A driver i liked and had respect from what i have seen of him on a telly screen over the years..

All the best to him and fingers crossed for a win this weekend.

I think he is right to leave because he deserves to spend his time among nice people rather than the sham & plastic people that are F1.

george

Indeed - going to a better place IMO.

Sad to see him leave but he now needs to concentrate on NOT helping Vettel one bit Red Bull have made it clear that Seb is no1 at the time and Mark has no place there. Big shoes to fill though - think Kimi could be a contender but does anyone want to play 2nd fiddle to Seb.

Here is the BBC link for official confirmation: http://www.bbc.co.uk...rmula1/23074108

Off to join Porsche and their new sportscar programme for their assault on Le Man in 2014 driving this:

I'll miss him on the Grid - payback time until the end of the season

It certainly wouldn't bother me if he got in the way of Vettel a couple of times for the rest of the year.

Interesting to see if Porsche can get back to building a serious Audi/Peugeot challenger at Le Mans

If Vermillion Male Bovine take anyone not in their "junior driver programme" as Webber's replacement, it makes a nonsense of the jdp IMO.

This was on the cards since the whole team order and vettel ignoring this.

It's a shame as I like Webber he's a nice guy. I hope he does well and does not help vettel this year.

When you think back to this and the fact it's been going on for so long I think he is right to move.

He's always going to be playing 2nd fiddle otherwise and no racer wants to do that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smW9yo-P_zk

Surprised it took this long to be honest. After win-gate (or whatever it's called) it was always going to go this way.

Shame as I enjoyed Webber's approach to the sport. His speed was never consistent enough though.

Not a surprise but opens up a lot more possibilities. The thought of Davidson, McNish, Webber, Toyota, Audi, Porsche all at Le Mans 2014 is going to be fantastic! But who replaces him? Favourites are Kimi and Ricciardo so far. Kimi wants a winning car but would have to be treated as an equal. The thought of Kimi beating Vettel in the same machinery does sound good but their "friendship" will go out the window. Does Kimi want the hassle?

Next year will be fantastic for the WEC. Should be more coverage with even more well known drivers from F1 and other places. I think it's a good move for him. I hope ITV4 pick up some of it even if it's only highlights. It's quickly becoming the Motorsports channel of choice with fantastic coverage of BTCC then highlights of DTM and WRC. I hope Vettel get zero help off him this year and I'd like to see him win a few races.

Been told WEC 6hr at Silverstone will be about £35 with full paddock access. Bargain!

I was always surprised Webber didn't tell Red Bull to shove it at the end of 2010 after the incident in Turkey and the fact the team quite clearly held him responsible for it (despite it being Vettel who moved in to him).

I was always surprised Webber didn't tell Red Bull to shove it at the end of 2010 after the incident in Turkey and the fact the team quite clearly held him responsible for it (despite it being Vettel who moved in to him).

After that incident in 2010, the "multi 21" gate would have been the icing on the cake IMO, and probably made the decision all the more easier for Webber. The rumour of him going to Porsche was kicking about some months ago but all parties quickly diffused the situation. I suspect the initial deal was done at that point and they have merely been ironing out the detail.

The Porsche LMP1 car ran for the first time a few weeks back and Mark has probably driven it but fully committing.

With there being 3 manufacturers in LMP1 now and with another ex F1 driver in the mix it should be a good draw. I just hope it's pushed properly. Eurosport did a fantastic job on coverage though even if I was sick of the adverts by the end.

Kudos to Webber for choosing his own career path rather than being forced out of F1.

Said today was about him and Porsche. Lots of the questions were for him in the press conference. It's amazing how many F1 only fans are acting as if he's retiring from everything, He was racing at what was WEC well before F1. F1 is supposed to be the pinnacle but just in WEC and WRC I can think of more superb drivers than I can count. F1 isn't the only race series.

Its a rising series, If Ferrari could be tempted back with a total works team that would be all the publicity needed to really put it in joe publics eye, for me the control tyres is the final nail in F1, At Le mans some teams were going 4 fuel stops without changing tyres, in F1 if pushed the tyres wont last 4 laps, totally farcical, Racing is dare I say it about one thing & its in the name RACING

Ferrari are already in the WEC with the AF Corse team, this is the works outfit. It is only racing in GTE Pro class though.

It would be highly unlikely for Ferrari to enter LMP1, what with the F1 and WEC outfits already draining resources.

Ferrari are already in the WEC with the AF Corse team, this is the works outfit. It is only racing in GTE Pro class though.

It would be highly unlikely for Ferrari to enter LMP1, what with the F1 and WEC outfits already draining resources.

Sorry, that's what I meant, in the top class

Edited 27 June, 201312 yr by Stuart_J

Been told WEC 6hr at Silverstone will be about £35 with full paddock access. Bargain!

That's what it was last year and this year but assume it will go up in price when numbers pick up, right now the WEC races are a ridiculous bargain though. I went to the Silverstone WEC race last year for £35, the paddock access wasn't that great as you couldn't really do much in the paddock but it was fantastic to get a walk along the pits and have access round most of the track during the race (some of the grandstands were closed annoyingly). There hardly any queuing to get in or out of the track and I thought the endurance cars were good for spectators as there's a tremendous variety from the eerily quiet of the Audis to some of the staggeringly loud GT's plus there's just a lot of cars which get bunched right up at some of the corners.

I've been really enjoying the endurance racing and had enough of F1 and the ridiculously fragile tyres so good to see a big name going to WEC and looking forward to getting another manufacturer into LMP1. What I also like about the LMP1 is the flexibility in the rules, Audi currently run a turbo diesel hybrid which when the electric engine is engaged drives the front wheels to temporarily make it a four wheel drive car whereas Toyota have a petrol hybrid which drives only the rear wheels but the electric engine is more powerful than the one in the Audi. Despite that one of the laps at Le Mans, an Audi and Toyota managed identical lap times down to thousandths of a second. The customer LMP1's are standard petrols so it will be interesting to see what Porsche bring, they do hold the record for all time wins with 16 in total but they're clearly worried about that record and quite rightly so with Audi winning 11 of the last 13 Le Mans races they've competed in.

John

Not surprised one bit that this has happened, been on the cards for a while I think. Will miss Mark Webber from F1, he's one of these guys who does show what he really thinks every now and again which is refreshing. Good call for him to go back to endurance racing, back to his roots before his F1 career took off, although I do hope the Porsche doesn't turn out like his Mercedes that he drove at Le Mans!

Not surprised one bit that this has happened, been on the cards for a while I think. Will miss Mark Webber from F1, he's one of these guys who does show what he really thinks every now and again which is refreshing. Good call for him to go back to endurance racing, back to his roots before his F1 career took off, although I do hope the Porsche doesn't turn out like his Mercedes that he drove at Le Mans!

Am I right in recalling the Merc did some unplanned acrobatics !!

Porsche pedigree is good, from another forum apparently all these models won in their first season

906

908

910

917

935

956

962

On a lighter note & poached from elsewhere

In the biggest shock in motorsport for some time it was announced today that several F1 journalists had got a story completely wrong.

Reports are now coming in of minor injuries in the F1 press room as colleagues are being repeatedly struck by toys being thrown from a number of baby carriages as Mark Webber confirmed what everyone apart from the ‘most respected voices in Formula One’ had already been saying for ages, that he’ll be leaving the FIA WEC’s feeder series to join the big show from 2014.

Mark Webber’s PR representative has reportedly been expelled from an until now undisclosed secret society “The Gravy Train” for failing to disclose the story “exclusively” to all of its members at the same time.

Webber, one of the most popular drivers in the F1 paddock (shouldn’t that read the only popular driver in the F1 paddock? Ed) is looking forward to changing his career completely from Formula One driver to Racing Driver.

In many ways this will involve Mark taking a major step back in his career though he is expected to rapidly re-learn the skills of overtaking, spontaneous smiling and driving for more than three laps without pitting for tyres, reasonably quickly.

Sebastien Vettel’s response is expected to be an excitable bound onto the orange box he keeps with him at all times to practice podium celebrations before getting cross when he realises that Webber’s replacement is likely to be someone whose career prospects will be transformed by the simple process of driving one of the three cars on the grid capable of winning a race (Four if you count anything Alonso is driving).

Am I right in recalling the Merc did some unplanned acrobatics !!

Indeed - 1999 was a bad year for Merc @ Le Man. Mark crashed in warm up and then Peter Drumbeck disappeared into the trees.

Did someone fit the 'ground-effect' features upside down?!!

Not sure how legal the colour scheme is of the car in post#3. Surely all the other competitors will get screwed up vision and throw-up. I know I did.......