The quality of F1′s on-board camera footage will also be improving in 2011.
When it was recently announced that the sport is switching to HD this year, reports said technical complexity meant that the on-board cameras will still capture only standard definition.

But French commentator Jean-Louis Moncet wrote in his latest Auto Plus column that on-board cameras have not been left out of F1′s new plans.

French broadcaster TF1′s formula one producer Noel Carles said: “FOM has been changing its equipment for the past two years and the issue of on-board cameras was finally resolved.”

EUR 10 million would buy a driver the second race seat at HRT alongside Narain Karthikeyan.
That is the claim of Germany’s Bild newspaper, with speculation linking a handful of drivers with the last remaining place on the 2011 grid.

The report said Christian Klien, Davide Valsecchi and Pedro de la Rosa are in the running, but team boss Colin Kolles played down claims the seat is being “sold” to the highest bidder.

“No one needs to come with a suitcase full of cash. It will be enough to have the guarantees of sponsors,” he said.

“We’re not the only ones doing that,” insisted Kolles.

Bild said the EUR 10 million dowry would represent a third of HRT’s entire budget for the season.

Another high profile ‘pay driver’ this season is Renault’s Vitaly Petrov, but as boss Eric Boullier confirms, his sponsors are not his only quality.

“My requirement (for a driver) is sporting success,” the Frenchman is quoted by autohebdo.fr.

“Of course, there is pressure from Bernie Ecclestone and (team owner) Gerard Lopez, each of them with obvious reasons concerning the conquest of new and interesting markets,” added Boullier.

David Coulthard can keep his job as a consultant with Red Bull even though he is the new full-time F1 commentator for British television.
The 39-year-old Scot saw out his grand prix career with the Austrian team until 2009, when he retired and became a BBC pundit.

For 2011, he is moving alongside fellow former driver Martin Brundle into the race commentary box, raising suggestions his contract with Red Bull might be a conflict of interest.

“David Coulthard will not be asked to drop or suspend his ties with Red Bull in the interests of impartiality,” a BBC spokeswoman told the Scottish newspaper Daily Record’s Sunday edition.

“We take steps to ensure that none of the off-air relationships that our talent may have can compromise on-air activity,” she added.

Red Bull and Coulthard declined to comment.

Luca di Montezemolo has hit back at Red Bull by suggesting the Austrian team doesn’t know “how to behave” as F1′s new champions.
After Ferrari poached Red Bull’s strategy chief Neil Martin and made offers to other staff members, Helmut Marko accused the famous Italian team of trying to buy its rival’s “spirit”.

“I see people who won world championships who don’t quite know how to behave as champions,” Ferrari president Montezemolo told reporters after arriving in the Italian Dolomites for the team’s media event.

“It’s part of the game, but maybe when they have won 10 percent of what we have won, then we’ll respond,” he added, insisting that Red Bull is not yet “in the habit of winning”.

Montezemolo, who was seen at Madonna di Campiglio with Bernie Ecclestone, was also asked about Red Bull’s alleged overspending but the Italian was not so bold as to say the accusations are true.

However, he suggested the saga demonstrates that F1 has gone about controlling costs in the wrong way.

“It shows that our view that we are against an artificial cap is the right one,” said the 63-year-old.

Barely a month after he collected the FIA prize for the best promoter of 2010, the Korean grand prix’s Yung Cho Chung has been ousted.
During a board meeting on Friday, the inaugural event’s chief organiser was accused of lax management and dismissed, the Yonhap news agency revealed.

F1 insiders were surprised in December when Korea was awarded the prize for the best event of last year, following late construction of the Yeongham circuit and widespread tales of sub-standard utilities and accommodation.

Yonhap reported that two other senior executives were also fired during the emergency shareholders meeting of Korea Auto Valley Operation (KAVO).

Park Won-Hwa, the former South Korean ambassador to Switzerland, has reportedly been named Chung’s replacement.

Promoter KAVO, a joint public and private venture, was not available for comment.

South Korea’s race contract extends for at least six more years but KAVO launched an investigation after the inaugural event last October when flaws in the organisation became apparent.

“Investors felt that KAVO’s management under Chung couldn’t guarantee success this year,” an unnamed official said on Friday.

McLaren has rejected any claims it has fallen behind in the development of its 2011 car.
It had emerged that that the Mercedes powered MP4-26 would not get its maiden run until after an interim 2010 car contests the opening group test at Valencia.

But Paddy Lowe, the British team’s engineering director, said during a teleconference on Thursday that McLaren sees its plans as “optimal”.

“It’s always been in our plans to launch it after the first test,” he said.

“One of the reasons was we wanted to make use of the first test to work with the car as a stable and known platform while we understood the new (Pirelli) tyres,” added Lowe.

“It also gave us a bit more time in the programme for the new car.”

One theory about McLaren’s approach is that the 2011 car features some key innovations that the team either wants to spend more time perfecting or shield from its rivals for as long as possible.

McLaren pioneered the so-called F-duct last year that was ultimately copied by almost every team.

“Yes, there will be some new elements,” team boss Martin Whitmarsh admitted to F1′s official website, “but as you can imagine I’m not prepared to add more detail at the moment!”

Vitaly Petrov on Thursday confirmed he is relocating from Spain to England.
Before the Russian secured a new contract with Renault for 2011, team owner Gerard Lopez insisted the 26-year-old needed to “move to the UK” to be “close to the factory” and in an “English speaking environment”.

At the Autosport International show in Birmingham, Petrov confirmed he has moved.

“First of all I’m now closer to the factory, and if I need to I can go any time,” Petrov, whose new residence is reportedly near Renault’s Enstone headquarters in Oxfordshire, is quoted by the Press Association.

Petrov, who previously lived in Valencia, admitted he was worried recently that he would not be retained by Renault after his rookie season.

“I was a little bit nervous. It was my rookie year and I knew I had made mistakes, but I also had some good races, so it was 50-50,” he said.

Renault will race in formula one this year with a British license.
It means that if Robert Kubica or Vitaly Petrov win a race, it will be God Save The Queen rather than La Marseillaise that is played on the podium.

Boulogne-Billancourt headquartered Renault SA’s ownership of the Oxfordshire based team was one of France’s last remaining links to F1.

But the team, previously operating under a French racing license, is now co-owned by Luxembourg investment firm Genii Capital and the Malaysian-owned British sports car marque Group Lotus.

There is also no French grand prix or active race driver in F1.

“Lotus is an English manufacturer,” Renault team boss Eric Boullier explained at the Autosport International show in Birmingham, referring to the outfit’s new title sponsor and partner.

He insisted that the change of identity for Lotus Renault GP is “important for everybody inside the team”

“We are rebranding everything inside the company now,” added Frenchman Boullier.

Renault SA’s official involvement in F1 this year will be limited to engine supply, with Renault Sport F1 providing V8s to customers Lotus Renault GP, Team Lotus and Red Bull.

F1 engineers will work with the sport’s new engine formula for 2013 to create a “sexy” sound.
That is the claim of Fernando Alonso, amid fears F1′s formidable engine note is not reduced to a feeble buzz after the normally-aspirated V8s roar for the last time next year.

Asked about the likely sound of the 4-cylinder turbo engines in 2013, Ferrari driver Alonso said on Thursday: “For the driver, the change will not be a big one.

“From the cockpit, we hear only 5 or 10 per cent of the ambient noise anyway,” the Spaniard said at Ferrari’s media event in the Italian Dolomites.

“For the fans, of course, it is important, but I am sure the engineers will work for example with the exhaust to ensure that the sound is sexy enough,” added Alonso.

The promoter of a grand prix on the streets of Rome in 2013 has not given up on bringing F1 to the Italian capital.
On Thursday, the event appeared to have heard its death knell when it emerged Bernie Ecclestone had written to Rome mayor Gianni Alemanno.

The Italian newspaper La Repubblica said Ecclestone’s letter explained that his sport needed to focus on expanding internationally and in the US rather than allowing single countries to host more than one race per year.

But Alemanno has clarified that the F1 chief executive’s letter was not a “rejection” for Rome.

“(Instead) there is the decision to grant Italy just one grand prix, either at Monza or Rome, or in both cities but in alternated seasons,” he is quoted in the Italian media.

The mayor added that Rome will announce a “finalised decision” next week.

The Rome race’s hopeful promoter Maurizio Flammini also took Ecclestone’s letter to be the start of negotiations with F1 officials and the organisers of the staunchly-opposed Monza event.

“Ecclestone has proposed alternating Rome and Monza,” Flammini said in a statement published by ANSA news agency.

“We will speak to the Automobile Club of Milan and to (Monza circuit owner) Sias to see if there is the possibility of collaboration,” he added.

A lawyer for Tony Fernandes’ F1 outfit Team Lotus said he is worried new anti-corruption laws in the UK could put off potential sponsors.

The Bribery Act, set to come into effect in April, includes new laws that might affect formula one’s culture of corporate hospitality, the Evening Standard quoted lawyer Jeremy Courtenay-Stamp as saying.

The report said Team Lotus and at least two other UK-based teams are examining the impact of the laws which carry a maximum jail term of 10 years.

Team Lotus’ Courtenay-Stamp said one possible infraction relevant to F1 is the bribery of a foreign public official, while another is the failure of a company to prevent the payment of bribes.

The provision to sponsors by teams of tickets and entertainment packages could therefore be seen as a “currency of bribery”.

“The sponsor may feel a little bit nervous about what they are doing in this area and cut back to the extent that they do not want to take people to races because it is deemed inappropriate,” said Courtenay-Stamp.

“It will mean that much larger corporations will enter these kinds of agreements with a lot more thought and caution, and that will affect teams with a UK sponsor base,” he added.

Colin Kolles has categorically denied FOTA’s claim that HRT was suspended from the teams association due to not paying its membership fee.

After a spokeswoman for the Spanish outfit said HRT had simply decided FOTA is a body for the big teams, FOTA general secretary Simone Perillo clarified that in fact part or all of the annual EUR 100,000 fee had not been paid.

“I can strictly deny it,” boss Kolles told the Hindustan Times. “FOTA has spread a misleading message which will be rectified in the coming days, however, for the moment I don’t want to say anything else.”

He also referred to the political power FOTA is readying to wield ahead of negotiations for a new Concorde Agreement beyond 2012.

“It is true that FOTA will be trying to be the only counterpart to CVC and Mr Ecclestone, but we feel this is an attempt by FOTA to punch above its weight,” said Kolles.

He explained that HRT therefore “didn’t want to delegate our independent power of negotiation on such a sensitive matter like the Concorde Agreement.”

There is also the matter of the annual 100,000 fee.

“We left because FOTA defends mainly the interests of the big teams. We see no benefit in paying money for being part of it. We prefer investing our money in the car instead of paying membership fees that don’t benefit to us,” said Kolles.

Rome will not host a grand prix, according to an Italian media report on Thursday.
The La Repubblica newspaper said F1 chief executive Bernie Ecclestone has written to the Italian capital’s mayor Gianni Alemanno explaining that one race per country is enough.

He reportedly wrote that F1 instead needs to concentrate on expanding internationally.

Ferrari recently admitted its opposition to the plans for a street race in the EUR district in 2013, stating that Monza should be Italy’s only F1 event.

The Repubblica report on Thursday came shortly after race promoter Maurizio Flammini said the Rome GP plans would be announced officially on January 21.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has the power to delay the inaugural Russian grand prix for a year.
The resort city Sochi has scheduled both the Winter Olympics and formula one for 2014, but it emerged recently that the Games is the priority.

IOC executive director Gilbert Felli confirmed that if construction of the F1 facilities puts the Games at risk, the inaugural race will be pushed back to 2015.

“If the IOC decides it (the grand prix) is not feasible, we could stop and postpone it until 2015. The IOC will make that decision,” he is quoted by the Associated Press.

Television spectators in German-speaking countries as well as Brazil, Britain, Australia and the US will be able to watch formula one in high definition (HD) this year.
Sky Deutschland this week pre-empted Formula One Management’s official announcement about the availability of a HD feed in 2011.

Confirmation about the BBC’s plans followed shortly afterwards, and it has also emerged that One will use the HD stream in Australia, as will Speed TV in the United States and Globo in Brazil.

“It’s fantastic news that FOM has decided to green-light HD broadcasts,” said the BBC’s head of HD Danielle Nagler.

Added Speed’s head of production and network operations Rick Miner: “We couldn’t be more pleased with this decision.”

And Australian Network Ten’s HD channel OneHD confirmed: “OneHD will be showing F1 in pure HD. Enjoy.”

However, in 2011, the on-board cameras will continue to capture footage in standard definition.