Season 4

[RichardRenes]

And Ho-Pin Tung drove two excellent, if unlucky races aswell. He could probably have challenged the podium in either race. And as things happened, it was not the team's fault

[F3 Rocks]

Originally Posted by Lam Pak

i can see again all asian countries got the worst teams.

Malaysia (Asian), won the first race of the new season and head up the championship for 2 reasons they had the best prepared team in Zandvoort, and the best prepared driver, simple, must equate to Asia have best team

[Lam Pak]

apart of malaysia, china has a bad team , korea has a sucker team, indonesia has a 2nd league team, pakistan has a careless team and india has no team.
china good result in 1st race was driver talent and korea was luck.

[META4]

Carlin is a Sucker team...

i think Trevor Carlin would laugh about it. I think Lam Pak you should have a bit more respect for peoples.

I just believe you just do not have the culture to talk about motorsport...

[Kiwi3]

Carlin Motorsport - winner of 150 races, claimed 325 podium positions and won three British F3 championships (including 2008). Also one of the very few non-F1 teams to have their own wind tunnel.

Besides have helped the careers of Takuma Sato, Narain Karthikeyan, Anthony Davidson, Nico Rosberg, Robert Kubica and Sebastian Vettel. The likes of Red Bull frequently place their young drivers in Carlin's care.

Very good choice to run an A1GP franchise it seems...

Why am I even bothering with this argument!?

[Adri_tifosi]

A1 Team China has a bad Team ? What do you smoke?

Astromega was the Alonso´s team at F3000.

Briand Ireland is one of the best engineers in the grid , and at this team a lot of good engineers have worked , like Chris Murphy (Campos Technical Director) , Rob Smedley (Felipe Massa engineer) and a lot of good professionals.

The problem in A1 Team China is the driver´s talent.

[F3 Rocks]

Originally Posted by Lam Pak

apart of malaysia, china has a bad team .

China have a very good team plus Brian Ireland, he is one of the very best race engineers in A1GP, the China car is always quick results will come

[RichardRenes]

Originally Posted by Adri_tifosi

A1 Team China has a bad Team ? What do you smoke?

Astromega was the Alonso´s team at F3000.

Briand Ireland is one of the best engineers in the grid , and at this team a lot of good engineers have worked , like Chris Murphy (Campos Technical Director) , Rob Smedley (Felipe Massa engineer) and a lot of good professionals.

The problem in A1 Team China is the driver´s talent.

I'd still keep it at unlucky. Stormlike winds can wreak havoc on those very aerodynamic cars, and boy did it do so.. gust of wind, less or more downforce, and you are a passenger of your car.

It's ironic that this probably would have affected the old car less, but hey.

[N.A-D.R]

Malaysia, China and India have some of the best teams on the grid. It just comes down to driver talent for them to win. Which India won a race, also Malaysia have won races, i think china have won a race or 2 in previous years. Pakastan and Indonesia just have crap drivers, thats why they are always last.

[F3 Rocks]

Originally Posted by N.A-D.R

Malaysia, China and India have some of the best teams on the grid. It just comes down to driver talent for them to win. Which India won a race, also Malaysia have won races, i think china have won a race or 2 in previous years. Pakastan and Indonesia just have crap drivers, thats why they are always last.

NADR .............You must be a very talented race driver to call Adam Khan and Hermanto "crap".............Adam Khan has matured over the past 2 seasons and has been winning races in Europe this season, If he could have made the Zandvoort race I think he would have scored highly. Hermanto took over the driving of the Indonesian car from Ananda Mikola and after some difficult races scored points, please dont call any driver who can score points in this series crap.

NADR................. foolish comments like yours should be kept to yourself.............

[ASRoma]

I completely agree with F3 rocks, don't speak when you don't know.

Adam Khan is a very good driver. He is doing well in the euroseries 3000, a series that is very underrated as it has very good drivers (Onidi, Piccione, Prost Jr, Rodriguez, Maldonado, Rigon, Razia, etc...)

Bryan Ireland is definitely one of the best engineers around. He was great in 3000 and in spanish F3 where he won the title twice with tec auto...

And who the ... claimed that Carlin sucked? that was definitely one of the stupidest things I ever heard...

[N.A-D.R]

Originally Posted by F3 Rocks

NADR .............You must be a very talented race driver to call Adam Khan and Hermanto "crap".............Adam Khan has matured over the past 2 seasons and has been winning races in Europe this season, If he could have made the Zandvoort race I think he would have scored highly. Hermanto took over the driving of the Indonesian car from Ananda Mikola and after some difficult races scored points, please dont call any driver who can score points in this series crap.

NADR................. foolish comments like yours should be kept to yourself.............

No you got me wrong, i mean't for 2007-08, there drivers performances were not statisfactory compaird to the other drivers. They were always last except for the odd race were they were kinda lucky. And i didn't call Adam Khan crap. I meant for the other pakistan driver, who was before him which was just not A1GP quality. Ali or something. Hermanto is just the average driver, nothing special...

[Lam Pak]

never find the perfect situation. ho pin tung build china success in zandvoort. astromega is a underrated team franky cheng said in china news. there are things you dont appreciate but where is astromega success in recent years. now-days they won ****. nothing. alonso story was longtime ago. past doesnt go over future.one famous enginer dont make the result come from the sky.

untill you know where youre from dont be ashamed. carlin is runing korea for money. carlin wasnt very good in a1gp befoe and portugal and japan and lebanon let them alone and never left them one room apartment.carlin didnt pickup another team and carlin hasnt many experience in big cars and they are not so good in worldseries renault.

pakistan has good driver. adam khan is racing in a1gp form start and he is very mature. the team doesnt care about the care and his words says bad setups.

indonesia is one of the most powerful countrires in asia with a lot of young talents. perfoamce racing never won a championship never. give hermanto a supernova car and you would see where he finishs.

give asian teams good teams (dams, supernova, campos, team england) and you see where they finish.

[Mak]

Carlin have F1 experience.. Obviously not a big car.. Lebanon with Supernova last year with out good driver.no better than Carlin.
Pakistan have very good team and top engineer John Gentry..
PS Pakistan ran with Supernova 1st year no results! he said the same about their setups and they went and won the championship the next year!
Most teams in A1 are good. However ultimately you are only as good as your driver!
Last year China won a couple of A1 races.
All racing teams are in it for the money. They all do there best, as good results mean more stability.

[Kiwi3]

Originally Posted by Mak

Last year China won a couple of A1 races.

Actually their best result is third, with Ho Pin Tung at Eastern Creek in season two and with Cheng Congfu at Zhuhai last year.

Lam Pak - the basic fact is that A1GP teams choose which companies they want to support them in engineering, engineering teams are not assigned to them by A1GP management or anyone else. So if Asian teams had bad engineering support (which isn't the case anyway) it would be because of their own poor decisions.

[RichardRenes]

It comes down to a simple question: how many capable drivers does a given country have? In GBR, GER, ITA, FRA or USA, there are dozens; in my country, the Netherlands, there are about 10 drivers capable of driving such a car. In China and India, even though they both have more than a billion residents, there are only a handfull capable drivers as car racing is still in it's infancy over there.

And that is where A1GP can help. In India, the team was recieved by the president, and I am quite sure Ho-Pin Tung's and Frankie Cheng's exploits are known in China (Though Kiwi3 may know more about that).

Seeing heroes creates heroes, eventhough it may take some time

[N.A-D.R]

Isn't Alan Docking Racing with Team Australia? So it shows many F3 engineering teams are in A1GP.

[rychard]

My big concern is that A1GP is more vulnerable to the global financial crisis than the Bernie Show.

Also, we still only have 9 confirmed rounds which, considering the interest in the new Ferraris, must be very worrying.

The South African currency (Rand) was 6.90 to the USD a year ago and today it is R10.18. That means costs for the team have automatically risen by 30% over and above the extra expense of new cars & equipment.

Makes you wonder .....

[Kiwi3]

Originally Posted by rychard

My big concern is that A1GP is more vulnerable to the global financial crisis than the Bernie Show.

Also, we still only have 9 confirmed rounds which, considering the interest in the new Ferraris, must be very worrying.

The South African currency (Rand) was 6.90 to the USD a year ago and today it is R10.18. That means costs for the team have automatically risen by 30% over and above the extra expense of new cars & equipment.

Makes you wonder .....

That's the second time you've suddenly popped up in the thread raising doubts about A1GP's sustainability, without any link to the immediately preeceding conversation. Any reason why?

Of course it's more vulnerable than the Bernie show. It's 100 times smaller for a start.

[Mak]

Kiwi3 I think Rychard's comments are directly related to the discussion topic, as there seems to be an underlinning problem with A1's finacial viability in the cuurent economics enviroment. The point being the huge expence of the new car in a time when the series already had huge debt.. Everone hopes that this can be overcome, but the problem still remains despite the gigantic efforts made by the teams and operations staff working in difficult conditions.

[diabloA1]

A series is never without it' fair share of problems. Even for F1. Unfortunately there is nothing we can do from our end. So I have resigned to just looking forward to the next A1GP race, and then the one after that.. and so on.. and so on..

If I had a rich Sheikh uncle I would definitely persuade him to invest in A1GP

[Lam Pak]

jig in water. in this topic can not say a1 gp is in crisis. the spanish and italian websites write that for first time and the defensors of a1gp get angry. there is nothing we can do from our end.a1gp is living bad days and you cant hide. face it.

i wish good luck to a1 gp. i want see a1gp stronger. but i face reality and reality is a1 gp is in troubles. and chengdu wont hapen.

[ford prefect]

Originally Posted by Lam Pak

jig in water. in this topic can not say a1 gp is in crisis. the spanish and italian websites write that for first time and the defensors of a1gp get angry. there is nothing we can do from our end.a1gp is living bad days and you cant hide. face it.

i wish good luck to a1 gp. i want see a1gp stronger. but i face reality and reality is a1 gp is in troubles. and chengdu wont hapen.

We shall see. Tickets are on sale for Chendu. I hope you will be proved wrong

I must say that I agree with a previous poster: I find your xenophobia puzzling to say the least. Also, whilst I accept your right to be negative, I believe that A1GP will survive and thrive.

I would appreciate it if you could explain what "jig in water" means?

[Kiwi3]

The financial sustainability of A1GP has been well commented on previously so is nothing new, I do find it puzzling therefore when someone will suddenly pop up and make statements like "makes you wonder", with some odd reasoning like the exchange rate of the Rand. It just looks as is the poster has a personal agenda to reduce confidence.

According to the latest press release from A1GP there has been building work progressing at the Chengdu circuit, so hopefully all is well (although I still think it's a weird choice of venue).

As for Spanish and Italian websites...Spain has no involvement in A1GP and Italian media gives a lot of space to motorsport coverage and needs to fill it with something. Most attention grabbing and easiest to do for a lazy reporter is recycled rumours about financial viability.

There does seem to still be a lot of activity coming out of A1GP, with the new podcast (although podcasts cost almost nothing anyway), and frequent press releases. As long as their is regular activity then I'll remain confident, a sign that things are going to go belly up is when things go quiet, and that hasn't happened yet. That brings me to another point which is where have the people gone that were previously criticising A1GP for not releasing any news?

[dave not neil]

Originally Posted by rychard

...The South African currency (Rand) was 6.90 to the USD a year ago and today it is R10.18. That means costs for the team have automatically risen by 30% over and above the extra expense of new cars & equipment....

But A1GP Holdings is registered in the British Virgin Isles, not South Africa. So the value of the Rand has little affect.