McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton and Sauber’s Sergio Perez have both been given three-place grid drops for the Indian Grand Prix, following breaking the rules surrounding double waved flags.

Hamilton’s penalty was given for “ignoring Double waved Yellow Flags at Turn 16 whilst Marshalls were in close proximity to the track,” whilst Perez’s was awarded for “ignoring Double waved Yellow Flags at Turn 16 whilst a car was being recovered in close proximity to the track.”

Both drivers were deemed to have breached Appendix H, Article 2.4.5.1 (b) of the 2011 FIA International Sporting Code, which tells drivers the following regarding double waved yellows: “Reduce your speed significantly, do not overtake, and be prepared to change direction or stop. There is a hazard wholly or partly blocking the track and/or marshals working on or beside the track.”

By finishing sixth in the British Grand Prix at Silverstone Kamui Kobayashi scored eight championship points – the best result for Sauber so far this season. His team mate, Pedro de la Rosa, had to give up at half distance because of damage to the rear of the car caused by an accident with Adrian Sutil. De la Rosa was speeding down the Hangar Straight when part of his rear wing shattered, causing the safety car.

Kobayashi was very happy with his race after finishing 6th from qualifying 12th, with the Japanese driver saying he found the race easy!

“I’m really happy, but actually I don’t have much to tell,” Kobayashi said. “I had a very good start from 12th, the team did a great pit stop and the race pace today was as good as I thought it would be. I was pretty confident before the race because I can really feel how the car is getting better and better now. I had no chance to overtake anybody this time, but I still enjoyed the race. I didn’t find it especially hard, I didn’t even sweat,” he concluded.

In contrast to his teammate, Pedro de la Rosa was very disappointed with his race after being hit by Adrian Sutil forced his retirement.

“Naturally I’m very disappointed,” said the veteran Spaniard. “The car was quite good. I had some understeer, but nothing major. Right after the start I was racing alongside Rubens Barrichello and he pushed me wide in turn one. That was where I lost two places and dropped back to 11th. But I was still racing for points when Adrian Sutil hit me from behind at half distance of the race because not everybody in front of me had stopped by then. Unfortunately the damage proved to be too bad to continue,” he lamented.

Team boss Peter Sauber said it was a ‘strong and successful’ race for Kamui Kobayashi, but the Swiss says that Kobayashi could have gone even faster!

“This was another strong and successful race for Kamui. But the difference to the recent Grand Prix in Valencia is this time he had to withstand a lot of pressure over the entire race distance. There was never a real gap ahead or behind him. He managed this tight situation very well and I think he could have gone even faster.

“My compliments not only to him and his driving, but also to the team which is improving the car step by step. Pedro had a very unlucky race. Right after the start he was pushed off by somebody, but he still had a good chance for points before the incident with Adrian Sutil on lap 26.”

Kamui Kobayashi (15th, 14th)

“After we lost some track time we tried to catch up with the programme, and I think we managed that quite well, especially with the short runs. We obviously have to improve our pace everywhere, but I found the balance of the car not too bad. I had only a little understeer and I think we can fix it with some set-up changes. The tyre situation with both compounds looks okay to me. The new track section is a bit bumpy and dusty, but it will get cleaner.”

Pedro de la Rosa (16th, 17th)

“I must admit it was not an easy day for me. The front end of the car doesn’t react the way I want it to. I really have a lot of understeer. It is worse in the very high and very low speed corners. I find it difficult to make the car turn. We have to look into the data now and find a solution.”

James Key, Technical Director, Sauber

“It was a fairly busy day. In the beginning the track was quite slippery, and therefore we did not get much work done in the first session. The new lay out of the circuit looks quite good, but there is also a significant difference in grip level between the old and the new part. The problem on Kamui’s car, which occurred at the very end of the first session, initially appeared to be engine related. Now it looks like it was an electronic issue, which we only found at the beginning of the second session. However, our main target is now to find the right balance for low and high speed consistency.”

The Spaniard said:

“We are all going to a new Silverstone and have to be open minded. The changes to the track look very nice and I expect its character, with plenty of medium and high speed corners, has remained unchanged, and this should suit our car more than the Valencia circuit did. I’m very much looking forward to the British Grand Prix.”

Pedro de la Rosa

Kamui Kobayashi unsurprisingly also likes the high-speed corners at Silverstone:

“I have a very good feeling for the race in Silverstone. I like this track a lot and I’m looking forward to seeing the new parts. The high speed corners make it one of my favourite circuits. Also there is always a good crowd, and I think this time with their fellow countrymen leading the championship they will be very excited. I like going to England, and London is a great city anyway.”

Kamui Kobayashi

Sauber’s technical director James Key revealed that the team have been analysing the new layout of the Silverstone circuit to get the best out of the C29 as possible:

“I’m looking forward to see how the new section affects the track. It was never a circuit that was easy to overtake on. It could be that the new section has some influence on that, but we won’t know until we get there. We’ve been working on what we think we need to do for the new layout. We will have a busy Friday to try and cover all the options to find out what is best for the modified track. What’s important there is high speed and medium speed stability of the car. The first sector, particularly, is dominated by these kinds of corners. It’s important that the car is competitive through Copse and then the winding section afterwards. There’s only really two or three places where braking is of high importance. It’s not a high braking energy circuit, so braking stability is less of an issue to consider, but we have to see how the new section affects that. I think we also have to keep an eye on the aerodynamic efficiency with the longer straights, so there is a bit to learn but also a lot which is familiar. I’m looking forward to the weekend.”

James Key

Kamui Kobayashi showed us the reason we all fell in love with him in the final races of 2009, passing Fernando Alonso and Sebastien Buemi on the final lap with his gung-ho style on full show, as he took 7th. Team boss Peter Sauber hailed the drive as ‘amazing’:

“I can only think of one word for it – amazing! I was obviously thrilled by his two overtaking moves at the end of the race, but what impressed me most was how Kamui mastered his long stint on the hard tyres. At times he was setting some of the fastest lap times of any driver, but still managed to look after his tyres. He also drove very consistently and didn’t allow himself to be put under pressure by Jenson Button. Signing a rookie is always something of a risk; on Sunday Kamui delivered confirmation that we made the right decision.”

James Key the technical director explained why the C29 was so competitive in the race:

“There are several reasons. When a driver finds himself in a competitive position like that he always finds something more in himself because he’s following quicker cars. And Kamui did a very good job. The race also showed that the car works when it’s in the right conditions, but the question we have and we had for several of the last races is why the car is more competitive in race conditions than qualifying. The drivers report that the car is easier to drive in the race, and tyre degradation wasn’t a problem either, so we weren’t particularly hard on the tyres. We need to look into the data, now that both drivers delivered a competitive race after a qualifying that was not up to our expectations. We need to pin down the differences in how the car is feeling and handling and see how we can apply that to qualifying.”

James Key also explained the next development steps for Sauber, and revealed that they have already started work on their 2011 car:

“We are currently in the process of splitting our resources as best we can between the current car and the C30. We are a private team and we don’t have unlimited resources to do everything we want. For Silverstone we have some front wing updates and modifications around the middle of the car. Then for Hockenheim we will have a rear end update which includes a diffuser step as well. The numbers in the wind tunnel are progressing well. At the same time we are focusing on Spa and Monza for lower downforce and drag configurations. And there will be further steps towards the end of the year.”

Kamui Kobayashi said of his moves on Alonso and Buemi:

“My car was feeling good and I had a lot more grip than Fernando and Sébastien with my fresh tyres; my lap times were clearly better. I only had four laps with the new tyres. I was genuinely faster, so I had to give it a try. I just wanted to get the most I could out of the situation. I was sure that I could get past as long as they didn’t make any strange moves under braking. I didn’t expect them to, as both of them are good drivers and would not throw away their points shortly before the end of the race.”

Sauber would have scored their first double points finish, was it not for the daft 5 second penalties dished out to numerous drivers for speeding behind the safety car. Pedro de la Rosa was demoted from 10th to 12th and said:

“No, that came totally out of the blue. I didn’t see the Safety Car delta time on the steering wheel display at all. The Safety Car went out onto the track as I was going through the final corners. These are fast corners, and we were still running close together, fighting for positions, as the race was still in its early stages. At the same time, I spoke to the pits on the radio, because I had been called in for a stop. Eight other drivers obviously had a similar experience. To tell the truth, I also think that if one of us had lifted in response to the delta time, it would have caused a crash. At the end of the day, I was 2.8 seconds too fast and accept my penalty for that, although this offence has not always been punished in the past. Plus, the fact that nine drivers all made the same mistake at the same time indicates that there were special circumstances involved. I found it surprising that the penalty was five seconds; a 20-second time penalty is about right for a drive-through.”

McLaren

McLaren have been talking up their changes for Barcelona, and are optimistic that the front row in qualifying is a possibility. There are major aerodynamic tweaks on the MP4-25, including on the front and rear wings. The team’s chief engineer Tim Goss said:

“We have certainly closed the gap. After the Barcelona test at the end of February, we were quite confident that we were there or thereabouts. So we were a little bit taken aback in [the opening race in] Bahrain. We were some way off, especially off the Red Bulls.

“In China, bar the slip-up Lewis had in qualifying, we proved that we had closed the gap in qualifying. We were probably only 0.2-0.3 seconds off Red Bull in qualifying trim.

“Barcelona depends very much on the technical changes and the results of the upgrades. We’ve made a big step forward, but the other teams like Red Bull and Mercedes are making some significant changes, Ferrari have announced that they are going to bring their own drag reduction rear wing, so I think it’s very difficult to make predictions for Barcelona. Although I’d like to think that we can put a car on the front row.”

Ferrari

Ferrari will head into the European leg of the season with their engine woes solved after the FIA gave the Scuderia permission to tweak the V8 which caused them problems at previous races. A glitch with the pneumatic valves in the engines was to blame for the failures.

That’s not the only change for Ferrari – they head to the Circuit de Catalunya with an F-duct! Whether they will use it or not at this early stage in its development is unclear. Red Bull say that an F-duct is on the way, but it shouldn’t be introduced for a while yet.

Mercedes GP

Mercedes are bringing a significantly revised W01 to Spain. In addition to a major aerodynamic and bodywork package, the length of the car is to be increased in order to improve its weight distribution and use its tyres more effectively.

They have also created an innovative air intake, with the regular single intake replaced with two separate holes on either side of the car.

Renault

Renault are making minor changes for Barcelona with a new front wing and other aerodynamic features, and the Enstone-based team are concerned that the longer wheelbase of the Mercedes may mean that the gap between the two widens. Alan Permane, the team’s chief race engineer explained:

“Mercedes may move away from us a little bit but we’ve got a new front wing and some other new aerodynamic parts that should help us make another step forward. It’s not the biggest update we’ve had this year, but it continues our approach of adding new parts at each race.

“It will be very interesting to see how the situation shakes out between the different teams.”

Force India

Force India have some aerodynamic improvements all over the car, with refinements to the front wing and bargeboard area, plus some mechanical changes aimed at improving lower speed corner performance, meaning that the Silverstone team are not concerned about losing pace to faster-developing rivals.

Toro Rosso

Toro Rosso’s STR5 will feature a new engine cover and the car will also carry new brake ducts this weekend, and team boss Franz Tost is targeting a Q3 session at Barcelona:

“In the last couple of races we already saw an improvement in our package, so in Barcelona, I would hope that if we do everything perfectly, we could get at least one driver through into Qualifying 3 for the first time this season, or if not, then at least very close to tenth on the grid, so that more points has to be a realistic target for us this weekend.”

Lotus

As you would expect at a team with Mike Gascoyne at the helm, Lotus are bringing substantial updates to Barcelona. The T127 will have an aero package with revised sidepods, front wings and brake ducts, and a number of mechanical changes.

Sauber

Sauber are bringing a package of updates to the Spanish Grand Prix, with particular focus on the front end and diffuser. The team are also trying to push their own version F-duct system.

Virgin Racing

Only Timo Glock will have a VR-01 with a big enough fuel tank after the fallout from ‘the Volcano’ meant that Virgin only had time to make 1 new chassis. Glock will also get an aerodynamic upgrade for this weekend’s race, while di Grassi will only have some new parts on his car and not the whole package.

Sauber have become the first team in the paddock to replicate McLaren’s duct system.

They have fitted the vent to the left sidepod on their C29 cars given the fact that the technical regulations forbid major changes to the chassis.

Sauber have shown impressive speed in recreating their own version of the device which stalls the rear wing at high speed when the driver closes a vent in the cockpit, especially considering it took McLaren two years to develop.

Sauber will have presumably used their driver Pedro de la Rosa’s knowledge of the device to recreate their own, as de la Rosa was a test driver at McLaren before joining the Hinwil-based team.

de la Rosa said the team have yet to decide whether the system is raceable or not:

“It is a prototype, and the team has been working the last week flat out. We just have to be open minded.

“We have no testing, and this is the first opportunity we have to try it. We have to test it, make sure it works and then decide if it is raceable or not. We just have to have the patience to test it properly.”

Pedro de la Rosa

BMW Sauber have dropped a hint that they may be changing the name and logo of their Formula 1 team, to Sauber Motorsport. It makes sense, too, given that BMW are no longer associated with the team.

The above, new logo was displayed on a press release previewing the Bahrain Grand Prix on the BMW Sauber media site.

However changing their name could cause its own issues – to change a F1 team name after already registering another, is difficult and could result with the loss of the team’s claim to TV revenue earned in the 2009 season. Another theory is that Peter Sauber may be waiting for a title sponsor before filling in the name-change form.

The 56-year-old German Willy Rampf has stepped down as technical director at the BMW Sauber team, after 10 years in his position at the Hinwil-based team.

Rampf is to make way for 38-year-old Englishman James Key, who will take up his position at the team on April 1st.

Key started off designing cars at Lotus, before launching his Formula One career in 1998 as a data engineer with Jordan. After becoming Takuma Sato’s race engineer, Key then spent a year in the aerodynamics department, before he was made head of vehicle dynamics. Key was appointed Technical Director in season 2005, when the team was renamed Midland. He retained this position when the team became SpykerF1 and then Force India. Key was in charge of the VJM02 with which the private team took a pole position, a podium place and a fastest race lap in 2009.

Key said:

“The first time I saw the facilities in Hinwil, I knew straightaway the kind of opportunities open to me there. The wind tunnel, the supercomputer, the machine park and the expertise of the team were extremely persuasive. There is significant potential at Sauber, and with the ever-changing world of F1 I think the team is very well placed at present. I am grateful to my old team for the past 12 years I spent with them, but now I very much look forward to starting my new job. I would like to thank Peter Sauber and the team for this great opportunity.”

James Key

BMW Sauber team boss Peter Sauber commented:

“Despite his young age, James looks back on more than a decade of experience in Formula One – and the 2009 car in particular proved quite a revelation. James comes from a private team and knows how to work around a limited budget. With us he will enjoy high-level technical opportunities. Willy and James will be devoting April to the handover. I have known about Willy’s plans for some time, of course, and fully understand his decision. He has achieved great things for our team. I had managed to get him on board as race engineer for season 1994. Then in 1998 he temporarily left the team to pursue his Paris-Dakar Rallye dream and ran BMW’s motorcycle involvement – a successful interlude, as we know. In 1999 he returned to the fold with the clear aim of becoming Technical Director. It was practically his first Formula One car that was out on the grid in 2001, and we finished fourth in the Constructors’ Championship as a privately-run team. We have Willy to thank for a great deal.”

Peter Sauber

Willy Rampf said:

“When you’re Technical Director of a Formula One team, the job comes first and everything else is subordinate to it. I have done my job with a passion for ten years, but now it’s time to hand over the baton. Peter Sauber gave me the chance to enter this league of motor sport and I greatly value all my years spent working with the team.”

Willy Rampf

Here are some images of the most debated liveries and you can vote like or loathe, for each livery.

Renault R30

This is the most modern car of our list of debatable liveries – it’s the brand new Renault R30! Some of us think that it is a great retro look, back to the days when Arnoux was battling Villeneuve, but others disagree, saying it is garish. What about you?

Brawn GP BGP001

Second on our list is the unforgettable championship-winning 2009 Brawn GP BGP001. Is it cool and stylish with it’s day-glo yellow lines, or boring and bland?

Renault R29

Next up is the 2009 Renault R29. Some liked it, and some loathed it – one of the most imaginative descriptions I have read about the R29 is: “the F1 car been painted with sick and then put a bit of red on the wings.” What do you think?

Honda RA107 ‘Earth car’

The Honda ‘earth car’ of 2007 is next on the list. The team ran sponsor free, with the car only sporting a giant image of the earth and the ‘myearthdream.com’ logo’s, designed to raise awareness of environmental issues. Being F1 fans, some people hated the environmental slant, and, unsurprisingly, myearthdream.com is no more.

Was this livery a dream, or a nightmare?

‘Chrome’ McLarens

A suggestion for this list I have had off a few people is the chrome McLarens, which first came about in 2006, and have stayed on the cars ever since. Some people think they look sleek and stylish, but others think that they are boring, and that McLaren should go back to the classic white and red. What about you?

Stewart SF1

I must admit, the Stewart SF01 is one of my favouite cars of all time, but some people think that it is boring, and @TommyB89 on Twitter said it was “cringeworthy Scottish patriotism.” What about you?

Sauber C24

The final car on our list is the Sauber C24. In my opinion one of the most disgusting liveries ever! Cast your votes:

Do you want to rant about how one of your favourite F1 livieries has made it into this list, or tell us how much you hate one of the cars pictured here? Leave a comment!