The Kob

I like Kamui Kobayashi. He is goofy looking. He smiles a lot. He gives entertaining and candid interviews and most important he is a balsy, aggressive driver... but doesn't appear to be a "crazy" or "wild" driver like I always felt Takuma Sato was. Hopefully he will get a drive with Toyota next year. Hopefully Toyota will still be in F1 next year.

Earlier today I was reading some articles about who goes where next year. The topic of USF1 was brought up, how they want to promote American drivers yet there are no Americans currently holding a superlicense. I figure Scott Speed probably still has a superlicense. Do they expire? I mean he only got shitcanned from Toro Rosso a year and a half ago. However, maybe the article I was reading meant that any American that USF1 is mildly interested in does not have a superlicense. I suppose that is fine considering old Scott Speed says "I hardly even follow Formula One any more". He's content to keep driving those big old NASCAR shitboxes around ovals while Red Balls foots the bill. I can't say I completely blame him I suppose... though I'd still follow F1.

Super Brawn GP & USGPE

How about that... Ross Brawn now is a stakeholder of the old Honda F1 team and now has a F1 team named after him. In all honesty, I didn't see that one actually panning out. I figured for sure a large company of some sort or a Richard Branson would end up buying the team. Good for Brawn and company. Now they just have to make it work!

Another thing that I didn't expect was to see the mighty Rubens Barrichello back in a F1 car either. How fun. While I think Rubens might as well throw in the towel, it is nice to see him back for another season in some way. Not that I'm against Bruno Senna being in F1, but it does make sense for Rubens and Button to team together since they are the most experienced couple on the grid (according to grandprix.com)

I find it funny that when the USF1 team was announced a few weeks back it was mentioned Bernie Ecclestone was all about the idea, yet he then made them change the name to USGPE standing for US GP Engineering. That just irks me since FOM doesn't even own the F1 name. Way to help out the little guy Bernie. The team had to tack on "engineering" to the name since Tony George is thought to own the rights to USGP, even though he doesn't currently have a USGP to run.

Gah!

USF1

I am very glad to be seeing all of these stories about USF1 in the news recently. This is a good sign. I was worried last week when I saw the first story that it was the only one I would ever see and never again would we hear anything of or about USF1. Hopefully they can keep their momentum and gather funding and get a team going. I wish them the best in their effort to marry F1 and America... for everybody's sake!

An American F1 team?

I just read a curious story on yahoo.com's UK F1 site. The story claims that Peter Windsor who is a veteran F1 journalist who currently works with SpeedTV in the USA as their on-site personality at F1 races as well as formerly working as Team Manager for Ferrari and Williams back in the 80's and early 1990's has partnered with IndyCar technical and design guru Ken Anderson and are planning a Formula One team to be called "USF1" which would showcase American drivers and technology in Formula One. It is said the team may be based in Charlotte, North Carolina which is the heart of NASCAR country with a possible second location in Europe.

Apparently the idea was hatched at the 2008 Canadian GP and it is said that good old Bernie Ecclestone has no objections to the venture (which is always a good thing).

It has been noted that Ken Anderson may be one of the people interested in purchasing the Honda F1 team and was last attempting to purchase Honda's other cast-away team Super Aguri last year... so the guy is pretty serious about getting into F1, which is always a good sign. Coupled with the fact that the guy has a background in racing design (and not just being an ex-race driver like many failed team heads are) and is working with a great mind such as Peter Windsor whom I greatly respect has me quite giddy right now and I honestly do hope to see USF1 on the grid in 2010 or 2011. That would be fantastic! Hopefully this isn't a fluke. I'd like to see this project come to fruition!

And for today's F1 Puerile MS Paint pic: