Honda Siel Cars has cut the cost of its best seller model in India, the City, by Rs. 66,000/-. The car is also available on discounts with dealers. Thus far, Honda has not ever given discounts and stubbornly adhered to pricing its vehicles in the stratosphere. The Accord which was once the best selling car in its segment has been trounced by rivals such as the Skoda Superb and now the Volkswagen Passat. The Jazz has never taken of due to its high pricing and sells in meagre numbers every month. The Civic has been beaten by the Toyota Corolla Altis and the Skoda Laura. The City for the last couple of months has been beaten at the market place by the Volkswagen Vento. What is hurting Honda is not just its high pricing of cars but the lack of a diesel engine. In all its years in India, Honda has done very little to develop cars with diesel engines. Now to arrest the trend of losing numbers for its best seller, Honda has slashed the price by the afore said amount. Honda claims that this is due to the localization of components, but everyone knows what the real story is.
Yearly Archives: 2011
Ratan Tata has been quoted by several newspapers as having said that it is time for Tata and Fiat to have a long hard look at their present arrangement. Tata is not for the diluting or ending the joint programme but for strengthening it so that both Tata and Fiat benefit equally from it. He is quoted as saying that talks between himself and Sergio Marchionne are fine but things need to get done at lower levels. He sees a bright future if this can happen.
“Stoner’s not just winning on his favourite tracks; with the Honda at his disposal, he’s making even the least preferred ones to look like favourites.”
Motogp riders, of late, seem to succumb to injuries that apparently form a pattern. Rewind a season and riders were plagued by arm-pump issues and were forced to go under the knife. Breaking collarbones is the new thing that that hangs over the grid like Damocles’ sword. Pedrosa has already taken an indefinite break due to this with Tech 3 Yamaha riders Edwards and Crutchlow falling victim to the same phenomenon in quick succession. As feared earlier, the grid size crumbled down to a lowly number of fifteen, despite Edwards making a lightening quick recovery to hop on to his M1, without which the number could have ended being ridiculed to a greater extent.
Stoner demonstrated his devastating speed knows no boundaries as he completed a hat-trick of victories aboard the Honda in Silverstone this weekend, something that last happened under the magical hands of Rossi way back in 2003. With this win under mild showers, not only has he dethroned the provisional leader Lorenzo, he also stretched the lead to almost a race win and cemented his title candidature further more. Despite looking comfortably poised to win the crown this year, stopping which would require a eureka moment for even Lorenzo, such an impeccable display of consistency and outright pace goes on to indicate how much of his raw talent remained latent under the obstinate Ducati all these years. Stoner’s not just winning on his favourite tracks; with the Honda at his disposal, he’s making even the least preferred ones to look like favourites.
Lorenzo has been, till now, fighting a losing battle against Stoner and is clearly on a damage limitation mode rather than mounting a strong attack till Yamaha gets back on equal footing with Honda on equipment front. Eyeing consistent podiums, which richly paid off last year, is a good strategy, but Stoner’s win rate of four out of six projects this approach in a poor light this time. Unable to take a straight fight to him in any conditions, the rest of the field including the man sporting the number one plate will have to rely on a stroke of bad luck to put brakes on Stoner’s momentum, the chance of which looks very bleak.
Spies and Simoncelli continued to prove their inability to attune to changing weather conditions as they recorded another DNF maintaining a miss rate of fifty percent, two of which were thanks to rainy conditions. It was a shame Spies’ accident was not captured by any of the cameras. What was however observed after Spies’ name was seen to be missing from the classification was a mangled piece of metal, which bore testimony to the magnitude of the impact. Spies, though, remains unscathed thanks to the back-protector, which was completely crushed.
Both Lorenzo and Simoncelli cracked under their own pressure originally intended to be piled on Dovizioso. Unable to get past a slightly slower Dovizioso, Lorenzo first hit the deck as his desperation to chase down an escaping Stoner got the better of him. Simoncelli followed suit within moments as his pace was only good enough in making feigned passing attempts and went sliding down the gravel when his urge couldn’t be translated into action. This DNF is a monumental blow to Lorenzo’s bid for the crown as Lorenzo, despite being a paragon of consistency, finally broke under pressure to chase Stoner down ceding substantial ground to the Australian by gifting the points’ lead to the latter on a platter.
Edwards arrived at Silverstone off the back of his collarbone-smashing accident and with no less than 13 screws being riveted. The Texas Tornado put up a gallant ride braving treacherously slippery conditions to get a podium finishing only behind the factory Hondas of Stoner and Dovizioso. When Yamaha thought their fortunes were ruined beyond salvage, Edwards saved their day with a heroic ride into the podium something that deserves rich encomiums. The fact that Edwards received the loudest roar of applause than even the race winner showcases the importance of being charismatic against being critical all the time, which is turning out to be the hallmark of current crop of riders.
Not so long ago did Rossi quip there’s no need to worry about being off the pace as long as the reason is known. His pace by far and qualifying position in Silverstone this weekend means he might start turning skeptical about subscribing to his own view as even the legendary duo of Rossi-Burgess couldn’t iron out the issues pertaining to corner entry. Rossi underwent a nightmarish British GP by recording largest ever gap between him and pole sitter, something that has turned the situation grave at the Italian garage. The Ducati seems to be a harder nut to crack than initially thought but if Rossi can’t tide over the problem, who else can? But going by the magnitude of problems the Ducati currently poses, chances are high Rossi might end up doing what was originally feared by Ducatisti – create another M1 out of the Desmosedici, something that’ll be keenly watched by everyone as Rossi and Burgess had already allayed fears by dismissing such notion.
It was unequivocally a bad hair day for factory Yamaha as both their riders crashed their bikes in a space of three corners partially instilling fear in the garage. A one-two finish for Repsol Honda made things look even worse for them. 2011 was expected to belong to Honda especially this year being the last chance to win the 800cc crown, failing which could tarnish their rich GP history of success stories. Honda has designed its plot clearly – hire the best riders and build the best bike – with which Honda should comfortably win back the crown although a clearer picture should emerge through the final phase of the season if Honda’s right in expanding its factory line-up.
Fresh after recording a best finish of seventh last week at Catalunya, home favourite Crutchlow was bullish about his chances on British soil, something that ended in tatters after he broke his collar bone in a crash during qualifying. It’s a pain to let go of a home race like this. Let’s hope Crutchlow doesn’t follow in the footsteps of Toseland whose Motogp career kicked off to a promising start, which later came to a halt owing to a nasty run of injuries.
Hayden rubbed salt into Rossi’s wounds by engaging in a hunt for a rostrum finish and also posting the fastest lap of the race, a feat that was significantly aided by his pursuit of his countryman Edwards. Hayden’s pace meant Rossi had clearly been unable to tap the available potential of the Desmosedici let alone making it better. Reduced grid size increased the chance to win vital points, an opportunity which was seized by both hands by the satellite teams. Bautista, too, recorded his best finish of the season with a fifth place, also his best finish in top class till date. Others’ results looked better that they really are and it was pathetic to see the Stoner lap Randy De Puniet and Hector Barbera on the satellite Ducatis, a scene we rarely witnessed in the recent times.
Motogp heads to the citadel of racing Assen in two weeks’ time. Stoner would be hoping to carry on with winning momentum. It’s also time Lorenzo revised his weekend plans from podium to victory without which the last few races might lose their significance. Spies and Simoncelli, most eligible aliens-to-be, need to take cues from their team mates and got to up their pace at least to break the duopoly of Lorenzo and Stoner. Rossi looked rather ordinary this weekend and the lean phase he’s undergoing has got to be unnerving. But with Assen next in the calendar, one can’t help thinking of Rossi’s storming ride from eleventh to first in 2007. Eager as ever, expecting the Doctor to cure the ailing Ducati soon.
Rain turned everything topsy turvy in the GP of Canada and handed Jenson Button of McLaren his first victory of this season. The race began behind a safety car and later there were many safety car periods thanks to either increasing rain or due to crashes some of which were wonderfully orchestrated by an ambitious Lewis Hamilton who finally went out of the race after making contact with his team Jenson Button. The incident was under investigation but the stewards decided that it was a racing incident and so Button had a reprieve and got to keep his win. Sebastian Vettel in the Red Bull Racing car led for most of the race and was in the lead towards the last couple of corners on the last lap when he made a small mistake and gave the victory to Button. Third place went to a charging Mark Webber in the other Red Bull Racing car ahead of Michael Schumacher who at one point looked good enough for second place. Still this is Michael Schumacher’s best result, finishing fourth. Narain Karthikeyan finished 14th ahead of four more cars and Force India’s Paul Di Resta rounded off the finishers in 18th place. The race was red flagged for a duration of two hours before it was deemed fit to resume.
It was a day of mixed feelings for Audi. Two Audis where destroyed in horrific crashes involving veteran racer Allan McNish and Mike Rockenfeller when they were passing slower cars belonging to another category. Finally in a race that went to the wire the Audi R 18 driven by Fassler/Lotterer/Treluyer won the race and was followed by three Peugeots which were dicing with the sole Audi for race victory.
Carlos Checa on the Althea Ducati took the win in the second race in the World Superbikes at Misano. Max Biaggi on the works Aprilia took second while Noriyuki Haga took third place on the PATA Aprilia to round off a podium of grand old men of two wheeler racing. Chris Vermeulen returning from a long and bothersome injury managed a tenth place on the factory Kawasaki in a race where the attrition was high and where only 14 managed to reach the finish line.
Carlos Checa took victory in the first race of the World Superbikes at Misano ahead of Max Biaggi on the Alitalia Aprilia and Marco Melandri on the factory Yamaha. Tom Sykes on the works Kawasaki started in pole but finished the race in fourth position, his and Kawasaki’s best result so far this season.
Kawasaki’s good luck continued in Misano with Broc Parkes taking the victory and points lead in the World Supersport race.
Casey Stoner won the British GP at a wet, wet, wet Silverstone circuit in a race that saw drama only in the form of three crashes, two involving the factory Yamahas of Ben Spies and Jorge Lorenzo and the San Carlo Gresini Honda of Marco Simoncelli. While Spies crashed on his own, the crashes of Lorenzo and Simoncelli were effected by Stoner’s Repsol Honda team mate Andrea Dovizioso. Dovizioso acted as a mobile chicane for Lorenzo and Simoncelli while Stoner was running away in the front. Desperation on the part of Lorenzo and Simoncelli to get past a slow but wide Dovizioso saw them crash out. Tech3 Yamaha’s Colin Edwards took the third place behind the Repsol Honda duo. Nicky Hayden finished fourth for Ducati while Alvaro Bautista equalled his best finish of fifth in MotoGP on the Rizla Suzuki. Valentino Rossi finished in sixth place 65 seconds behind Stoner on the factory Ducati. His elevation a result of five overtakings on the circuit and also the three crashes in front of him. Only 12 riders finished the race from the 15 who started.
For the sixth time in seven races this season, Sebastian Vettel has taken pole position at the Formula1 GP of Canada. The only time that he was not on pole, it was his team mate Mark Webber who was on pole and that means that Red Bull Racing have monopolized pole position in the 2011 season so far. But Canada seems to have been kind to Ferrari who finally pulled their act together and so Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa have qualified second and third. Fourth position went to the other Red Bull of Mark Webber while Lewis Hamilton in the McLaren qualified in fifth ahead of Nico Rosberg in sixth place. Hamilton’s team mate Jenson Button in the second McLaren qualified in seventh place ahead of Michael Schumacher in the other Mercedes in eighth. Ninth and tenth places went to the Lotus Renaults of Nick Heidfeld and Vitaly Petrov. Paul Di Resta of Force India qualified in eleventh while his team mate Adrian Sutil could manage only fourteenth on the grid. Narain Karthikeyan scraped into the race by just about making the 107% time of Alonso who was in first position in Q1. Jerome D’Ambrosio in the Marussia Virgin car could not make the cut, so technically only 23 cars will start the race. Marussia Virgin could appeal for amnesty for D’Ambrosio and if he gets it then the whole field will be in the race.
Tom Sykes of the factory Kawasaki Racing Team claimed Superpole in the Misano round of the World Superbike Championship in Italy. This is Sykes’ second pole in World Superbikes the last one being last year on the previous generation Kawasaki ZX-10 R. Favourite Carlos Checa took second place on the Althea Ducati while Max Biaggi finished qualifying in seventh place.