Congrats to Fernando Alonso and Renault F1 on their 2005 Championships.

A moment of silence for the death of the 3.0 L V-10...

Time for the 2006 Silly Season. Drivers Musical Chairs, Teams changing engines and tires, Multiple teams ex Mercedes Jr team, RedBull F1 Rosa Toro Italiani(sp}? Can the FIA race more than 6 cars at INDY? Anyone not get their free tickets? Can Ferrari give Schumi a car that he can win in or should he simply retire?

 

Yes retire. Time to go. Sort of odd (premonition??) to see him not even finish the race last night.
A new V8 accross the board and changes perhaps for qualifyng AGAIN!
Anyways, love F1 and hope Fernando stays on top and we continue to see this nice battle between him and Raikonen. Should be fun.

 

No, no, no. Schumi will be back in force as Ferrari gets its mojo back in '06. The megabudget and the meak shall all be on an even playing field in the new formula, as nobody will have the advantage of past experience. I still think that Rory Byrne, Ross Brawn and Jean Todt trump any other combo. That and the fact that Bridgestone will have additional teams in '06 should tilt the balance towards the boyz from Maranello.

 

It is a shame when, apart from Indi, we had maybe the best (most exciting) season for years, and then they go and change everything again

 

GBMINI: AMEN PREACH ON BROTHER!

From the 2005 topic
JB kinda reminds me of JV. The only difference is JV went to Williams and in his second year there he won a Championship. JB went to Honda. Honda reminds me of the 2005 Ferrari: Driver is capeable but the team gives him CRAP!

My prediction Honda will do to JB what it did to JV.. Waste his tallent in a poor car untill it eventually kills him.

I would expect the same from Puke boy at Toyota. As long as Schumi is racing in the same series Puke boy will never truly shine. Not he is a Xenon Bulb either!

Takuma Sato... Does this guy need a champ car ride or what?

 

I think the 2006 season will be fun. New teams, new engines and some interesting driver changes.

This will be the season when Schumi will prepare to hand the torch over. I would love it if he will make a resurgence. F1 needs Ferrari to be competitive.

Now the time has come for Rubinho to put up or shut up. Same for Jenboy!!! Honda better get their act together and get a race winning car.

BMW will require atleast 2 seasons for building a team up. It will be interesting to see whether Williams will be be on their way out. No JenBoy, no engines!!

Couldhart has sorta vindicated himself, with reasonable performances and it wil bu up to him to bring up Klien and Luizzi.

The big question...what will Rossi do???? That is something I am all keyed up. Kimi and Rossi at Ferrari....

 

IMHO, next season is an 'all bets are off' season. a lot is changing. it should be really interesting.

 

Let's not pretend for one minute that JV did anything but sold out to the highest bidder...he made his own grave in F1.

 

Rossi will stay in the land of passing. Or should I say on two wheels. IMHO he is not a Mike "The Bike" Hailwood!

 

Third isn't competitive???

 

It's not where they finished, but how they fell!!! Sheer dominance on track till last season and then suddenly, everyone is up on the pace. What surprsied me really was the lack of pace in the Ferrari and how much the drivers had to fight the car!!!

While in the past we had seen poor starts from Ferrari, they had always managed to get their act together after the first few races!! Not so this season!!!!

Tires killed Ferrari this season, and they have used most of the season to experiment with car setups. I am sure that 2006 will be different, with the new engine rules and the new teams.

 

Nope, he is not Mike Hailwood!! But the simple fact is that he is a risk taker!!! Doohan in his prime never thought about leaving Honda. Rainey stuck with Yamaha right through.

Only a supremely confident (or arrogant??) racer would switch teams because he/she wanted to try something different. So I think that there might be a chance that once his contract with Yamaha runs thorugh after 2006, Rossi might consider F1.

F1 desperately needs a great driver and flamboyant character. Schumi, masterful driver that he is, always lacked that charisma. What F1 needs is another Senna I thought that JV might be the next, but then he had to shoot himself in the foot!!!!!! Rossi would bring his intimable character to the F1 circuit. If nothing else, he will atleast liven things up!!!!!!

 

What F1 needs is to pry Danica Patric out of Rayhall/Letterman!

 

Mar 12 Bahrain
Mar 19 Malaysia
Apr 02 Australia
Apr 23 San Marino
May 07 Europe
May 14 Spain
May 28 Monaco
June 11 Great Britain
June 25 Canada
July 02 United States
July 16 France
July 30 Germany
Aug 06 Hungary
Aug 27 Turkey
Sep 10 Italy
Sep 17 Belgium
Oct 01 Japan
Oct 08 China
Oct 22 Brazil*

Changes (from ITV http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.a...34442&PO=34442) are:

The British Grand Prix at Silverstone has been moved forward to take the eighth slot on the calendar ahead of the Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal, and a month earlier than its traditional July date.

The other key change is that Bahrain will host the opening round of the series, with Melbourne being pushed back to the third round so that the Australian city can more ably host the Commonwealth Games.

The Belgian Grand Prix has been confirmed on the calendar despite recent revelations over Spa's cash shortfall.

The Brazilian Grand Prix at Interlagos, which takes over the finale slot in place of China, remains provisional at the moment.

 

Brazil provisional?????????????

 

I wish they'd move the USGP to the end of the season the way it used to be...I liked it better not having Canada & the USGP back to back...

 

 

The Doctor's right. I froze my cojones off that first race: wet, cold and shivering is no way to go through life. However, the race just after 9/11 in 2001 was exceptional - indian summer, all of Colombia's finest in skimpy whatNOT (emphasis intended on the NOT ).

While I do like the June setting for weather, by moving the race forward to coincide with the Canadian GP, we've lost the opportunity to crown the champion that the later race provided.

 

To try to move the 2006 qualifying discussion over to this thread, here's what Nigel Mansell had to say about it (http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.a...34458&PO=34458):

He's right about that last part, but the rest doesn't make sense to me. I don't think qualifying sessions are the time to be getting track time - you better have your set-up figured out by then!

Are 15 minutes enough time to make a run, make an adjustment in the pits, and then try again (as would be the case if you were only competing in the first qualifying session)? Probably, but you'll have to be quick in the pits.

 

I haven't been able to find an explanation for that, but given that's F1 we're talking about, I'm sure there's a good one!

 

I believe that the reason was that one of the trophy presenting officials had a cold, and when he used his handkerchief to blow his nose, the note produced was off key (B flat when it should have been an A). Initially fined $50,000 by the stewards, his appeal to FIA-Paris resulted in a one year race ban of all FIA sanctioned activity in Brasil, effective 1/1/06. Therefore unless a last minute agreement can be reached, there will be no Brasilian GP in 2006.

 

Of course, had he asked permission to blow in b-flat beforehand, it would have been alright.

 

Bernie has to ask Max before he can take a dump. If they don't do Brazil they will alienate a HUGE fan base. They would be better off screwing the US audience.

 

Been there, done that.

 

AMEN, Halelujia. Preach on Brother