Abu Dabi GP: Desert Stars

(F1 Drivers at Abu Dabi; Source: Grandprix.com)

Whale I pre-empted my recent Saturday “Qualie” teaser in honour of the tenth Anniversary of Canadian Open Wheel Star Greg Moore’s passing…

Along with the fact that I don’t recall it being an overly exciting Qualifying session, as Lewis Hamilton simply “Blitzed” the field, as it was reported that his margin of 0.667 seconds over second place Sebastian Vettel was the largest since 2005.

And “JAGUAR’s” (Hamilton) teammate “KOVY” (Kovalainen) continued his Rodney Dangerfield impersonation, as his Gearbox packed-up on the Fin in the middle of Q2, when it looked likely that Heikki would help insure a McLaren front row lockout… While ironically, as “Fredrico Suave” (Alonso) was making his final Qualifying run for Renault, the Spaniard failed to survive Q1 for the very first time in his career.

And while the Red Bull & BRAWN GP Boyz duked it out for the sharp end of the grid, they were left scrapping over P2 and beyond as Hamilton’s KERS equipped MP4-24 was unassailable, with the top two teams in this year’s Constructor’s Championship inverted; as Vettel led Mark Webber, with Rubino (Barrichello) besting ‘JENSE (Button) once again, while the Kimster (Raikkonen) was unable to advance into the final Q3 Qualie session, finishing 11th and “Fishy-Fellah” (Fisichella) was down in the doldrums once again. (P20)

Thus with Hamilton taking his fourth Pole in the last seven races and Kovalainen 13th, while Raikkonen was P11 and Fisichella starting dead last… (Some 1.5 seconds adrift of Hamilton) The odds of McLaren holding onto their narrow one point lead for third in the Constructor’s title seemed in their favour, as reportedly the difference between third and fourth is a cool $5 million…

Race
Although the Announcers, Driver’s and Media had all spent the entire weekend totally enamored by the brand new circuit (for obvious reasons) largely due to the man made Island’s sheer opulence… I found the race like qualifying to be most Anti-Climatic… Also being not overly impressed by the race itself, as Hamilton seemingly would walk away from the field with his KERS boost upon the F1 Circuses longest straightaway, three quarters of a mile in length and doubling as a future drag strip.

Yet Vettel did his best to remain within sight of the somewhat vanishing McLaren, whose lead was cut in half when “Louise” made an unforced error and thus Sebastian was able to take over the lead after running an extra two laps before pitting… But it was all for naught, as shortly thereafter Hamilton would be forced to retire with an unknown rear braking problem; as I found it most interesting that Peter Windsor reported that Lewis was running two different manufacturer’s compounds on his car; Carbon Industries at the front and Brembo on the rear…

Thus with Vettel’s stiffest competition tucked away into the air conditioned Pit garage, it was a cakewalk for the young German, building up an 18 second lead over eventual runner-up Webber, albeit new World Champion elect Button spiced up the show in the waning laps with a fairly epic duel with the Aussie over second place as the pair ran wheel to wheel, front wing endplates nearly touching, before ‘JENSE settled for the podiums final step…

Race Drive of Abu Dabi
Although Nick Heidfeld gave departing BMW Sauber its final F1 points and “BOOMER” (Sebastian Buemi) came home eighth, once again my hat’s tipped to the man of the fleeting moment; “K-Squared,” as Kamui Kobayashi once again drove an excellent race, finishing sixth, one place ahead of his senior teammate and scoring his first (and most likely last) Grand Prix points, as sadly Kobayashi now looks set to go back to being a Sushi waiter in Japan…

Kobayashi: It’s Toyota or Sushi

Top 3 - Qualifying
Pole: Lewis Hamilton
Second: Sebastian Vettel
Third: Mark Webber

Race Results
Winner: S. Vettel; 2nd: M. Webber; 3rd: J. Button; 4th: R. Barrichello;
5th: N. Heidfeld; 6th: K. Kobayashi; 7th: J. Trulli; 8th: S. Buemi.

Baking in Brazil

Whale and to think it was only raining HEAVILY here in the Pacific Northwest… As I was gonna steal Bob Varsha’s quip about the weather; Drizzle in the Sizzle for the title, but decided not to… As apparently the weather has been overly Fallish-like in San Paolo, as Friday’s morning Free Practice (FP1) session was interrupted by a 30min rainstorm, with drizzle returning at the end of the session and then once again returning for the final 20+ minutes of the afternoon session, (FP2) with further spritzing predicted for Qualifying and Race Day, as Y’all may know that Saturday morning’s final practice was interrupted for 42mins due to not being able to launch the Air Ambulance Helicopter. And then an overly LONG Qualifying session, but I digress…

Yeah, I know it’s only Friday Practice, but what in the HELL was “BOOMER,” nee Sebastian Buemi in the Scuderia Toro Rosso doing in second place? As even more impressive was the fact that the top 19 Grand Prix Piloto’s were only a scant 0.73 seconds adrift, while Giancarlo Fisichella finished last once again for the Scuderia, 0.9+ seconds adrift.

Meanwhile, Fernando Alonso made a light tanks flyer in the waning moments to grab the day’s top spot, with Championship rivals Barrichello third, Button fifth and Vettel seventh, as it was entertaining to hear ‘JENSE (Button) complain of both oversteer and understeer via his radio before grabbing P1 provisionally…

As previously mentioned, Saturday’s Qualifying was a veritable mess, with an 1hr 11min Red Flag delay during Q2 due to the monsoon like track conditions, as Vitantonnio Luzzi’s crash caused the second Red Flag of the day, while “Fishy-Fellah” (Fisichella) seemed more like a fish outta water, having spun off in Q1and bringing out the first Red Flag as he disgustedly walked back to the Ferrari pits; while Bob Varsha pointed out, in “Fisi’s” defense, he’s now running 2010 development “Bits” on his race chassis…

Admittedly Rubino (Barrichello) was on a lighter fuel load then front row competitor Mark Webber and those around him, having tried to take off like a scalded cat in front of 90,000 Brazilian’s chanting Rubino-Rubino-Rubino! But the ensuing melee behind him caused a Safety Car deployment, while the “Scrumptious ‘Nuan” (Jarno Trulli) vented his anger upon Peter Windsor over how he thought Adrian Sutil was just driving plain STUPID! After Sutil, Trulli and Alonso had all been taken out in a first lap crash.

Thus, the multiple carnage allowed “JENSE to move from P14 to ninth, with “ZEBB (Vettel) behind him, and all of this was before Kovalainen’s Pit fire when he was told to go before the fuel hose was decoupled and Raikkonen’s Ferrari was momentarily surrounded in a flash fire due to the combinations of hot exhaust headers vs. petroleum… Which thankfully snuffed itself out and the Kimster motored onto a sixth place finish, while McLaren would be fined $50,000 afterwards for their transgression…

Meanwhile Button ran into his fiercest competition of the race, none other then Grand Prix debutant “K-Squared.” (Kamui Kobayashi) who ran a mostly masterful race, keeping the Points leader at bay whilst in sixth place… With Jenson’s lone low point being the radio transmission to tell his engineer to tell the FIA to make the Toyota driver pull over, to which David Hobbs said you just need to get on with the job lad!

As Rubens pitted first, Webber took over the lead due to his longer duration on track and never surrendered the lead afterwards… While ‘JENSE made some pretty masterful passes upon his competitor’s, while Barrichello day spiraled downwards, having to ultimately pit for a tyre puncture, while the “Krakow Kid” (Kubica) ran a great race in the recalcitrant BMW Sauber, chasing Webber to the stripe, with Lewis Hamilton storming from the back of the grid to finish a fine third… And although Vettel finished one position ahead of Button in fourth place, with Rubens taking eighth, it simply wasn’t enough, as Jenson finished with 89 points vs. Vettel’s 74 and Rubens 72, hence clinching his very first World Championship with a single race remaining, while BRAWN GP also locked-up the Constructor’s Championship in their very first go…

Race Drive of Interlagos
Whale I suppose I’d have to choose between one of these three drivers, Sebastian Buemi, Hamilton and Kamui Kobayashi, as ‘JAGUAR (Hamilton) put on a most masterful Clinique racing from 17th to the final podium step, due to having a “Dry” setup in Saturday’s rain-fest… While Buemi quietly spent the entire weekend keeping his Toro Rosso at the sharp end of the grid enroute to scoring his very first World Championship points, but it was the Japanese driver’s performance which most captured my attention… Even if he “Nerfed” fellow countryman Kazuki Nakajima into the barriers…

His pass upon Fishy-Fellah for ninth place in the closing laps of the race reminded me of another Japanese “Lion” named Taku-San (Takuma Sato) making a blinder on David Coulthard many moons ago…

Top 3 - Qualifying
Pole: Rubens Barrichello
Second: Mark Webber
Third: Adrian Sutil

Race Results
Winner: M. Webber; 2nd: R. Kubica; 3rd: L. Hamilton; 4th: S. Vettel;
5th: J. Button; 6th: K. Raikkonen; 7th: S. Buemi; 8th: R. Barrichello.

“Kuhnichiwah” Suzuka Circuito

So the Japanese Grand Prix returned to its traditional (and rightful) home of the wonderful Suzuka Circuito this year for the first time since 2006, after a massive infield complex upgrade, including brand new Pit garages, Media Centre and extensive track repaving, which thankfully the circuit was NOT neutered by Herman Tilke, while reputedly Uncle Bernaughty was overly quick to point out to the BRDC how he’d asked the Japanese to spend money and they’d done it…

As memories came flooding back (Pun intended) as Friday’s practice session was an extremely soggy affair due to a fast approaching Typhoon, of which I’d encountered upon my wonderful outing to Suzuka way back in 2004… (Can it really be already 5yrs ago? Since seeing the TERMINATOR score another glorious victory…)

And I sat there pondering just how well would the Laser ride height sensor that Steve Matchett had pointed out its red light during the Singapore event function in the abysmal conditions.

Interestingly, it was originally pointed out by Bob Varsha that nine of the current twenty F1 Piloto’s on the grid had never raced a Formula 1 chassis in anger at Suzuka, which seemed pretty high to Mwah, as it was later pointed out during the Qualifying pre-amble that there were six “Freshman” debutants at this year’s Japanese GP event, with obviously half of these being the three Formula 1 Rookies of Renault’s Romain Grosjean and both Scuderia Toro Rosso Drivers Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Buemi.

The other three debutants are none other then reigning World Champion Lewis Hamilton and McLaren teammate Heikki Kovalainen and Toyota’s Timo Glock.

Meanwhile Red Bull Racing’s Sebastian Vettel and Force India’s Adrian Sutil have only participated as Friday Third Driver’s back in 2006, while Williams home grown talent Kazuki Nakajima had previously run at Suzuka countless times, just not in a Grand Prix.

Thanks to F1 Fanatic for doing the heavy lifting on this, as I got tired of SPEED blathering on ‘bout it all weekend long with never saying the names out loud!

F1 Drivers relish Suzuka challenge

And according to Inside Grand Prix, the hardest braking spot is the Casio Triangle corner just prior to the start/finish straight, where the drivers must bleed off a massive 204kph and resist a “Mega” 5.9G deceleration force.

And I’ve already scribbled about the wild ‘N wacky Qualifying session in Utterly chaotic Qualifying in Japan.

While the race seemed to be a somewhat more sedate affair, with Pole Sitter “ZEBB (Vettel) basically rocketing off into the distance on his Monza Renault Lump which will be utilized in one of the final two races, with Toyota’s Jarno Trulli getting jumped by the KERS powered McLaren of Lewis Hamilton on the start and BMW Sauber’s Nick Heidfeld moving up to fourth place, while once again ‘JENSE struggled mightly to get into the points from his tenth place starting position.

As the race was fairly dull from the leader’s perspective, although I was happy to see Trulli-Scrumptious get back around Hamilton, who would finish 2-3 respectively, while Button’s points lead was shaved once again, with great infighting occurring mid-pack, while Vettel simply “Walked-it!” For his third victory of the season and fourth of his young career, and thus, the Championship rolls onto Brazil, with button on 85 points, leading teammate Barrichello by 14 (71) and Vettel by 16, (69) with a maximum of 20pts up for grabs; meanwhile BRAWN GP is all but assured of wrapping up its very first Constructors Title at Interlagos, as it leads Red Bull 156-120.5 and both cars would have to retire from both races with a maximum of 36pts available in the Constructors chase.

Race Drive of Suzuka
Although I was hard pressed to choose between Jarno Trulli and a very impressive outing by “Quick Nick’s” (Heidfeld) resurgent BMW Sauber, my choice goes to the German wunderkind Sebastian Vettel, who simply dominated the weekend and is always a pleasure to listen to in the interviews and especially on his in-car radio when celebrating victory! As ‘Hobbo (David Hobbs) said again; Vettel like Michael Schumacher just seems to enjoy winning...

Top 3 - Qualifying
Pole: Sebastian Vettel
Second: Jarno Trulli
Third: Lewis Hamilton

Race Results
Winner: S. Vettel; 2nd: J. Trulli; 3rd: L. Hamilton; 4th: K. Raikkonen;
5th: N. Rosberg; 6th: N. Heidfeld; 7th: R. Barrichello; 8th: J. Button.

The Bright lights of Singapore

And then there were Three left fighting for the 2009 Formula 1 World Championship: BRAWN GP’s Jenson Button & Rubens Barrichello vs. Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel, who although mathematically alive, seems to be a veritable long-shot for this years F1 Driver’s Crown.

And I must say with my outing to Maryhill last week, it all seems like a blur… As Y’all know that Old saying It musta been fun, as another year’s time has already passed since scribblin’ my last GP Report…

Thus after returning, I sat down and gorged my eyeballs upon 6hrs of Formula One coverage from Singapore, (kinda like what I’ve done whilst poundin’ meese nucel’s away on ze keeboards today…) which unfortunately for me is a night race and therefore very difficult to see…

Even if ‘Hobbo (David Hobbs) ‘N Varsha waxed on eloquently about the amazing skylight and fantastic backdrop it provided, rambling on about the monstrous Flyer Ferris wheel, which reminded me of the mammoth Ferris wheel upon the River Thames… Or playing golf at night on a lit course, which seems a tad bit carried away to Mwah…

And thus I really don’t recall it being an overly dramatic event, since even after the reputed course improvements; it seems it was very difficult to pass upon, as the young “Louise JAGUAR” Hamilton simply rocketed off into the nightlight, leaving everyone behind, even if he had difficulties with his KERS system.

Although it was entertaining to hear about the RIDICULOUS ticket prices, with Bob Varsha claiming a GA (Gen. Admission) stub would set you back $175, with a Grandstand seat up along the Pit Lane/Front Straight costing up to $1,300, while if you were ultra sheik and seeking the ultimate ticket, then admission into the Paddock Club would only set you back a cool $8k for the weekend. (All amounts USD)

And its funny how my allegiances keep shifting, as I began the race by hollering for Nico Rosberg to get ‘JAGUAR, as he seemed “owed” a win after having been cheated out of his debut Grand Prix victory one year ago… Then I marveled at how hilarious it would be for Fernando to take the victor’s laurels after the dreaded shenanigans of Crash Gate, but rightly so, it wasn’t to be… After the weekend had begun quite eerily with Romain Grosjean crashing his Renault in the exact same spot that Nelson Piquet Jr. had done one year earlier…

And I’d forgotten about those most bizarre technical failures that the Red Bull & Scuderia Toro Rosso cars had suffered last year; when Red Bull claimed that Mark Webber’s mysterious gear boxes trying to select two gears at the same instantaneous moment were triggered by an electrical surge caused by the passing of an underground subway train…

Red Bull moves to avoid gearbox issue

Meanwhile, Rosberg’s race was effectively ruined when he managed to slither across the blend line while leaving Pit Lane on his first pit stop, being given a Stop – Go penalty, of which Red Bull’s ‘ZEBB, a.k.a. Sebastian Vettel would incur for speeding in Pit Lane… While Webber ‘N Co. may not have suffered electrical gremlins this year, but certainly the same could not be said for both Red Bull & Toro rosso’s brake failures, with the Aussies exploding on track after the Team Engineer’s had sent him on his way after a pit stop revealed massive amounts of black carbon smoke funneling out of the brake discs… No, they’re Ok Mark, trust us Mate!

And thus, Hamilton scored his second victory of the season, with Timo Glock and Fernando Alonso taking the final two podium spots respectively.

Meanwhile current point’s leader ‘JENSE finally managed to stop the bleeding by finishing ahead of teammate Rubino for the first time in a considerable while, as the two BRAWN GP drivers finished 5-6 respectively.

Race Drive of Singapore
I’ve been kicking around various header’s for my new race item of which I couldn’t come up with anything overly clever, having started my Drive of the Race theme with the Italian GP and Vitantonnio Luzzi’s glorious return to F1. As this will now serve as my inspiration for returning to my belated Grand Prix reports…

Although some may argue that his drive was somewhat artificially aided by the mandatory allowing of his passage ahead of Mark Webber, nevertheless, I found Timo Glock’s performance to be quite impressive as he finished ahead of everyone except race winner Hamilton.

Top 3 - Qualifying
Pole: Lewis Hamilton
Second: Sebastian Vettel
Third: Nico Rosberg

Race Results
Winner: L. Hamilton; 2nd: T. Glock; 3rd: F. Alonso; 4th: S. Vettel;
5th: J. Button; 6th: R. Barrichello; 7th: H. Kovalainen; 8th: R. Kubica.

Rubino Rubino!

Whale hats off to the “Old Guy!” As Rubens Barrichello ran another perfect race, qualifying and finishing ahead of his teammate “JENSE, the current points leader… Although Rubino took another two points off the Englishman; yet I enjoyed seeing Button’s camaraderie during the Post-race interview, openly congratulating Rubens on his fine accomplishment, all the while keeping a stiff upper lip, as you’ve gotta say it’ll be interesting to see how the last four races of the season turn out, eh?

Yet, I’d have to say that the Highlight of the weekend was the continued unbelievable pace of the Force India cars, as Adrian Sutil got his highest qualifying & race finish of his career, a fine fourth place, after starting second and being the only NON-KERS chassis in the top four, before going on to score his very first Grand Prix points of his career.

Yet you had to be even more impressed by the audacious return of VitanTonio Luzzi, whom seemed destined to score some points before finding a gearbox full ‘O neutrals while pounding around in sixth place ahead of, Ahem; Double World Champ-eeion “Fredrico Suave.” (Alonso)

And what a vicious hit Lewis Hamilton took in the closing laps while trying to edge ‘JENSE for second place.

Race Drive of Monza
While although one could say Ferrari New Boy “Fishy-Fellah’s” (Fisichella) debut outing was somewhat of a bust, having crashed Saturday morning and then qualifying P14 and ultimately finishing ninth, outside of the points, nevertheless you’d have to say he’s a marked improvement over the despondent Luca Badoer, even if Tonio outperformed him the entire weekend…

Top 3 - Qualifying
Pole: Lewis Hamilton
Second: Adrian Sutil
Third: Kimi Raikkonen

Race Results
Winner: R. Barrichello; 2nd: J. Button; 3rd: K. Raikonnen; 4th: A. Sutil;
5th: F. Alonso; 6th: H. Kovalainen; 7th: N. Heidfeld; 8th: S. Vettel.

Viva Italia

Yeah, I’m still playing Ketsup with my twenty-oh-eight Grand Prix recaps...

So, in this episode, we’re back at Monza, Italy once again... Which without doubt is one of the most famous of le Grand Premio Cirquito’s on the Formula 1 calendar... As the ambiance of the Tiafosi is simply unrivaled, and alas, what should this event’s “Press Dawg” beverage of the race be? How ‘bout a nice, cold, DEL DUCATO NUOVA MATTINA, or perhaps one of the countless fantastic varieties of vino, but none of that cheap Chianti table wine crap, Kapishe...

Friday Practice
SPEED’s on air coverage began with Bob Varsha noting that a Press Release had just been issued moments after the start of Friday Practice by the Scuderia, in what has become Ferrari tradition... Informing us that Kimi Raikkonen’s contract had been extended thru the end of the 2010 season, and thus contrary to popular belief, “Fredrico Suave,” a.k.a. Fernando Alonso would NOT be joining the Scuderia anytime soon. (Although rumours still persist that he’ll show up in Maranello in 2010?)

Then there was a camera shot of Herr Schumacher (Michael) in the pits, to which David Hobbs chortled; “Is that Ralf’s *Ralfanso) brother? To which much laughter was heard, while Varsha said; Yeah, the world famous R. Schumacher...

Professor (Steve) Matchett then digressed into revisiting the savage crash that The Iceman (Raikkonen) had endured one year ago during practice, as several replays were shown while Matchett said it sure looked like a steering failure, as in the steering had broken just prior to impact...

Having begun the session with a damp surface, the track was slowly drying out and The Hamburgular (Bourdais) was the first to throw down the gauntlet of top speed honours, with a registering of 206mph in the speed trap. Yet, compare this to the all time record set at Monza by none other than “Jungle Boy,” a.k.a. Antonio Pizzonia, in a Williams BMW V-10, hitting a maximum velocity of 231mph in 2004!

Yet, Varsha further marveled on about how Alan van der Mewe had managed to go 257.9mph in a slightly modified Honda F1 chassis at Bonneville... Well, actually Bob! The “Bonneville 400,” as the record attempt on the Salt Flats was known as, didn’t manage to officially break the 400kph barrier, but did indeed go 397.481kph. (246.983mph)

Matchett then digressed over the theory of drag vs. down force and how the engineers would love to do all sorts of slick “Aero” things to clean up the drag created by the open wheels, along with noting how the teams build special low down force front/rear wings for Monza only... What’s that about cost cutting?

And speaking about the track’s atmosphere... Peter Winsor chimed-in, by noting how Friday was Enzo’s (Ferrari) day... As speculation suggests that Enzo decided to stay away from the racing action after having egged on an early driver to go faster... Vamoosh-vamoosh...
“Più velocemente! Più velocemente! “
Having tried to inspire the young Piloto to go faster, the driver then proceeded to crash and perish on the following lap and hence Enzo decided he should stay away from the track during the racing action...

And as the track continued to dry, the other Sebastian (Vettel) outdid his teammate for trap speed honours, by moving the bar to 207mph; yet, this wouldn’t last long as Robert Kubica put the hammer down with a sizzling 213mph lap... Yet, “Nelson Nelson” *Piquet Jr.) Wasn’t to be outdone, by uncorking a 214.8mph blast before beaching himself, to which we herd the radio transmission from Renault boss Pat Symonds asking Piquet what he was doing? As Nelson sheepishly admitted he’d gone off track before the radio crackled again telling him to shut it off, Nelson...

Saturday Qualifying
In an interesting comment towards issues regarding keeping drivers face shields from potentially fogging in the wet conditions, it was stated that Arai was now running a heated visor, a la your cars rear “De-Frogger,” with mini electrical strips imbedded in the shields, which now also needed to be registered by being plugged into the corresponding chassis’s common ECU, of which there were some retorts made about this coming about due to Ferrari...

Rubens Barrichello fails to advance out of Q1 for the seventh consecutive race., while Giancarlo “Fishy-fella” Fisichella garners Force India’s very first Q2 session...

But, by far the most amazing aspect towards qualifying is the fact that both Kimi Raikkonen and Lewis Hamilton FAIL to advance out of the Q2 session, as “Louise” made a judgment error in trying to go out on intermediate’s when the track became damper, while Kimi simply was unable to move forward as we’d later find out he was allegedly on a “Dry” set-up. Thus Kimi would start from P14 with Lewis in P15, while Felipe Massa had barely slithered his way into Q3 by winding up tenth. But undoubtedly the surprise of qualifying was the fact that Sebastian Vettel scored his very first career pole ahead of McLaren’s Heikki Kovalainen and became the sports youngest ever pole sitter at the age of 21 years and 73 days old.

Teammate Bourdais was knocked out of P3 on the final lap by Big Brother Red Bull Racing’s Mark Webber, with Sea Bass winding up fourth, as the two Toro Rosso’s would out qualify the mighty Scuderia Ferrari on their home track!

Sunday Race
For only one of the few times ever, the race started off behind the safety car, as the weather conditions weren’t cooperating and the track was most definitely wet. This gave front man Vettel a great advantage when the cars were finally released, as the young German would be the only driver with a clear view ahead of him, while everybody behind battled with the spray of the rooster tails... As Kubica would later comment that he’d never even seen his teammate who he’d passed for position...

And it was simply amazing... Could Sebastian Vettel and Scuderia Toro Rosso actually win? As Vettel uncharacteristically continued to pull away from not only Heikki’s McLaren, but the entire field... And I continued to get more vociferous at the Telescreen, chanting for Sebastian to indeed win... Which was quite magnificent to watch the unthinkable happen! As Vettel indeed crossed the stripe ahead of a dejected Kovalainen and fairly happy Kubica, who was running a special helmet paint scheme commemorating his very first podium position he’d scored previously at Monza in 2006...

Qualifying Results
Pole: S. Vettel* (1st F1 Career Pole)
2. H. Kovalainen; 3. M. Webber; 4. S. Bourdais; 5. N. Rosberg; 6. F. Massa;
7. J. Trulli; 8. F. Alonso; 9. T. Glock; 10. N. Heidfeld

Race Results
Winner: S. Vettel* (1st F1 Career victory)
2. H. Kovalainen; 3. R. Kubica; 4. F. Alonso; 5. N. Heidfeld; 6. F. Massa;
7.; L. Hamilton; 8. M. Webber

Point Standings
(Round 14 of 18)

Driver’s
L. Hamilton 78
F. Massa 77
R. Kubica 64
K. Raikkonen 57
N. Heidfeld 53

Constructors
Ferrari 134
McLaren 129
BMW Sauber 117
Renault 43
Toyota 41

The Arden Forrest

(Photo source: Grandprix.com)

Continuing on with my theme of slowly recapping the 2008 F1 season, along with borrowing “Press Dawg’s” Beer of the Race tradition, I’d have gone for a most delectable Forbidden Fruit or Duval beverage...

But back to the racing action, as we’re now focusing upon the recently completed Belgian Grand Prix, moving on from the glitter of Valencia to the sublime of Spa Francorchamps... Which definitely has to rank as one of Formula One’s All time greatest tracks, residing in the Arden Forest... Thus it bothers me greatly to hear the rumblings of possible neutering of this momentous circuit... Please DON’T let Herman Tilke get his sweaty palms on another request for a hack job, in hopes of emasculating a legendary venue! As Emperor Bernardo seems quite intent on setting the wrecking ball to all of the Old Guard tracks, i.e.; Silverstone, Hockenheim, San Marino and Spa...

Friday Practice
Once again, this seems to be the most informative program of the week in SPEED’s coverage of the Formula 1 circus, as the opening segment featured Bob Varsha stating that RAIN was coming in 30mins. – Of the 90 minute broadcast, before segwaying into a recap of the various drivers slithering about the confines of the race track in the day’s first practice session.

Prior to Friday’s practice, Nick Heidfeld was pestered about not being so “Quick,” hammering him about his poor performances of late, to which the German replied; “You DON’T have to tell me... I already know ALL about it!”
.
Yet, Quick Nick isn’t the only driver feeling the heat of being an F1 Superstar, as The Iceman, a.k.a. Kimi Raikkonen was nabbed for speeding in the pit lane not once but twice, during the first practice session, incurring total fines of $4,900 Euros ($7,000k US Funds)

And as many of the “Heavy Hitters’ were reluctant to go out onto the track, as it was still damp, as I think only the Toro Rosso was willing to reconnoiter the circuit, this led Peter Winsor to launch David Hobbs into a great segway about driving at Spa; Asking Hobbo what it was like driving in the wet at Spa? As Hobbs had contested the 1968 1000k Sports Car event in the wet behind the wheel of a John Wyer Gulf Oil Ford GT40, while Hobbs waxed on about how it was totally different back then... As there weren’t any Armco (guard rails) run off areas and the trees lined the circuit, edging right up to the track... With Bob Varsha noting how the circuit was then a monstrous nine kilometers and it must have been miserable in the rain? As Hobbs noted how the event had taken over 7hrs...

And Winsor further mused; that’s when you drove with Paul Hawkins? Who was a rather shy, quiet, non-partying type of guy? (As Hawkins was a fellow Aussie)

To which Hobbs chortled back; Yeah, right! The first race I did with him was the ’68 Daytona 24hrs and he stumbled out of his hotel room and said: Uhm? How do I say this? “Swear word; My Swear word (Bleepity-bleep!) Hair!” As he was blutoed from having been up the entire night partying...

But Paul was an excellent driver... He once went into the Monaco harbour, but swam out... Yet, unfortunately he was killed at Oulton Park, behind the wheel of a Lola T70, when he hit a tree and was trapped in the fire...

Continuing with the somewhat morbid theme, SPEED played a very nice montage in remembrance of the just departed Phil Hill, with footage of him racing at Spa in 1961, enroute to victory after having battled all race long with teammate and title antagonist Count Wolfgang Von Tripps. Showed hill passing the yellow Ferrari of Olivier Gendebien, who’d just won the 24 Heurs du Mans co-driving with Hill the week prior... As Hill and Gendebien would share in the spoils of three Le Mans victories for Scuderia Ferrari, with Gendebien scoring a fourth victory at the Circuit de la Sarthe with Paul Frere, who is having one of the track’s corners renamed after him.

And although according to Varsha, there was constant politicking at Ferrari, with Hill never being quite sure if he was supposed to take the victory over Von Trips, but nevertheless, Ferrari squashed the competition that day with an unremarkable 1-2-3-4 finish; Hill, Von Trips, Richie Ginther and Gendebien, a feat that hasn’t been accomplished since in Formula 1.

And Varsha further mused that it’s quite hard to find, but if you ever get the chance, check out Phil Hill’s recording from the Sebring 12hrs race, way back when... As suddenly the Belgian landscape was shrouded in precipitation, with driver’s radio’s crackling; “Box-Box-Box!” (Pits) As everybody came in and the session was red flagged?

Saturday Qualifying
As somewhat typical, my note taking seems to slack off the further into a race weekend, as I find that typically the most information is gleamed upon Friday’s coverage and thus, I have very little in the way of notes here...

Although I did jot down that the Hamburgular, a.k.a. Sebastian Bourdais; You know, the other “Sebastian” at Scuderia Toro Rosso shocked the F1 circus by beating everyone in the Q1 “Qualie” session, as the radio crackled to life; Sebastian you’re P1.” As Sea Bass could be heard celebrating, after having picked up an amazing 2.5 seconds over his morning times and would go onto once again make the final Q3 session before ending up ninth.

Surprisingly, both Toyota’s failed to make Q3, while Nick Heidfeld and “KOVY,” a.k.a. Heikki Kovalainen topped the speed trap with an impressive velocity of 192mph...

Yet, it was Lewis Hamilton crushing the field once again, claiming the pole by 3/10th of a second over Felipe Massa, followed by Kovalainen and Raikkonen, as Massa has now out qualified his World Champion teammate 9-4 in the season’s 13 rounds.

Sunday Race
By now everybody knows about the outcome of this most exciting event... With Raikkonen having eased over Massa into Eau Rouge, which once was one of the most feared corners in all of F1, before The Iceman pulled off a brilliant pass upon Hamilton, who’d momentarily spun whilst leading the races early laps. And then there was that most atrocious finish when the skies opened up and Hamilton and Raikkonen played tiddlywinks with each other, before ultimately Kimi crashed into the barriers and Lewis went onto an apparent victory... With Massa gingerly trailing home in second place, while Heidfeld gambled and put on full wets and vaulted himself into third after having been ninth, before the FIA Stewards docked the young Louise a 25 second time penalty... Yet, all of this seems a bit ironic, as it was the 40th Anniversary of team founder Bruce McLaren scoring the team’s maiden Grand Prix victory...


Qualifying Results
Pole: L. Hamilton; 2. F. Massa; 3. H. Kovalainen; 4. K. Raikkonen;
5. N. Heidfeld; 6. F. Alonso; 7. M. Webber; 8. R. Kubica; 9. S. Bourdais;
10. S. Vettel

Race Results*
Winner: F. Massa; 2. N. Heidfeld; 3.; L. Hamilton; 4. F. Alonso; 5. S. Vettel; 6. R. Kubica; 7. S. Bourdais; 8. M. Webber
(* = Pending outcome of FIA Ruling, regardin McLaren’s Appeal)

Point Standings
(Round 13 of 18)

Driver’s
L. Hamilton 76
F. Massa 74
K. Raikkonen 57
R. Kubica 58
N. Heidfeld 49

Constructors

Ferrari 131
McLaren 119
BMW Sauber 107
Toyota 41
Renault 38

German GP Notes

So it was a bit strange to be finally wrapping up my delayed Telescreen viewing of this year’s German Grand Prix a fortnight after the actual event... Yet here’s a somewhat quick(?) wrap-up of my notes from the most excellent July 20th SPEED TV broadcast.

And stealing a page from Press Dawg, who likes to celebrate his race notes by picking his beer of the event, I’d definitely have to say that the German Grand Prix would cause me to pick Bitburger... Although if you cannot find a freshly imported BitBurger, then I’d suggest a Warsteiner, Ja Volt!

Friday Practice
Professor (Steve) Matchett rightly BLASTED the Emasculation the track had received in its 2002 makeover, saying the track just didn’t have the same dynamics as when the cars went out into the forest and blasted along those long straights... To which Peter Winsor concurred, saying that the track was now a very BLAND Herman Tilke design... As it was also noted how the weather had been threatening, as I believe it rained the two days prior to Friday and it was noted how it was humid with dark clouds surrounding the track.

And speaking of your mass marketing promotional strategies... Amazingly all five German F1 piloto’s managed to spend time atop the time sheets on Friday.

Sebastian Vettel was confirmed as David Coulthard’s replacement at Red Bull for 2009, with teammate Mark Webber on a one year extension, as Bob Varsha would spend the rest of the weekend marveling over the fact that 20yr old Vettel was the only Formel Ein driver without a Manager! Meanwhile Vettel’s current teammate at Scuderia Toro Rosso, The Hamburgular, a.k.a. Sea Bass (S. Bourdais) is racing on a one year contract and has been struggling mightily with the latest Adrian Newey incarnation of the Toro Rosso chassis, the STR-03 and hence Varsha twisted the knife slightly by inquiring whether there may be two open seats at Toro Rosso for next year?

Winsor then commented how he felt a bit sad for Bourdais, as he thought he was doing an excellent job and his driving style looked impeccable... He was a bit surprised that Deeter Majestic had picked Vettel as DC’s replacement over Sea Bass, as the young German is very forceful with his driving style, almost a bit ragged... (Hmm? Sounds a bit like somme-juan named Fredrico Suave, eh?) And then Winsor went off on a tangent about how “The American” driver, although Bourdais is French seems to always have such immense expectations placed upon them, saying how Michael Andretti had actually done a very good job if you overlooked the fact that his teammate was somebody named Senna and that they had lousy engines that year... (1993) To which David Hobbs disagreed, saying that the teams biggest problem with Mikey was his insistence to fly home between each round, yet, both Hobbs and Matchett noted that Bourdais was obviously a very gifted driver ‘cause championships don’t just fall off of trees...

“Hobbo” continued on about how he’d spent some time with Bourdais at the recent Goodwood Festival of Speed and he’s a really nice guy! And after Winsor’s long winded point about Lewis Hamilton’s visor fogging problem at Silverstone... To which Arai has now devised a twin visor shield for such weather conditions, Hobbs said he knows a bit about that as his glasses were fogging up in about one minute of sitting in the car and asked Sea Bass how he deals with that? As Bourdais replied he doesn’t have any problems, you just need to crack your visor open a bit.

Then Varsha prompted Hobbo to comment upon his experience at Goodwood, saying it was amazing how everything came back immediately and it wasn’t like he’d been out of the cockpit for thirty years... From the part where the mechanic sticks his head in and says Blah-Blah-Blah... Which of course brought immediate laughter from Matchett, who then muttered I don’t know why we bother!

Hobbo’s prattled on ‘bout how even the gearshift didn’t feel notchity at all even though he’d been warned... To which the ever sharp, krack pit lane reporter, The House of Winsor interjected; David when you were in the cockpit did you have any dreamlike visions of when Sam Posey was AHEAD of you... Which over the guffaws, Hobbs muttered; You mean when I was coming up to lap Posey?

Then with less than two minutes to go Louise “Jaguar” Hamilton threw down a Banzai “Flyer” lap on the Bridgestone “Soft” tires, being 0.7 seconds quicker then Felipe Massa who’d been atop the time sheets, who was in the pits during Lewis’s lap, yet Kimi Raikkonen who was also on the soft tires was 0.3 seconds slower then Jaguar...

Saturday Qualifying
“Nelson Nelson,” a.k.a. Nelson Piquet (DON’T call me) Junior. had an interesting Q1 “Qualy” session, where he’d started off late in P20, then did a “flyer” and hoisted himself into 11th before ultimately ending up 17th quickest and relegated out of qualifying... As the host broadcast replayed Nelson’s radio transmission urging the team to protest Vettel for blocking his final run... While Sebastian Vettel claimed the fifth quickest lap time of the session behind Louise “Jaguar” Hamilton, “KOVY” (Heikki Kovalainen) Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen respectively.

During Q2, all of the remaining competitors were content to sit stationary in the pit lane for the first four minutes and 50+ seconds of the 15 minute session... Before the two Ferraris made their appearance, with fast laps were traded back ‘N forth, Hamilton would wind-up quickest with a 1:14.6 to Massa’s 1:14.7 with Kovy in third, followed by an impressive run by Fredrico Suave, a.k.a. Fernando Alonso, who was ahead of The Iceman, (K. Raikkonen) with the only German driver advancing to Q3 Final Qualifying being Vettel...

To which they played a very entertaining radio transmission from Toro Rosso, where the young German asked; Where are we, where are we? To which his engineer replied; P9, to which Vettel yelled WOO-HOO! Over his radio, to which was met with the somber tone of don’t get excited yet... You still have to push! To which Hobbo immediately broke into his mock German accent about you need to push mein race-driver, Ja-Ja!

Final qualifying saw a rather odd ending as Kimi appeared to lift off upon crossing the chequered flag with five seconds to go having nabbed P2. To which would see the Finn slide down to sixth after the music had ended! As Hamilton claimed pole just ahead of Massa, with Kovalainen taking third, saying in the post race interview session how he’d done a little Rally-coursing! As Heikki had done considerable agricultural work with his McLaren enroute to P3... While out of nowhere, Jarno Trulli jumped to fourth and Ferdi the Putz (Alonso) slotted the nervous Renault into fifth place, while Vettel was the highest placed German in P9, sandwiched by his big brother Red Bull drivers...

NOTE:
Although I did indeed manage to capture the FOX TV Race broadcast on my ‘Ol Memorex tapin’ machine... I stumbled upon the SPEED TV rebroadcast (about 1/3rd of the way thru the Acura Pre-Race segment) the following morning after our return from Der Fatherland, , of which you can read about my “live” track report in; Hockenheimring.

And being in a semi-state ‘O Jet Rag, while Wishin’ to do nothin’ utter ‘den sit stationary upon the couch, I simply watched the race in order to fill-in the massive blanks from the racetrack and hence didn’t take any notes... Especially since this was originally a DELAYED, HACKED-UP FOX TV Show...

Race Report

Qualifying Results
Pole: L. Hamilton; 2. F. Massa; 3. H. Kovalainen; 4. J. Trulli; 5. F. Alonso;
6. K. Raikkonen; 7. R. Kubica; 8. M. Webber; 9. S. Vettel; 10. D. Coulthard

Race Results
Winner: L. Hamilton; 2. N. Piquet Jr; 3. F. Massa; 4. N. Heidfeld;
5. H. Kovalainen; 6. K. Raikkonen; 7. R. Kubica; 8. S. Vettel

2008 F1 Point Standings
(Round 10 of 18)

Driver’s
L. Hamilton 58
F. Massa 54
K. Raikkonen 51
R. Kubica 48
N. Heidfeld 41

Constructors

Ferrari 105
BMW Sauber 89
McLaren 86
Renault 25
Toyota 25
Red Bull 24

Bloody Silverstone

Otay, so it was awhile ago... And having just returned from a most bemusing time in BLOODY Heathrow, I apparently wasn’t in the mood to take notes on the Jolly ‘Ol Silverstone event, where the young “Louise Jaguar” Hamilton put on the ultimate driving clinique! Enamoring himself and McLaren to the reputed sell-out... I’m guessing that many of the fans and several of the drivers would have preferred the dry confines of the BMW Sauber Pit lane Park exhibit on display in Manchester, eh?

Race Report

Qualifying Results
Pole: H. Kovalainen (1st F1 Career Pole)
2. M. Webber; 3. K. Raikkonen; 4. L. Hamilton; 5. N. Heidfeld;
6. F. Alonso; 7. N. Piquet Jr; 8. S. Vettel; 9. F. Massa; 10. R. Kubica

Race Results
Winner: L. Hamilton; 2. N. Heidfeld; 3. R. Barrichello;
4. K. Raikkonen; 5. H. Kovalainen; 6. F. Alonso; 7. J. Trulli;
8. K. Nakajima

2008 F1 Point Standings
(Round 9 of 18)

Driver’s
L. Hamilton 48
F. Massa 48
K. Raikkonen 48
R. Kubica 46
N. Heidfeld 36

Constructors
Ferrari 96
BMW Sauber 82
McLaren 72
Toyota 25
Red Bull 24

Shoreline drive

(Sebastian Bourdais Photo: Grandprix.com)

Well, we’re back at it once again, with the Formula 1 circus returning from its three week hiatus... Of which I think the teams personnel deserved their short lived Holiday.

And I think that the new Valencia street circuit is very cool! Albeit it seems to have an overabundance of corners, as in a total of 25, yet it seems to be the first F1 race course that incorporates a working swing bridge...

But first a few quick thoughts about the previous race in Budapest, as once again, Friday’s practice times and Saturday’s qualifying results didn’t show the final outcome, as Ferrari’s Felipe Massa made a brilliant start from P3, vaulting into the lead and looking set to storm away to his fourth victory of the season. If only his Ferrari lump hadn’t gone “KABLAMOE!” With three laps remaining, eh? But, I digress...

And thus, back to this weekend’s event as I found Friday’s second practice session to be fairly nondescript, if such a thing can be said about these magnificent pieces of Engineering! As it was fun to see the camera’s high shot from above showing the cars screaming across the swing bridge. And with Valencia hoping to be considered a modern Monaco-esce circuit, minus the swimming pool complex(?) I had to wonder if they have scuba divers on station alongside the bridge. As recall in the brilliant movie Grand Prix, leading man James Gardner plunges into the harbour, of which has happened twice at Monte Carlo; First in 1955 with double World Champion Alberto Ascari aboard a Lancia and ten years later with Paul Hawkins at the wheel of his Privateer Lotus. As ironically, although both drivers emerged unhurt after swimming to safety, they’d lose their lives in other racing incidents.

Yet the SPEED TV crew spent a considerable amount of time discussing how drivers get acclimatized to brand new racing circuits and how long this takes? With David Hobbs offering it’s usually just a handful of laps and certainly they’d be up to speed within a half hours running... While Professor Matchett prattled on about how all of the teams receive three dimensional virtual circuit maps from the FOM/FIA, to witch the engineers can simulate an expected lap, yet Bob Varsha noted how Kimi Raikkonen, Lewis Hamilton and David Coulthard said they got nothing out of their team’s simulators since they were only utilizing 2D. But Varsha noted how Nick Wirth, former team principal of the failed Simtek Formula 1 team has been developing a 3D race chassis simulator, which utilizes hydraulic rams, a la aeroplane cockpit simulators and several teams have tested it, including McLaren’s golden boy Hamilton.

And speaking of the young Louise, Peter Winsor noted how ridiculous it was that the young Brit was fined $5,000 Euros for being two minutes late to Thursday’s press conference, especially since it had four drivers and they hadn’t even gotten to “Jaguar” before he arrived! (But I suppose rules a rule a rule, eh?)

Even more surprising was that Scuderia Toro Rosso’s Sebastian Vettel was the fastest runner in the very first ever practice session on the debutant street circuit, besting the Scuderia’s Massa by one tenth of a second, with Hamilton winding up third. Meanwhile, in the days final practice session, The Iceman ruined Homeboy Fredrico Suave’s party... With Raikkonen besting Alonso by two 1/100th’s of a second for the day’s top honours, while Jense surprised everyone by claiming P3 for Honda ahead of Massa, with Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen next, while Toyota’s Timo Glock was the seventh and final driver with a lap time in the 1:39 bracket.

And adding insult to injury was the fact that Alonso was slapped a $10,000 Euros fine and reprimand for brazenly crossing the yellow line denoting the pit entrance, which was shown in multiple replays when it was announced that car number five was under investigation... Yet, reportedly it was Alonso who talked the FIA into having a minute of silence at the track to honour the stricken passenger’s of the recent airliner crash in Madrid...

Qualifying
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention the wayward spectator moseying across the track during practice yesterday... Who was promptly escorted off the grounds by the Polica.

And SPEED’s opening monologue was fairly interesting as Bob Varsha read from the teleprompter, how crucial pole position has been since the inception of knock out qualifying in 2006; as in the debut season the pole sitter won the accompanying race 56% of the time. In 2007 the amount increased to 65%, but in the topsy, turvy season of twenty-oh-eight... The pole sitter has gone onto win only 36% of the time... So, will the stereotypical notion of street circuits being nothing less then a parade once again occur, making P1 very important or will something else happen?

Interestingly, the majority of the Q1 “Heavy Hitters” opted to run on the “Prime” (harder) tire instead of using up their allotment of soft option tires... With the end of “Qualy One seeing the grids most experienced drivers not making the cut, as both Honda’s, and Force India’s plus Red Bull’s elder statesman failed to advance, with Varsha saying; “Welcome to the new world order!” As Barrichello; (261) Coulthard; (240) Fisichella; (206) Button (147) and Sutil (29) have an average of 176 starts between them...

Mark Webber seemed pretty blunt when Peter Winsor asked him why the Scuderia Toro Rosso’s were ahead of the Renault powered squads. “Yeah, we’re getting our ASSES KICKED! But we know where 60-70% of the problems from... They’ve got more power then us! We’re good under braking, but it just seems to be taking a little longer to get out of the corners...” Hum? The customer Ferrari powered Toro Rosso’s are quicker then the “Reggie” powered Red Bulls? What’s that slogan, eh? Somme-then ‘bout having’ wings... Perhaps they need to top off with a few quarts of Deeter Majestic’s high octane energy drink? (Oh yeah, that’s right, Mikey Waltrip already tried that trick, eh?)

And speaking of Maranello derived lumps, the four fastest cars in a straight line were reported to be the two factory Scuderia chassis followed by the Toro Rosso’s, with both Massa and Raikkonen hitting a top velocity of 315kph. (196mph and NOT the 185 Varsha kept calling out during the broadcast... Since I’d expect him to know that the once “magic” 300kph barrier = 186mph) as David Hobbs so rightly pointed out how bleepin’ fast the new street circuit was, with an average lap speed of 123mph!

And even more impressive was Toro Rosso’s Vettel laying down the fastest lap in Q2, while The Hamburgular, a.k.a. Sebastian Bourdais made his way into Q3 final qualifying for the very first time, while local hero Fernando could only muster P12, as the Spaniard had admitted to getting lost on the track, confusing turns 10-12 with 12-17, as Hamilton had noted they’re all blind corners.

It was also noted how Michael Schumacher was on hand in the pits, with Matchett denoting how his sleeves were rolled-up and “I think he’s working boys.” Most likely helping Massa, who it’s claimed he has a strong repor with...

Race
Ah, time for one of the best parts of the show... The House of Winsor’s now traditional grid walk, of which he first interviewed Jarno Truli about the days heat, with Nico Rosberg being too busy listening to Three Doors Down to be bothered... But the most humourous interview was with Nick Heidfeld, who said they get paid to drive in the heat, so it’s not a problem and everybody knows that “Jarno works like an Animal!”

And then it was time to turn up the volume, as the lights went green, with the start being fairly straightforward, as pole winner Massa burst off once again like an arrow, with the rest of the grid in close pursuit, albeit there wasn’t the big collision Hobbs had been blathering on about at the Turn 2-3 complex... Although Raikkonen fell behind, losing a position to his fellow Finn, while once again Massa was steadily pulling away from Hamilton.

But the races biggest moments came in the pits, as first there was the potential collision between race leader Massa and Sutil’s Force India, as the Scuderia are currently the only team using a new pit lane light system vs. the traditional brakes-on lollipop, which has a sensor in the refueling nozzle that automatically tells the driver to go once its uncoupled, supposedly worth 0.3 second over the traditional method, while the two cars almost collided... As Massa would later describe that the concrete wall was coming up fast and he thought he’d back off to be safe, although this drew a Stewards investigation query.

Yet, mayhem would once again break out in the Ferrari pits, when apparently Raikkonen made a mistake, trying to leave before the refueling was done, although Matchett noted how Kimi was pointing at the light system... Before clipping three crew members, ultimately giving the refueler a broken foot. But the damage wasn’t over as suddenly the camera’s show Kimi’s car smoking before going KABLAMOE! And that was the end of another very poor outing for The Iceman, while it was repeatedly remarked how he currently earns a million per week!

But, it was Massa’s turn to shine, as unbeknownst to me it was the Brazilian’s 100th start, of which have all been Ferrari powered... As Felipe won the pole, led wire to wire and also recorded the race’s fastest lap! Not too shabby, eh? As for that inquiry, of which Ferrari was deemed releasing Massa in an unsafe condition, the team was fined $10,000 Euros and no further punishments were issued...

Qualifying Results
Pole: F. Massa; 2. L. Hamilton; 3. R. Kubica; 4. K. Raikkonen;
5. H. Kovalainen; 6. S. Vettel; 7. J. Trulli; 8. N. Heidfeld; 9. n. Rosberg;
10. S. Bourdais

Race Results
Winner: F. Massa; 2.; L. Hamilton; 3. R. Kubica; 4. H. Kovalainen;
5. J. Trulli; 6. S. Vettel; 7. T. Glock; 8. N. Rosberg

2008 F1 Point Standings
(Round 12 of 18)

Driver’s
L. Hamilton 70
F. Massa 64
K. Raikkonen 57
R. Kubica 55
H. Kovalainen 43

Constructors

Ferrari 121
McLaren 113
BMW Sauber 96
Toyota 41
Renault 33

Button’s up

Sounding like a broken record; it’s hard to believe that it was two year’s ago when Jenson Button scored his maiden Formula 1 victory at the Hungarian Grand Prix.

. And I’m certain that “Jense” would prefer to be basking in the afterglow of that historic weekend instead of puttering about the back end of this year’s Formula 1 grid at the “Hunga-boring,” which is notorious for being extremely hard to pass on, although I suppose this past weekend’s race was anything but boring, eh? (Jense did manage to finish 12th, albeit getting slowed down by Nick Heidfeld)

Hungarian GP Race Report

Yet, as for Jense, well, at least he doesn’t have to worry about Taku-san anymore, as his ex-teammate Takuma Sato had the audacity of passing Jense for position going uphill in the “B” Team “Super Best Friends” (Super Aguri) at Spa Francorchamps (Sept, ’06) And then being punted offline by the slithering BMW Sauber of Nick Heidfeld in the Mount Fuji rain fest. (Oct, ’07) As what NO “Suzuker Specials” last year, as in years past, Honda built special race engines for its Home Grand Prix... (Somme-thun to do with F1 engine rules freezes?) I mean being out performed by the Spykers, Err, Force India chassis… “Crikey’s Mate!” (Well ok, actually Honda and Force India have been fighting for Caboose on the field) But I digress.

As previously written, (Indy Day Trippin’) I’d just returned from my second jaunt to Indianapolis. As Clyde had driven us “Coast to Coast” in 2.5 days! And then upon returning from the 2006 USGP, I’d been forced to listen to the exploits of “Auntie Harriet’s” flight home…

Talk ‘bout pouring SALT in the wounds! It just keeps getting better ‘N better, eh? First Aunty Harriet (87yr’s “young” and attending her very first Grand Prix!) Has some young German whippersnapper sit next to her from Indianapolis to Chicago… As Harriet says; you’ve got kind of a funny accent. (“Kid!”) What are you doing in America? Oh, I’m Nico Rosberg… I was driving a Williams-Cosworth at the USGP!

(Rosberg had celebrated his 21st birthday during the Canada-Indianapolis week break; (June 25, 2006) “In America you make a big deal out of celebrating your 21st Birthday. In Germany it’s just another day,” replied Rosberg to Speed’s Bob varsha.

Then about one week later, (summer, 2006) I met Charlie, Emily, Tricia and Robert Nearn, for lunch in Pioneer Square. (Downtown Seattle) Yes, that’s the same Robert Nearn who just competed in this year’s Rolex 24 piloting the #06 Pontiac for Banner engineering.

So, did I tell you about my bar; Mews of Mayfair, Robert asked? NO! Yeah, me and a few blokes bought a four story building right smack-dab in downtown Central London. We just had our grand opening ‘bout 5weeks ago after renovating it for about 8 months.

James, my partner and bartender was dating (No longer) Sue Button… You know, Jenson Button’s sister. So after WINNING his very first grand prix, Button rang up and said we’re taking over the entire building for 24hrs. We’re going to party, party hard into the next day mate…

Robert had to partake Jense and 100 plus of his entourage from Button’s home town. You know how physically fit Formula 1 drivers are…. But they’re NOT much of partiers. As Button had said they’d go all night, but after a few beers Jense crawled off into a corner and fell fast asleep! Of course Robert had to “chat him up” and congratulate him on his victory. They talked a bit about his ’69 Dodge Charger he’s renovating.

Next Robert asked me. Have you ever heard of the GP Masters? Of course well I had to go watch them at Silverstone; They’re great fun to watch. Have you ever heard of DeCesaris? And I quickly replied. Don’t you mean “DUH-CRASHERIS!” Well he WON the race; I think it’s the very first event he’s ever won. (Apparently this victory was so stupendous that the GP Masters series went out of business, eh?)

After watching the Grand Prix Masters Robert flew over here to join his family for a brief holiday prior to racing at Sears Point Raceway (Sonoma, CA) for Synergy Racing with his co-pilot Charles Johnson. Robert says that Charles is a great guy, who’s also quite large. You see he’s an ex-NFL tight end who played for the Dallas cowboys.

In case you haven’t guessed by now. It’s “BLOODY HELL!” The life of a true “Jet-Setter,” eh? As Robert has been trying to get himself into a full time “gig” in a Pontiac GPXR, commenting “These Blokes make really good money!”

Having the pleasure of dining with Robert’s “Crew” during the winter holidays, this past December, over dinner I was asked, “Do you like that English driver?” Oh you mean Louise “Jaguar” Hamilton… Yes, he’s a real hot schue. And what about that other bloke who’s Robert’s mate? Oh, you mean Jenson Button.

“Poor Jense,” who’s been completely overshadowed by the past shenanigans of Ferdi ‘N Louise at Team McLaren, along with Hamilton’s sensational rookie season and who’s now leading the World Championship... Which has caused the shine seemingly to leave Button on the outside looking in as yesterday’s news.

You know how those BLOODY Brit’s are… Always looking for the next Formula 1 hero, with Britain now being totally enamored with their newest phenom, the young Messer Hamilton, who gave reigning two time World Champion Fred Alonso massive fits during his Rookie season… Causing Fredrico Suave to make a hasty exit us to Renault, yet you have to feel a little downtrodden for good ‘ole Jense and the factory Honda F1 outfit. As both Honda pilots were unable to progress out of Q1 qualifying for the very first time last season. (2007) when Button was bumped by Vitantonio Luzzi and the floundering Toro Rosso chassis, (Remember when Luzzi & Scott “NOSE” Speed drove for them?) yet even worse was hearing the radio transmission from Jense’s teammate Rubens Barrichello crackle to life; Complaining of being unable to pass the lowly Spyker ahead of him! Telling the team he was giving her all the power she’s got! Roger that, we hear yuh Scotty!

Yet perhaps new Team Principal Ross Brawn will be able to revive Honda’s fortunes and help Jense ring in the New Year with hopes of moving up the grid in 2008? Err, perhaps we’d better make that 2009, as I’ve heard that Honda has scuttled any further development of the beleaguered RA108 in favour of next year’s RA109 challenger…

Good Luck Jense!

2008 Hungarian Grand Prix

Qualifying Results
Pole: L. Hamilton; 2. H. Kovalainen; 3. F. Massa; 4. R. Kubica; 5. T. Glock;
6. K. Raikkonen; 7. F. Alonso; 8. M. Webber; 9. J. Trulli; 10. N. Piquet

Race Results
Winner: H. Kovalainen* (1st F1 Career victory
2. T. Glock; 3. K. Raikkonen; 4. F. Alonso; 5. L. Hamilton; 6. N. Piquet;
7. J. Trulli; 8. R. Kubica

Point Standings
(Round 11 of 18)

Driver’s
L. Hamilton 62
K. Raikkonen 57
F. Massa 54
R. Kubica 49
N. Heidfeld 41

Constructors

Ferrari 111
McLaren 100
BMW Sauber 90
Toyota 35
Renault 33

Mitty’s Magny

So just why is the Circuit de Magny cours so overly UN-LUVED? As this tranquil countryside circuit is just three hours south of Paris in the “Nevers-sais-Nevers” (Nevers) region, having been upgraded with a sizeable donation of Francs in the early 1980’s when France’s President François Mitterrand successfully co-erced Bernie Ecclestone in moving the French GP to his home region, in the tranquil Loire Valley… Could it possibly be the influx of Bovines or its propensity for Hay fever? As SPEED’s Peter Winsor was quick to point out how the Circuit plays havoc with allergies… Yet, I was told long ago by some smarmy Brits, that it’s truly a great racing venue, so go figure? (Although Bob Varsha was quick to point out how the track was overflowing with spectators and its now been reported that it’ll host another two years of the French GP…)

And so, Friday’s second practice session wasn’t too much of a surprise, as the field was seeing red… As in the two Scuderia Ferrari’s blitzing the time sheets, but Renault went for a bit of a ruse, by having Fredrico Suave (F. Alonso) end up quickest of all… Suggesting that the Spaniard was running on extremely light fuel tanks in hopes of grabbing some headline space for the Reggie, eh? Thus Felipe Massa was second ahead of Kimi Raikkonen, (P3) who was followed by Louise “Jaguar” Hamilton. (P4)

Sadly, the F1 paddock was mourning the loss of Toyota’s Ove Anderson, who’d been killed in a Vintage Rally Raid in South Africa and the Toyota team were donning black arm bands and sporting black stripes across the noses of their two TF108 challengers.

And a good deal of fun was had at the expense of SPEED’s senior commentator, Messer Hobbs, who waxed on a bit about how if he was to ever write a book, his missus said it should be titled; “I Shoulda Won, But!” to which the House of Winsor immediately broke in and said he’d just received a text message from Hobbo’s colleague S. Posey that says the title of Hobbs biography should instead be titled: “I could have been Second!”

Saturday qualifying saw the true formation of the grid come about, when The Iceman (K. Raikkonen) grabbed the pole position ahead of his Brazilian teammate, in what would be Ferrari’s coveted 200th pole… Giving the Scuderia Ferrari another front row lock-out, with Jaguar slotting into P3, yet recall that Hamilton and Nico Rosberg had both been given 10 grid spot penalties for the pit lane contretemps in Canada. And thus Alonso would ultimately start from P3 with Toyota’s Jarno Trulli alongside, while uncharacteristically The Krakow Kid (R. Kubica) was starting from row three.

And while Jaguar was to start from P13, his teammate Heikki Kovalinen was given a five grid spot penalty for supposedly driving too slowly and impeding Nick Heidfeld’s progress, while Rosberg started 15th and Honda’s Rubens Barrichello moved to caboose with a five spot gearbox change penalty.

When the lights went green, Kimi simply shot off into the lead, continuously setting the races fastest lap and pulling away from Massa, (I believe that Kimi set fastest race lap and thus tied Nigel Mansell for third for overall fastest race laps, as it would be Kimi’s 29th) with both Ferrari’s simply leaving the rest of the field in the dust. Then the unthinkable happened when Kimi’s exhaust decided to separate itself from the Ferrari lump. After being held on solely by a sensor wire, the offending exhaust pipe finally disembarked the stricken Ferrari, which enabled Massa to shoot by after having been behind by over seven seconds. Yet, amazingly Kimi held onto second place, while Trulli “Scrumptious” hung onto third to claim his very first podium in 55 races, after a massive blocking maneuver he performed upon Kovalainen, which seems an appropriate tribute to Toyota’s stricken founder.

As for Hamilton, the theme of his day was something to do with Groundhog’s, (Groundhog Day?) as he was forced to attempt passing Renault’s Nelson Piquet Jr. three separate times… And wound up tenth, out of the points for the second race in a row.

And bully on you Nelson Nelson, who pulled off a late race pass on teammate Alonso to secure seventh place, his first Grand Prix points of his young career, with Alonso having to settle for eighth.

Thus, Massa’s third victory of the season now makes him the fourth driver to lead the point’s standings in the past four rounds and the first Brazilian to lead the World Championship since Ayrton Senna did at Monaco in 1993.

Qualifying Results
Pole: K. Raikkonen; 2. F. Massa; 3. L. Hamilton; 4. F. Alonso; 5. J. Trulli; 6. H. Kovalainen; 7. R. Kubica; 8. M. Webber; 9. D. Coulthard; 10. T. Glock

Race Results
Winner: F. Massa; 2.K. Raikkonen; 3. J. Trulli; 4. H. Kovalainen;
5. R. Kubica; 6. M. Webber; 7. N. Piquet; 8. F. Alonso

2008 F1 Point Standings
(Round 8 of 18)

Driver’s
F. Massa 48
R. Kubica 46
K. Raikkonen 43
L. Hamilton 38
N. Heidfeld 28

Constructors
Ferrari 91
BMW Sauber 74
McLaren 58
Red Bull 24
Toyota 23

So now we’re off to Bloody ‘Ol Silverstone, where Jaguar has just claimed the fastest time in pre-race testing last week and although the race is a reported sell-out, there’s still the BMW Sauber Pit lane Park exhibit to visit in Manchester…

Il Notre Dam

ILL is exactly what I felt about the flippin’ FOX broadcast of the Canadian Grand Prix… And as I’ve still not watched the Friday second practice session, nor did I take any notes during Saturday’s qualifying, I’m quite behind on my F1 coverage… Of which will only fall further behind with the monstrous amount of Le Mans coverage this weekend on SPEED! Can you say Viva la France?

Obviously, I’d have to say I was most impressed by The Krakow Kid, a.k.a. Robert Kubica, who’s simply KICKED ASS and Taken NO prisoners since replacing the over spoken Jacque ‘O Lantern *Jacques) Villeneuve and I feel a little bit sad for “Quick Nick” (Heidfeld) whom I’m thinking perhaps days are numbered at BMW Sauber? Although the team is obviously keen to keep a German on tap, but I cannot help wonder if Heidfeld’s simply now keeping the seat warm for Sebastian Vettel? Who yes I know has a contract with Red Bull, but as I’ve just recently told Mary Ellen, there’s NO such thing as an iron clad contract in F1… I mean, just ask Fredrico Suave (Alonso)

Yet Kubica, who’s gone to extraordinary lengths to lose weight in order to gain every possible advantage out of the BMW Sauber is currently tied for the fourth best driver on the grid, as he and Heikki Kovalainen squabble over this position, with only Lewis Hamilton, Kimi “The REAL Iceman” Raikkonen and Felipe Massa ahead of him…

And Kubica was momentarily on Pole, until Louise “Jaguar” Hamilton snatched it away from his good buddy, with the Kimster third, just ahead of a very impressive Ferdi the Putz. (Alonso) Even more impressive was Williams Nico Rosberg out qualifying Ferrari’s Felipe Massa, while Mark Webber pulled a “DC” and crashed on the marbles on his way back to the pits at the end of Q2… As the track was breaking up once again and quite tricky off line…

Peter WINSOR: Kimi, quicker of the two Ferrari drivers. You are always in the points here in Canada but it looked like sector three is always a difficult one for Ferrari. The top speed is not quite there relative to McLaren Mercedes.

Kimi RAIKKONEN: The car has been good all weekend. Even this morning it was very good and then going into qualifying it is quite a joke with the circuit. It is always the same thing, the circuit breaks down and you miss the corner because there is so much sand. I lost so much time in corner 10 as I couldn't get around as the car just went straight and didn't give any traction. I am a bit disappointed on that because we had a car that could fight for pole position and we will see tomorrow how it is going to be in the race and whether it is going to be a nightmare when we do 70 laps and it breaks up after two laps. It is going to be quite interesting.

Interestingly, the man made island on the St. Lawrence River, which was built in 1967, was like many of the previous events when you’re never quite sure when or how many Safety Car periods there will be. Recall last years horrible looking shunt that Robert Kubica experienced, miraculously walking away with only a swollen ankle… So, this year’s Safety Car seemed a bit sedate as Adrian Sutil’s Force India came to a stop on the road before his front brakes caught on fire… Which led to one of the craziest incidents I’ve seen in quite some time… As everybody piled into their respective pit boxes after the FOM (Formula One Management) had displayed the graphic that the pits were open, Kimi Raikkonen stopped alongside Kubica, as there was a HUGE RED LIGHT being displayed at pit out… And although I’m not exactly sure why? I’m absolutely 100% positive that when Lewis Hamilton realized his mistake(?) he PURPOSELY chose the Kimster over his good, close, personal friend Kubica to impale with his hurtling McLaren… As obviously he wouldn’t wish for Kimi to gain valuable points on him as the defending World Champion.

With his two main race protagonists out of the picture, the race appeared to be his for the taking, although Kubica’s teammate Quick Nick had other designs after briefly leading and even passing Kubica on pit stops… But The Krakow Kid was NOT to be denied, as he drove 6-7 qualifying laps in a row in order to build up a 24 second lead over Heidfeld, who was now considerably slower after having taken on a large fuel load in order to make his race a one stop event…

Thus Kubica was triumphant, becoming the very first Polish driver to ever win a Grand Prix, as it was quite enjoyable to hear a different National Anthem being played… As Kubica stood proudly during the playing of the Polish National Anthem… And it was a “White & Blue Letter Day,” as Heidfeld followed Kubica across the stripe to give BMW Sauber its very first 1-2 finish in Formula 1, with a very delighted (Surprised) David Coulthard scoring his first podium for Red Bull, while Toyota’s Timo Glock scored his first points and impressively, German Hot-shue Sebastian Vettel held off McLarein’s Heikki Kovalinen for 8th place…

The Canadian Race Stewards later decided that both Hamilton and Nico Rosberg would be docked 10 place grid spot penalties for their roles in the pit lane accident, which will be served at the French GP... And while Raikkonen was busy pointing at the stop light for “Jaguar’s” indiscretion, as Peter Winsor later pointed out, Kimi isn’t to be let off the hook for running into the back of Sutil’s Force India at Monte Carlo…

Qualifying Results
Pole: L. Hamilton; 2. R. Kubica; 3. K. Raikkonen; 4. F. Alonso;
5. N. Rosberg; 6. F. Massa; 7. H. Kovalainen; 8. N. Heidfeld;
9. R. Barrichello; 10. M. Webber

Race Results
Winner: R. Kubica; 2. N. Heidfeld; 3. D. Coulthard; 4. T. Glock;
5. F. Massa; 6. J. Trulli; 7. R. Barrichello; 8. S. Vettel


2008 F1 Point Standings
(Round 7 of 18)

Driver’s
R. Kubica 42
L. Hamilton 38
F. Massa 38
K. Raikkonen 35
N. Heidfeld 28

Constructors
Ferrari 73
BMW Sauber 70
McLaren 53
Red Bull 21
Toyota 17

Monn knockoe

Ok, although I’m sure there were more interesting tidbits discussed during this past weekend’s Formula 1 race… Here’s what grabbed my attention all those days ago, as it was rough sledding having binged out on the Indy 500, Monaco GP and Monte Carlo GP2 races…

Thursday tidbits
Monte Carlo is so SMALL that you could fit the ENTIRE Principality easily INSIDE of Indianapolis, as its ONLY ¾ square mile and is the second smallest country in the world after Vatican City.

Listening to the Krakow Kid’s (R. Kubica) radio transmission, about the apparent problems in setting up the chassis, Peter Winsor wanted to know if he should go ask Ron Dennis if he had any more advice for Robert on where to LOSE some more weight after the “Ronster” had made jokes about how large Kubica’s nose was on the grid in Istanbul…

Top trap speeds; Lewis Hamilton hitting 291kp/h (180mph) while setting fastest Thursday practice time, as the cars scream around the two mile circuit in just under 80 seconds per lap at an average of 100mph! In a city you can completely circumnavigate in just over one hour…

Favourite Circuits
Steve Matchett:
Whenever anybody asks me what Formula 1 circuit should I go to? I always reply Monza and Monaco. Monza simply because of the passion of the Tiafosi and Monaco because its so unique…I mean every night you can go walk around the streets that the race is on, have a drink in the bars and eat at the restaurants all surrounding the course and get as close to the mechanics as possible while they’re working on the cars…

But Monaco is FERROCIOUSLY EXPENSIVE!

David Hobbs: But if you want to watch open racing then Spa. Although it’s a long circuit and the weather’s a bit dodgy and not very well attended, once you’re inside you can walk from nearly every corner to corner…

Bob Varsha:
Now you’ve got me thinking what’s my favourite circuit and to gain me some extra time I’m going to defer to Peter.

Peter Winsor:
Well Bob, I MUST SAY I’M ANNOYED! That we’re NOT going to Indianapolis this year… Although I’m NOT saying that Indy is my favourite circuit, but what a Major race that was and Formula 1 NEEDS to be in America…

As May turns to June and we’re going to Canada, but NOT the United States, I think it’s TERRIBLE! And I’m SICK about it and I’m rather SICK about the Team Owners who prattle on about how we NEED to be in America, how they love America, etc. but are NOT doing ANYTHING about it! As they should be out there ACTIVELY PROMOTING IT! The Drivers should be out there, the Top Three should be out there doing long media conferences selling Formula 1 to the American public and sponsors and as an F1 economy there NOT doing it and I think they’re remiss for NOT doing it…

Matchett:
Well I totally agree with you Peter to a large extent… Although BMW Sauber did indeed have there pit complex in Las Vegas this January. (Consumer Electronics Show) And there were tons of people there… And I think you’re 100% right on we need more Teams promoting it. Why couldn’t McLaren, Ferrari and others be alongside BMW’s Pit Lane Park? Except for perhaps the Commercial aspect of it, as Bernie Ecclestone may raise his hand and say I NEED a piece of that!

Hobbs:
It is after all the largest market for all of the top manufacturers… Definitely Ferrari and BMW, Mercedes, Honda… It’s the BIGGEST single market and F1 NEEDS to be there!

Saturday tidbits
The opening montage was sprinkled with comments from past and present Formula 1 luminaries, as “The Wee Scot,” a.k.a. Sir Jackie Stewart began the sequence by stating; Monaco hasn’t changed at all; Still the most glamorous, still the most colourful. It’s still the most exciting!

Felipe Massa; Its like racing a go kart in your house.

Kimi Raikkonen: If you don’t push, you don’t get the lap; but if you push too hard then you end up in the barriers.

Ayrton Senna; You position your wheels with the Armco ALL the time and you’re cutting it that close.

I don’t know why, but I found it just a tad bit eerie to be hearing Senna’s voice once again… As Bob Varsha had marveled earlier how Senna had once claimed that he’d look over at the giant video monitor while racing up the hill at “Bo Ravage” to see where his competitors were…

Mika Hakkinen; It’s very exciting, I mean you’re so close to the barriers all of the time.

David Coulthard; You cannot push 100% here, because if you go 101% then you’re into the barriers… Which were prophetic words as DC had a huge shunt towards the end of Q2 and although he was 10th quickest, advancing to the final Q3 “Qualie” session, he’d go NO farther due to the obvious damage he’d done against the Armco…

And Triple World Champion Nelson Piquet, who never managed to win at Monte Carlo once said; its like trying to fly a helicopter in your living room… While it was fun to hear Keke Rosberg, who’d won Monaco 25yrs ago for Williams telling Peter Winsor during his grid walk that he wouldn’t try telling son Nico anything because he wouldn’t listen to him anyways…

And “Quick Nick” Heidfeld’s record run of 28 consecutive Top 10 qualifying positions was snapped this weekend, when the German could do no better then 13th place in Q2 qualifying…

Thus, it was a very surprised Felipe Massa, who’d earlier said he didn’t like Monaco very much, snatching his 12th career pole over the REAL Iceman, a.k.a. “The Kimster,” nee Kimi Raikkonen. Massa’s Pole was the first for the Scuderia in Monaco since Michael Schumacher’s in 2000, while the surprising lockout of the front row by Ferrari was the teams first since 1979, which was also the last time a Scuderia pilot had won from Pole Position. (Jody Scheckter) Forlornly, Team McLaren took the second row on the grid after having been faster then the red cars during practice.

Adding more drama to the race was that it would become a wet/dry affair as it began raining just prior to the start of the race and everybody was using Bridgestone’s “Wet” intermediate tires as Massa shot off the line with Louise “Jaguar” Hamilton making his way around the Kimster, while fellow Finn, Heikki Kovalainen stalled on the formation lap and was forced to start from pit lane.

And I still don’t know how he got away with it, but Hamilton kissed the Armco with his rear tire, having to immediately duck into the pits for a replacement, as he’d later comment that you couldn’t see where you were going in the spray and everybody was aquaplaning…

Meanwhile Massa made a mistake while leading and handed the front spot over to Kubica, who led for quite sometime in the BMW Sauber, yet after pit stops Hamilton built up a massive forty second lead before Nico Rosberg slammed heavily into the swimming pool complex’s barriers, bringing out a safety car, which evaporated Lewis’s lead. By this time, Fredrico Suave (Alonso) who’d been the first to bravely switch over to “Slicks” on the drying track had shown that this was the preferred tire as he began setting fast lap times, while his hapless rookie teammate Nelson Nelson (Piquet Jr.) who’s reportedly under increasing pressure over keeping his ride managed to slide off track after they’d thrown dry tires on his mount…

And just prior to the restart, we heard Force India’s Adrian Sutil’s radio transmission note that he was the meat in a Scuderia Ferrari “Works” sandwich, with Massa ahead and World Champion Raikkonen lurking directly behind, as the young German had driven an amazing race from P18 to fourth, being on track to garner Force India’s and his first career points…

Yet, With everybody having made the switch over to the dry grooved tires and the laps winding down in what would become a timed event, the Kimster got a little too overaggressive and punted Sutil out of the way, to no avail! As Kimi would ultimately end up out of the points after his multiple race transgressions, including a drive thru penalty for Ferrari failing to have his tires mounted prior to the three minute board…

Thus Hamilton led Kubica and Massa across the finish line and the win was “Jaguar’s” first victory in the Principality as an F1 pileto and he seemed genuinely taken by his accomplishment as he was the first Englishmen to win on the streets of Monte Carlo since Graham Hill had done so for Lotus in 1969.

Meanwhile, Rubens Barrichello, who was starting his 256th Grand Prix, celebrated by scoring his very first points in over one year, while the hapless young German hot-shue Sebastian Vettel finally righted his miserable season with an impressive run to fifth place…

Qualifying Results
Pole: F. Massa; 2. K. Raikkonen; 3. L. Hamilton; 4. H. Kovalainen;
5. R. Kubica; 6. N. Rosberg; 7. F. Alonso; 8. J. Trulli; 9. M. Webber;
10. D. Coulthard

Race Results
Winner:L. Hamilton; 2. R. Kubica; 3. F. Massa; 4. M. Webber;
5. S. Vettel; 6. R. Barrichello; 7. K. Nakajima; 8. H. Kovalainen



2008 F1 Point Standings
(Round 6 of 18)

Driver’s
L. Hamilton 38
K. Raikkonen 35
F. Massa 34
R. Kubica 32
N. Heidfeld 20

Constructors
Ferrari 69
McLaren 53
BMW Sauber 52
Red Bull 15
Williams 15

Felipe’s Kastle

Once again the F1 outing at Istanbul was fairly sanguine… With Scuderia Ferrari putting on another clinique, as Felipe Massa scored his third Pole and Victory in a row in Turkey, a feat that hasn’t been accomplished since Michael Schumacher did so at, aghast, the USGP. (2003-04-05*-06) Well, actually Herr Schumacher WON the USGP four straight years in a row, including the infamous 2005 Michelin tyre DEBACLE… While also becoming the very first driver to ever WIN FIVE times at the Speedway, (2000, 2003-06) but I digress…

Perhaps I’m just trying to watch too bleepin’ muchoe race coverage, since with the euphoria of Indy Pole Day along with the Turkish GP, I seem to be having trouble remembering exactly what grabbed my fancy from Istanbul…

Although I found it ironic to hear Bob Varsha describing Massa’s domination as an Istanbul Massacre, or was that deliberate by Mr. Varsha?

As I’ve previously mentioned, the Turk’s have been busy bombing the buh-jesus outta the Kurd’s (Can you say higher crude oil prices?) and to date REFUSE to recognize the word Genocide in regards to the savage butchery or acknowledge the Armenian Massacre (Holocaust) of 1.0-1.5 million Armenian’s (Approx.) between 1915-17, with the anniversary being considered April 4, 1915.

But once again I digress, so back to the racing action, as impressively Heikki Kovalainen secured his very first front row starting position after his massive shunt two weeks ago at Barcelona, while row two saw the potential 2008 World Champion protagonists lining up, with Hamilton getting the nod over the Iceman. Even more impressive? Was the fact that both Red Bull runners made it into Q3, albeit by the time it came around, Coulthard had already used up his allotment of “soft” option tires and both drivers made only last minute runs with Webber grabbing 6th place behind the Heavy Hitters…

I did enjoy the comments between Professor Matchett and Peter Winsor over the slickness of their past race teams, when Matchett was discussing the mistakes of Toyota crew members using the radio to tell Jarno to pit at Barcelona when nothing was wrong with his car.

This led to Winsor telling a story about Patrick Head screaming into the radio for Nelson Piquet to PIT- PIT- PIT… F%%KING BLOODY PIT!!! As Peter noted that Messer Head got so enraged that he threw off his headset in disgust, before it was discovered he was NOT pushing the transmit button…

Which segways nicely with the best (Only?) Radio intercept of the race
Toyota Engineer to Jar no; “You’re 3 seconds behind DC and NICO’s a further +1 seconds, try to catch up to them…

Truly: “I’m pushing like HELL!” (YOU BLEEPIN’ IDIOT!)

Another excellent comment came from Messer Winsor in regards to the very KOOL thermal imaging camera that was used for the very first time during qualifying and then again during the race…

As the House of Winsor asked during qualifying; What colour is it showing for Nico Rosberg’s head? As there’s smoke pouring out of his helmet right now after not being able to make it into the Q3 final “Qualie” session…

And according to Ferrari’s Felipe Massa upon his Turkish hat trick, during the post race interview hosted by none other than SPEED’s Peter Winsor;

Q: Felipe, you like winning from pole. The Turkish Grand Prix always results in a winner from pole and everything delivered for you today.

Felipe Massa: It is just fantastic. Today was a very difficult race actually and Lewis was pushing me hard a lot for the whole race. Then when I did my pit-stop he was there straight away, so I thought maybe he had put less fuel in or something. I then realised and my team told me straight away he was on three stops. For sure, that was a little bit of help as he was very strong and I couldn't hold him on the track and he passed me. But then I knew I still had a good chance to win the race as three stops were a little bit optimistic. But anyway I created a reasonable gap to be at the front after the pit stops. It was difficult, but we made it three times in Turkey which is just fantastic…

“I think I can get a passport here already!”

Qualifying Results
Pole: F. Massa; 2. H. Kovalainen; 3. L. Hamilton; 4. K. Raikkonen;
5. R. Kubica; 6. M. Webber; 7. F. Alonso; 8. J. Trulli; 9. N. Heidfeld;
10. D. Coulthard

Race Results
Winner: F. Massa; 2. L. Hamilton; 3. K. Raikkonen; 4. R. Kubica;
5. N. Heidfeld; 6. F. Alonso; 7. M. Webber; 8. N. Rosberg

2008 F1 Point Standings
(Round 5 of 18)

Driver’s
K. Raikkonen 35
F. Massa 28
L. Hamilton 28
R. Kubica 24
N. Heidfeld 20

Constructors
Ferrari 63
BMW Sauber 44
McLaren 42
Williams 13
Red Bull 10

Spanish Flies

Amazingly Heikki Kovalainen escaped Un-Injured from his massive crash during the Spanish Grand Prix…
-
As fortunately FIA mandated safety design standards have vastly improved driver’s chances of survivability in today’s F1 racing cars. Imagine if this had been the 1980’s when driver’s lower extremities were placed far forwards of the front axle centerline…

Yet for those of us who watched a fairly processional Spanish GP, we were momentarily stunned by Heikki Kovalainen’s massive shunt against the tire barrier thru a 140mph corner…

According to Ron Dennis and Martin Whitemarsh, the team suspects that a “rogue” piece of stone somehow lodged itself between the front tire rim and suspension, as a sudden, unexplained loss of air pressure sent the hurtling McLaren straight thru the sand trap, impailing the stricken MP4-23 underneath the tire barrier… As it took ten minutes to dislodge Heikki from the cockpit of his heavily wrecked McLaren, which miraculously he would escape without injury!

Once again I found Friday’s second practice session TV coverage more informative then Saturday’s qualifying program, albeit Fredrico Suave did NOT disappoint his fellow countrymen, with a light tanks go for broke qualifying run in the dramatic Q3 Final “Qualie” session…

Paddock notes
Peter Winsor noted how glad he was to have his job and how good it was to see Bernie Ecclestone strolling the paddock, making sure that the F1 team’s palatial “Motor Coaches” were all parked perfectly a half inch away from each other…

Super Aguri was extended a further Grand Prix as it appears that its buy-out from the Magma Group has fallen apart. Honda F1’s boss Nick Fry said that Honda had paid a further 2.0 million Euros for the tiny “B-Team” to race this weekend, but don’t expect any further funding at Turkey…

Various discussions were made about the new aero treatments several teams were running, most notably Honda’s “Rabbit-ears,” NOT to be confused with last years version of “Elephant-ears” which Steve Matchett claimed the team had to discontinue because they were so UGLY!

Professor Matchett also discussed Renault’s new Dorsal Fin treatment on the spine of the rear engine cover a la Red Bull Racing; For more info see Speed TV’s chalkboard section…

While poised to become the most experienced man in Formula 1, Honda’s Rubens Barrichello completed two race distances back-to-back during the most recent test at Barcelona, a feat of 150 laps…

The House of Winsor noted how card playing has become all the rage in the F1 Paddock, as “Fishy-fella,” Tonio Luzzi, both BMW-Sauber boyzs and Ferdi the Putz, a.k.a. Alonso have all taken to playing poker until 11:30PM every Saturday night, while Giancarlo Fisichella is the man to beat…

Adrian Newey’s Red Bull version of the Scuderia Toro Rosso STR-03 is still on track to debut at Turkey despite Bourdais’s big crash…

And speaking of the Hamburgular, a.k.a. Sebastain Bourdeax (Bourdais) he’s managed to steal a better qualifying position ahead of more experienced teammate Sebastian Vettel once again, along with beating senior F1 driver DC!

And it was funny to see the Force India F1 team atop the time sheets for a long portion of Friday’s second practice session, with “Fisi” leading Adrian Sutil, who were then split by The Iceman… Before “Kazoo” Nakajima jumped to the top with Nico Rosberg hot on his heels, before the Spanish crowd went ecstatic with homeboy Fredrico Suave and Nelson Nelson of the Renault squad taking their turn at the top of the page…

But as Sir Jackie (Stewart) so bluntly pointed out on Peter Winsor’s grid walk, NOBODY would beat Kimi Raikkonen from pole… As he became the eighth driver in a row to win from the coveted grid position at Barcelona…

And while Alonso delighted the 132,000+ Spanish spectators, his engine finally “DONE BLOWN UP!” while running in the points… As it had been previously pointed out that engines were reported to cost a cool $250,000 Euros a copy. What’s that David? About $400k large greenbacks Bob Varsha quipped…


Qualifying results
Pole: Kimi Raikkonen; 2. Fernando Alonso; 3. Felipe Massa; 4. Robert Kubica; 5. Lewis Hamilton; 6. Heikki Kovalainen; 7. Mark Webber; 8. Jarno Trulli: 9. Nick Heidfeld; 10. Nelson Piquet Jr

Race results
Winner: K. Raikkonen; 2. F. Massa; 3. L. Hamilton; 4. R. Kubica;
5. M. Webber; 6. Jenson Button: 7. Kazuki Nakajima; 8. J. Trulli

2008 F1 Point Standings
Round 4 of 18)

Driver’s
K. Raikkonen 29
L. Hamilton 20
R. Kubica 19
F. Massa 18
N. Heidfeld 16
H. Kovalainen 14

Constructors
Ferrari 47
BMW Sauber 35
McLaren 34
Williams 12
Red Bull 8

Bahrain Sand Dunes

I’d have to say that with the continuing Maxxum-gate and the St. Pete Indy Car race, my thoughts have been wandering like the shifting sands of the Bahrain Kingdom, which still amazes me that the entire Island nation is smaller than the square footage of the neighboring Saudi Arabia airport…

Thus I found Friday’s practice session to be fairly non-descript, besides the re-hashing of Max Mosley’s Pictionary games. Although I found it a bit funny to hear how Professor Matchett’s ex co-worker (John Wheatley) and crew chief of some guy named Schumacher’s at Benetton had been called before the FIA to explain the rash of Red Bull’s suspension failures and whether or not the chassis were indeed safe?

I also enjoyed hearing Peter Winsor’s recanting of the Williams team fooling the FIA scrutineers over the mirror’s rearward visibility, saying that they’d had an Engineer hooked up to a radio to say yes… As the steward scurried about the rear of the car as Adrian Newey had positioned the mirrors in an outward’s location in favour of aerodynamics vs. driver’s visibility. As this had all come up over DC’s less than complimentary comments over the radio we’d been allowed to hear.

And the comment towards The Krakow Kid (Robert Kubica) deciding to loose six kilos of weight off his rakish thin frame in order to help the BMW Sauber team play with ballast is simply astounding! (6 kilos = 13.23lbs) As I always find this utterly amazing when drivers go to such measures in the vain of ultimate car performance…

Then with 8 minutes to go Lewis Hamilton slid over a kerb and slammed sideways into the tire wall, ripping the front wheel and suspension mounts clean off his chassis, to which the McLaren mechanics would stay at the track until 4:30AM building up a new vehicle, as the FIA has STUPIDLY Banned the use of spare chassis this season. Although the teams are allowed to bring spare monocoque’s (tubs) they’re not allowed to be built-up units and thus the McLaren boys worked late into the night building up a new chassis for Hamilton as he’d tweaked the sensitive bonded suspension pick-up points into disrepair, as well as both Louise’s and Heikki’s cars having issues with their transmissions… Ah, the life of an F1 mechanic, eh?

Yet the only surprise of Q1 Qualifying was the Hamburgular outpacing his teammate, the German hot schue Sebastian Vettel, as Sea Bass’s 9th time held up for P16 as the runners completed their flying laps, thus Bourdais made his way forward into Q2, out qualifying Vettel for the first time this season.

And the usual suspects made their way forwards from Q2 into the final Q3 Qualie session, although it was “Jense’s” first time this far up the grid in quite some time.

And I don’t know about you, but I really enjoy the camaraderie that the Three Amigos in the SPEED TV Formula 1 broadcast booth have developed, as Bob Varsha and David Hobbs have been friend and broadcasting colleagues for several years, thus I broke into laughter when Hobbo claimed that ‘Ol Phil Massa was lurking like a Spectre over Louise’s shoulder towards the final Qualie session… Which caused Varsha to chide the elder Hobb’s: NO more coffee for you. (Sunshine)

As although Massa had been blindingly quick the whole qualifying session, he was pipped by Kubica at the very end of the session by less than three one-hundred’s of a second, which gave both the Krakow Kid and BMW Sauber their very first Pole position, which of course caused Varsha to make the requisite Pole on Pole jokes…

Although it was later revealed that it was the very first time in Sauber’s 15yrs as a Constructor and the first time that a new team and driver had garnered the honours since Rubens Barrichello scored the REAL EJ’s (Eddie Jordan) first Pole in 1994.

Thus the grid formed up with Kubica on Pole, Massa in P2, with Hamilton third with the Iceman Kimi alongside in fourth. Row three saw Heikki ahead of Quick Nick in the second BMW Sauber. Row four was an all Toyota engine affair with Toyota’s Trulli “Scrumptious joined by Williams Nico Rosberg, with Jense’s Honda lining up in P9 with the affable Spaniard Alonso slotted in tenth.

Yet Kubica’s moment in the spotlights was soon finished, as Phil Massa sprang like a champagne cork and took the lead, immediately screaming off into the distance on the first of his many hot laps. But the commotion of lap one fell to Hamilton’s unusual lack of pace as the lights went green, dropping from P3 all the way back to tenth, even worse, being stuck behind his favourite dancing partner… Some dude named Fredrico Suave… Who I believe gave the young Louise a patented Ferdi (Hi) Jink as we witnessed Hamilton clouting into the rear of Alonso’s slower Renault which demolished Lewis’s front nose and effectively ruined his race…

After these shenanigans settled down and Professor Matchett pointed out the large chunk of rear wing missing from Ferdi’s rear wing… The race settled down into somewhat procession-like running, although there was an entertaining dust-up between Button and DC. And the comments about DC’s mirrors of course came into the fray as well as Jense not having too far to drive as he’s taken up residence in the Bahrain Kingdom something to do with not having to pay taxes… Although it seems a bit galling to think that this little Island can successfully host a GP with a maximum attendance of 34,000 spectators, while Tony’s ‘lil Sandbox isn’t good enough for Emperor Bernardo…

And speaking of Coulthard, he earned the word of the week, when describing kerb hopping as; Kerb Strike.

Thus as the Ferrari boyzs traded fastest laps and drove off into the sunset, the BMW Sauber teammates were left to scrum over the final podium position, which Kubica held onto, while Massa redeemed himself with the Italian press by convincingly winning over Raikkonen.

Kimi’s second place finish propelled him into the championship points lead while Hamilton’s 13th place finish. (His career worst) dropped him to third in the standings, while Kubica’s podium coupled with Heidfeld’s fourth place sees BMW Sauber take the Constructor’s points lead by one point over the Scuderia, who lead McLaren by a further one point, as we’ll now have a three week break for everyone to get rested up before the European season kicks-off in Barcelona…


Driver’s Point Standings
K. Raikkonen 19
N. Heidfeld 16
L. Hamilton 14
R. Kubica 14
H. Kovalainen 14


Constructors Points Standings
BMW Sauber 30
Ferrari 29
McLaren 28

Malaysia madness

OOPS! In all of my excitement of watching and reflecting upon the Australian GP, I forgot to watch the Friday free practice session aired late Thursday evening on SPEED. Not to mention NOT being able to figure out why the recording machine wouldn’t tape the qualifying and race episodes… Oh SHEISA!!! That’s right, the VCR is screwed ‘cause Daylight $avings time has been modified! Fortunately I was able to watch the Qualie session “live” and the re-broadcasted race while y’all were busy searchin’ for Easter eggs…

And there didn’t seem to be too much news, although Peter Winsor noted that the main Talking Point in the garage was the FIA deciding to put Red Bull on notice over the disintegrating suspension failures that David Coulthard has endured over the past two weeks.

Winsor noted that a McLaren design employee who’d remain nameless had scoffed that they used to add 25% more material to all of Adrian Newey’s designs (when he wasn’t around) to ensure chassis reliability… Yet the FIA has painted itself into somewhat of a corner, having previously deemed the RB4 crash worthy upon it’s passing of the current regulations, as there’s currently no structural integrity tests required for suspension components.

And Winsor noted that it was indeed blistering on the grid as the 90+ degrees, 85% humidity had him sweating profusely, while the drivers seemed to not be too bothered by the oppressive heat.

And in a reversal of fortunes, the Prancing Horse managed to lock-up the front row with Felipe Massa scoring his tenth career pole position with teammate Kimi Raikkonen alongside. Originally McLaren’s Heikki Kovalainen and Lewis Hamilton had secured the grid places of third and fourth, but the stewards deemed them to have both been on the racing line on their cool down laps while we watched Nick Heidfeld trying to get around them on a last lap flyer… Along with Fredrico Suave, thus both McLaren drivers were docked five grid positions for their indiscretions...

This elevated Truly Scrumptious (Jarno Truly) to third with The Krakow Kid (Kubica) alongside in fourth. Quick Nick (Heidfeld) who’s been slightly outperformed by his teammate lined up P5 with Mark “Dundee” Weber lining up sixth. And isn’t it funny how some Putz named Alonso cannot manage to get away from the McLarens… As Ferdi was in P7 alongside Renault refugee Kovalainen, while Hamilton was joined by Timo Glock on row five.

Nelson Nelson managed to improve his qualifying pace, lining up in 12th, while the Hamburgular wasn’t having such a good time in the oppressive heat of Kuala Lumpar, as Bourdais suffered a brake failure, an engine change, along with being fined over $6,000 for two pit lane speeding tickets.

As the lights turned green, Felipe Massa performed some Herr Schumacher surgery on the Iceman at the start of the race to keep the lead, while not too many fireworks occurred behind the red cars scrum, “Louise Jaguar” (Hamilton) managed to work his way up to fifth behind Mark Webber’s Red Bull chassis.

And I enjoyed the House of Winsor’s cynical comment about how perhaps the young Louise was simply awaiting a brake explosion or suspension failure from the Red Bull car and didn’t wish to get to close to the reportedly hard to pass Aussie… While Massa and Raikkonen traded fast laps while pulling away from the field.

Then the dreaded announcer’s curse was bestowed upon the young Brazilian, as David Hobbs stated that the Ferrari’s absolutely had the field spotted, Massa pirouetted off into the sand trap and beached himself while trying to keep pace with The Iceman, who’d gotten around Felipe during the first round of pit stops. Raikkonen had just blistered the field with a 1:36.1 lap with new second place runner Kubica managing a 1:37.6!

From thereon out, Kimi cruised home to his 16th career victory, coming on the fifth anniversary of his very first Formula 1 win at the same venue. Kubica took second with Kovalainen claiming the final podium position. Jarno Truly came home an impressive fourth ahead of Hamilton…


Driver standings
Hamilton 14
Heidfeld 11
Raikkonen 11
Kovalainen 10
Kubica 8

Thunder Down Under

CRIKEYS MATES!!!

That seems to be about the only thing I can think of that appropriately sum’s up the 2008 Formula 1 season opening race just held in the Land of Oz!


Friday practice notes
The Boyzs are Back
The Boyzs are Back…

Now it must “Trulli” be Spring as the SPEED TV gang is back once again to bring us the magnificent sights ‘N sounds of Formula 1! And although they’re not quite the boys of summer, I’ll take the Quartet of Bob Varsha, David Hobbs, Steve Matchett and Peter Winsor ANY day OVER the chalkboard high pitched noise machine affectionately known as the RASSCAR RAT PACK! (Mr. Boogity; DW, Larry Mac ‘N Cheese, Jeffery Arm & Hammond, Kenny “The Beaver” Wallace and Jimmy Mr. Goodbar Spencer)

Vijay Malia’s massive cash infusion into the new & improved Force India F1 team has the squad so enthused, that Chief Technical Officer Mike Gascoyne has brashly stated that if the VJ-M01 isn’t vastly up the grid by the season’s third quarter mark, then he should be fired! Careful of what you wish for MATE! Then again he’s pretty proficient at “Gardening Leave,” eh? Ah, don’t uze just lov’s the smell ‘O enthusiasm? Kinda like those new car deodorants you hang around your car mirror as the beginning of a new season bubbles over with optimism…

My very favourite Pit Reporter (Peter Winsor) was his usual krack-up-self, while interviewing Renault head designer Bob Bell, saying c’mon Bob when are you gonna win? To which Bell replied if they don’t get cracking this season then he’ll probably need to borrow Messer Gascoyne’s seeking employment want ads. And while discussing his much beloved adaptation of the SECU, Winsor rhetorically asked; do you mean drivers may actually have to de-clutch once again?

Winsor’s next target of affection was Honda test driver Alex Wurz, as a good bit of shtick was dolled out over Wurz’s needing to wear sunglasses while missing out on the Honda bloomer’s…

To which Varsha quickly quipped; Honda’s green-green shorts would get his vote as Team Schrek!

And speaking of bloomers, from the Varsha WAY TOO MUCH INFO files came the tidbits of David Coulthard’s shopping junket Down Under, claiming that DC has a penchant for buying up to forty pairs ‘O boxers, size small… To which quickly deteriorated into a bad skit by “Hobbo” over seeing Flavor Flav in a pair ‘O briefs while pooh-pooh-ing Briatore’s impending wedding to Victoria Secret supermodel Deanna Miller…

To which Matchett tried to awkwardly segway into much more serious techno-babble over the miniscule ride height adjustments the teams were currently making in the garages. Yet it is amazing how mechanics are constantly at work shimming the suspensions between half and one millimeter which makes crucial aerodynamic changes. Professor Matchett proclaimed that half of a millimeter is approximately the thickness of a hard back novel’s page… While the teams will need to add shimming to raise the chassis in proportion to the amount of fuel added, as the extra weight actually forces the chassis downwards.

Matchett also commented on the BMW Sauber’s front nose treatment by naming it the Bullwinkle treatment, in regards to the addition of the Viking style appendages that first adorned McLaren’s air box a few seasons ago, by placing a smaller pair of protrusions over the front suspension uprights.

There also seemed to be some confusion over the 2008 rules as Varsha noted that there’s NO spare car this year, although I heard it mentioned that somebody was in their team’s spare chassis for the race. And leave it to the WMSC to make the rules as clear as mud on a rainy day… As although Varsha is theoretically correct, the rules state that teams are allowed only two complete chassis at any given time, yet one may build up a new car as long as the engine and transmission along with all of the other nefarious FIA sealed bits remain intact in the changeover. Although I do NOT like this new rule as there is simply NOT enough flexibility to ensure a “Full” grid of 22 chassis. Nevertheless I suppose this rule was concocted under the aspics of MAD Max’s beloved cost cutting measures, while really trying to persuade drivers from committing any further Senna-Prost intentional crashing shenanigans.

I was also unaware that if you change your transmission prior to its mandatory four race weekend’s duty cycle you will receive a five grid spot penalty, a la premature engine changes, although this year teams are granted a “Mulligan” on the draconian 10 grid spot penalty. And while engine design has been frozen thru 2010, the manufactures are required to run 5.75% biomass fuel content this season as the FIA sheepishly tries to turn green, also having cut the Q3 fuel burning segment.

And I’d also not heard about the 2009 rules changes which will see a massive 50% reduction in aerodynamics, which will see the deletion of many of the countless winglets, flip-ups and aerodynamic aids…

Varsha also proclaimed that Renault new boy Nelson Piquet Jr was no longer wishing to be known as Junior or Senior and apparently will go by the nickname Nelson Nelson… As there will be NO more Junior biz.


Saturday Qualie-Quips
Some of you may already know about the newly revised Qualifying format, which thankfully sees the deletion of the Q3 fuel burning phase… (Note to Tony George, way to go on ADDING laps to Oval qualifying this season) Thus last years three segments of 15-15-15 minutes has been revised to Q1: 20minutes; Q2: 15 and Q3: 10, while all of the other previous rules still apply, i.e.; laps started prior to the checkered flag count and race fuel loads for the top ten must be in the tanks prior to the beginning of Q3, with positions 11-22 being allowed to re-adjust their fuel ballast up to 90 minutes prior to the green flag.

I’d say that the biggest disappointment of Q1 had to be Nelson Nelson not being able to haul his way up to P16, being relegated to a 21st starting position. Hmm? Hey Flavio, now what do you think about making Heikki walk the plank.

And speaking of Renault, reportedly the “Reggie” is paying Fernando Alonso $46 million per season to drive the Bleu machines, while the rumours of Ferrari driver shuffles has once again been wound-up, with German Hot Schue Sebastian Vettel’s name also being cast about. Oh crap, here we go again! And it’s NOT even anywhere’s near the official start of Silly Season, SHEISA!

And what in the HELL happened to the Kimster in Q2? As apparently Raikkonen had a fuel pressure problem, to which The House of Winsor immediately jumped on by proclaiming he was putting his cynical cap on… To which Varsha chided, Who, You? What me worry? While Peter went into his bad Italian accent, quickly proclaiming that it OBVIOUSLY had something to do with the McLaren/Microsof Common ECU control unit…

And Ferdi the Putz was uncharacteristically out of the top ten for only the second time since 2006, while Homeboy Mark Webber was bitterly disappointed to have suffered a front brake disc explosion, as I had a moment of brilliance upon nicknaming Robert Kubica as “The Krakow Kid” upon Varsha’s repeated comments of the Pole’s residence.

So it was a somewhat jumbled starting grid with Lewis Hamilton gaining his seventh pole, followed by Kubica. Kovalainen lined up third with Felipe Massa in fourth while Kimi was forced to settle for 15th. Quick Nick Heidfeld was 5th with Toyota’s Jarno Trulli in 6th. Row Four was filled by Nico Rosberg and David Coulthard, while Timo Glock slotted into P9 and Vettel rounded out the top ten…


Sunday Race notes
”Sunday driver NEVER took a test, out in the wild, wild, west!”

I’m NOT even gonna try to rehash the massive carnage of the race as there were simply too many incidents to cover, from Jarno Trulli’s “Hot Bot,” due to an exploding battery. The antics of Drivers being Drivers by having a multiple car melee on the first lap after the winter’s break… The Iceman loosing his cool by slithering off track twice; “The Krakow Kid’s” untimely undoing behind the safety car by Nakajima, along with poor ‘Ol Rubinoe’s fueling rig schumozzle… Aye Karumba!

As Professor Matchett was “Johnny-on-the-spot” catching Barrichello’s red light running, of which he was correctly DQ’ed one hour after the race, which means that the Australian GP saw only six classified runners at the chequered flag, tying the lowest number since the 2005 USGP Michelin Tyre debacle!

Yet in the end it was business as usual for Louise “Jaguar” Hamilton who thoroughly dominated the race, with Quick Nick and Nico on the podium. It was genuinely nice to see Hamilton hug his karting buddy Rosberg in congratulation’s of scoring his first F1 career podium, as Lewis eluded to during the post race interview it was the first time in eight years they’d shared a podium since their go karting days…

Word of the Week
“

El Twich-Oe”

Or as David Hobbs proclaimed meant extremely twitchy in El Spanol, while watching Fredrico Suave cutting a rug with the underperforming Renault R28, as I’m still not exactly sure what’s up with all of this talk about Ferdi’s differential giving him grief, as I thought it was Heikki Kovalainen in the McLaren…

Best “Dust Up”
Of the weekend has to go to the scrap between Fredrico and Heikki as Messer Hobbs duly noted that Alonso would be most desperate to keep the McLaren of Finnish new boy Heikke behind him, as the Ronster was forced to wipe the smile off of his mug after Kovalainen’s late race pass for fourth place was gifted back to the Spaniard upon Heikke inadvertently hitting the pit lane speed limiter…

Yet Alonso’s fourth place should have gone to the Hamburgular (Sebastian Bourdais) whose Ferrari lump went KUH-BLAMOE! With only two laps remaining, as I find it most odd to be suddenly rooting for the former Champ Car champ-pee-on! Yet he managed to avoid trouble and was leading the two time World Champion and Heikke’s McLaren in the closing laps before the McLaren boffins cut the spark to the 2.4 liter Ferrari V-8!

And it was so nice to NOT have to listen to Fredrico in the post race interviews!

Shanghai Shuffle

Well I just finished watching the Chinese Grand Prix and it certainly was an entertaining race! As I was absolutely thrilled to see “Kimster the Iceman” WIN!!! And he did it in quite typical fashion with another Bonsai move around World Championship and at that moment race leader Lewis Hamilton.

And what can you say about Louise? I mean that must have been heartbreak? Err heartburn to throw your race away on completely destroyed Bridgestone rubber.

And what about those Scuderia Toro Rosso drivers, eh? Sebastian Vettel continues to impress with a superb fourth place, the first time a Toro Rosso/Minardi has finished that high since Kyalami, 1993! And Vitantonnio Luzzi finished sixth ahead of Nick Heidfeld’s BMW Sauber to give STR their very first two car point’s finish… And with the 8 points scored, Toro Rosso leapfrogs past both Honda teams and Spyker in the Constructor’s point’s standings.

And I noticed that Maranello didn’t buckle to the EU’s pressure to not run their “Bad Habit’s” livery this weekend as I spotted both Ferrari pilot’s with Marlboro adorning their driver’s caps during the interview sessions. And speaking of scuderia Ferrari Marlboro, with Kimi Raikkonen scoring his fifth victory of the season, he netted Ferrari its 200th Career victory!

So with one race left in a fortnight at San Paolo, Brazil, will Louise “Jaguar” Hamilton make history as the very first Rookie World Champion ever in Formula 1? Hamilton definitely holds the advantage, being 7 points clear of Raikkonen and 4 points ahead of Alonso…

Singing’ in the Rain?

Holy Downpour Batman!!! Wasn’t that the MOST DIABOLICAL racing conditions you’ve seen in years? As I’m flabbergasted that the FIA actually squeezed in the entire race distance at the rain drenched Mount Fuji circuit…

Talk about earning your paycheck, as I simply couldn’t believe that those F1 pilot’s were capable of hurtling their race cars around in such HORRIFIC weather conditions. As the race seemed eerily reminiscent of the inaugural Japanese Grand Prix held at Mount Fuji 31 years ago!

You may recall that this was the race that Niki Lauda abandoned due to heavy rainfall, claiming the weather made the race too dangerous and there by handing that year’s Driver’s title to James Hunt.

The following year’s event was little better, with the first and second place drivers (James Hunt, Carlos Reutemann) skipping the podium ceremonies in favour of catching their flights. And with Niki Lauda having already wrapped up the 1977 Driver’s title for Ferrari, before departing the team as his relationship with Enzo had faltered. Lauda was replaced by Gilles Villeneuve whom had a tragic accident that killed a Marshal and photographer!

And although I know I watched it way back when? I simply don’t remember seeing the abominable race Down Under. As the 1991 Australian GP was Red flagged after only 14 laps with Ayrton Senna being declared the victor and half points awarded. And what was that race when Senna rammed into the back of whom in the rain…

Of course I suspect holding a motor race near the base of an extinct volcano in the fall will always be prone to inclement weather, eh? Although overall this is supposedly the better portion of the year to visit the Orient. So I can only ponder what this week’s conditions at Shanghai will be?

And if you think the organizers are NUTS for running at Mount Fuji so late in the season, my way back memory machine faintly recollected the 1994 Japanese GP as Professor Matchett was waxing eloquently about it. As the Suzuka race was held on November 13 and was also Red flagged after Martin Brundle struck a marshal attending a previously stricken race car in the exact locale and broke his leg! Yeah, you guessed it; it was RAINING that day too…

As for the racing, it seemed quite hard to follow this weekend, as there seemed to be a constant parade of race cars throwing up huge rooster tails behind them. And I’m still quite bemused over how Ferrari will indeed spin its wet weather tire advantage. Err excuse me Mr. Todt! Didn’t you get the memo? But who says that the FIA doesn’t play favourites?

And without doubt the star of the weekend had to be German “hot-shue” Sebastian Vettel, who took the Scuderia Toro rosso to never seen before performance heights… As it was pointed out that the last time a Minardi Tail-gunner Charlie” had led a Grand Prix was Estoril, 1989!

As Vettel became the very first driver to push a Toro Rosso into “Q3” Final Qualifying. Although he gave the Williams-Toyota team a bit of a surprise when he attempted pulling into their pit stall at the end of the Q2 session…

And Vettel’s weekend long “High” continued into the race, when the young German found himself leading his very first Grand Prix. Unfortunately the entire weekend would be for naught as catastrophe struck during the second Safety Car period. With “Big Brother” Mark Webber (Red Bull) second and Vettel third behind race leader Lewis Hamilton, young Sebastian rammed into the rear of an unexpecting Webber…

Mark Webber (DNF, Accident)
"That was a completely disastrous finish. We were in very, very good shape to challenge Lewis for first today. We were strong and I didn't make any mistakes despite the tricky conditions, cars were aquaplaning and the visibility was very poor. Fernando's crash caused the second safety car stint, which bunched everyone back up again. That wasn't great; I would have liked to have continued to the end of the race. Vettel was a bit wild behind me during the first safety car period and then did a very good job of hitting me very hard under the second safety car. I think today he will have learnt a very valuable lesson."

Adding insult to injury was the fact that Vettel’s teammate Vitantonnio Luzzi was deemed to have passed Adrian Sutil’s spyker under a yellow flagged corner for the final points paying position.

Which made me very happy to learn as I’m most impressed by my “Rookie of the Year” candidate Messer. Sutil, whom was elevated to eighth place upon the stewards giving Luzzi a 25 second time penalty which dropped him to ninth. Thus Toro Rosso is now the only constructor to have not scored points this season.

And as further penalty to Vettel’s errant ways during the second Safety Car shenanigans… Sebastian has been docked a ten grid spot penalty for China…

Meanwhile the race ending saw a terrific tussle between two Finns, as Heikki Kovalainen and Kimi Raikkonen frolicked about in the monstrous spray while challenging each other for second place. This would see two Finns on the podium for the very first time in history.

And rumours suggest that Lewis Hamilton’s father (and manager) Anthony has hammered out a new five year $110 million deal to stay at McLaren. That’s a paltry $22 million per season for all of you math whizzes out there.

Yet I found myself having a new found admiration for the young “Louise Jaguar Hamilton.” As not only was he fast, nor put a wheel wrong the entire race, he’s also tremendously smooth. As I marveled at his mannerisms of thanking the Japanese crowd for enduring such ABYSMAL weather conditions during the post race interview.

And speaking of memo’s, I seemed to have missed the one noting that the Japanese Grand Prix will alternate venues between Suzuka and Mount Fuji beginning in 2009…

Canadian Bacon

Ok, so it seems a little late, but I just finally finished watching all of the Canadian Grand Prix action “just-in-time” for this weekend’s “mega” coverage of the USGP.

And I have to say I didn’t find too much out of the ordinary to report. Although I do enjoy the Professor Matchett technical segments. And how many of you realize that John Wheatley, who’s featured in the RPM (Racing Per Matchett) is an old colleague of Steve’s from his Benetton days?

If I remember correctly, Wheatley was responsible for the front end of none other than somebody named Michael Schumacher’s chassis. As each car had a three member crew assigned to it at the factory.

Even though Matchett was the rear jack man during pit stops on race day. Steve was responsible for the front end of Schuey’s teammates chassis during his tenure at Benetton, while the rear end of each chassis had two men assigned to it. You can read all about these characters in Matchett’s first book: Life in the Pit Lane. (Check out Steve’s novels: Life in the Pit Lane, The Mechanics Tale and The Chariot Makers) And although I have his first & third books, I feel like waiting to obtain the middle book of his trilogy before continuing. So as to not pull a George Lucas trilogy of starting with the last first. But once again, I digress.

Interestingly Louis Hamilton and Giancarlo Fisichella had the top trap speeds of 196mph. So there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with the Renault’s horsepower. Just handling and dare I say it. Drivers?

And I spent several hours marveling over how in the HELL did “Ralfanso” (R. Schumacher) MISS that Marmot? I mean that was amazing to see the little critter in slow motion looking at the front tires… And being so close that it could read each letter of the sidewall. B-R-I-D-G-E-S-T-O-N-E!

I also enjoyed Professor Matchett’s long discourse on the Toyota’s rakish front suspension geometry. As Toyota’s Jarno Trulli suffered not one but two failures during Friday’s practice sessions. Interestingly Toyota appears to be running the steepest front suspension geometry angles. Which of course produces higher stress loads on the wishbones. And I found it intriguing to hear Matchett comment that Toyota is actually using MMC suspension pieces along with the de rigour carbon fibre. MMC is the acronym for Metal Matrix Composites, which is a blending of metal with other compounds. Apparently the failures were due to kurb hopping which is an integral part of F1 racing.

And speaking of Toyota. Messer Matchett mentioned that he’d heard from 2-3 reliable sources that the Japanese giant was pondering the purchase of Williams in 2 to 3 years from now? This would see the closing down of the Colone facility and moving the entire operation to Grove where Williams is headquartered. Although this is purely speculation. Bob Varsha also chimed in by saying he’d had discussions with a GP2 driver who had picked his team based on the plans to move up to Formula 1 in the future.

Yet without a doubt, my favorite moment of the race was witnessing Takuma Sato PASS Fernando Alonso on track for 6th place. As I screamed gleefully at the TV, preceding the maneuver. “Get him Taku! Get him Taku! Get him Taku!”

In fairness(?) to Alonso. Taku also passed Felipe Massa’s Ferrari on track. So where in the HELL did the mighty dragon slayer come from? I mean a “Super Best Friend’s” chassis passing the top two Constructor’s in a single race?

And talk about a wacky race… Did you notice the safety car skating on the marble’s during one of its four dispatchments. As well as when was the last time two drivers were black flagged for ignoring the red light at the end of pit lane? Somehow I suspect that this week’s USGP may be much more sublime…

Malaysia Sound Bites

Actually that’s STEAMY Malaysia. Or perhaps it was the Sepang Sauna… With ambient temperatures of 93+ deg f. and track temps. Of 133+ deg f. Here’s a few interesting sound bites gleamed from this weekend’s SPEED TV coverage of the Malaysian Grand Prix.

Most entertaining radio comment of the week: From our esteemed Americano Scott “nose” Speed: They’res somebody speaking Italian on my radio! Just what a driver wants to hear while trying to scream down the straight at 180+ mph. But as Bob Varsha noted: “I thought you drove for an Italian team””

And Steve Matchett had an interesting point to Speed’s other lengthy radio transmission.

Speed: “Touching on corners X & Y. Feels like there’s something under my heel stop? What else… Oh yeah, when I went to try warming up the brakes I got massive lock-up from all four wheels and the brake pedal feels a bit spongy compared to the other car!”

Matchett: Touching refers to the “Plank.” That’s about right, for maximum down force you want the ride height plank to be just touching at the end of the straights. The plank is a FIA legality device to ensure that the teams aren’t running their chassis too low, since if you wear off 1mm you can be disqualified. These planks are made out of a composite material. (Jabrock)

(This is the famous “plank” that cost Michael Schumacher a victory in 1994. So perhaps the 2005 USGP Michelin tyre DEBACLE was some sort of a “payback?”)

Matchett: As for Toro Rosso’s drivers both having brake issues, it almost sounds like they’re (drivers) are not keeping the brakes “hot” enough. As the brakes will grab badly at just 800 deg f and they’re probably getting too cool on the long straights. Matchett claimed to go through an enormous amount of braking issues with Gerhard Berger…

Matchett: The drivers have NO excuses about being able to overtake at Sepang as the circuit is 70’ wide in places…

Varsha: The teams are given 8 sets of tires for Friday, (4 sets of each soft & hard compound) which are then returned for Saturday’s allotment. For Saturday they’re given 10 sets (5 sets of each soft & hard compound) with a provision that they have to return one set each of these tires. Confused? Stick with us and we’ll explain it over the weekend…

And Peter Winsor brought up an interesting point about tires while on the subject. Now that Bridgestone is the sole supplier of F1, Bridgestone produces four various compounds of the control tire. For Australia they brought their soft and medium compounds. For Malaysia they’re using the medium and hard compounds. (Due to the much more abrasive race surface and heat?)

While David Hobbs was giving the track layout description he mentioned how it was the Germans’ Herman Tilke’s very first Grand Prix race track design and it was a real shame that his subsequent tracks didn’t turn out as nicely… (This was the 9th year of the Malaysian GP with the track being completed 10yrs ago)

Winsor: And you know the reason why the drivers like the circuit so much? Because it’s a real drivers circuit as you really feel like you’re going somewhere, as it has really good rhythm. In fact this is most likely the BEST circuit they race on now that Suzuka is off of the calendar…

Varsha: “OOH! Even better than Spa?” David Coulthard is absolutely “Gaga” over the newly remodeled Spa Francorchamps that’s back on the calendar this year…

And I’m not sure that Malaysia would be my first pick for vacation spots as the camera panned in on Mika Hakkinen “chumming” about in the McLaren garage on pit lane. Hakkinen made a “bold” statement, declaring that “McLaren’s Back!” (Uh DUH!!!) He also has pronounced that he’ll win this year’s DTM championship…

Varsha: It’s absolutely amazing that they average 48 gear changes per lap around Malaysia… (So may be paddle shifting isn’t such a bad thing after all?)

Winsor asked if anybody had any thoughts about the floor flexing issue. Which prompted a very long dissertation by “Professor” Matchett.

Matchett: Using the telestrator, he tried drawing on screen while the picture kept changing upon him. “Right!” Now in my days at Benetton we used to call it the “Tea Tray” since it looks like a tea tray and we used it to ferry our cups ‘N saucers about.

Anyhow it appeared from his telestrator drawings that the item was the floor mounting above the front splitter just behind the front wheels. Matchett explained that if you could induce the floor to move up then you could lower the ride height of the car (front suspension) by 2-3mm which would give you a significant increase in lap times, i.e.; .03-.04 second per lap. This is what the new “seamless” shift transmissions are supposedly gaining…

Hobbs: That seems like a much more cost effective way of increasing lap times vs. the new transmission.

Matchett: You’re absolutely right David.

Hobbs: Is that that really really long article of yours I tried reading last night?

Matchett. You mean the one you read 4 lines of and got up?

Hobbs: Well I fell asleep trying to read it… Laughter from Matchett: Thanks Hobbs!”

Matchett claimed that if you went to SpeedTV.com keyword search F1 it would send you to the portal with all sorts of Formula 1 info. So I naturally assumed that this would be where the article is hidden? But I CANNOT find it on their website, so good luck!

Upon an interesting segment with Professor Matchett in regards to the exercise of packaging in Formula 1 with his ex-Benetton “croney” where they used last year’s Red Bull/Ferrari chassis to discuss radiator/cooling requirements, this segment led to another quip from Peter Winsor…

Winsor: You’d think that Adrian Newey would be too busy with the design of the RB3 to be off racing? And perhaps some of his employers would prefer he didn’t! Yet Newey plans to compete in this year’s 24 Heurs du Mans in a Ferrari. And this is after he wrote off a vintage car (Newey’s GT 40) during last year’s historic Le Mans…

Varsha: Actually he’s written off two important vehicles…

Matchett. What is going on at Honda? They ran a chassis with the rear wing covered in wool tufts… Isn’t that what they used to do in your days David?

The car had a rear facing mounted camera on the roll hoop to observe what the tufts were doing. But if they’re at the stage where they DON’T trust their wind tunnels then they’re obviously grasping at straws!

Matchett & Winsor further debated Honda’s woes by claiming that it was more of a “Harmony” issue where the “aero guys” and mechanical engineers will always be at odds with each other.

While doing the packaging segment it was noted how not only would aero dynamists want there to be NO cooling ducts, they’d also prefer to loose the drivers, steering wheel, tires, etc.

Varsha: My story line is how Honda, Toyota and Renault: All Factory teams were out qualified by their customers…

(Nico Rosberg drove the wheels off of his Williams-Toyota and was “ROBBED” of a 7th place finish! Interestingly Toyota is running the Williams transmission this season, while Alexander Wurz suffered a transmission failure during the race…)

Hobbs: My story line is how everybody is absolutely mushy over “Louise” Hamilton… I mean you hate to keep hyping the guy because usually when something’s too good, it is. And I hate to jinx the ladd…

Yet you would have to say that the highlight of the race was Lewis “jaguar” Hamilton’s absolutely stunning drive of holding both Ferrari’s at bay… I mean Felipe looked really ragged!

And if the weekend’s scuttle-butt was true about Kimi’s damaged Ferrari engine? As first they claimed he’d be taking a 10 grid spot penalty for changing “lumps” prior to qualifying… Then that they’d run simulations of low revs and tried wrecking a motor with low coolant levels…

If this really happened then it speaks volumes for Kimi’s opportunity to finally become a world champion as his “Achilles heel” at McLaren was the over abundance of race motors going “KABLAMOE!”

Next up this weekend is Bahrain. So with new motors installed for the majority of the grid, watch out McLaren…”

And by the way Ron Dennis… “How ‘bout those BMW Saubers!” So much for running on light tanks, eh?

Australia Sound Bites

Ah, aren’t those the coolest racing cars on the planet? And what a thrilling first race of the season.

Here are a few interesting “sound bites” gleamed from the SPEED channel’s TV coverage during the past weekend’s Australian Grand Prix.

Friday Notes
During the second practice session Peter Winsor commented on how the Honda F1 factory team has paid the agency seeking sponsorship deals for the past 15 months a retainer of $200,000 per month to come up with “Nothing.”

Winsor wanted to know David Hobbs opinion on the “Eco-Friendly” livery? Hobbs commented that he definitely had the wrong job as Bob Varsha chimed in that he’d have done the work for half the retainer…

McLaren spent $2 million on its 2007 “glitzy” launch in Valencia…

And in the wake of cost cutting, it was pointed out that with the No Engine grid spot penalty for Friday’s practice sessions. Renault is now bringing eight engines per weekend, up from the squad’s previous five per outing…

Saturday Notes
Once again Peter Winsor was on form with his sarcastic comments towards the plight of the Honda factory team. Winsor noted that there was a joke already making the rounds about how the Honda and Super Aguri would swap chassis for the second race in Malaysia…

After Button failed to move on to the “P3” final knock-out qualifying session, Winsor noted that cynics in the pit lane were already noting how “Jense’s” failing to make the top ten was actually a good thing. That way Honda was saving about 30 kilos of petrol which figured in nicely with their new “Planet Earth” scheme…

With both Honda’s failing to make the top ten, while both “Super Best Friends” outqualified their “Big Brother’s” and “Taku”
(Takuma Sato) notched Super aguri’s first ever foray into P3 qualifying, the ugly rumours over chassis cloning flared up once again.

Matchett noted that Williams was prepared to file legal action against three teams that it felt were grossly “illegal.” These are the teams that have been in question all winter long: Super Aguri, Toro Rosso and Red Bull Racing. Varsha noted it’ll be interesting to see how the other teams feel towards this issue…

And the “Iceman” is so cool. Upon Kimi Raikkonen securing his first pole for Ferrari in his very first team outing, Winsor noted that Kimi was the first driver to accomplish the feat since Juan Manuel Fangio had done so in 1956, a mere 51 years ago…

Interlagos Finale

I’ve just finished watching SPEED’S coverage of the penultimate round of the 2006 Formula One season held in San Paulo, Brazil. As always I found the insights of SPEED’S “4 Musketeer’s” enlightening…

BMW-Sauber confirmed it’s 2007 Driver line-up, which doesn’t seem too surprising as the team’s current trio will stay intact. Nick Heidfeld and Robert Kubica will remain race drivers, while 19 year old German sensation Sebastian Vettel will return as test driver…

Williams has begun testing a Toyota powered hybrid chassis with mixed results. Apparently the engine is reliable, but the chassis is slow. Williams has also announced that AT & T will become the team’s new title sponsor for 2007…

Renault chose to play it ultra-conservative with Fernando Alonso’s engine choice for the season finale. Renault decided to preclude Alonso from any on-track participation Friday in order to keep mileage to a minimum. Renault also decided to replace Alonso’s primary “E” spec engine with the spare cars “D” spec “lump.” Renault elected for Giancarlo Fisichella to utilize their latest specification “lump” (The E-spec) while Alonso ran the older-spec engine with proven reliability to maximize Renault’s championship efforts…

Frank Montagny has been confirmed as test driver for Toyota in 2007…

Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button sported special “one-off” helmet designs for the weekend prior to being auctioned off for charity…

Jenson Button suffered a rear tire sensor failure during the Q-2 qualifying session. This caused “Jense” to lose his use of traction control. While Jenson falterd to 14th place, “Rubinoe” wound up with an 8th place grid spot upon making the final Q3 qualifying period…

Felipe Massa’s Ferrari was clocked at 189mph through the speed trap during qualifying…

Upon hearing that Michael Schumacher stated that Mika Hakkinen was his fiercest rival, Mika flew over to Brazil to witness Michael’s final race. It was nice to hear Mika’s voice again as SPEED’S Peter Winsor interviewed the Finn during the start of Saturday’s qualifying…

Audi has offered Michael Schumacher $12.5 million to drive either its sportscar or DTM challenger next season. Could we see Michael vs. Mika again?

Michael Schumacher suffered a broken fuel pump shaft at the beginning of Q3, netting NO time during the final qualifying session. The failure relegated Michael to a tenth place starting grid position for his final Grand Prix….

Massa wore a unique “home flag colours” driver’s suit while clinching pole position and his 2nd race victory. Massa becomes the first native driver to win the Brazilian Grand Prix since Ayrton Senna’s 1993 victory…

Sayanora Suzuka

Holy Smokes! I still just CANNOT believe it! With 17 laps remaining, final pit stops completed and Michael Schumacher on his way towards his record 8th World Championship. Schumacher’s Ferrari V-8 engine goes “KABLAMOE!” while leading the race! Amazingly this was Schumacher’s first detonated engine failure in 6 years… (France, 2000)

Sadly this past weekend’s race in Japan appears to be Suzuka’s final race for the foreseeable future. This extremely popular circuit with F1 drivers has always had a very loyal fan base. This year’s sold out event hosted 160,000+ spectators sitting patiently through rainfall at 8AM of Friday’s practice session to see the race cars navigate the famous course.
After 20 years of hosting the Japanese Grand Prix, this wonderful circuit owned by Honda will be replaced by the massively upgraded Mount Fuji circuit owned by Japanese rival Toyota…

“The Pen is mightier than the Sword?” I can only imagine what its like to be a TV commentator under the scrutiny of a nationwide audience… Yet again I found myself frequently catching SPEED’S Bob Varsha making many ’“blunders.” During Friday’s practice session, “Messer’s” Varsha pointed out the BMW-Honda… Later during the broadcast, “my friend” Mr. Varsha further “misspoke” once again. As I sat ruing about his blunder that Lamborghini’s foray into Formula One was during a period when it was owned by GM. I always enjoy how they simply go to commercial break and continue on as though nothing wrong has happened…At least I wasn’t the only person to notice the blunder. Varsha corrected himself during Saturday’s qualifying show after an astute viewer emailed to correct him that it was Chrysler who’d owned Lamborghini instead of GM…

During Sunday’s race, Varsha commented on how Bridgestone will become F1’s sole tire supplier next season. Claiming that not only will Bridgestone provide “equal” tire’s for all competitors, but has asked the FIA to utilize it’s current Champ Car philosophy of “Alternate” red sidewall tires. This strategy would require all drivers to use the alternate (softer) tires for at least one stint during a race distance. I presume this is Bridgestone’s idea to “spice-up” the show a la Champ Cars…

Shanghai Shuffle

I’ve just finished watching the video tapes of the Chinese GP practice
& qualifying sessions. Here are a few selected tidbits gleamed from SPEED’s TV coverage...

What happens when you shun Dietrich Mateschitz’s offer to run a full season in Champ Cars? You loose your “wings” as Red Bull F1 driver Christian Klien has been replaced by Robert Doornbos for the remainder of the season with GP2 driver Michael Ammermuller making his Friday driver debut for RBR in China…

Fernando Alonso was forced to sit out two crucial test sessions during the three week lull prior to the Chinese GP. Alsono originally suffered a bruised right knee during Saturday’s Italian GP qualifying session. Afterwards it was discovered tha Alonso had a hairline crack due to contact with the cockpit scuttle while bouncing over Monza’s curbing…

Renault suffered three engine failures during testing prior to the Chinese Grand Prix. This follows an engine failure for Fernando Alonso during the Italian GP. Giancarlo Fisichella suffered 2 failures with new test driver Nelson Piquet Jr. suffering the third.
Speed’s Steve Matchett who was a guest of Renault during its Silverstone test weekend speculated that Renault is most likely suffering the same random piston crown failures that Ferrari suffered at the beginning of the season…

The massive engine failures of several teams during the past few weeks seem due to the INSANE engine “homologation” rules being forced upon engine manufacture’s by the FIA. Apparently their 2007 engines must be presented to the FIA by the Japanese Grand Prix weekend. These engine designs will then be “frozen” for 4 years and mechanically limited to 19,000RPM’s…

Spyker announced that while Christijan Albers
Will be retained for 2007, Tiago Monteiro will be dropped…

Spyker also announced that it will campaign Renault customer 2.4 liter V-8 engines for 2007. With Scuderia Toro Rosso most likely upgrading to Ferrari customer engines for ’07, it appears that Cosworth could sadly be out of Formula One. Steve Matchett correctly noted this as a true tragedy…

Honda Racing sported 555 tobacco livery for the weekend as its primary sponsor Lucky Strike is not sold in China. China represents 30% of worldwide tobacco consumption…

Steve Matchett prattled on about Kimi Raikkonen’s lack of technical feedback skills compared to Michael Schumacher’s, while David Hobbs pointed out those were pretty damm large “schue’s” to fill! All three SPEED announcers speculated that Schumacher might even stay on at Ferrari as a test driver next season since Schumacher certainly seemed unwilling to quit piloting F1 cars…

”Qualie-Quips”

Just finished watching SPEED’s qualifying coverage from Monza, Italy. As always the Speed Posse was entertaining as always… Here are a few selected tidbits.

All 22 cars exceeded 200mph on the front straight. Top 3 speeds were posted by BMW-Sauber’s Nick Heidfeld, (213.3) Robert Kubica (212.5) and Toyota’s Ralf Schumacher. (210.6) Although top straight-line speed doesn’t necessarily translate to fastest lap time, with Heidfeld 2nd, Kubica 4th and “ralfie” 11th while Felipe Massa claimed the fastest lap. During qualifying Massa recorded a top speed of 214.5mph…

During the Q1 session a red flag stoppage was caused when Salon Yamamoto’s Bridgestone tyre failing on the front straight at 200+ mph. As typical the radio transmission was self explanatory. Yamamoto: “I’m OK, I’m OK.” Race Engineer: “Slow down and return to the pits.” Bob Varsha was quick to jump on this… “Sometimes things are so obvious. Slow down, come to the garage and then we’ll change underwear…”

While Steve Matchett explained that the two massive “KABLAMOE” engine failures in Anthony Davidson’s Honda on Friday were to the 2007 spec engines and seemed to be bottom end failures which suggested oil scavenging failure to him. Peter Winsor quipped: “It’s hard to tell since there’s not much bottom end to scavenge!”

Varsha speculated that Anthony Davidson will join “Super Best Friends” (Super Aguri) as the teams second race driver for 2007. Peter Winsor reminded us of the irony as Davidson’s last race drive was filling in for “Taku” at BAR-Honda where his engine “Done Blew Up” on lap 3…

Varsha speculated that the Midland F1 team has been sold to a Dutch-Arab consortium (Spyker?) for a cool $90 million with no official announcement as of yet.

Regarding Michael Schumacher’s possible retirement of which only 6-7 people know his decision, brother Ralf claimed: “I know nothing… I’ll probably just get a text message on Sunday.” David Hobbs quipped: “There’s nothing like brotherly love…”