Hybrid boost for Formula One

Renaults F1 R29 with an 18,000 RPM, 2.4L V8, a seven-speed semi-automatic carbon-titanium gearbox and an electric based Magnetti-Marelli KERS hybrid system. With the Formula One season opening in Melbourne next week, people are about to be bombarded once again with rhetoric of how ?racing improves the breed?. The idea that motor racing is an incubator for technologies that make passenger cars safer and better has always been something of a myth. With its demand for the ultimate of engineering in terms of performance and lightness (and scant regard for endurance and cost), F1 racing is so far removed from everyday life on the road that there is little scope for transferring its technology from the exotic to the mundane.