7.8.10

Winston D'Arcy is a good reporter but a touch unreliable, though to be fair he never knows when his line of business is going to take him away. He's gone AWOL again so it's fallen to the webteam to fill the gap. Since our last report there have been three GPs: Britain, Germany and Hungary. I didn't see any of them "live" preferring the Club's hillclimb at Loton Park and a Monoposto race at Mallory. I fell asleep during the Hungarian GP, emotionally exhausted after the website Editor's wedding the previous day.... Fortunately all were recorded.

Being called upon for GP scribbling duties has meant I've watched them pretty well back-to-back and this hasn't been as onerous as you might think. It has really brought home what an intense and fiendishly competitive thing F1 is. The BBC commentary team do a very good job, but can only make us aware of a small fraction of the decisions and actions that are going on in every team. For example did you know, until the radio message, that the Red Bulls have more than one oil tank and they pump the oil around? It hadn't occurred to me that none of the cars would go to the grid with sufficient fuel to run flat out throughout. They rely on a period of slow running e.g. under a Safety Car and switches to "lean" engine maps to get through to the end. Also becoming clearer is the teams' complete awareness of every.phpect of the race situation, how it affects them and what to do about it. However it's also clear that what we see and what we are told is just the tip of the iceberg and we diehard fans would just love more information.

Talking of diehard fans, the F1 fan survey revealed Monaco to be our favourite circuit. This didn't stop Bernie suggesting that the sport could do without the race. Clearly it can't and a new 10 year deal has been signed. This must have been Bernie being mischievous because it must grate with him that the Principality pays nothing to host the race. He has also been reminding everyone just who calls the tune by having all team-based advertising removed from the pits and paddock; Allsports having the exclusive rights.

This sort of thing does ensure that F1 stays in the headlines and the fact that these last three races have seen controversy over favouritism to one driver within teams, team tactics, technical legality questions and dubious driving can't have hurt either.

Webber then set off a blistering pace with only Hamilton remaining vaguely in touch. Alonso had qualified third, but after the first pit-stops was running in eighth, behind Kubica's Renault. He dived up the inside of him at Club, the pole moved him over and he had no alternative but to take to the run-off area, coming out ahead. Some time later he was awarded a drive-through penalty. To add insult to injury, not only had Kubica retired by then there was a Safety Car period before Alonso could serve the penalty. He ended up 15th. He was clearly furious and instructed the team no more radio. He then proceeded to drive the wheels off the F10 setting the two fastest laps of the race on laps 51 and 52. All this gained him just one place as he had a touch with Liuzzi and sustained a puncture. Still you have to admire him for making the effort - I doubt whether Raikkonen would have done so.

Massa had one of his hopeless races. After the incident with his team mate he had a spin late in the race, flat-spotted his tyres, pitted, catching the team totally unawares and finished 15th. As a race it was no stunner but there was some racing, notably by Vettel. He made his way up to seventh from being dead last with a particularly pushy last third of the race.

On his victory lap Webber said "Not bad for a number two driver", he has since said he said too much in public....

Click here for FIA lap chart.