2006 Formula One Season

Previous season: 2005

Next season: 2007

Background
2006 saw exciting changes that happened in the off season. The long time partnership of Cyril Abiteboul and Stephen Duncan ended after Duncan took the role of Team Principal of Ferrari in December 2005. With this, Jaguar, who signed the pair to run the team, accepted Renault's offer to buy back the team. With this Jaguar ceased to exist and the team became ING Renault.

Competent under went a buy out from Volvo to become Polestar-Volvo. Project One bought out the remains of the Porsche team late in the season. This allowed Project One to become a frontrunning force in 2006 due to Ben Farrell bringing over the Ferrari designs and ideas into a Porsche 2006 car that had a lot of time and money invested into it in 2005.

Another new team UKIP Nigel Motorsport joined after buying out the grid spot originally set for Minardi. They would struggle in their first year, however Robert Kubica would drag the team out of the bottom and give the team a staggering 8th place in the constructors after scoring an unexpected 2nd place in the USA.

The season was a 3 way fight between ING Renault, Red Bull Volvo, and Project One. A Renault car finished on the podium for every race of the year this helping them secure their first Constructors' and Drivers' Championships.

Red Bull's Felipe Massa would finish 3rd in the drivers championship taking the championship down to the last race. Despite Massa taking an early lead with 7 straight podiums, the consistency of the Renaults allowed them to finish the year in a dominant fashion. Red Bull's 2nd driver, the 21 year old Lewis Hamilton, would struggle throughout the year against his experienced teammate. He would lose to Massa head to head by a staggering 58-219.

Project One at times matched or exceeded the pace of the Renaults, however their race could never consistently deliver both cars in the points. 11 times a Project One car finished below 10 points in a race; 3 times a car scored 0 points.

Later in the year it was announced that due to funding issues, UKIP Nigel Motorsport and Project One would withdraw from the championship for the 2007 season. Project One would agree to merge with Volvo for the 2007 season.