GO GO TOKYO

 

Timo Glock and Kamui Kobayashi jetted out of Singapore early on Monday morning to head straight for Tokyo and a series of engagements with the team’s fans and partners.

It all began on Tuesday with a formal press conference at a Toyota facility in Tokyo, where the drivers as well as Team Principal Tadashi Yamashina met the local media and expressed their hopes for the Japanese Grand Prix.

After that, Timo and Kamui headed to the famous Roppongi area and the F1 Pit Stop Café, where they naturally received a warm welcome from locals whose passion is everything F1.

Wednesday saw both drivers leaving the hustle and bustle of Tokyo behind, taking the bullet train to visit the headquarters of Toyota Motor Corporation in Toyota City for an employee event.

Meeting and greeting completed, both made their way on to Suzuka by coach, while Jarno arrived late on Wednesday having taken a couple of days rest in Singapore to recover from a fever. Then the serious business of the Japanese Grand Prix could begin.

IT’S GOOD TO BE BACK

After two years at the impressive Fuji Speedway, the Japanese Grand Prix returned to its long-time home at Suzuka, although the paddock was barely recognisable to that which hosted Formula 1 for the last time in 2006.

For those team members with prior experience of Suzuka, memories of the paddock there were of tiny spaces, cramped garages and several team offices scattered around the paddock making coordination tricky.

While the Suzuka lay-out has always been world class, the facilities by that time were in need of substantial improvement and Fuji Speedway showed how good a Japanese paddock could be.

Suzuka rose to the challenge and delivered an all-new paddock complex which offered comfortable, spacious offices all located close to each other. The drivers even had their own rooms behind all the other offices, accessible only by walking around the block.

But one thing hadn’t changed and that was the passion of the Japanese fans, who even remained in good spirits during Friday’s severely rain-affected practice, cheering enthusiastically in the afternoon when the first cars ventured tentatively on to the track.

SPEED BY NAME, SPEED BY NATURE

 

As has become traditional at the Japanese Grand Prix, Jarno Trulli sported a new helmet design following a Panasonic ‘Kids School’ competition.

The contest for Japanese children required entrants to submit a design for the top section of Jarno’s helmet, following the theme of ‘speed’.

Over 550 entries were received and the winner, selected by Jarno in Valencia, was 11-year-old schoolboy Mitsuki Inoue, who was given a special trip to the Suzuka paddock to present Jarno with his new lid on Saturday.

Mitsuki’s bold designed featured the word ‘speed’ in Japanese characters and Jarno met him to officially receive it in the garage. Not only was the helmet presented, so too was a hand-written message in beautiful Japanese script from Mitsuki to Jarno thanking him for the opportunity.

Jarno drove the whole weekend with the new design, although on Friday it was another new helmet in the garage which got all the attention when Kamui Kobayashi stepped in for Timo Glock, who was suffering from a very heavy cold and a fever.