Sebastian Vettel claimed his third pole position of the season yesterday at the British Formula One Grand Prix as local hero Jenson Button had to settle for a season-worst sixth place.
The German Vettel clocked 1 minute, 19.509 seconds in his Red Bull on the 5.141km circuit as he topped the grid from Brawn GP driver Rubens Barrichello and Mark Webber in the second Red Bull.
Championship leader Button managed no better than sixth and compatriot Lewis Hamilton, the reigning world champion and the winner at Silverstone last year, will have to start in the last row from 19th place in his McLaren-Mercedes.
Button has won six of the seven races this season for a commanding lead on 61 points. Teammate Rubens Barrichello has 35 points and Vettel 29 points. Vettel won the other race in China.
German Force India driver Adrian Sutil crashed heavily into a tire wall at the Becketts turn at the end of the first session. He walked away from the wreck on his own, but then underwent medical checks. The cause of the accident was not immediately known.
Meanwhile, Formula One intends to sue the eight teams that announced plans for a rival series next season — the biggest crisis to engulf the sport since the championship began in 1950.
The governing body accused the Formula One Teams Association (FOTA) of “serious violations of law.”
The breakaway came after Ferrari, championship leader Brawn GP and six other teams failed to resolve a dispute over the introduction of a budget cap for next season.
Governing body the FIA has responded by delaying publication of a final entry list for next season while it “asserts its legal rights.”
“The FIA’s lawyers have now examined the FOTA threat to begin a breakaway series,” the organization said in a statement. “The actions of FOTA as a whole, and Ferrari in particular, amount to serious violations of law, including willful interference with contractual relations, direct breaches of Ferrari’s legal obligations and a grave violation of competition law.”
Ferrari is already countersuing the ruling body “to protect its contractual rights.”
But FIA president Mosley remains “completely confident” that the breakaway series will never come to fruition.
“In the end, people do what it’s in their interests to do and it’s in the interest of teams to be in F1 world championship, and there is actually no fundamental, or even important, issue preventing them from taking part,” Mosley said. “It’s all about personalities and power, and who can grab what from whom, which is easy when nothing’s at stake but, when it comes to the first race and it’s make-your-mind-up time, they will be there.”
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
The lights dimmed and the crowd hushed as Karoline Kristensen entered for her performance. However, this was no ordinary Dutch theater: The temperature was 80°C and the audience naked apart from a towel. Dressed in a swimsuit and to the tune of emotional music, the 21-year-old Kristensen started her routine, performed inside a large sauna, with a bed of hot rocks in the middle. For a week this month, a group of wellness practitioners, called “sauna masters,” are gathering at a picturesque health resort in the Netherlands to compete in this year’s Aufguss world sauna championships. The practice takes its name from a
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