Formula One News — September 2006

Alexander Wurz led the way in the first practice session for the Chinese Grand Prix although 11 of the 24 regular drivers did not set a representative time, preferring to keep their engines fresh.

Chinese GP - Practice 1 Results

Motor sport is set to return to the streets of Detroit, the capital of the American motor industry, for the first time since 2001. Motor City has hosted races since the early 1980s when Formula 1 raced on the streets around the Renaissance Center.

Jos Verstappen has dropped out of the opening round of the A1 Grand Prix Series at Zandvoort - a major blow for the race organisers, who had used the former F1 driver to draw in huge crowds of Dutch fans.

Motor racing is all about getting in the newspapers and it seems that sometimes it is not really important how that is achieved. Michael Schumacher was recently revealed to be the most popular driver in F1, despite all his obvious faults.

Johnny Herbert has spent the recent months trying to put a gloss on the face of the MF1 Racing team, using his "cheeky chappy" charm to offset the rather more dour presence of chief executive Colin Kolles and absentee owner Alex Shnaider.

The FIA-CIK and the FIA Institute is to launch an anti-drug campaign entitled "Race True" at the forthcoming World Karting Championship meeting at Angerville, in France.

Williams has extended Narain Karthikeyan's deal as a test driver, thus ensuring not only interest but in the team but also sponsorship from India's Tata, the country's biggest conglomerate of companies, which is involved in a multitude of different businesses.

Chinese GP - Thursday Press Conference

Sponsorship agent Udo Schneider has been sentences to four years in jail for his role in a bribery case related to a sponsorship deal he arranged with the German computer chip manufacturer Infineon.

Juan Pablo Montoya will make his stock car debut in a round of the ARCA Remax Series at Talladega in Alabama on Friday October 6. The Colombian former F1 driver will appear at the wheel of a Texaco/Havoline Dodge.

World Rally Champion Sebastian Loeb has been pretty much unbeatable in recent years with his Citroen but on Wednesday, Loeb did not help his cause when he crashed while riding a mountain bike in Switzerland and broke his arm.

Turkish Grand Prix organisers are saying that the $5m fine imposed by the FIA is too heavy a burden and that the race cannot afford to pay. In explaining the problem, the circuit manager Baran Asena told Autosport that the race had lost $5m in 2005.

An agreement has been reached between the Nurburgring and Hockenheim circuits to alternate the German Grand Prix

As we predicted some time ago, Red Bull Racing will be running GP2 driver Michael Ammermuller in its third car in the two Asian races. Although he was very successful in Formula renault last year, Ammermuller has struggled in GP2 this season but hopes to do better next season.

German engineer Alex Hitzinger has been appointed as the technical director of Scuderia Toro Rosso and at the same time has been named as the head of advanced technologies for Red Bull F1, a move that indicates that there is a convergence going on between the two teams

The FIA has announced the results of its latest survey, conducted in league with AMD. The federation's press statement said that 91,000 fans (about the same last year) took part in the survey and that 66% of these fans thought the reintroduction of tyre changes was an improvement.

The Elkhart Lake Champ Car event witnessed one other important result which we omitted to mention yesterday. Team Australia's Simon Pagenaud claimed the Champ Car Atlantic Championship when his championship rival Graham Rahal retired with an electrical problem after six laps.

The Champ Car World Series is to host two races in Europe next year, one the road circuits of Assen in Holland and Oschersleben in Germany. The news will be confirmed as soon as the necessary contractual work is completed.

Katherine Legge, the British girl who is racing this year in Champ Car, walked away from a collosal accident at Road America at the weekend when the rear wing fell off her car.

Mike Conway wrapped up the British Formula 3 Championship at the weekend at Silverstone to give the Raikkonen Robertson Racing organisation its first title. Conway won the title with a dominant display which saw two pole positions, two race wins and two fastest laps.

Former Toyota F1 driver Cristiano da Matta has returned to his home in Miami having been released from the Theda Clark Medical Centre in Neenah, Wisconsin, where he has been for the last seven weeks, since colliding with a deer during testing at Elkhart Lake.

Juan Pablo Montoya has been released from his McLaren contract and is now free to begin preparation work for his NASCAR Nextel Cup programme next year. NASCAR team owner Chip Ganassi intends to get into action straight away and will run Montoya on Monday in an Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA) car

Former Le Mans winner, F1 racer and automotive journalist Paul Frere is in hospital following a serious road accident while road testing a Honda Civic Type-R on country roads in Germany.

There are whispers in F1 circles that a big deal is being discussed that could result in Formula 1 TV rights for several countries to be bundled together for a single broadcaster.