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Like the nose of a WWII bomber, the welcome sign at the Brawn GP factory in Brackley has a tally of victories the team has notched up so far this season.

They’re not being overconfident, though — there are nine races left this year but only space on the board for another six wins, at least not without adding a second row.

But Brawn GP are not the only Formula One team with a connection to airplane nose art.

In World War I, Francesco Baracca was Italy’s top fighter ace scoring 34 kills. In recognition of his former cavalry regiment, Baracca adopted the embem of a prancing stallion — the Cavallino Rampante — and he became known as ‘The Cavalier of the Skies’.

After the war, Enzo Ferrari won a race in Ravenna where he met Baracca’s mother, the Countess Paolina.  Legend has it that the Countess asked Ferrari to use the prancing horse on his cars saying it would bring him good luck, as Enzo himself explains:

The horse was painted on the fuselage of the fighter plane flown by Francesco Baracca, a heroic Italian pilot who died on Mount Montello: the Italian ace of aces of the First World War. In 1923 … I met Count Enrico Baracca, the pilot’s father, and subsequently his mother, Countess Paolina. One day she said to me, “Ferrari, why don’t you put my son’s prancing horse on your cars; it would bring you luck.” … The horse was black and has remained so; I added the canary yellow background because it is the colour of Modena.

Ever since then the Cavallino Rampante has been the symbol of the Scuderia.

Continuing the tradition of drivers wearing special helmet designs for their home Grands Prix, Nick Heidfeld has chosen one of over 9000 designs fans submitted to his website to wear at the German Grand Prix next week.

At the British Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button both commissioned special helmet designs for their home race, although it didn’t seem to bring either of them much luck on the day.

The design by Hungarian fan Tamás Simon is made up entirely of circles and impressed Heidfeld and his helmet designer Jens Munser.  Heidfeld said:

This helmet stood out from all the rest. In fact, as soon as I saw it, I thought that it was a likely winner. My immediate impression was…’Wow!’

You can see Nick’s top 11 here.  As Heidfeld explains:

In the end, it was very difficult to limit the finalists to ten. That’s why we decided to go for a shortlist of eleven.

Thank god he didn’t choose the one with ears or the one with the big picture of his bearded face on the side.

After the race, the helmet will be donated to German television station RTL who will auction it off with proceeds going to the ‘Wir helfen Kindern’ charity.

You can submit bids by e-mail to auktion@spendenmarathon.de.

A couple of days ago, in a post asking when will Toyota win their first race, I included a list of the current Formula One Teams and the years they won their first Grand Prix.

By chance today happens to be the 30th anniversary of Renault’s first Formula One Grand Prix victory by Jean-Pierre Jabouille at the 1979 French Grand Prix.

In 1977 Renault introduced the RS01; the first Formula One car to be powered by a turbocharged engine.  Completely different from every other car on the grid, the innovative but unreliable RS01 soon earned the nickname ‘Yellow Teapot’ and would often end the race billowing smoke.  The massive turbo lag also made the car uncompetitive on tight circuits.

Despite the problems, Renault were determined to make the new technology work, as Jabouille recalls:

The new technology was what interested Renault – they wouldn’t have come into F1 had it been a question of building another V8 like the Cosworth. They wanted that challenge, but on top of that, we were also developing Michelin’s new radial tyres. It was a lot of work, complicated work, in a short space of time, and with the engine, it wasn’t just a question of developing the technology, we then had to make it drivable. There was a world of difference between the engine delivering good power on the dyno, and being usable in the car.

The RS01 eventually developed into the RS10.  First introduced at the 1979 Monaco Grand Prix, the new car overcame the turbo lag by using twin turbos and had one of the new ground-effect chassis.

The RS10 went on to take five poles and Renault’s first win and in so doing kick-started the turbo years of the 1980’s.  Once Renault had claimed the first win for a turbocharged car in Formula One, all the major teams started developing turbos.  Soon the engines were producing up to 1500bhp or as Martin Brundle said ‘way more power than grip’.

Incidentally, the 1979 French Grand Prix also produced one of the most epic Formula One battles for second place between the Renault of René Arnoux and the Ferrari of Gilles Villeneuve.  After practically driving each other off the road in the final laps, Villeneuve crossed the line 0.24 seconds ahead of Arnoux in a race he would later describe as ‘my best memory of Grand Prix Racing’.

Tag Heuer have been running a competition where if you guess who will win a race between Steve McQueen and Lewis Hamilton you can win some really nice prizes.

First prize is a limited edition Tag Heuer Monaco watch.  Second prize is a (presumably replica) Lewis Hamilton helmet and third prize is a ‘private driving day in F1’, whatever that is.

The competition closed on 10th June and unfortunately I didn’t win. 🙁  But at least we now know who won ‘The Duel’.

We featured the teaser video in an earlier post about Formula One adverts, and now here is the final cut of Duel, ‘the cinematic road race between Steve McQueen and Lewis Hamilton’.

To be honest, you probably won’t be surprised who wins…

Despite being one of the most well-funded teams in Formula One, Toyota have still not won a Grand Prix; something that every other team on the grid besides Force India have managed to do.

Toyota’s debut season was in 2002 and, despite scoring a point in their first race in Australia (when half the field was wiped out in the first corner), the team had little success until 2005 when, after scoring points in nearly every race, they finished second in the Constructors’ Championship.

It has now been seven years and although Toyota have committed to racing until 2012, the bosses in Japan must be wondering when their massive investment will translate into a win.

But is seven years such a long time to go without a win in Formula One?  Well, yes, actually.  While teams have come and gone in the past without their drivers ever standing on the top step, when you compare Toyota to the other teams on the grid at the moment their development begins to look a bit stunted.

Here is a table showing the debut year and maiden win year for each of the current F1 teams:

I suppose you could argue that Toro Rosso actually took 23 years to score a maiden victory, if you include the Minardi years, but then Minardi never had a budget of $400m.

Image: Toyota