Packing, Midland Style!

By Phil Giles
March 27 2006

So, Midland F1 fly off to some exotic location to race Grand Prix cars around a circuit. You see the end result on TV every other weekend but had you thought about how much planning and effort goes into moving the team from track to track?

Courtesy of the official site, we've a glimpse into the organisation of moving 25 tonnes of equipment around the globe.

When planning its season, every Grand Prix team has to pay special attention to the 'flyaway' races that form the backbone of the season. These events get their nickname because the cars and equipment travel by air, while the transporters and motor-homes that ordinarily fill the paddocks in Europe stay at home.

There are three blocks of flyaway's during the season. At the moment, we're in the middle of the Bahrain-Malaysia-Australia leg, which will be followed in June/July by a much more straightforward Canada-USA trip, and then at the end of the year by China-Japan-Brazil.

Of the three, the first is undoubtedly the toughest, logistically and otherwise. That's because at the start of the year there's always a race to complete three new cars, while new pit equipment and spare parts have to be readied as well. There are also new packing cases. By the third and final trip of the year, everything is usually a lot more relaxed.

The movement of freight is organised by Formula One Management, and every team has a basic free allocation that it can take advantage of. In essence, that compromises two rolling chassis, plus a specified weight for any other gear. Since the latter figure is never enough to cover everything, each team then adds whatever it needs to that subsidised allowance, and pays the  additional costs.

Obviously, it's extremely expensive to send something on a marathon round trip such as the current one, and every team is acutely aware that every extra kilo carried on that trip will cost a specified amount. Nevertheless, some teams are quite happy to send bottles of mineral water all around the globe at huge expense!

In contrast, MF1 Racing puts a premium on efficient packing and taking only the essentials. Every penny saved on freight can, of course, be put to better use developing the car.

The person responsible for making sure everything gets to where it has to be is Hadley Donaldson, who joined the team some four and a half years ago.

"The first trip is definitely the toughest one," he says. "It's the start of the year, and we have new equipment and new boxes. This year, we've increased our number of pallets [on the FOM aircraft] from seven to eight,  so we're actually taking more than we did last year - a total of 25 tonnes. 

To that, we have to add the Toyota freight, which is about 3-3.5 tonnes. It works out to be more financially viable for us to take two rolling chassis, and then the third car is put in a box, and gets built up when we arrive at the circuit."

If you have trouble packing your suitcase for your summer holiday, imagine what it's like for an F1 team with 25 tonnes of gear to fit...

To save costs, the team also sends a lot of non-essential gear, such as paddock equipment, by sea. Race organisers actually rent out things like tables and chairs - usually at huge expense - but MF1 packs three complete sets, along with items such consumables and cables. One container was sent to Bahrain, one to Malaysia, and one to Melbourne. Because they go by sea,
it's a very economical method of moving things around.

The main freight has to be ready to go more than a week before the first race.

"The freight for Bahrain left on the Saturday morning [March 04] of the previous weekend. We use a forklift to put the eight pallets onto a truck, which then takes it all to Stansted. Meanwhile, we take the two cars there in our own transporter," says Donaldson.

The crew unpacked everything at the Sakhir circuit at the start of race week, and then packed everything up again on the Sunday night after the race. On Monday, everything was picked up from the pit garage and whisked off to Malaysia by FOM. It was then duly delivered to the Sepang pits the next day, and the unpacking process began once more.

So it goes on. On Sunday night in Malaysia, the team packed up again, and on Monday, the cars and pallets were collected for the trip to Australia. The problem this time is the Commonwealth Games, which, up until very recently, made use of Albert Park. So the cars and equipment of all 11 teams remained in storage, awaiting the handover of the circuit to the F1 organisers. The teams should get have access to it all on Tuesday March 26 - less than 3 days before the first practice session.

Everything will then be packed up for the fourth and final time by the Monday after the race, and will finally get back to the MF1 factory at Silverstone late on Wednesday April 5. Phew!

Of course, Donaldson's worst nightmare is that somewhere along the way, equipment might be lost or damaged, but the system works well, so problems like that are rare.

"The cars are handled with kid gloves, but boxes do get forklifts driven into them! That can be annoying, especially because ours are brand new. We get them made specially by a company in Norwich, and they're designed to go in the pallets. It's like a big jigsaw.

"The biggest problem is forgetting something at the factory, which does happen occasionally! If it's something big and bulky, it can turn into a bit of a drama to get it shipped out."

The team also relies on bits and pieces going back and forth in hand luggage with staff - usually management and engineers - who travel home between the flyaway aces. After Bahrain, items such as suspension parts went back for routine inspection at the factory, and were then taken out to Malaysia. More bits went back after Sepang, and were then carried out to Melbourne. There
are also brand new parts that had to be taken out to the second and third races by hand. It all travels in huge suitcases, and it can be a costly business as inevitably, the airlines force the guys to pay huge fees for excess baggage. After Malaysia, entire gearboxes were also shipped back via DHL.

The funny thing is that while some of the car parts go home to the factory between races, most of the race team members have to stay on the road for the entire three-race duration.

"The hardest thing is the double-headers," muses Donaldson. "Flyaways are quite hard anyway, but then when you do back-to-back races, like Bahrain and Malaysia, there's so little time. It's quite relentless. Also, on this current trip we're away for four and a half weeks, which doesn't go down too well at home!"