Obviously it has been a busy time for myself with the confirmation of the news of my involvement in the bid to bring the Team Lotus name back to the Formula One grid. It all came about as I knew Nino Judge, who in the late 80s and early 90s was at Lotus and involved with the active suspension development of the car back then. Nino went on to set-up the Litespeed Formula Three team and did a good job with them.
When Max Mosley announced the change to the regulations and the budget cuts the thought was to get the Team Lotus name back on the grid. It is an exciting project and a chance to get the name involved again and we just hope that we can be one of the teams that will be chosen on Friday when the team list for the 2010 season is announced. It is nice to have Mike Gascoyne involved in the project. He has a lot of experience in Formula One from his time with Jordan, Benetton and other teams.
It also adds a little more seriousness to our bid. A lot of people are talking about entries, but having someone like Mike involved shows how serious we are. My team involvement will be in the running of the team and the decision making, but also obviously in the driver side of things. We are already looking at drivers who we would be interested in running if we are accepted for next season. It is very important that we get the right type of driver, who will fit into the team.
I am just happy being involved in the project and hopefully there are some very exciting times ahead. It doesn't really surprise me the row between the teams and Max Mosley is still going. In Formula One the budgets are still extremely high and Max is aware that they need to be reduced and I think that is something the teams do want - it is just how the reductions are enforced that is the issue. I think that the reduction in budgets will be a good thing as it will allow more teams to compete and will give 26 car grids again, which will be nice as it is something the sport has not had for a number of years.
Looking back to Sunday's Turkish Grand Prix, it was another good performance from Jenson Button and Brawn. Watching the qualifying session I noticed that Sebastian Vettel did his time in his Red Bull on soft tyres and Jenson did his on the hard tyre and so that may have explained some of the advantage Sebastian had. As it turned out he was five kilos lighter as well, but once Jenson got ahead on the first lap there was no stopping him.
Brawn, in racing conditions, just seem to have such a big advantage. Jenson is driving superbly and he reminds me of Michael Schumacher in his ability to drive very quickly when he needs to and keep it smooth and fast at other times. It was frustrating for Jenson's teammate Rubens Barrichello who just had a race where anything that could go wrong did go wrong. It is funny how those problem can hit just one car, while the other car in the team has no problems whatsoever.
It was just a bad day for Rubens and I'm sure he'll bounce back well at the next race in Britain. sports@thenational.ae
