Formula Master Championship - 2008 Season Thread

[JamesRamone]

Ammermuller is steadily racking up the points without actually looking spectacular, but he's doing a good job.

Did Eurosport show race 2?, i couldn't find any sign of it in the listings.

[gomick]

Harald Schlegelmilch - thats a great result for him

[Daisy]

Still think Formula Master is a promising series, but it really has lack of good drivers. Van Der Drift is the star so far (good driver), Ammermüller is fine, but I think about 75% of the grid would strungle in series like World Series, F3 Euroseries or British F3 (look only at Sanchez Lopez, frontrunner in this series, but backmacker in World Series by Renault).

(and by the way, can one of the moderators change the title into 'International?)

[Go_For_Pole]

I would agree but then how do you explain the excellent F. BMW graduate Kral struggling to even reach the points?

[META4]

there are also the WSR graduate drivers like Iaconelli (who gived up IFM already) and Nunez who are struggling

I guess there is something to see also with Team Engineering ,look at JD motorsports who is able to put Arabazhiev and Afanasiev on the podium

[Go_For_Pole]

Considering Arabazhiev was not even winning in F3000 that's surely true. Also Persiani who was fast (and crazy at times) last year is nowhere this year. But anyway, the series has come a long way in this couple of year. Let's not forget that it is only a couple of years old, it has a full grid and some amazing prizes (F1 test, GP2 test, WTCC test etc) for the three best drivers in the points.

[META4]

IFM came out last season,seems like the first season has not been a good publicity for them with a lot of Mechanical Troubles

When you see the grid from Last season and these season you can see that they lost a lot of drivers (Anahala,Frey,Cecotto,Ragues...) also some teams walked away

And they still lost recently some more drivers during the last meeting at Brno,Mancinelli(Euronova),Shraml (Fama),Iaconelli (ProMotorsport)

I guess now they have to Focus on putting a grid with decent drivers , as it was said earlier, half of the field has not really the pace

[META4]

Some changes for this race week end at Estoril, seems like Euronova lost 2 of his drivers,Crestani and Meadows, also Cram lost Alberto Costa

Davide Rigon races with ADM

Pivoda is racing with Euronova and Provenzano with Scuderia Fama , after the ADM truck took fire and burnt 2 of the team's car

only 24 cars on the grid

[META4]

Estoril Race 1

1 - Fabio Leimer - Jenzer - 18 laps
2 - Chris Van der Drift - JD - 1"090
3 - Michael Ammermuller - Iris/Jenzer - 10"803
4 - Harald Schlegelmilch - Trident - 16"169
5 - Kasper Andersen - Trident - 16"573
6 - Arturo Llobell - Cram - 17"066
7 - Vladimir Arabadzhiev - JD - 19"788
8 - Tim Sandtler - ISR - 20"336
9 - Davide Rigon - ADM - 39"714
10 - Sergey Afanasiev - JD - 40"672
11 - Pablo Sanchez - Cram - 41"876
12 - Alejandro Nunez - Trident - 43"061
13 - Josef Kral - JVA - 43"450
14 - Luca Persiani - FamÃ* - 44"825
15 - Michele Caliendo - ADM - 51"364
16 - Frankie Provenzano - FamÃ* - 53"772
17 - Daniel Mancinelli - Euronova - 55"652
18 - Matei Mihaescu - Jenzer - 59"204
19 - Tor Graves - JVA - 1'00"246
20 - Tomas Pivoda - Euronova - 1'06"460
21 - Yuhi Sekiguchi - Euronova - 1 lap
22 - Filip Salaquarda - ISR - 2 laps

[META4]

Estoril Race 2

1 - Vladimir Arabadzhiev - JD - 24 laps 37'49"682
2 - Arturo Llobell - Cram - 2"418
3 - Tim Sandtler - ISR - 11"031
4 - Chris Van der Drift - JD - 11"303
5 - Harald Schlegelmilch - Trident - 11"718
6 - Kasper Andersen - Trident - 12"290
7 - Fabio Leimer - Jenzer - 12"828
8 - Michael Ammermuller - Iris/Jenzer - 13"289
9 - Alejandro Nunez - Trident - 28"000
10 - Luca Persiani - FamÃ* - 30"960
11 - Filip Salaquarda - ISR - 31"149
12 - Sergey Afasaniev - JD - 32"902
13 - Daniel Mancinelli - Euronova - 34"210
14 - Josef Kral - JVA - 34"600
15 - Marcello Puglisi - Pro Motorsport - 38"453
16 - Michele Caliendo - ADM - 38"814
17 - Matei Mihaescu - Jenzer - 41"056
18 - Yuhi Sekiguchi - Euronova - 41"438
19 - Tor Graves - JVA - 50"828
20 - Tomas Pivoda - Euronova - 1'07"789
21 - Davide Rigon - ADM - 1 lap

[Pete Fenelon]

Originally Posted by Daisy

Still think Formula Master is a promising series, but it really has lack of good drivers. Van Der Drift is the star so far (good driver), Ammermüller is fine, but I think about 75% of the grid would strungle in series like World Series, F3 Euroseries or British F3 (look only at Sanchez Lopez, frontrunner in this series, but backmacker in World Series by Renault).

(and by the way, can one of the moderators change the title into 'International?)

Once again, too many series, too few good drivers. Careers can be 'stage managed' to ensure that Harry Hotshoe never meets anyone good until he gets to F1 these days.

There's really no reason for this series to exist other than the WTCC programme wanting a single-seater category. It doesn't seem to do anything in career terms that WSR or F3 do better (and it's not as though F3's particularly exciting!)

If they'd done something radically different - ultra-low downforce with honking great engines, say - it'd be interesting; as it is it's YAOMF in which you get two or three drivers on the way up and a bunch of interchangeable cannon-fodder.

[ivanalesi]

Last year they had great aerodynamics and lots of overtaking, it seems this year they have messed them up completely and the racing is more boring than F3. You could see this easily at Pau, F3 was great, IFM was boring.

[META4]

Originally Posted by ivanalesi

Last year they had great aerodynamics and lots of overtaking, it seems this year they have messed them up completely and the racing is more boring than F3. You could see this easily at Pau, F3 was great, IFM was boring.

Aerodynamicly the car is pretty much the same as the one from last year , only the Engine cover has been changed AFAIK , not much to influence overtaking

There are also drivers who cannot do anything against a bad engineered car like Siedler,Sekiguchi,Persiani,Mancinelli...

[gomick]

Congrats to Vladimir Arabadzhiev on his race win at Estoril

[Aslak Vind]

Interesting thread, indeed

I am voting for Kasper Andersen, what is the opinion of him on this board?

[META4]

Kasper Andersen did a brave choice by joining Trident in theirs first season in Formula Master. Unfortunatly for him, even if they are not bad, they are no quite at the same level as JD is. A shame when you know that Andersen was driving for JD last season and this season JD made win their all 3 drivers ( Van Der Drift,Afanasiev and Arabadzhiev)

He could definitly have challenged the title to Van Derdrift this season if he stayed with JD

[chunterer]

Andersen is pretty quick, no question but i'm not quite sure he's at same lvel as Van Der Drift, but then I don't think anyone is in this series either....

[Aslak Vind]

I think, that the main reason for Kasper choosing Trident, was that they also operate a GP2 team. And the possibilities for him getting from Formula Masters into GP2, was better this way.

However, I must agree with you guys; Trident is really fighting to get on top of things. And the move from JD was maybe not the right choice.

[gomick]

Brands Hatch this weekend people - should be some great racing...

[META4]

Once Again a lot of changes for this race at Brands Hatch

Sanchez Lopez left Cram to focus on WSR,
Puglisi left Pro-Motorsport (missing) for Cram
Provenzano left Fama for Cram
Costa left Cram for Euronova
Mancinelli Left Euronova for Fama
....

Free Practice 1

1-Afanasiev
2-Van Der Drift
3-Salaquarda
4-Ammermueller
5-Siedler


seems like they are racing on the small circuit

[META4]

Free practice 2

1- Van Der Drift
2- Sekiguchi
3- Leimer
4- Salaquarda
5- Schlegelmilch
6- Afanasiev

[chunterer]

Erm, Provenazno's not related to THE Provenzano family is he??!!!

[Emillian Stoyko]

Anyone have any info on what is the starting order? I can't find it ahywhere.

[Robbe]

1-v.d.Drift
2-Afanasiev
3-Salaquarda
4-Siedler
5-Andersen
6-Leimer

Full results here

[META4]

Race 1

1-Van Der Drift
2- Afanasiev
3-Puglisi
4-Meadows
5-Mancinelli
6-Costa
7-Ammermueller
8-Caliendo