Quick Video: Home-made donuts.

I'm not sure what the context is here, whether this man has just got divorced and can't keep the house, or was forced to sell his 7-litre AC Cobra, or my favourite thought that he just bought the house and plans to set up the living room on top of it. Talk about décor! "Ooh, I like what you've done with the floor. What's that smell though?" "Oh that? My doughnuts must be ready."

Whatever the context is, I just hope the floor stays the way it is. That's also superb car control, as it's very easy to let a car like that get out of hand, but he kept it in check with the brakes and didn't leave a scratch. Just plenty of delicious tyre marks.

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One Ticked Off The Bucket List

This article is so called because I've said from the start that I will drive this car before I die. As of 12/8/11, I have.

For my combined Birthday and Christmas present in 2009, my grandparents bought me a supercar gift experience that entitled me to drive a Lamborghini Murciélago 6.2 around a former airfield in Elvington in north Yorkshire (which I booked for February '10). Going from a 67bhp Fiat Grande Punto 1.2 to a 570bhp Lamborghini V12 a mere 2 or 3 months after passing my driving test was... interesting, especially as the driving position was rather awkward (requiring short arms and long legs) and I couldn't see out very well. The result was somewhat feeble driving. It was certainly fun though, and it sounded awesome - not just to hear that 6.2-litre V12, but also to snick-snick the open-gated manual gearbox into position - but I didn't really do myself proud. I didn't even hit 100mph. This year, however, was going to be better than last year......

For Christmas in 2010, I got another gift experience (that I asked for, rather than being a pleasant surprise). With another year of driving under my belt, I was finally going to drive the Gran Turismo Hero Car: the awesome Nissan GT-R. This is a car I followed as closely as one can on the internet. Every new spy photo, every new technical detail, I knew about it pretty quickly. The PlayStation racing sim had sparked a real love for the Nissan Skyline GT-R, and the bespoke R35 is something I anticipated more than pretty much anything (except maybe Gran Turismo 5). After about four years of dreaming about what it's like, and sitting in one at every opportunity at car shows, this was the big one. I was actually going to find out.

I said in my head on the way to Kenilworth (on the 12th August '11) that I would be able to compare Gran Turismo to real life. If my mind hadn't been distracted by a metallic dark grey McLaren MP4-12C in a petrol station, I probably would've remembered how the Lamborghini threw me around when the instructor and I swapped seats and that at the end of the day, even though the cars on GT5 handle almost identically to their real-life counterparts, and my Logitech Driving Force GT communicates so well you can get an excellent feel for how much grip there is, your chair at home isn't moving. Instead, I started thinking about the prevailing weather conditions as it started raining...

The clockwise circuit. Pit entry before final chicane.

We eventually arrived dry at Prodrive in Kenilworth, Warwickshire, where the track is based. Prodrive are actually a lot more important than they get credit for. They've put together Subaru Impreza rally cars for years - including Colin McRae's championship winner, if I'm not wrong - as well as the Aston Martin DBR9, Ferrari 550 LM, the 2011 Mini Countryman WRC, a few limited edition road cars and probably a few other things too, so it was cool to be on their turf, and actually spot a Countryman WRC somewhere out of the way of experience-goers.

As we sat there having arrived early, two of my siblings my mother and I (the third sibling and my dad weren't available), we rolled the windows down a little and relaxed, as the distant sound of Audi V8s, Lamborghini V10s, an Aston Martin V12 or two and the screaming supercharger of an Ariel Atom 300 echoed through the very tall trees that help hide secret cars from view. The anticipation built up as it had before in the car park at Elvington... and then it rained again. First it was light, raising the fear that this was the start of a slow-burning storm that would last our entire visit rather than simply a quick shower. With the 3:15pm deadline for when we could show up looming the rain picked up quite heavily, before subsiding into light drizzle and then, thankfully, nothing at all. Perhaps we were just on the edge of a bigger rain storm. Still, it left us with just enough time to get the minibus over to reception to sign in, get my papers in order and hop into the passenger seat of an MG ZS for two demo laps.

Once I'd found the right woman with a clipboard to show my paperwork, I waited as a white Nissan GT-R hoved into view, turning right before the north-east chicane and looping round the coolest car park I've seen all year, with two V8 Audi R8s, an Aston Martin AMV8 and two DB9s (one coupé and a Volante), three Ferrari F360s (one Modena and two Spiders) a broken-down F355 and an F430 of each body style, four Lamborghini Gallardos (three early Spyders and a rare LP550-2 Balboni in white), a Murciélago LP640 Roadster, a Porsche 911 Turbo (996), a Lotus Elise (S2), an Ariel Atom 300 SC (piloted by someone dressed exactly like The Stig), and a Vauxhall VXR8 (powered by a 6.0 Corvette V8 and hooned around by a lunatic). The latter two were for passenger thrill rides only. I stood eagerly as the previous person got out, waiting for the instructor to walk over and call out my name in a "now it's your turn to drive your dream car" kind of way...

"Olivia?"

Crap! Have I missed it? They explicitly say that if you're late, you don't get to do it, and it was by now a few minutes after 16:00, when I was due to be in the car. The next 10 minutes of waiting for the GT-R to return again were agonising, as I started to genuinely think he wasn't going to say my name after "Olivia" got out. Thankfully, he did say it, and I immediately put my hand up and hopped over the little fence for spectators (they must have been running late or something). I walked towards the instructor - sadly, his name escapes me - who extended his hand. I was a little nervous, so I looked at his hand for a moment and started handing him my paperwork, before realising he was going for a handshake. Brain fart number 1...

After I said hello, I headed towards the GT-R as the instructor opened the door for me, and lowered myself in. Having sat in GT-Rs before, everything was instantly familiar, yet it was still exciting to see it, a bit like seeing Jeremy Clarkson in person for the fourth or fifth time, except that this time it was the equivalent of finally being able to shake his hand and say hello (which I haven't actually done to JC yet). The bucket seats expected someone a little thinner than I am, and at first my side flab felt a little squished, but as I would later find out, those substantial side bolsters come in handy when the going gets twisty. The driving position was much better than in the Lamborghini I drove 14 months previously, but it still felt quite dark and enclosed, perhaps just because I'm used to driving a hatchback with taller windows and a much bigger windscreen. Still, it was resolutely a driving environment and not an armchair in a box with a wheel in front of it. One thing I'd have to get used to quickly was the semi-automatic gearbox, as like any real petrolhead, I've only ever driven a manual car (even the Murciélago). I asked if I could use the paddles to change gear myself and the instructor replied "I'll tell you when to change gear". Good. With my left foot retired for the next 10 minutes, I pressed on the brake and he pressed the starter button (why I couldn't have done that myself, I don't know...). The GT-R cleared its throat as it awoke and rested into a bassy hum. He put it into Auto while I got out of the pits - for want of a better word, as it was really just a line of cars with cones between them - and I released the brake expecting it to move off on its own somehow. It did a little, but I did of course have to brush the accelerator a bit... until we were cut up by a yellow Gallardo Spyder. These supercar drivers, eh? It's always all about them...

But enough about other people, and more about me in my supercar. Once the Gallardo had moved away in front of us, I started to move down the "pit" exit, avoiding the wet-surface skid pan, and onto the track. We were still going about 15mph initially, so I was prompted to move things on a little. Whenever I need to motivate the Punto, it takes a fair bit of throttle to get it to do anything at all, and this habit meant that I jerked the GT-R forward when I first tried to do the same thing here. Perhaps I'll have to mentally adjust how I use the accelerator. Or perhaps not; once we moved onto the track, the instructor kept saying "Give it a little more throttle", so I did. The first time I squeezed it a meaningful amount, there was more of a surge than I expected and I backed off again, but with memories of the Murciélago in the back of my mind, I wasn't going to waste another prime opportunity, especially not now I'm so much more confident behind the wheel (with 20 months under my belt instead of 2), so I persevered. The GT-R surged forward with the kind of constant force I've only ever felt before on a tube train, and the low, growly sound of the 3.8-litre V6 TT stirring underneath me motivated me further. The leather-bound soft metal gearshift paddles (right to go, left to slow) felt thick and meaningful when I changed gear. In fact, it was such a satisfying thing to do that I didn't really miss having to use a gear stick. I think I would miss it on a long term basis, but for now it was absolutely appropriate for what I was doing, and my left foot didn't keep tapping or pressing on the foot rest like I thought it might. I'm quite happy that my brain readjusted so quickly and easily to using paddles. That said, after the first chicane, I did forget to change up into 3rd gear despite the instructor saying "Up one! Up one! Go up a gear!" After I finally did, he felt urged to remind me how to use them. Brain fart number 2...

After that was out of the way though, things only got better. After two more chicanes (one of which looks impossibly tight, yet we're all encouraged to accelerate through it), I got to the final right-left-right before the long straight, lining up to overtake the Lamborghini Gallardo that cut us up before, on the exit of the final corner. Four more cylinders? 30 more bhp? Big deal. I know the GT-R is extremely grippy, even in conditions TopGear would call "mildly moist", so before the wheel was even straight I extended my right leg as far as possible and the GT-R duly responded, perhaps thinking "Yes, let's finally get this show on the road!" in that big computer mind it has. The result was unbelievable. It felt like the back of the leather bucket seat was a catapult that had just been released, and the Gallardo simply disappeared to my left. A part of my brain that had made me lift off before started saying "No, this is scary", but the rest of my brain was saying "No, keep going, this is fucking awesome!", and I got it up to 116mph before I had to slow back down again (I wasn't allowed to take it up to the red line in case I broke something, but generally shifted at around 5-5500rpm out of 7000). I only know this having watched the video afterwards, but I did have a quick glance at the speedo and saw it brush past 100 without incident. I had never felt acceleration like that before, and it was enough for me to say "Bloody hell!" out loud. In the braking zone, I again had to use the pedals differently - my 1.2 Punto has the bigger, more potent brakes from a 1.4 thanks to the factory workers being slightly Italian, so there's not much travel in the brake pedal and I don't have to squeeze it much. This meant that the instructor (okay, I think his name might've been Paul, but don't quote me on that) had to say "Ok, slow it down now, bit more, hard on the brakes! Theeere we go". At the end of the first chicane, there's a big bump, and the first time I accelerated on it, it felt like the car moved around a bit, perhaps coming unstuck, but the video didn't reveal any wobbling, so it was probably a brief drop in traction that the highly-advanced ATTESA-ETS All-Wheel-Drive system sorted out in an instant.

I had to get used to changing direction in the GT-R as well, because I generally consider being thrown to one side in the seat (well, as much as those side bolsters would allow) as doing something wrong or being messy, but here it's just because this car weighs 1740kg (plus people and petrol) and can still change direction quickly, and even in the two tight chicanes bookending the straight, you're going through them notably faster than you would on the road. The steering wasn't as heavy as the similarly hefty Murciélago, but it still felt very meaningful. It was very nice to use, and felt quite natural once I'd settled in. It's heavier than my Punto's steering, but in a good way (Fiat steering has too much power assistance, so there's not much feel). I do think that with practice, I would shave seconds off my lap times by acclimatising to how much you move around in the car and getting more confident and faster. In fact, I'd like to think my times tumbled anyway, but there isn't actually a start/finish line, so I'll never know. You're allowed 4 laps, an out-lap, two hot laps and an in-lap, and as I did the rest of them, I overtook another Gallardo Spyder (an orange one) in the same place, as well as a Ferrari F360 Modena on the little straight before the final chicane. I would also have overtaken an Aston Martin DB9 Volante there the next lap, but just when I was ready to accelerate again, they stayed right, and so did I, as I was instructed to pull into the pits. Curiously, the DB9 didn't pull into the pits, so maybe they were defending...

The instructor put the car back into Auto mode again as we made a long right, then went past the car park and looped round again to park to the right of an Audi R8, accidentally running over a cone with my left-rear wheel as I did (well, I am used to short-wheelbase hatchbacks). As we came in he asked me what I thought. I think I must have just used a superlative, but I can't remember. I shook his hand and thanked him for what he had just helped me do, but it was a slightly weak shake, fair enough considering the white-knuckle ride I just gave myself. It's difficult to immediately put an experience like that into words, but I can tell you now it was a rush like I have never had in a car before, if at all, and probably won't have in my own car for many years to come, which is actually quite a depressing realisation...
Still, I have at least experienced it, and I like to think I made the most of it, all things considered. I certainly gave a few poster-worthy supercars what-for, which was very satisfying. I was also far from disappointed after meeting my dream car. They say "don't meet your heroes", but there are some exceptions to that, and this is one of them. It is brute force, materialised. What a machine.

Unfortunately we missed the last minibus to a complimentary "Ride in a 4x4" on Prodrive's off-road course (which only costs a donation to charity), as it was getting to the end of the day by then. I watched as some of the cars went off to their resting place, including an LP640 Roadster and the DB9 Volante I would've overtaken, their V12s sounding utterly glorious in their own ways. Then, a different instructor in a white Mitsubishi Evo V (one of the other experience cars) turned up, asking out the window "Is anyone here still waiting for a minibus? Do four of you wanna lift back to the car park?" Two of my siblings, my mother and I obliged, and he drove us half way round the track before peeling off and asking for directions to our car, stopping right behind it. Of course, many thank-yous were in order! There was no seat belt for the middle rear passenger, so he was gentle on the brakes, but gave us a little something in the chicane to remember (you don't need to brake after the first right, so he pretty much took it as he normally would, albeit probably a little slower on entry). It was nice that my appreciative spectators got a little taste of what I just did. To top it all off, on the way back, my car-spotting eyes saw another McLaren MP4-12C (this one finished in eye-catching 'Volcano Orange'), a Ferrari F430, a Jaguar E-Type (S1), a blue Ford Sierra RS Cosworth and two lucky people with their own Nissan R35 GT-Rs.

Overall it was a great day out. The instructors were helpful, professional and friendly, the weather held off at the right time and the venue was great. I also left with a USB stick with a video of me driving, 6 pictures from a professional photographer and a printed photo in a special little folder thingy. As for the GT-R? I must have one. Full stop.

BONUS IMAGE - One of the Lamborghini Gallardos I overtook (with strange exhaust trumpets).
There are two kinds of people in the world: Those that would rather show off in a Lamborghini, and those who would rather hunt down and overtake those people in a Nissan GT-R. This may or may not be true.

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Welcome Back To Small Blog V8

OK, I've now had my unannounced summer break. SBV8 will now be open for business as usual!

It has been 6 months since I started this blog, and I'm happy to see the viewing statistics climb each month (even if most of it appears to be Google image search results for the Red Bull X1), and this right here is my 50th published post, and I have decided to move things on a bit.

There will be a bit more content in the coming weeks, with a racing game review, new posts featuring spy photos of upcoming cars, and a very special something else very soon! I will also try to get back into the habit of doing a regular feature, even if it's not one of the original ones, such as a weekly news round-up or something. I have piloted a few changes to the F1 articles (including having a big track map at the top so you can see what corners I'm referencing and naming paragraphs so you can skip to the bit you missed if you don't want to read it all) which I have decided to keep, and if I find a way to have a Wikipedia-style Contents bar at the top, I will try to implement it. Of course, the other way to look at the issue of long articles is for me to just write less, and this is something I will also endeavour to do, but I don't want to miss anything out that might be important to someone, so that's a balance I must strike. Maybe a brief summary in bullet points at the top or something.

Anyway, I notice that I have a triplet of followers now as well, so if you have any suggestions for improvements, I'm happy to read them. You don't have to be a follower to have suggestions, so any lurkers out there are welcome to have their say as well.

Enjoy!


I shall try to uphold my promises this time.

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Formula 1 - Hungarian Grand Prix 2011

Hungaroring Track Map. Those boxes are: Gear (brown), then MPH, Km/h, Lateral G. T# is Timing Sector

I never really remember the Hungarian Grand Prix. Each year it just sort of comes and goes. I know Jenson Button got his first F1 win here in 2006 (a race in which he lapped Michael Schumacher), and I know that this year he celebrated his 200th Grand Prix at this race on Sunday. Ferrari's second fiddle Felipe Massa probably doesn't remember much of previous Hungarian GPs either, even though the track has left a lasting impression on his mind...

He knows his way round well enough to out-qualify his team mate for the first time this season, however, and Red Bull were back on top after Quali having reverted to a slightly older setup for this race. Well, one of them was (three guesses which one). Behind Vettel were the two McLarens followed by the two Ferraris, both of whom need to consistently beat both Red Bulls if they want a shot at the title...

The race itself started under difficult conditions. Rather than deciding how early to jump onto slicks like in Silverstone, teams and drivers were instead wondering if and when they should switch from Intermediates to full wet tyres. Any drivers with even-numbered grid slots were immediately at a disadvantage too - because the track is rarely used outside of Formula 1 it's not so grippy, and because the racing line is firmly on the left-hand side, the Hungaroring has the biggest difference in grip between each side of the pit straight than any other track, IIRC - so Vettel could feel confident sitting in the front of the grid on a track with few overtaking spots and one line through most of the corners. His confidence was short lived, however, which I'll get to soon.

[Race Start] After turn 1, the McLarens were right next to eachother, going mirror-to-mirror into turn 2 with 3rd place Button on the inside, but he couldn't make it stick. Meanwhile, both Mercedes GP drivers were able to get past both the Ferraris by this point, or as BBC commentator Martin Brundle put it "And look at Rosberg, he's got up into 4th place! And so has Schumacher!" Whatever you say, Mr. Brundle. In his defence, both Mercedes drivers seemed pretty determined to be in 4th place, with Michael Schumacher challenging Nico Rosberg for the place, until they parted ways at the turn 6/7 chicane and Schumacher slipped into the clutches of Fernando Alonso (who passed Massa thanks to a better start from 5th on the grid). The Spaniard tried a move around the outside of the German - well, a German - at turn 11, but the septuple world champion wasn't about to be overtaken that way, and out-dragged him into T12 with the inside line. Alonso then planted his Ferrari on the outside again coming out of T13 to get the inside line into the long final hairpin and take 5th place back from Schumacher, who was quickly under pressure from Felipe Massa afterwards.

As rain and spray battered the cars' on-board cameras, it was very clear the drivers were earning their money this race. Everyone was scrabbling for grip, and as you watch the race you can see at least one car wobbling around at practically every corner on the track as the driver struggles to find grip and traction and get the power down. Jenson Button fell back behind Lewis Hamilton a little, who was putting serious pressure on Sebastian Vettel for the race lead, then Alonso overtook Rosberg at turn one of lap 3 at the same time that Massa overtook Schumacher just behind them. Alas, Alonso ran wide in turn 2 and slid onto the concrete, allowing Rosberg back past. On lap 4 Hamilton made a real attempt to take the lead at turn 2, where both cars almost drifted out of the corner and he couldn't make it stick, but Vettel had a wobble in turn 3 and that put the McLaren right on his tail again. Turn 2 of lap 5 saw Vettel mimic his mistake in Canada, spotting a McLaren filling up his mirrors and slithering way off-line under braking, giving Hamilton the lead of the race and putting Button right on Vettel's tail when he rejoined the track shortly afterwards. After lap 5 and much position changing, the order in the top 10 was: (1)Hamilton (2)Vettel (3)Button (4)Rosberg (5)Alonso (6)Massa (7)Webber (8)Schumacher (9)Paul Di Resta (10)Kamui Kobayashi.

[First Spin, First Pit Phase] On lap 8, any chance of a Ferrari 1-2 resulting from this scramble was ended when Felipe Massa slid off-line just like Alonso and Vettel did - again, at turn 2 - but because he wasn't as far off he tried to catch it and accelerate back on the track when he was still on the green painted edging, which was very very slippery. This sent him into a 540° spin as he went backwards into the wall, but thankfully for him he was already going relatively slowly when he slid off, so the impact was minimal and he was able to complete the race with just a damaged left rear wing end plate. 3 laps later, Webber was the first to pit, followed shortly by Alonso, as they took the plunge and went onto Super-Soft slick tyres in drying conditions. Button came in a lap later, and Hamilton and Vettel a lap after that. It looked very slippery at first, but the second and third sectors were slick-worthy, and they soon found a groove and the rest of the grid gradually followed suit. At this point Button was still on Vettel's tail after pitting, allowing him to simply drive past him before they even got to turn 2, clearly the most eventful corner on the track. Out of turn 1, Webber also had much more speed on the exit than Alonso, allowing him to drive cleanly past as well and show us that pitting a lap earlier gave them an advantage as the tyres had settled in and those drivers better knew what to expect of them. Indeed, Button set the fastest lap of the race so far, shortly after Jarno Trulli's Team Lotus (that's the green Lotus) had called it quits and become the first retirement of the day.

"Where's the a/c adjuster? It's too hot in here..."

Then, on lap 25, Nick Heidfeld pulled up just outside the pits in his Lotus-Renault GP car (that's the black Lotus) on account of what scientists would call being "Slightly On Fire". As he had left the pit box the peculiar side-exit exhaust that runs up to the front of the sidepod spat out a lot of white smoke and some other stuff out of the left-hand side, before coughing up flames in the same direction and igniting once and for all. I suspect it was down to that strange exhaust in the first place. Heidfeld later said that the pit stop took longer than expected, which meant that he was subsequently sitting there with the revs up and primed to go for longer than usual, and that could be what caused it. The exhausts literally get red hot in a Formula 1 car, and the internals don't cool down unless the car is moving, so that could've been the cause. It's the second time a Lotus-Renault GP car has caught fire this season. This one was somewhat more eventful, however, partly because it was happening during the race (don't worry, he soon ninja-jumped out of the car and got to safety), but also because when the fire marshals were putting the fire out, the left sidepod exploded dramatically. Not as dramatically as a prop in a Michael Bay movie, but enough to make one marshal hop and limp back to the wall as he was right next to it. This left charred bits of carbon fibre and composite material spread loosely across the pit exit lane, but luckily for drivers trying to avoid puncturing brand new tyres (including Webber and Alonso), there was just enough space to get past without crossing the line or hitting any debris. Bizarrely, no Safety Car was called while a Dacia Duster (Good News!) was towing the burnt Lotus backwards into the pit exit. After the second pit stop phase that happened amidst all this, the top 5 order was: (1)Hamilton (2)Button (3)Vettel (4)Webber (5)Alonso. Michael Schumacher was forced to retire at this point due to a gearbox failure, and Massa was pressuring Kobayashi for 6th place, which he got at turn 1 of lap 34.

[Unwelcome Dounts, Rain Threatens] On lap 37, Lewis Hamilton got it wrong coming out of turn 7, spinning the back end about 135° around and stopping very briefly on the racing line, with backmarkers as well as teammate Jenson Button behind him. Quickly wanting to get out the way of these fast-approaching cars, Hamilton did a half-donut as they passed, narrowly avoiding a Williams car and forcing Force India's Paul Di Resta to take to the grass to avoid colliding with a fellow Brit, who was then passed by another fellow Brit as Button went past to take the lead. Hamilton later apologised to Di Resta for this, saying that he just didn't see him. It was slippery at that end of the track, which was just on the outskirts of more rain, but the rest of the track still warranted slick tyres... or did it? Nico Rosberg put Inter's back on just after Button slid wide at turn 2 and gave Hamilton the lead back on lap 50 of 70. Vettel also ran wide twice on this lap, at turns 2 and 13. The McLarens battled once again for the lead, with Button getting ahead in the DRS Zone (on the pit straight) before sliding wide at turn 2 again, only not so much. It was still enough for Hamilton to get back past again. Because Hamilton was now ahead, he had priority for new tyres, and went in for some Inter's. This proved to be a mistake, as it then stopped raining and Alonso on Prime slicks sailed past him on the exit of turn 5, and he was then given a Drive-Thru Penalty for his earlier excursion. You can't stop in the pits during this penalty, so he ended up in the pit lane twice more than if he'd stayed on slicks and coped with it like Alonso did, and sadly this took him out of contention for the win after he went back onto slicks again. He ended up in 7th place, closely behind Massa and Webber.

[Last Phase, Scrap for 8th] The battle for 4th place now raged on lap 59 of 70, with Mark Webber overtaking Felipe Massa down the pit straight using a mix of the DRS and, I suspect, a double-whammy of KERS, as the 6.6 seconds of available power boost is reset as the car crosses the line. Hamilton then started having a look at Massa as well, eventually overtaking him at turn 12, where Fernando Alonso had just spun on a damp patch and rejoined, luckily without losing any places. It was at this part of the track in 2009 where the right-rear wheel of his ING Renault came undone and flew right off the car, adding just one mishap to a bad year for that team. Anyway, a big fight was developing between 8th-12th places, with Kamui Kobayashi leading the train in lap 61, with 13th-placed Nico Rosberg joining the fray going into 62, which is when it all kicked off in turn 1. Everyone tried to overtake everyone else, with Sergio Pérez going down the inside of Adrian Sutil but proving unsuccessful, Sébastien Buemi getting past Kobayashi for 8th and Jaime Alguersuari trying to get past him as well, but catching Kobayashi's wheel and doing half a spin, putting him at the back of the train in 13th. Rosberg then overtook both Buemi and Pérez in the undeniably faster Mercedes GP car. He would later move up to 9th and finish there. Catching the train on lap 64 was Mark Webber and Lewis Hamilton (in that order), who watched as Pérez skipped the chicane at turn 6 and conceded his place while rejoining right in front of them and desperately getting out of the way of 4ht and 5th place. As they looked for a way past the traffic, Hamilton was also looking for an opportunity to get past Webber for 4th, an opportunity which he found at turn 12 when Webber moved over too early having passed Kobayashi and Hamilton pounced under braking. Webber was in the DRS Zone, but opened his rear wing too early, wobbled out of the last corner and didn't get it open again in time to get any advantage out of it as they entered lap 65 of 70.

The two drivers would finish that way round, and Button won his 200th Formula 1 Grand Prix, on roughly the 5th anniversary of his first ever F1 win at this very track in a BAR Honda (which, interestingly, was the first wet Hungarian GP since the race started in 1987, and now he's won again at the second one ever). Sebastian Vettel quietly finished 2nd and extended his still-massive championship lead, with Alonso a valiant 3rd place. Scottish rookie Paul Di Resta registers his highest finish of the season thus far with a 7th place, escaping the madness behind him just before it all went nuts.

Now the teams and drivers get an enforced three-week break from work, before everyone reconvenes at the famous Spa Francorchamps on the 27th August for the esteemed Belgian Grand Prix. In the mean time, Jenson will be happily chewing through copious amounts of cake.

Pictures from F1Fanatic.com

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If Only - The Barn Find Of My Dreams

A website I use often called Jalopnik.com does these "Question Of The Day/Weekend" posts every other day and on weekends. Some of them are made into definitive lists, some of them are more open, with weekend ones always being the latter. This weekend it's "What is the barn find of your dreams?". Well, I don't remember having such a dream before, but it set my imagination off. After suggesting the missing one of only two roofless Toyota 2000GTs from the 007 film You Only Live Twice, I devised a dream sequence that made my brain tingle when I thought of it. It wasn't as long as this - you can find it in the comments after scrolling past a cool dream of someone's about a McLaren F1 - but I thought I'd turn it into a story. A bedtime story, perhaps. It is quite late now...

"One of those slightly freaky people who packs a classic car in one of those airtight bags to preserve it instead of driving/polishing/displaying it lives somewhere quiet in the countryside. He lives on an old farm which he used to maintain, nestled amongst rolling hills somewhere green with a few yellow fields and a road-length driveway all to himself, dusty and un-tarmac'd. This man, getting on a bit but able to look after himself, minds his own business having made himself a tidy fortune doing whatever it might have been, and owns a big estate car as a workhorse and a pair of classic cars, the more valuable of which he started preserving after about 6 months of expensive ownership. One day, a storm brews and turns the sky a graphite grey before turning nasty and tearing through the area. No-one really knows what happened to the man that day, but people feared the worst, as he had disappeared by the time the storm had subsided and was never seen again. Over time, people went back to their things and the tatty remains stood for a decade or two, maybe even three. However, his barn, which is a 5-10 minute walk downhill from his house, is left essentially intact, with only a few roof panels being broken and the walls lightly scarred from objects caught in the wind striking it...

On holiday in America, I'm doing a little exploring in some rent-a-crap US market saloon, looking for wiggly bits on a big road map of the area near my hotel, when I happen across this old barn, sitting quietly in the summer air and flanked by a large and somewhat overgrown yellow field. No-one's around and curiosity gets the better of me, so I use the tool kit in the boot floor of my rented car to break the chain off the huge doors and pull on them. They take a bit of persuasion, but I persevere, and the doors swing creaking open... As they do, a ray of sunshine behind me erupts over a perfectly preserved 1967 Ferrari 275 GTB/4, sitting in its airtight bag waiting to breathe again (that was the first '60s Ferrari I thought of, although thinking again, a 250 GTO would be an awesome thing to find in this way). Sidenote: I don't know how long these "carcoons" have existed, so assume the car was mint before it was packed, be it restored, well looked-after or relatively box-fresh.

Thinking this probably belongs to someone, I spot an old house that is connected by a stony path clearly beaten into place by feet, and decide to go and ask about it. Walking up the hill, I spot a smashed, rusted-out estate car and what looks like a '70s Camaro in similarly bad, sunburnt shape, although the Camaro's sitting in a partially-demolished garage. The house looks just as beaten up as anything else man-made I've seen nearby, save for that Ferrari 275, still in its airtight bag. I knock on the door and it shudders open to reveal spider webs and copious amounts of dust on every surface. There's no-one there and it looks deserted. Having trekked back and torn through the airtight bag with a knife I found - only to find the zip afterwards - the car is free, soaking up the first rays of natural sunshine its original Rosso Corsa paintwork has felt in years as it sits gleaming next to a dusty old tractor and some other abandoned farming equipment. I look around. The key's on the inside wall of the front of the barn, hanging off a nail and somehow looking relatively un-aged compared to any other metal in the barn. As there's nobody around for miles and I didn't see any police cars on the way here, I decide there's only one thing for it: I syphon the fuel from my rented car and fill up the Ferrari, hoping that the lack of any outside air getting to it meant the oil was still okay...

Before I know it, I'm going through quiet countryside in a 1960s V12 Ferrari, windows open, sunny but not too bright or humid, wind sweeping past the sunglasses I found in the glove box. It was a glorious day, listening to that engine sounding as sweet as it ever did, working through the gears, the undulating, twisty roads to nowhere all to myself. Because I'd used quite a lot of fuel finding this car, I had to pick a fairly short route through the rolling hills before returning to the barn, packing it back up and duct-taping the bag together to make it airtight again, before shutting the barn back up and crawling back to the hotel on very low fuel indeed in my anonymous saloon, stereo off so I could instead remember the sound of that 3.3L, 300bhp Colombo engine as it was still ringing in my ears.

The Ferrari 275 became my little secret. Whenever I was down or had the time during that month or two I was on holiday, it was off to the secluded barn, which I thankfully found a quick route to get to, always in a rent-a-car full of Super-Unleaded and a jerry can half-full of the cheap stuff for the trip home (the fuel tank is bigger than a jerry can, so I still syphoned fuel from the saloon). Each different day I was in it blurred together into one blissful montage of joy and emotion behind the wheel of that wonderful car, and by the time my holiday was over, I simply locked it up good and tight, sighed a sigh of sadness and whispered "goodbye" to it before I went back home. Needless to say, I knew where to go next year: the same place as the year before."

Then I came to and started being rational and considering details such as where the power to keep the bag inflated was coming from and the eventual wear-and-tear on the car requiring service of a vehicle belonging to a dead man, and the dream was spoilt...

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Sky F1 - A Calmer View

If you're on the main page, you can scroll down and read my initial reaction to the bad news that despite mention of F1 being "Not for sale" and Bernie Ecclestone saying it would be "disastrous" for F1 not to be on free-to-air TV (although since when was he a trustworthy person?), Sky has got its greedy hands on Formula 1 TV rights. I still stand by a lot of what I said - the presenters will probably be style-over-substance and have an irritating demeanour, the pre-race show will be interrupted with adverts for the million other Sky Sports, er, sports, and the commentators won't be as entertaining - but after learning a little more about the deal, it's not as bad as I thought it was.

The deal is currently going to last six years (from 2012-2018), and the BBC will still be able to show the full highlights of the races they're no longer allowed to broadcast live, so those of you who cannot afford the £610 for a Sky HD box can still see what essentially happened in those races. I still don't like that the BBC can't be there for every race, but they've already confirmed Monaco, Silverstone and the final race as ones they are covering themselves (given the choice for races that both channels cover, I will always choose the BBC). Sky coverage won't see adverts during the race like ITV did, but there will still be adverts before and after, and Sky ads are annoying. As far as I'm aware, it won't be in 3D, but because I can't afford a 3DTV and don't want to be sucked into an expensive gimmicky fad, that means nothing to me. The lack of in-race ads sounds like a calm-down tactic to me (and others), but hopefully that 'feature' will stay throughout the whole 6 years anyway. Hopefully the 6 years will be the full extent of Sky coverage as well. I want it to stay on the BBC, as I'm sure is abundantly clear by now.

I've previously mentioned FOTA and their potential to turn this on its head, but they haven't made any noises so far, and technically you can still follow a whole season on free-to-air, even if it isn't all live. The one big thing that will stop a lot of people watching Sky F1, even those that can afford the hideously expensive (and in my experience quite unreliable) Sky box, is that the money goes directly to Rupert Murdoch, who I gather is some sort of evil villain. He runs News Corp, for instance, which includes the recently shut-down phone hackers, News of the World. His media empire doesn't really need another major sport in it, but the fact that it will next year is a sad sign that both he and Bernie Ecclestone (Formula 1 owner and sentient, bespectacled troll doll) are equally greedy for money...
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Formula 1 - Coverage To Get Cancer Next Year

The best F1 broadcast team I've watched. Plus Jonathan Legard.

I feel outraged and disgusted when I inform you that the BBC's Formula 1 coverage will be cut in half next year because of BskyB.

As you may have read, an 'agreement' has been reached so that in 2012, Sky Sports will be the only channel network to broadcast the entire season of Formula 1, and BBC will only be able to show half the races live [Source: F1Fanatic]. The key problem with that is that BBC is a "free-to-air" channel, in that the channels are free to anyone who pays for their TV license in the UK. Or if you prefer to think of it this way, it is required by law that you are able to watch TopGear and Formula 1. The Formula One Teams Association (FOTA) state in their contracts that F1 must remain on free-to-air television, but next year it won't be, not a full season at least. If you want to see every race live - something that's effectively free this year - you will have to buy a subscription to Sky TV. Want HD, which again is free with the BBC? That'll be £610 a year. That's outrageous! Especially as 2013 will probably see a full-scale takeover.

Think of it like this

It doesn't just stop there, either. The BBC coverage is the best F1 coverage. That's a fact of life. Informative and entertaining presenters and commentators, professional interviewers, viewer participation on the red button with the F1 Forum (which is normally worth a watch if you've got an hour after the race). I remember watching F1 on ITV a few years ago, and Mark Blundell was a hopeless pundit, James Allen was an annoying commentator and the damn races kept going to adverts every 10-15 minutes or so. In 2009, after 10 minutes of the first pre-race programme, it was so noticeable how much better it all was, and particularly how much more genuinely informative it was, and is. Unfortunately I lost a bet with myself that David Coulthard and Eddie Jordan would have a fight while arguing over a controversial overtake or something, but other than that there were no disappointments. The people of F1 - team members and such - seem to have respect for them when they're on camera too.

I know what Sky are like, they won't keep most of these people on. Sure, they'll probably get Ted Kravitz quite easily - he's tied more to the sport than a particular channel - and perhaps Lee McKenzie, but they won't get top presenter Jake Humphrey to follow them over to the dark side, nor EJ or DC, nor Martin Brundle I suspect. The rest of the roles will be filled by people that look pretty on TV rather than people who actually know what they're bloody talking about. Have you ever seen Sky Sports News? Exactly. All plastic women and the odd flatulent Scottish sexist here and there. I don't want adverts back on my F1 screen either. I don't want to pay money for SkyPlayer to watch the currently-free highlights online that aid my race reports on here. I flat-out don't want Sky F1 coverage, even if I can get it. It'll be more like the ITV coverage, which was significantly worse, and will likely be presented by people that look and sound like rich bastards rather than petrol-blooded F1 enthusiasts.

Hopefully this will just be some horrible one-off, as FOTA chief and McLaren's Technical Director Martin Whitmarsh said a few months ago "All of the FOTA teams believe in free-to-air television ... Our current contracts require that F1 remain on free-to-air and the teams, through FOTA, are clearly going to safeguard their business interests and the interests of the fans in this regard." Fight valiantly lads and lasses, and know that you have the British public on your side, as well as people in other countries that receive the BBC commentary on the radio. This is not a good idea, it is not in the best interest of the sport, it's not what the viewing public want, and Sky, you're NOT welcome into the world of Formula 1. Leave it.

UPDATE [30/7/11] - I've written a little more here. It's not quite as rant-y as this is.
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