Exclusive!! - Toyota ran pedal system KERS in Turkey!!!

[John S]

Some late breaking news from autosport.com 

Here's an exclusive for you: Toyota became the latest team to run KERS at last weekend's Turkish Grand Prix.
Yes, you may have missed that little one in the news pages – and that would be because it wasn't actually on the F1 cars.

Sitting in front of the Toyota motorhome throughout the Istanbul weekend were two bicycles that featured a unique push button system on the handlebars.

Yes, these were bikes that reused some of the energy captured in braking to turn it into power that could then ease the burden on the man at the pedals.

It seems, however, that may be as close as Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock will get to a KERS system this year, with the TF109 looking increasingly likely to stick without the technology.

In another amusing twist on the KERS tale, it caused a bit of amusement that on the weekend that the members of FOTA chose to do their best to do away with the hybrid systems from F1, a new Mercedes-Benz promotional video on the hybrid technology was doing the rounds in the press office.

Although the environmental benefit of KERS has not been universally accepted by all in F1, it is McLaren who needs a pat on the back after Turkey for having taken the initiative in doing its bit to help save the environment.

For years now, teams have religiously distributed their press releases to journalists in the press office over a weekend. That means at least six sheets of paper from each team to around 300 people each weekend – estimates coming up at hundreds of thousands of sheets of paper per year.

So McLaren's ever inventive press duo Matt Bishop and Steve Cooper decided that, in this era of electronic media, it was pointless continuing to outlay on paper production when almost everyone now can read and access comments electronically.

McLaren's head of communications Matt Bishop said: "Our calculations show that, as a team, we could save as many as 20,000 sheets of A4 paper per season if we were to no longer print our previews and post-session round-ups on paper."

While most journalists were unruffled by the move, and if truth be told quite a lot of the press office probably did not even notice, McLaren did have one voice of discontent.

Veteran American journalist Dan Knutson still thought it important that he get his hands on a paper version of the paper release – so McLaren duly obliged.

It delivered him with a release that was headlined: "Dan Knutson's Analog Version." And in it, if you kept reading it to the end, Bishop had added his own quote:

"We have slain one Turkish maple for the purpose of providing a bespoke analog service to aforementioned seniors," wrote Bishop. "We have also issued one bespoke invitation to the unveiling of the McLaren M23, at Colnbrook, next Friday week. Tiffin will be provided at a cost of 15 shillings."

Let's hope more teams follow you. In the press releases that is, not the Tiffin.

[Scott]

Oh boy, those Wiz Kidz over at Mclaren's Communication Centre.  What brilliance, what innovation, finally figuring out that the press corps actually use computers and can access the data online (only the most ancient of reporters would need a paper copy).

Where were these morons when Mclaren really needed them to manage corporate communications during the first few races this year?  This is the first time I've even seen Bishop mentioned this year. 

[Alianora La Canta]

Tiffin? I like tiffin.