SofaF1

He should have been on pole, he should have won the race, and he should have over-taken Alonso. I’m not certain, but I think Michael just lost the championship. If he can’t overtake Alonso in a faster car on a track designed for over-taking, with his team-mate 10 seconds off in the distance, then something’s wrong. Perhaps he just doesn’t like the track, but World Champions can’t afford to not like tracks. They must be great everywhere. I’m not exactly sure what this post is about other than Michael caught onto the back of Alonso with about 15 laps to go, and I think it’s very significant that he couldn’t get past: Alonso drove amazingly, and Michael poorly.

The holiday is over and this weekend it starts getting interesting again.

In the last few races before rain affected Hungary Ferrari were in the ascendancy and Renault were having trouble even staying in front of McLaren.

But everyone at Renault seems to think they turned the corner at Hungary but it’s difficult to tell objectively because of the rain and also because the biggest factor in Ferrari’s recent performance improvement was tires and because of the rain we didn’t get any more information on that.

Last year Turkey pulled out a fantastic race for us and we’ve got to be hoping for more of the same. But last year saw Michael under performing he hasn’t won here or in China. And some commentators have said that Michael drove worse last year than he should have done even allowing for his car. But with his car causing him so many troubles last year it’s very difficult to tell.

So are Renault returning to form at the same time as Michael hits a track he doesn’t like? Or was Hungary a blip and without the mass dampners in the dry the Renault is compromised and Michael doesn’t have bogey circuits?

There’s another complicated issue a bit further back in the shape of rookie Robert Kubica. He almost scored a point at the end of his first race but it was stripped from him because his car was under weight. So how fast was he? The answer was almost certainly mega. Because he was only marginally under weight and that happened right on the last few laps when he wasn’t being caught anyway. And it was his first time of driving a formula one car in the wet. So should we expect great things from him this weekend? Well perhaps but it will be his first time driving a car anti clockwise.

And what about Jenson? Will his win last time change his fortune? Well I have a sneaking suspicion that Honda targeted this track as their spot for Jenson’s first win. So something special could happen.

Sebastian Vettel: just signed to drive BMW’s third car on Fridays.

Johnny Borrell: his band Razorlight headlined V Festival last weekend.

So what would you do if you were Frank Williams?We’ve already had the answer from Eddie Jordan and it’s pretty clear cut in his opinion: sell to Toyota. He suggests to Frank that he should sell Williams to Toyota over five years. So that there will be a cash injection to to team each year. So Frank gets a chance to set things right and then hand over the reigns.

A deal like this would only work if Toyota were guaranteed to get the team but the amount they have to pay to Frank is based on the teams position in the constructor’s championship. That way Frank wouldn’t be able to relax under the deal.

But is Frank ready for a deal? People point to Williams winning ways of the past. The fact that they haven’t been winning for a while. And these things are hard to deny but look at the prospects for next year. First Nico looses his rookie status and grows up a bit as he becomes Williams number one driver. Two the management aren’t constantly trying to work out which engine they’re going to have in the future. They have a secure multi engine deal with a supplier of good engines. Third they have a test driver. The promotion of Alex Wurtz seems like a backwards step. Like they aren’t going to be moving forward next year. But actually everyone has been saying about this years car is that it’s fast but tragically unreliable. So I think they might have played a very clever move with Alex. He has the continuity for the team. He has the consistency on track. And he’s supposedly one of the best testers there is for feedback. So why not give him the most mileage they can?

I’m not saying that their worries are over or that they won’t someday become Lexus F1 but I think the most important factor will be that Frank would want to be the last private team to quit not the second last. While McClaren are still going he won’t want to sell.

In a new show on Sky One, Formula One stars David Coulthard and Eddie Irvine will captain the teams in The Race, hosted by Denise Van Outen.

for more details: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4797463.stm

So, with five races to go, and 10 points between Schumacher and Alonso, it’s time to lay your cards on the table, step up to the plate, and take the bit between your teeth:

Who do you think will win the driver’s championship?

Who do you think will win the constructor’s championship?

And who do you want to win the driver’s and constructor’s championships?

From a really interesting interview with former Jenson Button-alike Derek Warwick: itv interview at the end there is a bit comparing the current drivers which I’ve clipped from the long interview.

In a shock move revealed last night by an undercover Swiss journalist, Michael Schumacher is to leave Ferrari with immediate effect in order to join Chelsea football club in time for the new season.

‘I’ve always loved football’ the 7 times champion said in an interview to a sofaf1 reporter this afternoon, ‘I feel I’ve achieved everything I wanted in motorsport, now I’m moving on to something else’.

When pressed about the deal offered to him by Chelsea, the German was shy: ‘It’s not about the money. I own a small country in Southeast Asia. I don’t need money. Corinna was getting worried about the risk of driving, and I wanted a new challenge’.

Rumours had been circling for a while that Schumacher, who broke his legs in an accident at Silverstone in 1999, has been thinking about a career change. No one, however, suspected this. With five races left to go, it effectvely hands the championship to Alonso unless Ralf changes his name and takes up Michael’s seat in the Ferrari.

The news comes not long after Montoya’s decision to move to Nascar, and shortly before the inevitable announcement of Coulthard’s switch to Russian ballet. It seems something is rotten in the state of Forumla 1, and all the drivers are leaving to eat their apples elsewhere.

I’ve been quite annoyed by commentators saying how Sunday’s race hasn’t affected the championship battle much, if at all. Can’t they see that no affect is an affect? Even if Schumacher hadn’t got that point, the battle still would have been affected. Now there are only five races left, as opposed to six. Schumacher really does have to come first every single time and he’ll only just win by virtue of having won more races, with their points tied. It’s all pretty exciting, if you ask me. I’m sure someone must know the name of the theory, or the scientist who discovered it: nothing happening is still something having not happened.