Jean-Pierre Jabouille 1942 – 2023

It is sad to have to report the death of another top driver from Formula 1 in the 1970s, with the news that France's Jean-Pierre Jabouille has died at the age of 80. He was an accomplished engineer in addition to being a quick driver. He came from an unusual background, having studied modern art …

Green Notebook from the Porte de Versailles

Readers who venture to Paris from time to time will know that there are numerous “Portes…” in the City of Light. Porte means door or gate, and it is a nicer word than barrière or grille. The reasons there are all these gates is because there were once massive earthworks around Paris - and they …

KERFUFFLES AND TRANSPARENCY

The current kerfuffle about FIA President Mohammed ben Sulayem's tweet regarding the possible sale of the Formula 1 group (not that it ever seemed more than a tickle from Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund) is much ado about nothing, but it does highlight a number of things about the sport which probably need fixing. Some …

Nielsen joins the FIA

The FIA has restructured its racing operations with Nikolas Tombazis, who has led the FIA’s Formula 1 technical team since 2018 becoming Single Seater Director. There will be four divisions: Sporting, Technical, Financial and Strategy & Operations all reporting to Tombazis. Following many years of close collaboration with the FIA in his previous position at …

Williams appoints Vowles

Williams F1 has named James Vowles as its new team principal. Vowles (43) will join the Grove team from Mercedes AMG Petronas, where he has been Motorsport Strategy Director for the last three years. Vowles has had an impressive career to date, which goes back 21 years, to when he joined British American Racing as …

AN INTRIGUING APPOINTMENT

Hyundai Motorsport has announced the appointment of Frenchman Cyril Abiteboul in the role of Team Principal to strengthen German-based World Rally Championship operations in Alzenau, a few miles to the east of Frankfurt. Abiteboul is a high-energy talented individual, who operated in Formula 1 in various roles between 2001 and the start of 2021. He …

Poppycock!

I was seeking a word to use to describe the arguments being put forward by F1 teams about why there shouldn't be an 11th or 12th entry and "poppycock" leapt to mind. The word means nonsense, or at least that is the polite version. I was amused to discover that the word first appeared in …

Sorry folks, the Audience is sold out

We'll have to do another one some time...

come to a virtual audience…

I have been hosting Audiences for Formula 1 since (would you believe) February 2010, although this has become a little harder over time as increasingly venues in places near Formula 1 races have viewed the sport as being an endless pit of money and so have priced themselves out of the market. This is frustrating …

Excited about F1?

If you are new to the sport but keen to know more about F1, you might like to consider subscribing to GP+. This is an electronic magazine dedicated to the sport. You can read it in Flipbook format or download it as a PDF. Unlike any other F1 publication it appears just a few hours …