Jul 15, 2011
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The German Grand Prix lags behind those other Grandes Epreuves like the British and Italian races in terms of numbers, because although it joined the world championship in 1951, it took a break in ’55, ’60 and 2007. The last time Formula 1 pitched the Big Top in the shadow of the Eifel mountains was back in 2009, as this race now alternates between here and the Hockenheimring.
The current track first saw F1 action in 1984, when it was home to the European Grand Prix and there was much mumbling from old fogeys that it did not deserve to be called Nurburgring, as it was no match for the “old” Ring, described by Sir Jackie Stewart as the Green Hell. No doubt several centuries ago, some old boys probably complained that Chariot Racing was not as exciting as throwing Christians to the lions, so if we accept that the old circuit is really not that well suited to modern F1 cars, then the current 5.148 km track is a pretty decent place to hold a motor race. If you really want to wait ages to see race cars whiz past, you can always come here to watch the Nurburgring 24 Hours that uses a combination of both tracks, producing a lap distance of 24.4 kilometres! Having been built in 1984, the facilities were given a major update last time we were here with an impressive new paddock, hotel, museum complex, all in stark contrast to the natural beauty of the surrounding countryside. Wherever you have forests and Germans you put them together and everyone goes camping and in recent years the home crowd has had plenty to cheer about, what with Michael Schumacher and now their new champion, Sebastian Vettel. However, it has to be said that the latest German champion seems to attract a far quieter crowd than the Schumi Army. Maybe they will find their voice this weekend as Vettel seems to be marching to back-to-back titles.
World titles are not on the Scuderia Toro Rosso radar just yet, but we seem to be going through quite a good performance patch at the moment. In Germany we will be looking to extend our run of consecutive points finishes to five, while working on improving our qualifying performance is also on the agenda. The track is a technical mix of slow, medium and fast sections with some passing opportunities, for example at the first corner and then at the hairpin. It is quite a challenge for the engineers and drivers to get the cars set up properly here and with Pirelli bringing their Medium and Soft compounds, tyre management will, as ever, be critical. Or maybe not, as the wonderful summer weather we experienced at Silverstone for the British Grand Prix is rumoured to be heading for Nurburg next week so that rain tyres might once again feature prominently.
Credit: Toro Rosso (www.scuderiatororosso.com)
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