Tag: BMW

Predictions For the 2009 F1 Championship

Posted on April 11, 2023

The 2008 Formula One season has just ended in what can only be called dramatic fashion. Lewis Hamilton rescued his championship by passing a slick shod Toyota in the rain in the last corner of the last lap of the season. It simply does not get any better or crazier than that.

We know that Hamilton has one the Driver’s Championship and Ferrari the Constructor’s Championship this year, but what about the 2009 season. Will it be more of the same or can we expect more changes such as the rise of BMW this year?

The answer is we can expect 2009 to be a very interesting year. Why? It comes down to a simple fact. To save money and …

The Most Popular Car Insurance Groups In The United Kingdom

Posted on February 14, 2023

AUTOMOBILE manufacturers and the leading insurers in the United Kingdom meet from time to time to assign what is known as ‘group insurance rating’ to the different cars and light commercial vehicles in the country. These ratings indicate the risk assessment of each car model, hence enable insurers to decide the premium price for each model. The insurance group rating system is widely used by insurers in the United Kingdom though the system is not binding on them.

The factors that decide a car’s insurance group rating are: car make, model, type, series, cubic capacity, and manufacturing year.

STRUCTURE OF RATINGS: Insurance group ratings have a numeric component and an alphabetical component. It is the numeric component that indicates the …

The 2009 Pre-Season Formula One Testing Reveals A Competitive Season

Posted on January 23, 2023

The last fifteen years or so has seen Formula One evolve into a sport where realistically only two or three teams had a chance to win each race unless it rained. The 2009 pre-season testing is providing a fairly credible belief that this has changed.

Formula One rarely makes significant changes. Minor tweaks occur all the time, but that is about it. Faced with the “Great Recession”, even the teams and power brokers in F1 have had to reconsider the championship. In a cost cutting move, they’ve slashed the cost involved in going racing in a number of ways in an effort to keep manufacturers and privateer companies racing. This cost cutting seems to have seriously narrowed the gap between …

Formula One – What If the Manufacturers Leave?

Posted on November 19, 2022

In case you haven’t notice, the world is going through a tough period. For Formula One, this means many of the manufacturer backed teams are in trouble as retail car sales plummet.

Honda is already out. Renault just received a total of 4 billion from the French government to stay in business. BMW and Mercedes rely on sales in the United States to fund their operations. Toyota is declaring its first loss as a company in practically forever. Ferrari…well, it is doing okay. Still, the prospect of a severe change in landscape for Formula One is not just a possibility, it is turning into a probability.

It costs a lot of money to be in Formula One. That goes without …

F1 Silly Season Gets Crazy With BMW Withdrawal

Posted on November 5, 2022

As with most forms of motorsport, F1 has its silly season where rumors fly about drivers moving from one team to another. The odd thing about the silly season in 2009 is many of the rumors may come true now that BMW has given up the ghost in Formula One.

BMW will stop participating in Formula One after the end of the 2009 season. That means the two drivers for the team, Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld, will be free agents and available to any team. While the BMW Sauber Team may be sold to an independent investor, you can be sure both drivers have clauses in their contracts voiding their deals if that happens. Regardless, their availability shakes things …

Renault Reconsidering F1 Effort?

Posted on October 27, 2022

The current financial meltdown has been tough for practically every niche of the economy, but car companies have been particularly slammed. Renault is the latest company in the news and questions are being raised about its Formula One effort.

Renault is a French car company that is the equivalent of GM in the United States. Unfortunately, its current economic condition is about the same as well. The company just reported over a billion dollars in losses for the last half of 2008. Renault’s market is much smaller than most car companies, so these are devastating numbers.

Things are so bad for Renault and other French car companies that the French government has had to step in to help. It is …

Formula 1 Racing 2007 A Season Preview

Posted on August 26, 2022

With all testing now complete, the Formula 1 racing teams head to Australia for the season opener on 18 March at Albert Park. Who will be ready to fight for the top honor? Who will wear the crown at the end of the 2007 Formula 1 season?

Let us start by looking at the Formula 1 racing teams that performed well during winter testing. The last week of testing certainly belonged to the scarlet Ferrari at the hands of Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen. Ferrari topped the time sheets in most sessions in the last week of testing in Bahrain where most teams were in action and some comparisons can be made. Mclaren was a close second with both Fernando …

Formula One Review – the Best Teams in 2008

Posted on June 27, 2022

The F1 season has come to an end with the drama of Brazil wherein we saw the driver’s title go to Lewis Hamilton by the hair of his chinny, chin, chin and Ferrari score a comfortable win in the manufacturer’s point race.

As we look back on the season, it is all to easy to focus on the drivers. While there is certainly a lot to talk about in that area, drivers are only so good as their cars. In this article, we take a look at the best teams in 2008.

The best team in 2008 was clearly McLaren Mercedes. They managed to avoid the massive tactical mistakes that have plagued them in the past. Well, at least for …

The Shifting Manufacturer Paradigm in F1

Posted on June 13, 2022

Even if you’ve been living under a rock, you know economic times are bad. One of the economic areas taking a particular beating is the auto market. The question is how badly will this impact F1?

It goes without saying that manufacturers play a huge role in making F1 competitive. The costs involved in running a team run easily into the hundreds of millions of dollars. For this, the teams are able to develop cutting edge technology they can transfer to their road cars and they gain serious exposure before the huge crowds that watch the sport. While these benefits are clear, manufacturers always have to weigh the cost versus the benefit. This is particularly true these days as the …

Looking Back at the 2008 Formula One Season

Posted on June 6, 2022

With the conclusion of the nail biting Brazilian Grand Prix, the 2008 Formula One Season has come to an end. For the second season in a row, it was an absolute cliff hanger.

The Championships were a mixed bag between the two heated rivals in the sport. McLaren has taken the Driver’s Championship through Lewis Hamilton by one point over Felipe Massa of Ferrari. In a flip of sorts, Ferrari prevailed in the Constructor’s Championship over McLaren by 21 points. From the expressions of team members, it was clear the Driver’s Championship was the big prize.

Both championships were up for grabs going into the final race, which made for exciting racing. The Driver’s Championship was considered the more competitive …