The FIA has published the updated rules for the 2010 F1 season.

F1 teams will no longer declare their starting fuel weights and post-race penalties have been changed meaning drivers could have up to half a minute added to their race time by the stewards.

Changes to the sporting rules

Penalties

Stewards hand out post-race penalties in situations where drivers would be given drive-through or stop-go penalties, but incur them too late in the race for that to be possible.

Last year stewards could only give 25 second penalties, but now they will be able to give 20 second penalties to drivers who would have received drive-through penalties, and 30 seconds to those who would have had stop-go penalties.

Drivers who get penalties during the race will now have only two laps to serve them instead of three.

Refuelling

The widely-discussed ban on refuelling is in the rules:

29.1 a) Refuelling is only permitted in the team’s designated garage area.
b) No car may be refuelled after it has left the pit lane for the first time whilst the pit exit is open for the
race.
c) Fuel may not be added to nor removed from a car during a race.
29.2 No car may be refuelled, nor may fuel be removed from a car, at a rate greater than 0.8 litres/second.

The FIA has also deleted the requirement for teams to publish their fuel loads before the race. This is no great surprise, as the fuel load no longer has as great a bearing on race strategy, and F1’s engine manufacturers may not want people working out which of their units are the most efficient.

Tyres

In place of ‘race fuel qualifying’ the FIA is now forcing the top ten qualifiers to start the race on the tyres they set their best time on. Here’s the wording of the rule:

25.4 d) At the start of the race each car which took part in Q3 must be fitted with the tyres with which the driver set his grid time. This will only be necessary if dry-weather tyres were used to set the grid time and if dry-weather are used at the start of the race. Any such tyres damaged during Q3 will be inspected by the FIA technical delegate who will decide, at his absolute discretion, whether any may be replaced and, if so, which tyres they should be replaced with.

The total number of tyres available to a driver has also been reduced to 11 sets of dry-weather tyres (six “prime” and five “option”).

A new clause requires drivers to hand some tyres back after FP1, which is no doubt to encourage more teams to run cars in the often-quiet first session.

Each nominated driver will be allocated three sets of dry-weather tyres for use during P1 and P2, two of “prime” specification and one of “option” specification. These are the only dry-weather tyres which may be used during these sessions. One set of “prime” specification must be returned to the tyre supplier before the start of P2 and one set of each specification before the start of P3.

Homologation

Team must now homologate certain parts of their cars at the start of the championship which they cannot change.

28.7 a) One specification of each of the following parts must be homologated prior to the first Event of the Championship season:
– survival cell;
– principal and second roll structures;
– front, rear and side impact structures ;
– front wheel;
– rear wheel.
Once homologated, changes to the these parts will only be permitted for clear safety or reliability reasons following written approval from the FIA.

It’s not hard to see how the FIA might want to widen this homologation in the future to keep costs under control.

Race suspension

New rules govern what drivers must do if a race is suspended, as it was during last year’s Malaysian Grand Prix:

41.2 When the signal is given overtaking is forbidden, the pit exit will be closed and all cars must proceed slowly to the starting grid. The first car to arrive on the grid should occupy pole position and others should fill the remaining grid positions in the order they arrive.

Some of the other changes in the 2010 sporting rules have been mentioned previously here, such as the reduced allocation of six days of straight-line aerodynamic testing (any day of which can be substituted for four hours of full scale wind-tunnel testing).

There’s also the new points system (25-18-15-12-10-8-6-4-2-1), provisions for a rookie driver test if a team needs to make a substitution during the season,

Here are the sporting rules in full:

Technical rules

Among the changes to the technical rules are a restriction on the maximum number of exits an exhaustmay have (two), limitations on the construction of suspension uprights and wheel assembly, and a revised list of permitted materials.

Drivers also have a new limit on the number of gear ratio pairs:

9.6.2 The maximum number of numerical change gear ratio pairs a competitor has available to him during a Championship season is 30. All such gear ratio pairs must be declared to the FIA technical delegate at or before the first Event of the Championship.

And these are the two additions to the technical rules which ban the use of wheel ‘hubs’ and spinners:

The ducts may not rotate with the wheels nor may they, or any of their mountings, protrude axially beyond the outer face of the wheel fastener;
No part of the car, other than those specifically defined in Articles 12.8.1 and 12.8.2, may obscure any part of the wheel when viewed from the outside of the car towards the car centre line along the axis of the wheel

Read the full 2010 F1 technical rules here

This year's British Grand Prix is to be held on Silverstone's new "Arena" circuit layout, which is aimed at improving overtaking opportunities.

Silverstone said on Thursday that it had been given approval to use the design by the sport's bosses.

The new layout introduces a series of corners after Abbey corner before rejoining the old track at Brooklands.

It lengthens the track by 0.472 miles to 3.666 miles and is expected to add about four seconds to lap times.

Silverstone had already decided to use the new layout for the MotoGP race, for which it has won back the contract from Donington Park, but was awaiting approval from the F1 authorities.

A statement said the new layout had "been designed with a view to creating three new overtaking opportunities".

The race organisers say the new circuit, built at a cost of £5m, will provide a better experience for fans in 2010.

It cuts out the Abbey chicane and Bridge and Priory corners, replacing them with a new sequence of fast bends and a pair of tight corners which will be in view from the Becketts grandstand.

The new configuration will have to be homologated by the FIA before this year’s F1 race.

Here’s how the new and old tracks compare:

With the lap length increasing expect the number of laps in this year’s F1 race to fall from 60 to 52.

Silverstone is also attempting to improve the facilities for spectators by constructing elevated viewing banks and moving existing grandstands to bring the fans closer to the action.

Silverstone Circuits managing director Richard Phillips said: "The new sections of circuit were initially brought in to comply with MotoGP safety regulations, but the 'Arena Complex' was always designed with both two and four-wheeled racing in mind.

"We have been very careful, working closely with drivers and riders, to make sure we are improving and enhancing what Silverstone already has to offer - from a drivers, riders and spectators point of view.

"Some will miss not seeing modern day F1 cars accelerating through Bridge, but we have to move with the times and continue looking at ways to improve the overall experience.

"The new layout will bring an extra dimension to Silverstone, a new challenge for the drivers, and will enable fans to get closer to the action."

The new track layout is the first stage of a series of improvements Silverstone is aiming to make after it ended uncertainty over the future of the British GP by winning in December a 17-year contract to host the race.

The next stage is a new pit and paddock complex, to be located between Club and Abbey corners and which is scheduled to be completed by the summer of 2011.

New garages, a race control building, media centre, hospitality and VIP spectator zones will be included.

Source: BBC

Heavy rain ruined the first day of the second pre-season Formula 1 test.

Nico Rosberg's Mercedes set the fastest lap during a brief period of dry running in the morning at Jerez in Spain before rain soaked the track.

The German clocked one minute 20.927 seconds at Jerez to head Toro Rosso's Sebastien Buemi by 0.104secs.

Rosberg's time was about two seconds off a representative quick lap in Jerez, and the persistent rain meant no more dry running was possible.

Wednesday also saw the first running of the new Red Bull car, which was not ready in time to run in Valencia so its pace compared with the other top teams will be watched with interest this week.

Mark Webber completed about 40 laps in wet conditions before he brought the session to a halt when his car stopped out on the track.

While waiting for a recovery truck, he positioned his helmet and head protection behind the car so photographers could not take pictures of the car's diffuser, a crucial part of the rear of the car that promotes aerodynamic downforce.

Here are the first pictures of the new car.

Red Bull have taken a gamble by missing the first test of 2010 to work on the design of their RB6. Designer Adrian Newey expalined the changes on the new car:

The RB6 is very much an evolution of the 2009 car. We tried to refine and evolve it rather than go to new concepts.

As a result, the car looks similar with elements such as the chassis and pull-rod rear suspension retained. The two main challenges were the larger fuel tank and the smaller front tyre. With the fuel tank, there was more to it than simply putting a bigger tank in the car – it puts more load on the brakes, so the brake cooling has to cope with that and you also have to consider what effect that extra fuel will have on the tyre degradation early in the race and if there’s anything we should change mechanically to cope with that.

The narrower front tyre changes weight distribution and the balance of the car. I think it’s a sensible evolution of the 2009 car. One obvious difference is that the 2009 car was not designed to suit a double-diffuser and we had to try to put one on as best we could around the existing rear suspension and gear box. With this car we’ve been able to design that part of the car from scratch.
Adrian Newey

FIA president Jean Todt has confirmed that Formula 1 teams are now allowed to miss up to three grands prix without penalty, as doubts persist over whether US F1 and Campos will be ready to start their debut seasons.

F1 impresario Bernie Ecclestone has stated on several occasions in recent months that he expects neither of the teams to be on the grid for the first race of 2010 in Bahrain on March 14 and predicted last weekend that both would ask to miss the opening three races – an option he says was now open under the terms of the latest Concorde Agreement.

Todt has now confirmed that teams would be allowed to skip three events – in any order – before they faced sanctions, which means US F1 and Campos would have the option of sitting out the first three races before joining the grid in China in mid-April should they need more time to get their teams in order.

"At the last session of the World Council the possibility of a team not participating in three races was endorsed, even if they were not consecutive races,” Todt was quoted as saying by Italy’s Gazzetta dello Sport.

Although both US F1 and Campos have publicly insisted on several occasions they will be ready to take up their respective place on the grid, the Serbian-backed Stefan GP outfit has been pushing ahead with plans to join the field should either of the confirmed teams’ plans fall through and says it has already shipped equipment to Bahrain.

Todt, however, has made it clear that even one of the 13 grid places becomes available there is no guarantee the spot will be filled.

“But if a team withdraws from the entire championship, a new team will not be introduced automatically,” the Frenchman added.

“It's always up to the FIA to decide if a team meets the requirements or not."

The Frenchman’s predecessor as FIA president, Max Mosley, used much of his final year in office to try and push through his controversial budget cap idea in a bid to cut costs and entice new teams into the sport, before a deal with teams was eventually reached on the Resource Restriction agreement which sets out particular areas where cuts have to be made.

Todt has reiterated that he won’t be returning to the budget cap idea himself in future and would rather see further cost reductions achieved through the regulations.

"I'm against the budget cap, because in China for example they can do more with the investments that you make in other parts of the world,” he said.

“Savings need to be made through the rules, like for example a single aerodynamic package for the whole year.

“The cars slide more at Monaco? Perhaps we should look at the driver's ability instead!"

He stressed that future rule changes need to be made with the environment in mind, suggesting that it wasn’t good enough for F1 to simply ditch energy-storage devices such as KERS because the technology was too expensive to develop.

"I will work hard to make them [the rules] as clear as possible but I can't guarantee that there won't be problems, the engineers are clever,” Todt added.

“The future is tied to the new technologies: it's not acceptable to abandon KERS just because it's expensive, the teams need to work out a way to make it affordable.”

Source: ITV-F1.com

Ferrari team boss Stefano Domenicali says the Italian team is not getting carried away with its dominant performance at the first pre-season test in Valencia this week.

Felipe Massa was quickest on the first two days of the test, before new signing Fernando Alonso clocked the best time of the week on his single day in the car on Wednesday – some 0.6s faster than the best effort by a non-Ferrari (Kamui Kobayashi’s Sauber on Tuesday).

Domenicali, however, is remaining cautious about the team’s form – pointing out that the potentially huge differences in fuel loads, combined with the fact that Red Bull has yet to launch its new car, mean it is much too early to draw firm conclusions from the headline times.

“We know very well that the testing lap times, especially this year, have to be handled with care,” he told Ferrari’s official website.

“Using an Italian expression from football, we’re still in ‘August football’.

“We can’t forget where we were in terms of performance at the last grand prix last year.

“There is still a lot of work to do to close the gap and there are still many problems we have to solve.

“And then we don’t know the petrol loads the other cars had on board, so it’s impossible to get a clear idea of the relative strengths on the track.

“Maybe someone also wants to play hide and seek and some still have to present their cars.”

Domenicali suggested the scale of the challenge Ferrari faces in attempting to rebound from its lacklustre 2009 campaign means it is unlikely to return to its absolute peak overnight.

“There are no miracles in Formula 1,” he said.

“If you want to be fast you have to work hard for months and months and then you’ll meet your competitors, who have as much capacity and are as motivated as you.

“We can’t take anything for granted and we shouldn’t delude ourselves by [early] indications, which could be completely misleading.

“We can’t work like in football where two good or bad results are enough to [take you] from riches to rags or vice versa.”

Having identified improved reliability at the start of the season as a key goal for 2010, Domenicali said the F10’s performance on this front was the most pleasing aspect of this week’s test.

“If there is one thing we’re really satisfied with then it’s the reliability the car has shown,” he said.

“The more than 1,400 kilometres (870 miles) driven are a very good start, and we need to ensure that the intense work at the test stand and in terms of simulations over the weeks before the debut on the track will bear fruit.

“In Valencia we also started to get to know the new Bridgestone tyres’ behaviour also related to the petrol load.

“But the data is still absolutely relative: this track is not particularly demanding on the tyres and the temperatures weren’t the ones we’ll have for example during the season’s first three races.”

He added that Massa and Alonso were thrilled with the outcome of the test and have already pinpointed some areas where the F10 could be further improved.

“They were both very happy with how things went, especially regarding the car’s reliability,” he said.

“They are both extremely motivated and have a great desire to drive; it would have been frustrating if we hadn’t started on the right track here.

Yesterday, the Virgin Racing team launched their first challenger in the VR-01.

See below for more pictures and information about the VR-01.

Designer Nick Wirth has created the VR-01 entirely using Computational Fluid Dynamics computer modelling. This is not a new technology for F1 – but relying on it instead of a wind tunnel to create a new car is a novel approach.

Wirth believes CFD is the best way for teams to develop F1 cars under F1’s new resource restrictions:

Today is a very proud day for everyone involved with Virgin Racing, however on this occasion, where the car is the star, I want to pay tribute to all the amazing people at Wirth Research who deserve so much of the credit for the VR-01. Putting together an F1 team, assembling an engineering group and designing a new car from scratch is an epic task in the timeframe we have been working to.

I have been fortunate to have worked with the very best designers in F1 and I am well aware of exactly what it takes to be successful in this sport. When you see what the existing teams have achieved using the conventional but proven design approach, it is unsurprising that there is a great deal of scepticism about our all-CFD approach. But we are competing in a sport that is undergoing significant change having come face to face with today’s harsh economic realities. Under resource restriction, convention will become too costly and necessity really will be the mother of invention. I have absolute belief in the digital design process and the opportunity to put the all-CFD approach to the test at the highest level – to demonstrate that this could be the way for the future of F1 – is very, very exciting.
Nick Wirth

The team, originally named Manor Motorsport, are using Cosworth’s CA2010 V8 engines this year.

Team principal John Booth said:

Not only do we have a great bunch of people at Virgin Racing, we also have a great-looking car. We are delighted with our fantastic new livery which provides a fitting integration of our racing brand with our important commercial partnerships. All in all, we have a lot to look forward to as we progress towards our racing debut in Bahrain next month.
John Booth

He also explained why the car was not ready in time for the test at Valencia this week:

The first stage in our on-track evaluation programme is our two-day shakedown at Silverstone on Thursday and Friday this week, where we will conduct systematic testing and confidence-building of all car parts and on-car systems. It was always intended that we would miss the first all-team test in Valencia this week and very early on we targeted the second Jerez test in two weeks’ time for our public testing debut. It is a testament to our methodical approach and the sheer hard work of the team that we are heading to Spain a week earlier than planned to take part in the first Jerez test next week.
John Booth

Virgin chairman Sir Richard Branson added:

I’m sure we will be measured by how fast the car is on the track in Jerez next week, but I hope that doesn’t overshadow the far bigger achievement of pulling an entire racing team together and taking a brave step that defies convention. In many ways this is an exploration, but given the absolute self-belief we have seen, I can’t help but feel very excited about what we can go on to achieve in the years ahead.

For now though I’m looking forward to seeing the VR-01 on –track in testing in the coming weeks as we prepare for Virgin Racing’s very first grand prix.
Richard Branson

Fernando Alonso's first time in the brand new Ferrari F10 saw the spaniard top the time sheets in Valencia as Massa did on both Monday and Tuesday.

The double world champion took over from Felipe Massa and set a best time of one minute 11.470 seconds - more than half a second clear of the field.

Pedro de la Rosa's Sauber was second, ahead of Michael Schumacher's Mercedes, which was 0.968secs off the pace.

McLaren's Jenson Button ended the day 1.481secs slower than Alonso.

The Englishman said he had spent a lot of time in the garage during the morning sorting out a problem with his seating position in the car.

He added that he was happy with the McLaren's reliability but that it was "too early" to judge the relative pace of the front-running cars.

Winter testing times are notoriously unreliable indicators of form because fuel loads, tyres and track conditions can make a significant difference to performance.

Alonso, whose appearance at the test brought a crowd of 30,000 spectators, said he was "very, very cautious" about judging the pace of the car from his first day's running.

"It was a very good day," he said, "because I found the car very easy to drive because Felipe was running two days and I've been taking this information from him and it was a help. Let's wait.

On the second day of Formula 1 testing in Valencia, Felipe Massa puts in another sterling performance to mantain Ferrari's pace in the last two days testing.

The Brazilian, now fully back in the swing of Formula 1 after his injury lay-off, completed a full 124 laps with a best time of 1m11.722s, 0.8s quicker than his Monday effort.

Massa set the time halfway through the sunny but cool day, on his 15th lap of the session, and remained in front until the end.

In a repeat of yesterday's result, it was a Sauber that occupied second place again.

This time Kamui Kobayashi was at the wheel, the Japanese driver taking over from Pedro de la Rosa and lapping within 0.3s of Massa.

Testing times from Valencia (Tuesday 2 February)

Video of the first test session for the Formula 1 2010 season