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From GMM

The Lewis Hamilton 'Twittergate' affair deepened on Sunday.

On Saturday, 'Tweets' posted by the 2008 world champion and featuring the obscenity-acronym 'WTF' suggested Jenson Button had been given a better front wing in qualifying.

The Tweets were deleted.

Then, ahead of Sunday's Belgian grand prix, the 'Twittergate' affair shifted into a higher gear when Hamilton posted via his social media account an image of a confidential McLaren telemetry sheet.

The sheet was apparently evidence of Button's qualifying advantage at Spa-Francorchamps, with hand-written remarks making clear Hamilton lost '6 tenths on the STRAIGHT' to the sister McLaren.

It also included sensitive team information, including the MP4-27's ride height.

"He was asked to take it down and he did it immediately," team boss Martin Whitmarsh is quoted by the BBC.

The affair comes amid Hamilton's reported tense negotiations with McLaren over his new contract for 2013.

"This is effectively a war," an unnamed paddock member said.

Whitmarsh, adding that Hamilton apologised, explained: "He misjudged the (telemetry) situation.

"He wasn't thinking clearly, obviously."

The 27-year-old British driver crashed at the first corner on Sunday, and did not appear for interviews during the race.

Afterwards, he said: "I really don't want to talk about the start. People can see what happened."

Frederic Makowiecki and Stef Dusseldorp have won the latest FIA GT1 World Championship round aboard the Hexis Racing No. 1 McLaren MP4-12C by over 25 seconds at the Moscow Raceway.

Heavy rains forced the officials to bring out the safety car for the start. When the green flag did drop, the track was so wet the race had to be stopped after only four laps, until visibility improved.

Alvaro Parente and Gregoire Demoustier placed the sister in second place, making it a 1-2 for Hexis Racing. Frank Stippler and Oliver Jarvis rounded out the top 3 in the No. 33 Audi R8 of the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT.

Championship leaders Michael Bartels and Yelmer Buurman (Vita4One BMW) had a tough weekend, bringing the car home only eighth.

Photo: Petr Gabriel/SRO

Race results - GT1 (Moscow)
1 - Makowiecki/Dusseldorp (McLaren MP4/12C) - Hexis - 29 laps
2 - Demoustier/Parente (McLaren MP4/12C) - Hexis - 25"411
3 - Stippler/Jarvis (Audi R8) - WRT - 31"828
4 - Ortelli/Vanthoor (Audi R8) - WRT - 32"470
5 - Basseng/Winkelhock (Mercedes SLS) - Munnich - 40"146

6 - Ide/Castellacci (Ferrari 458) - AF Corse - 55"900

7 - Amorim-Campanico (Audi R8)-Novadriver - 1'16"545
8 - Buurman/Bartels (BMW Z4) - Vita4One - 1'24"240
9 - Pastorelli/Jager (Mercedes SLS) - Munnich - 1'25"256

10 - Basov/Grossman (Ferrari 458)-Esta - 1'26"191
11 - Skryabin/Pier Guidi (Ferrari 458)-Esta - 1'27"459
12 - Lyons/Gai (Ferrari 458)-AF Corse - 1'40"751
13 - Baumann/Buhk (Mercedes SLS)-Heico - 1 lap

14 - Leganov/Afanasyev (Lamborghini Gallardo)-Rhino - 1 lap
15 - Nilsson/Vahamaki (Mercedes SLS)-Heico - 1 lap

16 - Lariche/Ebrahim (Ford GT) - SunRed - 1 lap

17 - Mayr-Melnhof/Lauda (BMW Z4) - Vita4One - 1 lap



Retirements
Lap 27 - Vilander/Salaquarda
Lap 27 - Toril/Ryabov
Lap 18 - Maleev/Ladygin
Lap 13 - Ardagna Perez/Cirò
Lap 4 - Proczyk/Mengesdorf

Championship

1. Bartels/Buurman 127; 2. Basseng/Winkelhock 121; 3. Dusseldorp/Makowiecki 110; 4. Ortelli-Vanthoor 90; 5. Jaeger-Pastorelli 86.

Frenchman Tristan Vautier ended-up his day's work Saturday with pole position at the end of a shortened Indy Lights qualifying session for the upcoming event in Baltimore.

When Emerson Newton-John crashed his Fan Force car in the new chicane, officials were forced to flag the session to clean everything up; causing the session to be shortened by no less than 7 minutes. 

Vautier, who was at the top of the timesheet then, earned pole in front of his teammate Esteban Guerrieri by more than 0.8 seconds.

Andretti's Sebastian Saavedra was third-quickest alongside team-mate Carlos Munoz.



Qualifying results - Indy Lights (Baltimore)
Pos  Driver               Team          Time        Gap
1.  Tristan Vautier      Schmidt       1m23.6893s
2.  Esteban Guerrieri    Schmidt       1m24.4943s  + 0.8050s
3.  Sebastian Saavedra   AFS/Andretti  1m24.5318s  + 0.8425s
4.  Carlos Munoz         Andretti      1m24.9580s  + 1.2687s
5.  Oliver Webb          Schmidt       1m25.0699s  + 1.3806s
6.  Gustavo Yacaman      Moore         1m25.2456s  + 1.5563s
7.  Adderly Fong         Brooks        1m26.4568s  + 2.7675s
8.  Juan Pablo García    Jeffrey Mark  1m26.6107s  + 2.9214s
9.  Jorge Goncalvez      Belardi       1m26.9396s  + 3.2503s
10.  David Ostella        Moore         1m27.3890s  + 3.6997s
11.  Emerson Newton-John  Fan Force     1m29.7625s  + 6.0732s
12.  Peter Dempsey        Belardi       1m29.9690s  + 6.2797s
13.  Victor Carbone       Schmidt

When Nationwide Series regular Ricky Stenhouse Jr. took the checkered flag from the dominant Sprint Cup driver, Kevin Harvick, it seemed like déjà vu all over again on Saturday night at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Only on Friday night it was dominant Sprint Cup driver, Kyle Busch, losing out to Truck Series rookie Ty Dillon.

Although the circumstances were very different it was the same result with different drivers on succeeding nights.

Stenhouse took the victory away from Harvick, who had led 157 laps of the 190-lap race, after the seventh and final caution for a crash among Danica Patrick and James Buescher.

To make matters more confusing, a television replay has Harvick (who ended up third) blaming Sprint Cup rival, Brad Keselowski (who finished second) for his defeat.

After his fourth victory of the year, the defending Nationwide Champion laughed at the partial cause of his win: "Heck, yeah, we stole it," Stenhouse said of his last lap run to win.

As the drivers circled on their cool down lap after the race Harvick saw a replay of Keselowski tossing out his water bottle and he blamed his rival for that final yellow.

"It's pretty obvious," said Harvick, who had words with Keselowski on pit road after the race. "They put it on TV and showed when the caution came out on the same lap. ... He told me it was intentional, so it is what it is."

Turning to Keselowski in the post-race interview, Harvick added, "Sleep good tonight."

In his own defence Keselowski argued that Harvick got the time and place of the water bottle incident wrong.

"It went out of my car 15 to 20 laps before the yellow came out," Keselowski asserted. "I guess that's why I was caught off guard with the comment that the water bottle caused the yellow.   

TV spokesmen confirmed that the replay of the water bottle toss was from laps before the final caution and a NASCAR official confirmed that the final caution was not due to the water bottle.

With his victory Stenhouse has closed to within 12 points of series leader, Elliott Sadler, who finished fourth. Sam Hornish Jr., who finished ninth, is 32 points behind in third place.

From GMM

An unnamed engineer has alleged that some teams broke the 'gentleman's agreement' governing the factory shutdowns during F1's recent August break.

As per an unofficial cost-cutting pact, the twelve competing teams all agreed to close their doors for a full 14-day period.

During that time, the teams pledged to do almost no official F1 business -- not even the sending of a single email.

But some teams broke the agreement, the unnamed engineer claims.

"The factories were, for the most part, closed," the anonymous source told the Spanish newspaper El Pais' correspondent Oriol Puigdemont at Spa.

"But what was done was that some work was put in the hands of suppliers, who continued to make parts in August," he claimed.

"I know firsthand that some teams, like Sauber and Williams for example, told their workers to shut down their computers on the last day of work and leave them at the factory.

"But there were others, like Ferrari, who never did that," the unnamed engineer said.

"The restrictions (of the shutdown) were very vague, and cheating very simple. You could just create a parallel email account.

"Also, if someone looked at the log of communications and you have talked to one of your colleagues, you could just argue that it's just your friend who is in the same team," the source added.

After undergoing a significant refresh for the 2011 model year, the 2012 Corolla looks remarkably unchanged. Four versions -- the CE, LE, S and XRS -- are offered in Canada. Minor changes in the various trim levels, such as an auto-down feature on the driver's power window and steering-wheel mounted audio controls, are hardly noticeable. More importantly, Toyota Corolla LE trim models get a new audio system with USB and auxiliary inputs as well as Bluetooth™ connectivity.

Keep in mind that these are just fine-tuning items in response to customer demand. When the refresh was done in 2011 that's when the biggies, such as the Star Safety System, were made standard across the lineup. Individual items such as 16” wheels were added to the Toyota Corolla LE and a “performance” engine was installed in the Toyota Corolla XRS.


Powertrain
The only engine for the Toyota Corolla LE is a wet-sleeved, aluminum, inline-four that puts out 138 hp; and the only transmission available is a 4-speed automatic. As the last vehicle to be replaced amongst it competition (Honda Civic, Hyundai Elantra or Ford Focus) expect to see more power and more gears in the transmission when the current Toyota Corolla is replaced.

Interior
Bucket seats up front and a bench in the back is standard fare for the Toyota Corolla lineup, and the Toyota Corolla CE is no exception. However, seating materials and interior trim do take a step up from the basic Toyota Corolla CE.

Unseen changes include the ability to order heated front seats with the cloth interior via the “Upgrade Package” that also includes an 8-way power adjustable driver's seat. The stereo also gets upgraded to a six-speaker system with XM satellite radio.

Getting into these well upholstered cloth seats in the 2012 Toyota Corolla is made easy with doors that open wide when there is enough room to do so. In the average parking lot, the doors are never opened to full width, so the fact that the doors are short overall is the best of both worlds. When crowded, a short door opens far enough to let you in fairly easily, and if you are out in the open picking up your wealthy aunt, the door will open wide enough to let her get in easily.

If you don't happen to have a wealthy aunt, but you do have a couple of small children in car seats, there is enough room in the Toyota Corolla to let you bend and twist to make sure seats and seat belts are done up properly. The only thing that would make the back seat even better is a bit more width so that a referee could sit between the kids comfortably.

Getting into these well upholstered cloth seats in the 2012 Toyota Corolla is made easy with doors that open wide when there is enough room to do so. (Photo: Charles Renny)

City driving
In the city, you notice the lethargy of the Toyota Corolla LE's 1.8L engine when coming off a stop, even if it has 138 horsepower. It is a bit of a chicken and egg situation: 138 horsepower is plenty, but the motor needs to rev a bit to get to peak power. It takes a while to get the rpms up because there aren't enough gears in the box to make things happen quickly.

Once you are moving, all it takes is enough right foot and a tolerance for the engine noise that penetrates the otherwise quiet interior. Part throttle kickdown will come into play, and you can then zip around to your heart's content.

Ride quality on the LE is supposed to be soft and a bit on the “luxurious” side. If you look at the average Toyota Corolla driver, you will see that the settings are right on. Things like automatic climate control are much more important than being able to zip around a corner at high speeds.

Toyota Corolla has increased in size over the past few generations, so that zipping into a parking space is no longer a no-brainer. You will still fit into mall parking spaces and angled parking spaces, but when you parallel park you are going to need to pay attention. The corners of the car are not always visible and it isn't always easy to judge where they are.

Ride quality on the LE is supposed to be soft and a bit on the “luxurious” side. (Photo: Charles Renny)

Highway driving
The flip side of being larger, with a soft ride, is that on the highway the Toyota Corolla LE offers a very comfortable trip. You do sacrifice some crispness in handling, but it is less susceptible to crosswinds and being moved about by 18-wheelers. If you get out of your comfort zone, the Toyota Corolla LE will still corner hard enough to get your adrenaline going. Passing might take a bit longer than you think it should, but the Toyota Corolla LE will get the job done.

Summary
The Toyota Corolla LE may not be an industry leader in every category for 2012, but it is a solid car that does everything well in every category.

Carsharing service subscribers are 3.7 times less likely to use an automobile for their daily commutes than people who own a car, according to a new study by Polytechnique Montréal published in the International Journal of Sustainable Transportation.

Single members rely on a car for 17% of their trips compared with 64% among single car owners. The gap is even greater when looking at couples. Carsharing members use a car for just 14% of their daily trips, while couples who own one (52%) or two (78%) vehicles are much more dependent.

About four couples out of 10 turn to public transit, riding their bicycles or walking, while just one out of four couples who own a car (and one out of 10 with two cars) do the same.

News 1 Sep, 2012

Jenson Button takes pole position, with a stunning performance in qualifying for the Belgian GP

News 3 Sep, 2012

First official pictures have been released of the production-ready 197bhp Peugeot 208 GTi

Pictures 3 Sep, 2012

European auto workers returning from their summer break may not be back on the factory floor for long, as carmakers order temporary shutdowns in response to a protracted sales slump.

Japan Inc. has a new export market: Japan.

At its just-opened $450-million factory in Thailand, Ford prides itself on being "fork-free." Eliminating forklifts, which can have big blind spots, from the floor improves worker safety, the automaker says.

Sometimes it helps to be the boss. Tony Stewart won the pole at Atlanta Motor Speedway with some advice from his Stewart Haas Racing teammate, and employee, Ryan Newman.

“That pole is 100 percent due to Ryan Newman,” Stewart said of Newman , who had qualified earlier in the evening and was able to tell the three-time Sprint Cup champion exactly how to set his car up.

Tony Stewart (Photo: Getty Images for NASCAR)

“He walked back down there to help us before we went out and said there's a ton of grip out there, you've just gotta do it. I was having a hard time convincing myself that's what I was gonna do.”

The key was running his Chevrolet in the high line through turns three and four.

“That's about 2½ seconds,” Stewart who turned a lap of 186.121 mph quipped. “I'm not sure if we'd have run the line I'd planned on running we'd have been that fast. It's awesome having a teammate like. I don't ever remember being here and seeing anybody run up at the top like he did.”

More surprising than Stewart's first pole in Atlanta was that it was only the 14th pole in his 14-year, 489-race, career in NASCAR's premier series.

Stewart, known for his irony with the media, added “I'm definitely known as a qualifier.”

Roush Fenway Ford pilot, Greg Biffle, will start outside the front row after turning a lap in 29.863 seconds (185.643 mph).

“It sort of hurts to qualify second like we did today,” Biffle said.

“You know, you ask any driver after qualifying, and they could give you 100 reasons why and what they could have done better. I got down in the middle of one and two and hesitated to push the gas down; I thought the car was loose and waited and waited and thought I was gonna have to run a second lap to make up for it. I come by and they told me I was on the front row. I wish I could do it over again, but it was a great lap to put us on the front row. It gives me a lot of confidence for Sunday, both for track position and for pit selection.

Kyle Busch will start third, in a Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, with a lap of 185.493 mph. Matt Kenseth will start fourth.

From GMM

At Spa on Friday, McLaren's 2012 car was sporting the most visibly obvious development, in the wake of Formula 1's month-long summer break.

The concept was described by Auto Motor und Sport as a pair of "unusual sidepods" for the MP4-27, featuring almost a second layer or wing above the top surface.

McLaren's new sidepods at Spa. (Photo: WRI2)

But the German publication said the Swiss team Sauber actually first thought of the idea, with the gap between the surfaces apparently speeding up the air as on its way to the rear of the car.

In other development news, Lotus will almost certainly not debut its double DRS-inspired straightline speed-boosting "device" at Spa-Francorchamps, after Friday's practice washout.

"With discretion being the better part of valour, we will conduct P3 (on Saturday) with a conventional aero package rather than attempting to squeeze Friday's intended evaluation into the precious final practice session," said technical boss James Allison.

British driver Jenson Button set a brilliant performance and used his upgraded McLaren MP4-27 to the best to clinch his maiden pole position as a McLaren driver for the Grand Prix of Belgium.

Button set the stunning pace in Q2 and repeated it minutes later in Q3, taking the pole with a fast time of 1m47.686.

Kobayashi, Button and Maldonado. (Photo: WRI2)

Japanese driver Kamui Kobayashi planted his Ferrari-powered Sauber in second place. That was his best performance in qualifying so far in F1.

Pastor Maldonado, the surprise winner of the Grand Prix of Spain qualified third in his Williams-Renault. However, an impeding incident involving the Venezuelan and 12th-place qualifier Nico Hulkenberg of the Sahara Force India team is under investigation.

Kimi Raikkonen qualified fourth in his Lotus E20 in front of Sergio Pérez in the second Sauber and championship leader Fernando Alonso in the Ferrari.

Kamui Kobayashi, Sauber (Photo: WRI2)

Button's teammate Lewis Hamilton will take the start in 7th place.

“The set-up wasn't perfect, but that was simply because we chose the wrong rear wing, preferring to stay with the version we used in Hungary," said Hamilton.

"The wing we'd been using in FP3 this morning hadn't been working very well, so we opted to go back to the older wing which we thought would be the safer option. It was a collective choice: we thought the older wing would be quicker in qualifying, but in fact Jenson has shown the new wing to be very good indeed."

Surprisingly, two-time World Champion Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull Racing, Michael Schumacher of Mercedes AMG and Felipe Massa of Ferrari failed to make it to Q3.

Mark Webber of Red Bull and Nico Rosberg of Mercedes AMG both received a five-place grid penality for gearbox changes.

Starting grid of the 2012 Grand Prix of Belgium*:

Row 1
Jenson Button (McLaren MP4/27-Mercedes) - 1'47"573 - Q3
Kamui Kobayashi (Sauber C31-Ferrari) - 1'47"871 - Q3

Row 2
Pastor Maldonado (Williams FW34-Renault) - 1'47"893 - Q3
Kimi Raikkonen (Lotus E20-Renault) - 1'48"205 - Q3

Row 3
Sergio Perez (Sauber C31-Ferrari) - 1'48"219 - Q3
Fernando Alonso (Ferrari F2012) - 1'48"313 - Q3

Row 4
Lewis Hamilton (McLaren MP4/27-Mercedes) - 1'48"394 - Q3
Romain Grosjean (Lotus E20-Renault) - 1'48"538 - Q3

Row 5
Paul Di Resta (Force India VJM05-Mercedes) - 1'48"890 - Q3
Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull RB8-Renault) - 1'48"792 - Q2

Row 6
Nico Hulkenberg (Force India VJM05-Mercedes) - 1'48"855 - Q2
Mark Webber (Red Bull RB8-Renault) - 1'48"392 ** - Q1

Row 7
Michael Schumacher (Mercedes MGP W03) - 1'49"081 - Q2
Felipe Massa (Ferrari F2012) - 1'49"147 - Q2

Row 8
Jean-Eric Vergne (Toro Rosso STR7-Ferrari) - 1'49"354 - Q2
Daniel Ricciardo (Toro Rosso STR7-Ferrari) - 1'49"543 - Q2

Row 9
Bruno Senna (Williams FW34-Renault) - 1'50"088 - Q2
Heikki Kovalainen (Caterham CT01-Renault) - 1'51"739 - Q1

Row 10
Vitaly Petrov (Caterham CT01-Renault) - 1'51"967 - Q1
Timo Glock (Marussia MR01-Cosworth) - 1'52"336 - Q1

Row 11
Pedro De La Rosa (HRT F112-Cosworth) - 1'53"030 - Q1
Charles Pic (Marussia MR01-Cosworth) - 1'53"493 - Q1

Row 12
Nico Rosberg (Mercedes MGP W03) - 1'50"181 ** - Q1
Narain Karthikeyan (HRT F112-Cosworth) - 1'54"989 - Q1

* Unofficial timing
**5-place penalty for gearbox change

Following the track issue that curtailed the first practice session for the upcoming Baltimore Grand Prix, the IZOD IndyCar Series official had decided to grind a section of the Pratt Street main straightaway.

The IndyCar series initially hoped to solve the problem by using that technique but it was eventually determined that a two-point configuration chicane would have to be reintroduced.

Nineteen of the 25 entrants completed at least three laps in the morning session, with Marco Andretti topping the time sheet with a best lap of 1m21.0211 seconds in the No. 26 Team Dr Pepper Ten car.

IndyCar drivers have backed the series' decision to introduce a chicane to prevent cars from being launched over the bump near the rail line.

Simon Pagenaud had a scary moment when his car took off on one of the bigger bumps only a land hard on its wheels a few metres later.

After the work being completed, Penske's Will Power ended-up the fastest in the afternoon practice and concluded that it had been the right move.

"I think it was definitely the right thing to do," he said. "It fixed the problem over the train tracks. They'll make a few more adjustments overnight, but all in all it's all good."

The Hexis Racing pair of Alvaro Parente and Gregoire Demoustier secured pole position for Sunday's Qualifying Race in a stunning return to form for McLaren in the seventh round of the GT1 World Championship in Russia.

Conditions were cold and cloudy at Moscow Raceway with the air temperature reaching just 13C. The sun had broken through briefly by the end of the session and track conditions remained dry throughout.

Parente in the No.2 McLaren produced a quickest lap of 1m33.536 around the twists and turns of the Moscow Raceway.

The No.1 McLaren of Fred Makowiecki and Stef Dusseldorp was second fastest in 1m33.726 to round out a good day for the French team.

Third was the No.3 AF Corse Ferrari of Toni Vilander and Filip Salaquarda with a best lap time of 1m34.188. The Ferrari duo had set the pace in free practice but Salaquarda says the change in weather conditions accounted for a slight drop-off in performance.

Misfortune struck the drivers' championship leaders Michael Bartels and Yelmer Buurman who suffered an engine failure on the No.18 Vita4One Racing BMW.

From GMM

More than a decade after the fact, Brazilian Luciano Burti has finally opened up about the crash at Spa-Francorchamps that ended his formula one career.

During the 2001 race, the Brazilian was battling with Eddie Irvine when they collided, sending Burti's Prost head-first into the barriers at a sickening speed.

"It took me two years to get back to normal," Burti, now an F1 television expert, said on Friday at the same Belgian circuit eleven years on.

He subsequently spent some time at Ferrari as a test driver, but never raced in F1 again.

"The worst was the first four months, when I needed to take medicine against seizures," Burti told Brazil's Totalrace.

"My memory of that time is terrible. It was a hell of a drug. I remember being confused, getting words wrong, saying 'cut the light' rather than 'turn out the light'."

Burti says he does not remember the race or the crash, his first memory being woken up from an induced coma three days later and finding that Rubens Barrichello had spent the night sleeping on the hospital floor.

And when he finally returned to Brazil, he was not the same.

"It was a time when I would remember things from ten years ago, but not what I did that morning," said Burti. "I would see somebody in the morning and then in the afternoon say to them 'Hi, it's been so long!”

Guy Smith of Dyson Racing set the quickest time in the opening practice for the Baltimore Sports Car Challenge presented by SRT.

Smith's lap of 1:25.899 in the No. 16 Lola-Mazda led Muscle Milk Pickett Racing's Muscle Milk ARX-03a of Klaus Graf by 0.289 seconds.

Muscle Milk and its drivers lead the Dyson contingent for the ALMS' P1 drivers, team and manufacturer championships.

Corvette Racing sat 1-2 in GT with their Corvette C6 ZR1s, led by Tommy Milner in the No. 4 Corvette. He set a time of 1:30.580 and went 0.356 seconds quicker than Jan Magnussen in the No. 3 sister car.

Conquest Endurance's Martin Plowman led P2 in the No. 37 Morgan-Nissan prototype. His time of 1:28.021 (83.435 mph) - good enough for third overall - was 0.923 seconds clear of Level 5 Motorsports' Christophe Bouchut.

Green Hornet Racing's Damien Faulkner posted the best GT Challenge time in his No. 34 Porsche 911 GT3 Cup. His lap of 1:34.854 gave the Irishman a 0.238-second gap back to TRG's Spencer Pumpelly.