The Great Debate (India)
COLUMN – Karun Chandhok: Flat out off track
The British Grand Prix weekend has always been one of my favourites. Ever since I raced here in the GP support race in Formula 3, it’s always been a weekend I’ve looked forward to — great crowd, great circuit, fantastic atmosphere and I get to stay in my own bed.
But being my adopted home race makes it a really busy weekend for me off track. The weekend really started on Wednesday itself this time. I promised the catering guys and also some of the guys in the team that I would bring them real home-cooked curry for lunch when they came to England and on Wednesday I did just that.
It was borderline spicy for a lot of people but everyone seemed to enjoy it – Sakon even asked me to write down the recipe for him. I spent Wednesday afternoon cycling around the circuit. Despite all the noise about the “new” circuit, to me it really wasn’t a big deal — three new corners really doesn’t make a “new circuit” but it was still nice to spend a couple hours pedalling around.
The wind was ridiculously strong which made pedalling around hard work and gave me an idea of just what it would be like in a super aero-sensitive machine such as a Formula 1 car.
Traditionally, on the Wednesday before the British Grand Prix, I always take my team out for a “thanks for the hard work” meal to my local Indian restaurant ‘The Khushboo’ where they get to try the “Karun’s special”. It was a great evening with lots of old stories from the guys about the drivers and teams they’ve worked with in the past.
Thursday started bright and early with a trip to our engine partners Cosworth. I’ve been to their facilities before but it’s still nice to go there and meet with all the guys working flat out in the background for us.
We had a good chance to show some of the media around the factory and even show them what an engine looks like on a dyno which is pretty cool. I was most amused by a double-decker bus parked outside and promptly jumped into the driver’s seat and started to have a look around his “cockpit” when the driver appeared out of nowhere looking a bit surprised.
COLUMN – Karun Chandhok: Satisfying weekend in Valencia
The European GP weekend was another positive result for me and a race that I quite enjoyed. I had to work really hard to pull away from my teammate Bruno Senna and then also fight on strategy with the faster Virgin Racing car of Timo Glock and to end the weekend 18th ahead of them was very satisfying.
Watching the replay of the race on Monday, the two clear highlights seemed to be Mark Webber’s accident and the whole safety car story. Mark’s shunt was pretty incredible — I really can’t recall anything so dramatic in a while, maybe Robert’s accident in Montreal in 2007 compares but this was a biggie. I sent Mark a quick e-mail straight away after seeing it and I’m glad to say he replied to say he was alright.
That being the case is a real testimony to the safety standards of a modern F1 car and the work done by the FIA with the crash tests and the safety standards for the chassis. When he landed on his roll hoop, Mark must have still been doing close to 200 kmh. It’s difficult really to say why the accident happened but clearly he didn’t realise how early Heikki would be decelerating into Turn 12.
At last week’s FIA meeting, there was a discussion about potential moveable rear wings which would make a huge difference to straight line speeds and promote overtaking. After seeing the accident on Sunday, I have to say that big speed differences may be good for overtaking but it may not be the safest solution for racing. The addition of Kers may be enough to promote overtaking in the same way as the push to pass system worked brilliantly at the last Indycar race a couple weeks ago.
The other rule that a lot of people asked me about this weekend was the 107 percent rule for 2011. Clearly whoever asked me that question hadn’t really done enough research because apart from a couple races where we’ve had mechanical or other problems, both Bruno and I have been within 107 percent everywhere.
The week leading up the race was a very busy one for us. Valencia was the second home race for the team and so we had a lot of guests and sponsors there at the weekend. During the week, Bruno and I visited Madrid for some promo work that included a visit to the Real Madrid Bernabeu Stadium and the museum.
I’m not a big football fan although I have got a bit into the World Cup but even so, it was hugely impressive looking around the place with such a rich history. We also visited Murcia, the home of the Hispania Group where we were part of a jury for a road safety video competition done by local schools. I’ve been working to promote road safety in India but pushing the idea of “race on the tracks and not on the roads” and it was nice to lend support to the cause in Spain. In fact, Jean Todt sent me a nice e-mail of appreciation last week after seeing the posters for the campaign in India.
COLUMN – Karun Chandhok: Canadian GP a mixed bag
The Canadian GP weekend was a real mixed bag of ups and downs for me. It was my first visit to the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, or for that matter to Canada.
I’ve grown up watching lots of races there on TV and was really looking forward to driving there this season.
There were two things that hit me when we reached Montreal -
1) Just how big the hire cars were — we all ended up with huge SUVs out of some Puff Daddy video or in Bruno’s (Senna) case a 5 litre Mustang GT and
2) the weather was just as cold, wet and miserable as the UK.
The circuit itself is set alongside the old Olympic rowing basic built for the 1976 summer Games and provides the most picturesque backdrop to a paddock of the season.
Walking around the circuit on Thursday in the rain, it really surprised me how narrow the circuit was, with the walls a lot closer than you think. Certainly apart from Monaco, it is probably the narrowest circuit on the calendar with very little margin for error.
COLUMN – Karun Chandhok: Turkish GP a bit frustrating
The Turkish Grand Prix weekend was a particularly frustrating time for me. Although they ended with Alguersari (Jaime) and Trulli (Jarno) respectively driving into me, the strong races I had in Barcelona and Monaco meant that I was looking forward to driving at Istanbul Park.
It’s a circuit which I quite enjoy and was generally quite strong at when I did GP2 in the past.
My flight out to Turkey had all the Red Bull guys on board with nearly 200 kg of excess baggage on the Easyjet flight — most of which probably included their F-duct.
It’s always a bit funny flying out to races if you live in the UK because they’re full of people from the paddock who you don’t really see much of until the return flight on Sunday.
I quite enjoy catching up with friends from GP2, Red Bull Racing, Force India, Williams, Renault or McLaren at the airports and on planes because once the weekend starts, it really is hard to get out of the little bubble that we seem to live in.
Looking back now, ironically, I was actually talking to the RBR guys about how it must be quite pleasant to have two really good guys fighting for the world championship but not really clashing.
Friday morning is generally spent waiting for the track to clean up before doing a couple of warm-up runs and the second practice session of the day is used to evaluate the two tyre compounds over longer runs when the track has a bit more rubber. We are all restricted to 3 sets of tyres for Friday so there’s a limited amount of work you can do and it’s really important to make every lap count.
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The Wall
