Brawn GP Racing Team

With just over another week to go until we have more F1 action these 3 week stints make me impatient. Silverstone saw Red Bull come to the fore but was this down to a giant leap forward by RBR or simply down to the cold weather conditions at the Northampton Circuit. Brawn GP ran some upgrades for the Friday practice sessions but decided not to implement them for the race due to the cold weather conditions the components must have shown no conclusive effect. The wind on friday was also playing havoc with setup. Below is a picture showing the bulbous mounds on the bulkhead (similar to the RB5 varients) and the different front wing endplates.

Updates have always been on the agenda for Nurburgring according to Ross so these combined with the late Silverstone updates could provide a giant leap forward. The problem with bringing so many updates however could be quantifying each parts net gain/deficiency.

"With the confusion over the tyres, we didn't run some new pieces we had because Friday [at Silverstone] was very difficult with the tyre temperature. We couldn't determine how the new bits were working, so we decided to avoid confusion and went back to what we had in Turkey."
"So we've got those bits and we have some new improvements for the Nurburgring."

Red Bulls large leap forward could be seen as a master stroke by RBR and Adrian Newey or simply that their car responds better to colder temperatures. I firmly believe the latter to be more the case as their car seems to be more stup to provide downforce from the top of the car rather than beneath like the BGP001.

"It has always been a strong car aerodynamically and at Silverstone in the slow medium speed stuff, we didn't take the return we normally could because the tyres were cold," he said. "So when we got to the complex there wasn't enough temperature in the tyres for our normal advantages to come through in that area."
"But we probably need to see a bit more in normal conditions to really judge it - a race where we are comfortable we are performing how we should be."

I expect to see a much closer battle between BGP and RBR come Germany as equalisation of weather permitations and updates come to fruition.

Further from that news has just come through that Bridgstone are to use consecutive Tyre compounds in the next 4 races, this should further play into BGP's hands as the tyres will operate more effectively.

For the main picture please see source: http://premium.f1-live.com/f1/photos-hires/2009/gpsilverstone/diapo_105.jpg