Sidepodcast

It’s well known in Sidepodcircles that guest writer Lou is a fan of Brawn GP, and in particular a certain British driver for the team. Here she tells us about the recent competition she entered and subsequent joy at receiving a prize.

I first came across Jenson’s design a helmet competition last year when it was originally launched for the 2008 British Grand Prix. It was something very different and I had a lot of fun thinking through designs I could enter and trying them out. Sadly I didn’t get any prizes last year , but when I noticed they would be launching the competition again for the 2009 British Grand Prix the combination of the winning prize and the fact that it was so simple and fun to take part in made me want to have another go.

This year the designs needed to be of a UK theme, so I wanted to incorporate the Union Jack and I also liked Jenson’s previous Union Jack themed helmet. The design I eventually thought of was slightly tricky with the tools they give you, and just my touch pad on my laptop, and it did take me a few attempts but didn’t take too long to complete. Sadly you could only submit one entry, otherwise I may have come up with a few other ideas.

When I opened the email telling me I had come third I was totally shocked. I hadn’t expected to get anything as there had been so many entries, so it came as a bit of a surprise and made me very happy. Initially it didn’t really sink in, but knowing Jenson had chosen the top three himself was almost reward enough.

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Guest writer Jeremy laments the disappearance of a top name in the sport, but ponders whether he may be coming back.

I’ve been a McLaren fan since Ayrton Senna joined the team in the late 1980s. They have been a frustrating team to follow at times, but over the years, I have developed a liking for Ron Dennis. He seems to be a perfectionist, bringing a clinical precision to Formula 1 that appealed to my Apple (Steve Jobs) influenced personality.

I rejoiced in Ron’s clever plan that brought Lewis Hamilton to the top of the sport and was bitterly disappointed when the title went begging in his first year. I marvel at the McLaren Technology Centre and feel Ron’s pain when I read that employees don’t understand how disappointed he is that they have dented a chequer plate panel in a service elevator through carelessness.

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Following on from our never-ending coverage of the Sidepodscience meetup, Gavin Brown takes a look at the experience from another angle.

Ah… the now legendary Sidepodtour to the McLaren exhibit at the Science Museum. But, I hear you ask, there has already been an article, a discussion and two podcasts about the exhibit, so why have a guest post on it?

Well, that is an excellent question. Clearly, there is no point in repeating what has already been said – but after discussing the matter with Mr. C. in the pub, he suggested I write a guest post on the exhibit. The reason – the fact that I had been to the Ferrari Store on Regent Street the day before and I was comparing the two. So here we are then!

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It’s 10.55am on Saturday, Jenson Button has just put the Brawn on pole in Malaysia, and within the hour it will be my turn to get behind the wheel of a single seater for a chance to see if I have what it takes to be a speed demon. After a quick sprint up the A43 past Brackley and the home of Brawn GP, I arrive at the hallowed, sacred ground that is Silverstone. The circuit evokes many strong memories for me, there’s something about the place I just don’t feel anywhere else. This is the home of British racing. It’s more than just a track, this is history.

I’d been given a Single Seater Experience as a Christmas gift from the family; it came with a six month expiry so I was determined to hold out until the good weather arrived. I couldn’t have picked a better weekend and was thrilled to see not a cloud in the sky and a strong dose of sunshine which I would hope could only improve track temperature and thus make me quicker. Upon arrival at the centre I handed over my driving licence as proof I could drive and was handed back a rather complicated looking circuit map with numerous dots and markings over it. As I read on it dawned on me all these little dots were braking points and apex points. The enormity of what I could be letting myself in for slightly unnerved me but in true racing driver style I hid any anxiety from my accompanying chaperone with a cursory shrug and a ‘looks cool’. After a brief wait a group of us were called into the drivers’ briefing room and so the fun began.

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Scott has been scouting around the comments for advice on getting into journalism, particularly sporting and motorsports. Who better to ask than Stuart Codling? Here he dispenses some invaluable advice.

“What advice can you give me if I want to start a career in motorsport journalism…?”

Well, Scott, you asked – and there’s no definitive answer, because times they are a-changin’, although there are a few principles that should hold true even in the internet age.

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We’ve just witnessed a fascinating race in Malaysia, but what was it like to actually be there? Guest writer Journeyer gives us an insight into how things appeared trackside, plus what the Sepang organisers can do to make it a little bit nicer for the fans.

Before coming in to this weekend, I was excited, but not THAT excited. The Malaysian Grand Prix had produced some good races, but had also produced some boring ones as well. The fact that the first race I attended was at Singapore last year set the bar pretty high for me. Surely, there was no way that could be beaten.

I was wrong. Yet I was also right. Confused? Read on.

FRIDAY: It was our first time going to the circuit, and the package we got (available from the Sepang website) was interesting. We took a monorail from the hotel to KL Sentral Train Station. From there, we took a Transit train to KL International Airport (KLIA). From there, a shuttle bus would meet us and take us to the outside of the circuit. From there, we’d switch to another bus that would take us to the gate. Once off the bus, it’s a one-kilometre walk through the gates and to our stands. It was tiring at first, but you get used to it.

The two free practice sessions were on offer that day. In an effort to attract more people to the circuit, the Sepang organizers decided to open it to the public for free.

Did it help with the crowd? Perhaps a little, perhaps not – most of the people I saw on Friday also showed up on Saturday and Sunday. But it did allow us to sit where we want. My mom and my sister went with me and my dad that day – they weren’t going to watch for the rest of the weekend.

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With the fallout from McLaren’s latest indiscretion still reverberating around Formula 1, guest writer Jeremy takes a look at the story from a different angle.

Maybe I’m just naive, but I found the recent news of Team Vodafone McLaren Mercedes misleading a stewards enquiry quite outrageous and disappointing. What shocked me even more, was the revelation on Australian TV during an interview with Peter Windsor, that he would have “tried to cover it up in front of the stewards” if he was in the same situation as McLaren’s Sporting Director, Dave Ryan.

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There are people who believe that the thing that sets F1 apart from other classes of racing is technology. The theory is F1 has the best people and has always had a technological lead. Only F1 could have ever made the great breakthroughs in technology that have taken us from barely modified road cars to cars that, in theory at least, could run upside down on a ceiling. Every time a piece of technology is outlawed we get howls of protest that F1 won’t be F1 any more because F1 must have better technology than any other class.

Of course all of this is based on a false premise. F1 has not always led all other classes and at times F1 has even been behind road car design. It has also been argued by those same people recently that USF1 has no chance of success because American racing technology is and always has been a long way behind European racing technology.

It has been argued that only a genius of Colin Chapman’s stature working in the unique pressure cooker environment of F1 could have shaped the under-side of the car to produce ground effect aerodynamics. Except that is not true. He was beaten to that technology by Jim Hall. Jim Who?

_{Jim Hall designed Chaparral 2H}

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On April 7th 1968 Jim Clark died in a formula two race at Hockenheim. He remains one of the small group of drivers inevitably mentioned whenever the subject of “the greatest of them all” arises. This tribute explains the effect that Clark’s fatal accident had on a small boy in Scotland.

_{Jim at the 1967 USGP}

40 years ago the greatest driver of his generation was killed in a Formula 2 race at Hockenheim in West Germany. Today it is inconceivable that a top grand prix driver would compete in a lower formula but then it was quite normal.

It is well known the Clark drove for Lotus in all 72 of his world championship grands prix and Lotus like Brabham made F2 cars and their GP stars drove them. Although, on this occasion Clark and his team mate Graham Hill were originally scheduled to drive Alan Mann’s new Ford F3L sportscar in its debut at Brands Hatch but Lotus boss Colin Chapman insisted they go to Hockenheim.

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This week, Steven Roy takes us back to the early days of motor racing, when sport and politics still mixed, but talent was all you needed.

_{Audi Rosemeyer Concept alongside an Auto Union Silver Arrow}

Some drivers slide under the door of grand prix racing unnoticed and after serving a respectable apprenticeship get promoted into top drives. Some like Kimi Raikkonen fly through the junior formulae so quickly that they can only be granted a license to compete on a probationary basis. One man never drove a race car of any description before he drove a grand prix car and died a legend less than 3 years after his debut with his entire motor racing career lasting less than 1,000 days.

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