French Fiasco

How does one describe the Model F1 French Grand Prix? In two words: Total chaos.

Felipe Massa and Pastor Maldonado qualified 7th and 11th on the grid for the race, respectively. The chaos already began before the five lights even went out, when McLaren did not show up for the third time this season. Maldonado dueled with the Red Bull of Jenson Button early on and made contact entering the chicane, losing an end plate. However, he was able to rebound and remain in the top 10 for the remainder of the race, finishing 8th. Meanwhile, Massa also stayed within the top 10 for the majority of the race until disaster on lap 31 when his car lost power.

Afterwards, team boss macus16 stated [the race] “certainly wasn’t the best weekend we’ve had – but by all means it wasn’t the worst. Our #1 Maldo had a good run to pull himself up into the points. We’ve just hit a little rough patch with the reliability, we can still keep on truckin’.”

Next week, the Model F1 World Championship crosses the English Channel into Silverstone for the British Grand Prix.

It’s In The Game

We all know about Codemasters’ work with the F1 games. Most of us may even remember when 989 Sports and EA Sports created them. With 989 now defunct and EA having withdrawn from motorsports game developing, it looked as if Codemasters has a firm grip on the sport. Until now.

Earlier on Tuesday, Massa and Maldonado were summoned by macus16 for a great sponsorship opportunity that all teams are receiving: EA Sports is planning to develop the first ever Model F1 video game, and in exchange for each team getting a cover shoot, they will receive an EA Sports associate sponsorship for next week’s British Grand Prix. As there are ten teams still active, there will be ten covers.

The duo spent much of Thursday morning working on the shoot, having to work in haste as EA had arranged for the Mercedes drivers to have their session in the afternoon, followed by Williams in the evening. The shoot lasted from Wednesday to Saturday (3 teams per day), and despite initial concerns that it would interfere with the teams’ practice and qualifying schedule, there were no problems throughout the week.

The game will be released worldwide on 25 March, with the covers depending on the region: in Manor’s case, their cover will be on the South American releases.