German Car Forum

Williams’ tester Kazuki Nakajima will make his Formula One race debut at the Brazilian Grand Prix next weekend, the British team has confirmed. Nakajima will step into the seat left vacant by Alexander Wurz, who announced his retirement on Monday.

The 22 year-old Japanese driver, who was named GP2 rookie of the year this season, has enjoyed a testing role with Williams since November 2006. He has covered over 7,000 kilometres in the FW29 and has already represented the team at five Grands Prix as a Friday driver.

“I am very grateful to the team who have given me this opportunity,” said Nakajima. “I hope I now know the car very well and thankfully have done some Friday driving as recently as Shanghai. This is a chance I intend to grab with both hands and repay the faith the team are showing in me with a strong performance.”

The Williams team stressed that the reason behind the opportunity was to build and develop Nakajima’s experience in the car, rather than to evaluate him for a race seat for 2008.

“You cannot assess a driver’s capability on the basis of one race but this is an ideal opportunity to develop Kazuki’s experience,” explained team principal Frank Williams. “I am confident he will approach the race in a very workmanlike and focused way.”

Nakajima, who is the son of Satoru Nakajima, who raced for Lotus and Tyrrell in the mid 1980’s and early ‘90’s, last drove the FW29 during Friday practice at last weekend’s Chinese Grand Prix.

Formula1

Let me see Hamilton winning DC, BMW in the top 5 and that whining Spainard bitch walking home with his head down. Nothing else i want to see and not giving any damn for anything else!

You with me, Luw?

What I hope will happen:
The whiners (i.e. Lewis and Alonso) take each other out. Massa wins his home GP and Kimi wins the WDC by coming second. Then I'll wait for one of Kimi's brilliant quotes (i.e. a short concise yet utterly useless comment). BMW coming 3rd and 4th.

What will happen:
Another boring race. Massa will probably win, and Lewis will take the championship.

You're damn right I am.

After having done some analysis and prediction Hamilton will win the championship. During the 3 latest GPs he's been in top shape.

Kimi's chances of winning are close to zero. He will need a miracle in the form of Alonso and Hamilton taking each other out.

If Hamilton finished 1st, 2nd or 3rd it will be over for Alonso or Kimi. My dream scenario is off course that Alonso falls victim for mechanical failure. I hope that Montoya will be present to bring some bad luck to Alonso.

What I hope will happen:
If Hamilton is still in the race, Kimi lets Alonso pass him on the final lap to crush Hamilton's dream of a WDC. I view Alonso as the lesser of two evils, there's just something about Hamilton that I don't like. I can't explain what though.

Beer's on me!

Haha! You won't see that of course, but mentioning Montoya and Brazil, brigns back good memories...:

He must learned from the British bitch.
Remember "I'm no.2"/Monaco, pit-lane "f------ swivel"/Hungary, "Alonso was mean"/Belgium, "I will quit F1"/post Japan ?!

Not giving any damn for that post or what he said: Alonso is a bitch, B E Y O T C H!

Hammy rules!

How 'bout that?

Hamilton is a bigger bitch, B E Y O T C H!

He's younger, but doesn't whine like someone who already won 2 DC.

So, no, you're wrong - Alonso is a bitch!

alonso is sooo siiickkk..i never liked him till lewis hamilton opened his mouth...hamilton is the worlds biggest bitch...alonso is just really really cocky...in the post race interviews in china he was hilarious when asked if he could beat lewis and he was like if the car is the same as lewis like Q1-Q2 then he has no chance...haha what a guy...i liked mclaren at the beggining of the year but what a stupid team

I don't like him either. I think there is something extremely disingenuous about him. Fair or not, he reminds me of golfer Phil Mickelson, who many fellow pros think of as a phony, a guy with one personality for the cameras and then his real personality. For a rookie, he was been involved in some strange "incidents" that border on being disrespectful.

I am hoping for a collision that will allow Kimi to take the title, but I doubt we will see it. I also doubt that Massa will be allowed to win. The thing is I see Kimi as neutral. In my mind, he doesn't have a preference who wins the title, so I doubt he will do anything untoward. Alonso may be another story.

Arguably, all F1 drivers are bitches.

Has anyone noticed Alonso's relationship with other drivers as of late? He seems to get along with everyone with the exception of you know who. After the Nurburgring incident with Massa, he seems to have had an injection of people skills. He chats more with other drivers after races, smiles and pats them on the back in the weigh-in. Alonso even waved to fans after he crashed at Fuji. What the heck was that all about?

I don't think Alonso is as unreasonable as most people think. He did apologize to Massa for accusing him. We are disadvantaged because not too many of us read Spanish or have access to the Spanish tabloids. We've been inundated with "Lewis Rags-to-Riches, Lewis is a super nice, Lewis is the greatest ever" stories by the British press since Australia. If we had similar access to Spanish papers, we wouldn't see Alonso as so terrible.

I completely agree with you, I just don't want to see Hamilton win. If he's this bad as a rookie, I can't imagine what he'll be like with a WDC under his belt.

In the end, it will likely end up as a boring race with nothing untoward happening and, unfortunately, Hamilton winning the title.

You guys are right. Massa won't be allowed to win, especially is Lewis and Alonso are still on the track. Kimi will need all the points he can get.

I wouldn't be so sure. Alonso is most likely praised like a god in Spanish paper. Hamilton is far from an exception when it comes to exposure in the press. More or less every up coming super athlete in the world gets nothing excessive positive exposure in their home country. It's a national pride thing.

It's very common, therefore I think it time for you to get over this whole "I hate Lewis because of he's over exposed". Seriously, only high school girls hate on other people like that. No offence though, I just find it really silly.

First, no offense taken.

I dislike Lewis mostly because I think he's less than genuine and at times disrespectful to his competitors in an unnecessary way. The fact that he has been groomed by one of my least favourite teams in all of sports also has something to do with it.

However, I will admit that the crazy press coverage has caused me to take a closer look at him. Believe it or not, that is not the main reason I dislike him. Button and Damon Hill were over-exposed at times, but I didn't dislike either of them too much during that time period.

My point is that all the positive Hamy coverage might have something to do with his sterling reputation in the eyes of F1 fans, despite some of his needless statements. If we read about Alonso in glowing terms in Spanish papers, I predict we would have a more favorable opinion of him.

f

haha...well put

sad to see Wurz not there to race his final race. instead, an unproven Japanese kid will take his place. it's a miracle what money can do these days and upstage talent.

anyways, there's prediction of plenty of rain for the race finale. hope Vettel gets a good result, Fred aquaplanes off, and Hammi stretches the tyres to the limit and skids off, and Kimi takes the title...

Kimi Raikkonen says Ferrari's Chinese Grand Prix performance has left him confident that the team will be fast enough to challenge for the victory he needs in Brazil.

The advantage has swung between McLaren and Ferrari all season, and with Raikkonen needing to win at Interlagos with Lewis Hamilton lower than fifth and Fernando Alonso lower than second to become champion, his title chances depend on Ferrari holding the upper hand at the finale.
The Finn said he had been buoyed by both his Shanghai win, and his charge from last to third at Fuji.

"I was really happy on Sunday night: we couldn't get the maximum in China and Japan, but we showed that we were able to win both of the races, which was very important in view of the race in Brazil," he said.

"The situation seemed to be compromised after the race at Fuji, but in Shanghai we managed to put things straight. Now we have new hope to win the title and it's good to know that we can go to Sao Paulo and try our luck.
"It would have been better if also Alonso would have not made it, but Hamilton's retirement, his first in this season, was very important.

"We have to go on working the way we did at the last two races. We have to give our best to try to have another double win. We do have the possibility, as you could see. If we manage to do the same at Interlagos everything depends on what our competitors can do."

Although Raikkonen's title hopes remain remote, he was optimistic that he could at least get up to second in the championship.
"Anything can happen in the race," he said. "There are more possibilities to pick up on Alonso."

He added that his delight at victory in Shanghai was still tempered by frustration over the controversy at Fuji - where Ferrari started on intermediate tyres having not received the race control email mandating extreme wet tyres.

"At the end I was asked if that was the most beautiful victory with Ferrari: undeniably it was a very difficult one; the first one on a wet track; and it was really a great feeling," Raikkonen said.

"It could have been even better if there hadn't been the bitter aftertaste from what had happened at Fuji, with the rules handed out by the FIA without us having been informed."

But he was very satisfied that he was responsible for Ferrari's 200th win in Formula One.

"I played only a small part in this great history, but I'm very proud to be a part of this legendary team," said Raikkonen. "200 wins show how strong Ferrari really is."

Geez, stop with the dissing of eachother's favourite drivers...

Hami DNFed and Kimi won in the last race, exactly how I wanted things to go down. As you can guess, I want Kimi to win the next race as well, and the championship. I'm just liking Lewis less and less and I don't want a McLaren to win the championship. Imo Alonso is probobly the most deserving WDC winner imo, but I still don't like him. If Kimi won it would look to suspicious. Why can't just someone like Kubica win?

Speaking of which. My respect for Kubica has never been higher than after the Chinese GP. I watched the practice and heard his radio conversation with the egineers and the dude really knows what he's talking about. He knows exactly what he wants and needs to drive fast, and communicates with the enginners just like a top driver should.

Why would be suspicious if Kimi won? I think it is most suspicious if Hamilton or Alonso won. They're the ones driving cars provided by a team that was barred from the constructors' championship for having Ferrari's secret information. Isn't that more suspicious?

I agree that Raikkonen's chances are remote. He needs a collision or Hamilton beaching it in the gravel to win. The one thing is that Interlagos is an old-style circuit that does not have miles of runoff area, which increases the chance of a driver actually paying for a mistake.

Damn, without that Fuji tyre fiasco, Kimi would only be 1 pt down to Hamilton.

McLaren promise driver equality in Brazil


Ahead of next weekend’s title showdown in Brazil, McLaren have released a statement reinforcing the team’s commitment to driver equality. Lewis Hamilton is leading the drivers’ championship, but both team mate Fernando Alonso and Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen could yet claim the crown.

In the statement, the British team state that they want to make it ‘absolutely clear’ that their policy of treating Alonso and Hamilton equally - in terms of car, engine, tactics and use of resources - will continue at the Interlagos race.

“This has been a tremendous season to which the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes team and our drivers have, I believe, contributed a great deal,” said McLaren team principal Ron Dennis. “This contribution has been enhanced by allowing Fernando and Lewis to race each other with complete equality. This will, of course, continue in Brazil where the entire team will be doing its absolute best to win the drivers’ world championship.”

Norbert Haug, Vice-President of Mercedes-Benz Motorsport added: “There have been a lot of suggestions and rumours about equality in the team this year. The current point standings illustrate better than anything else the fact that equal treatment is in place. During the 12 years Mercedes-Benz and McLaren have been working together all drivers in the team had the same possibilities to perform.

“We will not change this principle for the next race which is the last of the thrilling 2007 season and we will see both Fernando and Lewis compete for the drivers’ world championship title.”

Hamilton leads the standings on 107 points, four ahead of Alonso and seven in front of Raikkonen.

yeah right. after seeing the expression of the team and crew when Fred crashed in Japan, and seeing the different expression and hand gestures of Ron Dennis when Hammi beached his car in China, i find this hard to believe.

trust me, Mclaren will be racing against Alonso.

thank you


well i think , and mostlikly will happen , if hopefully no incident or DNF happens to hamilton , he will win the WDC title . he really diserves the tittle more than any other driver. if not i wouldnt mind if kimi wins the tittle but plz not fernando alonso!!!