Flavio vowed to help Piquet

Flavio Briatore has vowed to ‘help’ rather than immediately sack Renault's struggling Nelson Piquet.

Intense speculation has surrounded the future of the 23-year-old Brazilian, including rumours in Barcelona last weekend that Piquet could be ousted as soon as the forthcoming British Grand Prix to make room for reserve driver Romain Grosjean.

But in interview with Spain's Diario Sport, team boss Briatore said Piquet is being given time to prove himself now that the season has begun on the more familiar European circuits.

"He is a good team-mate for Fernando and has always been very loyal to him," the Italian said. "He is experiencing a difficult moment, but when someone is having trouble you help him, not kill him. We have to give him some room for the European races."

Briatore also did not want to address rising speculation that, given Kimi Raikkonen's struggles, Alonso is now being tipped by the Italian media to restore Ferrari's fortunes perhaps as soon as 2010.

"I do not talk about these issues because I have others to solve. These decisions are for another time," he said.

Red Bull love to secured Vettel with long term contract

Red Bull is keen to secure the services of Sebastian Vettel for a long time, team boss Christian Horner has admitted.

The Austrian squad's contract with the 21-year-old German, the only driver apart from Jenson Button to have won a race this year, runs out at the end of 2010.

But Horner told Sport Bild: "We see our future with Sebastian. We want to strengthen and expand our team around him."

Openly interested in Vettel beyond 2010 is BMW Sauber and McLaren Mercedes, but Bernie Ecclestone has made clear he would like to see his driver favourite at the wheel of a Ferrari – no surprise there.

However, Horner said: "Sebastian feels comfortable with us. If we give him cars with which he can drive at the front, there will be no reason for him to move."

Williams expecting more in Monte Carlo

Starting ninth, Nico Rosberg was able to finish Sunday's Spanish Grand Prix one position higher and claim one championship points for the Williams Toyota team, taking their tally to 4.5 from the first five races.

The FW31 proved especially rapid in the opening rounds of the championship, but a few small errors combined with some bad luck went against the Grove-based team who- by their own admission - has been unable to capitalise on their early pace.

"Nico secured a point for the team but we really need to be getting both cars in the points more regularly than we are if we’re going to improve upon our position in the constructors’ standings," stated Technical Director Sam Michael with reference to their eighth position in the constructors' championship.

"There were some positives from this weekend in that it was encouraging to be only 0.3 seconds off the quickest time during Q2, particularly on a track where aerodynamics are the key, and the upgrade package which we brought to the race worked as expected."

While Rosberg was able to finish in the points, team-mate Kazuki Nakajima has yet to qualify in the top ten or score a championship point this year. The Japanese racer started Sunday's race an encouraging 11th however but was forced to pit for a front wing following the inevitable first lap skirmishes.

"That incident caused damage to Kazuki’s front wing end plate so we had to pit him for a new front wing assembly," Michael explained.
"Because the safety car was deployed, it fortunately didn’t cost him as much time as it could have done."

However, stuck behind the Force India Mercedes of Giancarlo Fisichella at the back of the field when the race restarted, Nakajima was unable to make the pass until late in the 66-lap event and this ruined any hopes of his first championship points. He finished a distant 13th.

While the team are disappointed with the results to date, the development race continues and the FW31 will feature further updates for the high-downforce challenge in Monte Carlo is just over a week’s time.

"We will be bringing more upgrades to the car for Monaco, as will all of the other teams," Michael continued. "Our target is obviously to score more points as we haven’t had the conversion rates we would have liked in recent races. We are typically fast on street circuits, so we are looking forward to getting the best out of the FW31 at Monte Carlo."

Mercedes considering adding branding with Brawn GP

Given Brawn's dominance and McLaren's struggles, Mercedes-Benz is considering adding corporate branding to the championship-leading BGP 001.

Brawn GP's use of the Stuttgart marque's engines this year is simply a customer deal, but the package has won four out of the five races so far this season, and is leading the drivers' and constructors' championships.

A three-pointed star was not in Mercedes' original plans for the Brawn linkup, but Norbert Haug said after the Spanish Grand Prix that the scenario is now being ‘considered’.

"We have possibilities and options and it has been offered to us," Mercedes' competition boss, is quoted as saying by the broadcaster RTL.

However, the 56-year-old added that Mercedes does not want to ‘divert’ from its works relationship with McLaren, winner of the 2008 drivers' title with Lewis Hamilton.