The series that has so much action packed into one season that even the Hollywood gurus would start to laugh. If they just knew about the sport...
Indeed, the 2010 season was so action packed that you couldn't clearly say who would be the champion until the final checkered flag was waved.
Since the last season was so epic, now it's the chance to hype the next season so we can get very disappointed because one team will dominate the whole season! Yay!
The 2011 season will see no new teams, since FIA turned down Villeneuve & Co. This means there are no new places available. The top teams are also practically locked, so there won't be that many driver changes this year. The new teams are eager to get some new sponsors, so this way some of the youngsters might get a chance. But at the same time some of the youngsters will have to step aside.
During the 2010 season there was the fight between the Lotus and the Lotus over the name Lotus. Lotus wanted to use Lotus but Lotus refused and wanted to keep Lotus so Lotus fought against Lotus and now Lotus decided to change the name and so Renault will be called Lotus. Clear? Good. I don't understand it either.
Also, the situation of HRT seems to be very dark currently. They have no money, no sponsors, no drivers and now even Toyota decided to break the contract, so the team doesn't even have a car. The team was the only one struggling through the season. Will we even see the team next year?
Williams has also lost many sponsors and are running low on money, so expect them to get a pay driver too.
Lineup
(This will propably change dramatically during the winter and will be updated as the information pours in. The list will have some of the rumours in it, and they will be added and removed as they come and go.)
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Constructor || Engine
Drivers
Red Bull || Renault
Sebastian Vettel || Mark Webber
McLaren || Mercedes
Lewis Hamilton || Jenson Button
Ferrari || Ferrari
Fernando Alonso || Felipe Massa
Mercedes || Mercedes
Nico Rosberg || Michael Schumacher
Lotus Renault GP (Renault) || Renault
Nick Heidfeld || Vitaly Petrov
Williams || Cosworth
Rubens Barrichello || Pastor Maldonado
Force India || Mercedes
Adrian Sutil || Paul di Resta
Sauber || Ferrari
Kamui Kobayashi || Sergio Pérez
STR || Ferrari
Sébastien Buemi || Jaime Alguesuari
Team Lotus Renault (Malaysian1) || Renault
Heikki Kovalainen || Jarno Trulli
HRT || Cosworth
Narain Karthikeyan || Vitantonio Liuzzi
Marussia Virgin || Cosworth
Timo Glock || Jerome D'Ambrosio
The 2011 season will be the longest one in the history with 20 races to be held. The new track on the calendar is the Indian Grand Prix, if the track just gets done in time. They might still encounter the same situation what the Korean GP had. Shanghai is currently under the threat of being dropped from the calendar if it doesn't work out the drainage system.
The season will once again start in Bahrain, but this time it will have the original layout again, so the racing should be better again. The season, and propably the title chase will end at Brazil. Otherwise there are just some minor changes.
The Singapore GP might get shorter for 2011. There have also been requests to change the Abu Dhabi GP layout a little.
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Race Grand Prix Date
(1 Bahrain GP 13 March)
2 Australian GP 27 March
3 Malaysian GP 10 April
4 Chinese GP 17 April
5 Turkish GP 8 May
6 Spanish GP 22 May
7 Monaco GP 29 May
8 Canadian GP 12 June
9 European GP 26 June
10 British GP 10 July
11 German GP 24 July
12 Hungarian GP 31 July
13 Belgian GP 28 August
14 Italian GP 11 September
15 Singapore GP 25 September
16 Japanese GP 9 October
17 Korean GP 16 October
18 Indian GP 30 October
19 Abu Dhabi GP 13 November
20 Brazilian GP 27 November
Who to look at?
(These will obviously change if the situation in some teams change.)
Mercedes
While the top 3 teams were fiercely fighting for the championship the last year, Mercedes was dropped out of them quite quickly. With the rules changing dramatically again, and the long time Mercedes has used to develop the new car, they might be the big surprise of the next year. A victory could well be possible, given the talent the team has in Rosberg and Schumacher, backed up by Ross Brawn, the technical genius.
Nico Rosberg
This might be the true break through season for Rosberg, if the car just is fast enough. He finally proved his skills to everyone last year, gaining a couple of podiums with a car that was clearly just the 4th best of the grid at best.
Michael Schumacher
People were pretty much split on should Schumacher still continue or not. He decided to continue. Now he has had a year to get used to the car again, and surely the 2011 car will fit him better than the 2010 model. Maybe these will help him to gain some top spots again?
RBR (The defender)
So now the team has finally won the championship. Both of them. But will the team stay on laurels for too long? They have also pumped a lot of money and development time to the 2010 season, so the car might not be as good this year. But then again, they have Adrian Newey. And when he designs something, the laws of physics will follow his commands. And they have two strong competitors in their team, so they could still get another championship even on a more average year. The strong drivers will clearly be an issue too, though. We saw it even last year, and now since Vettel took the championship from the grip of Webber, the Aussie might not be too happy. They have admitted that they don't like each other too much on private life, but is this going to be seen on the track too?
Ferrari & McLaren (The challengers)
They missed their chances last year, but will they have better luck this time? Alonso was undeniably the strongest driver of the last half of 2010. He will surely prove to be strong this year again. The question is, can Massa finally get his shape and help Alonso or will he just fade away even more. McLaren also has two of the stronger racers. Hamilton is the true strong force, while Button keeps on bringing the car home on every race. They also seem to work together quite well, so this year just might be McLaren's once again.
Robert Kubica
So he didn't get the good seat again. But he is still easily one of the Top 5 racers of the field. Will his hope for the better days start to crumble as the season goes on? Or will he once more prove that he doesn't need the best car to win?
Lotus (The slow one)
Last year the team proved to be the best of the three new teams and has now got some good contracts in their pocket. They also have the biggest chance of the new teams to develop and get better. So will they actually get their first point this season? Or is it just all talk and no walk?
HRT
Quite simply... Will this team survive through the year? The story seems quite dark at the moment.
Pre-season lookup: Nico Hülkenberg
He was easily one of the better new drivers on the grid. But unfortunately these days money talks. Will he get a spot or will he be robbed from a seat by someone who has more money? Williams can't keep him anymore.
Important new rules:
-107% rule: If the driver is 107% slower than the fastest driver on Q1, his weekend will end there, unless he has proven to be fast enough on the free practice.
-Double decker diffuser ban: Only one level is now allowed and they have also been made smaller.
-F-Duct ban
-Kers: Optional for teams
-Increase of the minimum weight to get the teams to use the Kers system
-Adjustable rear wings
To spicen things up even more, the tire manufacturer has changed from Bridgestone to Pirelli. They have promised to bring significantly softer tires than what Bridgestone did. The first few races will show whether this is true or not. At the tire tests the Pirellis were slower than Bridgestones.
But here we go, the season is now (un)officially open! Who do you think will get the remaining seats and who will be crowned as the champion at the end of the year.
Also to get the polls running again, predict the champion! And also write your opinion on a new post if you want to have your guess on the front page so we can compare on who gets it right!
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Prediction - User
Fernando Alonso - 1nsane
Fernando Alonso - Christiano Bohessef
Fernando Alonso - Sutinen
Robert Kubica - Buka
Felipe Massa - Ivo Porc
Felipe Massa - Shifted
Sebastian Vettel - HSC King
Mark Webber - Manzur
Merged double reply from Wed Dec 08, 2010 5:28 pm: [Ah, it merged it here. Oh well. ]
((And sorry, a double post, but I'd like to move the current discussion from the 2010 thread to here...))
Ah true, I just checked the news. Wow, that will surely be quite a messed up grid then, trying to separate those two. I guess the only way to do so is by looking at those Total sponsors.Dan Hakulín wrote:Old Lotus - that with Tony Fernandes has already announced gold black colours, few weeks ago. There is public competition so anyone can make attempt on their design.
New Lotus - former Renault - announced that today.
It is going to be messy . Also I´ll miss current Renault´s colours, I liked them a lot....
Yeah, the current Renault colours were very nice. They should have lasted for longer than just a few seasons.
A picture of the livery of the new Renault:
Those Pirellis look nice though. Hmm, I think they could have just used the Renault yellow instead of the gold. And then the Lotus Lotus Lotus(Fernandes) one should have had the gold ones. Or something.