Thursday Thoughts: Young Drivers

This week's Thursday Thoughts question comes from RG of The Northern Waffler, who asks:

Which young driver, who is currently not in Formula 1, would you like to see in the series in the next few seasons?

This is a great question. When I'm asked about drivers who should be in F1, the default position is to look straight at GP2 - and if this had been asked three months ago it would have been a case of "well, pick one of these" from Lucas di Grassi, Nico Hülkenberg and Kamui Kobayashi (and he only on the strength of those stand-in drives at Toyota, his GP2 career was not great). Now each of those has been signed, to Virgin, Williams and Sauber respectively! So who's left?

Frankly the remainder of the GP2 pack hasn't yet impressed me enough, though I grant you I hadn't kept up with GP2 very well in 2009. Paster Maldonado is fast and furious yet has apparently calmed down a bit, could he now be ready? What of Jerome D'Ambrosio and Giedo Van Der Garde? I like both of them and I would really like to see them in F1. Romain Grosjean was fantastic in GP2 but hopeless at Renault, does he deserve another shot in a different environment?

This question can't pass without a nod to the oft-discussed Anthony Davidson and Paul di Resta, the Brits seemingly having lost their deserved F1 opportunities to an era when test drivers were ample and race drives were few. With the situation reversed they seem to have been passed over for drivers behind them on the escalator. The same could be said of Adam Carroll. I'd love to see Adam in a Formula 1 car. I think these are probably too old to be considered 'young' drivers now, but they should be there.

I was going to go for Ryan Hunter-Reay. The man is fast on the IndyCar road courses and is the perfect fit for F1 in terms of speed and image, and he should be in a McLaren or a MercedesGP (but not a USF1.. yet). Unfortunately at age 29, for the purposes of this question he is too old (as are some of the other names above).

Then there are the Red Bull proteges Daniel Ricciardo and Jules Bianchi, both are hotly tipped and I'd be very surprised if they didn't make it to F1 eventually, Brendon Hartley could be another. I think they are a while away yet though and to be fair I don't know enough about them.

So who do I pick?

After a lot of deliberating I'm going to go for Vitaly Petrov. I've been watching him for a while and I think it would be very interesting to see him in a Formula 1 race. He finished 2nd in the GP2 points last year and has scored some wins over the last couple of years, and while he may not be the out-and-out fastest driver around he is a fighter, and I do like to see a fighting racing driver - that's something that seems to have been missing lately in F1 aside from Hamilton (no I'm not saying he's as good as Lewis), look at Vettel who is a great lap-time driver yet seems to have an aversion to overtaking anybody. I think Vitaly is your classic underdog and I always love to root for that kind of driver, even if it rarely pays off.

Of course I could be proven wrong when I eventually get around to watching last year's GP2..

2010 Race Calendar

During the 2009 season I thought it would be a great idea to create a race schedule in Google Calendar featuring different racing series. I was busy with accounts studies at the time and I never got around to taking it further. Early last month I decided it was worth exploring so I set up a trial with F1 and IndyCar dates. I'd add more later if I decided it looked okay. Again I let it drop when other things got in the way.

Christine from Sidepodcast recently created a calendar highlighting F1 events and the SPC / F1 Minute podcast schedules and she did a great job, enough to inspire me to get on and finish my idea.

Here it is!



My schedule includes F1, F2, GP2, IndyCar, Le Mans 24hr, ALMS, LMS, MotoGP, WRC, IRC and WTCC. I've also put in Dakar, Goodwood and a couple of other things. I'll add NASCAR Sprint Cup and DTM soon - there are categories already so if you add them the events will hopefully appear in your calendar automatically.

Christine's calendar is F1-specific and it includes Free Practice, pre-season testing and car launches. My calendar includes none of these things, only qualifying and race. I highly recommend adding Christine's F1 calendar if you would like this extra information.

Click the "+GoogleCalendar" button to add to your own Google Calendar account. I have split events by race series so you can just pick the ones you want. I think there is a way to get them into iCal and other systems, though I don't know how.


The calendar is set to UK time because that's where I am and that's most useful to me. I'm not sure but I believe when you import it, it will adjust it to your own default timezone. Have a play with it and see.

Race start times are estimates apart from F1 and Le Mans. This information is surprisingly hard to find. E.g. IndyCar.com only lists TV start times, not race starts. Many sites only give the dates and I've had to improvise. Then there's the issue of timezones which I may have got wrong. I plan to make each forthcoming weekend as accurate as I can, beyond that just use this as a guide.

I've included qualifying for F1, Le Mans 24Hrs and IndyCar (times estimated). I don't intend to include any more qualifying.

I hope you find this useful and please let me know if there is anything you would like to add. If the demand is there and I think it warrants adding, I'll do so. I'm already considering Indy Lights.

As you can see I've also added a list version to the sidebar. When I create the new site I will have a version similar to the one above on its own page.

Race Review: GP2 Asia Sepang '09

GP2 Asia Series 2008/09
Sepang, Malaysia
Held: 4&5 April 09
Commentary: Martin Haven & Gareth Rees

Continuing my Race Review catch up series, this was the primary support event to the Malaysian GP and is the penultimate round of the series.

Points coming in:

Kobayashi 39
Valsecchi 29
Hülkenberg 27
Perez 25
D'Ambrosio 23


Feature Race - 33 laps
(the Sprint Race is noted below)

Qualifying:
1. D'Ambrosio (DAMS)
2. Nunes (Piquet GP)
3. Jakes (Super Nova)
4. Kobayashi (DAMS)
5. Villa (Super Nova)
6. Petrov (Campos)

The top 22 are covered by under 1 second, which the guys say is a surprise, and as Gareth says "this isn't Mallory Park this is a proper Grand Prix circuit".

Drama as the coverage begins as D'Ambrosio has NOT taken his pole position! His car broke down on the warm-up lap and he had to pit, he won't take the start, could rejoin later but will be many laps down.

The other omission is Nico Hülkenberg who is not racing this weekend, Pastor Maldonado has reclaimed the seat.

START

Several slow starts and the cars fan out wide, Villa stalls it from 5th on the grid. Lots of bumping and contact through that twiddly bit at the start of the lap.

Lots of side-by-side action throughout the first lap, but Mortara is out on lap one.
Nunes leads Petrov, Kobayashi and Maldonado.

32 to go - Parente passes..someone. Hard to tell. These liveries aren't easy to ID.

30 - Perez started 18th but is already up to 10th.

27 - Nunes leads, in 2nd and 3rd Petrov and Kobayashi are all over each other!

26 - Early pit stop for Kobayashi. He was sort of caught behind Petrov.
Ooh, Petrov runs VERY wide and allows Jakes into 2nd place.

25 - Maldonado pushing hard runs wide, scoots across the grasscrete or whatever it is, rejoins with dirty tyres and some positions down. Gareth: "Typical Pastor". The guys say he's a charming chap but he's a rough diamond.

Nice move by Yelmer Buurman on Vitaly Petrov, who is really struggling to get his car stopped yet still made Buurman work for it.

23 - Petrov loses another place as someone drafts him down the back straight, so he dives into the pits for new rear tyres.
Slow car on track: Razia crawling in 1st or maybe even coasting.

22 - Maldonado pits.. he's got damage on the nose. He's out in 15th with more yet to stop.

Shots of F1 personnel on the pit stand watching the race, including Nelson Piquet Jr and Felipe Massa. Remember this race happened shortly after F1 qualifying. Parente takes Gonzalez, who then pits..

20 - Nunes pits from the lead, as does Valsecchi who has a very slow stop with a sticking right rear.

19 - Perez has stopped in the pit entry, nearly blocking it. Dark clouds are approaching!
Perez has been pushed to his pit - replay and it looks like his radiator has been holed.

17 - Jakes is pushing Kobayashi for what will end up as 2nd after the pitstops.

15 - Al-Fardan finally makes his stop, the last to do so.

8 - Jakes is still close behind Kobayashi but can't seem to do anything about it.

7 - Maldonado smokes his tyres in an attempt to pass Petrov, can't make it by at the hairpin, tries it again at turn one and still can't do it! Couple of flat-spots on those tyres now, Valsecchi watching on.

4 - Discussion on the merits of KERS and how GP2 could have it if F1 develops it to be cheap enough. Hmm, hindsight.. :-)

3 - Maldonado makes an error and allows Parente to draw alongside, both have patience and Parente takes the position. Comment from Gareth that the Maldonado of old would've taken Parente out there and then.

2 - Maldonado and Valsecchi are close together as they lap a backmarker, both are just a little behind Petrov.

Diego Nunes wins!

Result:
1 Nunes (PiquetGP) 33 laps
2 Kobayashi (DAMS) +8.36s
3 Jakes (Super Nova) +9.15s
4 Rodriguez (PiquetGP) +13.87s
5 Buurman (Ocean) +16.81s
6 Petrov (Campos) +41.46s

Summary:
Pretty flat end to the race. Lots of drivers in little close groups but not seemingly able to do anything to make a pass. Good job from Nunes and Jakes, complete change of fortunes over previous form, well done. Amazingly, Al-Fardan came 9th after looking utterly hopeless back in Qatar.


Sprint Race - 22 laps

It is wet for Sunday's race, which was held a couple of hours before the F1 race. As ever the grid is the result of the Feature with the top 8 reversed.

1 Valsecchi
2 Maldonado
3 Petrov
4 Buurman
5 Rodriguez
6 Jakes

As it turns out this race has been delayed by 30 minutes by the wet conditions and we will have a Safety Car start (and no formation lap).

START

Yamamoto has stalled at the start and so has one of the FMS cars, could be Chen. Both cars are pushed into the pitlane. Yamamoto gets fired but stops at the end of pitlane, while they are taking the engine cover off Chen's car. I'm not sure why Yamamoto stopped, he has a green light which now turns red as the field comes by behind the SC to complete lap 1.

18 to go - Safety Car is in, green flag!
Contact on the last corner between Maldonado and Valsecchi.

A couple of spinners at turn two including James Jakes - that's a shame after his race 1 run.

No rain but the track is very wet, the cars are kicking up spray so it is hard to see who is close behind someone.

17 - Maldonado tries several times and makes it by Valsecchi, Petrov's coming with him. Meanwhile Buurman runs wide and loses a couple of places. I was doing the same at that corner on the Wii last night..

16 - Kobayashi brakes far too late and runs into the wide runoff at turn one, loses a position.

15 - Maldonado leads, followed by Petrov, Valsecchi, Nunes, Al Fardan, Buurman, Parente and Gonzalez. Kobayashi is 11th, D'Ambrosio 17th.

12 - The DPR cars are off course and out of the race.

Nice dive from Petrov at the final corner to pass Maldonado for the lead! Interesting to see Petrov is quite a bit faster today, relative the rest of the field.

11 - Petrov, Maldonado, Valsecchi, Nunes, Al Fardan, Gonzalez, Kobayashi, Buurman. Points only go to the top 6 in the Sprint though.

Petrov just set the fastest lap of the race. Apparently Jakes got the point for FL yesterday (Villa was faster, Jakes was fastest of the top ten finishers, a rule to prevent pitting for tyres and going for a time).

Replay of D'Ambrosio running off track into an area where several marshalls and a tractor were working on two cars already - dangerous stuff, he should've backed off under yellow and he didn't. Commentary guys are saying he should get a penalty, I agree.

9 - Rodriguez off course, too much speed and into the gravel. I think he recovers eventually.
Pics of Razia walking back to the pits.

The track is drying now and there's not much spray. Due to the Safety Car start and the wet conditions this is now a timed race and there are 11 minutes to go.

D'Ambrosio does indeed get a black flag, hooray for the stewards! Replay again, the car in front checks up and Jerome just drives by and off course. He pits and shuts down the engine - looks like a straight black flag and not a time penalty!

8mins - Replay of Al Fardan running wide at turn one, same way Rodriguez did.

Perez vs Gonzalez - Perez makes the pass through turns 1 and 2 but loses out at the switchback, he makes it stick a few corners later.

5mins - Nunes sets Fastest Lap. The guys are talking about setups, some of those who have gone for dry or intermediate setups should be getting faster than the guys with wet setups now.

2m30s - Parente is now fastest. Kobayashi is pressuring Al Fardan for 4th, he's closed up but doesn't seem to be able to make the move.

The clock hits zero, last lap.

Vitaly Petrov wins!

Kobayashi and Perez cross the line side-by-side!! Who got it? How did Perez get up to Kobayashi?
Replays: Perez gets the position by half a nose! Fantastic, and it was the final points place as well..

Result:
1 Petrov (Campos) 22 laps
2 Maldonado (ART) +2.91s
3 Valsecchi (Durango) +4.34s
4 Nunes (Piquet GP) +6.36s
5 Al Fardan (iSport) +21.54s
6 Perez (Campos) +24.49s

Summary:
A drying race track saw some desparate moves, some worked and some didn't and it was fun to watch both those and the struggles to control the cars on the slippery surface.


POINTS:
1 Kobayashi 47
2 Valsecchi 34
3 Petrov 28
4 Hulkenberg 27
5 Rodriguez 27
6 Perez 26

Next up is final round of this GP2 Asia season supporting the Bahrain GP, and with 22 points available for two wins and two fastest laps it isn't over yet.

Race Review: GP2 Asia Qatar '09

GP2 Asia Series (08/09)
Losail, Doha, Qatar
7&8 of 12
Held: 14-15 February 2009
Watched: 3 October 2009
Coverage: Eurosport / Martin Haven & Gareth Rees

This is the first ever GP2 night race but Qatar has hosted night events for MotoGP and World Superbikes before so this should be no problem for them.

Feature Race (34 laps)

Grid:

1. Hülkenberg (ART)	2. Perez (Campos)
3. Petrov (Campos)	4. Kobayashi (DAMS)
5. Rodriguez (Piquet)	6. Yamamoto (ART)
7. Villa (Super Nova)	8. Valsecchi (Durango)
9. Mortara (Arden)	10. D'Ambrosio (DAMS)
11. Jakes (Super Nova)	12. Bonanomi (Meritus)
13. Parente (Meritus)	14. Nunes (Piquet)
15. Crestani (Ocean)	16. van der Garde (iSport)
17. Herck (DPR)	18. Ricci (DPR)
19. Razia (Arden)	20. Rigon (Trident)
21. Al Fardan (iSport)	22. Gonzalez (FMS)
23. Buurman (Ocean)	24. Porvenzano (Trident)
25. M.Dalle Stelle (Durango)	26. Nai Chia Chen (FMS)

[all Dallara-Renault-Bridgestone]

Kevin Chen was SEVEN seconds per lap slower than Hulkenberg in qualifying. Stunningly bad.

Formation Lap

Medium compound tyre this weekend. Like F1 there is a range of tyres, unlike F1 they use the same one for the whole weekend at the choice of Bridgestone.

Parente is new in at Ocean so he'll take this race to acclimatise, he hasn't raced since October.

Grid.. GO!

BIG CRASH on the start. Commentary says Yamamoto had stalled and he was hit. Huge impact as the back of the grid gets up to speed.

Safety Car

Yamamoto is ok. 3 or 4 others involved and those guys seem okay too. Buurman is one of them. Gonzalez another.

Safety Car is stopped at the beginning of the main straight to wait for the leaders, who reach it... and it doesn't move. Front straight blocked with debris.

Replay: Buurman jinked right to avoid a slower car and rams Yamamoto, there's no way he could have seen that car, he was unsighted due to the wing of the other car he was avoiding.

The field is now being led through the pit lane.

Very slow clear up. They don't have a road sweeper, and they only have one man with a brush! They also only seem to have one Caterpillar lifter to move the cars..

32 to go - Perez leads. Al Fardan has stalled on pit entry. Eventually he gets in to the pits and is refired.
31 - Chen does the same. Gareth says it'll be no loss if he's not restarted.. Ah, they've found some more brooms.
29 - Main straight is now clear and the SC lights are off. Order: Perez, Hulkenberg, Petrov, Kobayashi, Valsecchi, Villa.
28 - RESTART
27 - D'Ambrosio pits from 8th or so. Rigon is in from a long way down. Tyre temps will be very low after this 20 minute yellow period, in which the SC was driving very slowly even for a Safety Car.

25 - Parente passes Mortara at turn one.
Kobayashi in trouble, Valsecchi and Villa pass him.
Petrov pits. Villa takes Valsecchi with the momentum from the other move. Good stuff.
24 - Rodriquez spins it at turn one, stuck in the gravel, he's out.
21 - Villa passes Hülkenberg for 2nd, though they do need to pit. Petrov is fastest man on track.
20 - Perez pits from the lead. Kobayashi is dropping back again.
19 - Villa leads for one lap and then pits.

Petrov leads Perez after their stops, potential lead change between team-mates when it shakes out after Petrov put in solid laps - but Perez is now all over him.

16 - Perez passes Petrov, who's shot his tyres with those fast laps. Hülkenberg has still to pit, he was pulling a gap on these two.

13 - Ahh, Villa has been given a drive-thru for pitlane speeding. He was driving well for a podium, too. Shame.
Della Stella is crawling around with a loose rear wheel. Hm.

Good racing between Valsecchi and the chasing d'Ambrosio, who makes a nice move on the main straight, the last of several clean attempts. No blocking or swerving here.

Bit of a stalemate for a while (that's code for BORING).

6 - Provenzano spins at turn one, recovers through the gravel. I have never heard of him.
5 - Hülkenberg makes his pit stop from a huuuge lead. Slightly held up by a DPR car also pitting, from almost a lap down.
Nico H. rejoins the track still with a big lead! The entire length of the pit straight (and Losail has a long straight).
3 - Provenzano is off again, looks like a wheel hub breaking..
2 - Hülkenberg has a 16sec lead and Kobayashi's tyres have come alive! He's chasing Petrov for 3rd now, I didn't notice that earlier. Tyres are an oddity here it seems.
1 - Last lap.

FLAG - Hülkenberg wins!

	Top Ten	Margin	Pts
1	Hülkenberg	34 laps	10+1
2	Perez	13.295 sec	8
3	Petrov	14.343 sec	6
4	Kobayashi	14.746 sec	5
5	D'Ambrosio	23.419 sec	4
6	Valsecchi	33.919 sec	3
7	Mortara	35.214 sec	2
8	Razia	35.341 sec	1
9	Jakes	41.162 sec
10	Crestani	43.774 sec

Hülkenberg picks up the point for Fastest Lap. True FL-setter Parente was outside the top ten, this rule prevents backmarkers pitting for new tyres every few laps and doing qualifying runs to get the point. Keep scrolling down for Sunday's race.


* * *
Sprint Race (23 laps)

Yelmer Buurman does not take the start after yesterday's crash, it seems because they haven't been able to repair the car in time rather than for medical reasons but I'm not completely sure.

Grid is the finishing positions from the Feature with the top 8 reversed.

1. Razia	2. Mortara
3. Valsecchi	4. D'Ambrosio
5. Kobayashi	6. Petrov
7. Perez	8. Hülkenberg
9. Jakes	10. Crestani

Pastor Maldonado's seat has been taken by Nico Hulkenberg for a few races and this will be Nico's last event of the GP2 Asia season.

Grid..GO!

Front row slow away, Campos guys [Petrov and Perez] away fast from row 3 and jump into 1st and 2nd by the first turn!
Kobayashi and d'Ambrosio dropped from 4th/5th to 7th/8th on the start.

22 to go - Perez leads Petrov, only just.
21 - Hülkenberg and Razia run wide into the dust!
19 - Jakes re-passes Crestani at turn one (didn't realise he'd gone back..).
18 - Now he takes someone else.. can't identify.

Parente is off-track, through the gravel, rejoins bringing lots of dust and crap on to the circuit. A few drivers have done this now, it doesn't help the grip which is pretty bad as it is.

Perez, Petrov, Mortara, Hülkenberg, Valsecchi, Razia, D'Ambrosio, van der Garde.

16 - Top 3 well clear of the rest of the field which is still running in close proximity to each other. Bonanomi in the Qi Meritus Mahara car passes Rigon for 14th.

Meritus race in the GP2 Asia Series in place of Racing Engineering who only race in the European series, all the other teams race in both.

14 - Bonamomi racing closely with Nunes and takes the place, some close hard and fair racing!

12 - Perez and Petrov have cleared off in to the distance but Mortara has dropped into the clutches of Hülkenberg. Nico has been looking after his tyres much more effectively than his rivals who have all slowed down somewhat compared to earlier.

11 - Hülkenberg now racing Mortara, can't quite make it work. Rear-facing onboard! We can see Valsecchi and Razia coming up behind them.

Kobayashi is dropping down the field, he's 14th.

8 - Hulkenberg passes Mortara for 3rd just as we go to a commercial break! Now, can Valsecchi and the three guys behind him capitalise? Only a quick break, wow, Nico hit the warp drive, he's suddenly 3sec up the road one lap after the pass!

6 - Parente gets really crossed-up in the dust and loses a bundle of positions. The Hulk is 1sec/lap faster than the two leaders, but may not have enough laps to catch up.

4 - Provencano spins into the gravel, elsewhere so does Chen. Replay: Crestani runs wide and Provencano loses control into the gravel trap! Avoidence or coincidence, hard to say.. Frankie Provencano has graduated from Formula Master.

2 - Mortara in 4th is bottling up a lot of cars behind him, big train has caught him up all the way down to 11th! And now they are all catching Chen, who did a 2 minute lap last time compared to 1m41 for the leaders...

Perez suddenly jumps forward in lap time, a clear 2sec faster than before.

Sergio Perez wins!

	Top Ten	Margin	Pts
1	Perez	23 laps	6+1
2	Petrov	2.355 sec	5
3	Hülkenberg	11.929 sec	4
4	Mortara	19.454 sec	3
5	Valsecchi	21.735 sec	2
6	Razia	22.618 sec	1
7	D'Ambrosio	24.029 sec
8	van der Garde	24.346 sec
9	Jakes	25.253 sec
10	Villa	26.074 sec

Perez gets the point for Fastest Lap. A great result for the Barwa Campos Team, 2nd and 3rd in the Feature race and a 1-2 in the Sprint!

Points:

Kobayashi	39
Valsecchi	29
Hülkenberg	27
Perez	25
Rodriguez	22
D'Ambrosio	21
Petrov	19
Villa	12
Mortara	11
Bamber	8

The next race was at Sepang seven weeks later supporting the Malaysian Grand Prix.
Now that we're in the off-season I will catch up with those rounds soon - I hope!

Catch-Up: GP2 Asia - 5&6 - Bahrain

GP2 Asia Series
Rnd 5, Bahrain Feature
Held 23 Jan / Watched 31 Aug

This is GP2 Asia's first of two visits for the 2008/'09 winter series, the second visit will come as the support to the F1 race in April. As always, first up we have the feature race which today is for 34 laps. These are my 'short notes' - I want to cover lots more racing and I'm still working out the best way to do it, either short-form versions of the notes posts or more general impressions like the recent A1GP post.

I've got the Eurosport commentary team of Martin Haven and Gareth Rees. Haven is the 2nd tier / junior series extraordinaire, he seems to do commentary on literally *everything* outside of F1 in Europe. Rees is an experienced driver at this level having competed in F3000 for a while before running out of money.

Gridded. Long hold on the start..
Hulkenberg leads into turn one. Kobayashi 2nd. At least 3 stallers.

Stallers are clear as leaders complete lap one, either got fired on the grid or were pulled into pitlane for refiring..

Lots of action back in the pack. GP2 cars, particularly in the Asia Series, are not easily identifiable and less so the drivers. No standout colour schemes. The cameras being so far from the race track don't help, they aren't zooming in enough.

Top 5 after 2 laps: Hulkenberg, Kobayashi, Mortara, d'Ambrosio, Rodriguez

Haven on Hulkenberg: "Willi Weber will try and talk him into being the next Schumacher, whether that's Michael or Ralf remains to be seen." Ha!

Dive-bomb into turn 1! Cars left, right, everywhere as they try and lap a backmarker who was delayed when he stalled at the start. Backmarker should have eased off and let the leaders through, he just got in the way.. d'Ambrosio ahead of Mortara in the melee.

After 8 laps, Hulkenberg and Kobayashi have checked out on the rest of the field. Kamui is pushing hard and is only 0.37sec behind Nico, trying to pressure the F3 Euroseries champ into a mistake. Commentary guys earlier made the point that Nico won't be used to the race lengths and the higher g-forces of these cars compared to F3, and that'll come into play in the second stint.

We're not really seeing what's going on with the rest of the field, which is a shame. This earlier generation car is more entertaining than the current European series car, we're bound to be missing something good back there.

Eventually we see it.. just a long line of cars. I'm disappointed.

Kobayashi passes Hulkenberg into turn 1! Very late on the brakes, nice move.

Pitstops, 14 laps done 20 to go.
Wheels bang, Perez and Villa touch!
Top six are running longer on their stops.

Problem for Hulkenberg's tyre changer, long stop on the right rear. Cost him a position to Mortara.

Hulkenberg is faster than Mortara, he's trying it on Mortara with Rodriguez & co closing in.

Valsecchi passes van der Garde, caught him completely unawares, good move.
Ricci got tagged into a spin.. put himself on the apex and someone clouted him. Not sure of his position in the order..

Kobayashi leads d'Ambrosio by about 8sec, with Mortara and Hulkenberg 6sec further back.

Pretty poor driving standards in this field, particularly Razia weaving all around, looking like ramming his opponents off the track.. I know the Asia Series attracts new drivers rather than series returnees but this is silly.

Valsecchi has passed Rodriguez, working his way up the field from 10th, doing a good job. Rodriguez could have a problem because van der Garde is catching fast as well, or is he just slow.. commentary is saying he was an early stopper, could he have worn his tyres out?

Kobayashi wins!! - despite there being no flag until the 2nd place man crosses the line... oops.

Points go to D'Ambrosio, Mortara, Hulkenberg, Valsecchi, Rodriguez, van der Garde, and the reverse grid pole to Perez.

Pretty boring race after the stops, seems to be a theme for these Asia Series races, action early on then gets dull quickly. The two DAMS cars hammered the field here, good job from them. Kobayashi is still at racing speed on what is meant to be the cooldown lap... he didn't see a flag so he's carrying on! Eventually he gets the message and heads to parc ferme.

Truly awful standards on the last lap when someone tried to run Yamamoto off the track, could have been Razia again! Let's hope things are better for the Sprint, and also for the F1 visit later in the year. Keep scrolling for the next one..


****
GP2 Asia Series
R6, Bahrain Sprint
Held Jan 24 / Watched Aug 31

23 lap sprint race, no stops, reverse top 8 on the grid, points only to 6th in this race.

Good start from Perez, has a healthy lead through turn 1. Cars 3-wide after turn 1! Another stalled car on the grid.
Van der Garde pitted at the end of the formation lap but seems to be running now.
Nunes comes out of the pits after missing the start, he may have been the staller left behind this time.

Replay of a great start from Villa, up from row 5 to brake ultra-late into turn one and is now 4th. Courageous! Of course had he got it wrong he'd looks stupid..

D'Ambrosio passes his teammate Kobayashi.
Ooh, lots of action all down the field!
Petrov and Yamamoto going at it, Petrov coming off better.

Wow, 4-wide, nearly 5-wide for a short while! I think this is the same group, Yamamoto, Petrov, Gonzalez, Bonanomi and a couple of others - people keep catching this group which is being held up by Gonzalez.

Perez leads, Valsecchi, Hulkenberg, Valles are the top 4.

Al-Fardan proves he's completely out of his depth as he wanders all over the road, then fails to brake for the corner, hits Razia and loses his front wing - has to pit for a repair. Razia wasn't at fault at all, perhaps unusually.

D'Ambrosio has passed Villa for 4th - switchback move, good stuff!

Valsecchi is catching Perez who may be struggling for grip. d'Ambrosio passes Hulkenberg with less than a lap to go!

Perez wins by 0.7 seconds!

Perez, Valsecchi, D'Ambrosio, Hulkenberg, Villa, Kobayashi (who seemed a little off-pace).
D'Ambrosio started 7th, good job to get a podium. Bamber finishes 7th, Mortara 8th but no points for those in the sprint race.

Good entertaining stuff this one.

Points:
1. Kobayashi 34
2. Valsecchi 24
3. Rodriguez 22
4. D'Ambrosio 17
5. Villa 12
6. Perez 10
7. Hulkenberg 10
8. Bamber 8

Next up is Losail, Qatar - which is GP2's first night race - and then a visit to Malaysia to hook up with F1 before the finale which is back here in Bahrain.

Weekend Preview: 25-26 July 2009

Feature Events

FIA Formula 1 World Championship

- Formula 1 ING Magyar Nagydig
- (ING Formula 1 Hungarian Grand Prix)
- Hungaroring, nr.Budapest, Hungary
- (10/17)
- www.f1.com

F1 returns to the dustbowl of the Hungaroring, where as usual the forecast is for high temperatures. The dust of the surrounding area has a tendency to get all over the track and make grip very hard to come by, it is this in combination with the circuit layout itself that tends to prevent good racing at this notoriously boring race track - though the changes to turn one a few years ago have created a divebomb-braking opportunity for the brave/crazy (if not in the F1 race, definitely in the GP2 support races!).

I am not a fan of this event although it did bring F1 to Eastern Europe as long ago as the mid-1980s, and track improvements over the last two decades have improved racing.. a bit..

TV Guide:
UK – LIVE on BBC One at 12.10pm Sunday, race starts at 1pm
(qualifying on BBC Two at 12.10pm Sat)
USA – HEAVILY DELAYED on FOX at 3pm ET.

IRL IndyCar Series

- Rexall Edmonton Indy
- City Centre Airport, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
- (11/17)
- www.indycar.com

This is the second visit to Edmonton for the IndyCars but the 5th (I think?) running of the event, with this being a former Champ Car venue - but any advantage the CC guys had has now been erased and there should be a nice level playing field, apart from the actual track surface of this bumpy airport circuit!

Of note this year is the first visit to the circuit of the supporting Indy Lights series.

TV Guide:
UK – LIVE on Sky Sports 2 at 10.45pm Sunday (directly after NASCAR)
USA – LIVE on VERSUS at 5pm ET Sunday

FIM MotoGP

- British Grand Prix
- Donington Park, Castle Donington, England
- (11/17)
- www.motogp.com

The final visit to Donington for the premier motorbike series, for now at least, as it moves in the opposite direction to F1 and will pitch up at Silverstone in 2010, with apparent mixed feelings from the riders. Some love Donny, some can't wait to leave. I think it makes a great motorbike track with the sweeping curves.

Living in the UK I know the forecast for the weekend. Saturday is due to be warm and sunny so qualifying should be representative - but rain is due to appear for the race on Sunday.

(I can never remember if DP is in Northants or Lincs)

TV Guide:
UK – LIVE on BBC ONE at 3pm Sunday (directly after F1), race start 3.30pm
USA – SPEED claims 6pm ET, which is not possible because the race starts at 8.30pm ET.

Other Events

GP2 Series

- Hungaroring
- Budapest, Hungary
- (6/10)
- www.gp2series.com
- (F1 support with F.Master, FBMW Europe and Porsche Supercup)

TV Guide:
UK – Eurosport 2
- Race 1 @ 4.45pm Saturday (this may be slightly delayed due to MotoGP coverage)
- Race 2 @ 7pm Sunday (very delayed - I can't see any live coverage)

World Superbikes

- Brno
- Brno, Czech Republic
- www.worldsbk.com
- (with Supersport, etc.)

TV Guide:

UK – Eurosport
- Race 1 LIVE @ 11am Sunday
- Race 2 DELAYED @ either at 3.40pm or 6pm (Eurosport's website sucks)

NASCAR Sprint Cup

- Allstate 400 at the Brickyard
- Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Speedway, Indiana, United States
- www.nascar.com

TV Guide:
UK – LIVE on Sky Sports 2 at 7pm Sunday
US - LIVE on ESPN at 2pm Sunday

NASCAR Nationwide Series
& NASCAR Camping World Trucks

- O'Reilly Raceway Park
- Indianapolis, Indiana, United States
- www.nascar.com

Firestone Indy Lights

- Edmonton
- Alberta, Canada
- (IndyCar support)

IMSA Atlantics

- Autobahn Country Club
- Joliet, Illinois, United States
(with Star Mazda)

FIA GT

- Total 24 Hours of Spa
- Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium
(with European GT4 and British F3)
- www.fiagt.com

Super GT

- Sugo
- Sugo, Japan

Silverstone Classic

- Silverstone Circuit
- Silverstone, Northants, England, UK

A multitude of historic racing series at what used to be known as the Coys Historic Festival.
Featuring: GP Masters, Pre-66 F1, the David Leslie Memorial Trophy for 90s Tourers, BRDC Historic Sportscars, Classic Group C and a lot more.

TV Guide:
UK - LIVE all weekend on MotorsTV

* * * *

Sources:
Live Sport On TV
RaceFanTV
SkySports.com
Eurosport.co.uk
BBC.co.uk
SpeedTV.com

Weekend Preview: 11-12 July 2009

Feature Events

FIA Formula 1 World Championship

- Grosser Preis Santander von Deutschland (Santander German GP)
- Nürburgring, Germany
- (9/17)
- www.f1.com

We have passed the halfway point of the season and it is time to pay a visit to the Eifel region of Germany and the Nürburgring, which hasn’t seen a Formula 1 race since that wet event of 2007 – after that race the circuit entered into a ‘sharing’ agreement with the Hockenheimring.

Previously both circuits held races in the same season, Hockenheim would take the German GP and Nürburg would take the European GP. This changes when Valencia took the latter title and simultaneously both German tracks realised they were losing a fortune paying Bernie’s fees. This explains why this is only the second German Grand Prix to be held on this iteration of a track called Nürburgring (of course, the old circuit held the German GP for years, as the Eifelrennen).

This track should suit the Brawns more than Silverstone, and should in theory work against Red Bull – but this was before RBR’s pre-Silverstone upgrade, how will that affect them?

Overtaking spots
The first corner is notable for being almost a dead stop (the start will be fun!) and is a good place to try a pass. The other major spot is the chicane at the end of the lap which follows a fast, long run up the hill.

TV Guide:
UK – LIVE on BBC One at 12.10pm Sunday, race starts at 1pm
(qualifying at 12:10pm Saturday)
USA – Delayed? on FOX but I can’t find when

IRL IndyCar Series

- Honda Indy Toronto
- Exhibition Place, Toronto, Canada
- (10/17)
- www.indycar.com

The return of the streets of Toronto to North American after a one year absence due to the series ‘merger’, although the official website incorrectly and very frustratingly refers to this as the ‘inaugural event’, thus completely ignoring the last 23 years (it has been running since 1986). Wasn’t this supposed to be a MERGER??

Still, nice to have it back.

TV Guide:
UK – LIVE on Sky Sports Extra at 6pm Sunday
USA – LIVE on ABC at 1pm ET Sunday

Other Events

NASCAR Sprint Cup

- Lifelock.com 400
- Chicagoland Speedway, Joliet, Illinois, USA
- (19/36)
- www.nascar.com

TV Guide:
UK – LIVE on Sky Sports 2 at 1am Saturday night / Sunday morning
USA – LIVE on TNT at 7.30pm ET Saturday

For all other events I will list the UK time (BST not GMT) and channel only, if you are elsewhere you will have to look it up (check their website).

GP2 Series

- Nürburgring, Germany
- (5/10)
- LIVE on Eurosport: Race 1 Sat @ 3pm, Race 2 Sun @ 10:30am
- www.gp2series.com

Well done to British Eurosport for signing up GP2 after Setanta Sports collapsed! I think only the British arm is covering it so I’m afraid I don’t know the situation elsewhere in Europe.

Intercontinental Rally Challenge

- Rally Russia
- (6/11)
- www.ircseries.com

V8 Supercars

- Townsville, Australia
- (6/14)
- www.v8supercars.com.au

* * * *

Elsewhere in sport don’t forget to keep up with le Tour de France which in the UK can be found nightly at 7pm on ITV4 for the next 2 1/2 weeks. I believe there are copious amounts of coverage on Eurosport too. In the US you can see it on Versus, which curiously also takes Phil Liggett’s commentary (I’m guessing he records links for each network every day because he talks about ITV4 by name on our coverage).

I plan to complete the Goodwood posts during this weekend, then next week will catch up with some race notes because I haven’t done Turkey or Britain yet!
Hopefully soon I will be able to find time to start watching all the other stuff I like to keep up with, which I had to put on hold during my college studies. I am a very long way behind.

Weekend Preview: 20-21 June 2009

Feature Events

FIA Formula 1 World Championship

- Formula 1 Santander British Grand Prix
- Silverstone, Northamptonshire, England, UK
- (9/17)
- 60 laps
- www.f1.com

The final FIA Formula 1 British GP to be held at Silverstone, for the foreseeable future at least, as in 2010 this event is scheduled to move to Donington Park. Irrespective of how Donington will turn out, it will be a shame to leave Silverstone. The facilities for the crowd, the teams and the sponsors are not brilliant yet the actual racetrack is one of the best in the world. I absolutely love that camera position on the fence on the entry to Maggotts/Becketts, you really get a sense of the speed and the rapid direction change of these cars.

Quite what the motorsport landscape will look like by June 2010 is anybody’s guess – which teams will arrive at Donington? Will the circuit even be ready? Will FOTA organise their own British GP, held at Silverstone?

All this is for the future.

For now though, let us focus on this race meeting. We can reasonably expect the Brawns to be strong and today’s times from Free Practice suggest the recent Red Bull updates have strengthened that team. We could be in for a very competitive race!

While this is a home race for Jenson Button, it has historically been one of Rubens Barrichello’s stronger circuits, expect him to come into play here. As for the other teams.. forget it, they are scrapping for minor points.

TV Guide:
UK - LIVE on BBC One at 12.10pm BST (race start 1pm), followed by the F1 Forum on the red button service
USA – DELAYED on FOX at 3pm ET (I’m not sure how much pre-race they’ll have, if none that’s still a SEVEN HOUR tape delay *shocked*)

Support races: GP2 Series, FBMW Europe, Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup, Historic Sportscars

BEFORE THE RACE at about 11am UK be sure to head to www.sidepodcast.com and join the live Parade Lap! It is an online radio show loosely discussing F1 with a laid-back Sunday vibe. It will end as the BBC coverage begins and there is live text commenting! Stick around on the site to live comment the race.

I intend to both live comment the race on SPC, and live tweet on Twitter. If you follow my Twitter account and are located in the US (or elsewhere) and do not wish the result to be spoiled, you should avoid Twitter completely or un-follow me until you have seen the race. Sorry, the live audience isn’t going to wait for you!

IndyCar Series

- Iowa Corn 250 Presented by Pioneer
- Iowa Speedway, Newton, Iowa
- (7/17)
- 250 laps
- www.indycar.com

The return to the fast 7/8ths of a mile oval in the Pressdog’s back yard, Iowa. Check his site for regular updates from the track during and after the weekend!
Iowa is a small oval but it is designed in such a way that the racing and the speeds are as they would be on a superspeedway. Craziness ensues! They haven’t been coming here long but it is turning into a must-see event, unfortunately year 1 was for all the wrong reasons will lots of crashes. Year 2 was much better with close racing everywhere. What will this year bring?

TV Guide:
UK – LIVE on Sky Sports Xtra at 6pm BST
USA – LIVE on ABC at 1pm ET

Support races: Firestone Indy Lights, USAC..something or other

Other Events

NASCAR Sprint Cup

- Toyota / Save Mart 350
- Infineon Raceway, Sears Point, California, USA
- (16/36)
- www.nascar.com

TV Guide:
UK - LIVE on Sky Sports Xtra at 10pm Sunday
USA – LIVE on TNT at 4.30pm ET Sunday

For all other events I will list the UK TV channel only, if you are elsewhere you will have to look it up (check their website).

NASCAR Nationwide & Trucks

- Milwaukee (Saturday on ESPN2 and Friday on SPEED, respectively)

GP2 Series

- Silverstone
- Britain
- (4/10)
- Setanta Sports 1: Feature on Saturday at 2.55pm, Sprint on Sunday at 9.25am (both live)
- www.gp2series.com

FIA Formula 2

- Brno, Czech Republic
- (2/8)
- Eurosport & live web streaming: Race 1 at 11am Saturday, Race 2 at 12.30pm Sunday
- www.formulatwo.com

FIA World Touring Cars

- Marriott Race of the Czech Republic
- Brno, Czech Republic
- (6/12)
- Eurosport: Race 1 at 11.45am, then F2 at 12.30, then Race 2 at 1.45pm(both Sunday)
- www.fiawtcc.com
- with F2, FMaster

FIA GT Championship

- Oscherseleben, Germany
- (3/8)
- Setanta Sports at 10:30am
- www.fiagt.com
- with FIA GT3 European Championship, FIA GT4 European Cup, Formul’Academy, FRenault NEC, ATS F3

Australian V8 Supercars

- Hidden Valley, Australia
- (5/14)
- www.v8supercars.com.au

Grand-Am Rolex Series

- Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, Lexington, Ohio, USA
- (6/12)
- www.grand-am.com

Super GT

- Sepang, Malaysia
- (4/9)
- www.supergt.net/en

Intercontinental Rally Challenge

- Ypres, Belgium
- (5/12)
- Daily updates on Eurosport
- www.ircseries.com

 

I believe that’s everything, let me know if you spot something else worth noting.

For those in the UK, don’t forget the return of Top Gear on BBC Two at 8pm Sunday!

Finally, if you missed the Jackie Stewart, Jim Clark and Graham Hill docos on BBC Four earlier in the year, as I did, they are repeated in one lump on Saturday night from 8pm. Enjoy!

Weekend Preview: 23-24 May 2009

Feature Events

Formula 1

- Grand Prix de Monaco
- Monte Carlo, Monaco
- (6/17)
- www.f1.com
- Track Map

I will write a full preview shortly.

TV Guide:

UK - LIVE on BBC One at 12:10pm

US – LIVE on SPEED at 7:30am ET

Support races: GP2 Series, FRenault 3.5, Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup

IndyCar Series

- Indianapolis 500
- Indianapolis Motor Speedway
- Speedway, Indianapolis, Indiana, United States
- (4/17)
- www.indycar.com

I will write a full preview shortly.

TV Guide:

UK - LIVE on Sky Sports 3 at 6pm BST (GMT+1)

US – LIVE on ABC at 12pm ET

Support races: Firestone Indy Lights (Friday)

Other Events

NASCAR Sprint Cup

- Coca-Cola 600
- Lowe’s Motor Speedway
- Charlotte, South Carolina, USA
- (12/36)
- www.nascar.com

TV Guide:

UK - LIVE on Sky Sports 3 at 10:30pm Sunday

US – LIVE on FOX at 5pm ET Sunday

Support races: Nationwide Series (Saturday)

GP2 & Formula Renault 3.5

- Monaco
- (2/10) & (3/9)
- www.gp2series.com & www.worldseriesbyrenault.com

This is the only event in the year where the two biggest F1 feeder series meet at the same place at the same time. This and the extra F1 running on Thursday causes a scheduling shuffle.

The GP2 Feature Race has already taken place, it was held on Friday morning. The Sprint Race will be held after F1 qualifying on Saturday. Not so long ago GP2 only got one race here, and the extra one was a compromise for giving up a slot to FR3.5 which only has one race this weekend – but it is directly before the F1 race.

GP2 Feature: Friday 11:15am local
F1 qual: Saturday 2pm
GP2 Sprint: Saturday 4pm
FR3.5: Sunday 11:10am
F1 race: 2pm

Also in Monaco: Porsche Supercup

ADAC 24h Rennen Nürburgring
(Nürburgring 24 Hours)

- Nürburgring Nordschleife
- http://adac.24h-rennen.de/en.html

This is one crazy event. If you think a normal 24 hour race is tough, imagine driving the 16 mile Nordschleife + GP circuit combo around the clock!

Not only that but 230 cars are entered for practice and 220 qualify, even on this track that is a lot of cars! The organisers also have to keep track of some 800 drivers…

You should be able to follow the event from 4pm German time (3pm UK) on Saturday via streaming on the above website, and there will be live timing. Best of all, www.radiolemans.com will have commentary!

Among the fastest cars are Porsche GT3s, Ford GTs and the new Audi R8 GT which lap the circuit in eight and a half minutes.

There is a brief history of the event on Wikipedia.

WRC

- Rally D’Italia Sardegna
- Sardinia
- (6/12)
- www.wrc.com

Indy Lights

- Indianapolis Motor Speedway

(held Friday)

British Rally Championship

- Jim Clark Rally

British Superbikes

- Donington Park
- Leicestershire, England, UK

* * *

That’s it, if ever if you think I’ve forgotten something please point it out in the comments. Enjoy your weekend!

Weekend Preview: 9-10 May 2009

Feature Events

FIA Formula One World Championship

- Formula 1 Gran Premio de España Telefonica 2009
- Circuit de Catalunya
- Montmelo, Catalonia, Spain
- (5/17)
- www.formula1.com
- Track Map

The teams have their luxurious motorhomes (palaces?) back, races are at their usual times again, and people actually will actually be on site watching with their eyes - Formula 1 is back in Europe!

Questions to be asked this weekend:

Which teams will choose to run KERS this week? Which teams will have added a new diffuser? Will the crazy-looking wings actually generate passing at what is usually one of the most boring races of the year? This place will be a true test of the new regulations.
Find out on Sunday!

TV Guide:

UK - LIVE on BBC One at 12:10pm with the usual suite of options appearing on the Red Button when the race starts at 1pm.
Qualifying is LIVE on BBC One at 12:10pm Saturday.

US – LIVE on SPEED at 7:30am ET
Qualifying is LIVE on SPEED at 8am Saturday.

Support races: GP2 Series, FBMW Europe, Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup.
The schedule is here and you can convert to your time zone on the sidebar.

You can listen to a short preview of the event here to get up to speed on the current news.

Other Events

IRL IndyCar Series

- Pole Day for the Indy 500
- Indianapolis Motor Speedway
- Speedway, Indiana, USA
- www.indycar.com

Indy’s long qualifying process starts with the big one, qualifying for the top 11 spots including the pole position! The draw for the qualifying order takes place on Friday night with the first car in line due to start the four-lap average from 12pm ET (I believe?).

After the 11th run the ‘bumping’ begins – the field is limited to 11 positions and the slowest gets knocked out on each faster run.

Repeat for positions 12-22 on Sunday and positions 23-33 next Saturday. Yes, this means if you are quick Sunday but not Saturday you might qualify in 12th with a faster time than the guy in 11th…

Finally, next Sunday is the last chance qualifying of Bump Day when whole field is opened up again and the slowest car regardless of position is bumped off the list.

There is copious TV coverage in the US but I’d imagine this one is best followed online using the radio, live timing and all of your Twitter friends!

TV Guide:

US – Versus has a huge level of coverage from 12:00pm to 6:30pm EDT on Saturday and Sunday with the same again for next week’s sessions.

UK and elsewhere - www.indycar.com live streaming video with live timing (go to the main page and check the options)

NASCAR Sprint Cup

- Southern 500
- Darlington Speedway
- Darlington, USA
- (11/36)
- www.nascar.com

This is another Saturday night race.

TV Guide:

UK - LIVE on Sky Sports 2 at 12.00am Saturday night / Sunday morning, repeated on three times across Sky Sports during Sunday.

US – LIVE on FOX at 7pm ET Saturday

Support races: Nationwide Series (Friday)

Le Mans Series

- 1000km of Spa
- Spa-Franchorchamps
- Francorchamps, Belgium
- (2/5)
- www.lemans-series.com

Peugeot rejoin the series in the final European sportscar race before the 24 Hours of Le Mans next month. They’ll be up against the Lola Aston Martins and the Kolles Audis.

The GT2 battle will be as fraught as ever as well!

TV Guide:

UK – Updates on Eurosport at 11:45am (30 mins) and 5pm (1 hr). Pretty shoddy for a six hour race I must say.

Support races: Radical European Masters, Classic Endurance Racing, Formula Le Mans, British GT

GP2 Series

- Circuit de Catalunya
- Montmelo, Catalonia, Spain
- (1/10)
- www.gp2series.com

F1’s feeder series proper gets going after the diversion of the Asia Series. I have to say I need to do some reading up on who is doing what, and which drivers have been promoted from junior categories, because I’m a little bit behind on my GP2 news! Should be fun though.

TV Guide:

UK – Feature race doesn’t seem to be live on Saturday at all, we have to wait until 8am Sunday to watch it on Setanta Sports 1 followed directly by live coverage of the Sprint race.

This is a major step down in coverage compared to what we have been used to – we have had live coverage of the this or its predecessor F3000 for well over a decade, perhaps nearer two decades. This is not good news.

World Superbikes
- Monza, Italy

Don’t follow it so I don’t know…

* * *
Please note there will be no dedicated F1 Preview for the Spanish Grand Prix as regrettably I do not have time to write one. I have a lot of exam and project work to do so the blog will remain quiet for the next couple of weeks – but I will still be updating my Twitter account!

GP2 Top Ten 2008

For the final instalment in my trilogy of Top Tens of 2008, I'm going to take a brief look at the GP2 Series. Since 2005, GP2 has positioned itself as the official finishing school of F1, despite not having official links with the FIA itself, and being more closely aligned with the commercial arm of F1, the FOM/FOA group operated by a Mr B C Ecclestone. It is the replacement for the then-ailing F3000 International Series which seemed to end up sending most of its drivers to America instead of F1. There's nothing wrong with racing in America, but this is perhaps not what the official F1 feeder series should be doing. Fans of the IRL might liken it to the Lights frontrunners going off to race in Formula Nippon.

Before we continue let me point you in the direction of the Too Much Racing Sidebar. If you scroll down to the white section you'll notice a new Last.FM box has appeared above the one that was already there. What does this mean? You can now play my personal radio station! If you've ever wondered what crap I listen to when I write this stuff, now you can find out. That's right, any music I've played via Winamp has been noted in Last.FM and is now available to you. Just hit Play and continue reading.
Remember if you navigate away (to write a comment, or visit another blog) it'll stop playing, so you might want to hit the little icon on the bottom right of the red area to pop-out the player. I highly recommend Last.FM to anyone who listens to music through their computer.


2008 GP2 Series
For the avoidance of doubt I am only considering the main GP2 Series which raced in Europe, starting in Barcelona and ending in Monza. The Asia Series hasn't been considered.


1. Lucas di Grassi (P3 - Barwa Campos Team)
After finishing the 2007 GP2 season runner-up in points, Lucas spent the winter alongside Nelson Piquet Jr sharing the double-duty of testing the Renault F1 car and doing development work on the new generation GP2 car/engine combo. When the F1 drive went to Nelson and the test role was reduced by the F1 regulations, Lucas found himself without much work. So in June he jumped in to the Barwa Campos Team to replace the underperforming rookie Ben Hanley, and after missing the first three weekends (i.e. six races) goes on to out-score everyone else in the remaining 7 weekends of the season to wind up 3rd in points, just narrowly beaten to 2nd by Bruno Senna and ahead of the highly-rated Romain Grosjean.
Okay so he tested the new car before anyone else, but since then everyone but him had run six races and most of the field had also done the inaugural Asia Series so you've got to say they'd caught up by then.
I reckon that's pretty impressive.

2. Giorgio Pantano (P1 Champion - Racing Engineering)
Pantano had a good season, taking the previously unfancied Racing Engineering team and transforming them in to race-winners - just as he did with Campos the previous year and FMS the year before that. Giorgio seems to have decided that if nobody will take him in F1 or IndyCar, he'll prove himself by becoming a good development driver as well as a fast racing driver. Okay so his chance in F1 has been and gone which is a shame (2004 feels like an age ago), but what chance an IndyCar ride in 2009? He can't stay in GP2 yet again, that's for sure. Perhaps he'll work on improving the fortunes of A1GP Team Italy, or worse, some team in Superleague Formula. At least the guy with most Feature race wins won the title, as it should be.

3. Bruno Senna (P2 - iSport International)
Bruno had some excellent drives this year, but is still prone to silly mistakes and misjudgements. It won't take long to knock those out of his system, but didn't people say that this time a year ago? He's definitely still improving yet somehow this still feels like a year of unfulfilled promises. If he doesn't dominate in 2009 I'll be very surprised.

4. Romain Grosjean (P4 - ART Grand Prix)
Romain was expected to walk this year's title after his performances in F3 last year and GP2 Asia over the winter break. As it turned out, his ART car was a lot more 'pointier' than the opposition and this was something he seemed to struggle with, perhaps his style not suited to those characteristics. The rest of the grid's cars seemed more docile, with some commentators suggesting this was the key to ART's dominance in the early years of GP2. With a change of teams on the cards he'll be good next year. Very good.

5. Pastor Maldonado (P5 - Piquet Sports)
The latest stupidly-quick-but-prone-to-crashing Venezuelan to come off the conveyor belt came on leaps and bounds this year. Last year he and Viso were pretty close, with Viso more consistent while Maldonado showed more long-term potential. This year Pastor demonstrated that potential to great effect with some excellent drives, but had a few too many retirements from races. Fast but erratic, and likes the old Banzai move even if it won't work, just to show the others that he'll do it.

6. Sebastien Buemi (P6 - Trust Team Arden)
The highly-rated Red Bull man was fair-to-middling, and perhaps a little overhyped. He was a very good A1GP driver in the Lola-Zytek, and seems to be slowly transferring those skills to GP2. It was a reasonable upper-midfield year and should be a title challenger next year. Seemed to always be around when others hit problems.

7. Jerome d'Ambrosio (P11 - DAMS)
This is a guy I didn't rate at all going into the season. He seemed to make stupid errors early on which cost him a lot of points, but went on to impress me a lot through the year and if it wasn't for that early form he'd be much higher in the points ranking and could easily have been 7th. Like Buemi he was one of the guys who was able to find good results when others threw them away, and was often up there on merit too, particuarly in the final rounds at Spa and Monza. One to watch with interest.

8. Vitaly Petrov (P7 - Barwa Campos Team)
Seems to have stopped making errors and has picked up some speed, but not quite there yet. He could use another year and looks like he'll get exactly that. There's not much more to say really.

9. Karun Chandhok (P10 - iSport International)
Karun seems to be one of those guys who always seems to be in the wrong place. He's a fast driver and a professional one, yet seems to get involved in the pack when he maybe should be ahead of them given he's in an iSport Dallara, one of the two top teams. This is possibly down to not getting enough out of qualifying, but he's a good racer and runs very well when he qualifies up front. He works for it and goes for moves where others don't. Perhaps he's the new David Coulthard? One thing's for sure: Vijay Mallya shouldn't be dimissing him so readily.

10. Alvaro Parente (P8 - Super Nova Racing)
Alvaro had always struggled with a budget in every formula he's raced in, so he knows a good fight. He impressed at the first round in Barcelona with a win in his first race and 7th in the reverse top-8 sprint race, but then seemed to drop back during the year. He's a fast driver, a good guy, and deserves another year in GP2.

Other Surprises?
Luca Fillipi who should be in this list but fell out with ART, prompting a move to Arden, which didn't seem to work either. He showed a huge amount of promise in 2007 and was expected to iron out the bumps this year. Didn't happen. Shame. He needs a stellar 2009.

Mike Conway should have done better although he was with Trident..

Christian Bakkerud fell apart again with his customary back problems, ironic given his name, which is unfortunate because he was an excellent F3 driver.

What of 2009?
The backmarker BCN Competicion team has been bought by the ex-Jordan F1 driver (and now SEAT touring car driver) Tiago Monteiro and renamed as Ocean Racing Technology. With the team relocating from Spain to Portugal you can't expect much improvement early on, but perhaps in the long-term?

We're going to have an unmissable 2009 championship with Senna vs Maldonado vs Grosjean the main title fight, with probably Buemi and one or two others sticking their noses in with a few wins. I can't wait!
In the meantime the '08/'09 Asia Series is already under way with the 1st-generation cars. When I eventually get around to watching those races I may just post a little top ten as a warm-up to the main season.

In the meantime, have a great New Year, whatever you're doing!

GP2 Catch-up: Hockenheim

I tell you what, it was really refreshing to watch an open-wheel race without sitting here tapping out a load of notes about it. I did find my concentration lapsing, my short attention span causing me to drift away. I'm not sure if this is because the race was so old (July), because I don't care enough about the participants this year, or because I'm now used to note-taking during the racing.

This is a short summary of the two races.

Feature Race
This was fairly tedious most of the way through, the drivers just couldn't make a pass work. I swear there was more passing in the F1 race the next day and that NEVER happens with GP2. There was the odd good move but it was pretty much decided in the pits and a faultless drive from Romain Grosjean - until the rain fell with just 5 laps remaining. Chaos!
Senna and di Grassi, who were running about 5th, took to the pitlane for wet tyres and fell some 25 seconds behind the remaining leaders including Grosjean and Pantano, who stayed out and tried to hang on.
The rain held at one end of the circuit, yet it was fairly dry at the other end (at the pits). The race became a question of whether the guys who stopped would catch the guys who didn't - and whether the latter would spin out - before we ran out of laps.
Several drivers spun out, most of whom were on dry tyres, but Grosjean and Pantano held on to finish 1st and 2nd respectively. I believe the top wet-shod finisher was Senna in 4th. Parente was 3rd and I can't recall if he pitted or not.

The result was short-lived as Grosjean was later given a time penalty for overtaking under yellow flags during the wet-weather period - and there were a lot of yellow flags. The penalty reversed the top two positions giving Pantano maximum points (inc. fastest lap).


Sprint Race
Sunday's race was more eventful with some good moves both at the hairpin, and at the Mercedes... err... bit. It stayed dry throughout so it looks like several guys made some good calls on setup.
The best drive of the day was Mike Conway who after a dreadful Feature race had to start this one from 24th. He finished 9th without the aid of the Safety Car!
Giorgio Pantano was out early with a broken steering arm after a hit with Soucek. Lucas di Grassi was out shortly afterwards when Maldonado used him as a brake at the hairpin. This was time for the others to claim valuable points.

Karun Chandhok put in a very good drive against Andi Zuber to claim a deserved win, with Senna fighting up to 3rd and Grosjean 4th.
There was some pretty good racing throughout the field, which didn't spread out as much as it often does. I wonder if that was down to the lack of pit stops in the sprint?


I won't detain you with the points standings for a 3-month old race but I would like to keep posting these little summaries until I complete the season. I'm considering covering A1GP in the same way which I'll only begin when I've done GP2. I haven't decided on GP2 Asia yet, last year's Asia series was so dull I'm not too bothered about it.


Come back soon for my preview of F1's Japanese Grand Prix featuring green grooves!

GP2 Catch-Up - Silverstone

Delayed mini-notes from the two GP2 races held at Silverstone, supporting the British GP. I plan to do this style of notes for GP2 from now on with the proviso that they'll be dropped if I'm too busy. Nice get out clause, eh? As I said before, I'm miles behind on watching GP2 which is why I'm posting about Silverstone the weekend after the series ended. I do know who won, I'd like to see how he did it!

Coverage from ITV4, who have improved at every round.

Silverstone, Northamptonshire, England
Rounds 9 and 10 of 20.

FEATURE RACE
36 laps
Sat. 5 July
Dry and sunny, patchy cloud

- Senna and Grosjean start on the front row.

- GO! Senna leads, Grosjean drops a place to di Grassi, as Pantano also gains. Conway had a terrible start from 8th and is now about 24th.

- Senna off course at Stowe, rejoins 5th. May have been the wind which is strong here, cars with wings don't like strong winds as it messes with the downforce. Lucas di Grassi now leads.

- Zuber is off course as well, he was 4th. Replay: Spins at speed! He's rejoined.

- Chandhok makes a good move on someone... we cut to Buemi losing multiple places, replay, tyres touched with Maldonado.
- Someone in the gravel! Ran wide. Maldonado. The Buemi collision caused damaged?

- 2 cars pitted for tyres - this is early. Conway is one of them.
- Maldonado off again at the same place as last lap.

- Chandhok takes Fillipi, another good move, Fillipi left the door open a little too much and Chandhok took it.

- Vitaly Petrov takes Ho Pin Tung, Petrov is 10th from 16th on the grid.

- 11 laps gone, 25 to go: di Grassi, Grosjean, Pantano. More cars are starting to pit.

- Grosjean pits from 2nd. Most cars have pitted except for the faster cars who are leaving it a while longer. Grosjean emerges 8th with 6 guys left to stop. Grosjean is the leader of those who have pitted.
- Pantano pits. Championship leader before this weekend. Does he beat Grosjean? No! Pit strategy didn't work, positions maintained.
- di Grassi is in, so is Senna - almost touch in the pits! Senna had to brake to avoid him. Senna comes out in 10th, di Grassi is 4th, still ahead of Grosjean and Pantano.
- Chandhok is in, gets out ahead of Senna to gain a place.

- Kobayashi took an early pit stop and it worked well, he's now 4th.

- Spoke too soon! 2 laps later he's out of the car, parked on the grass. Technical failure of some kind.

- Buemi passes Fillipi through Bridge corner, ballsy.

- Pantano in 3rd is faster than Grosjean in 2nd, directly behind him.
- Pantano pushes his way through! They touch several times under braking for the chicane.

- Chandhok v Zuber, wheels touch, Zuber stays ahead. Then Zuber blocks into Copse! Not impressed with that, pretty dangerous place to block.
- Meanwhile Pantano has caught di Grassi, the leader. Grosjean has fallen a long way back having leaned on his tyres earlier.
- Zuber just lost three places, he didn't slow down in time and overshoots the corner. Watching the mirrors and not the road? Chandhok, Senna and Buemi are through.

- Pantano dummies di Grassi into Stowe, passes for the lead! di Grassi fights back at the next corner but can't quite do it. 5 laps to go.
- Maldonado in the wall! Major damage, he spun the car in front of someone almost taking him out too. Local yellow only due to location of the car, it is out of the way.

- Chandhok passes Grosjean but it was under the yellow so the place is given back immediately. Buemi then gets by Senna!
- Grosjean very slow through the fast corners compared to Chandhok. Grosjean is locking his brakes at nearly every corner. Chandhok is now through.
- The last three laps of this were absolutely crazy! Grosjean v Senna v Buemi. Brilliant stuff. Grosjean lost out due to wearing his tyres but held on valiantly for most of that and does indeed beat Senna who went over the gravel in the last few corners.

- Giorgio Pantano wins! di Grassi 2nd, Chandhok 3rd, Buemi 4th, Grosjean 5th, Senna 6th. Conway made it as far as 14th after dropping to 24th on lap 1.



SPRINT RACE
24 laps
Sun. 6 July
Very Wet

- Fillipi on pole because he finished 8th yesterday. Zuber alongside him. Top 8 from race 1 are reversed, P9 onwards line up in yesterday's finishing order.

- Buemi and Herck crashed on the out lap to the grid! They cars hadn't even reached the formation grid yet, let alone the race start grid. I have a feeling we could see a lot of cars go out. Buemi should have started 5th, Herck was way back.

- GO! Someone stalled, slow getaway for Zuber. Lots of spray. Maldonado was the staller. Fillipi leads ahead of Senna (started 3rd). Senna passes him for the lead, but in the same shot his teammate Chandhok spins off!
- Fillipi is off the track, in the gravel. Yellow flags at turn one, don't know why.

- Parante and d'Ambrosio in the gravel, d'Ambrosio should continue.
- Grosjean has lost his front wing, is somehow holding off the other cars at these wet lower speeds. Petrov spins under acceleration! Pantano now 3rd.
- Grosjean pitted for his new wing.

- Fillipi vs Kobayashi, Fillipi goes off again and gives the place away.
- Conway is somehow 4th and setting fastest laps - he started 14th!

- 5 laps gone and the top 4 are already 20 seconds ahead of the next group.

- Grosjean has recovered to 12th, he's passed Villa. Grosjean's teammate Fillipi has spun off again!! He's struggling to stay on the track.
- Senna is now setting fastest laps while leading.

- Grosjean is pushed onto the grass by Buurman! Grosjean gets by him on the next straight, just drives past.

- At half-distance we have: Senna, di Grassi, Pantano, Conway, Soucek, Petrov. Just the top six score in the sprint race, top 8 in the feature race.

- Grosjean picks off Valerio easily for 9th.
- Kobayashi is 7th and he started on the last row of the grid.

- Petrov v Soucek for multiple corners! Petrov wins. He'd been faster at the overtaking spots but yellows prevented a pass before now. Kobayashi has caught these two while they were fighting.
- Soucek and Kobayashi collide!! Soucek pushed into the barriers, wheel ripped off the car. Replays... might not have been a push as Soucek got a wheel in the dirt which spun him around. His car is far enough out of the way not to need safety car.

- Raining hard now. Maldonado takes a drive-through for speeding in pitlane, after his car was pushed there to be refired at the start!

- Fillipi has pitted and retires. Maldonado now has to take a 10-second stop/go penalty for overtaking under yellows. Not much point him continuing after his day!

- Asmer has spun through the polystyrene advertising hoarding, destroying it, he was running last already.
- Senna is now in lapped traffic, which can't see him due to the spray. He's 8 seconds up on di Grassi who will surely close in now. 3 laps to go.

- Villa messes up the chicane and gets on the grass, spins around and stalls it. He was the only driver to finish every race this year - until now. He's out.
- Asmer spins again, either at the same place as last time or he's taken out another hoarding! He gets out and walks away.
- Senna has actually opened out the gap going through traffic.

Bruno Senna wins! di Grassi 2nd, Pantano 3rd, Conway 4th, Petrov 5th, Valsecci 6th.

Replays: Big shunt on the last lap! Three cars into each other at Bridge corner, involving Kobayashi, a BCN car and Maldonado. Lots of debris at Bridge. Terrible for Kobayashi who was 6th and on for a point after starting 25th.
Only 15 finishers, six of whom were lapped.


POINTS
Top 6 at the halfway point of the year:
50 Pantano
39 Senna
25 Buemi
24 di Grassi
23 Grosjean
20 Petrov



BLOG NOTES

Thanks to Jeff at MyNameIsIRL for pointing out the FEEDJIT live feeds by adding it to his own blog. A great addition which I have no qualms about stealing. It misreports where I am but you get the right region within the country. It'll be interesting to see a) if I have many readers and b) where they are.

The McLaren/Hamilton penalty hearing was today and the result will be announced tomorrow. I am expecting no change to the penalty and possibly an extra penalty for 'wasting time', which is not without precedent.

Bits and bobs

Just a few things you can expect from me in the next few weeks:

F1
Race notes on the remaining F1 races this year, starting with the Italian GP this weekend. If I think about it tomorrow or Friday I'll do a race preview but it won't be as good as the Belgian one. I liked that preview. I guess I could gloat about having been to Monza.. Nobody likes a show-off, least of all me, but everyone likes to show off.... so that sounds like a plan. Consider it done.

Then there's Singapore, Japan, China and Brazil. I think that's the right order. I haven't been to any of those so the previews would probably be a bit rubbish.

MotoGP Indy
A little after the Italian GP this Sunday is the MotoGP race at Indianapolis. If last Sunday's IndyCar madfest at Chicago and F1 craziness in Belgium didn't get you going, then how about back-to-backs at two of racing's most storied venues? Shit if these 8 days don't do it for you, you don't like racing, and if you don't like racing what are you doing reading this? Go away!

GP2
I keep promising to watch (and post about) some GP2 - and then I end up doing something else entirely. I'm not watching the races and ignoring the blog updates, I really haven't seen the races yet. Basically this means I'm like 8 weeks behind on GP2. So yeah I need catch up with that, now the IndyCars are done I should have an extra couple of hours a week for doing that. Any bets on when I'll *actually* watch the things?

A1GP
I said I'd do a series preview for A1GP. Their first race of the new season was due ten days from now but it got postponed, apparently indefinitely. I think there's a clear weekend in there somewhere so I'll see if I get time to knock something up but I'm not promising anything.

I've just realised I have no clue why I'm posting this, yet I'm going to hit Publish anyway. Does this mean I've become a Blogaholic? Is that a word? Help!

By the way, on the whole Lewis vs Kimi thing:
Both put in great drives and I'd have been happy for either to win - ON THE RACETRACK. Post-race decisions disappoint me, especially ones which make no sense at all.
Glock got the same penalty as Hamilton but I understand that, he passed under yellows, that's a No-No. Fine. Yet Hamilton backed off enough that Raikkonen was ahead by a nose. The position was returned in accordance with accepted precedent.
Hamilton was faster on the straight because he had been faster for the whole of the previous lap. The McLaren is just better in the rain on this type of track.
What about all of this did the FIA stewards miss? Even Charlie Whiting of the FIA told McLaren it was safe - twice! The stewards are independent of Whiting..
The FIA's structures are too rigid and old-fashioned, and they always have been. Time for a rethink.