OK. Let’s get the puns out of the way first. The inaugural Formula E electric motor racing series in Beijing ended with a shocking crash as the volt wagons of Nic Heidfield came together before the last corner.
With Prost in the lead, Heidfield slipped down the inside. Prost immediately swerved into him just as his father did to Ayrton Senna all those years ago. It had the desired effect. Heidfield’s car hit a curb, leapt into the air, somersaulted three times before landing cockpit down and breaking into pieces. Not too long ago Heidfield would have been dead. But he squeezed out of the wreckage and sprinted after his former friend to have a quiet word about the incident. Nicolas Prost first blamed Heidfield before eventually bowing to the stark reality of the TV footage and the anger of a couple of million fans and apologised.
Prost’s Renault team is part-owned by Alain Prost while Heidfield’s Venturi outfit is part-owned by Hollywood’s Leonardo DiCaprio. Leo knows a bit about racing, having driven a fast old car around Sydney in the Great Gatsby.
You know when a race promoter says that he doesn’t really care about crowds, what he really wants is the social media nerds, that not much good can happen. What you don’t know is that each driver has two cars. Yes. Although the race only goes for an hour, the 20 Spark-Renault SRTs only have enough juice for 30 minutes. When the drivers come in for a pit stop they actually change to a new car. And the three drivers ranked most popular by online voting get a three-second power boost from 150 to 180kW during the race. There would be a lot of V8 Supercar drivers who are praying that never comes here.
Staying in China, Hong Kong’s Steve Hung has just single-handedly put the British manufacturing industry back in business. The property developer and would-be casino operator just handed Rolls Royce an order for 30 long-base Rollers. In the $20 million order, Rolls will build two of the most expensive Rolls-Royce Phantoms ever commissioned. They will have bespoke clocks designed and created by Graff Luxury Watches. Given Laurie Graff doesn’t get out of bed to make a watch for less than $100,000, you can expect your car to be on time. In a nod to Steve Hung’s preferences, the two most expensive Phantoms will additionally feature external and internal gold-plated accents.
Click here to read on: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/executive-living/motoring/pulling-the-plug-on-a-shocking-show-formula-e-electric-motor-racing/story-fngmee2f-1227070517472
