Formula One News — September 2003

The Lamborghini company, a subsidiary of the European car giant Volkwagen, is to make an announcement about a motorsport program at the Frankfurt Motor Show tomorrow.

A letter of intent has been signed for Turkey to host a Grand Prix in 2005 and a new racing circuit is under construction but there have been warnings recently from the Turkish Ministry of Health in Ankara that it will not support tobacco advertising at the event.

A large fire at a Bridgestone plant in Japan will not have any effect on the racing tires. Bridgestone has nine production facilities in Japan including the Kuroiso factory which caught fire on Monday.

The World Health Organization's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC)- the international treaty aimed at stamping out tobacco advertising around the world - has been open for signature since the middle of June.

The accident which befell Ralf Schumacher at Monza last week was odd. It seems that the car ran into a sand trap and flipped over.

The last week has been filled with claims and counter-claims about tires. One side has said this, the other side has said that and very few fans really care one way or the other why it has all happened.

In recent days Jos Verstappen's trusty Dutch sponsors have eben looking at what they would like to do for next year and have been shopping around the F1 paddock to see if anyone can offer them a better deal than Minardi.

Mugen is to restructure following the recent scandal over tax evasion. A new company called M-TEC will be established shortly.

Bobby Rahal, the three-time CART champion and former boss of Jaguar Racing, has been recognised with the naming of part of the Laguna Seca race track (now known as Mazda Raceway) after him.

There are whispers that Toyota Formula 1 test driver Ricardo Zonta wants to get back into competitive racing and is trying to put together a deal to take part in the last four Champ Car races this year in Miami, Mexico City, Surfers Paradise and Fontana.

The Motorock organization, which is part of the group trying to buy the CART Champ Car series, is to headline Elton John at the forthcoming Grand Prix Americas in Miami. The concert will take place at the American Airlines Arena on Saturday September 27, the night before the race.

British tobacco giant Gallaher Group, which sponsors Jordan Grand Prix with its Benson & Hedges brands, is reporting a profit of $382m in the first sixth months of the year, a seven percent increase over 2002.

Canadian teams and drivers held a press conference in Montreal earlier this week to explain to the Canadian authorities and the public that the loss of the Canadian Grand Prix will have a devastating effect on racing in the country.

The last few days have seen a number of daft remarks being made by some of those involved in the current tire controversy.

Plans to redevelop Brands Hatch racing circuit for Formula 1 use were laid down in 2000 but the application for planning permission, agreed by the local Sevenoaks District Council, were then sent to the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions.

Ferrari's Ross Brawn has come clean about his team's role in the current tyre controversy, admitting that it was Ferrari which alerted the FIA to what he considered to be an problem with the Michelin front tyres.

Chandrababu Naidu, the chief minister of the state of Andhra Pradesh will be in Monza next week for a meeting with Formula 1 boss Bernie Ecclestone to discuss the possibility of holding a race in Hyderabad.

Estonia's Marko Asmer has been confirmed as a Williams test driver. The 19-year-old has already tested for the team on several occasions this year.

Michelin's attitude towards the FIA warning about tires has been rather confused in recent days.

Further details are emerging about Ralf Schumacher's accident at Monza yesterday and it seemed that the car did not hit the barriers as was first reported but rather that it flipped several times.

According to our sources Michelin is busy making a batch of new, slightly-narrower front tires which will be used at the Italian Grand Prix if it is deemed necessary for the French company to play it safe because of the FIA's warning about the measuring of the contact patch of the tires.

Townsend Bell had his first runs in a Formula 1 car yesterday at the Lurcy Levis testing facility near Magny-Cours in central France, at the wheel of a BAR-Honda. Bell is due to do three days of aerodynamic testing for the team, checking that the results of the windtunnel are confirmed when the car runs on a track.

Bernie Ecclestone is going to get a lot of mail in the next few days. A Canadian marketing company has printed 108,000 postcards pre-addressed to the Formula 1 boss.

With just less than a month to go before the United States GP at Indianapolis, there has been flooding at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, following a miserable summer in Indiana. Record rainfall hit the city on Monday with 7.2 inches of rain recorded in a single day, beating the 108-year-old record.

There are some reports in the German press suggesting that Juan Pablo Montoya may not stay next year at Williams, despite the fact that he has one more year to run on his contract.