Ray S

From F1.com

"New floor and diffuser for Force India in Bahrain Force India are making major revisions to their car for this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix, as the team continue the search for their first Formula One points. A revised floor and diffuser will be among the changes debuting on the VJM02 at Sakhir.

Drivers Adrian Sutil and Giancarlo Fisichella have shown some promising pace in the opening three rounds of 2009 and team principal Vijay Mallya hopes the latest updates to their Mercedes-powered machine will keep them in touch with the rest of the field.

“We are planning to introduce a significant aerodynamic upgrade for the Bahrain Grand Prix, including a new floor and an interim diffuser,” Mallya confirmed. “Amongst other items, we also plan to use new auxiliary wings on the front wing and reprofiled sidepods to incorporate the amended rear end.”

The changes are not merely a response to the recent double-decker diffuser ruling, but have been planned by the team since the VJM02’s debut (at the end of February) as part of their aerodynamic development programme. “It will represent a good step forward for the team,” added Mallya.

Sutil is the man who has come closest to taking Force India’s maiden points. He finished ninth in Melbourne and was running as high as sixth in China last weekend before crashing out with less than six laps to go. The German has high hopes for the Sakhir updates, but admits scoring might still be a big ask.

“The new parts we have coming through for this race should keep us close to the others and I hope we will be able to have a good, competitive race,” said the German. “The goals for Bahrain are really going to be the same as for China. For sure I want to finish the job, but I think getting points here will be very difficult.”

Fisichella, meanwhile, believes the Force India package is basically sound and hopes the latest revisions to the car will help address its one major failing - an overall lack of downforce.

“Mechanically the VJM02 is good,” he said. “It feels quite balanced and consistent and is a big improvement from last year. We’re working well with the new team partners, McLaren and Mercedes, and I think we have a lot we can be positive about.

“We know where we need to improve: we are missing a lot of downforce and it shows, but now we have started to introduce new upgrades I am hopeful we can start to fix this problem.”

DanR

it will be dry and hot so Button

Larry Herman

Agreed. The Brawn is the most gentle on it's tires and will have the advantage when the track temp is really high. Plus I still think that they are faster than anyone else right now.

On a side note, it is interesting to see how close Webber is to Vettel in terms of speed and wet weather driving. I know that Vettel is the new wonderkin, but it just affirms that Webber is quite fast in his own right.

Ray S

I'm surprised no votes for Alonso yet???

Newly improved car and all!!

ltc

Evidently Sir A.Wayne is too busy in Off Topic Politics and Controversy to pay attention to F1 anymore.

I feel as though a moment of silence might be in order....

Veloce Raptor

He got his *** handed to him royally by SundayDrover, and then ran away crying for his mommy. He is too scared & embarassed to come back here anytime soon.







Professional Racing and Driving Coach




clicky here....

Flying Finn

Button.

Bahrain suits better to Brawn, they won't have the rear suspension problems they had last race. Red bull (who has the best rear suspension and benefited especially in last race) won't be as good as they were.

Ray S

Ok, that was long enough. Plus we all know he will be back....

multi21

Just finished watching the Chinese GP last night and thought it was very interesting. Great drive by Vettel. He seems to be the real deal and could be a breath of fresh air in F1 as compared to the other young drivers like Hamilton and to a lesser extent Alonso.

Looking forward to the next race, it would seem the Brawn cars are the ones to beat especially if Bridgestone brings such a varied type of rubber like they did in Australia and China. From testing on Friday in China, Brawn cars race nearly twice as long as their competitors on the super softs, but could not get tire temps where they wanted them to be when it was raining from start to finish.

In Bahrain, the heat and drifting sand on track will play into the advantage that the Brawn cars enjoy with their chassis and tires. It seems the only time to attack the Brawn cars are at the start of the race and after a safety car period when their tires are less than optimal.

Re: Wayne. Let sleeping dogs lye (or it that lie). It's really been nice and civilized without him here. He's more circus than substance, let's try and keep it that way.

PS: Thanks for starting the thread, Ray!!

Ray S

Last night!! Pete, how could you stand the wait???

multi21

I was out of town until last night, but had it recorded. Trust me I was SOOO tempted to go online to see the results and whenever I was on RL, I saw that there were 3 pages of posts on China, but I was a good boy and never clicked on the thread. Glad I didn't as it would have spoiled a great race.

sjfehr

Bahrain is actually quite humid, being located in the middle of a bathtub. So it will be wet and hot.

Veloce Raptor

Hell, it has "rain" in its name.






Professional Racing and Driving Coach

wanna911

+1, Webber seems to be holding his own.

Trucho-951

I’m still rooting for Alonso. If it hadn’t been for that suspiciously weird coincidence that the safety car came in exactly right after Renault made the call to bring in Alonso for fueling, I think he would have done much better, at least collected more points.

Anyway some call it a coincidence, I think it may have had something do with the FIA not happy with all of Flavio’s recent smack talking.