 points, but his title options as well as everyone else’s have been dissipated by the impressive performance that Sebastian Vettel from Red Bull has had, accounting for 259 points of the 300 in game.

  Out of the 12 races disputed this year Button has won two: the Canadian GP as well as the Hungarian. In Canada it was an epic victory, as he upset Vettel on the last lap, completing 34 passes throughout the race. While in Hungary he celebrated his 200^th Grand Prix start with a victory in the same circuit where he won the first F1 race in his career back in 2006.

  There are only 7 races left in the season, where despite no longer having chances to clinch title Button will be racing for pride. His next challenge is the Italian Grand Prix at Monza, a circuit where his best result has been a second place, position in which he finished last year.

  Regarding his future with McLaren team boss Martin Whitmarsh already confirmed the 2009 world champion as part of the team, as they find themselves satisfied with the driver’s performance.

  Truth is that if McLaren has had better results this season it has nothing to do with Button and his teammate and countryman Lewis Hamilton, but with having a slower car than the Red Bull Racing. For this weekend’s race he was already admitted that “I don’t yet feel totally at one with the car, but we’re working on it.”

  Hopefully for him next season his car won’t be an issue to end up with Red Bull’s hegemony.

• Hamilton and Button are not comfortable with the MP4-26

  Date: 2011.03.11 | Category: Motorsports News, Sports News | Response: 0

  Both drivers agree that their car is not in conditions to fight for the title yet.

  Early in the week McLaren driver Jenson Button expressed that he didn’t feel that his car, the MP4-26, was going to be ready to fight for the first place in the 2011 F1 season opening race at Melbourne, Australia. He bases his comments in a comparison from the results obtained in the latest practices, where rivals Ferrari and Red Bull have been signing better performances.

  If there were any doubts about Button’s feelings, just the day after his teammate Louis Hamilton cleared them by stating that their car was not ready to fight for the championship as of today. Hamilton also compared their car to Ferrari’s and Red Bull’s, since those two teams are the favorites to clinch the title.

  This doesn’t mean that McLaren won’t be fighting to win the championship this season; it just means that their car will need more time to evolve and become more competitive. The commitment of the drivers to clinch the title is such that “we won’t be happy being the third best team,” Button said.

  With their comments the drivers are not looking for someone to blame for this situation because like Hamilton explained: “this is what is all about, find where your weaknesses are so you can fix them,” which is what they have been doing with the test drives. Nevertheless he feels that the issues found might be a little bit more complex to fix than what they expected, sending an advice to their fans that for the Australian Grand Prix they won’t be atop of their conditions.

  Meanwhile these corrections take place and the MP4-26 evolves into a better care, the strategy for McLaren in the first races of the season will be to finish among the top five, so that once their car is atop they will still have chances to fight for the title.

  Hamilton is confident in the evolution of the car into one that can give them full guarantees to win the title. And despite having expressed his concerns about it not being in the same line as Ferrari and Red Bull are right now, “this doesn’t mean that it will not turn into a car winner of the World Championship,” he said.

  Button is also optimistic about the improvements that car will have as there is “a long way to go” in the season. After the last practices he feels that some good improvements have been done. This gives him a good feeling because it shows that the team is in the right track to increase the performance of the MP4-26.

  In other news about the team, McLaren has announced that former test driver Pedro de La Rosa will join them again this season. He will be the test driver and substitute in case Hamilton or Button suffers any setback along the season.

  De la Rosa has been linked to McLaren since 2003, but last year he left the team to drive for Sauber. After his one year absence he has decided to come back and bring his experience to the team, something that makes Hamilton really happy, as a guy of experience is exactly what they need to make the MP4-26 a better car.

• 10th anniversary for Alonso

  Date: 2011.03.04 | Category: Motorsports News, Sports News | Response: 0

  Ten years have gone by since the Spanish driver arrived to Formula 1 where he has won two championships.

  Since his debur race in the Australian Grand Prix back in March 4 of 2001, Fernando Alonso has been running with the same mentality of “don’t run to make friends, but to win.” Ferrari team driver and last season runner up thinks that to be remembered he needs a lot of victories, and that is what motivates his ambition. 

  The Spanish driver confessed that he would like someone to “make a movie about his life,” and if he dream comes true, he would like to write the best scenes of it running for Ferrari, where he plans to become a legend.

  Alonso feels totally identified with the team’s philosophy and is proud of their history, something that he is enjoying to the fullest. “Out of the team” is how he explained that he felt when running for McLaren, despite having won his only two championships under that team.

  Ironically the 2011 F1 season will begin in the Australian Grand Prix on March 27, after the political conflicts caused the debut race of the season at Bahrain to be postponed until further notice.

  With the new F150^th Italia car Alonso hopes to have his best partner towards his third F1 Championship, and leave behind the bad memories from last year, when the title was lost in the last race to German Sebastian Vettel from Red Bull team.

• Political conflicts suspend Bahrain Grand Prix

  Date: 2011.02.22 | Category: Motorsports News, Sports News | Response: 0

  F1 president and CEO Bernie Ecclestone has confirmed this Monday what many saw coming: the suspension of the season opener race in Bahrain.

  All the motorsport fans that were anxiously waiting for the start of the 2011 F1 season will have to hold on a few more days to see this happen. The political conflicts that have breaked out in the region has had its repercussions in Bahrain, where the protest against the dictatorship regime have left four deaths already.  

  This is the reason why Bernie Eccleston, F1 president and CEO, has decided to change the 2011 fixture by moving the Bahrain Grand Prix from March 6 to November 6, to give more time for the conflict to cease and guarantee the safety of the teams and fans. If the conflict hasn’t come to an end by then, the championship will see its number of races reduced to 19, as the race would definitely not be run under those conditions.

  The 2011 season will then begin on March 27 in the Australian Gran Prix, something that fulfills that desire of the teams, since they were not willing to run in those conditions.

  For Marc Webber from Red Bull team this is the right call as “it’s probably not the best time to go there for a sporting event. They have bigger things, bigger priorities.” And we have to agree on that.

• Bahrain’s conflict could suspend the Grand Prix

  Date: 2011.02.18 | Category: Motorsports News, Sports News | Response: 0

  The death of four protestors against the political regime makes the FIA doubtful about running the season opener race there.

  The first signs of the effect that the political chaos that has breakout in Bahrain, with the killing of pacific protestors against the dictatorship regime has had in the Formula 1, are starting to show up.  The Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA), ruling entity of the F1, just announced the teams competing in the 2011 F1 Championship that the practice races prior to Bahrain’s Grand Prix will not take place there.   

  With this decision it wouldn’t surprise anyone if the FIA finally decides to suspend the race, since the ending of the conflict remains uncertain. If this action is taken the season opener race would take place in Australia on March 27.  

  The final decision should be made before Thursday of next, as the teams would need to travel between that day and Friday in order to be able to compete on March 13, as it was initially planned. Bernie Eccleston, president and CEO of F1, said that he will have a resolution before the death line for teams to travel to Bahrein.