And a nice little slideshow of the designs so far.


McLaren have the edge in the looks department but the front wing aero looks a bit complex?

Seems they've found a half way house between platypus and pretty.

I just hope McLaren have got it right about compromising the floor!

And now the Red Bull breaks cover........

Well almost.

Wonder what the air intake atop the nose does?

It allows air to enter....obvious, innit!

BBC carrying live text coverage of pre-season testing. No pictures or video yet*

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/16914962

More coverage here, but again just text based but, in my 'umble opinion, a better, clearer layout; http://live.autosport.com/commentary.php/id/435

Possibly to cool KERS as RB had problems with it over-heating last year.....either that or it helps the smoke from a burning KERS unit escape?

I don't know who is in charge of BBC Web design (or, more importantly, who they use to assess "usability") but the BBC site, so long a paragon of good Web usability, is a right mess. Even with cookies set, it takes me about 4 clicks to get to a detailed breakdown of the weather yet, after one click, I get to find out where the coldest and warmest place in the world is... WTF?

The BBC Sport site is now truly cack.

Interestingly, although these are just shake-down laps, Raikkonen is absolutely flying in the Lotus (formerly known as Renault)! Probably way too early to tell anything from the times and perhaps that's him peaked for this season but he seems happy enough back in a F1 car.....

Even a Marussia would fly with a thimble full of fuel in it's tank

Hmm, not so sure Mr Bezzer, his lap time is a sub 1m 20s last time I looked, and even with a thimble of fuel he's fair going some......

Ahhh but remember after last year's first day of testing, Reubens in a Williams was fastest

The other thing to note is that he's out in front on the slower medium tyre, everyone else is trying on the faster softs. seems strange to me. No doubt the FIA will find an infringement on his car!

True!

Quoting from Autosport Live;




In other words, like we all know, first day of testing pre-season means sod all!

There were a few people that I spoke with last year who appeared confident that Ferrari had it "in the bag" after pre-season testing and the McLarens performed so miserably....then again, we now know that McLaren had to do a massive amount of work to catch up before the season started!

Quoting from BBC Sport - Day one of pre-season testing;

Someone, somewhere, has their timings muddled up.....

BBC coverage of this is really annoying. They keep going on about Schumacher and Rosberg topping the timing sheets, but they are driving last years car! It has no relevance at all. The rest of the feild look a lot closer than last year, but as above it is early days and last year did show promise for some teams that never materialised in the season.

Petrov takes from Trulli at Caterham to prove that money can talk, (although mine just shouts "Cheerio!" ).

Oh no!

2012 Merc launches at last.......


But Force India's co-owner may have bigger problems

Kingfisher are not the only Indian Carrier in trouble. The state airline Air India has not been paying any of its bills for the last few months either.

Hmm, Ferrari on the back foot or sandbagging?

Anybody know off hand when Sky's F1 channel starts?

March 9th

Cool - ta - wasn't encouraged when I checked Sky's site only to be met with a blank black screen...

Lotus (formerly Renault) seem to have a big problem and it sounds like it could set them back a fair way!