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Time variable may again influence the outcome of Ferrari and McLaren will go head to Malaysia on Easter Sunday in the Grand Prix.

The season is already shaping up to be a battle between Ferrari and McLaren in the Grand Prix circus heads to Sepang and the Malaysian GP on Easter Sunday (April 4, 2010).

After the tedium of Bahrain is the wheel to wheel racing in changing conditions in Melbourne, which saw the reigning world champion Jenson Button to show their tactical skills by requiring a change of tires at the right time and ahead of the competition when the storm their first win of the season. There was also need for a technical error by the Red Bull driven by Sebastien Vettel, who had pole position, lead to spin off and let the button through.

Unfortunately for tactical excellence McLaren same does not apply to other driver Lewis Hamilton, who was called to change a tire other unnecessary cost him his career never recovered items and frustration finally collided with local driver Mark Webber the second Red Bull on the penultimate lap to take them both down on the ground. Hamilton managed sixth and Webbber, who was forced to pit, dropped to ninth. So there are only two points for Red Bull after the holding of the first row.

Michael Schumacher continued his poor start to the season after the derivation of the first corner forced him to pit and struggled for most of the race to get past Jamie Alguersuari in Toro Rossi. Finally he and I just had a championship point as a reward.

Ferrari was strong again with Fernando Alonso Felipe Massa take third and fourth is to ensure both the constructors and drivers championship. The second race was impressive by Renault, Robert Kubica, who held off the Ferrari Challenge and take second place.

Malaysian Grand Prix
Like Melbourne, tire wear will be critical in Malaysia as high temperatures combined with fast corners. The atmosphere will be missed by the audience will be low, interest in motor racing is not as high in Malaysia. The country also has a weather system that is bright warm sunlight one minute and then torrential rain a few minutes and returned to the sun. This has created havoc in the past and probably will do so again.

Jenson Button won the race from pole position last year.

Lotus and 3CX
As the Lotus team funded by the Malaysian currency, the drivers will be extra keen to do well on Sunday. And the contest will be closely watched in the team’s headquarters in Norfolk, England, thanks to telecommunications 3CX, who have installed their phone system at a technical center and mobile operations racetrack. This means that the race team can contact each other wherever they are on the way to Norfolk. Cars can not win the race yet, but at least have a unified communications system that ensures everyone knows what happens.

Table After two Grand Prix
Makes: Ferrari (70) McLaren (54), Mercedes (29), Red Bull (18), Renault (18), Force India (8), Williams (5).

Drivers: Alonso (37), Massa (33), Button (31), Hamilton (23), Rosberg (20), Kubica (18), Vettel (12), Schumacher (9), Liuzzi (8), Webber (6 ), Baric Hello (5).

Approval and Grid Positions
Information on approved and grid positions shown here after Saturday’s final qualifying. If not, try to beat fresh.

Lewis Hamilton:
“I really enjoy racing in Shanghai – the track is a good blend of fast and slow stuff and it throws up a few nice challenges for the drivers. Finding the right set-up is important, you need speed and balance through the high-speed corners but decent mechanical grip for the hairpins. We got it spot-on last year, and while I don’t expect us to enjoy that sort of performance advantage this season, I think we’re all looking forward to a good showing. Hopefully, some of the upgrades we’ve added to MP4-24 for this race will have a benefit: it would be very encouraging if we could qualify a little further up the grid and be regularly challenging for points.”

Heikki Kovalainen:
“The best corners on the Shanghai International Circuit are Turns Six and Seven – the fast, sweeping left- and right-handers. The left is almost flat in sixth before you shift down a gear and change direction at very high speed. It’s difficult to find the ideal set-up because of the variety of different corners: there’s some heavy braking, fast esses and high-speed changes of direction, which require a good aero package, and some slower corners where mechanical grip is important. It’s all about compromise – it’s a real challenge for the drivers and the engineers. But at least you can overtake – mainly into Turns Four, 10 and 13 – so I hope we’ll see some great racing this weekend.”

Martin Whitmarsh, McLaren-Mercedes (Team Principal):
“We have reasons to be both disappointed and optimistic about our performance in the opening races of the 2009 season: disappointed because we do not yet possess the necessary technical package to enable us to fight with the leaders, but optimistic that our rate of progress is sufficiently rapid that we should be able to fight for points finishes on a regular basis. This weekend’s race will see a number of new components introduced to MP4-24, and while we do not expect them to radically transform the car’s potential, they should move us a little closer to the front than we saw in the opening two races.”

Norbert Haug, McLaren-Mercedes (Mercedes-Benz Motorsport Vice President):
“Last year, Lewis drove an excellent race on this challenging circuit and won. For this year’s Chinese Grand Prix, it has to be our target to start further up the grid than was the case in the first two grands prix. Those two races showed that points-finishes or even podiums were possible, even when the basic speed was not good enough. The team has developed further technical and aerodynamic improvements which should enable us to make another small step forward.”

Source: McLaren F1

The FIA has summoned McLaren to an extraordinary meeting of the World Motor Sport Council to respond to charges that it breached Article 151c of the International Sporting Code (ISC) at recent stewards meetings at the Australian and Malaysian Grands Prix in the last fortnight. The news comes just days after Lewis Hamilton was thrown out of the Australian Grand Prix after he and his team were found to have misled stewards in a post-race investigation.

Article 151c of the ISC states that “Any fraudulent conduct or any act prejudicial to the interests of any competition or to the interest of motor sport generally” is a breach of the code, prompting the FIA to call a special meeting of the WMSC to examine the details.

The post-race investigation at the Australian Grand Prix concerned Lewis Hamilton’s overtaking of Jarno Trulli behind the safety car in the closing stages of the race, when the Italian ran wide. However, after being told to by his team, Hamilton let Trulli by again later in the lap, but in the stewards meeting directly after the race, both Hamilton and the team insisted that no instruction was given to let Trulli by. After hearing evidence to the contrary and after listening to Hamilton’s pit-to-car radio, the world champion was subsequently disqualified from the race.

More concerning to the FIA however is that Hamilton and McLaren continued to plead their innocence at the season hearing in Malaysia, at a time when the stewards had already heard the pit-to-car radio and a post-race interview given by Hamilton confirming he had been told to let the Toyota through. Soon after the Malaysia hearing, McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh continued to deny that Lewis had lied to the stewards, saying “I don’t think there is any indication of [a lie]. There is no suggestion that Lewis lied to the stewards”.

Sanctions against McLaren could range from points deductions and fines, to the extreme case of being disqualified from the constructors’ championship for the second time in three years. Lewis Hamilton is unlikely to be punished individually.

The WMSC hearing will take place on Wednesday, 29 April 2009, just three days after the Bahrain Grand Prix.

Full statement from the FIA:
Vodafone McLaren Mercedes has been invited to appear before an extraordinary meeting of the FIA World Motor Sport Council in Paris on Wednesday, 29 April, 2009, to answer charges that, in breach of Article 151c of the International Sporting Code, it

• on 29 March, 2009, told the stewards of the Australian Grand Prix that no instructions were given to Hamilton in Car No. 1 to allow Trulli in Car no. 9 to pass when both cars were behind the safety car, knowing this statement to be untrue;

• procured its driver Hamilton the current World Champion, to support and confirm this untrue statement to the stewards;

• although knowing that as a direct result of its untrue statement to the stewards, another driver and a rival team had been unfairly penalised, made no attempt to rectify the situation either by contacting the FIA or otherwise;

• on 2 April, 2009, at a second hearing before the stewards of the Australian Grand Prix, (meeting in Malaysia) made no attempt to correct the untrue statement of 29 March but, on the contrary, continued to maintain that the statement was true, despite being allowed to listen to a recording of the team instructing Hamilton to let Trulli past and despite being given more than one opportunity to correct its false statement;

• on 2 April, 2009, at the second stewards’ hearing, procured its driver Hamilton to continue to assert the truth of the false statement given to the stewards on 29 March, while knowing that what he was saying to the stewards was not true.

Source: Manipe F1