British tabloid The Sun called the McLaren driver ‘Lewis Whamilton’ after another bad day at the office for the 2008 world champion.
On Saturday, Hamilton was reprimanded at Spa-Francorchamps for his bizarre qualifying crash with Pastor Maldonado, and the Williams driver said after Sunday’s grand prix: “He did the same today … I think he needs to be more focused on his race”.

Rookie Maldonado was referring to Hamilton’s race-ending crash with Kamui Kobayashi.

Sauber’s Kobayashi said: “I don’t know what I needed to do — maybe go into the gravel for him?”

Niki Lauda, speaking to Germany’s motorsport-magazin.com, was unequivocal: “He takes things to extremes. He’s only got himself to blame.”

But Hamilton initially refused to take the blame, telling reporters afterwards: “As far as I was concerned, I was ahead of whoever I was racing and then I was hit by them.”

He later apologised to Japan’s Kobayashi via Twitter.

“After watching the replay, I realise it was my fault today 100 per cent.

“I didn’t give Kobayashi enough room, though I thought I was past. The team deserves better from me,” said Hamilton.

Paul di Resta is even better than F1′s new world champion Sebastian Vettel.

That is the claim of triple Indycar title winner Dario Franchitti, who is Scot di Resta’s cousin.

Di Resta, 24, is on the cusp of his formula one debut, having secured the 2010 DTM title and forged a strong link with Force India by spending last season as reserve and Friday driver.

“He definitely has the skills,” 37-year-old Franchitti told Germany’s Sport Bild.

“He is one of the most talented drivers I’ve ever seen,” he added. “He beat Vettel in the Formula 3 Euro series (in 2006).

“Sebastian is a good driver, but Paul is better,” said Franchitti.

Di Resta told Motorsport-Magazin.com: “Sebastian and I have had some ding-dong encounters, and I hope and feel sure that we can continue this in the formula one arena.”

As the F1 calendar looks set to expand, the sport should consider culling Friday’s 180 hours of free practice.

That is the belief of Williams’ chief executive Adam Parr, who revealed he has proposed to have the traditional race weekend format condensed to just Saturday and Sunday.

F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone visited the media centre at Istanbul Park on Friday, and smiled broadly when a reporter said he had heard rumours about 24-race calendars in the near future.

But according to Germany’s Motorsport-Magazin.com, the 79-year-old Briton wants F1′s three-day weekend to remain in place.

Parr, however, questions the entertainment value of the current Friday format, and is quoted by The Press Association as suggesting that cutting out Fridays will mean less equipment for the teams to transport.

“I can see the calendar going to 24 over the next two to three years, and I’m not sure whether logistically, with these longer weekends, it will be easy to do,” he said.

Parr said he raised the issue recently in Barcelona, and teams including Ferrari, McLaren and Renault did not baulk at the idea.

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Earlier, Ferrari technical boss Aldo Costa played down suggestions the team’s F-duct solution is dangerous.

Unlike McLaren’s system which is believed to be activated by the drivers’ knees, it became clear in Barcelona that Alonso and his teammate Felipe Massa are triggering the airflow on the straights with their left hand.

Often at the same time, the drivers are then using their right hand to make adjustments to the brake balance.

But Alonso insisted after qualifying: “I always have my hands on the steering wheel.”

Indeed, onboard video shows that the Spaniard has a black pad sewn onto the knuckles of his left glove that allows Alonso to block the airflow while keeping his thumb in place on the steering wheel.

“There is no problem,” he told Germany’s Motorsport-Magazin.com.

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Fernando Alonso now has a solid upper-hand over his Ferrari teammate, according to Nick Heidfeld.

The gap between the pair on the Barcelona grid is six tenths and five grid positions, meaning that Massa has only outqualified Alonso once in 2010.

“Already at the last race it was clear that Fernando is consistently faster,” Mercedes reserve driver and grand prix veteran Heidfeld told Germany’s Motorsport-Magazin.com on Saturday.
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The pair shared the Circuit de Catalunya in morning practice, when the experienced Austrian Klien took over the cockpit usually driven by Senna’s fellow rookie teammate Karun Chandhok.

At the end of the session, Klien’s best lap was five tenths faster than Senna’s.

“There were two reasons,” Brazilian Senna told Germany’s Motorsport-Magazin.com.

“First, he had the fast-shift transmission in his car, which is worth about two and a half tenths per lap, and secondly I had a problem with my engine cover,” he insisted.
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Red Bull boss, Christian Horner, has advised that F1 could lose its engine suppliers if the engine freeze rule is maintained.
Last year, Mercedes was considered the most powerful engine of the grid. The main teams urged the FIA to allow them to update their engines during a given period of time, consenting on minor relevance enhancements and readjustments. As a result, “the ‘touches to the engine’ are quite limited.”
Even though, in the Regulation there isn’t a stipulation for engine equality, the fall of Honda, Toyota and BMW means that there are only four engine manufacturers left: Mercedes, Ferrari, Renault and Cosworth. On this regard, Horner seems worried because, if the engine freeze rule hinders the manufacturers to enhance the engines they sale, everybody will choose the most powerful to this date, and this would force the others out. In other words, there’s the possibility that there would only be two brands left.
“FIA has all the information at hand to decide upon an adjustment to the engines,” Horner said from Germany to the Auto Bild Motorsport magazine. “It would be a disaster to lose another engine manufacturer at the end of the year, because they cannot compete with the others. The chassis development rules are so strict that the engine plays an ever more important role everyday.”
This year’s refueling ban means that fuel consumption will become a critical factor in the races. Renault, which supplies its engines to Red Bull, as well as the factory team, believe they have more efficient engines regarding fuel consumption, even though they have slightly less horse power.
An engine with better consumption will allow the team to refill less fuel at the beginning of the race, which is a factor that will have a value of tenths of lapping time during the first laps of a Grand Prix. Fuel levels will no longer have an incidence on the scoring times, because the first ten will not have to perform the Q3, with enough fuel to start the race.
For this reason, the single-seaters with Renault engine, could get a worse scoring in the Q3 but make significant progress during the first laps, thanks to their weight/load ratio.