In the round-up: Mercedes reserve driver Mick Schumacher is confident he will have an opportunity to race in Formula 1 in the future.
In brief
Schumacher confident of return to F1 grid after “interest” in off-season
Schumacher lost his drive with Haas after two seasons with the team in favour of Nico Hulkenberg, and hoined Mercedes as reserve driver. However, he says he has already received “interest” about his future from other teams.
“There’s obviously no guarantee, but I’m in a comfortable position right now where I feel like I can learn, I can extract the maximum out of this year – even though I’m not driving,” Schumacher told media including RaceFans at the team’s launch this week.
“I’m sure that with the results I’ve shown in junior categories, but also in F1, I’m sure that there will be opportunities. Over the winter, a few people have already mentioned that there’s interest. So in one sense, I’m not too worried.”
Maini quickest on final day of F2 test
Campos driver Kush Maini set the fastest time on the third and final day of the pre-season F2 test in Bahrain, ahead of veteran Roy Nissany.Maini’s best time of a 1’42.623 was almost three tenths faster than Nissany’s, but not quick enough to beat the overall fastest time of the test set by Richard Verschoor at the end of the second day.
The Formula 2 championship begins during the weekend of the Bahrain Grand Prix on Saturday March 4th.
IndyCar Detroit GP to offer free viewing areas
The first of IndyCar’s new-look Detroit Grand Prix will have free viewing areas around half of the circuit, organisers say.
The race, which is moving from Bell Isle to a new street circuit in downtown Detroit from this year, will allow fans to watch from standing areas trackside free of charge.
“Our mission statement is to give back to the Detroit community in different ways,” said Detroit Grand Prix president Michael Montri. “We are excited to welcome the entire community to our re-imagined and inclusive event.”
The Detroit Grand Prix will be held on Sunday 4th June, the weekend following the Indianapolis 500.
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Links
Motor racing links of interest:
From Melbourne to the MTC: Oscar outlines his intentions ahead of rookie year (McLaren)
"I think once the helmet goes on, they’ll just become another driver on the grid that I am trying to beat, but, at least before the season starts, that is probably the most unique element of the mental side of things that I need to get used to."
MoneyGram Haas F1 Team and Chipotle Mexican Grill announce new partnership (Haas)
"The Chipotle Mexican Grill logo will feature on both the nose and side of the VF-23, racesuits of MoneyGram Haas F1 Team drivers Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg and team apparel."
F1 in Schools World Finals to be staged alongside Singapore Grand Prix in 2023 (F1)
"Singapore has been announced as the host venue for this year’s F1 in Schools World Finals, with the event to be held from September 8-14 and run alongside the city-state’s popular Grand Prix. F1 in Schools involves students forming teams to design and manufacture miniature F1 cars, and then racing them for glory along a 20-metre track, with 2023 set to mark the 18th running of a World Finals."
Tony Kanaan Played A Key Role In Jimmie Johnson’s Two-Year IndyCar Career (Forbes)
"I love being around him. He and his family are so much fun. He is so intense in a good way emotionally. Where he is in life, these moments mean so much. I share that and recognize that. We’ve had a lot of time talking about how special these opportunities are at our age and the quality of rides that we are both able to have experiences with."
"'Breakneck' chronicles the story of a racer, who — despite growing up as a poor orphan — climbs the Formula E ranks only to have her first ePrix race end terribly, and in her removal from the sport. To make ends meet, she becomes a getaway driver for a gang in Miami, still reminiscing of her days as a Formula E driver."
Alonso and Stroll debut the AMR23 at Silverstone (Aston Martin via YouTube)
"Our 2023 F1 challenger made its debut today at Silverstone, with Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll each getting solid runs in the AMR23 at the team's official filming day."
We always endeavour to credit original sources. If you have a tip for a link relating to single-seater motorsport to feature in the next RaceFans round-up please send it to us via the contact form.
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Social media
Notable posts from Twitter, Instagram and more:
2023 HELMET 💥 pic.twitter.com/9s3CSgwYgE
— Lewis Hamilton (@LewisHamilton) February 16, 2023
🔴🟡 My colours, our colours. Forza Ferrari!!
–@ScuderiaFerrari #Carlossainz pic.twitter.com/71ChEITmwa
— Carlos Sainz (@Carlossainz55) February 16, 2023
A BIG moment. 🤩 The seat fit for @OscarPiastri's first-ever McLaren racing car. ✅ pic.twitter.com/ZYck7K7O9B
— McLaren (@McLarenF1) February 16, 2023
Looks at this young guns…… thanks Boss. https://t.co/jlTeqpk6LU
— Tony Kanaan (@TonyKanaan) February 16, 2023
It's a new dawn for @F1: Drive To Survive…
Season 5 premieres February 24 pic.twitter.com/dNNmIQ0riB
— Netflix (@netflix) February 16, 2023
|@AlpineF1Team also used its launch to highlight the work it is doing to promote young female racing talent through its RacHer programme and announce former French international footballer Zinedine Zidane as a brand ambassador.#F1 pic.twitter.com/UzJgMzvPnb
— RaceFans (@racefansdotnet) February 16, 2023
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- Find more official F1 accounts to follow in the F1 Twitter Directory
Comment of the day
With so many cars on the 2023 grid with little in the way of paint to reduce weight, reader Robert isn’t so keen…
Personally I think it’s sad that it has come to this, where the cars have so much bare carbon on them. The carbon-look in itself isn’t as cool as it was 15 years ago so I don’t see any reason to go for it other than necessity for weight savings. Mercedes can try to talk up their look as much as they want, but I think they must be truly desperate. They don’t have a livery this year, only some sponsor stickers.
If enough people, and perhaps more importantly the right people, shout out that they want to see more color on the grid eventually they will put it in the rules. Something like minimum 65% of visible bodywork area must be painted or wrapped. They already do CAD-checks for some stuff so that should be relatively easy to implement. You could still run a black livery if you wanted to, it would just have to be painted black. Or even carbon-looking vinyl on top of the carbon itself… if you truly desire that look. But if forced to cover up the structural material, I bet all teams would boast their true colors and nobody would ever doubt who is who in the pictures.
Robert
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to Steve_P83, Mister Nillionaire and Roodda!
The Dolphins
17th February 2023, 1:12
The amount of comments about the look of the cars, their colours or lack thereof, is a true example of bikeshedding. Let’s move past this, especially the talk about enforcing painted surfaces.
S
17th February 2023, 8:28
It’s not that long ago that rear wing end plates in F1 were enlarged solely to make more space for increased visibility. All cars were also mandated to have a large vertical plane on their rear bodywork for increased visibility.
A significant factor in the design of the current car was to also maximise space for increased visibility.
Amending technical rules for audience and sponsor benefit is not a new concept.
Now teams no longer have to worry about keeping lots of sponsors visible on their cars, they’ve just about stopped painting them. Perhaps F1 is paying them too much….
If you think that’s the right way for F1 to go, then that’s your thing – but most people don’t. 1 additional rule with no downsides would not be worth protesting against.
When Crofty is continuously tripping over himself trying to figure out which car is which and taking 3 or 4 goes before he finally gets the right team (but still the wrong driver), I’ll be more than happy to remind everyone that the cars should be painted properly as they are designed to be put on TV.
F1 is entertainment made for an audience.
The Dolphins
17th February 2023, 19:11
I’d like to see some data to back up this claim.
Robert
17th February 2023, 21:18
I think you have part of the answer in what you said yourself.
The Dolphins
18th February 2023, 5:27
I view them as a vocal minority. Looking at comments sections of the car launch articles it’s the same group complaining about the lack of colour. Those who don’t mind the trend are not complaining nor are they likely to post about how great it is because it’s irrelevant.
Phil Norman (@phil-f1-21)
17th February 2023, 11:55
I’ve never heard of ‘bikeshedding’. What on earth does this mean. Can’t we use proper English?
The Dolphins
17th February 2023, 19:10
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_triviality
Asanator (@asanator)
19th February 2023, 12:18
See….Brexiters!
Carbonized
17th February 2023, 12:50
Just one more rule in a book already too thick. What’s next? Extreme weight chasing is the result of rules that forced the cars in the overweight zone. Do we really need new rules to counter the effect of the old ones?
Robert
17th February 2023, 22:04
For me the “issue”, if we can call it that, of lack of paint is similar to that of driver weight. There is now a rule for the driver and seat to be a minimum combined weight. I think that is a positive, because without that rule the larger drivers would have been forced away from the sport due to the performance benefit in having a smaller driver. Many great talents would have been unable to ever get into F1 because their genes simply made them tall. I don’t want that, and I think many would agree. In fact, enough people did agree to make it a rule.
A similar problem have now arisen regarding paint. The extreme competitiveness in F1 have led the teams to even remove a few grams of paint to gain performance. Once they have started, they will never stop, only go to even further extremes. This means that even if they wanted to paint their cars, they can’t because that would give them the same type of disadvantage as having a larger driver did before. Do we really want that? Color doesn’t make a car go faster, or race better. But people like colors, that’s why very few people have all their walls and furniture at home in plain grey.
Ideally, I would love to see a completely revamped rule book with far fewer rules. A set of safety standards, a few key performance limiting factors, and then let everything else free under a budget cap. But that will never happen. So at this point, the best solution I can see is to regulate this are too. Before it gets completely out of hand. The paint-stripping trend has been ongoing for some years now, and it’s only going in one direction. It will never turn on its own.
Shimks (@shimks)
18th February 2023, 22:38
Nice attitude to label many people’s opinions as bikeshedding just because you don’t agree.
Jere (@jerejj)
17th February 2023, 6:19
I can’t see him realistically becoming a full-time driver for 2024, any more than Ricciardo, as teams are clear with their driver plans for the medium to long term.
2025 is another matter, but for 2024, only Team Hinwill & even that team is a stretch unless Zhou starts to underperform massively.
Jay
17th February 2023, 9:50
I’d love to see Ricciardo join Bottas at Alfa Romeo. I wonder if he’d be willing to go to Alpha Tauri, I doubt Tsunoda has another season in him.
Jere (@jerejj)
17th February 2023, 12:33
@Jay Tsunoda would only get replaced by an RB driver from outside F1, most likely Iwasa, but certainly not by someone like Ricciardo.
Jay
17th February 2023, 20:27
I like how certain you are. Got any stock tips?
some racing fan
17th February 2023, 10:04
The IndyCar series’s schedule has got to expand, and this “revitalized” downtown Detroit street circuit, that unless it becomes good for racing will be a complete disaster. I have seen maybe 2 or 3 circuits worse than that one. This near-identical schedule to last year’s is not good for the product. They need to be at the Homestead-Miami oval, Mexico City, Watkins Glen, the Nashville oval, Mont-Tremblant, the Pikes Peak oval and have rounds in England (Donington wouldnt be bad), Japan (Motegi oval) and Surfers Paradise. This 17 race schedule- including 2 road course races at Indy is weak.
S
17th February 2023, 10:31
Holding too many events each season outside of the US (used to be more than 2, could have changed?) would make them an international championship rather than a domestic one – meaning the FIA automatically become directly involved with it.
Would the FIA endorse two somewhat comparable, top level, open wheel international championships concurrently? I doubt it.
More to the point – would Indycar want to move away from their core market? And what is there to gain?
A recent answer to a similar question by Roger Penske firmly points to them being quite content to stay in the US. It’s all working pretty well for them where things are, and they don’t want to deal with all the downsides that F1 suffers.
Ciaran (@ciaran)
17th February 2023, 11:22
So much drama for some livery reveals. We haven’t even started testing yet and the demands from fans are tiring! When the 5 red lights go out, none of this will matter.
SjaakFoo (@sjaakfoo)
17th February 2023, 12:12
These are the same fans that will immediately start complaining if a driver “winges” on the radio, or Wolff or Horner “winge” in the media.
The Dolphins
17th February 2023, 19:14
@ciaran and @sjaakfoo: correct and correct
mrfill (@mrfill)
17th February 2023, 13:41
It appears the Schumacher PR machine is considerably more successful than its subject.
The machine has been grinding out stories telling us how wonderful he is and now they tell us that ‘other teams’ want to sign him and the future looks rosy. Strange that when they had the opportunity to sign him just a few weeks ago, none of them was even vaguely interested in giving him a seat. But best not mention that…
My money is on him never getting another full time driver seat in F1 in spite of all the hyperbole.
Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
19th February 2023, 15:21
I pretty much agree with this.
Not sure if others will think the same as me here, but I think his overall performance including everything was no better than Latifi. He had a few more signs of good speed, but latifi wasn’t without them. he did well in Hungary in 2021 and japan last year for example. But despite Latifi and Mazepin getting criticized for their crashes, schumacher actually crashed far, far more than both of them. In 2021, he was the most expensive driver in terms of the repair bills for damaged caused by crashes, and he also had the most of anyone last year too.
He is far too crash prone and not really fast enough to be of that much interest to other teams in my opinion. I think it is more related because of his name and family.
Grosjean was deemed to be crash prone and the vast majority wanted rid of him. Yes, Schumacher is way younger, but he was actually worse than Grosjean in his final season. I don’t see much reason for teams actually being interested in giving him a seat. Giovinazzi looked better to me and he’s now out of F1.