More wins could quickly follow for F1′s newest race victor, Nico Rosberg.

The Mercedes driver began the 2012 season with more than a century of races under his belt, causing some pundits to predict he will never taste winning champagne.

But he broke through in China just a day after his maiden pole.

“I took 113 (races to win) and he’s on 111,” 2009 world champion Jenson Button smiled in Shanghai.

Niki Lauda thinks Rosberg’s next wins will be easier.

“It (winning) gets easier,” the Austrian legend said in China late on Sunday, “because he know you can do it, and you’ve proved it.

“The next victories come quite quickly,” Lauda told the German broadcaster RTL.

Patrick Tambay won just two grands prix in consecutive seasons, 1982 and 1983, but he said the first one – achieved in Keke Rosberg’s championship year – came with “a sense of completion”.

“After that, things seem easier,” said the Frenchman, “especially so when you’ve waited 110 grands prix!

“It will feel like a relief,” Tambay told RMC Sport. “Now, he’s still young at 26 but with a lot of experience; he has everything he needs to reproduce this victory.

“The first is the most difficult.”

However, Tambay thinks Rosberg has a fight on his hands if he thinks the Shanghai victory is a springboard to a potential championship challenge.

“I see the McLaren as the best car of the season. They passed up a good opportunity for the (China GP) win,” he said.

Lotus has overcome a serious chassis flaw to lead the field as the final pre-season test began at Barcelona.
The former Renault team had to sit out last week’s running at the Circuit de Catalunya as designers grappled to fix a problem with the front suspension mounting.

“The mounting of the suspension is now the strongest part of the car,” an unnamed team member is quoted by SID news agency.

At the end of his return to action on Thursday, Romain Grosjean was quoted by France’s Auto Plus: “It (the E20) feels the same, there’s not much difference really.”

Indeed, the revised car is 1 kilogram heavier, but the biggest issue is the four lost days of testing, which after an FIA clarification cannot now be made up.

“To miss four days is not ideal as suddenly we have to try to work twice as hard to catch up,” continued Grosjean.

“It’s true that it’s not great, but it’s not as problematic as it might have been.”

He is referring to the fact that, so far, the Lotus appears intrinsically fast.

Asked if the E20 felt as good around Barcelona’s demanding layout as it had at Jerez last month, the reigning GP champion enthused: “Yes, exactly the same.

“You can trust the car, push it, play with it.

“You can attack, and if you attack too much, you know what will happen — if you have understeer, you know that by attacking less, you’ll have less understeer.

“On this aspect, the car is very good.”

1982 world champion Keke Rosberg told the Finnish broadcaster MTV3 that while the Lotus looks as good in Barcelona as it had at Jerez, it is still not clear if it will be able to compete against F1′s regular top teams.

Auto Motor und Sport quotes Grosjean as saying: “I think there are a couple of teams ahead of us — Red Bull and McLaren look very strong.

“Behind them, it’s a lot closer than it was before.”

However, amid F1′s now extremely limited track testing regime, there is no ignoring the four lost days of running.

Asked if he is ready for 2012, Grosjean said according to Finland’s Turun Sanomat: “I have to be.

“Of course, the more time you have with your car, the better you feel. However, it is what it is.

“We have this four days prior to Melbourne and that’s better than nothing,” he added.

* Caterham had to replace Heikki Kovalainen with his teammate Vitaly Petrov on Thursday, as the Finn recovered at his nearby hotel with food poisoning.

 Jaime Alguersuari has told his fans he “will return” to formula one despite not having a seat on the 2012 grid.
Along with Sebastien Buemi, who moved to Red Bull’s reserve role, Spaniard Alguersuari was dumped by the energy drink company’s rookie team Toro Rosso.

A Barcelona native, the 21-year-old’s fans showed their support by displaying banners as the Circuit de Catalunya test began on Tuesday.

“I did nothing wrong, but I wasn’t killed either,” Alguersuari told the Italian magazine Autosprint. “I’m only 21 and I did my best with the equipment I had.”

One of the men who replaced Alguersuari, Daniel Ricciardo, backed Red Bull’s decision to make a clean-sweep of the Toro Rosso lineup for 2012.

“The only reason they kick you out is if you are not performing. And then you probably don’t deserve to be world champion,” the Australian is quoted by The Sun newspaper.

“That’s just the business we’re in.”

But Keke Rosberg, the 1982 world champion and Mercedes driver Nico’s father, criticised Red Bull for not giving Alguersuari a fair chance.

“They (Alguersuari and Buemi) had been there for three years and they (Red Bull) didn’t think they would go all the way to the top, so I understand if Red Bull wants to do something else.

“What I don’t understand is why the decision was made so late, when there was not anything else available for them.

“If someone says in June that they no longer need your services the following year, that’s fair. Then you have the time to find a new job.

“Buemi would probably have found something, if he’d have had more time,” added Rosberg.

Nico Rosberg’s father has questioned the decision by Mercedes to delay the launch of its 2012 car.
Nico Rosberg, the German-born son of 1982 world champion Keke, has publicly backed his team’s approach in not running the W03 in anger until now, a full group test after main rivals Red Bull, McLaren and Ferrari got their new cars up and going.

“There is definitely some risk,” said former McLaren and Williams driver Keke Rosberg, 63.

“It’s Barcelona and so there could be some snow and the test could even be cancelled.

“Or if it happens to you what happened to Ferrari in Jerez, then you have even a shorter amount of time to fix everything.

“The tests are separated only by days and then there is the last one, and again it could be snowing or raining,” added Rosberg. “It’s not Andalucia, remember, but the Costa Brava.”

Rosberg said the issue for Mercedes and also Ferrari is the risks they are needing to take in order to catch up with last year’s pacesetters, Red Bull and McLaren.

“How could Ferrari be having such problems, when without the exhaust gases last year they won at Silverstone?

“Maybe it’s because they had to take such a leap, but when you do that there’s the risk it will go wrong.

“It’s the same for Mercedes, because last year they were in calm waters with a big gap to the top and the middle groups.”

 A former world champion has dealt Lewis Hamilton a mild rebuke after the Briton refused to appear at Adrian Sutil’s assault trial.
Not only did the McLaren driver defer to his team’s looming car launch date rather than leap to his former friend’s aid in Munich, he has also refused to contact Sutil or answer a single question on the matter posed by the media.

Sutil’s father has called the 2008 world champion “pathetic” while the former Force India driver himself described Hamilton as a “coward”.

“I don’t know whether you’d call him a coward,” 1980 title winner Alan Jones told GMM, “but I don’t know whether I’d like to have him in the trenches with me.”

Hamilton, who recently reunited with his girlfriend Nicole, had a tumultuous 2011 season and so this year will be accompanied to races by experienced manager Didier Coton.

When involved with Mika Hakkinen’s career, Coton worked for the management company headed by Keke Rosberg.

“In the past, Lewis has certainly made mistakes in the professional organisation of his life,” Rosberg, backing the changes Hamilton is making, commented to the Finnish broadcaster MTV3.

“You can’t go flying every other week to America when you’re making a serious job of being a formula one driver,” he said.

Keke Rosberg also questioned a recent claim made by the 27-year-old Briton.

“He says he wants to win all the races this season. That’s quite a claim.

“I would think Jenson Button wonders how he will do it when he will probably win a few races in the same car,” said Rosberg.

 Felipe Massa may have kept his seat at Ferrari for economic reasons.
That is the view of Keke Rosberg, the 1982 world champion and father of Mercedes race driver Nico.

Keke’s Finnish countryman Mika Salo, a former Ferrari driver, told MTV3 last week he was “surprised” Brazilian Massa kept his seat for 2012 after two consecutively poor seasons.

Massa already had a contract for 2012, but at the end of 2009 – when Kimi Raikkonen was replaced by Fernando Alonso – Ferrari showed it is not afraid of paying handsomely to end a deal.

So is Rosberg also surprised Massa is still Alonso’s teammate?

“I think that’s been influenced by the fact that they burned quite a lot of money with Kimi,” the 63-year-old said.

“They could have again paid off the guy with the contract and taken someone else, but at some point you have to be economically mindful — you can’t always go for the most expensive option,” added Rosberg.

 Amid all the ‘ugly’ talk, Alan Jones doesn’t mind the look of F1′s field of 2012.
With McLaren the notable exception, every team has incorporated an awkward ‘step’ into its nose design as the optimum solution to new FIA rules.

Paul Hembery, Pirelli’s motor sport director, recently decried the look as “pig ugly”.

But 1980 world champion Jones doesn’t think so.

“I don’t think aesthetics matter, and anyway I don’t really find them (the 2012 cars) particularly ugly,” the Australian told GMM.

“There’s a couple of interpretations of the new nose that aren’t as nice as some of the others, but there are a few out there that don’t look too bad at all,” said Jones.

“And I’ve never seen an ugly car in the winner’s circle,” he smiled.

Meanwhile, another former world champion – 1982′s Keke Rosberg – described McLaren’s solution as aesthetically pleasing, but hopes the British team has not made a mistake by going a different route to the rest of the grid.

“At least it’s nice looking and I wish the others would have done the same,” said the Finn.

“Jenson Button is quite a big guy and he has said he is sitting significantly lower than last year.

“If it (McLaren’s solution) suddenly becomes a problem for them, with the chassis already homologated then that’s just what they’ve got,” he told the MTV3 broadcaster.

After step noses and clever exhausts, the latest buzzword in the Jerez paddock is ‘Lotus’.
The former Renault team is turning heads with its new black and gold E20 car, which has been consistently the quickest 2012 car throughout the opening test of the pre-season.

“I am one of the happiest guys in the world right now,” said Romain Grosjean on Thursday after easily outpacing Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel.

The reigning GP2 champion was also quicker than the 2012 McLaren, steered for the first time on Thursday by Lewis Hamilton.

“The Lotus looks quite impressive,” said Briton Hamilton.

Drawing conclusions based on test results is an unreliable practice, but the body language in the Lotus garage so far is confident.

“At the moment they are quicker and more consistent.

“There are more question marks about us, Ferrari and McLaren,” said Vettel.

“For the first test it looks good,” team boss Eric Boullier admitted to Finnish broadcaster MTV3, “but still you can’t really speculate on anything.

“Between here and Melbourne, all the cars will change a lot.

“It is true that today we have a good car, we are able to drive a lot of laps and that is why we are at the front,” he added.

After watching the action trackside from a corner, Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg told Auto Motor und Sport that the E20 is “a missile with an incredible amount of grip”.

“The Red Bull and the Lotus make the best impression,” agreed 1982 world champion Keke Rosberg, who is also at Jerez.

Hamilton described Grosjean’s best time – 1.18.4 – as “good”, while Red Bull’s Webber wanted to know what compound of Pirelli tyre was fitted to the Lotus.

Told it was the medium, the Australian admitted: “Then it was a very good lap.”

Grosjean smiled: “The car is easy to drive and predictable everywhere, especially in the fast corners, and when you go over the limit it is easy to get back.”

Said Webber: “If Grosjean can do those laptimes then we will all have to watch Kimi (Raikkonen).”

Lewis Hamilton has a new day-to-day manager, British newspapers have revealed.
As his on and off-track woes worsened last year, the 2008 world champion insisted he was happy with his management team headed by pop industry agent Simon Fuller.

But Fuller’s company, XIX Entertainment, has now appointed Didier Coton – the famous F1 driver manager who handled Mika Hakkinen’s career – to look after McLaren’s Hamilton.

Formerly with Keke Rosberg’s outfit, Coton now heads his own management firm, Monaco based Aces Group.

“Didier’s appointment builds on the existing strengths of XIX and I am delighted to have him as part of the team,” Hamilton is quoted as saying.

British tabloids also report that Hamilton, 27, has reunited with his girlfriend Nicole Scherzinger.

Sebastian Vettel is a brilliant driver and his countryman Nico Rosberg is in the same league.
That is the view of Gerhard Berger, who watched Vettel’s first grand prix win in 2008 as the team co-owner on the Toro Rosso pitwall.

“He is a killer,” the great Austrian told Bild newspaper, “and his great advantage is he doesn’t look like it. He looks like a nice young man from your neighbourhood.”

Two years older than 23-year-old Vettel is fellow German Rosberg, who has not yet won a single race despite having almost two seasons more experience.

But the son of 1982 world champion Keke Rosberg has consistently beaten Michael Schumacher at Mercedes, prompting Berger to observe: “I see him on a par with Vettel.

“All he lacks is a fast car.”

Ross Brawn has admitted he would like Nico Rosberg to play a long-term role at Mercedes GP.

The 25-year-old son of 1982 world champion Keke Rosberg joined the team last year and scored 70 more points than Michael Schumacher as the sport’s most successful driver made his return to F1.

It is believed Rosberg signed a three-year contract, meaning he is set to stay at least until the end of next season.

But team boss Brawn told Sport Bild that Rosberg is “extremely talented” and would be welcome at Mercedes for much longer.

“It is very important that we have drivers like Nico Rosberg with us in the long term,” said the Briton. “I would be very happy if our relationship with Nico continues for a long time.

“He has all the qualities needed by a world champion,” added Brawn.

Nico Rosberg does not think his dominance within the Mercedes team this year has been well enough recognised.

Indeed, the focus of attention at the Brackley based squad in 2010 has been Michael Schumacher’s difficult return to the sport.

But the context of the seven time world champion’s struggle has been Rosberg’s 13:3 dominance in qualifying, and his 68 point margin over his famous teammate in the drivers’ championship.

Rosberg, who moved to Mercedes in 2010 after four seasons at Williams, said: “I don’t think my performance is well enough recognised.”

Schumacher’s problems this year have been explained as due to Bridgestone’s new narrower front tyres, which do not suit his driving style.

But “It’s the same for me,” 25-year-old Rosberg told the German weekly Sport Bild.

“Actually I think Michael has been able to adapt his driving style better than I have,” said the German, whose Finnish father is the 1982 world champion Keke Rosberg.

Rosberg also played down the effect of Schumacher’s three-year break since initially retiring in 2006.

“Michael has 15 years of experience in formula one,” he said.

Rosberg said his own recent experience “hasn’t advantaged me because it’s mainly been with grooved tyres, and the current front tyre is different from anything else before it”.

Mercedes’ competition boss Norbert Haug insists Rosberg’s efforts have not been undervalued within the team.

“I think it’s absolutely obvious that Nico has so far extracted what was possible from the car,” he said.  “Only on a very few occasions was this not the case.

“I think he learned a lot with Williams and if you would name one of the top guys that are currently young and experienced in formula one you would certainly mention Nico,” added Haug.

“So Nico is a very good benchmark for probably everybody in the field.”

Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg may be good terms with his performance in qualifying – Rubens Barrichello at the start only an opponent?

Actually, Nico Rosberg in qualifying would have liked to place in Singapore immediately after the World Cup favorites, had to be in the top 10 finals but still give Rubens Barrichello (Williams) defeated and brought “only” seventh. This is the 25-year-old, however, satisfied that he was in 1:46.443 minutes but team-mate Michael Schumacher again behind.

Shall deduct Rosberg a positive conclusion and says immediately after the qualifying session.. “That’s OK I think today I would have to be six, it annoys me a bit that Rubens is not purely down to me But that’s okay. “says the Mercedes driver for the record, adding:” I’m on the clean side and is determined to crack it on Sunday at the start. ”
It should not be the seventh place but taken as an indication of a performance increase for silver, says Rosberg. “It’s not just about Mercedes and Singapore, but Mercedes and all routes. Why can not we now break out into singing,” said the German. “We must continue to work hard and see that we are soon ahead. Currently we are still missing a corner.”

Part of this residue would Rosberg on race day to make up from Singapore – preferably at the very first meters against veteran Barrichello. “The tactic is for Sunday: First of all make a good start,” announced the son of former champion Keke Rosberg of confidence. “I’m on the clean side, so that would be it. Then we will see again.”