Work at the 2012 US grand prix venue in Austin is back at full swing, according to the motoring weblog Jalopnik.
“The crews are on site and construction of the Circuit of the Americas is underway. I saw it with my own eyes,” wrote the reporter.

The news follows the recent contractual disagreement between the circuit owners, original promoter Tavo Hellmund and Bernie Ecclestone that almost steered the entire project off track.

“Last month the track was mostly just a collection of cleared dirt paths but now crews on every part of the track are working to establish the necessary support structures,” the reporter revealed.

“Cranes hold the support beams for the pits, paddock, and media centre.”

The Texas venue’s communications boss Ali Putnam confirmed that the project is “back to normal” after the speedbump.

Heikki Kovalainen has refused to rule out switching to another team if Caterham does not take a big step forward in 2012.
With his reputation damaged after disappointing subsequent tenures at Renault and McLaren, the Finn moved to the start-up Team Lotus in 2010 where in the past two seasons he has rebuilt his confidence and form.

He was even mentioned earlier in the 2012 ‘silly season’ but remains under contract to Caterham for next season.

According to Turun Sanomat newspaper, Kovalainen was asked if he now feels a sense of ‘obligation’ to stay at Caterham for the long term.

“Not in any way,” he answered. “I want to see what we can do together and let’s see what is the situation in the summer.”

The 30-year-old would not say therefore whether he will definitely be at the team in 2013.

“It depends on the car’s performance,” said Kovalainen. “I can not give an exact percentage but if we continue to develop next season then it (the chance) is high.

“Otherwise it is small,” he admitted.

Kovalainen was also asked about his new nickname ‘Niceman’ that is doing the rounds — a mischievous play on countryman Kimi Raikkonen’s Iceman moniker and an intimation that he might be ‘too nice’ to truly succeed.

“I don’t take it too seriously,” he smiled. “I am myself and cannot be someone else.”

The job-seeking Bruno Senna visited Williams’ Oxfordshire headquarters in recent days, Brazil’s Globo Esporte reports.
The nephew of late Ayrton Senna, having started 2011 as Lotus/Renault’s third driver, lost his race seat to Kimi Raikkonen and Romain Grosjean at the end of the season.

A return to the reserve role has been rumoured for 2012, and he has also admitted to contemplating a switch to Nascar.

But Globo reports that Senna, as well as team incumbent Rubens Barrichello, were both separately spotted at Williams’ Grove factory this week.

The report said the 28-year-old underwent some physical tests and met with engineers at Williams, who still have a race seat vacancy alongside Pastor Maldonado for next season.

He apparently made a “good impression” on the famous British team, who are reportedly also interested in Senna’s experience with Renault power, as Williams switches from Cosworth for 2012.

Globo also said Barrichello, who according to Auto Motor und Sport has amassed $5 million in personal sponsorship in a bid to keep his seat, was at the factory on Monday and Tuesday.

The report said the Brazilian veteran did not know about the candidacy of his countryman Senna.

 Robert Kubica has split with his rehabilitation doctor Riccardo Ceccarelli, according to reports in the Italian and Polish media.
The reports said the parties disagreed over the final phase of the Polish driver’s recovery from horror injuries sustained early this year whilst rallying.

“I can confirm that there were differing views as to the next phase of rehabilitation,” Ceccarelli confirmed.

“Robert will continue with this process under the direction of someone else. Who it will be, I don’t know.”

Dr Ceccarelli said he stands by his earlier prediction that Kubica could be fit enough to return in 2012.

“I’ve always said that and I stand by it, even though expectations that he could be back in a Renault in November were probably somewhat exaggerated.”

Also according to Omnicorse, Ceccarelli said he doesn’t know if Kubica’s management has been in talks with Ferrari.

F1′s rumour mill is refusing to idle, even in the last days before Christmas.
One rumour has been triggered by former McLaren driver and lead British television commentator Martin Brundle, writing on his Twitter page.

“(I) suspect Vitaly Petrov may re-emerge at Caterham in 2012,” he wrote, amid earlier rumours Jarno Trulli could lose his seat. “Music has stopped, there’ll be a mad scramble for seats.”

In the pages of Spanish newspaper AS, meanwhile, Toro Rosso refugee Jaime Alguersuari is being linked to the reserve driver role at Mercedes for 2012.

And multiple international reports in recent days have galvanised rumours that Ferrari junior driver Jules Bianchi is to replace Nico Hulkenberg as Force India’s Friday practice driver.

New team boss Luis Perez Sala has admitted HRT might struggle to get its 2012 ready for pre-season testing.
With a change of ownership during 2011, the Spanish team has now split with boss Colin Kolles and installed former Minardi driver Sala as principal.

In the background, HRT is also reorganising its scattered headquarters and Sala admitted that it will be a tough winter for the former Hispania team.

“Inevitably we will be delayed by this reorganisation,” he told Radio Marca.

“Additionally, the FIA now requires us to pass the crash tests before we can test, which sets the bar even higher.

“I hope it is all done in late January and we make the preseason, but if it gets difficult then at least I hope we make the shakedown before Melbourne,” added Sala.

HRT boss Luis Perez Sala has played down Jaime Alguersuari’s hopes of rescuing his F1 career with the Spanish team.
Spaniard Alguersuari has lost his race seat at Toro Rosso, but one of the last spots on the 2012 grid is at HRT, raising the prospect of an all-Spanish super-team with the 21-year-old alongside Pedro de la Rosa.

Sala, a former Minardi driver, admitted he was surprised to hear Red Bull’s bad news.

“Absolutely. It’s bad news and incomprehensible,” he said when asked about Alguersuari’s ousting.

“It’s clear that it would be a dream to have him, the very best Christmas present, but I doubt it is realistic because we already have a path with very long conservations with other drivers,” Spaniard Sala told Radio Marca.

He acknowledged that long-time McLaren test driver de la Rosa’s signing has helped to attract Spanish sponsors, but it is likely that HRT is looking to pair the 40-year-old with a paying driver.

McLaren doctor and fellow Finn Aki Hintsa does not think Kimi Raikkonen will struggle on his return to formula one next season.
2007 world champion Raikkonen’s decision to come back to the sport with Lotus after a couple of seasons away has been compared with Michael Schumacher’s recent struggle to readjust after a three-year sabbatical.

But Hintsa, who knows Raikkonen well after the now 32-year-old’s five-year tenure at McLaren until 2006, plays down that comparison.

“Physically, Kimi is definitely as strong now as he ever was,” he is quoted by Turun Sanomat newspaper. “It is clear that a return to F1 for Kimi will be easier than it was for Michael Schumacher two years ago.

“First of all, Kimi is so much younger than Michael, and secondly, he was not away for as long and while he was away, he kept driving in a very demanding category,” said Hintsa, referring to Raikkonen’s world rallying exploits.

Indeed, while Raikkonen only turned 32 some weeks ago, Schumacher is clearly F1′s oldest active driver as he approaches his 43rd birthday in January.

“At that stage of life a ten year age difference is a major factor in top-level sport,” said Hintsa.

“When an athlete turns 40, the response time begins to slow down naturally and there’s nothing you can do about it. It is not possible to turn back the clock.”

France’s return to the F1 calendar after a three year absence is now looming.
That is the claim of Gilles Dufeigneux, who in June was appointed directly by French prime minister Francois Fillon to lead efforts to arrange the race’s comeback.

It is reported by the Nice-Matin newspaper that the event would be staged at Paul Ricard, with an annual race date alternating with Belgium’s Spa-Francorchamps.

“Things are moving in a very real way,” said Dufeigneux.

“All the indicators are green now, or soon will be. My current mood is summarised with three words: optimism, prudence, humility.

“We have entered the stage of completion and we can say that final decisions will be made very soon, in January or early February,” he revealed.

 Gerhard Berger’s nephew is speeding down the road to follow his famous uncle into formula one.
Two decades ago, ten-time winner Berger shared the McLaren garage with Ayrton Senna, whose own nephew Bruno went on to race in F1 with HRT and Lotus/Renault.

Now, 17-year-old Lucas Auer – the son of former BMW motor sport director and Toro Rosso co-owner Berger’s sister Claudia – is getting serious about his single seater racing.

This year, he raced in the JK Racing Asia Series and was recently crowned champion.

“It’s really important for my future,” he said of the title. “I had to win this season and now I can see what I will do in the future.”

Last week, according to motorline.cc, the young Austrian tested a F3 Euroseries car at Valencia, with 52-year-old Berger watching on.

 Fernando Alonso and his wife Raquel del Rosario have announced they are splitting.
Then a Renault driver and reigning back to back world champion, Spaniard Alonso married del Rosario – lead singer for the Spanish rock band El Sueno de Morfeo – in 2006.

Earlier this year, 30-year-old Alonso – who now drives for Ferrari – moved from Switzerland to return to his native Asturias.

“We are separating from marriage, but never as friends”, a joint statement issued by the couple said.

“We ask that the media respects our personal lives which, as you know, we have always been keen to protect.”

Bruno Senna is considering Nascar as a back-up option should his F1 journey end for now.
That is the claim of the Italiaracing website, in the wake of the Brazilian’s loss of his Renault/Lotus race seat.

It is rumoured Senna, 28, could return to the team’s reserve role for 2012, but Italiaracing said Nascar is another option, where his countryman Nelson Piquet Jr headed after his own F1 career foundered in 2009.

The report said Senna has ruled out America’s premier single seater series, Indycar.

“My family would not let me (race there),” he is quoted as saying.

Senna’s fabled uncle Ayrton was F1′s last fatality in 1994, when Bruno was 10.

 Jaime Alguersuari sounds confident his formula one career is not over at the tender age of 21.
With not a single kilometre of F1 circuit testing behind him, the Spaniard made his debut mid 2009 but two years later has been dropped by Toro Rosso.

To EFE news agency, he insisted he is not despondent, albeit whilst acknowledging it will be “quite difficult” to find a race seat for 2012.

“I am looking at some options, there are some things and soon there will be news,” said Alguersuari.

“I am starting a new phase because I am only 21, I have done more than my job at Toro Rosso, starting at 19 years old. I think I did a good season, not a bad one.

“I do not have any resentment, I am not angry or sad — the opposite, I thank them (Red Bull) for everything they gave me. They chose to bring me into formula one and obviously I would have liked to continue.

“I have to be mature, I don’t want to judge whether the decision is good or bad. I want to have a positive message. Every cloud has a silver lining.

“I know that news (about my future) will come, I feel more relaxed than when I was at Toro Rosso. I think my time in F1 is not stopping here.”

EFE reported that Alguersuari said he didn’t know if HRT was interested in pairing him with Pedro de la Rosa, or whether he might become Red Bull’s official reserve driver for 2012.

As Adrian Sutil departs Force India, he is being linked with famous formula one teams Williams and Ferrari.
Germany’s Auto Motor und Sport claimed that, while his exit from the Silverstone based team after a five-year tenure only became official last Friday, the 28-year-old has been making new plans for 2012 since Abu Dhabi.

“Williams is interested,” said the magazine, “and not only because of his Medion sponsor money. In the second half of the season Sutil did a lot of good to his reputation.”

Auto Motor und Sport claims Ferrari is also interested, even though the Maranello based team’s president Luca di Montezemolo has yet again insisted that Felipe Massa’s contract for next year will be observed.

“Felipe knows next year is very important for him,” said the Italian.

The German report said: “Sutil would be an interesting option for Ferrari in 2013. That’s why he only wants to sign for one year with Williams.”

Sutil’s manager Manfred Zimmermann is quoted by Sport Bild: “Adrian’s future is not fixed yet and we will not be making any short-term panic decisions.”

F1 chief executive Bernie Ecclestone, meanwhile, neglected to mention Sutil when he hailed the German presence on next year’s grid.

“For Germany, we need Sebastian, Michael and the two Nicos,” he is quoted by Kolner Express tabloid.

Caterham’s 2012 formula one car has been declared fit to run by the governing FIA.
A new rule for next year means cars now have to pass all the mandatory crash tests before they are allowed even to test ahead of the 2012 season.

Technical boss Mike Gascoyne, referring also to the team’s new identity after two seasons as Lotus, revealed the good news via Twitter.

“Great week,” he said on Saturday. “Renaming as Caterham F1 Team on Tuesday and today our first chassis, CT-01 passes all FIA homologation test.

“Well done all,” added Gascoyne.

According to Finnish newspaper Turun Sanomat, lead driver Heikki Kovalainen is confident.

“I believe that next season we will fight for the middle places. On a good day I can be close to the points,” he said.

It is rumoured that the fate of his teammate Jarno Trulli is uncertain, but the Italian also sounded confident ahead of 2012.

“Hopefully next year the sun shines some more after this season of suffering,” said the veteran.

“There is a lot of hope and good will for the new project, but ultimately it’s only about what you get on the track. The clock never lies,” said Trulli.

The 37-year-old said he is not yet ready to stop.

“After Toyota withdrew I thought about changing to a different category, but I believed then – and I still believe now – in the project with Lotus,” he insisted.