The Malaysian MotoGP race was red flagged on the second lap after a collision between Marco Simoncelli, Colin Edwards and Valentino Rossi. Simoncelli who was dicing for fourth position in the race, fell as his motorcycle slid from under him but unfortunately, the motorcycle instead of sliding away from the rider, slid into him taking him directly into the path of Colin Edwards and Valentino Rossi. Simoncelli was hit by Edwards’ bike and possibly by Rossi’s bike as well. It seemed as if Simoncelli’s helmet had come off under the impact. The race was immediately red flagged while Simoncelli was taken to the medical centre. After sometime the race was cancelled and now the announcement has come that Marco Simoncelli has succumbed to his injuries. Simoncelli’s death comes just a week after Dan Wheldon’s in Indycar Racing. The last MotoGP rider who lost his life to an accident on track was Daijiro Katoh, who was also riding a Honda like Simoncelli. Our prayers are with the family and friends of Marco Simoncelli in this time of great grief brought on by a most untimely death. Rest in Peace Marco Simoncelli.
After the round at Valencia where Martin Tomczyk (Schaeffler Audi A4 DTM) raced to the top of the driver’s standings, the final round of the 2011 DTM will be held today at Hockenheim, a German town in northwest Baden-Württemberg, in the Upper Rhine valley.
Miguel Molina, driving a Red Bull Audi A4 DTM has secured the pole position. Jamie Green (AMG Mercedes C-Class) stands second and the inevitable 2011 DTM champion Martin Tomczyk will be third on the front row.
“I’m very happy about my second pole position this year. I’ve got to thank the team that did a superb job after we had a problem with the car yesterday. I also want to thank Audi and my family for their support. I’m proud to be starting into the last race of this DTM era from the top spot on the grid. We’ve got the best starting base tomorrow and will try and do a good job to turn into the best possible result.” said Miguel Molina.
Bruno Spengler (Mercedes-Benz Bank AMG C-Klasse) of Canada who was the runaway points leader in the DTM series early in the season but lost the lead due to a damper failure in the Oschersleben race, qualified sixth whereas Mike Rockenfeller (E-POSTBRIEF Audi A4 DTM ) and Timo Scheider (AUTO TEST Audi A4 DTM) took the fourth and fifth positions on the grid.
“It’s a pity. I feel that I could have done better today, but still couldn’t manage to qualify higher than 17th. Obviously, I had been hoping to be start from higher up the grid in my first race as Mrs Wolff. But there’s everything still to play for, so I’ll have to be on the prowl, just like a real wolf tomorrow.” said Susie Wolff.
Ralf Schumacher (Salzgitter AMG Mercedes C-Klasse) managed a 13th, David Coulthard (Deutsche Post AMG Mercedes C-Klasse) took 16th and Susie Wolff (remember Susie Stoddart? Yes, she’s married to Toto Wolff now. Congratulations Susie!) in the TV Spielfilm AMG Mercedes C-Klasse took 17th.
“I had a clean lap in the final part of qualifying, but Miguel Molina was a little bit faster than me. I had hoped to get on pole, but second on the grid is a good starting position for the race. I won the last race of the season at the Hockenheim Ring once before, in 2007, so all being well, I can do it again tomorrow and we can round off the season with a home win for Mercedes-Benz.” said Jamie Green.
That was nice! It was really tight today, a nice way to close this year’s DTM season. After Valencia, making it into Q4 was a way of thanking my team. In the last qualifying segment it didn’t quite work out, I lost some time in the last turn. On top of that, I needed two laps in the third session. So my tires weren’t so fit anymore. Still, I’m pleased. I’ll be starting into the race alongside Mike (Rockenfeller), which is great. We’ll manage …” said Tomczyk.
David Coulthard on his 16th place, “I had hoped for more than 16th place in the final qualifying session of the season. Actually, I thought I had done enough to go through to the next stage in qualifying, since the balance of my C-Class was really good. In the cool conditions, however, getting the tyres up to temperature wasn’t easy.”
DTM Live Timing here
DTM.tv here
The Hindu Business Line reports that Bajaj Auto will showcase an all-new 2012 Pulsar in December to celebrate 10 years of the motorcycle’s launch.
“We launched the first Pulsar in November 2001 and are now ready with a 100 per cent new bike with remarkable engine technology. It is really the next big step after DTS-i,” Mr Rajiv Bajaj, Managing Director, said at a press conference in Mumbai on Friday.
According to Mr.Bajaj, the technology on the 2012 Pulsar does not exist anywhere in the world and could soon be a part of the company’s Pulsar range which would also filter down to the Discover range in due course of time. Of course, jokes about DTs-i becoming digital triple spark ignition have already started popping up on the internet. However, we shall let Bajaj have the benefit of the doubt. Though fuel injection on motorcycles is something we’ve become accustomed to in India, back when Bajaj launched the 220 DTs-Fi, it was truly a step ahead for the industry. Of course, Bajaj proved its marketing mettle when it dropped the technology that was the flagship 220’s claim to fame and went back to the carburetted version, and made the 220 so much more affordable.
We also would like to bring to attention the design sketches by the duo Mark Wells and Ian Wride, at Xenophya Design. These sketches were captioned as being 250cc design concepts for an motorcycle manufacturer based in India.
It wasn’t too long ago that enthusiasts were speculating these were for Bajaj’s new range of motorcycles based on the design similarities to Bajaj’s current range. The rear cowl on the Mantis, the bike painted white below, seems to derive from the side panels on the Pulsar range. The front fairing on the red bike, seems to be a simplified and leaner version of the half fairing the currently adorns the Pulsar 220. Of course, we might be completely off the mark, we’ll just have to wait and see. Read Faster and Faster’s interview of the duo here.
The new Pulsar is rumoured to have liquid cooling, but we will reserve our opinions till we have further information. It does seem logical to have liquid cooling and the works, considering the competition does, but Bajaj has always tried to keep its products affordable and we wonder whether Bajaj could keep the bike under the 1 Lakh bracket if the engine is liquid cooled. There is also the KTM 200 in the equation, which should hover in the 1 to 1.5 Lakh price bracket, but we believe the Pulsar is of a different breed compared to the KTM and they would not be stepping on each other toes.
The 2012 Pulsar though introduced by the end of this year, should be available at dealers sometime in 2012.
Watch this space, while we post updates on the 2012 Pulsar as we receive them.
Source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/companies/article2559425.ece
For the first time in four years, two time Formula One World Champion Mika Häkkinen will climb into the cockpit of a racing car, as a guest driver for the final round of the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup on 13th November in Zhuhai (China). Häkkinen will be driving a Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3, in his capacity as a brand ambassador to Mercedes-Benz, for the six-hour race along with 2010 Mercedes-Benz DTM driver CongFu Cheng and Lance David Arnold of Germany.
The SLS will be racing in China for the first time. The car has been entered by an independent team, Customer AMG Sports Team China.
Häkkinen last raced on 14th October 2007 in an AMG Mercedes C-Class in the DTM season finale at Hockenheim. Between 2005 and 2007, he competed in 31 DTM races for Mercedes-Benz, securing three wins, three pole positions and eight podium finishes.
“It’s a great honour for me to be able to contest the first SLS AMG GT3 race in China. Although I’ve visited China many times, I’ve never raced there, which is why I’m really looking forward to Zhuhai. It will be a tough race in a competitive field, but I’ll do my best for Customer Sports Team AMG. Of course, being a guest driver in such a line-up should be a lot of fun, especially in the SLS AMG GT3. It’s a great customer motorsport vehicle which is both fast and extremely good-looking.”
The Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 is the competition version of the legendary gullwing, designed for customer motorsport. The car contested its first full racing season in 2011, including the ADAC GT Masters, the VLN Endurance Championship at the Nürburgring and the FIA GT3 European Championship. In its debut season, the SLS AMG GT3 scored victories in all three of these series; in the FIA GT3 European Championship, customer outfit Heico Motorsport won the team title, the first trophy for the gullwing.
After its reveal at the Chengdu Motor Show in mid-September, the Peugeot 308 sedan is being launched today in the Chinese market. The 308 in China is called the ‘Dong Feng Peugeot 308’ and is produced at the plant n°1 of the DPCA (Dongfeng Peugeot-Citroën Automobile) joint venture in Wuhan. The 308 will reinforce the brand’s presence, notably within the C segment (mid-size vehicles), a strategic segment representing today 50 % of sales within China, the world’s largest automotive market.
The 308 sedan utilizes platform 2 of the PSA Peugeot Citroën Group vehicle base, which with this
new launch should reach a total production level of 1.3 million units per year.
PSA Peugeot Citroen’s entry into India with a plant in Sanand, should begin though, with its flagship Peugeot 508.
One of the first entries submitted for the CRT category was that of the Marc VDS team which actively tested a BMW 1000cc engine in a Suter chassis. However, in the interim things have turned sour between Suter and Marc VDS which is run by the ex manager of the Kawasaki factory MotoGP team, Michael Bartholemy, with the team accusing Suter of giving a better chassis to Marc Marquez’s team in Moto2 rather than to it. Originally team Aspar was to run a Ducati for Hector Barbera though it now appears that Jorge Martinez has decided to run two CRT machines (he always wanted two bikes) and that means that one Ducati is available as a satellite spec machine. Marc VDS could take over this motorcycle and run it with Scot Redding as the rider. Marc VDS team has complained that the Suter chassis is very expensive and so if they had the money for that, it is likely that they can cough up the money for the Ducati. This however is still the silly season and only by the GP of Valencia will we probably know who is doing what.
It is believed that another confirmed entry in the CRT category of MotoGP (the other being that of Team NGM Forward with Colin Edwards) is the one by Ioda Racing Project’s BMW-Suter machine which will be ridden by Italian youngster Daniel Petrucci. However, the actual confirmation of this will happen during the GP of Valencia. As many as eight CRT entries are expected with Jorge Martinez’s Aspar team planning to run two CRT bikes (engine – chassis combination yet to be decided but possibly Aprilia RSV4 engine in FTR chassis; riders also to be decided though Hector Barbera is likely to be one of them), Gresini one CRT with the Honda CBR1000RR engine (frame to be decided), the Blusens BQR supposedly confirming two entries (Kawasaki ZX-10R engines with FTR chassis;riders not yet known, though the name of Yonny Hernandez has been mentioned in rumours) and a few more.
Tom Sykes was taken into the Kawasaki Superbike Racing Team by Paul Bird when Paul Bird Motorsport was running the official Kawasaki effort. Prior to that Sykes had been a factory Yamaha rider and teammate of Ben Spies before he lost his ride at Yamaha. Paul Bird also was instrumental in convincing Kawasaki to keep Sykes for 2011 and Sykes rewarded Kawasaki with a win, the first in six years. PBM has been told that Kawasaki no longer needed its services and Paul Bird has said that even Sykes’ services have been dispensed with. However, Tom Sykes says that it is still possible that he will ride for Kawasaki along with Joan Lascorz next year even though the manufacturer has suggested that the World Superbike Racing team will become more in house. Kawasaki is keeping mum on this. It has supported Chris Vermeulen from the second half of last season and the whole of this season, when the injury that he sustained last year has kept him out of the saddle. It is believed that Vermeulen will no longer be with Kawasaki and he may even be out of racing for a while.
The promoters of the Formula1 GP of India and the owners of the Buddh International Circuit have finally unveiled the circuit to the world ahead of the impending F1GP of India on the 30th of October, 2011. The circuit which is designed by Herman Tilke is considered to be very smooth, wide and conducive to overtaking. The overall length of the circuit exceeds 5 kms and has ups and downs created artificially to enable the enhancement of the spectacle. The circuit uses the latest Tecpro barriers, and has good drainage system should it rain during the GP weekend. The grand stand is supposed awe inspiring. An old Red Bull Racing car was driven on the circuit.
Picture courtesy: Autocar India.com
It is well known that Maruti is being crippled increasingly by its workers striking work at the Manesar plant and this has been pushing up the waiting period for its cars to many months. Tata Motors which has the Fiat Multijet engine in its range in the form of the Quadrajet just as Maruti does (the same engine which Maruti calls DDiS) is trying to take advantage of the demand for diesel engined cars and Maruti’s inability to meet demand, by increasing the production of its own vehicles. Tata has the very capable Manza and now the facelifted Vista to take on the Dzire and the Swift from Maruti.