Aussie Motoring

For some reason the press seem to ignore Australian participants in important overseas motor sport events. For example, you will always hear the who won the latest Formula 1 race but you rarely hear where Mark Webber - Australia’s only representative in Formula 1 finished.

If Mark Webber doesn’t get much mention in the local press then Chris Atkinson gets none even though he is performing well in the World Ralley Championship. Chris currently drives for Subaru and is currently sitting in 9th spot in the drivers after three WRC rounds.

The grid for the Malaysian Formule 1 Grand Prix is:

1. Fisichella/Renault

2. Button/Honda

3. Rosberg/Williams-Cosworth

4. Webber/Williams-Cosworth

Other grid positions are will not be announced till Sunday morning due to the new rules. A number of drivers, including Schumacher/Ferrari have opted for engine changes and this can affect their position on the starting grid by up to 10 places.

Racing begins at 5pm AEDT

The F1 season got off to an interesting start last weekend with the Bahrain Grand Prix. Already Renault have chalked up their first win but drivers agree that this year promises to be much closer than last year.

New engines - 2.4 litre V8’s in place of the 3 litre V10’s and a whole new raft of rules governing qualifying and tyres have also been introduced. You can read more about the new rules here

The Dakar Rally is over for another year and this time it certainly had its down side for Australian motor sport enthusiasts. But for Mitsubishi it was another successful year and VW were quite happy with the outcome too.

For the first time a diesel powered car gained a podium finish in the world’s toughest rally event and you can read the full story here of how the VW Touareg did it.

Ice racing is hardly likely to catch on here in Australia any time soon but in Europe it certainly does have a following where a Kia Rio driver has just beaten an F1 driver to take out the championship. The win gives Kia Riao it’s third consecutive series win.

Kia Rio driver, Yvan Muller, has taken sufficient points in the final round of what is regarded as the World Championship for the unique motorsport of ice racing, the Andros Trophy, to beat former F1 Grand Prix World Champion Alain Prost and win the championship title for the third successive year.

The domination of the series, which is held in freezing conditions on specially-built race tracks on the top of mountains in the Alps, by Muller and the Rio was achieved despite Muller carrying more weight-penalty ballast as the twice-previous championship winner. Muller comprehensively fought off last minute challenges from former F1 Grand Prix World Champion Alain Prost in a Toyota, Jean-Phillipe Dayraut in a BMW and Franck Lagorce in a Fiat.

The Kia team wrapped up the title with a superb tactical performance in Super-Besse, high in the Alps, recording solid placings in both races that were sufficient to secure enough points for Muller to win his tenth ice racing title.

According to Muller, “It was the hardest ice racing season in my career, and surely the most beautiful victory, even if I had to play a game I’m not used to. During the last three seasons, the team proved we could beat everybody, dominating in 2004 and 2005, or playing tactics and nerve breaking games this season.”

“In racing we are used to hearing about ‘fastest times,’ but this year we had our ‘fastest’ time even with 490 kilos of ballast,” commented Paul Bourion, Kmotorsport team principal. “We did three seasons with the Kia Rio and we won three championships, thanks to Yvan, while this year and in 2005 we also won the constructor’s championship. And we are very proud of that record,” he added.

Muller and the Kmotorsport team now go to Paris and the Stade de France for the final event of the season — a non-championship round on a specially created ice-track at the country’s national stadium on 18 March.

The one-time Jordan formula 1 racing team has now been renamed MF1 Racing and will race under a license from the Russian Automobile Federation. That makes it the first team to compete under the Russian flag in F1