grumpyf1

After a few weeks of no races, but plenty of miles on track, the first in-season test for several years highlighted that Red Bull and Lotus seemed to have found extra time. Oh, and the Williams had improved a bit... Q1 in Spain saw Senna drop out, which seemed somewhat at odds with the pace of his team-mate. Q2 turned into a bit of a nightmare for some of the big names, as just a tenth of a second separated 5 th and 12 th places. Unfortunately, Button and Webber timed it badly and found themselves as spectators for the final push. Massa once again dropped out in Q2 as well, making it 5 races in a row. In a team where failure isn’t tolerated, his days must surely be numbered. Maldonado was fastest, too.   Q3 proved just how important tyres have become in F1, as Rosberg, Vettel and Schumacher didn’t bother to put in competitive times, whilst Kobayashi couldn’t, his car having ground to a halt at the end of Q2. The remaining 6 went for it, and it was Hamilton who bagged pol...

Wotcha. Right, here's the round up of all the random stuff relating to Fantasy Formula 1 and Vettel's Reign in Spain (damn, why didn't I think of that before). Anyway, here's the driver and team stats for you: Congratulations to Ian and Tony’s Mum, who bagged the two highest individual FF1 scores of the season so far with 126 and 109 respectively. Naughty corner? The stewards. Did they really tell the teams it would be OK for cars to be launched into the path of each other because the pit lane was nice and wide? Lucky no-one was scraping bits of battered Ferrari off the tarmac... Hero: Some high quality driving from a lot of different drivers, but for me it was Heidfeld again for failing to see last place on the grid as an obstacle to getting points. Fantasy Formula 1 driver of the day was, of course, Heidfeld with a huge 36 points. The top three drivers so far are Vettel on 124, Webber with 98 and Heidfeld (up 1) on 87. Hamilton drops out of the top three....

It was an interesting couple of weeks in F1-land as we headed off to the normally rather dull Spanish Grand Prix. Alonso failed to spot that his contract said 2016 and signed it (he probably thought it said £2016 Million) and Sutil apparently got into "racing incident" with a chap named after some soap and duffed him up a bit in a nightclub, which I'm sure lifted his mood no end, and took his mind of the fact that di Resta is making him look decidedly average so far this season. As the practice sessions got underway it turned out that someone at Pirelli had inadvertently added a extra bucket of 'slow' to the hard tyre, and Heidfeld calmly said "fire" on the radio whilst his elbow and half the car caught fire, keeping him out of quali whilst Renault scraped the black bits off the car. Qualifying saw Crikey Heikki through to Q2, although possibly because the Force India team decided not to use the softer tyres, preferring to keep them for the race. ...

Evenin', my pretties. How are you all? Apologies for the delay in getting this to you - I spent all of yesterday trapped in a minibus, hypnotised by the slowly rolling behind of a plump lady in last place in a marathon. But enough of my fantasies, you want the Fantasy F1 scores, dontcha?! Well then - let us begin with who go what: Followed by what can only described as a) Hallelujah! A miracle!! OR b) a massive statistical error... Yes, it would appear that I am in the lead. Ha! Ha ha! See! Me!! It's me! You bunch of muppets!!! I'M IN THE LEAD! WAHOOOOO!!! I shall, however, not allow it to go to my head, and will remain calm and pleasant at all times, you bunch of second-rate losers. Race report and other stuff to follow... (My once in a lifetime winning streak was calculated to the tunes of Fleetwood Mac's "Tusk" LP, on vinyl, from a place in time some call 1979...)

Wow. He made that look easy, didn't he? After dominating qualifying on Saturday, Webber managed to get a great start in the Spanish GP and avoid being overtaken by Vettel and assorted McLaren's and Ferrari's. He maintained a small margin until the first round of pit-stops, then gently eased away. No dramas. No mistakes. No problems. Easy win (if there ever really is such a thing in F1). Meanwhile, Vettel struggled with a pit stop problem that let Hamilton through into second, then brake issues that eventually led to the team telling him that the situation was "critical". He was heading for a disappointing 4th when Hamilton suffered a major tyre blowout and said "hello" to a tyre barrier, giving Alonso second and Seb 3rd. Jenson Button spent most of the race trying to overtake an improved Schumacher, but all things are relative. Improved merely meant better than in previous races, not better that most other drivers. Still, 4th is a bit more like the Micha...