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Brabham has become the latest hopeful to submit an entry for the 2010 Formula One World Championship.

Last Thursday, the new team released a statement announcing its application as a ‘cost cap Formula One team’ for 2010.

This brings to 10 the number of new teams that have announced their intention to compete in the Championship next year.  Of the current F1 teams only Williams and Force India have signed up unconditionally while the other FOTA teams submitted a joint application with a number of conditions attached.

The FIA is due to announce the approved list of competitors for 2010 on June 12 and with space on the grid for only 13 teams next year not everyone who wants to race is going to make the cut.

Here’s a quick rundown on the new entries.

Brabham

The new entry using the famous Brabham name is not the same team that Australian Jack Brabham founded in 1960 and went on to win 2 Constructors’ Championships and 4 Drivers’ Championships.  In 2008, German tool company Formtech bought the assets of Super Aguri when it went into administration.  Formtch’s owner, Franz Hilmer, intends to run the new team from Super Aguri’s old Leafield facilities.

Hilmer claims he owns the rights to Brabham Grand Prix Limited, a claim that seems to be disputed by the Brabham family.  A statement issued by Brabham Enterprises Limited says:

Sir Jack Brabham and the Brabham family have expressed their surprise at the recent news reporting that an entry has been submitted for the 2010 FIA Formula One World Championship by Formtech with the intention of operating as Brabham Grand Prix Limited.

The family would like to make it clear that they are in no way involved with Brabham Grand Prix Limited and received no consultation regarding the company’s plans to resurrect their historic name in Formula One.

The family is taking legal advice and will take necessary steps to protect their name, reputation and its goodwill.

Prodrive

Founded in 1984 by David Richards, Prodrive started out running rally cars for Porsche, MG and BMW.  In 1990 Prodrive began a successful partnership with Subaru going on to win three World Rally Championships.  Prodrive has also been successful in sports car racing, first with Ferraris and later in collaboration with Aston Martin.

David Richards has previous Formula One experience as team principal of the Benetton and BAR Formula One teams and in 2006 Prodrive was selected to compete in the 2008 Formula One World Championship, however a protest against the team’s planned used of customer cars resulted in Prodrive pulling out of Formula One.

It is expected the team will rebrand as Aston Martin in 2012.

Lola

Lola is another team with a long racing history.  Started in 1958, Lola was one of the top chassis suppliers for sports car racing in the 1960’s.  In the 1980’s and 90’s Lola built cars for the Group C racing series and also produced cars for Le Mans-style racing.

Lola’s first entry into Formula One was in 1962, supplying the Mk4 to the Bowmaker-Yeoman Racing Team.  In 1997 Lola entered Formula One as a constructor in their own right.  Pressured into competing a year before they were ready, the team only turned up for two Grands Prix and failed to qualify at either.  Lola went into receivership shortly after and was bought by Irish millionaire Martin Birrane.  Since then Lola has produced chassis for IndyCar, Formula 3000 and A1GP.

USF1

There had been rumours about a new US based F1 team for some time before USF1 was officially announced in February.  Run by engineer Ken Anderson and F1 journalist Peter Windsor the team is based in Charlotte, North Carolina with a second European base in Spain.

USF1, or USGPE, plans to promote itself as ‘Made in America’ using American technology and, if possible, American drivers.

In April, Windsor revealed that the team are looking at using the standard Cosworth V8 engine.

N. Technology

N.Technologywas created to manage the worldwide official sporting activities of the Fiat Auto Group, designing, manufacturing and racing touring cars.  The team finished third in the World Touring Car Championship in 2005, 2006 and 2007 with Alfa Romeo.

N.Technology also designed and produced the Formula Master single-seater.

Team Superfund

Experienced F1 test driver Alex Wurz will become principal of the new Team Superfund.  Wurz drove for Benetton for three seasons before becoming McLaren’s third driver.  He replaced Juan Pablo Montoya due to injury in the 2005 San Marino Grand Prix where he finished fourth, eventually being promoted to third when both Honda drivers were disqualified.  He returned to a full-time race seat in 2007 with Williams but retired at the end of the year and is currently test driver for Brawn GP.

On the move into management, Wurz told Autosport:

I was always interested in going into team management, even when I was racing in F1.

Team Superfund is financed by the investment company’s Austrian owner, Christian Baha, and it is understood the team would prefer to align themselves with an existing team, based in the UK, rather than build everything entirely from scratch.  Wurz:

While personally I wouldn’t want to end up as a pure customer team for years to come, we would prefer to work with an existing team to begin with.

The team plan to use the spec Cosworth engine.

Epsilon Euskadi

Spanish racing team, Epsilon Euskadi is the only major motor sport team from the Basque Country.  Team principal Joan Villadelprat has been involved in Formula One for over thirty years, working with teams such as McLaren, Ferrari and Benetton.

BMW Sauber driver Robert Kubica won the World Series by Renault Championship with the team in 2005.

Villadelprat says the team’s F1 entry for 2010 is different from those of the other new entrants:

The difference between ourselves and other people is that, first, we have a project that’s different from everybody else’s, with a social output, which is what Max Mosley is looking for. We have the mechanics’ school, the engineers’ school, the lower categories, from karting, Formula Renault 2.0 and the World Series.

I’m not sure if Formula One needs a training company (isn’t that what the junior formulas are for?) but the team has financial backing for four years and they are planning to build their own chassis.  Villadelprat:

We are building everything in-house. We have made the investment, something not everybody has, to be able to build everything in-house. This is a new team, built from scratch. I just want the opportunity to be able to produce a good programme.

Campos Meta 1

Spaniard Adrian Campos raced for Minardi in 1987 and 1988, contesting 21 races but only finishing two.  He had more luck in Spanish Touring Cars, winning the Championship in 1994 before going on to form the Campos Grand Prix team.  Fernando Alonso raced for Campos in the 1999 Spanish Euro Open MoviStar by Nissan series.

Campos entered GP2 when it was launched in 2005 and in 2008 won the Teams’ Championship before Adrian Campos sold his stake in the team which was then renamed to Barwa Addax.  Campos Racing is also involved in Spanish Formula 3.

The team haven’t revealed much detail about their F1 application but Spain’s Marca paper has reported that Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim is involved.

Litespeed

British Formula Three team Litespeed has announced a deal with current Lotus owner, David Hunt, to use the historic Lotus name if their F1 application is successful.  Litespeed team principal Nino Judge said:

Team Lotus is synonymous with great British engineering and formula one innovation, which easily demonstrate why ex-Lotus personnel would want to bring this championship-winning name back.

The ex-Lotus personnel he refers to include former Lotus driver Johnny Herbert.  Ex-Force India Chief Technology Officer, Mike Gascoyne, is also involved in the new team.

Like Brabham, though, the new Team Lotus won’t be the same team started by Colin Chapman in the 50s and went on to win 7 Constructors’ and 6 Drivers’ Championships.

March

March Engineering was founded in 1969 by Max Mosley, Alan Rees, Graham Coaker and Robin Herd.  The team was only moderately successful in Formula One, claiming three victories in 207 races, but managed to win the Indianapolis 500 five times in a row from 1983 to 1987.

March also saw success in Formula 2, Formula 3 and sportscar racing before it was wound up in the 1990s.  The company is now owned by the chairman of Swindon Town Football Club.

According to Autosport, the team has nominated Cosworth as its engine supplier.

The results are up for round 7 of the f1buzz prediction game and they show once again that practice times are not necessarily a good indicator of race performance.

Everyone except Sergio wanted to see Felipe Massa, if not winning his fourth Turkish GP in a row, then at least on the podium.  In the end it seems Ferrari just have a lot more work to do before they can win races again.

Andrew scored the most points, correctly picking Button and Vettel for a podium.  He maintains his lead with a 10 point gap over Sergio while Mark had another good week picking up 5 points for Button’s fastest lap.

The next race is the British Grand Prix in two weeks time and there are plenty of points left so anyone still can win!

Image: Getty / Red Bull

In the words of second place finisher Mark Webber, Jenson Button was “on another planet” today as he stormed to another crushing victory in the Turkish Grand Prix.

Starting in second place on the dusty side of the track, Jenson stayed behind pole sitter Sebastian Vettel through the first lap until turn 9 when Vettel ran wide.  That was all the opportunity Button needed to take the lead and from then on he drove a perfect race.

Sebastian Vettel managed to close in on Button in his second stint but couldn’t get past and Red Bull’s choice to keep him on a two stop strategy saw team mate Mark Webber pass him during his second pit stop.

Rubens Barrichello had a bad start losing 10 places off the grid due to a clutch problem.  His day went from bad to worse when, after a great battle with Heikki Kovalainen and several attempts at putting his car in places it wouldn’t fit, he retired on lap 47 with a gearbox problem – the first Brawn retirement of the season.

Despite finishing 13th, a smiling Lewis Hamilton “thoroughly enjoyed the race”:

It was quite an uneventful race but I actually enjoyed myself this afternoon.  I was very heavy at the start but I just pushed and pushed.  That’s why I can smile – because I think I drove to my full potential.  The most important thing is for us to keep our heads up and to keep pushing.

There has been a big change in Hamilton’s attitude since the beginning of the season.  After the controversy of Australia, Lewis’s post race interviews were monosyllabic and he looked very unhappy with himself and his team.  Now,  he seems to be enjoying racing again.  It is as if Button and Hamilton have switched positions this year.  Last year it was Jenson that was always putting a positive spin on his team’s terrible performance.

Now that Lewis has given up all hope of retaining the Championship he can relax and concentrate on developing and getting the most out of his car.

2009 Turkish Grand Prix Race Results

Pos	Driver	Team	Grid	Time	Points
1	Jenson Button	Brawn-Mercedes	2	1:26:24.848	10
2	Mark Wbber	Red Bull-Renault	4	1:26:31.562	8
3	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull-Renault	1	1:26:32.309	6
4	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	5	1:26:52.691	5
5	Nico Rosberg	Williams-Toyota	9	1:26:56.387	4
6	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	7	1:27:04.844	3
7	Robert Kubica	BMW Sauber	10	1:27:11.095	2
8	Timo Glock	Toyota	13	1:27:11.807	1
9	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	6	1:27:15.048	0
10	Fernando Alonso	Renault	8	1:27:27.248	0
11	Nick Heidfeld	BMW Sauber	11	1:27:29.175	0
12	Kazuki Nakajima	Williams-Toyota	12	1:27:31.224	0
13	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	16	1:27:45.302	0
14	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes	14	lapped	0
15	Sebastien Buemi	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	18	lapped	0
16	Nelson Piquet Jr	Renault	17	lapped	0
17	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	15	lapped	0
18	Sebastien Bourdais	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	20	lapped	0
RET	Rubens Barrichello	Brawn-Mercedes	3	retired, 47 laps	0
RET	Giancarlo Fisichella	Force India-Mercedes	19	retired, 4 laps	0

Image: Brawn GP

The FIA now publishes the weights of each car after qualifying on Saturday.  Those cars that make it through to the final qualifying session must use the fuel they qualified with while the rest of the field may refuel before the race.

Below is a graph showing the actual top ten qualifying times as well as those times adjusted for the weight of fuel each car is carrying.  The graph assumes a standard lap time cost of 0.3 seconds per 10kg of fuel.

From these weights we can see that pole sitter Vettel is fueled lighter than Button alongside him while on the second row Barrichello is fueled lighter than the Red Bull of Mark Webber.  This could be good news for both Button and Webber tomorrow as their adjusted times are quicker than the cars alongside them.

Massa’s hopes for another victory look even more remote when we see that his team mate Kimi Raikkonen outqualified him despite carrying more fuel.

The one man that looks very out of place is Fernando Alonso.  His eighth place grid position was only possible because he was fueled lighter than anyone else on the grid.  He can expect a challenge from Rosberg and Kubica during the race.

2009 Turkish Grand Prix car weights

Image: Renault

Sebastian Vettel has claimed his second pole position of the season in qualifying for Sunday’s Turkish Grand Prix.

The German’s time of 1:28.316 was enough to take the number one grid slot from Brawn GP’s Jenson Button.

Vettel’s team mate Mark Webber briefly had the fastest time in Q3 but will start behind Vettel tomorow on the second row, alongside Rubens Barrichello.

McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton missed out on getting through to the second qualifying session for the second time in a row.  While the team had been cautiously optimistic about their chances in Turkey this weekend, Hamilton seemed to lack confidence and struggled for grip in the twitchy MP4-24.  He will start from 16th on the grid.

Lewis Hamilton said afterwards:

Our car seems to have got slower relative to the others as the grip has gone down on the track.  I pushed as hard as I could today but I just had no grip out there.

Force India’s Adrian Sutil made it to Q2 for the second time in a row and he will start from 15th on the grid tomorrow, between the two McLarens.

Despite a good performance in practice, Ferrari’s Felipe Massa will start from the fourth row of the grid behind team mate Kimi Raikkonen.  He will have a hard time making it four Turkish victories in a row from there.

The new double-decker diffuser fitted to the BMWs of Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld seemed to have helped a little, lifting Kubica into Q3, but the team are still firmly in the mid-field.  The Red Bull diffuser on the other hand was finally given a chance to work properly after the slow corners of Monaco and either of the Red Bull drivers could be on the podium on Sunday.

2009 Formula One Turkish Grand Prix Qualifying Results

Pos	Driver	Team	Time
1	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull-Renault	01:28.316
2	Jenson Button	Brawn-Mercedes	01:28.421
3	Rubens Barrichello	Brawn-Mercedes	01:28.579
4	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	01:28.613
5	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	01:28.666
6	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	01:28.815
7	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	01:28.858
8	Fernando Alonso	Renault	01:29.075
9	Nico Rosberg	Williams-Toyota	01:29.191
10	Robert Kubica	BMW Sauber	01:29.357
11	Nick Heidfeld	BMW Sauber	01:27.521
12	Kazuki Nakajima	Williams-Toyota	01:27.629
13	Timo Glock	Toyota	01:27.795
14	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes	01:28.207
15	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	01:28.391
16	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	01:28.318
17	Nelson Piquet Jr	Renault	01:28.582
18	Sebastien Buemi	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	01:28.708
19	Giancarlo Fisichella	Force India-Mercedes	01:28.717
20	Sebastien Bourdais	Toro Rosso-Ferrari	01:28.918

Image: Red Bull Racing