Alvin's Formula One Blog

The Monaco Grand Prix is a Formula One motor race held each year on the Circuit de Monaco. Run since 1929, it is widely considered to be one of the most important and prestigious automobile races in the world, alongside the Indianapolis 500 and the 24 Hours of Le Mans. The circuit has been called "an exceptional location of glamour and prestige." The race is held on a narrow course laid out in the streets of Monaco, with many elevation changes and tight corners as well as a tunnel, making it one of the most demanding tracks in Formula One. In spite of the relatively low average speeds, it is a dangerous place to race. It is the only Grand Prix that does not adhere to the FIA's mandated 305 kilometres (190 mi) minimum race distance. The first race in 1929, was organised by Anthony Noghès under the auspices of the "Automobile Club de Monaco", and was won by William Grover-Williams driving a Bugatti. The event was part of the pre-Second World War European C...

Hmm, what can I say? The Spanish GP came and went. It was that fast. I sat through the 2 hour race and felt like it was only 15 minutes. In fact, for the last 16 laps, I was checking my Facebook while the race was winding down. In a word it was "Boring". Barcelona has been a snoozefest for many years, producing processional racing due to the difficulty of overtaking there and also due to the fact that teams test there and know the track inside out. So it's difficult to get an upper hand unless you've got something special in the bag. Sunday's race was no different. It was boring as usual, although there was some highlights here and there. This was undoubtedly due to the tires being overly sensitive. There were 77 pitstops in this race alone, the highest ever. Pirelli themselves were stumped . Pirelli motorsport director Paul Hembery has admitted that things were over the top in Barcelona and revealed there could be changes afoot. "We aimed for two to th...

The European leg of the season is upon us and some say this is where the real order will be known and where the real racing for the championship will start (for some teams at least). Why is that? Well, the reason is because for the last 4 flyaway races, the teams have had to pack whatever they needed for those races and make do with what they have. It's too far away to design something, test it and put it on the car say between Melbourne and Sepang. So most teams learn as much as they can from those races in order to redesign the car for Barcelona. Hence sometimes the cars at Barcelona can be called chassis B. Circuit de Catalunya aka Circuit de Barcelona is situated to the North of Barcelona in Montmeló, Noth-East Spain. It is most famous for annually hosting the Spanish F1 Grand Prix although is also home to Moto GP, and GT racing competitions as well as other racing events. At 730 metres, the run from the grid to the first corner at Barcelona is the longest of the season. ...

Hmm, 3 weeks is a long time in F1, no? After waiting 4 months for action, we got 4 races then suddenly all quiet. Seems like 3 weeks is longer than 4 months. Only God knows how I made it through the winter. Anyway, we'll have the start of the European season next week in Barcelona. That should be fireworks as teams will be bringing big updates to their cars there. The order will be jumbled up again, not to mention the changes made by Pirelli to the hard tire. We'll see. In the meantime, who the hell is Dougie? Well that would be Dougie Lampkin. He is the 12 times FIM Trial World Champion. And what the hell is the FIM Trial? Well, it's a motorcycle event. What?? Motorcycle? Blasphemy! Actually not. Since we're all motorsports fans generally and F1 fans specifically, we are allowed to talk about other motorsports besides F1. Any sport that uses a motor falls under motorsports, not just F1 or cars. So what is the FIM trials? According to Wikipedia: Motorcycle tria...

This article was is re-produced from F1Technical.net in its entirety . It is an excerpt from Renault F1 Q&A. Enjoy. A throttle has come to be associated with any part that controls the power of an engine – such as the accelerator pedal – but in actual fact it is a hydraulically operated mechanism used to increase or decrease inlet gases to the engine. In a V8 there are eight throttles on the top of the engine unit that control the amount of air that enters each of the engine cylinders from the airbox. When the throttles are open, air enters the engine unit. Fuel will be injected just before the inlet valve and hence the combustion chamber, and the spark plug will ignite the fuel and oxygen content in the air. The throttle therefore dictates the amount of fuel burned on each cycle to produce efficient power. When the throttle is closed, no air enters the engine and the combustion process is temporarily suspended. All the throttle valves are controlled via the accelerator ped...

I have written before about Thailand being interested to host an F1 race here . It was to be a street race in the heart of Bangkok. I didn't give it much thought at the time as the announcement was made suddenly and the Thai authorities did sound too confident about it. As we all know, things change very quickly in F1 and deals can be made upside down. So, it was not really a groundbreaking news at the time. Now after being so quiet for so long they've burst on the scene again and this time they even have an approved track layout and they're saying it will be a night race. This looks like a stronger case for the race but as we know in F1, anything is possible. Plus we also know that at the moment the calendar is quite full with so many other countries lining to pay Bernie his money. So, I'm not quite sure who will get the chop to make way for Thailand. Although I have a bad feeling it will be Malaysia. Singapore has only been on the scene for a few short years b...

How do you get attention nowadays in a world full of Tweets, status updates, news flashes every tenth of a second? Well, you do something bonkers. Like the Renault Twizy F1 Concept. Renault has applied F1 KERS technology to its electric city car, the Twizy, to come up with a really bonkers one-off concept. The Twizy Renault Sport F1, to give it its full name, has an F1 KERS unit in place of the usual rear seat and is capable of 0-60mph in 6.0s. The Twizy is also fitted with an F1-style steering wheel, front and rear wings, sidepods and slick tyres from a Formula Renault 2.0 car. Slightly less impressive is its top speed of 68mph. When KERS is activated it offers an extra 80bhp for 14 seconds on top of the 17bhp from the Twizy's standard electric motor. Just like in an F1 car, the driver has a KERS button on the steering wheel and can choose between harvesting and deploying power. The KERS unit adds an extra 30kg in weight but it more than makes up for it with the extra power....