FIA official Charlie Whiting has inspected the reconstructed A1-Ring and approved it for events up to formula one standard.

That is the news of the Austrian newspaper Kleine Zeitung, reporting that the former venue of the Austrian grand prix has been renamed ‘Red Bull Ring’.

The track in Zeltweg was demolished after its final F1 race in 2003 and was recently rebuilt by Dietrich Mateschitz’s energy drinks company.

It is set to be reopened in mid 2011 and is slated to host a range of motor racing categories including DTM, F3 and Formula 2.

“Red Bull’s world championships are the best advertisement for the race track in Spielberg,” said the Kleine Zeitung report.

A major hurdle for the Red Bull Ring, however, is the circuit’s noise quota, with an F1 race meaning few other events could be held to make the venue profitable.

Jaime Alguersuari could test Red Bull’s title-winning RB6 in Abu Dhabi on Saturday, the Spanish sports daily Marca reports.

Currently, only the new world champion Sebastian Vettel is scheduled to drive the Renault-powered car at Yas Marina later this week, when the F1 teams will get their first taste of the new Pirelli tyres for 2011.

Many teams are fielding their complete race lineup for the Pirelli test, but Australian Mark Webber is reportedly heading off on holiday instead.

Marca said young Spaniard Alguersuari is under contract through 2013 not to Toro Rosso but to its owner Red Bull, the energy drink company.

The report said the 20-year-old chatted at length in Abu Dhabi last weekend with Dr Helmut Marko, who is Dietrich Mateschitz’s right hand man and the head of Red Bull’s driver programme.

According to a rumour in the Italian media, Nico Hulkenberg is a candidate to replace Felipe Massa at Ferrari in 2011.

La Stampa newspaper said the rumour came from “a voice” within the famous Maranello based team, where Brazilian Massa – who already has an ongoing contract with Ferrari – struggled alongside Fernando Alonso this season.

German Hulkenberg, 23, has not been retained by Williams for 2011, and his manager Willi Weber has strong links within Ferrari due to his former charge Michael Schumacher’s decade-long tenure there.

But another voice at Ferrari insisted: “Felipe is untouchable.”

La Stampa acknowledged that the rumour might have been generated by Weber to keep Hulkenberg’s name circulating while he is on the market.

Italy’s Autosprint reported the same rumour linking Hulkenberg with Ferrari.

It will be “difficult” for Sebastian Vettel to defend his title in 2011 because Fernando Alonso is F1′s best driver.

That is the view of 63-year-old Brazilian Emerson Fittipaldi, who like Spaniard Alonso is a double world champion.

When asked by Germany’s Die Welt newspaper if German youngster Vettel will win again in 2011, he answered: “It is possible, but it will certainly be very difficult.

“Ferrari will be improving their car for 2011 to make up the little missing piece from this season.

“And Fernando Alonso is currently the most complete driver,” insisted Fittipaldi.

“He has so much experience and as much ambition, and he doesn’t like to lose,” he said.

Fittipaldi also thinks Michael Schumacher will be back to full strength in 2011.

“Before the race in Sao Paulo I had breakfast with (Mercedes bosses) Ross Brawn and Norbert Haug and they assured me that the next car will better meet Michael’s style.”

“I believe in Michael Schumacher,” he admitted.

“I remember having a talk with Ayrton Senna when Michael was at Benetton. Ayrton found it extremely hard to race against him. That, you do not lose. I won my last major race when I was 49.”

2014 could be the last time Melbourne hosts the Australian grand prix, state Victorian premier John Brumby has admitted.

The race’s annual taxpayer-funded losses have grown to almost $50 million, moving the ruling Labor Party to consider not renewing the current contract.

“I know there’s a range of views in the community and it is a costly major event, but we’ve got it until 2014, and really we’ll look at whether we go beyond that,” Brumby told the national radio broadcaster ABC.

He added that the debut race in 1996 was amid a broader major events programme for the state.

“Certainly when we first won that (event) in Victoria it had a newness and a freshness and the longer you go with these things that freshness can obviously diminish a little,” said Brumby.

The other side of state politics is also questioning the value of the grand prix, with opposition leader Ted Baillieu saying the cost is “a real worry”.

Red Bull its paying its entire staff – about 550 people – a healthy championship bonus.

Media reports say the bonus for the workers at the team’s Milton Keynes headquarters is 10,000 British pounds each.

“I’ve had a load of texts saying ‘Thanks for the new kitchen’,” joked team boss Christian Horner.

The bonuses, costing the team almost $9 million, will be paid out of Red Bull’s extra FOM prize-money for winning the constructors’ world championship.

“Championship bonuses are in every contract,” Horner is quoted by The Independent. “I guess we can afford this.”

The other piece of news emerging from the new F1 champions is the apparent thawing of relations between teammates Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber.

“He (Webber) came to congratulate me (after Abu Dhabi) and showed me a lot of respect which was one of the most important things that happened,” world champion Vettel revealed.

“We talked about some things that got in our way a little bit this year.”

Webber is quoted by Swiss newspaper Blick: “The rivalry was maybe a bit too much sometimes. It is important that you can shake hands afterwards.”

Team boss turned 37 on Tuesday.

“I got a message from Bernie which said ‘You’ve already had your gift from Ferrari so you won’t need anything else from me’,” he is quoted by the Telegraph.

Karun Chandhok will test the 2011 GP2 car this week in France.

The Indian driver has been asked by his old team ORT to give the new car its maiden test in Paul Ricard beginning on Thursday.

“I really hope my experience in formula one and in GP2 will be helpful to the team,” he said.

“My goal for 2011 is to remain in formula one, but for the time being it’s good to have the opportunity of knowing the new GP2 car,” said Chandhok, 26.

The new GP2 car has been designed by Dallara, who also penned the Hispania that Chandhok raced early in 2010.

Chandhok wrote on Twitter that the Paul Ricard test is a “good chance to try (the) Pirelli tyres and knock the rust off!”

The Yas Marina track, scene of the last two F1 season finales, is targeting a round of the MotoGP series.

“We are working on it for 2012,” the Abu Dhabi venue’s boss Richard Cregan told emirates247.com.

“It’s not confirmed yet, but we are working on that with MotoGP. The circuit may have to have some work on the curves but this is normal,” he added.

The impressive floodlit circuit was built in 2009 at a cost of some $1bn.

The actual track layout of the impressive Yas Marina venue in Abu Dhabi is “flawed”, according to Martin Whitmarsh.

“It is a great facility and everything else, but as we saw in GP2 and as we saw in F1 it is almost impossible to overtake here,” the McLaren and FOTA boss is quoted by The Guardian.

1992 world champion Nigel Mansell agrees, arguing that the lack of overtaking last Sunday meant an anti-climactic finale to the otherwise thrilling 2010 title.

“The two protagonists, Alonso and Mark (Webber) just didn’t pass anybody,” he told the Daily Mail. “It was a very boring race.

“Alonso is known for his charging, and to have a car which seems to be quicker than the car in front and not being able to overtake doesn’t make sense,” added Mansell.

Whitmarsh said he thinks the Yas Marina layout should therefore be changed.

“I personally would like to see it changed. I think it is a fantastic facility that we come to, but the end of the straight they need a wide challenging corner, not a chicane that has got one line through it,” he argued.

“You could see that when we first saw the plans. There is a massive commitment here to making this a great venue, so in the scheme of things priority should be given to looking at the circuit,” said Whitmarsh.

Circuit boss Richard Cregan did not rule out layout changes for the future.

“We have already extended the exit of turn eight and we are now studying the other various elements that we can improve,” he is quoted as saying by Auto Hebdo in French.

A Dutch GP2 driver has emerged as a contender to race at Williams next year alongside Rubens Barrichello.

On Monday, the British team announced that Nico Hulkenberg is leaving Williams, and the disappointed German’s manager Willi Weber said he suspects Pastor Maldonado has been signed for 2011.

But another driver with links to some very attractive sponsorship backing has now entered the frame.

Late last month, 25-year-old Giedo van der Garde’s manager said he was in talks with several teams and had received “concrete offers” from two.

Dutch reports said one of them is Virgin.

Fascinatingly, van der Garde’s manager Jan Paul ten Hoopen is also the commercial director of the Dutch fashion brand McGregor, and the driver’s father-in-law is Marcel Boekhoorn, a major shareholder.

It was believed that McGregor would cease its sponsorship of the Williams team at the end of 2010, but it is now being reported in The Netherlands that the deal has instead been extended by three years.

Jan Paul ten Hoopen is quoted as saying: “This extension underscores our belief in the future of formula one and Williams in particular.”

Nico Hulkenberg will not return to Abu Dhabi later this week for the Pirelli tyre test.

The 23-year-old German said at the Yas Marina circuit at the weekend that he and 2010 teammate Rubens Barrichello will be sharing the FW32 for the two-day Pirelli tyre test on Friday and Saturday.

But on Monday, the British team announced that only Barrichello has been re-signed to race in 2011.

That news has affected Williams’ Pirelli test schedule, a spokesman confirmed on Tuesday.

“Rubens will now drive both days,” he said.

Vitaly Petrov has revealed he considered voluntarily relinquished track position to Fernando Alonso last Sunday in Abu Dhabi.

Ferrari’s bungled race strategy left a furious Alonso trapped behind the Russian’s Renault during the championship finale.

Petrov admitted after the race that he would have avoided crashing into the Spaniard “if he had tried a move”.

And speaking to the Russian sports daily Super Express, he added: “It went through my mind to let Alonso pass me.

“But I remembered 2008 when Vettel almost took the championship from Hamilton by not letting him go.”

Alonso gesticulated angrily at Petrov on the slowing-down lap in Abu Dhabi and told reporters he thought the rookie had been too aggressive.

But Petrov insists: “I was not aggressive. It was a normal race.

“I would also be angry if I was in his situation, but with myself or my team for doing the wrong strategy.”

Alonso was later quoted by Blick newspaper: “Everything (with Petrov) was clean and fair.

“Technically we had only the third best car in 2010. But if you’re the leader before the final race, it is hard to lose the title in the last minute.”

If a head will roll at Maranello for Ferrari’s 2010 championship loss, it will be Chris Dyer’s, according to press speculation.

“Some things will change and, sure, some heads will roll,” said the authoritative Italian daily La Gazzetta dello Sport.

The newspaper did not name Dyer – Ferrari’s chief track engineer – but some Spanish sources did, claiming it was the Australian’s decision to “cover” Mark Webber’s Abu Dhabi race strategy that stranded Fernando Alonso behind Vitaly Petrov.

“The only thing we can do is try to take a breath, recharge the batteries and push people to do a better job next year,” team boss Stefano Domenicali said.

Triple world champion Niki Lauda told the Austrian press on Monday: “There should be three days of morning, then they all eat spaghetti again and forget the defeat.”

Fernando Alonso said the reason for the championship loss was the pace of Red Bull’s car.

“They had the best car, and Vettel showed with his 10 pole positions that he was the fastest. And that’s not easy.

“It’s worse to lose the title when you have the best car, like we did at McLaren in 2007. This time it’s clear that Red Bull were better,” the Spaniard told El Pais newspaper.

Red Bull’s policy of driver equality ultimately helped Sebastian Vettel to win the 2010 drivers’ world championship.

In the days and weeks leading into the Abu Dhabi finale, numerous commentators chided the team’s reluctance to make points leader Mark Webber the de facto number 1, including by switching the finishing order in Brazil.

It would have meant Red Bull went into battle last weekend “with only one driver with a chance instead of two — and probably the wrong driver,” said Dr Helmut Marko.

And “It is always better to have two strings to one’s bow instead of one”, added the energy drink company’s motor sport consultant.

It has been suggested that the equality policy confused Ferrari when Red Bull split its two drivers’ race strategies after the early safety car in Abu Dhabi.

“Our policy of allowing the drivers to compete got us into the position where they (Ferrari) had to worry about two of our drivers and not just one,” said Adrian Newey, the designer of the RB6.

“It depended on whether they wanted to cover Mark for the championship or Sebastian for the championship,” he added. “In the end they chose to cover the wrong one.”

Niki Lauda, who was one of the strongest voices in favour of the use of team orders before Abu Dhabi, conceded on Monday that Red Bull actually made the right call — and an honourable one.

“‘Didi’ (Dietrich Mateschitz) said he would do it like the Olympic Games, but F1 is not the Olympics.

“It’s incredible how this team won in the end in the most correct way,” the triple world champion is quoted by Kleine Zeitung newspaper in Austria.

“For me, it’s unique in the 60 year history of the sport,” added Lauda.

“If there were only two, three politicians who acted like Mr Mateschitz, we would be in a better place,” he said.

Toyota has called off a technical collaboration with the struggling Spanish F1 team HRT.

We reported at the weekend that an announcement about HRT and Cologne based Toyota Motorsport GmbH (TMG) would be made on Monday.

The news that was expected was a technical and support tie-up for the 2011 season, including use of the car that was designed and built by Toyota late in 2009 but never raced.

But in fact, Toyota confirmed that the collaboration “has been terminated and will not resume”.

“TMG regrets that HRT has not met its contractual payment obligations and will pursue all available options to reach a satisfactory conclusion to this matter,” read a statement.

HRT, having recently concluded a deal with Williams to use the British team’s gearbox next year, responded: “Hispania Racing is very surprised about Toyota’s press statement … and this matter will be a subject of further clarification.”

The team’s technical boss Geoff Willis told the BBC: “There will be no comment until (there are) explanations from (boss) Dr (Colin) Kolles and the (team owners) Carabantes.”