I've never met Ron Dennis !

2012-01-12T13:00:00.002Z

.....and now Kubica has broken his leg, tripping over on some ice. I don't think his maker wants him to get back in a Formula one car ever .....

Robert arriving for his seat fitting yesterday

2011-11-30T22:39:00.001Z

Well done lad, almost £1300 raised for Movember,

http://mobro.co/Sidewaysbob

Webber 'wins' the battle, Vettel takes the war.

2011-11-27T21:06:00.001Z

And the final result is in, it’s all over and about bloody time too.

Dear Bernie can we not have a 10 month season next year please, it’s too long. This year it was four races too long, in the good old days the FIA would have banned Vettel for a few races to give everyone else a chance. Bernie must be losing his touch !
Right straight off the bat then and I think Vettel has done a great job this year, he’s been consistent, hasn’t had to rely on the Lady Luck and has done exactly what he’s paid to do. He even gave Webber a win at the end of the year, what a jolly nice chap.

And to be honest with you all I think he is a jolly nice chap. He’s not a smug git like Schumacher was for all those years. He not a grumpy bugger like Alonso is and hes happy to give an interview on the starting grid unlike Hamilton. He can turn it on when he needs a pole, turn in fastest laps when he has too, and he can have a gear box problem when his team mate needs a moral boasting win.
What more do you require of a driver ?

So what if he hasn’t had to drive form the back of the grid to win or over take a load of people, this year do you really think he couldn’t have done that if he needed to. But the reality is he’s not let himself get into the position where he needs to do all that. Front row all year, beating Mansells record of 14 poles in a season here in Brazil, that’s 79% of the races he’s led into the first corner and from there it’s difficult not to win. As other drivers had to avoid each other and make up for a bad qualifying run, he calmly got on with it.

So you know I think he’s done alright this year, complaining he can’t over take is just sour grapes really.

Right then, Vettel on pole, gets away cleanly again, except this time rather than sailing off into the distance ... oh he did. Errr with Webber behind for a change. Then unexpectedly he started getting messages about the short shifting in 2nd gear to make it cool down a bit, then short shift in 2nd and 3rd. Then suddenly he was being told to be extra specially careful with the gearbox because it might explode at any second. As this was happening he slowed down a tinnys wennsy little bit, just enough for Webber to close up. Then he told the pits that “Got un himmel I vill haf to slow down aun let my team mate pass to save zee gear un box, himmel”
“oh” we all thought, maybe Alonso or Button can catch him and pass him and we he won’t make it to the podium yet again in two traces.
But then an odd thing happened and he started to follow Webber and not drop back at all like he had a gearbox on the edge of survival. Hamilton showed him how it was supposed to be down as he exited turn three and found he had a box of neutrals and not 4th gear as he expected.
No Vettel managed to be 2 seconds a lap faster than anyone else and apart from Webber and proceeded to pretty much cruise to an easy second place, ‘gifting’ the win to Webber who has singularly failed to come out of Vettels shadow all year ... what a surprise.

As for the rest who cares? They didn’t get close and didn’t look like beating the Redbulls all weekend.

So Webber gets his one and only win of the year, well done him. He also got the fastest lap on the very last lap, I think he’s trying to make a point there.

Vettel second for a change, he didn’t look too fussed

Button makes a bit of a meal of it but did enough to ensure 3rd with a fine drive past the ailing Alonso

Alonso is 4th and will be more than happy to see the back of this year Ferrari

Massa is as dull as ever in 5th after much weaving around in front of Hamilton.

Sutil might have done enough in 6th to buy the seat a Williams or even keep the seat at Force India.

Rosberg should have got a bit more out of the car than 7th but its still, as ever, better than Schumacher.

Di Resta rounds out a good rookie year in 8th, hopefully he’s nailed onto a Force India drive now.

Kobayashi was 9th apparently.

And Petrov rounds out the top ten, just to remind everyone that yes Renault are still in fact taking part.

Finally Ricciardo is the last man walking, will we see him in a Torro Rosso next year. More than likely though I don’t know why, Luizzi beat him most of the time.

the real winner in all of of this though ...

see you next year lads ...mmmmwwhahahahahahaha

Dear God this had better be interesting.

2011-11-23T22:03:00.001Z

Brazil.

And aboutbloody time too. Does it seem like it’s been a long, long year to you ? It doesto me and I’m not too sure why really. We’ve had some great racing, but a lotof well, dull races. You knew who was going to win after the first corner forpretty much the whole season.

Most peoplehad realized that Vettel was going to walk this championship after Spain. Ohthere was Hamilton’s win in china, with a pass for the win least we forget. Butthat is pretty much it in terms of dicing for the win. There was a sort ofomnipresent feeling that Vettel was going to be untouchable all year .... andhe has been.

But I don’twant this to sound like I’m moaning about it all. On balance it’s been a goodyear, the racing away from the top spot has been cracking. Once Vettel haddisappeared off into the distance, we could watch Hamilton and Massa cloutingeach other whilst Alonso dragged a lame stallion to places it shouldn’t havebeen. Button really settled into the McLaren suit like it had been made forhim, as Webber looked like his Redbull had been made for someone else smallerand more German.

The midfieldsaw Mercedes struggle to catch the big boys, Renault fail to deliver itsrevolutionary exhaust to the front. Both of these big spenders found themselvesbeing swamped by the likes of Sauber and Force India. Who might not have beenup there challenging the top five, but they were both a constant feature of thelower top ten.

With TorroRosso suddenly getting their act together for the latter half of the season we’vehad an interesting fight for sixth place all season. If you were watching it ofcourse, it was easy to miss some weekends.

Lower downand Williams has had its worst year ever, Lotus continued to look the most professional,while HRT and Virgin continued to look inept and rubbish. Actually that’s a bitunfair. HRT have tried hard, they weren’t helped by the thing being sold to abunch of money men, but they turned up to every race and they kept going in thecertain knowledge they’d be 3 or 4 laps behind the winner and they didn’t giveup. Virgin sold up to the Russians and fired the Wurth squad which was unfairbut probably the right thing to do.

I like aplucky underdog and HRT have provided plenty of amusing quotes for me thisyear.

The driversmarket has been a bit static this year. Kubica was the key but then he crashedbefore he could take the Ferrari seat everyone expected him to claim in 2012.Now with Kubica saying this week he’s not going to be in any F1 cars in 2012(and I suspect ever, I’m afraid) 2012 could well see the major teams jockeying fordrivers for 2013. Massa, Webber,Hamilton, Schumacher, Sutil and Di Resta are all expected to be moving, some toother teams, other to a long overdue retirement. Driver like Barrichello are not expected back in2012 anywhere and Schumacher needs to start justifying the paycheck soon.

Right then.

There is absolutelynothing at all to race for here, except pride. So I expect Webber to be all gunghoand balls out to restore some credibility, Hamilton to keep the ball rollinginto next year and Massa to start the “getting his finger out to keep his seatfor 20 races next year” program. This week Ferrari has told Massa that no seatis guaranteed despite what the contract might say. So he’s on a notice to start delivering with abit more consistency.

but really, Vettel is going to win this one and a McLaren will be behind, probably.

Ourchampionship is still up for grabs so please update your predictions and praythey make a fist of it in Sao Paulo.

Good luck.

Hamilton has a big smile for a change.

2011-11-13T23:02:00.001Z

Well that was a bit of a turn up for the books wasn’t it?England beat Spain, who would have thought that was possible ? Then to cap aweekend of unusual events, Vettel has a “catastrophic tire failure” and cashesout to let Hamilton take a very welcome win.

To be fair Hamilton has been all over this track since dayone, He was robbed of the victory in 2009 by a broken brake disc and justcouldn’t match Vettel last year. So it’s about time he won this one. It’s atrack like Singapore and Monaco, those tight twisty circuits that require a bitof bravery and a sharp handling car.

Would he have been able to beat Vettel if it had been astraight fight ? Who cares, it’s about time he had a break and had Lady Luckcruise around on his shoulder. It’s been a tough year with too many sillymistakes and trips to the steward’s office. So it’s good to see the smile back on his facewith a well deserved win.

He lost pole to Vettel in Q3 having set a time in Q2 thatwould have seen him sitting pretty on pole. The problem with Vettel is that heis fast becoming the qualifying king. He’s always been able to come out anddeliver a hot lap when it matters. These days he seems be able to just go outand drive that perfect lap that just blows the opposition away. Better thanWebber who has failed spectacularly to be anywhere near matching Vettel theonly drivers getting close to him are Alonso and Hamilton. Who go out and rag the cars like Greece with abailout cheque, they thrash their poor machines but still end up looking at theback of Vettel exhaust come Sunday afternoon.

So as the cars tore away from the line as the lights wentout, we watched Vettel sail into his usual spot at the head of the field with aheavy heart. “oh, it’s going to be one of those races, is it” we thought.Vettel went a touch wide through turn one gave a funny sort of twitch and thenswept into turn 2, except the back of the car continued to sweep into turn twolong after Vettel had asked it to stop. The front pitched into the air as the rearleft tire parted company with the wheel rim and Vettel sailed off thecircuit. Hamilton and co blasted pastand never stopped to ask if he was okay.

“Hurrah”, we all chorused, “Now let’s see what our newest doubleworld champion can do with the best car from the back of the pack”. Except, notbeing used to driving a sick car with a flat tire, he spanked it back to thepits and broke the suspension in the process!

Oh well.

So we were treated to Alonso keeping Hamilton honest for 55laps

Hamilton never really looked like breaking into any kind ofsweat with a controlled race ahead of Alonso. The McLaren had the legs andhandling to make sure the Ferrari couldn’t get closer than a few seconds. Tantalisinglyclose to the magic one second DRS zone, but whenever Alonso got close Hamiltoncould open out the advantage and stay safely in front, despite variousWilliams, Torro Rosso’s and the like getting in the way. It wasn’t much of a spectacle,more a sort of high speed chess game. But given how rough I felt after the party the night before that suitedme just fine.

So then Hamilton gets his third win of the year and jolly welldone to him. He Mum was there on her birthday and it was nice to see a happyHamilton family for a change. He didn’t have to do too much, but avoid the backmarkers and make sure Alonso didn’t get too close. Some slick pit work from McLarenand a sticky wheel at Ferrari might have robbed us of a grandstand result, butit’s nice to see someone other than a German in the top step this year. Some of the more excitable press is already sayingthis is Hamilton of old and he’s going to win the next gazillion races andsweep all before him. I think it’s a fortuitouswin, when he needed the luck to go his way for a change.

Alonso was second and tried hard to take the fight to Lewis.But the old story of the Ferrari not liking the hard tires meant he was alwayson something of a back foot. I’m sure it’s more than they were expecting, butit continues to be a disappointing season for the team from Italy.

Button managed to salvage third after Alonso caught himnapping on lap one. He had a bit of a dice with Webber as his KERS failedduring the middle part of the race, with some exciting moments as the Redbull zipped past in the DRSzone then lost out in the twisty bits. I think this was a race where Button waslucky to get the podium, if Vettel had been alright and Webber hadn’t tried tobe too clever he might well have been further back. So I suspect he’ll be happywith this result.

Webber misses the podium in fourth; the car didn’t have thelegs on the fast bits and could only overtake with the DRS open and ButtonsKERS not working. Tried to be clever at the end with an extra stop and someblinding laps, but it wasn’t enough and he managed to keep fourth only because Massaspun the car fighting thin air. Webber has to look back at this race and thinkit was a massive failure on his part. Yes, the team wasn’t all that slick atthe pit stops, and the car was underpowered on the straights, but he ragged it whenhe needed to be smooth and got caught out by Button being better when itmattered. Fastest lap will be scant conciliation.

Massa, despite everything just couldn’t blame this one onHamilton. He had the chance to nab fourth but as seems to happen a lot thesedays, needed a lot of geeing up from Smedley to stop him from going to sleep inthe second half of the race. Given thatAlonso is on the podium, Massa, like Webber, is failing to deliver for his teamat the moment. He must feel his days are numbered as a Ferrari driver.

Rosberg was sixth once again ahead of his team mate.

Schumacher didn’t hit anyone this time in Abu Dhabi butcouldn’t beat his team mate yet again for seventh

Sutil doesn’t fall asleep and beats his team mate to eighth.

Di Resta did a good job on a circuit that seemed to suit theForce India’s. I would guess that he’s done enough to certainly keep his seatat Force India for next year, Sutil despite a late bid for clemency may well beoff. Well let’s hope so anyway. Ninth is okay, it might have been more with abit of luck.

Kobayashi rounds out the top 10 with the “did he take partin the race I must have missed him” award this week.

Liuzzi makes it home in last place with this extra specialquote “....still, I pushed until the very end and got the car past the chequeredflag which is a positive thing. It was a difficult race but we got a decentresult” that would a decent last place there buddy, two laps behind the winner.

Abu Dhabi 'aving a laugh

2011-11-09T21:44:00.003Z

Abu Dhabi then ......

...I’ll be honest here; I’m struggling to write anything aboutthis place.

It’s dull, and the highlight is that the sun goes downwhilst the race is on.

Its got a big building that lights up in the dark ..

And ......

Last year no one could overtake and Vettel won the championship.

I don’t think that’s going to change this year, Vettel hasalready won the championship.

Sorry about this, I’m finding it very difficult to write anythinginteresting about this race, I can’t even get enthusiastic about it. Vettel will win, probably, one of theMcLarens will be second and if the other McLaren hasn’t hit the other Ferrari,it might fight it out with Alonso. Mercedes will follow the big boys home,Petrov might be there or there about and at least one if not both of the TorroRosso’s will round out the top ten.

So there you go. Ifyou have anything to add ... I’m more than happy to share it with the class.

Watch it .. or the puppies die.

and in a shamless attempt to bump the numbers up on this site ... here are a pair of great tits.

Vettel .... who else

2011-10-30T21:51:00.002Z

Well that’s made things a little trickier hasn’t it?

I thought Herman Tilke had finally cracked it. The Circuitlooked impressive (despite looking a bit rough around the edges) the track hada load of potential we though, there are gradients and blind corners, a coupleof long straights that aren’t dead flat and a lovely sweeping corner that goeson forever. Yet it still disappointed. There still wasn’t a race to be had.

Vettel and the Redbull are just too good. Not helped bydrivers falling over each other yet again. But still, he was miles away from beingchallenged nailing the pole, fastest lap, win triumvirate just to rub it in.

Anyway, at 150mph according to F1 designer Garry Anderson, youraverage 2011 Formula One car will generate about 1200Kgs of down force. That’sabout the same weight as all the celebrities from ‘strictly come dancing’ waltzingon top of the car. The old cliché goes; an F1 car could drive through a tunnelupside down if the driver was mad enough, with just the down force sticking himand the car to the roof.

What this means inreality is that an F1 car comes alive at the sort of speeds that would put anEU finance meeting about face to shame. The tap dancing celebs mean your F1 carcan change direction eye wateringly, mind bendingly fast. They dance throughthe corners flicking left and right in the blink of an eye; they glide like professionaldancers waltzing from one end of the floor to the other with a cheeky wink tothe judges half way through. A nod and a glint of white teeth maybe even glimpseof fake tan and it’s on to the next pirouette.

Sometimes, of course these whirling, twirling dances cancome over all Ann Widdicombe rather than Margo Fonteyn, a lunge here a missstep there and a dangerous leap at the apex

Witness one Felipe Massa who, after Friday afternoonpractice, said;

“It’s a very interesting track and there are corners wheredriving skill can make a difference.”

What he was obviously referring to there, was turns eightand nine in the middle section of the lap. Where, at the climax of qualifying heclouted the big, obvious, orange concrete block designed to stop cars cutting thecorner at turn eight. But not contented with that, during the race he cloutedthe big, obvious, orange concrete block designed to stop cars cutting thecorner at turn nine. Breaking the front suspension both times, thus demonstrating“where driving skill” can indeed “make the difference.”

I’m not going to go into the Hamilton/Massa incident, youall know what I’m going to say anyway and I’m not changing my opinion of eitherHamilton or Massa. Go and hunt around the web for various ex Formula onedrivers and those that should know better to hear their knee jerk, agendafilled nonsense. It’s getting nasty between those two now, Ferrari and McLaren needto sort it out one way or the other, before we have to stand on the grid for anotherminutes silence for a dead driver.

I shall leave Mr Atkinson to have the final comment

So India then, I rather liked the track, thought it wasexciting and I’ll never get tired of watching a driver dance through a highspeed chicane as long as I live. Was itdull because there was no race as such?

Maybe?

It certainly wasn’tempty like Korea or China and that, I think, helped to put some of the shineback onto it. Maybe next year we’ll have a four way fight for the championshipto spark it into life, this felt a bit too much like a test session at time.But I shall be looking forward to this race next year.

So then Vettel, has now lead more race laps in a season thananyone else, ever. Back in the day when facial hair was considered perfectlyfine for an English driver Nigel Mansell lead 692 on his way to the title ofworld Champion. Vettel has managed to beat that target with two races to go, noother driver has led more than 100 laps! He gets yet another win; having cruisedto an easy pole (added by Massa destruction testing his suspension inqualifying) then got the fastest lap at the end of the race for good measure.It’s all too easy for him isn’t it.

Button didn’t see much of him in second place, after passingWebber on the first lap, and then fooled himself into believing that he wassomehow fighting for the lead. Still it’s another podium trophy to add to thecollection. Keeps the pay check ticking over if nothing else.

Third place for Alonso, see Jenson above. Passed Webberduring the pit stop and collects another trophy.

Personally I thinkthe debate about Vettel being one of the greats might be over in reality. Justlook at Webber in fourth, he’s achieving nothing of note this year, someoneeven suggested he would be allowed to win a race by Vettel now it’s all over. That’sgot to be a kick in the nuts hasn’t it, to be smirked at so much that peoplesuggest the only way he’s going to win is if his team mate gives him a win. Yes Mark, you’re not too bad for a Number twodriver you chump

Fifth for Schumacher, very almost got to have a race withNico, but then didn’t

Nico, who was told he was free to race Mickey at the end, aslong as they kept it clean, knew that was code for “Mercedes do not want you bendingtheir cars when Mickey carves you up ‘defending’ fifth place. Give it up lad”.So he duly waited in line like a good boy.

Hamilton, another weekend to forget I’m afraid. Watching himin the post race interview, saying he tried to talk to Massa and getting no responseafter the minutes silence on the grid. You could see in his eyes he’s kind oflost and doesn’t understand where it’s all gone so wrong. You know what heneeds is a father son chat in a quite boozer when this season is all over. He needsthe rock that was his father back there helping him make sense of all thechaos. My biggest fear is that he walks away from motor sport at the end of theyear. He is a phenomenal talent in the same way that Trulli isn’t, the mostexciting British driver in a generation and we can’t lose that.

We’ve lost too manyBritish sports stars this year already.

Alguersuari continues to do rather good things in the TorroRosso, with yet another eighth place finish. I truly believe that we are seeinga driver build his stock up here. The Redbull driver program gradates normallyget fired for being rubbish, But Algy looks like he might find himself with aseat next year if this keeps happening. Maybe he’s got his act together as thethreat of being fired has caught up with him, or it might be Redbull spending abit of money on the junior team for a change. But the result is Algy get thepoints whilst the like of Kobayashi fail to deliver.

Sutil bags a ninth, remember him? He used to be the next bigthing, now it looks like he’s on the way to Williams, that’s if Kimi doesn’tget there first of course. He’s made the classic mistake of demanding that theteam tell him if he’s got a seat next year at Force India. Liuzzi tried thatlast year and now he’s in an HRT, a salutary lesson for us all there.

Finally Perez does his PR some good with a tenth placefinish. Would you have “slow but steady” Perez or “scary and delusional” Massain a Ferrari next year, a question important people are starting to ask atFerrari. Once again the lack of any sort of support for Massa after the racewas noticeable by its absence wasn’t it? Where was Dominicali calling for Hamiltonto be banned back to the Stone Age? If Perez keeps this up he could be Alonso’snew ~~whipping boy~~ team mate very soon.

I still don’t like him, but that’s by the by.

Oh and finally our hero of poor power steering Trulli rumbleshome five laps behind the leader dead, dead last. Almost 3 laps behindKarthikeyan who hasn’t even races this year, good old Trulli.

Will the circuit be finished by Sunday ?

2011-10-26T22:11:00.001+01:00

Well then, it looks like everyone who needs to has finally arrived,so let us begin.

So India then and the inaugural Formula One race at the BuddhInternational Circuit in Greater Noida, New Delhi. Narain Karthikeyan gets a ride in the HRT whilstKarun Chandhok gets told he’s not as good as Trulli and is relegated to Lotus pitlane tour guide for the weekend.

It’s a brand spanking new (Tilke) circuit that lookssomewhat like Turkey, China and Korea. It’s more finished than Korea was lastyear, but it’s a bit slapped together in places with the BBC five live team questioningtheir commentary box having no windows earlier in the week.

No doubt it was timeto turn up in the world’s fifth largest economy and try and sell some cars tothe locals that aren’t dirt poor. But as with a lot of things in India thesedays it would appear that a lot of time has been spent writing reports andshifting farmers off the land, and not much time spent finishing off buildingswith tools such as a set squares or a spirit levels.

I know it’s not the done thing, but really .... this is thefifth largest economy in the world and it still can’t build a major sporting venuewithout bits of it falling down before the event takes place. I suppose it’sbetter than having a few floaters in the swimming pool and a pack of wild dogshanging around the competitor’s accommodation. But really, Abu Dhabi managed to build a new track without having torebuild it the day after the first race finished.

Okay, so then this being a new track that as far as I knowhasn’t been troubled by anything with an engine and sticky rubber running onit. It’s going to be extremely green and very dusty for the whole weekend; thismakes it a lottery in terms of picking a finisher let alone a top ten.

Tires then, it’s all going to be about the tires, the teamthat gets a handle on their tires and how they’re reacting to the new circuitas it rubbers in, and comes up to speed is going to have an advantage. Allthe teams have topological and simulation data on the track, but no one has anyexperience of the surface and how it reacts to heat and the load of the tires. It’sgoing to be slippery and chew tires up to begin with, the question will be howlong will the tires last when they get to the midpoint of the race.

Given that none ofthis matters though, except for Force India who are running for pride, I don’tthink any of the team will be trying all that hard. Other than Force India in factI’m struggling to think of any teams that have India sponsorship to worryabout, maybe the back end of the grid will pick up some local pin money. ButFerrari doesn’t sell too many cars east of Dubai, Redbull sell a few drinks butnot as much as they do in Europe, whilst McLaren has two British drivers I suppose.

Redbull then, though McLaren went very well in Korea last week,until the race when Vettel got back up to speed obviously.

Hey ... maybe Webber will finally get his act together anddo something other than go backwards.

In other news New York ... sorry New Jersey USA will begetting a Grand Prix in 2013. Whoopty doo. Yet another circuit shoe horned intoa city. Look Monaco is fine, we’ll have it because, well, we’ve always had it.Montreal doesn’t look like a city so that’s okay.

But have they learntnothing from Valencia? This year all the talk on the commentary was about the architectureand the fact that they have a race. Not about the race, because yet again therewasn’t really one, just the car running around an empty dockyard which on Mondaymorning would be turned back into a fish market.

America has some fantastic circuits that, whilst maybe notup to FIA speck, are superb circuits for actual racing on. Lime Rock, LagunaSeca, , Road America (Elkhart Lake) and Watkins Glen all have history and moreimportantly Herman Tilke has been nowhere near them. Why can’t we go to thesecircuits? No one in Texas gives a monkies about F1 they’re all NASCAR red necksthrough and through. Even Indy car struggles down south these days. New York isall about the money yet again.

But hey, as long as Bernie is getting paid, it’s all goodisn’t it.

Talking of Bernie, the finger pointing and “it was him I gavethe money too” backside coverage that has been going on in Bavaria over thepast year, has finally arrived at the courts. To recap, when CVC bought the rights to Formula one, it is alleged thatBernie paid former BayernLB bank executive Gerhard Gribkowshy just a whole shedload of cash for “advice” on selling F1. Now I don’t know about you, but ifsomeone offered you $44 million dollars for advice, you’d expect more than aslap up meal and a round of brandies in the smoking room later.

Bernie has claimed it’s all above board and totally fine Guv’ner,whilst the Bavarian authorities continue to investigate his involvement. Everyone knows he’s a shady character, but I doubtthey’ll be able to pin anything on him this time.

Dan Weldon RIP.

2011-10-16T23:10:00.001+01:00

Dan Weldon just got killed at the Last Vegas Indy car race . .

It's a monster 15 car pile up at 200mph.

Very very sad ... Motor sport is still a dangerous sport, but you forget how dangerous it is until something like this happens.

Fuck.

RIP

Redbull rampage through the history books

2011-10-16T21:44:00.001+01:00

Well there we go then. It only took onemore race but Redbull has now managed to win not only the world drivers’championship but the constructor too.

There isn't much left for the rest to pick up now. Second place I suppose, butwho cares about that really?

Whowas second last year? .... See you don't care do you.

Andthe feeling of not really giving a monkeys pervaded the paddock in Korea thisweekend. When Hamilton drove a simply stunning lap to claim his first pole ofthe year, it was a very much muted Lewis that got out off the car.

There were no high fives, no "nice worklads, and thanks for giving me a fast car". No, he got out and walker offto the press conference. It later emerged from the media that "words"may have been spoken in Japan along the lines of "get your act togetherand stop blaming everyone else Lewis". I have no idea of the validity ofthese claims. But given the muted reaction of the McLaren squad, I thinkeveryone is looking forward to the end of the year.

Anyway, come race day and after a valiant 30 seconds of letting Hamilton lead,Vettel overtook the McLaren and drove off for yet another easy win. Hurrah!

Lewis and Webber, meanwhile where having aproper dingdong battle for second place behind him. With very little running inpractice the teams had a bit of stab in the dark over set up, tire wear wasthought to be a bit of an issue and it was a decision of long straight low downforce or high down force twisty bits. With no full tanks dry running they didn’t know how much wing to run tolook after the tires.

Redbull went with more down force for thetwisty bits and Webber was half a second faster than Lewis who had geared itlong for the kilometer long straight. As the race moved into the final third,Webber behind Lewis would close up to the gearbox of the McLaren as they cameout of the “street section” onto the start finish line, but coming out of turnone Lewis nailed the KERS and dragged the car far enough ahead to cover Webberas he came back at him.

It was stirring stuff. Trulli managed toget in the way (yet again) at one stage and Webber got the drop on Hamilton outof turn one. But Lewis got his KERS and DRS fired up and as they reached theend of the long straight he retook second, proper old school racing with noquarter given and no bits of carbon fiber flying off either.

Normally when Webber gets up behind someoneit’s only a matter of time before it all goes horribly wrong and he punts themup the back side. Lewis this year too, seems to have been having a bit of brainfade when other drivers start invading his personal space. But not this time,both drivers behaved themselves and we had some classic dicing.

And yet … well it still felt like thedrivers were going through the motions for second place. It wasn’t all thatexciting because it didn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. Whowants to be second? Okay yes, Lewis is a born fighter who needed to at leastfinish to get his mojo working again. Whilst Webber, who has failed abysmally toachieve anything of note this year, was driving for pride if nothing else.

Still you know hmmmm.

Jenson joined to watch the fun from arespectable distance towards the end and Alonso joined for company. Alonso had a race to forget and Jenson wasnever really in the hunt for anything. But then none of them really had a batschance in the proverbial, as Vettel was out there making it look oh so easy.

So then Vettel, well you know the drill bynow … Missed pole by about yay much for a change, but took the lead after 200yards or so and then wondered where everyone else got too. Got the fastest lapof the race on the last lap, just to show how much better at this he and thecar are. Ho hum.

Hamilton second, we had flashes of the oldLewis during the race. But the swaggers gone, the ease and style are missing.He’s better than anyone when it’s all on the same song sheet. But a brilliantballs out watch me and eat the dust you suckers pole should have pointed theway to an easy victory. But he couldn’t catch Vettel and had to pull it all outof the bag to stay ahead of Webber. I pray to the Gods of four stroke andPirelli rubber next year car is good enough for him.

Webber, took the fight to Hamilton, butjust didn’t have enough oomph out of the first corner to worry Lewis till theend of the lap. It’s been a bad year for the Ozzy and that’s not going tochange soon.

Jenson 4^th, after last week’slights to flag easy win he was off the pace this time around and couldn’t touchthe faster boys. Saving the tires andfuel weren’t enough this time around and he had to give best to his team matefor a change.

Alonso struggled to get the tires to work,as he has all season and struggled once again to beat Massa. Who has apparentlyout qualified him four out of the last six times? I suspect they’re testingbits for next year’s car; it’s the only logical explanation.

Massa 6^th. And he didn’t hitLewis or anyone else this time …. Hurrah.

Alguersuari has a barn stormer and haulshis sorry backside up to 7^th. Okay Mickey Schumacher got broadsidedby Petrov being an idiot. But Algy beat the faster Force India’s and Rosberg onmerit in a straight fight. Give the lad his dues, he’s done well.

Rosberg, yes he was in the race and he got8^th

Buemi … yes I know, he’s still driving ….Who knew? And he gets 9^th.

Paul Di Resta ups his stock again anddrives it home to 10^th, good job.

There you go then. We have a two week breakuntil we should be going to India; there are a few question marks over moneyand customs letting stuff in and out of the country in time. The track looks tobe mostly finished, there are some angry locals complaining they aren’t on thegravy train or seeing any of the money they were promised for their land(they’ll soon learn that was all a pack of lies). There are lots of Media typeswondering if it’s worth the risk of dysentery to cover a race that meansnothing.

So we’ll see what happens in the next weekor so. Personally on the grounds Bernie complained about Silverstone being athird world track, I think they should go and see what an actual third worldtrack is like. Though I can’t believethere is as much mud in New Delhi in October, as there is at Silverstone inJuly.

2011-10-12T09:00:00.001+01:00

Korea
The long blunt needle of speed nudges deeper into the upper reaches of the dial, gently caressing the soft redness where the engine stops murmuring and starts to purr and moan, growling with heightened desire. Eyes narrow as the driver feels the urgent throb building behind him, waiting for the howl and scream, the explosive trust of force propelling him into orbit.

Time slows as the heat rises, any second now and it will all be released in one huge detonation of noise and speed waiting for great gobs of torque to come hard and fast through the drive shaft to the wheels, which will rend and claw at the tarmac leaving their sticky residue in long thick lines.

The heartbeat quickens, sweat begins to prickle the skin of the driver, hot life giving fluid is pumped by machine. A rising crescendo of throbbing vibration and violent noise as first one then another light is sparks into life, the heart beats wait and then suddenly the lights are gone The cars are launched up the road in their haste to depart the scene before they are asked to pay for their ungentle manly manhandling of the pristine layer of tarmac.

Everywhere there is noise and movement. Flashing machines bark and snap left and right fighting to be freed from the grip of gravity and momentum. Twisting and turning driver and car wrestle each other for control, sweat stinging eyes, temperatures rising hot sticky rubber wearing thin with the strain of keeping everything planted on the edge of control, of adhesion and the short trip to the dark undergrowth and hard, hard wall. Quick precise fingers caress the gentle curves of the circuits, teasing the car to ever greater heights of desire to go faster and faster, building all the time.

Man and machine writhing together, faster and faster the cars pulsating around and around the track until finally the matador stands before the crowd and waves the flag in the face of the rampaging bulls and stallions, the crowd releases its breath in a wave of shouted exultation.

Then suddenly the champagne is being sprayed hard and fast high into the air and over the gently cooling bodies of the cars below. Fountains and fountains of sweet sticky fizz, eyes screwed shut against the jets of ice cold liquid. The media scrum a frenzy of flashlights blazing to capture the moments, the open eyed moment of glory as the victor, fist clenched, finger hard and pointing to the watching throng, demands their adulation and recognition.

I think Vettel will win.

2011-10-09T22:40:00.004+01:00

Well all right ... well done lad.

Vettel and his finger of win Part two.

2011-10-09T21:39:00.001+01:00

So he didit then.

Finally

Vettel haswon his second championship, a back to back championship no less and he is theyoungest driver to do so.

You can’treally argue with the results either, he’s beaten everyone without too muchdifficulty. Poles, podiums and enough wins to write a new chapter in the recordbooks headed “The next generation”.

So why doesit all feel like such and anticlimax? Where’s the Hullabaloo, the Pizzazz andrazzamatazz? Where are the bright lights,big fanfare and sparkly jackets, the dancing girls and fireworks of flashlightphotography?

This iswhat happens when you win the title with four races to go. The circus has to bein Korea by Wednesday to set up for the next round of the now redundantchampionship. So there’s no time to get all worked up. And because this hasbeen telegraphed for six months, it’s no big surprise. Not like last year whenVettel came from behind and snatched the prize from under noses of Alonso andWebber. This year it has felt like a foregone conclusion since pretty much thefirst round. Vettel has just had that aura around him that this is destined tohappen, that this is as inevitable as the Sun rising tomorrow and a ConservativeMP getting embroiled in a dirty little sex and nepotism scandal.

But despitethe aura I’m still not convinced he’s the second coming either. Yes there isthe pass on the outside of the Curva Grande, two wheels on the grass past aFerrari on cold tires. But that was the highlight of an otherwise undemandingyear!

I think theother drivers have dropped the ball and missed chances to take the fight toVettel. Whilst he has undoubtedly performance as required all season as he ispaid to do, go out and win every week lad. There hasn’t been a consistent challengeto him in reality

Hamiltonhas over driven a poor car and tripped over other, less talented, drivers.

Webber hasdriven into far too many drivers again and made basic in qualifying and schoolboy errors off the line time and again.

Alonso hasbeen hobbled by a Ferrari that couldn’t seem to get its tires to work at halfthe circuits and seemed to go backwards at half distance.

Only Buttonhas got his act together and the second half of the season has seen him get hismojo finally up to speed. But alas for the spectacle it has been too little toolate.

Today’s winwas another pretty good one in a year of pretty good drives. He seems to havegrown in confidence and stature as the season has gone on and now it seems thatMcLaren are turning into the Jenson Button team. More through a process of the team justfollowing the success of a driver rather than an Alonso giving it all the “big Iam”. This more than anything has probably contributed to Hamilton having a yearto forget. The realisation that results are what a team need to gel it around adriver, rather than a feisty girlfriend and a few hip hop stars on the guestlist.

This racewas another where Jenson just seemed to be on top of his game all weekend. He missedpole by the gnats proverbial left testicle, but if you need a driver to nail itlap after lap when the tires are not working, Jenson is your man. So as theVettels and Hamilton's chewed through tires he just kept his head together andworked the car to win the race. A goodpit stop and being Mr Consistent left the other drivers to scrap for the secondstep. He didn’t look like he was going to lose all day. Even when Vettel triedto drive him off the circuit at the start of the race, the new improved calmButton just got his act together and drove the perfect race.

It was all ratherdull in the end.

Hamiltonand Massa reconvened their on circuit spats again. This time Massa attempted a veryambitious move around the outside of Hamilton into the chicane at the end ofthe lap. Oddly, this “avoidable contact” didn’t end with the (Ferrari) driver getting a drive throughafter he clouted a car he was trying toovertake .... one rule for the, one rule for the rest.

Not that itmade much difference to either Hamilton or Massa. Both look like they want theseason to end so that can leave the media spotlight for a bit.

As for therest, I don’t know. I was half asleep after watching the Bathurst race.

Stuff like this.

Exciting stuff, i think you'll agree, anyway.

I thinkI fell asleep for the last few laps. Vettel got told to go for the points andleave Alonso and Button to it. Button was a bit touch and go on the fuel, butwas far enough ahead at the end to protect his lead.

So a very creditablewin for Button at what he called his other home race. He seemed pretty happywith the result and I think he deserves it. Vettel tried to put the frightenerson his at the start, squeezing him onto the grass as they all raced into turnone. Three or four years ago that sort of thing would have got the blood boilingand Jenson would have been all over the show. These days he gets his head downand wins. You can’t ask for much more than that, he even got the fastest lapfor good measure.

Alonso gotsecond, finally the ability of the Ferrari to not work its tires pays off andhe gets a podium result for his troubles. Kept Button honest at the end, but didn’tlook like he was going to catch and pass the plucky Brit in the remaining laps.Vettels was protecting his championship point so wasn’t going to try anythingBanzi any time soon.

Vettel doeswhat needs doing and rode lady luck all the way to third. Was a bit naughtywith the squeeze on Jenson at the start, the fact is, that is the only time sofar this year that you could say he has been naughty, gone is the “crash kid” tagit would seem. Anyway, had thoughts of going for the win, but an older wiservoice told him not to and he settled for the points and the championship.

Webber, whohas been comprehensible beaten all year, fails to make the podium in the bestcar again. Gone is the posturing and the “it’s so unfair they all hate me” shtick.He’s being very quite these days, admitting his shot at the title was last yearand he missed it. Like Massa I don’tthink he’ll take to being a number two driver very well. The truth can be justa cruel as Lady Luck.

Hamilton. Chewedhis tires and hit Massa again for 5^th. Like an England Rugby team,brilliant to watch when it all goes right, frustrating when the promise failsto deliver. But I still think he’s brilliant.

Schumacherwas 6^th apparently.

Massa wasjust as rubbish as normal in 7^th

Perez witha head cold that would have felled lesser men was just as boring and tedious asusual and picked up more points for Sauber in 8^th. I think he’s turninginto my new Trulli. Just sort of annoyingly there and under the mistaken beliefhe’s actually good rather than extremely well sponsored.

Petrov ....yes .. remember him? Well he’s 9^th for Renault as Senna who replacedan under performing Nick Heidfeld got 16^th. It’s not just about themoney remember, but it helps. Anyway Petrov got some points. He’ll know hisfate in a week or two after Kubica gets into the simulator to see if his new bionicarms work.

Rosbergdoes a cracking job coming from the back of the grid to 10th after he failed toset a qualifying time due to “technical” problems with the car on Saturday.

This week’stail end Charlie is the ever reliable Liuzzi. Who spent most of the eventsitting at the back of the pits watching mechanics take engines out and slotnew engines into his HRT. I’m talking bets on how long it is before he getsfired for next years driver to get some miles under his belt.

So then,Vettel picks up where he left of last year, but does it with a lot more ease,less broken bits and no whinging from his team make. If it wasn’t for thatbloody finger, I might actually like the man.

Japan, time to crown a champion...

2011-10-05T21:23:00.001+01:00

Hello again.

It only seems like yesterdaythat we were all sitting around watching the flood lights of Singapore glintingoff the carbon fibre. But suddenly the F1 teams have rocked up for the JapaneseGrand prix at the Suzuka international racing circuit.

I love this circuit;

It’s got a whole load ofmotor racing history.

It has got balls outfast bits.

Grab you nuts and holdon corners

And there is a sillyhairpin for Banzai overtaking moves from the likes of Kobayashi and Webber.

Now, you might ask,“what’s all the fuss about?” and the simple answer is its old school thisplace. It’s tight and needs controlled aggression down the long fast sweepingcurves, twisting like sinew through the hills. You won’t find any girly runoffareas that don’t punish the Playstation generation. There are no resets here,get it wrong and there will be a lot of carbon bits to clear up. Just ask TimoGlock how hard the pit straight wall is.

Winning here is something you can add to yourCV, it has gravitas. It means something. The Figure of eight track windsthrough the countryside and the driver has to work the car, control and directthe power and speed. If the car has a mind of its own or the driver isn’t ontop of his game he will tool around getting in front of the fast boys. The 130R corner into the hair pin before thepit straight is a test of courage and set up. It’s lost some of its bite like EauRouge at Spa but it still demands a certain amount of respect. Last year LucasDi Grassi crashed his Virgin on the wayto the grid at 130R.

To win here you need tohave a car that can flow throw the corners, that can caress the rumble stripsand hang out where only the angles liketo take cigarette breaks.

So what’s been happeningin the little bubble of formula One these past weeks?

Well not a lot really.The Internet has gone into apoplectic rage over the Hamilton v Massa incident.Most normal people gave a tut when Hamilton grazed the rear tire of Massa’sFerrari. Then rolled their eyes as the FIA gave him a drive through for themost minor of crimes. Finally some raised an eyebrow at Massa smacking Hamiltonin the press pen after the show, there were a few words and that should havebeen and end of it all.

But then F1.com releaseda highlights package, which had an extra audio message from the Ferrari pitwall. The lap before Massa and Hamilton are due into the pits Rob Smedley saysto Massa, “Hold Hamilton as much as we can. Destroy his race as much as we can,c’mon boy!” As the two protagonists exit the pits the Ferrari as usual suffersfrom not getting the heat into its tires so that Hamilton gets a run on Massaand then it all goes wrong for everyone.

Massa limps back butgoes nowhere fast after the safety car “spoils” his race. Hamilton just gets onwith it and races back to a creditable 5^th.After the race Massa throws a bit of atantrum, Hamilton ignores him and avoids the swinging rattle.

After all of this therewas suggestion that the drivers would like to have a chat about Hamilton andhis “driving standards” during the next drivers meeting, the more astute of youwill recognise the scarlet hand of fate attempting to deflect some awkwardquestions coming their way. Or maybe not, I couldn’t possible comment.

The teacups start torattle when the Smedley message turns up.

Thisof course sets the internet off, a few tabloids followed and eventually Massaissued a statement

“Idon’t recall what Rob said. I don’t think there’s any value in stirring uptrouble now and trying to link this with the subsequent contact with Hamilton:they are two separate moments and they have nothing to do with each other. I’msure that Lewis and I will find a way to clear this up and put a lid on this story,as is only correct between two drivers. What happens on the track should remainon the track.”

Which is all very nobleand a jolly fine statement until you start wading into the press pen at the endof a race waving you rattle around and giving someone a slap whilst they’re inthe middle of an interview. The fact that Smedley has to motivate his boy bytelling him to “destroy” another driver’s race is worrying enough. That theydon’t have enough control over him when he goes off to give the interviewsafter the race should set alarm bells ringing.

He still seems to be underthe impression he was robbed of a world championship by Hamilton. Forgettingthat the FIA tried everything in the book to stop Hamilton winning that year, evengoing so far as to throw the book at him when he overtook Kim in Spa. I suppose being world champion for only 15seconds could be annoying, but he needs to leave this martyred routine back inthe motor home, get his head down and start driving like he has a pair.

Oddly enough there hasn’tbeen much noise from the official Ferrari press off over all of this. If I wasMassa I’d be looking for some back up and wondering where the troops were.

Hamilton meanwhile haskept his head down whilst the team has said it’s all a storm in a tea cup andmaybe the results speak louder.

Right then.

Oh come on Vettel willwin and clinch his second world championship here, I think (I’ve not checked)that Redbull can also wrap up the constructors here too. I don’t think you’llfind anyone betting against that.

Button has finallysigned on the dotted line with McLaren for a few more years, he looks to be thebest of the rest right now with a car that can take the fight to Vettel, Alonsoand Webber are in close attendance, but Lady Luck has been avoiding them likethe plague recently.

The only real fight leftis for constructors points with Ferrari and McLaren going for second place,whilst the Force India are chasing Renaults fifth spot and the tail end mob aretrying to look respectable for next year’s sponsorship money.

There is a bit of fightout there, no one is going to risk it all for a handful of points anymore though.

The smug bastard.

It’s time for somebrighter news

This Monday sees therelease of the Senna film on DVD and Blu-ray.

If you’ve not had achance to see this on the big screen, why not?

Now I think I may have mentionedbefore that I’m not Senna’s biggest fan. I find it difficult to respect someonewho was prepared to driver another car off the track to win a championship. ButI did respect his talent. I knew he was one of the best drivers I will ever seein a racing car.

Thething that I got from the film was that Senna was the last of the greatanalogue drivers. He was brilliant when it was him an engine and four wheels.When Electronics came in 1992 /1993 you could see his frustration. And the filmshows the deteriorating relationship with McLaren, as he sees the Williamselectronic packages start to surpass his pure talent.

Sennain the wet in Monaco or on a pole lap at Silverstone was a demonstration inpure commitment. No one else I’ve ever seen could come out of the pits and justblow everyone else away with a stunning qualifying lap. He did it time after time and he never tiredof doing it. Vettel is talented, but he’s got the absolutely best car everbuilt to help him. When he takes a ~~Toleman~~ HRT to second at Monaco, thenI’ll be impressed.

Onceelectronics came in his head and shoulders talent was no longer enough. Yes hecould nail a pole lap, but if the traction control of the Williams launchedthem off the line like a rocket from 3^rd, pole counted for nothing.

Whenhe went to Williams in ’94 and realised that Benetton now had the betterelectronic package with Schumacher. He complains that he can’t stay withSchumacher through the high speed turns, and I think he realises that his talentisn’t enough anymore.

Thefootage of Senna on the day he dies is very, very moving. You see a man hauntedby the desire to win, but know his talent is no longer enough. He’s taking morerisks than he’s comfortable with and you just want to step into the screen andtell him not to go out. Not to get into the car and to just walk away.

I urgeyou to buy the film on your format of choice

Oh and finally, the Bathurst 1000km is on this weekend.

with lots of this

plenty of this ....

but mostly a lot of this ....

Massa throws toys out of pram, Hamilton unmoved

2011-09-26T18:46:00.002+01:00

There's been an incident, give Hamilton a drive through.

2011-09-25T22:59:00.001+01:00

Well it wasn’t aclassic, but it had its moment.

But if I was LewisHamilton I’d be asking........... WHY ME ????

Yeah I’m a fan ofLewis, I admit it, I love his balls out get the job done, “I stop racing whenthe flag stops waving” attitude. I think he’s ace and I also think the FIA istrying to stamp on him and his old school attitude to racing.

If you want drivers togo out and try racing, you have to expect a certain amount of actual racing.There might even be a bit of contact now and again, but as long as no one getshurt that’s all good, right? It’s exciting and we want exciting after years andyears of watching processional races. This sort of exciting racing we aretalking about could be typified with the Rosberg/Perez incident. Rosberg getsit a bit squiffy coming out of a corner so that Perez can get a bit of a run onhim and takes the position, but Rosberg is having none of it. Onto the main straightthey wave around a bit as Rosberg pulls alongside into turn one and they end uphaving a bit of a handbags match which results in Perez being bumped off thecircuit. The upshot is that Rosberg keeps his place and Perez drops back enoughfor Schumacher to have a run at him. Except Perez “brakes earlier then Iexpected” according to Schumacher who collides with the back of Perez’s car andis launched into the air, before smacking the wall quite hard.

How does the FIA reactto this “exciting” racing? They ‘investigate’ Perez and Rosberg for a bit, andthen decide that there was no malice and intent and everyone was fine so let’sget on with the race. No harm, no foul. A racing incident you could say.

Now let’s look at the way the FIA react to the Massa/Hamilton ‘incident’.

Lewis is tucked up behind Massa; he’s out of position after a poor startwhen he had to avoid a slow starting Webber. Finally after a few laps offollowing the Ferrari Hamilton is within one second and has his DRS open cominginto the braking zone. He’s gone to the outside but realises that he’s notgoing to make that work so brakes and starts to cut back to try and undercutMassa out of the corner. But Massa on the inside of the corner and ahead, isbraking earlier than Lewis. This catches the McLaren driver out who locks hisfront outside wheel and the left side of his wing clips Massa’s rear righttire. Lewis loses the right side of his wing and Felipe gets a puncture.

No one is hurt and there are no flying cars. Massa limps it back to thepits for a new tire, whilst Hamilton tries to carry on for another lap but hasto pit for a new nose a lap later. They are both back towards the rear of thefield after all of his but both can carry on.

So how does the FIA react? No harm no foul? A racing incident perhaps? Nothey throw the rule book at Hamilton and give his a drive through for“avoidable contact”, yet Rosberg nurfing Perez off the circuit and indirectlycausing Schumacher to end up in the wall is laughed off with a cheery “youguys!!” wave.

Where is the consistency here?

The only highlight of all of this is that we are treated to thespectacle of Massa in the post race interview looking like a kindly old unclehas offered him a Worthers Original then tried to touch him in theunmentionables. He bleats on that Hamilton is a dangerous driver that doesn’tthink and he could have killed everyone in 20 mile radius with his Kamikaze movethat was dangerous and mad and stuff and he shouldn’t be allowed anywhere neara race track.

Oh get a grip Massa, he touched your right rear tire, he didn’t crashinto the back of you and drive over your head. He also didn’t then drive like aschool teacher after a hard day in front of the upper fifth three days beforethe end of term. No he went out and spanked it passing Massa easily the secondtime and hauling his backside from pretty much last to 5^th. Properold school racing that.

Yet the FIA seem to have a downer on Hamilton, he could have won this,but lady luck just doesn’t want to give the plucky Brit a break right now. Hegot caught by Webber off the line went left and got squeezed into turn one,from there on in he was always fighting to get back to the leaders. But I want to see that, I want to see driversfighting to win, not tooling around whining like a baby when they get foundout.

However just to be fair, after the race Schumacher did get a slap wristfor driving into Perez.....

Anyway, Vettel won.

Easily.

Yet again.

Button kept him honest at the end by appearing to catch him, but it wasall a little bit too late and ultimately in vain. Vettel had the race won bythe time he got to turn one when the lights went out. As the others tried to catch him he wasturning in fastest lap after fastest lap. Dull really, but there you go theperfect storm, Newey has produced possibly the best car of this generationswhilst Vettel is completely and totally in tune with this slab of automobileperfection. Even a second rate talent like Webber, even race after race as hecocks up the start yet again he can haul the car onto the podium. He’s not as intune with it as Vettel but he can show the potential of the car ... ImagineHamilton in the car... that would be something to see.

So then, Vettel gets pole and wins blah blah blah he only needs one morepoint to take the title. Do you think he’ll drop the ball now ... no meneither.

Button gets second which is about as good as he could hope for, Vettelplayed with him a bit at the end but he was never going to be caught. This isButtons 5^th podium since Canada eight races ago. If only Vettelwasn’t so far ahead, we could have had a classic season on our hands, If Buttoncan win every race and Vettel fails to finish anymore we would have a Britishchampion. But that’s not going to happen any time soon. To his credit though hedid get the fastest lap in the closing stages, so at least he can say he wastrying.

Webber is third and didn’t have to do too much for that. A couple ofspunky overtakes, but only because he didn’t get it off the line cleanly yetagain. This year there has been a lot less whining about the team favouringVettel over him, I think the penny may have dropped that he’s not all thatgreat and it’s better to get results then believe your own press.

Alonso drives it home to 4^th the Ferrari once it gets to halfdistance just seems to give up the fight and fade away. It’s rubbish on hardtires and half a tank of fuel. Alonso will always try, but you can’t pass windin the face of a thunderstorm, as I tried to explain to my God Daughter onlythe other day.

Hamilton eventually brings it home to 5^th, if the FIA hadn’tgot all in his face he could have been with Button giving Vettel a few squeakymoments towards the end. Another one tochalk up to experience and move on, next year’s car will be better.... hopefully.

Paul Di Resta rediscovers his mojo and gets an excellent 6^th.He drove a smart intelligent race, not making it easy for faster cars to passhim, but not being getting in the way of cars he was never going to beat. Thismight sound like he was giving up and not fighting, but to finish first, firstyou need to finish. He doesn’t have a car that can beat a healthy McLaren,Ferrari or Redbull. So why ruin their race and risk getting punted in to thewall, better to let them pass and not lose time to his true rivals in theSauber and Williams cars. A good solid result and another step towards a frontline drive one day.

Rosberg ends up 7^th and needs to buck his ideas up. Hecouldn’t pass Sutil when he needed to and looked like a hoodie with a car fullof recently ‘acquired’ DVD players being chased by the old bill through somemarket down of central England on a Saturday night. When Perez tried to punishhim for his mistake he was all over the shop, perfectly acceptably according tothe FIA as it turns out. I’m surprised he didn’t get out of the car at the endand make a dash for the nearest garden shed to hide out from the eye in the skywith the heat seeking camera. Time is running out for this once very shinystar.

Sutil... yes remember him? Well he was 8^th, got in the way alot and was dull.

Massa 9^th should do his talking on the race track and stopwhining like a girl that it’s all so unfair when the bigger kids get a bitrough.

Perez makes it to 10^th which is a shame; he could have gotmore if Rosberg hadn’t punted him out of the way. But really, he’ll think thatthis sort of boring slowly, slowly racing is somehow worthy. That if you stayout of trouble and just tool round you will pick up points as other moreinteresting and exciting drivers aim high but fail. He’s starting to think he’sa big fish in a small pond with this uninspiring point collecting races.

He had a test drive with Ferrarilast week, as part of their driver development program. And this sort of thingwill do his hopes of getting a Ferrari drive in 2013 no harm what so ever. Buthe thinks it’s because he can win in a faster car, when really his ability todo as he’s told and just keep driving round without getting into trouble is allFerrari want to compliment Alonso. It’s kept Massa in a job for the last twoyears after all.

Now our last place driver is going to be the Liuzzi because even thoughthe FIA classified Alguersuari as a finisher, he wasn’t moving when the flagdropped, therefore he can ‘t win our award.

And that’s you lot, see you two weeks for the Japanese GP, I’m going tobed its late.

Can Vettel take the crown under the flood lights

2011-09-21T22:54:00.003+01:00

Okay then, the European season has run its courseand now it’s time to crown the F1 world Champion.

Welcome to the Singapore Grand Prix and Vettelsascension to the hall of the greats. Yeah, I know he’s not one of the greats,but he has (almost) won back to back titles and there aren’t too many that havedone that.

But am I getting ahead of myself ?

Will Vettel clinch the deal in the cool night air ?

Well to string it out for a fewmore races either Button or Alonso needs to win and Vettel needs to not finish,but given how reliable the Redbull has been this year that’s unlikely.

Basically, if Vettel wins and Alonso and Button arenot on the podium, It’s a done deal.

Vettel might crash, but he’s one of these new youngguns like Hamilton and Rosberg who can go out and spank the street circuitslike Monaco and Singapore. Also given that he’s a qualifying God these days, he’llbe up the front and thus does not have to work his way past other cars, whichalways makes things easier.

So I’m pretty sure he’ll be crowned F1 WorldChampion this weekend. Which is fair enough you have to admit, if you have acar that can win with ease week after week, then you shouldn’t be surprised ifthe driver goes out and wins week after week. Unless it’s Webber of course, whoeither hits other cars or forgets to engage first gear off the line, week afterweek.

Singapore then, this is the toughest circuit of thechampionship, it’s hot, humid and lasts bang on 2 hours. It’s a stop starttrack with lots of heavy braking into tight corners before short sweepingstraight bits. The problem has always been that the brakes never get enoughtime to cool down, so the discs which run at well over 1000 degrees start tocook the wheels, which heats the tires up and this year’s Pirellis don’t likegetting hot.

When the Pirellis get hot they start to lose theirgrip faster than a Greek government put in charge of a bailout cheque from theEU, Added to which, the cars need to be brimmed up with fuel at the start for along two hour race. Heavy cars with hot brakes and slippery tires equal lots ofexpensive carbon bits smeared down solid looking walls being swept up by thecleanup crews.

We might well be seeing rather a lot of thesafety car on Sunday.

Singaporeisn’t a bad circuit; it’s not too narrow like Monaco so there is overtaking tobe had, especially if the tires only last 10 laps.

The cars do lookfantastic under the stars and the arc lights, with the City lit up with neonand street lights. The place has bags of character and lots of happy lookingpunters. Exactly the opposite to Yas Marina in fact

So all things considered being on pole is going tobe at a premium here. Let’s look at the likely candidates.

Alonso – the Ferrari is nimble enough, and theSpaniard has the balls to drive it like he stole it, which is what you needhere. Ferrari need to salvage something from this year with a car that’s been lackluster on the hard tires, if they can get ahead off the line then they cancontrol the pace of the race and avoid the carnage behind.

Hamilton – has gone very quiet of late, with codedmessage to the press and media to cut out the character assassination columninches. He’s spent a lot of time in the steward’s offices around the world andI think it’s starting to affect his mojo. Last year he would have nailedSchumacher after two laps, this year and after many “stiff talking to’s” hefollowed the German for lap after lap. I think he’s found a team mate in buttonthat can out drive him and he needs to prove to himself that he still has it.This place is like Monaco, a place Hamilton excels at, so a pole would go along way to building him up again.

Vettel – Currently the best one lap specialist outthere bar none, if you need a hot lap when the chips are down he is the go tooguy this year. He doesn’t seem too fussed about the title either so he’s notholding back to pick up points, he wants to nail this and crush the opposition.

Webber – If he has it all his own way, he’s goodfor a hot lap or two. He needs to do something to prove he’s worth the contractextension after all.

Button - maybe, but he’s not really a Banzai lapkind of driver. With much umming and arring over his contract a pole and resultwould go some way to getting him a salary like Lewis has.

As for the rest will there’s Massa, not a chanceand Rosberg likes this place a lot so he might have a pop.

As for the winner, well like I say it’s a long oldwidow maker of a track to it’s a game of survival. The Redbull is a bit suspecton tracks that are hard on tires, but with lots of lesser drivers painting thewall in hint of carbon fiber, they can manage their tires effectively. Ifthey’re at the front then they can control the pace and not burn the tires outchasing the lead down.

But I would loveto see Hamilton win again, he looks a bit sad every week walking back from therace stewards office towards the media who are already sharpening their pencils.Remember the race in China all those months ago where he chased down Vettel andovertook him to win the race. That was vintage Hamilton and that’s what we’vebeen missing

The big greything on the horizon though is rain, and plenty of it. The met office iswarning of a big old thunder storm sometime during the weekend. Last year itwas during the day and was nice and dry but humid and hot for the race. Thereis talk this year that the typhoon sweeping over Japan at the moment will makeit as far as Singapore by Saturday, so we could see some rain on the cars. Oncethat happens ... well we’ll see if we get a race at all.

Sort out your Predictions by Friday please.

Qualifying kicksoff at 3pm British time, the race is at 1pm BST.

Monza, better late than never

2011-09-19T23:11:00.000+01:00

Monza then ... well they managed to have a two hourrace where the highlight was Hamilton stuck behind Schumacher. That doesn’tsound all that exciting does it? And you would be right, it wasn’t all thatexciting.

Well I lie really, the first 15 laps or so werefun. Until you realised that Hamilton wasn’t going to get past Schumacheranytime soon. There was Liuzzi making an impact into turn one, where heimpacted on Rosberg and Petrov and a few others, taking a lot of drivers out ofthe race in one move. Alonso gave theever hopeful Italian/Ferrari fans something to cheers about for 10 minutes ashe passed Vettel off the line and had the lead whilst the safety car clearedLiuzzi’s mess away. Then we had the stunning scene where Vettel passed anothercar for the lead of the race and he didn’t wait for the pits or crash into theother car or hit his team mate or crash into the wall.

So let us celebrate the first 10 laps or so,because Vettel won yet another race and will in all probability have the wholeshow wrapped up by the time we leave Singapore in two weeks time. I don’t blamehim for this sense of anti climax that I now feel; I don’t even blame the otherteams. The racing has been good and Vettel has done what he is paid a lot ofmoney to do. Go out and win.

What annoys me is that whilst the world sat on itsbackside and watched the F1 race in Italy, a much, much better race washappening at Silverstone. For 6 hours Peugeot and Audi slugged it out with abrilliant show of tactical and balls to the wall racing. But not just Audi andPeugeot, BMW, Ferrari and Porsche battled for GT1 honours as the whisper quiteDiesels battled around them, in some cases through them.

Endurance racing is multi class racing with the bigprototype cars, and you never get to hear about it in the main stream press. Ifyou tell most non racing folk that you like motor racing they will almostalways say something like ... “Oh I like Formula One too, that Vettels greatisn’t he.” or some such nonsense. To most folk’s motor racing starts and stopswith F1 on a Sunday afternoon. Tell themthat Audi won a brilliant 24 hour of Le Mans this year ahead of three Peugeotsand a bunch of petrol cars and they’ll look blankly at you. Tell them about arace through the night with three cars chasing one car on a quadruple stint andthey start backing off.

To be fair this state of affairs does have an upside ... it means I don’t have to wad out £200 gazillion pounds to get into thecircuit and I get to sit in a grandstand seat. It also means I can wander intothe pits before the race and talk to team owners, drivers, mechanics and otherassorted motor sport types as the cars are checked over before the race starts.

Trust me you don’t get this sortof access in Bernies ordered little world.

These are the mechanics of the 007Aston Martin checking over a front brake problem they discovered with the carin the warm up 2 hours before the race, whilst I stand there and take pictures.

Meanwhile at the back of the pits,the pit lane babes catch up on texts and discuss tires strategies I imagine

Anyway, back to Formula One Isuppose. Errrum yeah Vettel won, whoop dee doo. Was there any doubt in that ..probably not. Ferrari went of a bit of Glory, but Redbull and McLaren have themeasure of them and only rain is going to spare Italian tears this year.

The result then, Vettel wins itwas pretty easy, on a track that rewards going very very fast, there is littlechance of one car chasing down another, especially one that seems to be workingphenomenally well right now.

Button did another good job of nursing tires and fueland not getting all hot under the collar to get to 2^nd. He breezedpast Hamilton and Schumacher as they fought each other to a standstill and justgot on with things. It wasn’t all that exciting to watch but that’s what getsresults. Button is having a storming time of it at the moment, being the mostconsistent driver behind Vettel. If only the McLaren could have had won fewmore, we might be seeing a different championship.

Alonso gets 3^rd but was lucky Hamilton washeld up for so long. The Ferrari really doesn’t work at all on the hard tireswhich is a major failing for the team. Nothing is going to change now, it’s tooclose to next season to start redesigning a car now. They’re just going to limpalong and hope the others drop the ball.

Hamilton made it to 4^th but could have wonif this or that or maybe those things had gone his way. To his credit he couldhave punted Schumacher off numerous times and has every right to feel cheated. I think being marched to the stewards officeevery race has got to him, he toned it all down and looked like a shade of hisformer self. McLaren had the wrong rations in the car and he was never quite fastenough to take the Mercedes ahead of him. It was like watching F1 from 5 years ago. Dull.

Schumacher is a cheating German and that is all ... in5^th. I have no respect for him anymore. Too aggressive yet again andeven his boss had to tell him to pack it in twice.

Massa 6^th, not all that good.

Thanks to Liuzzi taking out much better cars meansAlguersuari gets a deserved 7^th, He’s sort of found his feet thisyear and has turned in several fine performances. Given Torro Rosso is aRedbull run gig, I expect he’ll be fired before the end of the season.

Di Resta had sort of faded from the picture over thelast few months, so its a good result to get to 8^th. It’ll put himback in the minds of the bigger teams again.

This week Senna makes up for the woeful performancelast tiem in Spa with a creditable 9^th.

Just ahead of Buemi in 10^th, if Algi doesn’tgo at the end of the year, Buemi will.

There you go then the only other news is Trulli gets tokeep his Lotus seat for next year. Where does the man get the money from ? Ican think of no other reason why he is still allowed to drive a car within 200miles of an F1 Circuit.

Monza .. yes, i know

2011-09-13T11:05:00.001+01:00

Yes i have watched the race and i will write something soon.

Meanwhile, here is a picture of an Audi

Back to the home of F1 fans

2011-09-07T21:28:00.002+01:00

Hello race fans.

The circus has decamped from Spa, traveled south and pitched up at the heartland of motorsport and the Autodromo Nazionale Monza in the suburbs of Milan.
If you want history, passion and speed then Monza is the race for you. This cathedral to motorsport is only rivaled by Silverstone in terms of speed and history with both circuits being there at the very beginning of the Formula one world championship. The likes of Fangio, Gonzalez and Moss made their name here, the likes of Peterson, Rindt and Von Trips lost their lives here.

Touching 210 mph as they travel like a missile through the Italian parkland, nowhere else do you see a Formula one car demonstrate just how fast these things are capable of going, just how much raw speed an engine, four wheels and a few bits of carbon fiber can have. In 2009 Montoya lapped the track in 1m19.525s (162.949 mph) which remains the fastest lap ever recorded in an F1 car.

As for the atmosphere, well there are no more fanatical race fans than the hundreds of thousands of Tifosi that pack the circuit for the race weekend. Monza doesn’t need to bus in the locals or fill the stands with clueless corporate suits on a day out from the office. These fans are here to support one team and one team only because this is Ferrari country, the stands will be awash with Scarlet as the Tifosi go wild whenever the Ferrari exits or enters the pits. They love it, Italy loves it.

Basically you have to have a car that goes like a hoodie carrying an armful of phones 4 U’s finest when the driver mashes the loud pedal to the bulkhead. Head down and fast, break for the right left Variante del Retifilo, into the woods for the long sweeping flat out right of Curva grande until you arrive at the left right Variante della Roggia, a short blast to the two right handers at Curve di Lesmo than nail the throttle until you get to the left right left flow of Variante Ascari a good exit from there and max out the rev all the way down to the Curva Parabolica. Nail the apex, let the car run out to the very edge of the track on the left as the tires try to spit you out of the right hand corner that goes on forever before you’re onto the start finish straight once again.

This place is as old school as it gets, get it wrong and it ends in broken bits of carbon fiber and pain. There are no tarmac run off areas to save your sorry backside. Ride the curbs and stay off the grass.

Pretty much no one, apart from Webber, thinks there is any chance of the championship leaving Vettels grasp now. But there are still honors to be races for and a win at Monza is one of those honors. No driver worth his pay check thinks this is just another race, the big boys will want to show the faithful that they deserve the praise and the also ran's want to have their moment of glory.

Given that the Redbulls don’t normally run well on the power circuits like Spa and Monza, I’d expect at least one or other of the Redbulls to win here too. But the McLarens were fighting with one hand behind their backs in Belgium. Button got to 3rd from way back in the pack and Hamilton was controlling things nicely until he took his eyes off Koby. Hamilton won’t give up until the chequered flag drops and he’s pumped up looking to save his year. But you know, Vettel has been showing Lady Luck a rip roaring time of late and she can be difficult to tempt away from a driver when she takes a shine them. I think she remembers the days when Schumacher and her used to go gallivanting around the world in a spray of champagne and trophy’s … It must be a German thing.

Whilst all this frivolity is going on with the sharp Italian suits and the attendant, but very bored looking, glamorous arm candy in Italy. I shall be in, a no doubt windswept and wet, corner of a Northampton airfield watching proper cars with roofs, lights and different engines continue to battle for the title of world endurance champions.

In what is becoming an annual event for me now, I will be huddling manfully in the teeth of a howling gale watching the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup Silverstone 6 hour race.
Yes, after Le Mans and Spa this is about as good as it gets for me. For a mere £25 on Sunday I can sit in any grandstand seat, hang around the back of the pits whilst the race is on. Talk to any driver I happen to bump into and sit and enjoy 6 hours of quality racing. £25 might just buy you a cup of tea and sticky bun at the British Grand Prix, so a full days racing with the chance to meet the teams and watch the racing from inside a garage for the cost of an umbrella is damn good value in my book.

Right then, don’t forget to update your predictions before Friday. If it’s cold Ferrari won’t win, but don’t bet against a red car on pole. I think it’s going to be a straight fight between Redbull and McLaren.

Spa, better than a 1000km drive from the Alps

2011-08-29T09:25:00.002+01:00

Well then, after traveling 1000km from the foothill of the Alps I returned just in time to find Bruno Senna of all people on the grid for the Belgium GP. I have yet to find out why Heidfeld got the old heave ho, but i suspect it’s a money related issue. Oh they might well say they’re unhappy with the results that Heidfeld was getting and they want to build a future with a young driver etc. But at least Heidfeld can get the car round the first corner of the race without hitting anyone.

I didn’t see qualifying but it sounds like the weather played it’s usual roll in proceedings. leaving Schumacher and Button out of position and Vettel on his customary pole.

I understand there was a bit of a to do over the state of the tires after qualifying, with Redbull rather unhappy that they couldn’t change their tires on the grid and still have pole. Their tires were blistering on the inside of the fronts which could under load cause the tires to fail in some of the higher speed corners. The FIA considered this appeal from Redbull, then told them to “Man up and get on with it. If they wanted to change their tires they could have a 10 place grid drop like anyone else. Now stop whining and get on with the racing” Newey threw his hands in the air and
flounced around telling all and sundry that the end was nigh.

Once the race got started under clear blue skies, Webber forgot to engage first gear and got swallowed by the rest of the pack, Rosberg got a blinder off the line and lead the race by the time they got to La Source, then Senna tried to take out half the field with a Banzai move up the inside on locked up cold tires.

Once it was all sorted out Rosberg lead from Vettel and Massa of all people for a couple of laps, before the Merc ran out of puff and Vettel cruised past him. Not doing any cruising was Hamilton, normally a driver to spank this place, he was having trouble keeping up with the big boys on the long straights. McLaren had expected rain and stuck the big wing on the back rather than the tea tray like everyone else. He was doing alright but had to drive the nuts off the car in the twisty middle part of the circuit to keep up with big boys.

Vettel and Webber with the first to blink with tires that were blistering after 5 and 3 laps respectively. Newey gave everyone a knowing smug “i told you so” look, then scratched his head as Hamilton kept his tires until lap 10 when he pitted from the lead. This put him out behind Kobayashi in a Sauber that the McLaren would normally zip past. Through Eau Rouge and up the Kemmel Straight the McLaren just about had the legs to take the Sauber before the breaking point. Hamilton moved to the inside of the corner to cover the racing line, perfectly legal, then drifted back across the track to take the racing line. Except he didn’t see that Kobayashi was still right with him already on the racing line.
Now it’s easy to sit on a sofa and spit your tea across the room in abject rage as you point at the screen and curse Hamilton to the heavens. You can leap upon the sofa and call Hamilton all the names under the sun and swear you will have vengeance in this life or the next whilst smiling smugly that you always said he was a poor driver. But the fact is, at 180mph the drivers can’t see much over their left shoulder when they are coming into the chicane at Les Combes. It’s a snappy little right left right, that needs concentration, so Hamilton thought he was clear as he had made the pass before the breaking zone, he didn’t see Koby probably because he didn’t think the the Sauber would try to come up the outside of him into a corner that he was leading into.
You can argue until you are blue in the face, but Hamilton was ahead going into the corner and Koby was in the the blind spot and does have a duty to avoid the car in front. You can argue that Hamilton had made his one move to cover the corner and was moving back across the circuit and should have checked that he was clear to do so. I think he just didn’t think the Sauber would be there and he took his eyes off the Sauber at the wrong moment and missed the white car closing in on him. It’s a racing incident, Hamilton held his hands up afterwards and said;

"After watching the replay, I realise it was my fault today 100 per cent," said Hamilton via his Twitter feed. "I didn't give Kobayashi enough room though, I thought I was past”

The end result was a lengthy safety car period as they cleared the remains of Hamilton’s car off the track. Koby continued on and the internet went into overdrive with accusations that Hamilton is the Devil/God incarnate and should be Hung up by his testicals/made king of the world.

Meanwhile Vettel took over the lead, from Alonso who hadn’t pitted for new tires during the safety car period. And that was it for the race. Button made things interesting for a bit chasing the leaders down he got Alonso for 3rd but couldn’t quite reach Webber who had recovered from his woeful start with a fine drive to second. Webber got the fastest lap and the move of the race when he passed Alonso down the hill into Eau Rouge, a move that requires a lot of guts and Alonso to not cock around.

So Vettel wins, yadda yadda yadda, all be over by Singapore and the Constructors is pretty much a done deal now.

Webber Second, poor start, good recovery and a fine 1-2 for Redbull.

Button got third but could have won if not for a nose change and a rear wing that got broken in the first corner carnage.

Alonso brings it home 4th blaming the safety car for the Ferrari not being fast enough and not looking after it’s tires.

Schumacher a mistake in qualifying meant he didn’t qualify, during the race he looked after the fuel and tires and gets a well deserved 5th for his troubles.

Rosberg gets beaten by Schumacher for a change, he got a scorcher off the line and lead for a lap or two before normal service was resumed. the Merc is defiantly the next best thing after the top three teams now. Especially if Renault are going to fire perfectly acceptable drivers for the cash now.

Sutil, was apparently 7th.

Massa looked better then 8th, but wasn’t.

Petrov is now able to look better than his team mate in 9th and must be happy he has Russian money to back him up.

Finally Maldonado makes it to 10th after trying to kill himself and Hamilton in Qualifying.

Well done all

see you in two weeks time for the Italian GP, except I'm going to the Silverstone 1000km instead.

Button wins, the BBC losses.

2011-08-01T21:37:00.005+01:00

What a weekend of disappointment that was then.

If you’ve not heard the terrible news than I suggest you sit down before I give it to you

Ready ?

Okay then, from next year you won’t be able to watch all 20 Grand Prix on the BBC. No, from next year you will be able to watch 10 GP’s on the BBC live and the other 10 will be either tape delay or extended highlight, the detail of which are to be worked out over the next few weeks.

If you want to watch all 20 races live and uninterrupted (ish) next year then you will have to pay Mr Murdoch (who is accused , lest we forget of employing people quite happy to hack the phone of a dead girl) and his Sky organisation, £600 pounds for Sky sports TV.

Now I’m not really annoyed, like some of the internet, at the BBC. Because they don’t have the money because the government has listened to the Sky whispering campaign about how the BBC had too much power and it was all so unfair that the BBC got state money and stuff. So the government didn’t increase the licence fee and told the BBC to move to Solford and fire all their managers and save money.

So they had to cut the budget somewhere and this is a high profile expensive sport which was costing the BBC £45 million a year to televise. They had to save money somewhere and so they appear to have sold the rights to sky and picked up 10 live races and the highlights package. To save Wimbledon, football highlights errrr and what little else sport is on the BBC these days.

No. I’m annoyed at Bernie for being a two faces lying bastard. In May he said that FOTA (the people that own the F1 TV rights) would “never” sell the rights to have F1 on pay TV ... never happen ...no way amigo.

Two months later he’s sold the rights to Sky.

Okay i know that F1 costs money and that all this technology and entertainment has to be paid for somehow .... But screwing the money out of the audience, for less isn’t really on, in my opinion.

£600 a year for 10 live races which is all your paying for, as the other 10 will be live (from the studio in London I assume) for free on the BBC at the same time so why would you watch the Sky feed with its adverts every 20 minutes? Oh they’ve said, “We’ll not show any adverts during the race ... honest” but Mr Murdoch also says he knew nothing about the phone hacking and it was nothing to do with him.
Put it this way, if you saved £600 up you could just about afford a Sunday grandstand ticket at the British GP next year. Or you could fly to the Italian GP stay at a pretty reasonable hotel and see the race from a Grandstand. Or you could go to Spa and camp under the stars and see a brilliant race. Or have the time of your life at Le Mans for a week with food and beer and 24 hours of racing which is just fantastic. Not 10 races and busty beauties explaining how Alonso keeps his hair so shiny and other such guff.

And no, this does not mean people will go to the pub on a Sunday afternoon and watch the F1 race from Valencia because the bloody German or Spanish Bloody football on Sky will bloody well be on.

Personally ... i won’t be paying for my F1 next year. I will be watching the BBC live events and probably the highlights. I might be investigating the F1 steaming that are available if you hunt around the darker areas of the internet.
Anyway ... that’s politics and will no doubt play out over the next few weeks.

Meanwhile in Hungary

It wasn’t the most exciting race of the year but throw in a bit of rain and a slippery track and Button will show you how it’s supposed to be done. He almost lost to his team mate but a throttle peddle moved a fraction of a millimetre too soon and suddenly the back to back win was over for Hamilton.

But you know, motor racing is more often than not about “the Story” the feel good factor that gives a team a reason to try that little bit harder. At Le Mans this year the number two Audi had “the story” of losing its two sister cars in horrendous accidents as well as Britain's Leena Gade who became the first female race engineer to lead a team to victory. In the GT amateur class the third place car had a 50 year husband and wife team in a Ford GT making the podium on their wedding anniversary, Stories as are what gives motorsport it human element amongst all the machinery and petrol.

This year at Hungary was Button 200th GP and the place he first won a F1 race in 2006 which set him on the road to the title in 2009. There was a ready made story for the press to latch onto and he didn’t disappoint them. But then this was also the race the almost killed Massa back in 2009, a driver that has looked lack lustre and down ever since his accident.

I imagine it’s always hard for Massa to come back to the place that almost killed him. Yes drivers are made of strong stuff and most of them shrug off the danger with a wave of the hand and “it’s not that scary really” knowing smile. But Massa got pulled from the car with half his helmet missing and a 6 inch gash above his left eye, he was lucky to be alive let alone see.

It must mean something for Massa to go through that blind entry turn four every lap and know that he was 2 millimetres from death. So to come here as everyone is saying how poor he’s doing and how he’s not the racer he used to be, to then go out and out qualify Alonso must have been very, very satisfying indeed.

Anyway this has been quite long and rambling let’s get to the race.

Vettel on pole for a change, once again showed he can’t handle it when he’s under pressure. Meanwhile Hamilton showed him how it should be done and looked like the Hamilton of old. Tail in the air a tally ho and off he went to go and win the race. Except he was once again and bit too rough with the tires and whilst he had an extra set of super softs to play with, everyone else realised that the “harder” soft tires were the ones to be on as the track rubbered in toward the end of the race. He tried to nail it and pull out a nice big lead, but a smattering of rain on one corner and a heavy right foot spun the luckless Brit round.

As he spun the car back to point the right way for the race Paul Di Resta in the Force India, who was having a good weekend at last, had to take to the grass to avoid Hamilton and the race stewards pinged the McLaren driver with a drive through penalty dropping him back to 6th behind Webber and Alonso. He managed to pass Webber in the closing laps to take 4th whilst Button showed everyone once again that if you want to win in wet slippery conditions, do exactly as he does..

Button, didn’t do anything wrong and wins his second race of the season, in the wet .. on a slippery track. All credit to him he looked after his tires and did what had to be done. He knew how the car felt and lady luck was sitting on his shoulder as Hamilton and he fought for the win. Ignored the team when they said come in for inters and won comfortably in the end. Either of the McLaren could have won here and both could have got pole, does this mean they have passed Redbull as well as Ferrari, I don’t think so. I think the circuit just suited them and the cold weather hampered the Ferraris and Redbulls. If it had been a bone dry spankingly hot day I think it would have been a different story. But thems the breaks and you have to take them when they present themselves, not spin slowly and hand the victory to your team mate. After two DNF in Germany and Silverstone you could hear the relief in his voice at the end of the race.

Vettel is 2nd and was lucky to get that. But then again he doesn’t have to try too hard. It’s his to lose and I think he knows it too.

Alonso was 3rd and once again showed that the Ferrari does like to get it’s front tires up to temperature in its own good time thank you very much. Give it a hot track and it’ll be all over the top step. Put it on a wet track and it’s more picky than a 5 year in a sweet shop, it knows it’s supposed to make a quick choice, but it’s bloody well going to take it’s time over deciding to have the chocolate button over the curly whirly.

4th for Hamilton in the end and I think he was satisfied with that after all the drama. The post race interview we expected was Hamilton spitting blood about losing to his team mate and the stewards giving him unfair penalties. What we got was a Hamilton with his tail in the air and a “Well done Jenson I got beaten by the better driver today”, then amazingly he spent 5 minutes apologising to Di Resta and saying how sorry he was and yes that was a fair penalty. It’s like he’s had a load of media training in the last few weeks few or something.

5th for Webber who was miles away in qualifying and still hasn’t signed a Redbull contract yet. Time is running out you grumpy Ozzy.

6th For Massa who I like to think will see this weekend as a minor personal victory. He out qualified Alonso on pace and guts and looked like the old Massa again. Maybe not as feisty and balls out, but comfortable in the car at last. And he got the fastest lap, take that Grim Reaper.

An excellent 7th for Di Resta who’s had a tough time of it of late, so it’s good to see him back in the top ten. He’s a better driver than Sutil and I think people are starting to realise that now.

8th for Buemi who wins the “did he take part it he race” award.

9th for Rosberg who beats his team mate, because he didn’t finish, but that’s about the only positive thing to say about him this week. He’s now driven 100 Grand Prix and has yet to look like winning anything, I see challenging time ahead for the likable German.

Finally 10th for Algueruari who gets beaten by Buemi for a change.

This weeks last place fool is, Liuzzi who gets beaten by D’ambrosio and his rookie team mate Ricciardo. How many of those non Redbull sponsored drivers do you think will be racing next year?

This weeks HRT quote is another belter from Colin Kolles (Team Principal): “Hungary is traditionally a long race, this time even more tricky in changeable conditions. It was important to be on the track until the end”

Wise words indeed Colin. I think we can all take something from that.

2011-07-29T17:54:00.002+01:00

We are gathered here today to mourn the passing of Formula One.

God Rest it's soul which was sold out for Murdocks money.

RIP F1

Acceleration, that's what you need in Hungary.

2011-07-27T12:52:00.001+01:00

Back in the day, at the dawn of video games, the driving sim used to be a pretty simple affair, it was a couple of pixels moving between a long flowing line to mark the track. You went left and right as the track flowed out of the screen and you crashed into other blocks of pixels every now and again.

As things progressed the pixels started to look more and more like an actually car and the tracks started to be a different colour to the rest of the screen. Soon as well as other cars, there was stuff at the side of the track to crash into.

Time past and soon it was possible to start setting up the car. This would usually mean a simple choice between acceleration and top speed. You either went like a rocket off the line, or pulled the leading car back on the straights. Those that knew the dark arts always went for acceleration, because the corners are where you win and lose a race. There were never enough long straights to pull out enough of an advantage to stay in front of the accelerating cars.

Things haven’t really changed much over the intervening years, being able to go fast is one thing, but getting through the corner as fast as possible and being able to accelerate out of the corner is still where races are won and lost.

Which brings us to the Hungarian GP, a place that has one long straight and a couple of high speed corners, but mostly miles and miles of technical little corners that need precision and patience not blood and guts. Oh and usually very hot weather. In short … this is Ferrari territory.

The Ferrari isn’t the fastest car in a straight line and it’s not the quickest through the fast corners, but goes off the line like lightening and can get the power down efficiently out of the corners. Their KERS unit is okay, not as quite as good as the Mclaren unit but more reliable than the Redbull lump. Their ace in the hole is that they have one of the best drivers in the game at setting up and thinking through a race in Alonso. Love him or loath him you have to admire his ability to work a car through its problems and shortcomings. His ability to give a team direction is second only to his ability to divide them.

The Hungarian track is all about being consistent, the driver needs to flow around the circuit carrying as much speed into and out of. It doesn’t get much use for the rest of the year so the track is pretty dusty and green for the first Friday practice and comes to the drivers as the weekend progress. It’s an evolution process of setting the car up as the grip improves.

Hungary marks the end of the first half of the season before the month long holiday for the teams. So the front runners will be testing lots of new bits to get some sort of idea where to develop the cars after the enforced break.

Around the paddock it’s all been rather quite, only the on going implosion of Renault has kept the headline writers happy. The team principle, Eric Boullier , has come out to say the team needs to get it’s finger out and deliver on some of the potential they showed at the start of the season. The fickle finger of fate seems to be pointing towards the drivers for not delivering with Senna jnr getting a Friday test drive in Hungary, whilst the word on the street is that the floppy haired failure Grosjean will get another crack of the whip when Petrov gets fired. Are either of these two any better than Heidfeld and Petrov? Not a chance, but they are much cheaper and the cost would appear to be the deciding factor here. Once again, Money people not understanding the passion of motor racing non-shocker.

So then back to the point of all this. Acceleration, that’s what is required here and I think Ferrari are now on a par with Redbull, the updates at Valencia appear to have made the difference with the Red cars much much closer to where Redbull are, Massa had the other car up behind the top three until a wheel nut cost him an extra second in the pit top let Vettel through,.. If it’s hot then the Ferrari is going to be a no brainer for the win.

Webber always chokes when the chips are down and Vettel can’t overtake for toffee, if the Ferraris or McLarens can nail qualifying then Redbull will have another disappointing weekend.

Don’t forget to update your predictions before Friday.

Lewis is a driving GOD

2011-07-24T19:38:00.001+01:00

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Lewis Hamilton is the most exciting driver on the circuit today.

What an absolute thunder bucket of a race. Give Lewis a sniff of the chequered flag and he will thrash the car within an inch of its life to give you the win. Considering that last week McLaren were all long faces and “where the heck did the speed go!!!”. This week , whilst Jenson was looking a bit lost and miserable, Lewis was out there spanking it for the win. What a turn around, and he didn’t need a pit stop to pass anyone he did the talking on the track and showed Vettel how it should be done.

Redbull in fact had a terrible weekend by their standards. Webber got pole with an outstanding lap, laughing in the face of Ferrari who though they just had to turn up after Silverstone and nail the pole. Whilst Vettel got jumped by Alonso who though he had it in the bag and Hamilton who was as surprised as anyone after he’d told the world he wasn’t even thinking about doing well in qualifying. So for the first time in 14 races Vettel wasn’t on the front row on Sunday and was going to have to show everyone he could overtake. Well that’s what was supposed to happen. The smug young German was expected to cruise back to the front of the field and win with ease.

What actually happened was yet again Webber choked on the big occasion when the red lights go out and ended up behind Lewis who’d made a blinding start. Alonso almost jumped Webber too but backed out of the first corner at the last second to set up an afternoon of a Hamilton, Webber and Alonso master class in racing. For 60 odd laps the three of them drove the nuts of their cars to try and take the win. All Vettel could do was fart around behind Massa and look rather sad and pathetic as he stared forlornly at the back of the Ferrari. He was hopeless; if he made an attempt to pass I missed it. All I saw was a world champion protecting his championship lead and nancying around for the points. Where is the glamor in that ?

At the front it was nip and tuck, never more than 3 seconds between them. Once Alonso had his tires up to temperature he came back at Hamilton. Webber jumped them both with an early stop but lost out to Alonso the next stop.

Then the defining moment of the race came when Alonso dived into the pit and came out ahead of Hamilton who had pitted the lap before. “Aaah” we thought, this is going to be Alonso’s race after all, oh well. But then Hamilton steamed round the outside of Alonso into turn 2 taking the lead and motoring on to the win. See Vettel .. That’s how you do it.

Make the move -> take the win.

Not; wait and wait and wait and wait and pass Massa in the pits on the last lap you tart..

Alonso tried to get the jump on Lewis at the end with the last stop for the hard tires, but Lewis absolutely spanked the McLaren on cold tires and Alonso stayed out a lap too long to lose the race by 3 seconds. Just for good measure Hamilton got the fastest lap as the race ended to show all and sundry that he is a driving GOD.

So Hamilton gets his second win of the year and is a happy bunny once again. Up until Qualifying he was saying the car was too slow and had not grip, then all of a sudden with low fuel and sticky tires he was the balls out Lewis of old. Nailing a front row spot and taking the win. Its races like this that keep me coming back time after time.

Alonso is Second after thinking all he had to do was turn up for the win. The Italian team was so confident of victory that they’d sent Alonso out in Q1 at the very start to set a banker lap and lay down a marker for everyone else to chase, then Webber stole the pole and Hamilton from nowhere passed him too. Alonso tried his damnedest to get the win but was beaten by a better driver on the day. If only this had happened at the start of the season and we could have a four way battle for the title. As it is, it sets up an exciting second half to be second to Vettel.

Webber started 1st finished 3rd ...... that’s about right and he didn’t need to worry about being told to stop racing this time happily, he’s done that before the first corner hahahahahahahaha.

Vettel, proved he can’t pass anyone in the best car of the field, for 4th.

Massa plays tail gunner and made Vettel look as ordinary as Hamilton did last week in 5th.

Sutil, plays it softly softly and is the best of the rest this week in 6th.

Rosberg didn’t step up to the plate and should have at least gotten past Sutil. The shine is defiantly starting to fade off this star in 7th .

Schumacher makes it through a race to 8th this time without having to replace his front wing for a change, but still doesn’t look like a seven times world champion. It’s got to the point where people aren’t even talking about how badly he’s doing anymore. That’s how far he’s fallen!

Kobayashi is 9th wining the “did he take part in the race ? I must have missed him” award this week.

Finally Petrov is 10th and got in everyone’s way during the race.

Right at the back of the grid Chandock makes it home 4 laps behind Hamilton and 1 lap behind the HRT of Ricciardo. So they fire Trulli for being rubbish and replace him with Chandock who can’t get ahead of the HRT’s. Now I Like Chandhok, he’s lucid and erudite so I feel sorry about making that jibe. But still he did do worse than Trulli and will have done nothing to build his reputation. Hopefully we’ll see him in India if nowhere else, I’d like to see more of him because I think he not a bad driver. Unlike Trulli who is shit.

And finally In HRT watch we have this gem from Colin Kolles, Team Principal:
“ The pit stops went smoothly”

More positivity, that’s what I like form HRT.

Germany ... It'll be efficiant you know.

2011-07-19T21:04:00.002+01:00

Welcome to the second half of the season and the German GP from the Nurburgring.

Now I’ll be honest and up front here, I don’t really like this circuit .... It’s just a bit too ... well, German for my liking.

This is all coloured by playing GT and F1 games over the years of course, but whenever Nurburgring turns up, my heart sinks a little. Yeah it’s got some fast bits and the odd technical bit. But I just don’t think it flows, it’s almost an exercise in what a track should be like. Flawless and ruthlessly efficient, there no silly little corners like Monaco or stupidly fast sections like Silverstone. There’s no seat of the pants grip the wheel and hope she hangs in there, type stuff here. It’s just .... well.... all so efficient and safe really.

Which isn’t to say the races are dull far from it in most cases, these are the hills of central Europe after all which means there is either a heat wave or more usually some rain and rain always spices things up. So the racing over the years hasn’t lacked for some excitement. But I find myself rather hoping for rain here more than any other circuit. Being rather efficient means there isn’t really anything but a single racing line. Which, without the rain, tends to produce a bit of a processional race and a win from the front row a more than a fair bet.

This places suits the more passionless drivers on the grid, Button, Vettel and Alonso go well here where being smooth and patient are the keys to a good lap. Drivers like Kobayashi, Webber and Hamilton who like to hang it out there, somewhere where the talent ends and lady luck is drinking her champagne, don’t go so well here. Hamilton in particular seems to have a bit of a love hate relationship with this place. It’s win or go out in blinding glory, stones, grass and bits of carbon fibre galore, fun to watch but not always with something to celebrate at the end of it.

Talking of the English wunderkind, he’s been getting a lot of press interest of late with stories of his imminent move to someone other than McLaren any day now. How much of this is just the tabloids filling a few column inches, how much is Simon Fuller keeping his boy in the public eye and how much is actually true is anyone’s guess. I’m sure Lewis isn’t happy with things at the moment, he can’t win and like all F1 drivers he thinks he has a God given right to win. The question i think that’s occupying his mind is can McLaren build a car that can beat a Newey designed car next year. The pragmatist in my thinks not and maybe Lewis is coming to that conclusion too.

This is of course the silly season though, when stories appear on Friday about driver A going to team X which of course are denied by team X before disappearing on Monday to be replaces with stories about driver A going to team Z all along. And it was driver C that was going to team X as long as diver D goes to team G when driver H is fired for not being as fast as driver W. It’s called silly season for a reason you know.

This year’s key to unlocking all of this is Massa. Everyone thinks he’s going to either get fired or retire at the end of the season. If he does then there is a seat a Ferrari and with the prancing horse looking like they have some direction now, they could be the next best seat after Redbull when the music stops. Webber has still not put his X on a new contract with Redbull, so there is a seat there, possibly. But that is all rather dependent on what Massa is going to do, because most people think that Webber will walk away from Redbull to Ferrari given half a chance.

Well they did until last week, when Alonso fresh from winning at Silverstone said that he would be happy to work with Lewis again. I know, i don’t believe it either. He says all the ho harr in 2007 was the fault of the team and he never had a problem with Lewis ... that was all the tabloids filling column inches. So Hamilton might have a shot at a Ferrari seat ... something I think we can all agree that would be orgasmic.

Button is also not overly happy with the boys from Woking who cocked up his Silverstone race. Personally i think it was just one of those things, these things happen when the team is fighting tooth and nail just to stay in the hunt. The car was nowhere all weekend so they had to roll the dice and see if Lady Luck was going to smile for them. Unfortunately she was deep into her second bottle of Italian Frescarti and wasn’t interested in a pint English bitter. The wheel man realised that the nut was missing so went for the spare gun just as he’s supposed to do. The lollypop man misread the move and released Button with no fourth wheel. Fighting for a podium meant saving seconds in the pits, a comfortable lead would have given them the time to make sure the wheel was on. Thems’ the breaks when you’re not at the front.

There is some speculation that Button will take the Massa seat at Ferrari, but i think he’s embedded with McLaren now and too far into his career to be trying to play the politics game in Italy.

So then the race this weekend.

Well you have to go with Redbull, maybe Webber but probably Vettel, Redbull will have their all singing all dancing Blown diffucer back on song with no silly tantrums front the FIA to distract them.

The only real challenge i can see is coming from Alonso now, Ferrari is going to be behind him 100% and Redbull know this. Webber didn’t get bitch slapped at Silverstone because Horner likes the press attention. He was right too you know, Webber is a bit flaky in those situation and would undoubtedly have taken them both off if he hadn’t been told to wind his neck back in.

Realistically then, Ferrari have to hope that Vettel doesn’t finish in the points for the next nine races for them to stand a chance of any silverware this year. Alonso is good but he is 90 odd points behind Vettel, Ferrari have left it very late to get their act together but this is Ferrari and if a crisis and needless panicking is required you can bet your ass on Ferrari turning up to the party all red faced and flustered.

McLaren needs to bounce back mostly just to keep their drivers happy. They’ve looked out of sorts for a few races now and despite lucking into the Canadian win, don’t look like they can find that edge to carry them past Redbull. These boys will never stop trying to win, but you can see their shoulders starting to drop a little as each week they look at the back of a Ferrari or a Redbull. They need something special to happen here in the heart of Germany. Something to fire the troops up and get the team going again.

As for the rest, Mercedes will be praying for something from Mickey and Rosberg, the Mercedes stand will be full of corporate clients and guests. They throw a lot of money at this race and it needs to start delivering for them on the track. Rosberg managed to finish at Silverstone higher than he qualified for the first time, let’s see if he can do it again. I think Mickey has had his high point of the season at Canada. With a bit of luck he could have had a win there but the tires wore out before his talent and he was just off the podium. Maybe that’s given him the boast he needs, he’s talking about doing another year at the moment, weather Mercedes want to bank roll that is open to debate. But he’s always gone well here so a top ten should be attainable this weekend.

Renault meanwhile have been very quiet of late after claiming that Kubica was coming back any day now. I suspect the dawning realization that he’s not coming back is hitting home. Look at Massa he just got a small spring in the face and he’s never been the same. Kubica had most of his right side rebuild. How fast do you think he’ll be? Not very is the honest answer. Anyway we’ve not heard much out of the Renault team of late and I imagine they’re trying to decide if it’s worth carrying on with two under performing drivers or not. They’ve lost the “No WE’RE Lotus” debate and the money looks like it’s going to walk soon, so they’re starring down the barrel of back of the grid misery very soon indeed. Time to hunker down and start phoning the old contacts I imagine.

The boys at HRT are having fun with their new owners, who like most new owners have blundered in and started telling all and sundry that they’ve been doing it all wrong and they know how it should be done. This in essence means they want to fire Liuzzi, understandably, and bring in some new untried hot shoe Spanish touring car driver. Well why not, Petrov used to go ice racing back in mother Russian and look how well he’s doing, no one else has got anywhere near his high jump record so far.
Maybe the New HRT owners will turn it around and then again maybe Petrov will win this weekend.

So then, The blown diffusers are all turned back on this weekend and it’s probably going to rain. Pick the winner (Vettel) out of that.

those crazy guys at HRT

2011-07-18T19:25:00.003+01:00

I love HRT even their sense of humor is crap !!

Dear FIA stop changing the bloody rules.

2011-07-10T20:26:00.002+01:00

Right then, what do we make of all that then?

The big story of the weekend was the engine mapping and whether the teams could run with some fuelled over run, some unfueled over run or none what so ever. At the Valencia event the FIA had told the teams that all engine over run to blow exhaust gas through the diffuser in the middle of the corner was a complete no no from the British GP onwards. The teams turned round and complained alot and then said “well ok, if we must”. Which was all fine and dandy until Mercedes went to Charlie Whiting the head of the technical department at the FIA on Monday and said,

“Zee car vill not vork with no over run. Ve promise not to burn any vuel but vill only blow air over ze diffuser mine heir” Charlie though this through and said okay. When the Renault heard about this on the Friday of the British GP they said
“zoot alors this is not on, we want the same break”, Charlie said “well, okay then but don’t tell anyone else.”

Except the whole point of this ban was to stop Redbull with its Renault engine from disappearing off into the distance. Give them the break and what do you know the Redbulls are just as fast as they ever where and Ferrari can’t get pole. So on Saturday morning Charlie turns round to the Renault teams and says ...”Look, you know I said it was okay to run the same engine map as you had at Valencia ... see the thing is you didn’t ask me before some random secret cut off point that I didn’t tell anyone about and have only just made up. So Mercedes engines can run with the Valencia map because they asked for the break on Monday, and you can’t because you demanded the same treatment on Friday”.

Now I don’t think Christian Horner is the best team boss out there, he is just a mouth piece for the Redbull drinks company at times and did kind of screw Webber over somewhat last year. But even I think he has every right to be pissed off when he’s told the three legged race is going to be run with the other teams only holding hands whilst he’s going to have to be blindfolded as well as tied up.
He got shafted and he wasn’t going to go quietly.

So whilst the cars tooled round in practice 3 on Saturday morning Horner and Adrian Newey were up at race control reading the riot act. This dragged the rest of the teams in and there was a lot of to’ing and not a little fro’ing between the FIA, Bernie’s truck and the conference room where the Technical committee tried to sort the whole sort mess out.

Meanwhile Webber and Vettel did their normal job with their “hobbled and woefully underpowered” cars and got first and second on the grid for the race on Sunday by about the normal length of time it takes to lie your face off the FIA. Meanwhile the McLaren’s played the game with a straight bat, turned the blown diffuser off and were one and half seconds off pole for Jenson in 5th and two seconds in 10th for Lewis. You make your own minds up here, I couldn’t possible comment on who had the right to the self righteous indignation.

So Sunday dawns with a drop or two of rain in the air and the blown diffuser row is still rumbling on annoying everyone like an HRT at the back of the grid.

The teams were going to sign a letter to the FIA saying “Up yours you can’t police this stupid rule and it’s too late in the season to be changing stuff”. Except the Ferrari engine teams of Sauber and oh Ferrari said, “Well actually we rather like this rule so we’re not going to sign anything”. So we have more shuttle diplomacy, Bernie’s called in and the FIA throw their hands in the air. Then it all goes very quite on the subject and as the teams line up the start grid, Bernie pops up on the BBC pre race grid walk to say .. “No mate, it’s all fine and dandy no worries, nothing to see here me old china it’s a done deal nar what I mean” there is a bit of head scratching from the media and suddenly no team manager want to talk about it and it looks like a compromise has broken out.

Now if you are, as I am, an avid F1 watcher you will know that Bernie is less than happy with Mr Todt. The FIA seems to be trying to take over the running of F1 as the rule writer and impose some sort of checks and balances. Whilst Bernie is feeling like his toes are being stepped on and is getting a bit shirty about this take over. It’s his baby, he’s nurtured this after all into the global phenomenon that it is and is not a happy bunny.

F1 watchers are viewing this as another victory for Bernie in the on going war. The FIA have been made to look stupid whilst the FOTA teams are united behind Bernie against the FIA. Mr Todt who had nothing to do with all of this is going to have to cop the flack and field the questions whilst Bernie rubs his hands and darkly laughs to himself in the shadows. My wife insists I say ALLEGEDLY for legal reasons at this point. Mr Ecclestone might not rub his hands.

Back on track and half the circuit is very wet and the other half is bone dry, so it’s inters all round as the drivers watch the lights go out and they get to some actual racing. Webber on pole once again chokes and what was a fine pole is suddenly yet another second place as Vettel storms past him into his usual first place.
Hamilton makes a blinding start from 10th and is up to 6th by the end of the first lap. We then get treated to a master class from Hamilton as he carves his way back up the field, whilst the likes of Schumacher attempted to nail anything in his way.

As the race progressed we got to see Lewis drive the backside off the car on a greasy track with slick tires. He managed to work his way up to Alonso in third and never one to back out of a challenge, took the Spaniard on the inside at Copse corner. That isn’t normally a place you over take another car, it’s even less of a good idea when there is a dry line through the corner and the only way to pass is to go off line through the marbles and water. Yet that’s what Lewis did, through the spray he nailed Alonso to the cheers and cries of the fans on the muddy banking. They have a Hero and he didn’t disappoint them.

McLaren however did disappoint them. Button who was keeping it steady and sneaking up to a podium went into the pits for a new set of slicks, but a missing wheel nut and a lollypop man missing the signal sent Jenson back out with only three wheel fully attached to the car. He got as far as the pit lane exit before the wheel tried to part company with the car and Jensen’s afternoon was done.
Then Lewis got a message over the radio to tell him to turn the aircon off and only use fifth gear as the lads had only put enough fuel in the car to make it to the lap before the end of the race. Lewis was a sitting duck and before long Alonso was back past him and hunting for the win.

It was all looking like a normal day at the office for Vettel at the front of the race until the last pit stop when randomly there was a problem with a wheel and he got delayed, that was enough for Alonso to take the lead and cruise to the flag.
As the race wound down Alonso cruised it ahead of Vettel who was being caught hand over fist by Webber trying to restore some sort of pride. That is until Horner got on the blower and said “Oi cut that out you’re a number two driver and you’re not allowed to take points away from the runaway championship leader” Webber ignored it and tried to pass the German anyway but couldn’t even do that.

Massa had been told that Hamilton was a bit touch and go on the fuel so girding his loins he tried to make a race of it. As Alonso crossed the line for a comfortable victory, Webber was giving it two fingers to the pit wall and tried to sneak one past Vettel but couldn’t, then Massa had a bit of a wild lunge into the last corner up the outside of Lewis who locked it all up and the swapped a bit of paint with the Ferrari, Lewis cut back inside as the Massa gunned it out of the corner and took to the run off trying to get the power down. Hamilton got 4th place by 0.1 of a second as the fans erupted on the banking.

The final result

Alonso in 1st with a pretty easy win all told, he had the pace of the Redbulls once his tires got up to temperature and would probably have won without Vettel getting caught in the pits. Does this mean we have a race for the championship afterall? Not a chance, Vettel can cruise it from here and still win comfortably. But he might have to work a bit harder now.

Vettel Still on the podium in 2nd. Nine races, six wins and three seconds it’s that easy for him. However, he couldn’t take Hamilton who was struggling with low grip and low fuel. Vettel can’t pass and can’t make a pass happen, see Hamilton nailed the winner on a slippery track and Vettel once again relied on a pit stop. I think if Hamilton had a Newey car he’s be 9 and 0 for the year so far.

Webber was on pole but only got 3rd and got bitch slapped for trying to race his team mate. Happy days!

Hamilton had a bit of a rubbish car and drove the nuts off it for 4th. I still think he’s the most exciting driver there is. And he made Vettel look ordinary.

Massa, did alright with 5th and the valiant try for 4th was a flash of the Massa of old.

Rosberg, had a piss poor start but still hit less people than Schumacher top make it to 6th.

Perez, avoided the excitement to make it to 7th and gets the “did he take part in the race, I didn’t see him at all” award this week.

Heidfeld was 8th and did better than I was expecting at least.

Schumacher, lost yet another wing in a fool hardy over taking move and got a stop go penalty as a reward. Was the first of the front runners to stop for slicks as a result and was able to change to the right tire at the right time. Makes it to 9th at the end more by luck than judgement though.

Finally Alguersuari is 10th yet again. I guess being told to get some results or get fired has focused his race craft.

This weeks last place hero was the new boy who was in to replace our regular last place hero Karthikeyan. Yes D.Ricciardo was a mere 3 laps behind the action and in HRT press release watch Colin Kolles has this to say;

Colin Kolles, Hispania Racing Team Principal: “The race for us was quite good because we had a good strategy and did good pit stops. Obviously our cars are not as quick as other cars; this is a little bit unfortunate. Otherwise we could show that we would’ve been much more competitive. The target was to finish the race with both cars, which we did, and both drivers could do some good lap times”.

An exercise in stating the bleeding obvious there.

There we go then. There was fun, there were games. A bit of rain a few laughs and some sun. Can anyone stop Vettel? About as much as they can stop Bernie manipulating the whole thing behind the scenes .... ALLEGEDLY.

2011-07-09T11:05:00.002+01:00

"I don't care what you said in Friday Charlie, the Renault's are not allowed to win at Silverstone".

Moments later .. Bernie stole a child's bag of sweets.

Blah blah Blah Vettel .. however.

2011-07-05T22:06:00.002+01:00

All right then. Back to Blighty and the British GP... hurrah ... blah blah blah Vettel blah blah county mile blah blah.

Right that’s enough with the predicting.
What is it about F1 that keeps us coming back year after year ? More to the print what keeps us tuning in week after week when we know what's going to happen. Remember the Ferrari years when Mickey won race after race ? The only highlight was whether Barrichello was going to move over before the last lap or not. Very .... dull .... indeed.

Yet each time it was a grand prix weekend we all switched on the TV and sat down for the race, usually to go to sleep if we’re being honest, but that's not the point.

I think we come back for the personalities, the movers and shakers the mad the bad and what they’re all doing when the racing isn’t on. Without them there is nothing because it’s all rather boring and sterile. This fact was brought home to me when I played F1 2010 on the PS3 last week. It's a great driving game, the physics are all present and correct.

Tires ... check.

All the Cars... check.

Trulli going slow ... correct-a-mundo.

You get to practice then qualify just like they do each weekend. Then you get to race whilst a disconnected voice tells you that you are faster than Trulli (surprise surprise) and how you can look forward to another five laps of tooling around admiring the perfectly rendered scenery. Then if you make it to the podium you're whisked off with no champagne spaying at all, to a press conference where a bored looking Holly Samos asks you stupid questions which you can answer in a variety of mundane ways.

It's dull, now admittedly I only raced around Bahrain for the evening, but I missed all the stuff around the weekend. Where was Bernie talking about how he doesn't agree about the new engine reg’s for 2014. What about Lewis wondering why he had to visit the stewards yet again ! There was no HRT press release talking about being happy to be within 107% for two races in a row.

F1 is not just about the racings. It's about McLaren stealing Ferrari secrets and about Redbull having a trick blown diffuser. Where was the FIA getting the random ban hammer of doom out of its scarlet velvet bag ?

This week alone, back in reality, Williams have signed a deal with Renault for engines next year. The last time we had a Williams-Renault team it won five constructors championships and four drivers titles, so no pressure there then lads.

Down the grid at Virgin Marussia, having fired nick Wirth and crew, they've just signed a deal with McLaren to share technical facilities and a bit of know how. You could see this as McLaren getting its own junior team like Redbull and Torro Rosso. Or you could see it as virgin selling its soul (or what’s left of it) to move up the grid.

Meanwhile HRT have been sold off to a Spanish bank with Japanese money. It’s never a good plan getting the banks involved as they never get the hang of racing, they're just after a return on their investment. When there inevitably isn't one, they look to sell it off as fast as possible. Leaving the poor team in the same position there were in before.
The other back marker Lotus, having bought the rights to the Caterham name will be sporting said name on the side of their cars this weekend. Caterham a name synonymous with open top pocket rockets built to various degrees of professionalism by middle aged men in their garage after work. Usually to be sold on afterwards as the realization that they do rather like a roof in the pouring rain of an English summer.
If you see a Caterham on the road it’s usually going past you barely under control on the other side of the road approaching a blind corner or oncoming arctic lorry. Not something I think Trulli has ever attempted.

Elsewhere, the rumblings of discontent continue at Renault itself with lots and lots of staff figuring the management was only ever in this for a quick buck and is going to high tail it out of there any day now. The car has been impressive from a “why isn’t it winning yet?” standpoint as the drivers have signally failed to achieve anything. This could be down to the fact they have no money and were rather pinning all their hopes on Kubica. But I don’t think the team is being lead by particularly well by the Genii group who are only in it to “get some face time “... whatever that means. The word is, if you can turn a computer on and rather fancy a go at designing an F1 car Renault would be more than happy to talk to you right now.

Lastly this week has seen Christian Horner stick one into McLaren by finally saying publicly that they don’t want Hamilton to partner Vettel next year. This might be all smoke and mirrors of course but for the fact that Horner turned round and said
“In a shorter career Seb has already won more races than Lewis, had more pole positions and won the same amount of championships. We are absolutely delighted to have Sebastian.”
Take that young Mr Hamilton and your McLaren friends. The thought that Lewis was going to go to Redbull to replace Webber was a non starter. Why put two of the top three drivers in the same car and have to deal with the fall out of that. They had enough trouble last year dealing with Webber getting all high and mighty after he won a couple of races, they just don’t need the grief of it all. That and Lewis would have asked for a whole shed load of cash that takes money away from development. It’s a complete non starter.
Webber going to Ferrari .. I can see. Massa’s umming and arring about nest year and Alonso doesn’t face any kind of threat from the grumpy Ozzy. So I’m pretty sure that McLaren are going to have two Brit drivers next year.
There you go then, just over a 1000 words on Formula 1 with very little about the actually racing.

Something I will try to convey to the chaps at Codemasters tomorrow when I get to see the new F1 2011 game.

In a vague attempt by me to “get with the new media world” You can now follow me in Twitter.
@sidewaysbob2002
I think it is, it’s mostly me complaining about stuff, but there is a certain amount of motor sport stuff too. ....... so little time, so much media to fill *sigh*

Anyway predictions in before Friday please, I’d go with a Vettel win and the McLarens close behind. Ferrari has got their tails in the air and a damp summer weekend could make it a lottery.

Good luck.

Valencia .... bloody crap.

2011-06-26T22:01:00.002+01:00

Well I suppose it couldn’t last. Eventually the real world had to return and the fantastic action packed racing had to be .... well packed away for another year.
Valencia is a dull, tedious, boring track in the middle of a dockyard with absolutely nothing to commend it what so ever. Even the drivers in the post race interviews complained about it being a dull race to take part in and no doubt a dull race to watch and they weren’t far wrong.

It comes to something when the most memorable thing about the race is the BBC endlessly banging on about how the pits used to be a fish market once upon a time. Come on, I’m sure Valencia has a lot to commend it, but its ex-fish market pit complex is not one of them.

Anyway there was a race and yet again yada yada yada Vettel blah blah won at a canter ho hum. This time it was Alonso keeping Vettel honest and the Spanish crowd happy. Webber tried to remind everyone that he still drives for the world champion team and to be fair he didn’t hit anyone for a change. But he drove a bit slow for a minute or two at some point or other and found that Alonso had gone from third place to second place whilst he was in the pits. Dullsville central.

The McLaren’s didn’t seem to be able to get their tires working all weekend. Hamilton started third and well, ended up forth after a lap or two. Button didn’t have much more to offer. Same for the Mercedes and Renault's, nice try ... no bananas chaps. Even Kobayashi, normally the sort of driver to keep up entertained with the odd random Banzai overtaking move, failed to do anything of any note.

For big chunks of the race we were watching the battle of 13th place!

Oh well, Silverstone next, let us pray to the Gods of Petrol that the action picks up again there. And dear Lord, let’s have a British winner for a change, not the bloody German and his bloody pointy finger please.

So then, Vettel won .... again. Lets play a game of stat watch shall we ..... Vettel has now over taken Michael Schumacher with the ‘Most consecutive starts from the front row’ Vettel now has 13 to Mickys 12. Our Nigel is next with 15 then Prost with 16. He has some way to go to beat Senna’s 24 though. Next ‘Most consecutive podiums from the first race of the season’ Vettel now has 8 just one behind Hamilton and Alonso, Mickey got 17 in 2002 and I think Vettel has a shot at that. Vettel now has 567 points from 70 starts, that’s an average of 8.10 points per entry, which is better than Hamilton’s 7.51 or Alonso’s 5.41. So far this season Vettel has got 186 points that 93% of the points available, in 2002 Mickey got 84.71% of the available points with 144 of a possible 170. Vettel now has 22 poles from 70 starts, that’s 31.4 % whilst Senna only managed 65 from 162 starts or 40.1%, can you see Vettel not blowing that away this year. Finally, Vettal has lead over 1000 laps this year. God I hate him.

Alonso in 2nd managed to give the home crowd something to cheer about.

Webber, yes he’s still driving 3rd.

Hamilton, driving as fast as he could, gets a 4th.

Massa 5th could do better. See Alonso for details.

Last week’s hero Jenson is this week’s 6th place loser.

Rosberg was 4th at one point, ends up 7th.

Alguersuari was quite good in 8th and may get to keep his seat for the second half of the season.

Sutil beats his better team mate to 9th, just ahead of.

Heidfeld in 10th who is fast going off the boil.

Finally Narain Karthikeyan was dead last and not a happy bunny. This weeks HRT watch makes rather depressing reading I’m afraid. Narain had this to say ;
“At the beginning I was trying to keep with the pack, with Liuzzi and D’Ambrosio, but after seven laps I locked the front and after that I had a lonely race. I finished the race but there aren’t many positives I can take away from it”.

Oh dear, I know how he felt.

There you go then. Valencia is apparently getting a five year extension on its contract. The FIA must love that old fish market because the racing sure isn’t up to much.

Valencia is crap.

2011-06-25T13:51:00.003+01:00

I missed the Hamilton rage fest of Monaco and the boating regatta of Canada, so I'm looking forward to some speed freak F1 action.

Except it's Valencia next and it's utterly utterly dull. I fell asleep during the second qualifying event.

dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull dull.

Break out the bucket and spade, it's Valencia

2011-06-22T11:54:00.000+01:00

Welcome back race fans. After the exceptionally soggy Canada we return to Europe for the next round of races, starting off at Valencia.

Now I don’t really mind the track at Valencia. It has a few interesting touch, a bridge over the dock yard entrance, a fast run between the walls to test the brave. But there in lies the problem with this harbour side track, it's not Monaco. The track is wide enough for three cars pretty much everywhere, so there is no real sense of danger as in Monaco. And because it’s in a dockyard there are no punters for big sections on the track. No punters means no atmosphere what so ever, unless you have a thing for containers and cranes you weirdo.
On the wide shots of the track you can see miles of golden sandy beaches off in the distance, packed full of happy holiday makers who are totally oblivious to the grand prix taking place not more than 200 yards away.

The races over the years have lacked a certain something. Like Turkey and China there are interesting races out there, but very little to get the pulse racing. Last year the only memorable moment was Webber attempting to go for the long jump distance record after trying to roughly mount the back of a lotus.

This year with the tires, KERS, and floppy rear wing we have been getting some pretty exciting races. Even the race in Barcelona kept your attention to the end, so you never know there might be something on here.

Except ....... can you see anyone other than Vettel winning ? Another podium result for the young German here and its going to be all over as a championship by Hungary ! and yet people are already calling this a classic year?

Team wise there is very little grumbling from Redbull these days, as Webber comes to terms with being the far and away number two driver this year despite some of his best driving in years. He's had to drive from way back on the grid numerous times and demonstrated a commendable ability to not hit anyone else in the process. Yet his smug team mate is sticking it on the front of the grid and winning with ease from there.
However, the future isn't looking too rosy as the FIA seem determined to stop the teams for using the engine over run to power the diffuser in and out of corners. They've still not really explained just how they plan on policing this rule, but ban it they will from the British GP. This is going to affect Redbull more than most so they're complaining the most about it. Only that by the time the ban comes in Vettel will have all already cleared a space on the desk for the silverware. Oh well. However from this weekend, teams will not be able to run a “qualifying engine map” which means the likes of Redbull can’t run the engine turned all the way up to 11 on the fuel dial. Then turn it back to nine for the race. McLaren have been making a big song and dance over the Redbull having all this extra power for qualifying and how it’s not fair, so the FIA are banning qualifying engine settings. So far Redbull have locked out the front row in qualifying at every round, could we be about to see a new pole driver ?

In the next door pit, McLaren have one happy driver and one very out of sorts driver. The persistent rumours that Hamilton is going to Redbull next year refuse to go away. Whilst Button has or is about to sign an extension on his contract with McLaren.
The Woking team are the next best thing this year, being the only team other than Redbull to win a race. Yet it’s only been when Redbull have made a mistake that the McLaren driver have been able to capitalise. They can take the fight to Vettel, but they don't have the car to win on merit just yet. This, it would appear is what is frustrating Hamilton the most. He's over driving the car and making mistake after mistake. He did this last year in Monza after the second corner crash with Massa, the next 4 races saw Hamilton just throw caution to the wind and he went all Banzai all over the place. It’s as if he is so desperate to win that second championship that he forgets to win, first you have to finish. What he really needs right now is his father telling him to “calm it down son and stop being an arse”, but I think that bridge may have been burned for too long now.
To be fair though, I though Button chopped him in Canada. It was a touch unnecessary of button to come quite that far across the track after getting the chicane wrong. But, well Button was riding Lady Luck that weekend like she was a $400 hooker, he was having the ride of his life and there was no stopping him what so ever. So Hamilton was unlucky as far as I was concerned, but it is messing with his head.
Anyway, it could be worse, he could be driving for Ferrari where is appears it’s a whole road of wrong down that end of the pits. They don’t even look like getting a sniff of the top step at the moment. Alonso is ragging the arse of the car but it’s just not delivering the results for him. Two podiums in Monaco and Turkey have come as others have cocked it up and are scant reward for all the hard work he’s put in. Whilst Massa still doesn’t look like the driver that won the championship for 30 seconds in 2008, he’s had moment of brilliance but he’s not stringing a weekend together any more. Maybe there is some truth to the rumour that Button is going to Ferrari when Massa moves on, I certainly don’t see Massa getting a ride with the red horse next year.
Alonso has been talking up this weekend, it’s in Spain and he’s Spanish and all. The Ferrari might stand a chance here, especially if the Redbull qualifying engine is turned off. I don’t think a win is on the cards, but a podium is a possibility if Hamilton, button and Webber come unstuck.

As for the rest ? Well Mercedes appear to be getting their act together at last. Mickey has the bit between his teeth and could have bagged himself a podium in Canada, whilst Nico continues to be almost fantastic.
Renault, are having a bit of a moan about the engine over run ban. If you have a look at the footage from Canada you can see the side exit exhaust in front of the side pods blowing the water away. It’s a brilliant idea and in the hands of better drivers that car should be on the podium. Kubica is still making noises about coming back before the end of the year. But I think he’s done too much damage to his body and is just not going to have the flexibility he once had. Heidfeld hasn’t really made the grade and Petrov is just ….well … very Russian.

The rest are rubbish and I can’t be arsed to write anymore.

It's all about the money..

2011-06-05T21:09:00.002+01:00

Okay right then, errrrrrrrrrrrrr Canada errrrrrrrrrrr Vettel, okay or maybe Hamilton if he can keep his cool. Maybe the Mercs will go well here and I suppose Alonso has a good shout.

Canada is a couple of long fast flat out straight bits connected by silly little hairpins and other stuff to slow the cars down.
By rights it should be a McLaren walk over, but given Vettels inability to lose anything this year I guess you have to go with the cheeky German scamp yet again.

I suspect that a lot of the teams have already given up the championship. Williams have fired their manager and design chap. Ferrari has fired their design chap and now Virgin (Moruissia) have fired their owner! Well the chap that owns the design side of the company at any rate. Nick Wirth was told in no uncertain terms that he was no longer required on the pit wall or anywhere near the car after Monaco. What the Russians are planning to do for a car next year is anyone guess. Wirth has actually designed some of the more successful cars in endurance racing, working with Honda, Porsche, they’ve also built numerous Indy 500 winners so Mr Wirth and his team are not mugs. But when they designed the car last year with a fuel tank too small to last a race, the writing may well have been on the wall. Still I’m sure the Russians know what they’re doing.

Meanwhile if anyone in the world missed the Bahrain GP, AND IF YOU DID YOU ARE AN IDIOT. They will be ever so happy that the damn thing will now take place at the end of the year. Which means the season is now going to end on the 11th of December in India of all places !!!. Like the season wasn't long enough already.
This is after all the teams said, “No Bernie we are not going to finish the championship in December and no we are not comfortable going to Bahrain”.
To which Bernie replied “ Don’t worry lads ... it’s not about the money. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to see some men about a camel full of cash”

Back to the Canadian GP... Vettel will win it ... no Hamilton .... Vettel .. probably.

Who cares about all that though? The FIA and the Automobile Club de L’Ouest (ACO) have agreed to a joint WORLD ENDURANCE CHAMPIONSHIP. Hurrah and back slaps all round. The big wigs have got round the table and thrashed out a deal ... about bloody time.

Vettel ... or ..... Hamilton ... button ... no not button ... Vettel, or, definably Hamilton.

The reason the FIA-ACO deal is important, is because of the real power in motorsport and the real power in motor sport is not F1.

Formula 1 is for the sharp suits and the hospitality boxed select few who schmooze and cruise big business for money. They like to think it’s them that make F1 what it is, without their money there would be no F1 they think. But they’re wrong so very very wrong.

The Real power in motorsport are the huddled muddy masses sitting on the banking, the ones that have stumped up £150 to be herded like sheep and treated like scum, the ones still on the banking watching the Renault sport race and the Fiesta Challenge long after the hospitality boxes have emptied of the slightly tipsy middle management on a jolly with the free tickets from the jolly nice cable rep chap.
The muddy masses watch with their eyes because it’s bright and easy and will do whatever it has to do to keep their attention, for the right price of course.
But their hearts are far away in a field in France, which will forever be hallowed ground. The names of Bentley, Jaguar, Aston Martin, Ford and Porsche and now names like Audi, Peugeot, Corvette and Mazda are given heritage and substance there. This is where heroes are made and legends are forged in the dark hours before dawn.

The muddy masses return to give thanks and praise the name of Karl Benz for giving us the Internal Combustion Engine and Motor Sport.

The masses return for the greatest race on earth.

24 hours of the Circuit de la Sarthe

Le Mans.

The FIA knows this and it’s why they tried to shut the ACO out 20 years ago, but still the muddy masses came to prey to party to drink and to watch. The teams still came to prove they could beat everyone else, still the manufactures came to prove their car was better than the next guys. The FIA tried to create their own endurance series, but it failed without Le Mans.

Now the FIA is back at Le Mans accepting that the Automobile Club de L’Ouest knows what it is doing and that the power in motor sport comes from the muddy spectators paying for all of this to happen. Because if they left, there would be no one to pay for the rich boys to have fun. Turkey is finding out that it needs to have paying punters to have a race. China is spending more and more money to keep a race that no one goes to watch.
And now Bahrain is shooting its citizens, arresting its doctors and paying Bernie to come back with the circus so they can bring the punters back and their bright shiny coins.

Watch the race in Canada, if you’re happy for the circus to go back to Bahrain.

This weekend 250,000 souls will travel to France to prey at the altar of motorsport. The race will be seen around the world. On Saturday at 3pm CET all those petrol heads will turn to the Mecca to four stoke power and catch their breath for just a second as it starts again, as it has been starting for 79 races since 1923.

The Flag will drop and the petrol cars will try to catch the diesels cars. The exotic Audi and Peugeot prototypes will have four or five laps before they’re weaving past the Porsche, Ferrari and Lotus GT cars. For 24 hours the drivers will battle to be crowned the winner of the greatest race on earth.

Watch the race at Le Mans if you know that motor sport should be about passion, not money.

Get on the glad rags we're off to Monaco.

2011-05-24T21:50:00.003+01:00

Well Wednesday has rolled round pretty quick hasn’t it !

Okay then, Monaco it is I suppose.

Firstly, if you’re updating your predictions, you need to do it before midnight on Wednesday. As, for some reason connected with making lots of money and poncing around in sharp suits and stuff, they close the circuit down on Friday to swank around. That means the first practice is this Thursday and as we don’t want the clued up getting to big an advantage, predictions close on Wednesday night before said practice.

You have been warned.

Right that’s the housekeeping out of the way. Monaco is a strange sort of place. It’s not really a circuit that the super fast can win at, nor the super smooth. She takes no prisoners does the Lady Monaco, She and Lady Luck have a riotous old time here. Staying out late at night there’s enough champagne for both of them to get thoroughly razzed up, before rewarding those brave souls that want to flirt with their more dangerous bumps and curves. For a very select few there’s also the long dark slippery tunnel to play around in.

Monaco requires a driver to concentrate 100% for two hours as he threads the car through the narrow tunnel of concrete and armco. He has to be millimetre perfect lap after lap, wheels just brushing the metal skirts and shiny curbs because this place is no respecter of legend or losers. No matter how great the driver is in his own lunch time, if he drops his concentration for a second he’ll be smearing his very expensive carbon ride down the armco before he can think up any excuses as to why he shouldn’t get fired.

The belief that Vettel can’t overtake comes in a large part from this race, he doesn’t like it. Oh he came second last year you cry, but he was never close to Webber and it was only the fact that he had a car that could cruise to the front of the grid that kept him at the front all day. He’s never liked the place and will say so more than once during the weekend.

Hamilton on the other hand glories at this place. He loves, no adores Monaco and seems to feel he has a God given gift to spank the tarmac. The first year he came to Monaco in an F1 car, he just flew around the circuit, drifting the car in total control through the swimming pool complex and round the casino. If you want to thrill at what a car can do when the driver has a hand full of its hair and isn’t worried about getting her a little sweaty, go and find onboard Youtube videos of Hamilton driving a lap of this place. It’s pure petrol heaven.

Webber also likes this place, last year he arrived after a win in Spain and totally dominated the weekend to get his championship run well and truly motoring. This year he blew the race in Spain and hasn’t looked as comfortable as Vettel at all. If he wants to make Vettel work for his championship (because honestly right now it’s Vettels alone to lose) this is where it has to start.

Ferrari also needs to get their act together. They had an opportunity presented to then at the start of the race in Spain and contrived to lose it. I doubt they could have won, but there was a podium there for the taking. As usual with Ferrari when things need calm, mature even headed responses, they reorganise the company and fire a couple of people. First to go is Ferrari's technical director Aldo Costa, who’s going to have “new responsibilities” before this weekend; presumably these responsibilities are cleaning the windows and emptying the bins.
Will this help them get to the front of the grid ? Not a chance. Consistency is how you win championships, not firing all and sundry when it doesn’t go to plan.

At this point in time the FIA are saying there will be DRS on the start finish line during the race, but no DRS in the tunnel for the practice and qualifying. I’m not sure it’ll make too much difference as I don’t think it’ll be a factor.
Fancy go faster buttons and flappy rear wings are not what this place is about, it’s car control and mechanical grip. It wouldn’t surprise me if Redbull don’t even bother to fit their narcissistic KERS system this race just to teach it a lesson.

Meanwhile Pirelli are talking up their tires this weekend with a suggestion that a two stopper might just be possible ..... No I don’t think it’ll happen either. There will be just as many marbles off line to catch the HRT’s and Virgins out as normal. But you never know, the car that can do the fewest stops stands a chance, so maybe the likes of Perez or Di Resta might have a punt at the longs runs to make up a few places. Certainly the Sauber can look after its tires so anything could happen.

Bugger me. It's a Spain race with passing.

2011-05-22T22:03:00.002+01:00

Right, it’s just a quick one this week as I knackered after selling loads of junk to unsuspecting punters at the Farnborough car boot sale. Which meant I missed the race and had to watch it later so now I’m tired .... and there is no wine in the house which is a cardinal sin in my book.

Okay, so Spain then. Plenty of over taking this time round and a much better race for it too. I do think we’re kind of losing the qualifying excitement though. As drivers opt to save tires rather than going out and making a fist of it, anyone not in a Redbull doesn’t feel the need to get in the way of the Vettel-Webber fight for pole so it’s all a bit of an anti climax once those two have done their Q3 run.
After qualifying everyone though the Redbulls were going to just disappear off into the distance with their second a lap advantage. Webber had managed to get his act together long enough this time out and piped Vettel to the top spot, but Vettel kept saying he had a problem with his KERS unit and it was no biggy that he wasn’t on pole. The grumpy Australian didn’t look too convinced, though he didn’t look all that happy either. Looking far happier was Alonso who hadn’t ended up in 5th as usual, but was in 4th for his home GP. With a 6 year contract in his back pocket he felt things had turned a corner and the car was going to give him the chance to fight for the win this time out.

The race on Sunday however was all about Lewis and Vettel.
Off the line and Alonso got a flier and Webber got blitzed by the Ferrari and Vettel hardy har har. Hamilton slotted in behind and those four took off into the distance. Button who had started in 4th ended up in 10th after a horrendous start.
This year it’s all been about the teams calling the right strategy not just as the race unfolds but all weekend. Alonso had used too many tires getting his 4th on Saturday, so as the race went on he didn’t have enough nice new soft tires to stay with the Redbulls. He had to pit earlier and couldn’t make the tires last long enough to give him a shorter run with the hard tires at the end. He spent too long racing the afternoon away with Webber who after his bad start kept his eyes on Alonso and not on what Vettel was up to.
Button after the bad start looked after his tires and the team guided him through the chaos with a three stop strategy that worked for him. They realised that Alonso didn’t have the tires for the fight so they reacted to what he did and went after the third spot he should have got. When Alonso ran out of grip at the end Button was able to leapfrog the Ferrari and Webber who missed the bigger picture.
Hamilton just spanked the car all day and drove the bollocks of it like the driving God he is. Oh yes indeed.

So then Vettels 4th win and fifth podium of the year. He’s starting to look unstoppable. He kept Hamilton behind him for 10 laps at the end when the likes of Webber or Alonso would have taken them both off. He did all that with a KERS system that worked some laps and not others. So you have to give him that credit. Worryingly for Redbull though the McLaren more than had the legs of the Redbull in the tight twisty stuff, so they might well struggle at places like Canada and Valencia.

Another 2nd for Hamilton. That’s it lad stop the German getting too smug with that bloody finger of his. And he got the fastest lap, result.

Button does another super smooth job for 3rd, making the three stopper work this time out. I think the smooth strategy is risky one to go for, it only needs a lap or two stuck behind a Renault or a Merc for it instance and it all ends in tears. That and I like my drivers to go for it a bit more. Still, he’s picking up the points and keeping the score board ticking over.

Webber, once again shows he chokes when he’s on the front row. 4th is all he gets after not making the most of a pole and letting Alonso take the lead on the first lap. He seemed to be on the back foot after that and spent too long messing around trying to get past the Ferrari. Vettel didn’t look too fussed about not getting pole on Saturday and you fell right into his trap. That sound Mark, is the sound of your world championship chance exiting on platform 5 bound for HRTville you’d better run for it.

Alonso should have got more than 5th, but he used too many soft tires on Saturday and couldn’t make two sets of hard tires last long enough at the end. Maybe he’ll go better in Monaco next week. The Ferrari is there or there abouts, it’s certainly where that Ferrari should be in 5th so they can’t feel too hard done by.

A solid 6th for Schumacher who has a much better weekend after his nightmare in Turkey last time out. He didn’t bother to contest Q3 deciding to save tires and accept a 10th place spot. It paid dividends in the end when he got a flier off the line at the start of the race taking Nico into the bargain. He made his Merc very wide all afternoon and gets a creditable 6th for his troubles. Is this the return of the old master .. I sincerely hope not.

Rosberg is a disappointing 7th. Must try harder next time lad.

Heidfeld has a barnstormer from the very back of the grid to 8th spot. He turned his engine into moving BBQ on Saturday morning practice so missed qualifying entirely as they rebuild the car. So with a full complement of tires and a few timely moves he kept his head down and drove back though the field to get some valuable points. In days gone by the Renault could be counted on as one of those cars that could be developed to stay in the game. These days and Mercedes have passed them now, while Ferrari, Redbull and McLaren are distant memories. Okay he’s 8th from the back of the grid but Petrov started in 6th and ended up 11th as the Saubers went past him. Things are looking grim for the Renault.

Perez makes it to 9th, and gets the “was he in the race” prize. I’m still to be convinced he’s the second coming, but others are talking about him taking Massa’s seat .... I have as yet, no idea why.

Finally Kobayashi finishes 10th after getting a puncture and pitting on the first lap. Another good race from him and it also confirms that the Sauber is a tasty little car with more than one upset in it.

That’s that then. It’s a fast turnaround for Monaco now, more on that when I get round to writing it.

Brapbrapbrap ... then it was all silence.

2011-05-17T20:09:00.002+01:00

Right then fellow Petrol heads. This was going to be a long moan about how boring the Spanish GP normally is and how it’s usually won from pole ..... then the FIA decided that they hadn’t been throwing their weight around nearly enough this year and have banned clever throttle over run.

“What’s clever throttle over run”, you all cry. Well, children, let me enlighten you a little bet. All the teams have a very very cleaver exhaust systems that routes the very hot and very fast exhaust gasses though narrow slots on the trailing edge of their diffuser at the back of the car. This “pulls” the air though the wing and under the car due to the venturi effect. Low pressure behind the car caused by the fast moving exhaust gas increases the down force just a whole shed load.
So, getting your exhaust gas to come out in a nice thin line over a wide area in just the right spot gives you a load of down force which increases your grip and thus speeds in the corners where all the time is made in motorsport.
“But”, you say “what has that got to do with throttles?”. “Shhh” I say, “I’m just getting to that bit”. When you get to the corner, if you’re sensible, you brake. But that means you come off the power and your exhaust gasses stop, at just the point where you want a load of down force and grip to be there for you. What all the teams have been doing and Redbull with more success than most, is to keep the engine pumping out the fast moving gas whilst braking at the same time. If you listen to the cars as they brake into the fast corners you can hear a sort of staccato “brapbrapbrap” noise as the trick throttle pumps the engine really fast in micro burst.
During qualifying, Redbull in particular have been whacking up these throttle micro bursts to 100% open. If you do it too much you’ll cook the engine and the back of the car, so for the race they turn it down to I think 50%, still enough to keep them ahead of the pack, and not cook the engine. All very cleaver, if your engine can take it like Renault and Redbull, underhand dirty cheating if you’re McLaren and Ferrari.
They are all at it of course, but Italian teams that couldn’t get it to work properly have been having a quite word, Whilst British teams with British drivers have been muttering and asking pointed questions.

So in the spirit of being fair to all and making sure the Red Italian team gets a few more points they banned it. Well not banned it exactly. They’ve said this ...

“It is understood the directive to the teams tells them that, under braking, the throttle input can now be no larger than 10 per cent of its maximum. Some outfits had been gaining aerodynamic benefit from keeping the throttle flow at 100 per cent under braking.
To push this regulation change through, the FIA has deemed that throttle use will be allowed only for the purpose of increasing torque, not for 'aerodynamic performance'.
This effectively means that any team found to be using off-throttle blown diffusers could be in breach of the famous Article 3.15 of the technical regulations that outlaws moveable aerodynamic devices.”

Quote from autosport.

Just how the FIA plans to police this is anyone’s guess. Short of having real time telemetry from all of the cars on each and every lap being checked by a technician, who knows what the throttle response should be for any given part of the track and where the breaking point is when looking at a linear real time telemetry feed. I can’t see how they’ll know when a car is using 10% or 23.4% let alone 100%. Maybe they’ll have an FIA official standing at each corner listening for the BRAPBRAP.

So the upshot of all this is ... I have no idea who will win.

Because Pirelli have now decided it’s time to bring really hard, hard tires. Nitwits have been complaining that there is too much over taking and that in the good old days Fangio would race for 14 hours in his linen suit and not have to rely on having a far superior car than anyone else and it was all so much better and there was more Gin in the pink gins in the club house and other such bollocks. Clearly forgetting that only four years ago you only had to watch the first 5 laps to pretty much know who was going to win in two hours time. Plenty of time to wonder off and have a few stiff pink gins before catching the Ashes being won at Lords with Buffy and the lads.
Now you have to concentrate on the race there’s barely enough time for the waiter to take the drinks order before someone is over taking and heaven forbid entertaining the proles in the muddy spectator cattle pens. huuurumph !!!
Okay, so four stops per race is a bit much, maybe just three would be better and make it a little more of a race rather than a lottery. Pirelli are going to bring some hard tires which can last more than 12 laps before they turn to mush.

Will all of this make a difference to the result? It’s hard to tell. The rule change is going to affect everyone, some more than others. It might make qualifying a bit more of a spectacle too, with drivers not having to save fresh tires for the race.

But really Vettel hasn’t looked like being raced by anyone so far and I can’t see that changing anytime soon.
I think McLaren are going to struggle against Mercedes, whilst Ferrari looks like they got their finger out and are back on track.

But this is Barcelona, and it’s always a dull race remember.

The (safe) deer hunter

2011-05-10T18:56:00.003+01:00

move along, nothing to see here ......

Give it up Schumacher you're starting to be an embarrasment !!

2011-05-08T20:20:00.002+01:00

It’s another Vettel benefit race as he cruises from the pole to the win. This time it was the Ferrari of Alonso that took the fight to the Redbull as the McLarens got bogged down fighting each other, whilst the Mercedes of Rosberg and Schumacher failed to deliver their qualifying potential.

The weekend had started with misty skies and a very wet track on Friday, most of the big boys didn’t bother to trouble the timing beam. They figured that driving around a wet track when the race was forecast to be bone dry was a waste of time and could prove costly. Just how costly that could be was demonstrated by Vettel who did go out and after a wobbly lap or two told the team “Hey chaps .. Watch this !!!“ Before promptly stuffing it into the wall and writing off the brand new updates the team had just finished bolting onto his car.
Everyone else looked on and though “ho ho, we might be in with a shout here” Vettels car was too badly damaged to take part in the second practice session and everyone really thought they really did had a chance then. Both of the Merc’s looked fast, but there were some glum faces at McLaren as things didn’t seem to be going their way.

Come Saturday and qualifying and the Redbull mechanics had rebuilt Vettels car, so well was it rebuilt in fact, that it just cruised past everyone else and took a pretty easy pole. The only surprise was that Rosberg was still up the sharp end of the grid in third. Maybe Schumacher had been right and the Merc has got better with three weeks rest. The McLaren’s were behind the two Redbulls as Webber had got his act together this race and was only just behind Vettel rather than the back of the grid. Hamilton saved some pride for Woking by being 4th ahead of Alonso who was smiling for a change and Button was sixth. Schumacher confirmed the potential of the Merc by getting between the Renaults of Petrov and Heidfeld in eight spot. Whilst Massa showed he was almost as good as he used to be in tenth. Could Rosberg push Vettel on Sunday? Were Ferrari back in the hunt at last ?

So on Sunday, Rosberg hoped he’d be able to jump Vettel when the lights went out and control the race from the front. What happened was Vettel engaged first gear and shot off into the distance followed by Webber and Alonso. And that was the race for the win over with. No one got close to Vettel for the rest of the day and the only time the camera focused on the young German was at the end of the race to see him waving his bloody finger around again. This is starting to get annoying now.
This in now three wins in four races for Vettel and he just looks like he can turn it on when he needs it. Webber and Alonso were nowhere near him all day and he didn’t make the mistake of thinking he could get away with a 3 stop race this time around. When Webber and Alonso stopped with 11 laps to go for some soft tires, Vettel came in too and covered that. Can he over take anyone .... well there is no one for him to overtake at the moment, the car is reliable, KERS or no KERS balls out faster than anyone else. Ho hum, Despite the finger waving I’m kind or warming to him, so far he hasn’t arsed around and given it all the “big I am” mouth of the like of Schumacher in his prime. I’m not going to say he’s humble or anything, but he always thanks the team and says it’s them, if not more than him. As an engineer, I like that.

Anyway where was I .. Oh yeah Vettel won again.

Webber starts second and finished second. A late pit stop for the soft rubber, gives him the fastest lap and allowed him to mug Alonso in the process. Again it demonstrates that the Redbull is the class of the field even in the grumpy Australians hands. He wasn’t close to taking the fight to Vettel but he did do what his contract tells him to do.

Alonso had a happy weekend for a change and gets Ferraris first podium of the season in 3rd. About bloody time! The new wings did their job and Alonso driving the wheels of the car did the rest. Massa who loves this track couldn’t make it into the top 10 at the end, okay he had a poor pit stop with a clutch that wouldn’t engage so the wheels were spinning as the mechanics tried to give him new tires. But the point is, Massa wasn’t fighting for a podium here and that must be the bench mark of the car, it’s Alonso that made the difference and the reason you can never count him out. With his home race in Spain next he’ll want to keep the ball rolling and fight for the win.

Hamilton also has bad stop with a sticky wheel nut holding him up on his third stop and was a long way back in 4th. He got stuck behind Button at the start of the race and cooked his tires in 11 laps trying to get past. Once he’d done that he was on the back foot for the rest of the race. The sticky wheel nut robbed us of a three way fight for second spot, but in reality the McLaren wasn’t on the pace here and was lucky the Mercs were rubbish when loaded with fuel. The new aero bits can’t come soon enough if Ferrari has got their act together.

Rosberg should have got more out of this but 5th was all he gets. The car was fast when there was no fuel in it, but off the line and it looked like it was missing a gear or two. Once the flappy wings got switched on after 2 laps, it was like shooting fish in a barrel. Schumacher who ended up in 12th was no better and Brawn confirmed after the race that they need to work some on the race set up. With the tires the way they are, just being in the top ten look’s to be good enough, they don’t need to be trying to get a car to pole. Rosberg’s got it in him, he just need the car to catch up.

Button gets 6th after trying to do the race on three stops. Even the famed ‘smoothest driver on the track’ couldn’t get this to work for him and he was passed by Hamilton and Rosberg at the end of the race. If he wants a tilt at the title this year he needs to get his finger out and stop relying on being smooth. Grow a pair Jenson and start ragging it lad.

Heidfeld turned up once to wave a fist at Petrov and spent the rest of the time not being as interesting as anyone else on his way to 7th. Slowly slowly catchy monkey and all that guff, I think we’ll be seeing the Renaults back here from now on as the other teams get their development programs in gear for the European season. Renault has lots of work to do.

Petrov in 8th demonstrated to Schumacher that the German should call it a day and retire with some dignity left intact. Petrov drove the nuts of the Renault and the front wing of the Mercedes and should have got more for his efforts. That he didn’t is a testament of the car not him. I like the Russian, he’s fun.

9th for Buemi, nope, I have no idea either and he gets the “did he take part in the race?”, award this time out.

Finally and unfortunately we didn’t see it, but Kobayashi come from the back of the grid, after the engine died on his first qualifying lap, to take a very well deserved 10th. As a comparison, Perez, who was 14th had the fastest lap for a long time and would have been in the top 10 too if he hadn’t lost a front wing at the start of the race. The Sauber is turning out to be a fast little car and Koby is an exciting driver with plenty of potential, imagine what he could do in say a Mercedes for instance.. (Perez is still only a legend in his own lunch time as far as I’m concerned).

The race for the chance to be crowned the most rubbish driver goes to Liuzzi in the HRT, who didn’t really have much competition this week. Every time we saw him, he was either off line being past or off the circuit being past. He was five laps behind Vettel and 2 laps behind his equally rubbish team mate Karthikeyan who has an impossible long name that’s difficult to spell even stone cold sober. This week’s amusing HRT quote comes from Liuzzi who says “Overall this has been a positive weekend up until qualifying” that’s the spirit lad.

So there you have it. The first 3 rounds didn’t lie and Redbull have a championship winning car, the driver to do and lady luck belting out Deutschland Uber alles from the top of the hospitality bus as embarrassed staff try to talk her down and get the bottle of champagne out of her hands.
Can anyone stop them .. who knows? She’s a game old lass and she’s having a grand old time.

Put the Chocolate and wedding cake down, we're back to racing.

2011-05-03T21:13:00.003+01:00

Right, has everyone had enough chocolate and wedding cake ? Good, then I'll begin.

Welcome back to Europe and round four of the F1 world championship. It’s always good to be back in Europe with the crowds and the history and the whole, “this in where motor racing began vibe”. Except we’re in Turkey which has no history, no vibe and no punters in the stands usually.

Which is a shame really, because i rather like this circuit because I think Tilke just about got this one right with its majestic sweeping turn 8 into the daring do turn 9 and 10 before the balls out fast run through turn 11. The rest of the track is a bit Mickey Mouse and all over the show, but turns 8 onward are a real test of daring drivers and fast cars. That’s the sort of thing I like.

So it’s about carrying the speed through the twisty bits and keeping up the momentum for the long straight after turn 10. That’s where the race is won or lost, well I think it is, so it must be true. This year it’s seems to be all about keeping the tires alive longer than the other chaps. If you can push at the end of the race whilst others are hanging on for the line, you stand a good chance of getting some points, maybe even a win. I expect Turkey to be similar to China, in that teams with fresh rubber are going to have the advantage.

So “what’s been happening these last three weeks then?”, I hear you ask.
Well News corp. Have confirmed they’d quite like a slice of the F1 action, along with an Italian investment company that counts FIAT as a major client. Ferrari is obviously in more trouble than we though. Ho ho. It’s all at the “well, how much is it worth then? “, stage of negotiations. Personally I don’t think the likes of Murdoch should be allowed to get their avaricious hands on the sport. Before you know it, it’ll all be about cheers leaders and five minute breaks after 15 laps for adverts and stuff. Less racing and more razzamatazz, if you think DRS and KERS is terrible, wait for the increase in wings size to increase advertising space.

McLaren have been grumbling about the Redbull car yet again. Asking pointed questions about the use of engine mapping to change the exhaust characteristic during qualifying. Mostly they’re annoyed they didn’t think of it first.

Talking of annoyed about not thinking of things, Ferrari are apparently bringing a whole new car, with new wings front and rear to sort out the lack of down force issue. Yet the team is still talking down its chances here, "But our car has a lot to recover: we've had wind tunnel problems and other problems in our methodology” said the chief designer, Nikolas Tombazis. Ferrari doesn’t normally admit they’ve got things horribly wrong, so I’m guessing things must really be bad.

The boys at Williams wish they just had to contend with a lack of down force. The car has been an utter dog thus far, frightening the likes of Lotus and Virgin at the back of the grid. Things have got so bad they they’ve fired (sorry, accepted the resignation of) Sam Michael and hired the disgraced former head of engineering at McLaren, Mike Coughlan. He, you may remember, got caught half inching the blue prints of the 2007 Ferrari before the FIA found out and Max started throwing his weight around. Coughlin’s been over in America for the last few years waiting for the fall out to subside. Now he’s back, let’s see if he can bring anything to the once great Williams team. Personally I think this is the same as sticking a plaster on the hulk of the Titanic and claiming it’s all going to be fine if the band could just start up again please. Firing your team manager and engineering chief after 3 races is never a recipe for success.

Talking of rubbish circuits run by morally questionable dictatorships, Bahrain has been given until to the 3rd of June to either shoot all the peasants or clean its act up and join the rest of us in the 21st century. I think Bernie might move this date back and back and back until either everyone is dead, or it really is unacceptable to have a Grand Prix in the middle of a revolution.

Over at Lotus and Trulli has revealed that the reason he’s not won a GP yet this year, is because the power steering in his car is a bit rubbish ... No Jarno, you are a bit rubbish and should stick to wine making and leave the real driving to the professionals. Apparently the lack of power steering “hampers his ability to feel what the car is doing” it’s going forward really really slowly Jarno hahahahaahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaa ha
Lotus F1 (the green ones) have also announced that they now have the rights to Caterham cars (the ones that look like a lotus) and will be building F1 Caterhams and selling them now. Maybe they can give one to Trulli and see if he’s any faster in that !

Whilst HRT are up for beating Virgin this time out, a feat i think might well be doable as Virgin continue try to learn the Russian for “can we have some money please, comrade” I really think we’ll be seeing the back of Virgin before we wave goodbye to the HRT underdogs. Things are not looking at all rosy for the Virgin boys who may have been a bit premature in taking the Russian Rubles.

Kubica has finally left hospital, but there’s still no word on a future return.

Finally Mickey Schumacher believes that “Mercedes will be fast in Turkey”. He won’t but Nico might.

I want to have Hamiltons babies. i really do....

2011-04-17T21:45:00.001+01:00

In the future if anyone ever tells you that Formula One is boring, you’ll be able to show them this race, the third race of 2011, in China and then laugh in their faces.

I though last week was a cracking race, but this week the only thing we had missing was a flying Russian. We didn’t know who was going to be on the Podium until the last lap, there was overtaking, Button went in to the wrong pit, Webber drove his heart out almost could have won and best of all Vettel couldn’t wave his finger around in a smug manner as the end of the race ... Just everything you could ever want from a Grand Prix.

I have seen some drives in the 30 years I’ve been watching F1, but that has to rank as one of the best i’ve ever seen. Hamilton, yes i am biased but i like my racers to be gutsy and bold and adventurous and willing to rag the thing on the limit to win. Not arse around looking after tires and picking up points, bin it or win it. That’s what i want and that’s what Hamilton delivered in China.
He realised after Sepang that having fresh rubber for the race is more important than being on pole, so whilst Vettel went out and claimed his 3rd pole of the season, Hamilton kept his cards close to his chest and let Button try to unseat the current qualifying king. Button ended up 2nd, but Hamilton in third had an extra set of fresh soft tires to go for glory.
Not so happy yet again was Webber who had an electrical issue in the car on Saturday morning and had to make a very hasty exit from the car in the garage, as smoke poured from the vents in the car. Come qualifying and he failed to make it out of Q1 ending up in a very troublesome 18th position normally reserved for the likes of Virgin and Lotus.
Talking of unhappy, the Ferraris continue to underperform in qualifying and the race. There were lots of very rich and powerful Ferrari types flying back and forth to China this week, with both Alonso and Massa saying they need more qualifying pace to stand any sort of chance.

So the race day dawns bright and sunny with plenty of big names peppered throughout the grid. The midfield had the likes of Schumacher, Petrov and Heidfeld in it and Webber was all the way at the back. All of this was the last thing on Hamilton’s mind however as there was a big problem with the car.

As the cars were being started in the garage to take to the grid before the race, Hamilton’s car had given a bit of a cough and a half hearted splutter then refused to start. Added to that there was a very strong and very worrying smell of petrol coming from somewhere inside the engine bay. With minuets to spare the crew started taking Hamilton's engine cover and air box off. With the seconds ticking down until the pit lane closed and Hamilton’s would have to start in the pits. The Boys from Woking repaired a loose fuel hose, rebuilt the engine airbox and got the cover back on. As fire extinguishers were made ready they tried the car again, it gave a little splutter then fired up with a strong hard note of readiness. The lads cleared the exit and had Hamilton out onto the track with 30 seconds to spare. This left them five minutes until the grid cleared and the cars started the parade lap, for them to get the engine cover off again, make sure everything was okay and reconnect the telemetry wiring harness, which had been missed in the rush to get Lewis out.

That is not how a racing driver likes to prepare for his afternoon.

There were a few nervous looks as the McLaren left behind the sister car and Vettel on pole, but away Hamilton went. When the red light went out for the start of the race, Vettel made a terrible start, Button and Hamilton got a flyer and beat Vettel to the first corner. At last we had a race on our hands.
The McLarens edged away from Vettel as Rosberg had a run at the Redbull and for the first stint the top three cars were covered by just 2 seconds. Button eked out a small led only for Hamilton and Vettel to chase him down, Rosberg pitted early as the others tried to make the soft tires last a few extra laps. But when the softs go off they really go. Button dived into the pits closely followed by Vettel leaving Hamilton to struggle on when he should have been in that lap. As Button and Vettel got new Pirelli rubber Hamilton fought to keep the car on the road as the Ferrari cruised up behind him and Massa claimed first spot before Hamilton could get round to the pit.

Crucially Vettel had gone for a two stop strategy so had to make his tires last longer for this and the next stint. The rest went for a 3 stop race meaning they had to cover Vettel by at least 15 seconds to give themselves enough time to get in and out and chase Vettel down. After the first round of stop Rosberg was leading, but couldn’t put any distance between him and the pack as the brakes started overheating. Further down the race and it was difficult to keep track of who was fighting who on what tires. Schumacher and Webber were fighting tooth and nail, Di Resta was doing a sterling job and Kobayshi was making a name for himself. Perez meanwhile was colliding with anything in that got in his way. Alguersuari lost a wheel after a bungled pit stop and was the only driver to retire all race. Hamilton, Button Rosberg and Vettel battled through the crowd using KERS and flappy wings to make pass after pass and driver the nuts of their cars. It was tremendous stuff with drivers trying to build gaps and stop other from getting too far ahead though the middle of the race.

As the Race came to the closing laps, Hamilton with his fresh set of soft tires was 5 seconds behind Vettel with Button, Massa, Rosberg and Webber behind them. Webber was having a storming run, from all the way back in 18th remember. And he too like Rosberg had fresh soft tires, Button had used softs and Massa had very old hard tires.
As it wound down Hamilton drove the arse of his car to catch and pass Vettel, whose old tires gave up the ghost with just three laps to go. Massa’s tires also gave up as first Rosberg then Webber went past him. But Webber wasn’t finished, taking the Mercedes of Rosberg and then like shooting fish in a barrel Button got jumped on the second to last lap.

So Hamilton gets his first race win of the season and it was a beautiful thing. To have a car almost miss the start, drive the nuts off it and win is brilliant. He didn’t settle for the points he was aggressive and kept his game head on rather than binning it and losing it all. If you missed the race, you have to watch it. After last week where it all went wrong this week it almost all went right. The McLaren is defiantly up there with the Redbull so we are going to have a championship this year.

Vettel, gets 2nd which could have been 3rd if his tires had gone off a lap earlier. He still drove a great race but the strategy let him down, on any other day he would have won, but Lady Luck has had enough of his finger and fancied and change. Is the Redbull the best car still ... maybe, but the McLaren isn’t too far behind.

Webber might very well have had the drive of the day to 3rd. He was a long way back and had to pass a lot of other cars on the track to get this result. If Vettel had been back there do you think he’d have done the business, no me neither. So that’s a great result for the grumpy Australian and this time i think he deserved it. He also got the fastest lap so that should cheer him up.

Button in 4th could well have won this, but the dice didn’t fall his way. Things started to go wrong when he stayed out an extra lap and then drove into Vettels pit slot when he did come in. Whilst his usual smooth style would normally have worked for him, this time Hamilton’s aggressive drive with new tires did the job. Let’s see just how matey those two can be if they’re both fighting for the silverware at the end of the year. Because i think they will be.

Rosberg, started 4th and finished 5th, in a race like this that’s no bad thing. He rolled the dice with an early pit stop but it didn’t work out for him as the faster cars came through. But he beat Schumacher and that’s always worth celebrating.

Massa Finally beats Alonso for the first time since Germany last year (I think, it’s late so I’m not going to check that) and on merit too. 6th place with a car that doesn’t like the tires is not to be sniffed at and it’s nice to see him stick it to Alonso.

Alonso raced his little heart out to 7th but is struggling to beat anyone at the moment.

Schumacher started 14th so to make it to 8th would normally be a good thing. But Webber started in 18th and made it to the podium. So it looks less impressive this time out hardy har har.

9th for Petrov, who didn’t try and clear the tower this week, well done and he beats Heidfeld again.

Finally Kobayashi gets 10th beating Di Resta in 11th.

Hurrah for HRT to finally finished a race, both of them were dead last, but you know what. They got there and Liuzzi was only 17 seconds behind the Virgin of Glock at the end. The tail and Charlie though was Karthikeyan who was only 1.17 second behind his team mate at the flag. Well done lads.

Once again i think Racing was the winner. The FIA didn’t need to wade in with any stupid penalties. The drivers scrapped for every point and no one cruised off into the distance, all that on a track that doesn’t always throw up the most interesting of races.

Is it the tires or the flappy rear wings? maybe, yes, no. I don’t care really. There’s over taking all the way through the field and a car can come from the back to get a podium if the driver doesn’t arse it up. You have to like that. If anyone thinks it’s too complicated go to the BBC driver tracker and watch Trulli all afternoon, it’s what you deserve. The rest of us will glory in a truly golden season of F1 because that’s what it is going to be.

China, don't mention the disidents

2011-04-13T12:54:00.003+01:00

So then, with barely enough time to draw breath and wash the champagne out of the race suits. The team have upped sticks and moved to the Shanghai International Circuit in China for the 3rd race of the year.

With such a tight turn around between races there is very little change the teams can make to the cars for this race. Obviously Renault will be flying a new car out for Petrov, but for the teams at the back of the grid such as HRT and Virgin, just getting a car to the race is an effort.

So there are unlikely to be any new aero bits or mechanical updates from any of the teams here, which in reality, means that the cars are going to be in the same spec as they were in Malaysia. That’s not to say the big boys won’t be sending the odd drawing office assistant out with a new rear wing element or exhaust manifold as hand luggage, but new floors and engine covers will have to wait for the return to Europe and the Turkish GP.

China can throw up the odd interesting race, especially if it rains. Last year Buttons smooth style on a slippery track helped him to his second win and the first McLaren 1-2 of the season. Vettel got the pole in the dry, but rain on race day left the Redbulls struggling.

Based on Malaysia which is a similar sort of circuit to China, the long fast straight and between sweeping corners is going to suit the Redbulls and McLarens. Button looks like he could be the one to take the challenge to Vettel on circuits where conserving tires is going to be at a premium, whilst Alonso and Hamilton will race the back sides off their cars.

I think the Redbull have the stronger long run pace, where the McLaren can’t stay as fast for as long on the harder tires. Meanwhile the Ferrari seems to have a problem with tire management full stop, they can’t seem to get the hard tires to work in qualifying which means they’re using up soft sets to make it into Q3. This leaves them with less option in the race and they’ve having to come back from further down the grid which in turn works the tires harder.

Renault look like their whizzy little start software has lost none of its zip with Heidfeld in the car. A blinding start last week from both of the Renaults set them up for two top ten finished until Petrov forgot where he was and though he was at Aintree not Sepang

Petrov takes the chair comfortable.

Can Renault do it again and get another podium? I don’t see why not, as long as they can get into Q3 they should be able to move up the order when the red lights go out.

Of course Renaults gain is Mercedes loss. They got both cars home in Malaysia, but they were an awfully long way back when you think how much money has been thrown at the team so far. There has been a lot of discussion of late over Schumacher and “What in the name of Stirling Mosses underpants is he doing coming back. The mans a fool !” Personally I didn’t think he’s a fool for coming back. Yeah he’s in a midfield dog of a car that doesn’t look like it’s going to go any faster any time soon. But he’s still out there giving it the beans and trying to drive other cars off the road. He’s lost none of that vim and vigour of old. Sure he’s missing the endless testing and win whatever the cost from the Ferrari days. And I can’t see an 8th world championship anytime soon. But He’s still got a smile when he gets out of the car, he doesn’t bad mouth the team or other drivers. So I guess he’s just doing it because it’s an enjoyable thing to do. Also it’s not like the old days when there was a 40% chance that someone would die during the race. It’s far far safer than it was 30 years ago when Lauda and Prost came back after a break.

As I said, I respect Schumacher for what he’s done, I still don’t like him as a person but I have no problem at all with him being there.

Williams still need to get their act together. What was a promising design and direction looks like it’s turned into an utter failure. That and the fact the firing of Hulkenburg for Malder what’s name is looking more and more like the stupid move everyone said it was.

Force India, two races two points from the rookie. Good stuff.

Torro Rosso, looked fast, then didn’t, rubbish drivers still.

Lotus are making noises about a new diffuser, when they should be talking about firing Trulli.

Virgin are being very quite

And Liuzzi is saying the HRT is still going to blow Virgin away at the next race.

Vettels smelly finger of win,

2011-04-10T22:08:00.000+01:00

Now that was a cracking race.

There was overtaking, there was drama there was a flying Russian, in fact everything that’s good about Formula One was right there. We might have lost refuelling but we’ve got tires that keep the teams guessing and a flappy wing that can actually make a difference. Top stuff.

Well okay, there is the fact that Vettel got to wave his finger round once again. If you’re not a fan of Germans waving their finger at you in an overly smug way, then, well i suppose it wasn’t all that ace.
But apart from that bit, i think we can say F1 is in rude health at the moment with three different teams represented on the podium. Then to top it all off the FIA got to throw its weight around and hand out a few penalties at the end. I think Racing was the winner today.

So, yeah Vettel, wasn’t quite at the front as much as he was in Australia. But when it came to the important stuff on Saturday afternoon, he assumed his customary position at the front of the grid much to the annoyance of masers Hamilton, Button and especially Webber. All had had a shout at the pole but Vettel stepped up and calmly took it by a tenth of a second from Hamilton. Webber who had been the fastest Redbull up to the point wasn’t happy, but he was less bemused then Alonso who sat looking at the timing screens wondering just where all the winter testing speed had gone. He’d made it to 5th on the grid but was over a second back from the fast boys.

Importantly Heidfeld had got things right this time around and made it to 6th for the race, hoping to put the first race of the season behind him and show why he’d been picked to replace Kubica. With Petrov just behind in 8th I think we can assume that the Renault is in fact this year’s fourth car to beat. As Rosberg was behind him and Mickey was way back in 11th. Kobayashi rounded out the top 10 showing that when others drop the ball (Schumacher) he is more than capable of picking it up.

Amazingly the HRT made it into qualifying one and succeeded in beating the 107% rule! This meant they got to take part in their first race of 2011 hurrah for the plucky rubbish team at the back, who weren’t quite so rubbish this time.

So to Sunday and would you believe it, it looked like rain was coming for the race. There was much muttering and scratching of heads as teams looked at the radar to try to guess if and when it would come. As no one had tried out Pirellis wet weather tires up to the point there were a lot of teams who hoped it wasn’t going to rain, they could mostly be found at the front of the grid.
As it turned out there was a light smattering for the first 10 laps or so, but it never amounted to much and as the race went on the chance of rain dropped and the teams got on with trying to guess how long their tires would last.

Off the line Vettel had engaged first gear and driven off up the road closely followed by the two McLarens and amazingly two Renaults, who have a suspiciously good start system it would appear. Webber had tried to start in second gear and got swallowed up by the pack which was all using KERS unlike the Redbulls, who don’t need it according to Newey.

Once all the hoo harr was over Vettel lead from Heidfeld and Hamilton. The German started to slowly pull away from the Renault, whilst Hamilton tried to keep in touch with the Heidfeld and look after his tires at the same time. Not something he’s used to doing or even noted as being especially good at. And so it proved again as he had to come in to change his tires earlier than he hoped for and spent the rest of the race recovering from.

Vettel didn’t seem fazed by having a Heidfeld behind him and just did enough to stay comfortable ahead of the Renault. Once again, give Vettel a clear track and the best car on pole and, as long as the car stays together, he’ll deliver you a comfortable win. There was a bit where Button tried to chase him down towards the end of the race. But really he didn’t even have to break a sweat today, even when his KERS broke down half way, he was still comfortable faster than anyone challenging him. As long as he’s got blue flags waving for him he’s unstoppable. Mores the pity, that finger he waves around at the end is still annoying me. I’ll give him the credit he’s due but i still think the likes of Hamilton and Alonso are better races.

Button made it home in 2nd this time. This is a track he likes to race on and he did a good job of looking after his tires in the second half of the race. He wasn’t the fastest driver of the day, but he kept his head and didn’t rag the tires when he was behind other drivers. Rather than racing Hamilton he dropped back and waited for his team mate to pit, leaving the track free for him to try and take the fight to Vettel. By the end he was only three and bit seconds behind Vettel, due mostly to the finger waving and showing off from the Redbull driver. But the point is he didn’t arse around and was fast all weekend.

Heidfeld managed to pick up 3rd place after Hamilton and Alonso had a bit of argy bargy and burnt their tires out. Hamilton who spent most of the afternoon trying to stop different drivers from over taking him was unable to stop Heidfeld who used his flappy rear wing to good effect and showed better paid drivers how it should be done. He did well to hold Webber off at the end as his tires finally went off and he defended like a Trojan to get a well deserved podium spot. Kubica must have been crying silent tear of frustration as he watched his car pick up its second podium of the season.

Webber managed not to hit anyone for the second race in succession and collected 4th still well behind Vettel, he’s starting to wonder if this is going to be a repeat of last year all over again. He messed up the start and then lost places over the first lap. Then when Hamilton came out ahead of him on hard tires he couldn’t find a way past with his flappy wing. The Redbull is fast as long as it has a German driving it and it’s at the front. Put it in the midfield and it desperately needs a working KERS unit. Still Webber did all right, profiting mostly from other drivers not being kind to their tires. He got the fastest lap as the race drew to a close trying to chase Heidfeld down, but cooked his tires and had to settle for 4th in the end.

Massa picks up 5th and the “did he take part in the race” award, with an uneventful and uninspiring run.

6th for Alonso who had an outrageous time of it ! He got jumped by the Renaults off the line and tried hard to stay in contention all day. Battling his way back to the front he managed to look after his tires but got stuck behind Hamilton who was struggling on the hard tires. Struggling so much in fact that as he came out of turn 7 the Ferrari had to swerve out of his way and Alonso clipped the McLaren’s rear tire and lost most of his front wing as he went past. The pass lasted the length of the straight as he tried to brake for the next corner he discovered that half his wing had gone. There was nothing Hamilton could have done, he was just slower than the Ferrari and apparently Alonso should have been paying more attention as the FIA slapped him with a 20 second penalty after the race for avoidable contact. I think it’s a bit harsh that, Alonso lost out and had to pit for a new nose anyway, it was just a racing incident. As it was it makes any difference to the result but still, the FIA was being a bit heavy handed there.

7th for reasons that will become clear in a minute was Kobayashi with another strong race from the likable Japanese fellow. He put the moves on Schumacher numerous times which is always pleasant to see.

8th for Hamilton who had a race to forget really. He got jumped at the start by Heidfeld, couldn’t look after his tires when it mattered. Couldn’t get the hard tires to work for him and had to make an extra stop at the end losing 3rd spot. Then to top it all the FIA get the random ban hammer out, pinged him for making too many swervey moves in the braking zone and give him a 20 second penalty. What was an okay ish 7th ends up as a race not for the autobiography 8th. He battled hard with Alonso for a handful of laps until the Ferrari punted him up the arse ragging his tires and driving at the edge of reason and gets nothing for it. Still I’d rather watch Hamilton battle to 8th than Vettel cruise to yet another first.

Schumacher looked boring in 9th getting over taken by pretty much anyone who fancied a go. But he did beat Rosberg who had a terrible race to 12th. They’ll be working a lot of overtime to get this car sorted. Perhaps they can go for a third version.

The final points go to Di Resta who has now finished two races and got two points. Jolly well done to him. He blew Sutil away once again and looks to be settling in nicely. Whilst the Likes of Perez get fated for driving carefully and not destroying their tires, Di Resta picks up the points and gets on with being a rookie.

This weeks tail end Charlie is Glock, a late bid by Petrov to launch his car into orbit fails as though he had done enough to classified, he wasn’t actually moving as the flag fell. Glock was 2 laps behind Vettel and the Virgins don’t look like closing that gap any time soon. The HRT of Liuzzi tried very very hard to be last and was doing a sterling job of it, but with 10 laps to go, he somehow damaged the rear wing and that was that. I’m starting too really like the chaps at HRT who are absolutely overjoyed at completing 82% of a race. That sort of enthusiasm is what gets you to 96% of the race and then it’s only a short hop to the world championship.

You can read more of their positivity at

So that’s that then. Vettel looks like he’s on for the hatrick. Mclaren have a fast car and two fast drivers. Ferrari are close but Renault have a shot at the big time and are taking every chance they get.

What's that in the distance ... oh it's Vettel winning

2011-03-28T12:42:00.000+01:00

Well, wasn’t that all jolly interesting and a little surprising.

It has got to be worrying for the rest of the teams though, Webber included. Vettel rolled up on Friday and never really looked back to check where everyone else was. The McLaren’s tried to spoil the party on Friday afternoon, but really the Redbull is about a gazillion miles faster with the cheeky German at the wheel. Especially considering they don’t have a KERS system fitted to that car. At the end of Qualifying it was almost a second faster than Hamilton, a country mile by anyone’s standard.

More surprising perhaps though, was the fact that the car behind Vettel was the McLaren of Hamilton. A team who two weeks ago, threw away the original design for the back of the car and started the whole thing again from scratch. To date they had not got the exhaust and gear box to go a race distance and here they were, the closest thing to a challenge.

They weren’t the only happy face in the pits on Saturday evening. Petrov had somehow kept it all together and got his car up 6th for the race. Whilst his much fancied bearded team mate had gone out in Q1. Kobayashi had also gone well sticking the Sauber into 9th just ahead of Buemi in the Torro Rosso in 10th.

Not so happy where the Ferrari and Mercedes teams. Who had both expected to be up the front giving Redbull a bit of a challenge. Alonso faffed around to a not too bad 5th but behind the McLaren’s and Redbulls, Massa over drove his car into 8th spinning as Q3 came to a close to annoy various drivers on hot laps. Rosberg did alright getting it to 7th but Schumacher who had given it all “the big I AM, I’m a winner me “, during the run up to the weekend couldn’t make out of Q2 and stopped in 11th. Hardy har har.

Also massively unhappy were the whole HRT squad, who spent most of Friday and Saturday trying to get their cars into some sort of working order. Liuzzi eventually made it out to do a few laps, but by the time Q3 ended HRT were so far behind Vettel you need something akin to the Hubble telescope to find them. They were informed by the FIA that they were no longer allowed to play with the big boys because they were just too damn slow.

Come the Race and as suspected Vettel just drove off into the distance. He didn’t look like being challenged all day, trading fastest laps with Hamilton for the first 10 laps or so. All this without a KERS system or any opportunity to use his silly flappy rear wing do darr. He just calmly and methodically blew everyone else away. When Button tried to hold him up to give Hamilton a sporting chance, Vettel just drove round the outside of him. By the end he was cruising around waving his finger around and being extremely smug and German. Winning the first race of the season always set a driver up for a good year and it’s going to be a brave soul to bet against Vettel making it two championship in a row.

Behind Vettel, Hamilton gave chase and to be fair kept him honest all day, but a broken under tray at two thirds distance put paid to his efforts. However if you’d told the plucky lad he’s be on the podium next to Vettel in Australia he’d have laughed at you .. to your face. That car was a complete mess two weeks ago and here it is up there best of the rest. If they can now develop the car as they usually do, it’ll be race winner.

In third Petrov, no I don’t know how he did it either. He didn’t hit anyone, he didn’t crash and when he got hassled by Webber he had the measure of him. All told a great result for the much derided Russian. Who I have to say was jolly nice in all his interviews afterwards and came across an likable chap. If he can do that again once Ferrari and Mercedes their act together, I shall be mightily impressed.

Alonso eventually managed to make it to 4th with a bit of luck and a tail wind. The Ferrari didn’t look all that sharp during the weekend and must have surprised the boys from Maranello, who all expected to be up there with Vettel. Alonso did alright but he was never where the action was and just sort of kept it on the grey stuff.
Webber just can’t get a break in Australia. Another 5th spot for him and he looked utterly bemused by that. His team mate was all happy smiles and “check me I’m ace me” whist the dour Ozzy just couldn’t work out why he was so far back. On the bright side he didn’t hit any one this time.

Button finally made it to 6th after spending most of the race looking at the back of Massa dog slow Ferrari. He tried lap after lap to use his flappy rear wing to get a run on the Ferrari into turn 1 but Massa was having none of it and kept pulling just far enough ahead to thwart the Brit. Finally Button made a desperate lunge up the inside of the hairpin and ran out of road. Taking to the escape road he emerged ahead then told all and sundry that he was miles ahead of Massa and it was all find and dandy. The FIA raised it McLaren eyebrow up another notch and hauled Button in for a drive through penalty. So Button did a good job to get back to 6th really and it shows that the McLaren is a car with some solid speed.

Mass made it to 7th eventually and looked rubbish all weekend. Spins in practice and qualifying, He never looked fast and must surly be counting the days till he gets his marching orders. Most defiantly a Number two driver now, he’s had his shot at the title and I doubt he’ll ever get another. Welcome to team Alonso !

Now 8th should be the Sauber of Perez who did a cracking job one stopping his way into the top ten. Massa had to make 3 stops to claw his way into the points. Whilst the young Mexican kept his nose clean and the car in one piece to get a great result. That is until the FIA checked the leading edge of the rear wing and found it had a square profile and not a round profile. A tiny tiny thing that had passed scrutinering with no trouble, got pinged in post race. Perez and Kobyashi got disqualified and that was the end of their champagne party.

In his place Buemi didn’t really do much to get 8th

Sutil got 9th as Koby got fired and this weeks “did he take part ithe race award” I missed him entirely and thankfully he missed the walls.

Finally a very lucky 10th for Di Resta. Who appears to have been told to let his team mate go past him. Welcome to big school lad. Up to that point he had been faster than Sutil all weekend, but ran out of puff as the race went on. Still it’s a good debut and let’s hope there’s more to come from him.

So all in all it was okay. I don’t think the flappy rear wing was much cope. There were a few occasions where you could see it made a difference to the driver overtaking. But mostly the drivers in the top 8 were all much of a muchness and couldn’t get much benefit from it. We’ll if it make a difference in Malaysia with a longer straight.

So that’s race one, it looks like it’s going to be Vettel benefit year, but McLaren might just be able to keep him honest.

Australia - After a false start, here we go.

2011-03-22T22:19:00.003Z

G’day mate throw another shrimp on the flamin’ barby and settle down for the 2011 Melbourne Grand Prix.

Yes it’s that time of year once again, the lambs are gallivanting around the fields, the days are getting longer and Bernie is talking bollocks once again.

After the down trodden and repressed masses cried enough is enough and the Bahrain Grand Prix is just too awful to have to sit though again, we’ve skipped the first race of 2011 and headed straight for where it should have started all along.

It’s been a long and grueling winter series for all of the teams. The front runners have been playing a cagey game of Chinese whispers giving nothing away to their rivals, whilst the midfield have thrown the odd cat amongst the pigeons with hot laps and a lot of bare chest posturing. Round the back of the bike sheds the new boys from last year have survived the winter and returned, HRT to much surprise from everyone have even turned up with what looks suspiciously like a new car amazingly.

Redbull and Ferrari spent most of the winter trying very hard not to look like they were too fast. There was much muttering about sandbagging and “not really trying hard enough”. Vettel popped the odd fast lap, with an evolution of last year’s car. Whilst down pit row and Alonso would respond in kind then try not to look too fast again.
Webber and Massa played supporting roles in this task. Then claimed that “No we’re not number two drivers we’re real men with every chance of winning ... no really we are... Look it’s written in my contrast ... etc” of course fooling no one but themselves.
Redbull and Ferrari look like the teams to beat this year. Vettel has now got that self belief winning the world championship gives you whilst Webber has that “I was robbed guv’ner” hunger. It’s supposed to be all sweetness and light in the Redbull pit, but i doubt Webber will get his chance of the title anymore than he really had last year. Possession is after nine tenth of the law after all.
Massa will do well not to get fired this year. He had a really bad year last year, yeah he’d come back from almost being killed, but he never looked like his heart was in it. Alonso has that ruthless “this is MY team now sunbeam” ability to mold the team around him. If he can stop Ferrari from being old 1970’s comedy Ferrari and make them lean mean Ross brawn Ferrari he, and they be unstoppable.

The other Grandee team McLaren had an ... interesting winter. It would appear that they were trying to pull a fast one with a trick exhaust system that blew the exhaust gas around the gearbox and through the diffuser, thus creating quite by chance you understand ... a blown diffuser. The FIA saw threw this ruse and having already banned the material it was made from years ago, told McLaren to sort it out. They tried using a different material, the FIA raised its eye brow and McLaren tried again, but the third material couldn’t stand the heat and promptly melted.
So the boys from Woking have been struggling to get any testing done and have now apparently gone off the idea of a blown gearbox and diffuser. They claim to have redesigned the whole thing and found more than a second per lap, which is good.... except that they were about two seconds behind Ferrari and Redbull to begin with. Hamilton and Jensen have both been making “it’s not really as bad as it looks” noises, but there are a lot of long faces in Woking at the moment.

Joining the top table this year looks to be Mercedes, who have been showing off to anyone that will give them the time of day by building not one but two new cars for the season. Apparently Mickey didn’t like the first car, so they built him a new one. Being a seven times world champions does mean something after all. Nico who had a pretty good year last year putting the moves on said seven time cheating German champion all year, has gone well in testing with a string of hot laps to his name . Mickey has been going well in testing once he got the B spec car, so if Mickey and Nico are on form they could well be up there this time.

Now for the purposes of clarity and sanity, i shall be referring to what was Renault and is now Lotus Renault GP, as Renault, or the black ones. Whilst the plucky underdogs that feel Trulli is actually a good driver unbelievably, that were Team lotus ... as Lotus, or the green ones.
Whatever happens in the court and whoever comes out with a bit of paper saying they can ride rough shod over decent British engineering history, the French will be Renault (the Black ones) and the Malaysians will be Lotus (the green ones).

Renault have managed to lose the use of Kubica who had a particularly nasty rallying accident (Thankfully he survived to whinge another day) but did gain the bearded wonder Nick Heidfeld. Who got into the car and did a good job of surprising all and sundry by being pretty fast and way better than Petrov, who is still rubbish. Renault now has a trick exhaust that comes out under the side pods of the car and blows the exhaust gases under the car. They’ve (well Nick actually) have popped in a few fastest laps over the winter, so look set to continue their best of the rest performance ... which is what they’ve always been, don’t kid yourself, Kubica was never the second coming. Petrov might not have such a bad year this year, but don’t bet on it.

That’s it for the possible winners this year

The Midfield consists of Force India, Williams and Sauber. They’re going to be scrapping it out to be the best of the rest and pick up the points when the Grandees drop the ball.
Force India have fired Liuzzi, because he was quite frankly crap. In his place comes Paul Di Resta who comes from a pretty impressive Family of Scottish motor racing talent (the current Indy Car Champion Dario Francitti is his cousin i think) anyway, He’s the current DTM world champion and comes with a lot of backing from Mercedes. Is he any good you ask? I don’t know. He’s done the usual Formula Renault, GP2 etc and is as i say the current DTM champion. So he has the pedigree to be here. During the testing season he was always up the sharp end with the big boys, nothing spectacular but he certainly held his own. It’s (yet again) another make or break year for Force India, Sutil has to deliver something and Di Resta needs to be consistently in the points or the money is going to start looking else ware.

Williams have sold half the company to the public (not usually a good idea) they fired their hot new talent Hulkenburg and brought in a paid driver, Pastor Maldonaldo. Who has oodles of South American money and a smattering of talent. He’s no Trulli, but he’s no Hamilton either. I think this is a sad thing because i have lot of respect for Frank and the boys at Didcot. They used to be contenders, they should be up there with the like of McLaren and Ferrari but ever since BMW and arguably Honda left them all those years ago, they’ve been shit.
To turn all this shitness around this year they have built a car with no backside. The gear box is about the size of a walnut, this apparently is to allow the air a clear flow around the engine and over the rear diffuser to increase down force without the drag, or something. I’m not too sure to be honest. Anyways, Pastor managed to total one of the new cars during testing unsurprisingly, whilst the oldest man in F1 history, Barrichello continued to bang in solid times and the odd fastest lap. Will they win a race, not a chance in hell, will they be top 10 finishers almost certainly.

Sauber have fired the totally forgettable thingy and have a new forgettable driver Sergio Mendez. Who i have never heard of and don’t expect to trouble the top 10, he could be a safe pair of hands for the last place driver though. Krazy Koby is back, and Sauber have a little bit more money this year. They had a few Banzai laps in testing, but i suspect this is just to get more sponsorship money. Another solid year with the odd, “how the hell did they get up there” result beckons.

The red wine is almost gone, so let’s motor though the rest of the field.

Torro Rosso have got a new car that doesn’t say “Redbull” under the cover this year, they still have Buemi and Alguersuari however. Place your bets on which one of those it the first driver to be fired this year.

Lotus, who were the most professional of the new boys last year continue to look the most professional this year. They’ve had more time to knock up a car on their shoe string budget and it has a few more refinement than last year’s car. It looks pretty, and was only about two or three seconds off the midfield boys during testing. It looks like another safe and solid year for the green ones, who are my favorite of the tail end chaps. Trulli still hasn’t got his marching orders so he’ll be making a nuisance of himself again, whilst Heikki gets another shot at impressing the big boys.

Virgin have been sold to some Russian Mafia money laundering outfit and will be called Marussia (which is Russian for “I’ll take it in used tenners comrade”) Virgin. Nick Wurth who now runs Virgin is on a hiding to nothing, as i expect the Russians to leave before the he gets any point. Whilst the rest of the grid has tried to make it look they’ve not copied the Redbull wholesale, Virgin have built a car that looks nothing like the fastest and most successful car last year. Glock keeps his seat and D’ambrosia (i have no idea where they get these silly names driver from ) is in for whatisname.

Finally HRT make it to the start of year two with no sponsorship and the hapless Liuzzi has signed on with Narain Karthikeyan. If the car holds together they might........ Who am i kidding they’ll be lucky to make it as far as qualifying.

So it’s all set for an exciting Formula 1 season. The usual suspects are at the front mostly and the usual rabble is in the middle.
The big unknown is the tires. No one has managed to put together a consistent long run on the Pirelli rubber. The soft tires are 5 seconds a lap faster than the hard but last as long as an HRT in qualifying trim. Whilst 20 laps seems to be about the most the hard option will do before they give up the ghost. The word on the street it we could be looking and four stop races. Six stops at places like Canada could be on the cards.
This means that if a midfield Johnny takes a punt on the fast but fragile soft strategy he could be in with a shout of a top ten spot. I’m looking forward to those outside the top 10 diving into the pits with 5 laps to go to try and grab a point at the end of the race.
I’ll talk about KERS and the silly floppy rear wings as the season goes on, for now we’ll see how all that pans out in Australia before i slate it completely.

I think it’s going to be straight fight between Vettel and Alonso this year. Unless McLaren really have pulled the rabbit out of the hat, they’re on the back foot already. Ferrari and Redbull have solid fast cars to work with and two of the fastest drivers in the game. If Vettel can learn to overtake and he might just be unstoppable, if not Alonso is going to steamroller title number three.

Practice starts at 1.30 on Friday morning, live on the BBC red button do darr.
Qualifying is at 6am on Saturday.
The race is live at 7am on the BBC and is also in glorious eyeball massaging HD don’t forget

2011-03-14T19:22:00.002Z

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2011-02-24T08:34:00.002Z

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Bahrain says no.

2011-02-23T15:34:00.003Z

Well that's a bit of a turn up for the books. Bernie is still under the impression that a race will happen in the gulf state this year, but I have my doubts.

Anyway It's a dull rubbish track and I for one will not be missing it.

Meanwhile. Pirrelli continue to struggle to make their tires last more than 10 laps. Should make things interesting shouldn't it !

2011-02-17T18:58:00.002Z

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Is it 2011 already ....

2011-01-28T15:09:00.003Z

Coming soon.

It's a new dawn, it's a new day and a new year.

And Bernie is feeling good.

"Leave it 'art son, no' what i mean"

Vettel takes it, as Webber and Alonso cock it all up.

2010-11-14T21:02:00.000Z

So there we go then. It all ends much as it started, with a dull race that promised so much.

It should have been fantastic. All five of this year’s title contenders where up the sharp end of the grid after qualifying three. Vettel putting in an electric performance to take the pole by the knats proverbial testical from Hamilton. Webber choked on the big occasion as he has done on so many occasions over the years and ended up behind Button AND Alonso. How could he win the championship from there?

When it came to the race we’d all forgotten that last year’s race was a horrible dull affair with cars in a long procession and precious little spectacle to be seen. And so it proved again this year. Off the line and Button got the drop on Alonso to take third whilst Webber despite previous history managed to avoid hitting anyone or anything to sit behind Alonso, something he was destined to do for a very long time.

Meanwhile, Rosberg made a move on Schumacher and so surprised the disappointing German seven times world Champion that he spun in the middle of the chicane and then Liuzzi with nowhere to go attempted to mount the stricken Mercedes in a very forceful way. The result was a lengthy pace car period whilst the work experience marshals watched each other dither around trying to get Liuzzi's car off the top of Schumacher’s car. There was a bit of half hearted pulling of pieces and comedy attempts to clean up with the only two brooms in Abu Dhabi, before racing was allowed to continue.

I say racing but what we actually got was almost an hour and a half of dull tedious chess. Webbers had cooked his tires behind Alonso so had to make a very early stop for new boots. Which prompted Ferrari to take their eyes off the main challenge of Vettel and follow Webber into the pits. After the usual slick pit work, Alonso dived out in the exhaust smoke of Petrov. Normally a reliable cove to crash before half distance but this time amazingly that, after also changing his tires early, was driving a fine race. Thus had no need what-so-ever to get out of Alonso’s way.

And that, as they say, was that. Hamilton and button tried to take the race to Vettel, but he was having none of it and pretty much cruised to the win. Leapfrogging both Webber and Alonso in the table and taking his first World F1 Drivers Championship. Redbull does indeed, it would appear, give you wings. (If you’re German and had been brought up on the stuff since birth).

An early pit stop was how it all ended. But we did get to see a Driver take the chequered flag and take the main prize for a change. It’s kind of nice when that happens. Rather than finishing in the middle of the pack and winning by default as so often happens.

So Vettels wins in Abu Dhabi. The thorny question of “does Vettel deserve the drivers’ championship” I’ll have to ponder for a few months. Was he the best driver of the year? No not really for me, he crashed too often in unforced situations and I still maintain that he can only win when he’s at the front of the field. Luckily for him the Redbull has been the class of the field and given him ten poles this year. Even Webber with five poles couldn’t fail to be a championship contender. So to win from yet another pole is kind of what Vettel has done all year. If he didn’t crash or hit someone, he won. This is pretty much what you have to do.

Lewis gets a deserved 2nd place with a car that was at best 5th best behind the Redbulls and Ferrari’s. He never gave up and has raced when all looked lost for him. Great wins in Spa, and Canada and a gifted win Turkey kept him up there and if he hadn’t got all Leary in Monza he would have had a better shot coming into Abu Dhabi. But this is only his 4th year in F1 and the 3rd time he’s been a title contender. The next few years are going to be fantastic as Vettel and Hamilton fight it out to be the best there is.

3rd for Button who’s retained his credibility with great wins in Australia and China when the changeable conditions played into his hands, he didn’t seem able to take the fight to the others with poor qualifying performances all year. But he didn’t disgrace himself with some storming runs to pick up points when all looked lost. Considering that the Media was planning the memorial service when Hamilton buried him, he’s done a good job to be nobody’s number two this year.

Rosberg grabs 4th with yet another good solid drive, much the same as he’s been doing all year. He showed Schumacher how to do it all year and hasn’t been phased by the ex world champions attempts at mind games. Jolly well done to him, Redbull would do well to grab him when Webber throws his final hissy fit and storms off.

Kubica in 5th had “problems” in qualifying and didn’t make it to Q3. The problem being he’s rubbish. The last of my top division drivers, okay he’s all right and in a better car would probably get podiums and stuff, but he’s like Boutsen all those years ago, fine now and again but he’s no world champion. If Massa flounces off I think he’d be mad to hide in Alonso’s shadow at Ferrari, but he may feel he has more of a chance to prove himself over there.

6th for Petrov who doesn’t hit anything for a change and made Alonso look very ordinary all evening. I don’t think he’ll be back next year because he’s not really achieved much this year. He’s got a bit of Russian money behind him, but not enough for a top team to bother with. He may well end up in a Force India or one of the tail end Charlies, but his Renault days are numbered I suspect.

7th for Alonso, oh what could have been, someone at Ferrari HQ is going to get the kicking of their life on Monday morning. They had to cover what Webber was up to, if he got ahead of Alonso they would lose the title and if Vettel won with Alonso lower the 4th he’d lose the title. Webber was the closest challenger so it made sense on paper to cover what Webber did to avoid that scenario and hope there was enough time to get back to 4th. Except they missed the fact that Petrov and Rosberg had already changed their tires and were not inclined to get out of the Ferraris way. Queue much forehead slapping as they realised Alonso was going to be stuck in the midfield.

I didn’t mind Alonso winning it all to be honest. I like Ferrari and had no problem with the team orders thing in Germany. All the other teams do it to a greater or lesser extent, it’s just Ferrari aren’t too sneaky about it. It’s a team game, it’s always been a team game and the tiny fine Ferrari got from the FIA is an admittance that it was a stupid rule anyway. In the end it didn’t matter, something Massa will no doubt point out in his resignation letter. Redbull didn’t seem to feel the need for blatant team orders and they had two drivers with a shout. Rather than one strong shout and a rather pissed off second driver. Oh wait hang on!

8th for Webber who hasn’t delivered since Hungary. Ultimately he hasn’t been the best all season and only took the points when Vettel got it wrong. He seemed to complain endlessly all season that he wasn’t being given the same equipment or a fair crack of the whip, whilst Vettel just kept quiet and got on with it. The remark in Silverstone about being a number two driver goes against the evidence I saw. The team has been pretty fair all season to both drivers. Yet Webber has felt the need to tell all and sundry that he’s having to do it all with a comedy eye patch, an arm tied behind his back with no food and only 5 cylinders and it’s all soooo unfair boo hoo. Truth is he made it difficult for himself and felt the need to blame others as he didn’t deliver. I’m sure he’s a really nice bloke, but he lost this all himself.

9th for Alguersuari, in a Torro Rosso of all things!

Finally 10th for Massa. The German win that was stolen from him didn’t matter in the end. Which isn’t going to make him feel any better is it? It’s been a long and difficult season for the likable Brazilian, but the fire wasn’t in the eyes after Germany, maybe even from China when Alonso carved him up into the pits. He must have seen the writing on the wall that Alonso had arrived and the team was no longer his. Which he must have suspected would happen all along. I don’t think he’ll stay for much longer, he must know that Alonso would never play second fiddle to a team mate, look how that turned out at McLaren. Alonso now owns Ferrari and that means Massa either goes back to being understudy as he was to Schumacher and Kimi or move on to ... I don’t know, Renault perhaps.

So that’s the season then.

Vettel

Alonso

Webber

Hamilton

Button

These 5 have fought hard in what has been a tremendous season. The Redbulls have without doubt been the best car all year, I still question its legality, but we’ll never know what they were doing. Maybe it was all within the rules and in a few years I doubt any one will remember wobberly floors and suspicious ride heights. The racing has been at times exceptional and at others extremely dull. But you’ve not know from race to the next just who was going to take the ultimate prize. The FIA has managed to keep its oar out of things with the Drivers Steward being a great success and no stupid penalties getting in the way of the racing.

Next year see the return of KERS and Pirelli as the sole tire supplier after a 20 year absence. New for 2011 will be adjustable rear wings, although how they’re going to work has yet to be finalized.

But for now we can reflect on the youngest world F1 Champions and a new name on the Constructors cup. Redbull have finally arrived and put their mark on the sport we all love so much.

Yas Marine ... as last

2010-11-10T20:32:00.002Z

Right I have an open bottle of red wine to help ... let’s go

It’s been a long hard road to reach the Yas marine in Abu Dhabi, 18 races spanning the globe from Europe, to America the Far East and now the Middle East to crown the 2010 Formula One world champion. There are three drivers in with a chance to take the spoils and lift the ultimate Cup in motorsport, Alonso, Webber and Vettel could take the title.

Alonso has had a blinding second half of the season out scoring all and sundry. But Ferrari got nailed for calling team orders in Germany before it was really acceptable. The FIA fined them and then ignored the howls of self-righteous indignation from the media. The other teams mostly shrugged and said, “We all do it ... just not so obviously” and got on with it. Redbull kept mentioning it now and again, generally when their boys weren’t leading the championship.

I don’t mind Alonso winning. When he’s good he’s a great driver to watch and you have to admire his ability to drive a team forward and make them work for him. But like Schumacher before him, his ruthlessness makes it hard to like the man.

Redbull have tried very very hard indeed to lose the Championship. But managed to sneak the constructors in Brazil last week, and might just take the drivers in Abu Dhabi. Depending on where Alonso is, Webber can ... or ... should take the title here. He has the fastest car and should be able to cruise it. But Vettel might yet throw a spanner into the works. If he’s leading and is required to move over to allow Webber to win and get enough points, do you think he would? The team say’s it’s up to the drivers to do the right thing. But Webber and Vettel dislike each other with a passion apparently. There’s no happy McLaren mateyness between drivers in this garage. After Webber basically claimed they all hate him at Redbull last week, I suspect they all now hate him. He’s been there since day one so to turn round and say they don’t want him was a bit disingenuous I though.

The thing with Redbull is you feel they should have won this month’s ago, yet have somehow missed every opportunity. Their drivers have hit people, the cars have had problems, engines have let them down but no more than Alonso’s Ferrari has.
Would I like to See Webber as the Champion? No not really, he’s done far too much whinging for my liking. He driven into other drivers and been overly aggressive when it wasn’t needed. Oh yeah he’s held his hands up when he was wrong, but then he’s whined that the team doesn’t like him and it’s all so unfair. Blah blah blah.

Vettel I don’t think is all that either. He ONLY seems to win when he’s on the front row of the grid. He’s not had a storming midfield run to claim a podium in a car that should on paper be able to cream the opposition. In Hamilton or Alonso’s hands that car would have been champion after Spa. And he waves his finger around when he wins a race. It’s only a small think and its ridicules to get annoyed by a German waving his finger around. But it get’s right on my tits.

There is also the sneaking suspicion that the Redbull car isn’t playing by the rules. Nothing has been proved, but after the floors and front wings of the cars started getting testing in Monza, Ferrari started winning more races. It might all be down to the blown diffuser and the rear end suspension, but at times they’ve been over a second faster than anyone else. That’s a country mile by today’s standards.

So Ferrari might have been really obvious about their “Cheating”, Redbull have been very clever about theirs.

Hamilton was undone by a single corner in Monza. If he’d not dived under Massa into the first chicane on the first lap, then he might be coming with a better chance of the win here. As it is, he’s going to need Webber to driver into Vettel (not unreasonable this year) and Alonso’s last engine to go bang before the final flag of the year. Which is not too farfetched, well okay it is. But it would make for a fantastic end to the season.

I’d love Hamilton to win the championship. I think he’s the only driver that just got on with it this year. Yeah he’s made mistakes, but he’s tried to win. He’s tried to overtake and make a race of it, but he’s also come up short and cocked it up. But just for telling Charlie in Korea that the track was fine and they should all be on inters as the rest of the Nancy drivers complained it was too scary, was the highlight of the year so far for me. He said in the BBC interview before the race in Brazil that motorsport should be dangerous, he is right. Motorsport is about speed and danger. Not parking it up when the track get’s a bit damp. I doubt he’ll win here. But I’d love it if he did.

Button hasn’t done too badly this year. A few good wins and safe comfortable year picking up points and not arsing around hasn’t set the world on fire. But he’s done the job McLaren wanted him to do. They needed a driver who could collect the points whilst their star driver went for the glory. Kovalinium couldn’t do that last year for them, and Button might just have sneaked the title if things had gone his way.
Considering almost everyone said he was going to get buried by Lewis, I think he’s come out of the year with his head held high and credibility intact. He’s still a pretty nice bloke and the fact both Lewis and Jenson are talking to each other still is probably down to Jenson more than Lewis. The team have harmony and two fast drivers. It’s just unfortunate that Lady Luck didn’t like their brand of Champagne.
So there you go.

That’ll be you top five, not necessarily in that order though.

Max says ......

2010-11-03T19:54:00.002Z

Naaaah i don't want no jive ass FIA job brah. It be dope.

Brazil, falling down but still fun.

2010-11-02T20:36:00.000Z

Here we go then, it’s make or break time for those wanting to take part in the Abu Dhabi race for the chase for the cup for the thing.

Brazil, it’s old, it’s tired and you’ll get mugged on the way to the circuit. But it has a raw passion this place, fuelled by fans every bit as vocal as the Tifosi and as informed as the British. Except they’re all whacked up on home brew and the samba beat. It’s doesn’t stop them having a good time and cheering anything that’s loud, fast and driven with some passion though, not even the predicted rain is going to put a dampener on this party.

Brazil is all about the big long run up the hill and the start/finish straight, Its foot flat to the floor from Juncao to the Senna S.

Alonso is in the driving seat and this weekend it’s going to be all about how close to The Spaniard you can get for the final race. More than 25 points adrift after Brazil and its goodnight sweetheart welcome to the tail gunner seat.
Now Alonso lucked into the win in Korean, Vettels Redbull had the measure of the Ferrari driver and had the Redbull not spewed bits of Renault engine all down the road, would have won easily. Alonso has used all of his engines up for the year, so can’t afford to blow his last one up. If he does he’ll get a grid penalty for Abu Dhabi and that’ll make things harder.
So he doesn’t need to win here, but he can’t afford to be much lower than 4th or 5th. A Third would be great and a win fantastic. He has an 11 point lead over Webber which isn’t comfortable, but it does give him breathing space, as long as Webber doesn’t beat him with wins. I think Ferrari will aim for 3rd and not stress the engine too hard. They have to hope that Massa will be on form to play tail gunner for Alonso.

Webber had a hard time of it in Korea with a school boy error into the wall in the rain. He needs to be ahead of Alonso to take the championship lead back. Something he should be able to do with his brand new engine. Realistically it’s a straight fight between these two now, but nerves, mechanical reliability and Lady Luck might yet decide this.

Hamilton is now 21 points behind Alonso and will need both the Ferrari and Redbull drivers to cock it up to stand a chance. He’s got nothing to lose so may as well just go for it and when they’re the odd Hamilton always goes for it. The hill and the first sector will suit the McLaren but the rest of the lap will see the Redbulls pull back any advantage. A win is unlikely but if it’s raining then you never know, personably I’d like to see him get a win so that the final race is more exciting.

Vettel, who is now 25 points behind Alonso, needs to win and all the other to hit trouble to stand a chance, that’s unlikely. What’s more likely is that Vettel is going to be leading and Webber will be behind him with Alonso in 3rd. THEN the question is going to be “will Vettel let Webber past to guarantee at least one championship for Redbull” place you bet.

Finally Button who is 42 points behind Alonso and whilst not mathematically out of it should not be making any plans for a big home coming bash any time soon. Oh yes he could still win the title, but he’ll need Lady luck to have an epiphany and come skipping down the road for that to happen.

Massa and Kubica are the drivers that could spoil the party here. Massa has always gone well here and despite a lack lustre season I see no reason why he shouldn’t be in the top five here. He needs to be ahead of Webber and Vettel to help Alonso out, and I suspect keep his job at Ferrari next year. Now would not be a good time to grow and pair and take the win ahead of Alonso.
Some people of my acquaintance are under the mistaken belief that Kubica is a better driver than Button ! But they are idiots and should be jeered whenever they turn up for work. If Jimmy McWrong of the Wrong people suddenly hit on the idea to use his head to nail the picture to the wrong wall, he would still be in a whole world of more right than to suggest that Kubica is better than Button.
“Oh, but it is the Reanult that has let him down with its mechanical frailty” they wail, bollocks he’s crap, get over yourselves.

Rosberg will beat him this time out. As long as Webber doesn’t hit the German again.

Mickey always used to like this place, if he can be arsed.

So really, Alonso could do with being ahead of Webber, but his engine is a bit suspect. Hamilton needs to win ahead of button and the other to not finish. Vettel and Button need a miracle. Rain could provide that. It’ll depend on where Lady Luck will be hiding from the downpour.

Bernie bigging up the slow boys

2010-11-01T21:52:00.006Z

Bernie in "mindless bollocks yet again" shocker

In an astonishing outburst, F1 commercial rights-holder Bernie Ecclestone has lambasted 2010 newcomers Lotus, Virgin and Hispania (HRT) as 'cripples' and 'an embarrassment' – and accused them of doing 'nothing' for the sport.

The British billionaire's remarks are even more extraordinary given that he played a leading role in trying to attract new entrants onto the grand prix grid this season by way of financial incentives. However, almost eight months on and the best of them – Lotus – is still languishing around 1.5 seconds adrift of its closest rival and some 3.5 seconds shy of the outright benchmark. HRT is regularly more than five seconds off the pace, and none of the three have come even close to scoring points.

Whilst acknowledging that with Red Bull gearboxes and hydraulic systems and a widely-anticipated engine-supply deal with Renault, the ambitious, Anglo/Malaysian Lotus effort deserves to remain in the top flight for a second consecutive campaign, Ecclestone criticises Sir Richard Branson for not investing more money into Virgin – and makes no mention at all of Hispania.

“They do nothing for us,” the recently-turned 80-year-old told the Financial Times. “They are an embarrassment. We need to get rid of a few of those cripples. Richard should put some money in there (Virgin), shouldn't he? He could do what (Red Bull magnate Dietrich Mateschitz) has done and put some money in.”

Ever the canny businessman himself, Ecclestone went on to confess that he would like to see one of Red Bull Racing pairing Mark Webber or Sebastian Vettel clinch the drivers' crown this season, as there would then be five world champions in the field in 2011 – a factor that could only serve to boost F1's popularity.

Adding that there is 'no truth' in rumours that he is lining up disgraced former Renault F1 managing director and 'Singapore-gate' protagonist Flavio Briatore as his successor on the commercial front – with speculation that GP2 Series director Bruno Michel and Prodrive chairman David Richards are similarly in the running to eventually assume the helm – he explained that he has no intention to retire despite his advancing years, vowing to stay 'as long as I can deliver'.

“Somebody will emerge when I'm not there,” he mused. “I think two or three people may come out of the woodwork, but I don't think it could be carried on in the same way as it has.”

Finally, having attempted to float F1 on the stock market back in 1997 – only to be blocked by a number of teams' refusal to sign a long-term contract in the absence of a higher percentage of the sport's income, controlled by his Formula One Management (FOM) company – and again in 2000, when he was scuppered by an anti-trust investigation that had been launched by the European Commission the previous year, Ecclestone insisted he would never try to do so again.

“There's no way I would sit in front of a load of share-holders,” he urged. “It wouldn't float under me.”

F1's parent company Delta Topco is owned 5.3 per cent by Ecclestone, and 63.4 per cent by private equity investor CVC Capital Partners, who likewise are understood to be uninterested in selling a business that is worth in the region of £3.8-£4.4 billion.

It's not often that I'll agree with Bernie. But he is right about Virgin and Bransons actual interest in the racing. He was all over the paddock last year in his linen suits having a laugh with a cheeky smile and a ready bottle of champers.
This year I'm struggling to recall his gurning mug on the TV biging up his brand investment.

But what the heck,I've enjoyed the new young bloods at the back of the grid. It's given Trulli something to do without getting in everyone's way. Mr Fernandes has proved to be a jolly nice bloke and has tried very hard to be professional and not cock around too much with the Lotus name.

HRT, well yes, all rather embarrassing I'll admit. But you have to admire their pluck and it looks like they'll make the end of the season. A considerable achievement when you consider that the car is the very same car that started the season and is only held together with gaffer tape and a pair of Colin Kolles braces he left in the factory one night.

10 years ago Redbull were a rather rubbish Jaguar racing. Today they look set to win at least the constructors championship. Given time even the most stupid of ideas can bear fruit.

Break out the storm laterns, there are cars out there somewhere

2010-10-24T15:51:00.001+01:00

Lady luck can have a very strange sense of humour at times. She can take a liking to a driver and shower him with poles, fastest laps and wins galore. Fantastic wins in a claustrophobic Monaco and the windswept fields of Silverstone for Webber, she can rewards the brave balls out drivers of Canada and a soggy Spa for Hamilton. Even Button has impressed her enough to sneak wins in Australia and China.
But what ever Vettel does he just can seem to impress this fickle lady with a liking for Champagne. In fact the whole Redbull team should have had both championship sewn up weeks ago, they are so much faster than anyone else yet the have had bad luck after bad run. Webber has hit most of the field and Vettel has had pretty much every part of his car fail at some point this year. Time is fast running out and Lady Luck is starting to look quite minx in Ferrari Scarlet.

I have to say it was a better race than i was expecting. The track looked okay, if a little ugly and boring. I imagine for a normal dry race you wouldn’t get much in the way of over taking, but throw in the rain and a track that was only laid 11 days again and you get an exciting race. Hurrah! I always though Silverstone was in the middle of a windswept nowhere. But the Koreans have found the only ugly bit of a windswept coastline next to a shipyard and some interesting looking mountains in the world. If they get the money the they’ll build a city and a marine around the track, for now though it looks like the marsh in the middle of nowhere with a half build track on top of it. Spactator wise, they all turned up latre and left early. The stands had punters but there were still big empty gaps. Especially the darker it got.

Vettel made pole look easy on Saturday and after almost 2 hours of sitting around behind the safety car start and being bored on Sunday afternoon he disappeared off into the mist and gloom of the race. Hamilton who had looked pretty fast all weekend (behind the Redbulls) spent most of his time behind the safety car start complaining that it was fine to drive and they should all be on interes anyway. Once they were released to race, he got passed by Rosberg in the Merc that had had a few tweaks on the grid whilst they waited for a break in the rain. Everyone tip toed around for a few laps before Webber ran wide on turn 7, hit the wall and as he crossed the track backwards, collected Rosberg. Which left Vettel behind yet another safety car ahead of Alonso then Hamilton, Schumacher and Massa
Once they’d cleared Webber and Rosberg off the track we had a bit more racing. Until Buemi tried to take out first Kovalainen then Glock before ending up beached on the kerbing minus a wheel and several areo bits. Hamilton managed to jump Alonso for 2nd as the pack pitted during the safety car, but once it all got going again he overcooked the first turn and let Alonso back into an important 2nd place. And that looked like being it for the rest of the day. Sutil attempted to hit both of the Saubers with some horrendous overtaking moves. Actually you’d struggle to call them overtaking manoeuvres, they were more like desperate lunges at non existent holes in an embarrassing attempt to look like a bankable driver for next year. What he ended up looking like was an arse.

Then suddenly Lady Luck got tired of sitting in the rain and gloom at Redbull and wondered off to see if their was any free champagne down at the Ferrari hospitality rooms. The Engine of Vettel gave a rather strangled cry and blow a couple of Renault pistons out the side of the block, depositing a large quantity of oil, water and chunks of metal down the straight until he ground to a halt. There you go nine poles and 3 wins so far this year. It didn’t look like a particularly tough circuit for engines this one, especially in the rain where they’re nowhere near caning it on the twisty bits. Lady luck was then to be seen getting slightly tipsy in the back of the Ferrari garage as Alonso cruised off into the growing darkness, followed by Hamilton who was struggling on very used rubber and Massa who was taking it very carefully in 3rd.

Schumacher didn’t hit anyone this time out and made it to 4th ahead of Kubica who couldn’t live up to any of his hype in 5th.

Liuzzi slipped and slithered where his team mate couldn’t and ended up in 6th ahead of Barrichello who struggled for a long time on used tires to grab 7th and was thankful that it was all over.

Kobayashi had a more subdued race than last time, a few brave moves but the kamikaze stuff was left to the Torro Rosso and Force India boys this week. He picked up 8th mostly by luck and not hitting anything.

Behind his team mate and out of a job next year already, Heidfeld did alright but it was nothing special in 9th. Mostly he just avoided getting clouted but Sutil.

Hulkenberg the soon to be ex Williams F1 driver if rumours are to be believed was 10th after a late tire change as he’d ran the rubber down to the canvas. I’ve not been overly impressed with the lad, he’s not delivered when given the opportunity and Barrichello 200 years his senior has shown him the way home too often.

Other notable exits, Petrov had a big one into the final corner and his seat might not be a safe as he though it was. Unless he can come up with a whole shed load of used tenners, he may well be fighting it out with the Virgin and HRT boys for a seat for next year.

With so many so called worlds best drivers and Trulli cocking around in the wet, Kovalainen comes home ahead of Both of the HRT boys. Okay the lotus was a lap down and the HRT’s two laps back but they finished when the Redbulls didn’t and you have to give them some credit for that.

So the Red machine profits from Redbulls double retirement and Alonso now leads the drivers championship. If you consider that he was 47 points behind the lead half way through the season, you have to consider him as one of the favourites now. He’s taken the most points this half of the championship, the only fly in the ointment is the lack of engines he has left, with a slender 11 point lead over Webber it’s not over by any stretch of the imagination. Lady luck has could still change here mind yet.

And so it begins.

2010-10-20T18:14:00.002+01:00

Apparently the track surface is already breaking up and will need relaying at least once. Expect gangs of Korea equivalent Irish navies to be patching the thing up on Sunday morning.

What a shower of shit !

This is all Bernies fault. We're only here to line Bernie and CVC's pocket and nobody wanted this race except them. There are hundreds of circuits around the world that could host an F1 race, but we're in South Korea at a circuit that the drivers can't even drive on.

it's a fucking joke.

Will there be hot as well as cold warter in Korea ?

2010-10-20T12:53:00.001+01:00

Okay then after much ho har and Bernie threatening to throw his toys out of the pram, we’re off to Yeongam county for the inaugural South Korean Grand Prix. Which apparently is all perfectly fine and dandy and just waiting to hold it’s most important event ever right now.

The highlight of this weekend is going to be listening to the commentators picking the place apart. Extra points for spotting every time the Legard says “Still needs a lick of paint here and there but ….. “, and then saying some moronic statement or other.

It’s another FIA Tilke design as usual, but don’t let that fool you into thinking it’ll be dull, lifeless and only there so Bernie and CVC can line their pockets with Korean money, no sir-e-bob.

This place is still a building site and it’s going to be another “spot the spectator” event for sure. They might be able to build all of the worlds landfill tat, but I doubt they can rustle up more than a handful of spectators that have “South Korean” stamped on their passport.
Anyway the final tarmac layer got laid about 2 weeks ago so it’s still curing effectively. Normally a circuit has to run a few FIA sanctioned events before it can call itself an F1 circuit. Even some chavs in a selection of stolen escorts and Saxos would be nice, but as far as I’m aware the only thing bedding this place in is construction equipment rushing to build the stands.

So the surface is going to be like a skating rink for the first two test session. Expect at lest one high profile name to crash test the scenery at some point on Friday and with home grown marshals rather than plucky English marshals, it might be a bit dicey if they do his the wall. Given just how slippery it’s going to be I have a fiver on the ex snow racing champion Petrov to go quite well here. Also the HRT’s should be okay because they handle the same whatever the conditions, as everyone else tries to find some grip the HRT boys will be wondering what all the fuss is about.
The track itself looks kind of like a cross between Malaysia, Valencia and Canada. A couple of blindingly fast straights, linked with a hairpin and then a noodles back section with sweeping corners and stuff, there’s not much of an elevation change and not a lot to look at. It’s got Redbull stamped all over it really.
So the podium is probably going to be between Webber, Vettel and Alonso. Hamilton could get a tilt at it, but Lady Luck appears to have the humph with him at the moment. Alonso has been talking up his chances of late and Ferrari are very much behind him, Massa has been doing a good PR job of telling all and sundry that he’s a Ferrari man through and through and is only there to help Alonso win. But I think this is a Redbulls drivers to loose now. Vettel is right back in the hunt with a couple of good results and Webber has been consistent enough. It could well come down to qualifying and that has been the preserve of Vettel this season. If he can get a pole here then he’ll avoid the carnage that will undoubtedly happen on the first lap.

Everyone that isn’t in a Redbull, Ferrari or McLaren has pretty much stopped developing this years car, so they’re looking to pick up points where possible.

Kubica keeps fighting with Rosberg for the best of the rest title, Schumacher might get a result here as it’s a new track for everyone.
Hulkenburg is looking less and less likely to keep his seat for next year, whilst Petrov might get another year now the F1 circus has signed to go to Russian for a GP in 2012.
The chaps down at Force India are getting worried as neither, Sutil or Liuzzi has a contract for next year at the moment. The Word is Sutil is off to Williams in place of the Hulk, but other rumours have him getting the boot into the doomed “test driver” roll for some one after underperforming this year. There are a lot of Gp2 drivers getting linked to all sorts of seat at the moment. So there are lots of drivers looking over their shoulders rather than were the tarmac is going.
Meanwhile back at Ferrari, the word on the street at the moment is that Smedley is the one looking to move on after his boy got shafted by the Alonso machine. If he does go then Massa is probably going to follow him, Renault is the favourite at the moment with a swap for Kubica. I don’t see why Kubica would ditch the number one at Renault for a definite number two at Ferrari, but money can be a great incentive to some.

Predictions updated before thurdays midnight please, there’s still plenty to play for.

Good luck.

Qualifying kicks off at 5am on Saturday, the race is at 6am Sunday I think, the BBC is being a bit vague.

It's petrol head fest of motorsport and by God i'm tired.

2010-10-10T17:08:00.002+01:00

Ooooh what a weekend.

First off I'm up at some ungodly hour of Saturday Morning to watch the BBC try to make a very very wet Japanese track look exciting. I switched off at the point Eddie Jordan handed over two paper boat and tried to have a race in the stream running through the pit lane. It was just not going to improve from there really.

Which left Qualifying to be run at 2am British time. Which was excellent news as it meant i had a reason to stay up and watch the Ozzy Bathurst 1000km which started at 12.30 am and didn't finish until 7am, when the F1 race started in Japan.
It was motor sport heaven. An hour and a half of big grunty Australian V8's motoring up Mount Panorama is truly a site to behold, like Le Mans, Monaco and the Indy 500 i think it's one of those races a Petrol head has to have on their list of things to do before they die. Bathurst is like a mini Nurburing, It's narrow, dangerous and very fast. On the opening lap, after tagging a slow starting car off the line, driver Fabian Coulthard lost control of his Holden at 300kph into the chute corner and barrel rolled his car six times before he came to rest in the gravel trap. Just think about that. 300kph a little over 185 mph and he turns in to find he has a rear puncture and he has no steering or brakes at this point. The car was completely destroyed. All that remained was roll cage bolted to an engine. Mr Coulthard, once the car had come to rest, made sure all his arms and legs were still in place than calmly climbed out of what remained of his car and walked off to the pits.
They build them strong in Australia.

By 2am I'm ready for some F1 and thankfully it's a dry track in Japan. I'm not sure, the red wine and port had kicked in by 2.30am but i think it was a pretty dull qualifying with all the usual suspect in the right place. Vettel looked miles faster than the rest, only Webber, Kubica and Alonso looked like keeping him honest. Hamilton did well but after hitting the wall in practice he'd had to change his gearbox so got knocked back 5 places to 8th for the afternoon race. He was putting a brave face on it, but i think his title chances have pretty much gone now.

I had planned to watch the V8's, but the red wine had other ideas and I passed out at 3.30am, i think.

But not before setting the alarm which woke me up just as the cars are setting off on their formation lap. A quick check on the V8's and some one in a vodaphone had won and I'd missed it all for yet another year.

The F1 start kicked off almost immediately, with Petrov taking out Hulkenburg off the line, then Massa got lost on the way into turn one and speared across the track into a hapless Liuzzi. With Di Grassi crashing before he'd even got to the line we were 5 cars down before the end of the first lap. Then as Kubica was following the safety car behind Vettel as they cleared up the carnage, the poor Polish chap lost his right rear wheel and stopped halfway round the track . Six cars out, the Redbulls off in the distance and no one really taking the fight to them.

Button had gone for starting the race on the harder tires, hoping to stay out longer and try to gain some places. But the Redbulls just pitted, then caught Button and waited for him to pit. Alonso had a bit of a go, got the fastest lap a few times, but each time he did Vettel just went faster. Once Hamilton lost the use of the first three gears in his new gearbox, all the fun was over up front. Thankfully Kobayashi kept us all entertained with a few wild over taking moves, and Rosberg crashed with a few laps to go.

So it's Vettels third win of the season and put's him right back in contention. Eddie Jordan believes that he can now go on and win the last 3 races. He was all over this track all weekend and never once looked like being beaten. Webber doesn't yet have enough points to cruse to the title so it's going to come down to these two and how they get on. If they start taking each other out, Alonso could still sneak it. But Vettel who looked dead and buried 4 races ago is right back in the hunt. He was fast and confident all weekend and didn't need any luck to keep this win. A pretty easy pole and but for Webber getting all racy at the end he'd have had the fastest lap too. But it all only seems to work for him when he's at the front and the car holds together.

Webber, once again got lucky that Kubicas wheel fell off so he didn't have to racer him. But the luck didn't quite hold out to Vettel giving him the win. The pressure is now on the Ozzy to keep the lead in the championship. He needs the others to slip up or get some wins in the remaining races. He nicked fastest lap on the final lap to prove to Vettel that he's still a wheel failure away from the title. But i think the pressure might just be starting to tell on the Ozzy.

Alonso did what he could on a circuit that wasn't supposed to suit the Ferrari. He was there or there about all weekend, but never looked as fast as the Redbulls. He claims the next three races are going to be his for the taking, but i really doubt it. The Ferrari just couldn't match the Redbulls on the fast or the slow bits and Alonso was really just racing Hamilton until his gearbox got the gremlins.

Button in 4th benefited from Hamilton's gearbox problems, tried to be a bit tricksy in qualifying with hard tires for the start. But even that couldn't help him take the fight to the Redbulls. He's pretty much out of the championship now.

Hamilton is lucky to bring the car home in 5th. He was chasing Alonso down with fastest lap after fastest lap, until the new gearbox 3ed gear box went pop and locked him into 4th to 7th gear. He still managed to be faster than the two Mercedes behind him, but Button cruses up to him and passed with ease. He's still the best driver on the grid in my opinion and I'm sure he can win again. Abu Dhabi or Brazil could easily be his with a bit of luck. It just seems that Lady luck has got the huff with him at the moment.

Mickey Schumacher makes it to 6th after Rosberg's rear wheel fell off. Mickey couldn't get past Rosberg for a whole bunch of laps and looked ordinary as usual. This result goes some way to make up for the mess of Singapore but not by much.

Kobayashi drove a great race to get from 14th on the grid. He passed car after car going into the hairpin and i suspect he actually planned to pass a few of them. He certainly put on a show for the home crowed and has certainly emerged as a bonafid racing star this year. He's tied into a Sauber contract for the next few years, but you have to wonder why he hasn't been picked up by the likes of Renault while drivers like Petrov cock around. He didn't look he was going to be satisfied with just tooling around this weekend and he went for every gap presented to him. Avoided the carnage at the start of the race and fully deserves he points.

Heidfeld picked up 8th behind his team mate. Considering this is only his second race of the year, that's no mean feat.

Barrichello in 9th get's this weeks "was he there i missed him entirly" award. No, i tell a lie, i saw him being passed by Schumacher and Kobayashi.

Buemi in 10th well done him.

There you go then, I'm knackered. It's been a long weekend of motor sport an i need some sleep.

Hopefully we'll all be back for Korea in two weeks time, but given the pictures of the circuit floating around the net, i don't think it's going to happen. I've seen the layout and it looks like an interesting place, but they've only just put the top layer of tarmac on so it'll be like a skating rink for the race. But we'll see how much money they're prepared to pay Bernie i suppose.