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From GMM

The next high-profile departure at Ferrari will be chief designer Nikolas Tombazis.

That is the claim of the well-informed Ferrari specialist and media insider Leo Turrini.

As Ferrari faltered yet again in 2014 despite the start of the all-new 'power unit' era, the red-coloured exits have flowed like wine at Maranello.

Stefano Domenicali, Luca Marmorini and even Luca di Montezemolo, Fernando Alonso and Marco Mattiacci have all now gone, and rumours suggest Pat Fry has been marginalised by the promotion of the 2015 car project leader, James Allison.

Not only that, Ferrari's Greek designer Tombazis, 46, also looks set to depart.

Ferrari F14 T. (Photo: WRi2)

Writing on his reliable Quotidiano blog, Turrini said the end of Tombazis' "Ferrari experience" is now sealed with the exception of "formalities and technicalities".

Notwithstanding the period of turmoil at Maranello, however, continuing Ferrari driver Kimi Raikkonen is confident about the future.

Backing the arrival of new teammate and friend Sebastian Vettel, and new boss Maurizio Arrivabene, the Finn said: "It's not easy to change things.

"But we have a clear plan of where we need to improve," Raikkonen is quoted by Speed Week. "I feel that the things that have been changed within the team will bring a very, very big improvement."

From press release

Force India Formula 1 team announce Thursday that it will use the wind tunnel facilities of Toyota Motorsport GmbH in Cologne, Germany, as the nominated site for all aerodynamic testing in 2015 and beyond.

Force India's wind tunnel facilities in Brackley, United Kingdom, will remain operational and available for external customers.

“The decision to use Toyota's facility in Cologne is indicative of our ambitions to continue as a competitive force in Formula 1,” said Dr Vijay Mallya, Team Principal and Managing Director.

“It's one of the most significant decisions in our history and gives us access to what is regarded as one of the finest wind tunnels in the world. We have used the facility previously on an ad hoc basis and we are aware of the advantages of basing all our aerodynamic research in Cologne. It will strengthen our approach and give us a solid base to build upon for the years to come.”

Members of the FIA World Motor Sport Council Wednesday rubber-stamped the 2015 World Rallycross Championship calendar.

The international series will visit North America again just once - at the famed Grand Prix of Trois-Rivieres, August 7-8.

The 12-round series will start in Montalegre, Portugal and will end late November in Argentina.

2015 FIA World Rallycross Championship schedule:

25‐26 April  PRT Montalegre
15‐17 May  BEL Mettet
23‐24 May  GBR Lydden Hill
19‐21 June  DEU Buxtehude
03‐05 July  SWE Höljes*
07‐08 August  CAN Trois-Rivieres, Quebec
21‐23 August  NOR Hell‐Lanke
04‐06 September  FRA Loheac
18‐20 September  ESP Barcelona*
03‐04 October  TUR Istanbul Park
17‐18 October  ITA Franciacorta
27‐29 November  ARG San Luis

* Subject to circuit homologation.

From GMM

Reports indicate Bernie Ecclestone's reign over formula one is once again under threat.

This year, the sport's long-standing 'supremo' survived the Gerhard Gribkowsky corruption affair.

But reports in the Financial Times (FT), The Times and by the Sky broadcaster this week claim that Paul Walsh is being lined up as chairman of the F1 board.

It is a move that could reportedly "signal the beginning of the end of Bernie Ecclestone's control" of the sport.

"A board meeting is being scheduled for early next week to discuss Mr Walsh replacing Nestle chairman Peter Brabeck, who has been F1 board chairman for two years, according to people with knowledge of the situation," wrote FT correspondent Roger Blitz.

He added that Brabeck is currently undergoing medical treatment.

Walsh stepped down as chief executive of Diageo, the owner of McLaren sponsor Johnnie Walker, earlier this year.

FT said F1's controlling shareholder CVC wants Walsh to take on some "executive duties in addition to chairing the board", which could see "Ecclestone's role as chief executive marginalised".

Ecclestone, 84, was quoted as saying he "wouldn't have a problem" with Walsh taking up a role.

"If it was something positive, I'd be delighted," he added.

CVC chief Donald Mackenzie is thought to be behind the impending change, with Blitz saying he wants "a more professional approach to the running of" the sport.

"In particular, Mr Mackenzie was worried about F1's digital, commercial and PR strategy," the Financial Times added, saying Ecclestone could be retained "in an honorary capacity".

"Mr Ecclestone said that was not a role he envisaged," Blitz noted.

From fia.com

FIA World Rally Championship competitors will be banned from receiving split times in special stages from the start of 2015 to spice up competition.

The FIA World Motor Sport Council voted for the ban with big penalties, likely to include exclusion from the championship, for breaking the rules.

Split times are available via the championship's results service and wrc.com. Teams quickly forward the information via text message, which appears on a screen in front of the co-driver.

Drivers use the data to manage time gaps to rivals. It allows them to decide whether to push harder if chasing a competitor ahead, or to measure their pace to preserve a stable margin over a driver behind.

The ban is intended to prevent teams from controlling their drivers so much and to preserve unpredictability.

It also means, for example, times cannot be sent by text message via a third party away from the rally, or by a team member displaying information on a board in the stage, as happened before electronic transmission became the norm.

It also means drivers cannot be informed during a stage if a rival has retired or lost time.

Split times will remain available to teams and fans to view as normal.

Safety information, including notifying crews if a stage has been neutralised following an accident, will still be permitted.

Adapted from GMM

Former F1 driver Patrick Tambay has hit out at the FIA for so squarely blaming Jules Bianchi for his life-threatening Suzuka crash.

At Wednesday's meeting of the World Motor Sport Council in Qatar, the 10-man panel charged with investigating the October accident handed down an almost 400-page report.

Signed off by the likes of Ross Brawn, Stefano Domenicali and Emerson Fittipaldi, they found that although water was running across the Japanese grand prix track, Jules Bianchi "did not slow sufficiently to avoid losing control".

Frenchman and former Ferrari driver Patrick Tambay said the report left the overwhelming feeling that Bianchi was squarely blamed for his own crash.

The 65-year-old said the FIA had declared: "'We wash our hands'.

"I think it's a shame to accuse the driver -- there must be interests of insurance or things like that," Tambay told RMC Sport.

"It is a judgment to exonerate responsibilities, but I think it's a little bit too hard to just blame the driver," he charged.

Jules Bianchi's crash at Suzuka, Japan. (Photo: WRi2)

A certain number of changes to the Formula 1 sporting regulations were approved by the members of the FIA World Motor Sport Council Wednesday in Doha.

The following decisions were taken:

Points
Points for both titles will no longer be doubled for the final Event of the Championship.

Standing Restarts
After consultation with the Teams who raised a number of safety concerns, Articles 42.7 and 42.8 on standing restarts have been rescinded.

Virtual Safety Car (VSC)
Following tests of the VSC system at the final Events of 2014, the introduction of the system has been approved for 2015. The VSC procedure may be initiated to neutralise a race upon the order of the clerk of the course. It will normally be used when double waved yellow flags are needed on any section of track and competitors or officials may be in danger, but the circumstances are not such as to warrant use of the safety car itself. The full text of the article is available in Annex I.

Suspending a race
When a race is suspended, the pit exit will be closed and all cars must now proceed slowly into the pit lane, not the starting grid. The first car to arrive in the pit lane should proceed directly to the pit exit staying in the fast lane, all the other cars should form up in a line behind the first car.

Team personnel or equipment on grid
If any team personnel or team equipment remain on the grid after the 15 second signal has been shown the driver of the car concerned must start the race from the pit lane. A ten second stop-and-go penalty will be imposed on any driver who fails to do this.

Power Unit Penalties
The replacement of a complete power unit will no longer result in a penalty, instead as specified in the current regulations, penalties will be applied cumulatively for individual components of the power unit.

If a grid place penalty is imposed, and the driver's grid position is such that the full penalty cannot be applied, the remainder of the penalty will be applied in the form of a time penalty during the race (not at the next race as was previously the case) according to the following scale :
• 1 to 5 grid places untaken: A penalty under Article 16.3(a) will be applied.
•  6 to 10 grid places untaken: A penalty under Article 16.3(b) will be applied.
•  11 to 20 grid places untaken: A penalty under Article 16.3(c) will be applied.
• More than 20 grid places untaken: A penalty under Article 16.3(d) will be applied.

Time Penalties
In addition to the existing five-second penalty (Article 16.3a), a new ten-second penalty (Article 16.3b) will also be introduced, to be applied in the same manner.

Unsafe Release
If a car is deemed to have been released in an unsafe condition during a race a ten second stop-and-go penalty will be imposed on the driver concerned. An additional penalty will be imposed on any driver who, in the opinion of the stewards, continues to drive a car knowing it to have been released in an unsafe condition.

Qualifying Procedure
The qualifying procedure was clarified: for cases when 24 cars are eligible seven will be excluded after Q1 and Q2, if 22 cars are eligible six cars will be excluded after Q1 and Q2, and so on if fewer cars are eligible.

Safety Car: lapped cars
Once the last lapped car has passed the leader the safety car will return to the pits at the end of the following lap, the race director will no longer have to wait for all the lapped cars to reach the back of the pack behind the safety car.

From GMM

F1 could be set to lose one of its major free-to-air broadcasters in a key market, according to Germany's Sport Bild.

Last week, RTL blamed "incomprehensible rules" and "counterproductive external representations" for a significant ratings decline in Germany this year.

Although the German Nico Rosberg, driving a works Mercedes, was in the hunt for the title to the very end, RTL said its average audience had dropped by almost a million viewers per race this season compared to 2013.

Reportedly, they were the worst ratings in 20 years, when Michael Schumacher won his first world championship in a Benetton.

Now, Sport Bild claims RTL is contemplating not renewing its formula one deal beyond 2015, with its current contract said to be worth some EUR 50 million per season.

"We are still achieving a market share of 30 per cent," spokesman Matthias Bolhofer said, "but overall, the development of the audience is not satisfactory."

From GMM

Organisers of the former Korean grand prix have been caught off guard by the country's surprise return to the 2015 calendar.

The unpopular and remote Yeongam race was held four times until 2013, whereafter the organisers ran into financial trouble and Bernie Ecclestone declared: "I don't want to go back there."

But Korea has made a shock return to the 2015 calendar, with the FIA on Wednesday rubber-stamping a May 3 race for next season, albeit with a 'to be confirmed' asterisk.

An official of the former Yeongam event, however, told French news agency AFP on Thursday: "We were given no prior notice.

"The FIA just announced it, although we've already conveyed our position about the difficulties of hosting a race next year."

The unnamed official said the organisers are effectively "broke", adding that the race is also unlikely to be held due to "negative views many people in the province have over the cost".

"Negotiations have been held on revising the contract in an attempt to reduce the financial burden, but they have been unsuccessful so far," the official added.

The AFP report said it is possible the May 3 race in Korea next year might actually take place on the streets of Seoul, the capital and metropolis.

From GMM

The Belgian grand prix in August was the turning point of Nico Rosberg's ill-fated 2014 championship campaign.

There, at Spa-Francorchamps, the German famously collided with eventual champion Lewis Hamilton.

Nico Rosberg was squarely blamed and heavily rebuked by Mercedes officials, prompting Hamilton to declare "war" and go on win the next five grands prix on the trot.

Team boss Toto Wolff admits that Spa might have been the turning-point for the once on-form Rosberg.

Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, Mercedes AMG, at Spa-Francorchamps. (Photo: WRi2)

"Spa was very difficult for Nico," he told Germany's Sport Bild.

"Maybe it even confused him because he didn't know anymore what is right and what is wrong," added Toto Wolff.

"We might have to sit down and discuss the situation again, as we want to handle these situations better in 2015," he said. "We have to admit that, as a team, we did not always handle things exactly right."

However, Wolff said that although Hamilton is now the new double world champion, that is no reason Rosberg cannot return to top form next year.

"Nico beat Lewis in his prime discipline this year, which is qualifying," said the Austrian. "He has all the ingredients you need to take on Lewis Hamilton and become world champion."

From Citroen Racing

Norwegian Mads Østberg and Swede Jonas Andersson will compete in a works Citroen DS 3 WRC for the entire 2015 World Rally Championship.

Their season will therefore begin at Rallye Monte-Carlo (19-25 January), alongside Sebastien Loeb/Daniel Elena and Kris Meeke/Paul Nagle.

Mads Østberg will have the chance to add to his one WRC win, as he takes part in all thirteen rounds of the calendar next season.

From indycar.com

Verizon IndyCar Series team owner and four-time Indianapolis 500 Mile Race winner A.J. Foyt was released from Baylor-St. Luke's Medical Center and is recovering at Houston home following triple bypass heart surgery Nov. 12.

Although surgery was successful, Foyt developed complications with his lungs.

He was kept on a ventilator for eight days to allow his lungs to recover full functionality. Ten days in the Intensive Care Unit was followed by an additional 10 days in the hospital.

“It's been pretty rough but I guess I slept through the roughest part,” said Foyt, who will turn 80 in January.

“I had some problems that most people don't have after open heart surgery so I made my doctors work extra hard but they saved my life. We've turned a corner so everything's pretty good. I've got a long way to go but I'm feeling better every day.”

Foyt is expected to make a full recovery.

From GMM

Sebastian Vettel says he never lost respect for Daniel Ricciardo throughout the 2014 season.

As it turned out, this year was the German's last campaign with Red Bull, where he earlier won four consecutive drivers' titles with Mark Webber as his teammate.

"The fact that I never had the best relationship with Mark is well known," Vettel, who has now switched to Ferrari, told the Swiss newspaper Sonntagsblick.

Sebastian Vettel, last appearance with Red Bull in Abu Dhabi. (Photo: WRi2)

But for 2014, Webber was replaced with another Australian, Daniel Ricciardo, who won three races versus the number 1-wearing Vettel's zero.

"First of all," 27-year-old Vettel said, "Daniel is of a different generation. He only knows this new formula one.

"But we worked with respect. I've known him for many years and there was no problem. That he ended up with more points bothers me of course but that's not a reason to not like him," Vettel added.

Now, Sebastian Vettel said his new goal is to become Ferrari's "tenth world champion".

But he admitted it might take some time: "We have not set any timetables, as that rarely works in formula one."

From GMM

A former long-serving McLaren driver and a team insider have criticised the British outfit for its handling of the 2015 driver lineup deliberations.

While it is now clear Fernando Alonso is definitely headed to the team, the announcement has been delayed while McLaren considers keeping either Jenson Button or Kevin Magnussen as the Spaniard's first Honda-powered teammate.

If Button is ousted, the 2009 world champion's long and illustrious F1 career will have ended without an appropriate farewell.

And a decision against Dane Magnussen, despite his solid debut in 2014, could end the 22-year-old rookie's grand prix career after just a single season.

McLaren supremo Ron Dennis acknowledged the dilemma at the Abu Dhabi finale recently.

"Everyone feels - understandably - that we are not being too fair to Kevin and Jenson," he told Britain's Sky.

"But they are contracted to the end of the year and the only pressure we have is from the fans and the media and they are going to be the first ones that jump on us if we make the wrong decisions for the future," Ron Dennis added.

Kevin Magnussen and Jenson Button, McLaren. (Photo: WRi2)

Former long-time McLaren driver David Coulthard said he thinks the delayed decision is tied up with a "behind-the-scenes shareholding wrangling".

But he also thinks the team has mismanaged the driver choice process this year.

"McLaren are in a public sport and the heroes of the sport are the drivers," David Coulthard told the Daily Mail. "With that in mind I can't help but think it hasn't been McLaren's best year of PR."

He said one of the biggest issues is that Button has been potentially denied the opportunity to properly farewell the sport he served for 15 years.

"Did he deserve to be treated with a little bit more respect given his time in the sport? Yes, I certainly think that is a valid argument," said Coulthard.

Jenson Button, 34, told his almost 2 million Twitter followers this week that he still "can't answer your questions about my future just yet. Hopefully soon."

Britain's Daily Express newspaper said the situation is being felt throughout the McLaren team.

It quoted a team insider as saying: "Ron has lost a lot of respect over his dithering on the driver lineup."

The FIA World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) published its 2015 calendar, which features a new and exciting race held on the famous and notoriously long Nurburging.

Consisting of 12 rounds from March to November, the calendar includes visits to four new territories not featured in 2014 as part of a continuous process of widening the WTCC's global appeal and increasing television coverage opportunities.

The legendary Nürburgring Nordschleife in Germany, a new addition for next year, will give the WTCC stars the chance to race on the demanding 25-kilometre track dubbed the Grüne Hölle(or Green Hell) due to the challenge it poses.

In a WTCC first, the 2015 season will conclude with a night race in Qatar.

FIA WTCC 2015: calendar:

6-8 March Argentina (Termas de Río Hondo)
17-19 April Morocco (Moulay El Hassan)
1-3 May Hungary (Hungaroring)
15-16 May Germany (Nürburgring Nordschleife)
5-7 June Russia (Moscow Raceway)
19-21 June Slovakia (Slovakia Ring)*
26-28 June France (Paul Ricard)
10-12 July Portugal (Vila Real)
11-13 September Japan (circuit TBC)
25-27 September China (Shanghai)
30 October-1 November Thailand (Buriram)
20-22 November Qatar (Losail)*
*Subject to the signing of event promoter agreement

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has demanded that Takata produce documents and answer questions under oath about its use of ammonium nitrate as a propellant in its airbag inflators, according to documents posted on NHTSA's website...

Chrysler Group said it will expand its recall of about 149,000 pickup trucks in 12 states and territories to include passenger-side airbag inflators, made by supplier Takata, to address concerns about improper deployments.

Strong truck sales helped AutoNation to a 6 percent increase in new-vehicle sales in November.

Japanese supplier Takata acknowledged today that it still does not understand what is causing airbag explosions that have hurtled metal shards into vehicles even as it insisted that calls for a broader recall to remedy the problem were misguided.

Visteon has completed the sale of its interiors operations in India to Reydel Automotive Holdings.