grumpyf1

Blimey (pretends to fan himself with hand). That was pretty intense, wasn't it? I think it might take me a while to type a race report up for that one! Belter of a race though... but who was the thoroughly pleasant chap impersonating Lewis? Weird. Anyway, thanks to all of you who read my letter to Bernie from Friday night - 72 of you yesterday alone. I seem to have struck a chord. Most unlike me. I'll go back to being completely out of tune with public opinion as soon as possible. So... here's the scores on the doors for the Hungarian GP: Heading into the F1 summer break, did I manage to keep the lead?! Did I testicles.... 1 point?! Dammit. Well done Ian. Grrrrr..... (It's RAWK night in the grumpyf1 household - Brian May's "Back To The Light" single.)

Dear Bernie, Hello. Hope you don't mind me dropping you a letter. I know you're busy trying to cram more cash into your bank account, but I need to say a few things.... A long time ago, in a living room far, far away (well, Oxfordshire, actually) and young me had some pals round for a birthday party. The jelly and ice cream was great, but we'd popped the TV on for a bit of light relief from a Monopoly marathon and there was this F1 thing on. Some chap called James Shunt (or something) went round another car is such spectacular style that I may have said a rude word out loud. My Mum wasn't best pleased, but my love of Formula 1 had begun. Now, a lot has changed since then. Drivers, teams and even lives have come and gone, and you've rather brilliantly built F1 up into the amazing, globe-striding extravaganza we petrolheads love so much. Emotional investment occurred, big time. We're even going to India this year. Genius work, that. And we're heading ...

Whilst the Mrs basks in the warm glow of finding out who died in CSI, I bring you the random grab-bag of oddities relating to Sunday's scintillating (but parky) German GP. First up, the driver and team stats: Naughty corner: Buemi for assisting with Heidfeld's spectacular exit from the race. Wake up, not-as-good-as-the-other-one-Seb! Hero: Hamilton was actually on form this weekend, and managed to be polite, cheerful and not a complete git. Impressive. Fantasy Formula 1 driver of the day was Lewis, with 27 points. The top three drivers so far are Vettel with 224, Webber on 174 and Hamilton with 160. Oh surprise, surprise - Maldonado STILL hasn't scored anything. The top three teams so far are Red Bull on 228, McLaren with 216 and Ferrari (up 1) on 168. Renault finally drop out of the top 3. For the first time this FF1 season, Red Bull's points aren't entirely made up of Seb's score. It's back to the front for me thanks to Ian's rubbish sco...

It was surprisingly chilly over the weekend at the German GP. But probably not as icy as the look you might have got from Seb post-race. Whilst his season doesn't exactly look to be crumbling just yet, it does look a bit like the first cracks are starting to appear... It wasn't a great weekend for Trulli either - dropped in favour of the brilliantly cheery Karun Chandhok, wiser personages that I think he'll be in Jarno's car at the Indian GP at least too. Glock re-signed to Virgin for a couple of years, which hardly sounds like a recipe for a flourishing career, but he looked pretty chuffed about it nonetheless. Qualifying saw Vettel off the front row for the first time this century (well, it feels like it, anyway) with Webber continuing his pole-bagging streak and Hamilton bunging in a scintillating lap for 2nd on the grid. As the start of the race drew near, the temperatures had rocketed to a sweltering 13C, there were spots of rain and everyone was freaking-...

Good grief. That German fellow with the pointy finger wasn't even on the podium! I'm befuddled and puzzled. Standard Monday there, then. Apologies for the delay - visitor this evening and a nasty attack of lazyitis last night means I'm running noticeably behind schedule. So, without further ado (or any adon't), here's who out of you lovely people scored what... And the all important running totals... Might I say.... WAHOOOO!!! No? Well, too late. WAHOOOOO!!!! There, I did it again. Looking at the big jumps of some of you this week, it still looks like it's wide open though. I'd keep an eye on that Henry if I were you.... (Musical assistance from Cyndi Lauper, and the CD single of "The World Is Stone" from '92.)

Hello. My my - you're looking smashing tonight. Is that new underwear? You should really check your webcam settings you know... Anyway, it's time for the random collection of stuff that follows the main results, starting off with the driver and team statistics! (Cue fanfare...) Naughty corner: Whoever decided hot and cold blown exhaust off-throttle gubbins sounded like an interesting reason for an argument. Tip of the day: get out more. Hero: Well, I know I’ve slated him a fair bit recently, but Hamilton did a fine job this weekend, and even got rid of that daft beard-thing. So, him. Fantasy Formula 1 driver of the day was Alonso, with a tidy 29 points. The top three drivers so far are Vettel on 212, Webber with 158 and Hamilton (up 1) on 133. Button’s DNF sees him drop out of the leading trio. Guess what! Maldonado still hasn’t scored a single FF1 point. The top three teams so far are Red Bull on 212, McLaren with 189 and Renault on 150. Even though ...

Can't deny it - I bloody love British GP weekend. And with an improved Silverstone and one of the whizziest swooping camera gadgets ever, the armchair enthusiast's view was even better than usual. It was a shame to see it being dominated by a mind-blowing dull exhaust-blowing story, as the teams engineered themselves another bloody good row that most folks couldn't give a carbon fibre winglet about. It did afford Christian Horner the opportunity to practice his grumpy facial expression though, and good job too - he was going to need it again at the end of the race. Narain Karthikeyan was unceremoniously dumped by Hispania prior to the weekend to allow Daniel Ricciardo into the seat, his masters at Red Bull clearly feeling that 4 of their drivers on the grid simply wasn't enough. Some money apparently headed HRT's way too. Williams also announced that they were teaming up with Renault once again, bringing back misty-eyed reminiscences from old-timers about thei...

So... hang on a second. Vettel didn't win the race? I'm confused now. I thought he always won the races. Well, who did then? Alonso?! Nah, you're having me on... Whilst I recover from the shock of it all (and the inhalation of fumes from sanding and painting windows today -ooooEEEEEE!), here's what you all scored yesterday: Furthermore, and much to my eternal disgruntlement, I must also divulge the running totals... *Sobbing noises* I can handle not being in the lead any more. *Sniffle* Yeah. No problem. *Quivery bottom lip* I mean *Sob* it's only a game, right? *Unsavoury breakdown follows* (Tuneage tonight courtesy of Kate Bush and the CD single of"The Red Shoes".)

Haven't mentioned the allotment for a while, have I? In fact, I haven't mentioned anything else other than F1 for a while, have I? Naughty Grumpyf1. Anyway, apart from having an allotment, we seem to have become home to half the hoppy, slithery wildlife in Cumbria. Today on removing the sheet from the top of the compost heap there were 8 slow worms and 4 frogs. The slow worms proved their name to be highly inaccurate by vanishing pretty sharpish, and most of the frogs buried themselves surprisingly fast, except for this cheeky chap... By the way, me and some twitchums have a cunning idea for a new type of biscuit. You in...? (Musical accompaniment tonight is something new... sort of. Kate Bush's "Director's Cut". Liking it s far!)

The lovely @Catpaws123 off of the twitter suggested I should write a review of the Senna film, having seen it yesterday evening in Ambleside. First of all, I should point out that I am plenty old enough to have been a big F1 fan, with my rear end firmly planted on the sofa, at the time of Ayrton's fateful end. I, like so many others, was enthralled by the titanic struggles Ayrton was enduring trying to haul the Williams car, stripped of its active doo-dahs and traction wotsits, to the front of the field. So I began watching this with some trepidation. Whilst I was shocked by the frightening accident a youthful Barrichello suffered that weekend at Imola, and appalled by the death of Ratzenberger, I didn't feel like I really knew either of them. Senna, though - how could you not marvel at Ayrton? I'd watched him die once; I wasn't sure I wanted to go through that again. The film-makers are sympathetic towards Senna, which is not surprising. Alain Prost comes acro...