NOVEMBER 15, 2007

In Barcelona

While Michael Schumacher has been amusing himself setting the fastest times of the testing in Barcelona in recent days, there has been much interest further down the grid with a couple of new drivers in action.

While Michael Schumacher has been amusing himself setting the fastest times of the testing in Barcelona in recent days, there has been much interest further down the grid with a couple of new drivers in action. The most obvious of these was Karun Chandhok in a Red Bull who did a decent job alongside David Coulthard. Italian GP2 driver Luca Filippi, who was in action in a 2007 Honda RA107, which was being run for Honda by the Super Aguri test team. This seems to suggest that the Italian, who comes from a rich Italian family with interests in the trucking business, could be a candidate for the team, alongside Takuma Sato.

The team is looking for money and there are believed to be several groups that are interested in buying the team (and retaining Honda protege Aguri Suzuki) but any sale is going to be dependent on an agreement about the use of customer cars. This was agreed in principle at the Brazilian GP but, in the finest tradition of F1, was then un-agreed as soon as some of those involved left the meeting. The intention now is to have another meeting to get this - and therefore a new Concorde Agreement - in place before the end of the year.