TEAMS AND DRIVERS

The new car from the Lotus F1 outfit has been designated the E20, after team bosses found out that star driver, Kimi Raikkonen, was a big fan of depressing TV show, ‘Eastenders’.

‘E20’ is the post code for the fictional hell… hole of Walford, set in the real life hell hole of the east end of London.

A team source told Grand Prix Diary “We are keen to keep Kimi happy, so we’ll do anything, no matter how small to do that.” He went on, “We thought naming the car after his favourite TV show was a nice thing to do.”

If this picture of a beaming Kimi is anything to go by, the plan seems to be working…

When the design bods at Caterham F1 saw the technical regulations for 2012 it became apparent very quickly that whatever they did, the car was going to be a bit on the ugly side.

This obviously is not just a Caterham… issue, it will more than likely affect much of the pitlane but as they were the first team to launch their 2012 challenger, the spotlight fell on the look of the CT01 particularly its duck billed platypus style nose.

The team found a good way round the problem, launch the car online and in the dark. By the time we get to see it in daylight we’ll have seen everybody elses ugly offerings so hopefully the shock will have worn off.

Now as you can see, during the off season this website is not exactly kept up to date but even we are not quite as tardy as the Hispania Racing Team.

A quick look at the team website shows that Daniel… Ricciardo and Narain Karthikeyan still drive for the team even though Ricciardo is now at Toro Rosso while Karthikeyan effectively ceased to be a driver last summer. Vitantonio Liuzzi is still there but as they haven’t sacked him just yet we’ll let them off with that one.

Mind you, rumours that Pedro de la Rosa may not even start the season could explain why that particular high profile signing is pretty much nowhere to be seen.

However, HRT’s website woes are nothing compared with those of  Williams, who were rather embarrassed on Tuesday as their profile page for the as yet unannounced Bruno Senna was up and down like a yo-yo as the page was built in front of us. When the page was down it was replaced by an AT&T logo, a company who ceased to be involved with the team some weeks ago.

Cracking start to the season lads.

Well, as soon as we manage to get ourselves organised that is. The aim is that our 2012 website will be a more fan interactive and Twitter friendly affair than the one you see here. Just like Adrian Sutil, the… site has done a good enough job for the last few years but it is now time to chuck it away and get a new one.

We’ll be doing away with the race and team lists you see to the left, as over the course of the season they become a bit unbalanced. I mean, you try finding something funny to write about the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix or the Sauber F1 team. It just isn’t going to happen. Anyway, we’ll still have the usual brand of lunacy, competitions and great pictures from Sutton Images all year.

Watch this space.

Music loving F1 fans were slightly excited today, when rumours surfaced that record label, K-tel, were to be the new title sponsor for the Williams team.

K-tel are famed for releasing compilation albums with dodgy covers but until now had never… been connected with F1.

Sadly it seems that the fans are to be disappointed as the new sponsor is believed to in fact be Q-tel, a telecommunications company from Qatar, not known to be in the music business.

This is indeed a shame, as the opportunities for an album of Williams related songs would have been endless, with possible tunes to include; ‘Making plans for Nigel’, ‘Get into the Grove’, ‘Pastor Duchy’ and in deference to last season, ‘Williams, it was really nothing‘.

Bookmakers reckon the chances of HRT becoming F1 constructor champions are the same, at 500 -1, as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge calling their first child ‘Jedward’.

You have to say, ‘Jedward Windsor’ has a far more likely ring to… it than ‘HRT, World Champions’.

On second thoughts, its probably best to save your money.

To say F1 news is a bit thin on the ground at the moment is a bit of an understatement. Normally we would just make stuff up but we can’t even be bothered to do that.

So, how about we give… you a competition to have a go at, with not one but THREE ace prizes from the good people at RetroFormula1.com.

For no reason whatsoever, we have decided to have a competition based around the 1974 British Grand Prix, with prizes to match. One lucky reader can win a Brands Hatch poster of the 1974 race, a Hesketh cap and a pretty cool Tom Pryce / Shadow t-shirt.

To enter just follow @F1_Retro and @GrandPrixDiary and Tweet to both the answer to the following question?

What does Buffalo Chateaubriand and the 1974 British Grand Prix have in common?

WINNER ANNOUNCED @BROWNSQUIRREL

The answer is that race winner, Jody Scheckter, now sells organic meat including buffalo. Exciting eh?

Terms and Conditions.

We know you won’t read these but here we go. Competition open to international types as well as the UK, which is nice. Enter as many times as you like, not that it will improve your chances. There is no vegetarian option to the question. Entries close midnight 31 December and, hangover allowing, the winner will be announced on New Years Day. Anybody asking the usual silly questions will be automatically disqualified and made to stand in the corner. Amen to all that and good luck.

You wait ages for a French F1 driver and then just like London buses, three arrive at the same time.

With Romain Grosjean at Lotus, Charles Pic at Marussia and now Jean-Eric Vergne a la Toro Rosso, the 2012 grid will… have a distinctly Gallic feel.

With all the general stroppiness going on in Europe at the moment, the return of the French to F1 may be a good thing, as long as they don’t insist on only working a 35 hour week before siding with the Germans to give the British drivers a hard time.

While we are at it with the French stereotyping, we should mention that the white flag, indicating a slow moving vehicle such as a retiring car, is rarely used in F1 these days which removes the potential for any embarrassment should they see the flag being waved in their direction.