Sidepodcast

For the first time, the pole sitter at the Turkish Grand Prix was not the winner.

The Race

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There wasn’t a huge amount of action to digest round Monaco, but still enough to hold our interest.

The Race

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This article was originally written for BellaOnline, but is republished here for posterity.

Early last week, the FIA announced some new regulations that would affect the 2009 season. It seemed very late to be changing things, particularly the points system. The World Motorsport Council met and decided that the driver with the most wins would secure the championship, regardless of how many points he had scored. Points would still be calculated in case of a tie, and for the constructor’s championship.

There was a general outcry in the paddock, with many past, present and future champions suggesting that although the principal was good – to encourage drivers to fight for wins – this was not the way to go about it.

FOTA issued a press release over the weekend stating that the FIA’s actions were actually illegal and they couldn’t enforce this points system change on them. The Sporting Regulations do state that a change cannot be introduced so close to the start of the season without the teams unanimous agreement. They argued that they had not agreed to any such thing.

“The amendment to the sporting regulations proposed by the World Motorsport Council was not performed in accordance with the procedure provided for by Appendix 5 of the Sporting Regulations and, as per the provisions of the article 199 of the FIA International Sporting Code, it is too late for FIA to impose a change for the 2009 season that has not obtained the unanimous agreement of all the competitors properly entered into the 2009 Formula 1 Championship.”

The FIA then retracted the decision, saying that if the teams weren’t in agreement, then the system could be postponed until 2010. Their retaliation was that the WMSC was under the impression the teams were behind Bernie Ecclestone’s medals idea, and this was essentially the same thing. FOTA admitted that they had talked to Bernie about the idea but that no firm decisions had been made, and they were definitely not behind the system that the FIA was proposing.

Either way, for now, things will remain as they were, with the winner scoring 10 points, down to the eighth place finisher scoring 1 point. Bernie Ecclestone is confident the “winner takes all” system will be in place for 2010, though, and that it will be in the regulations early enough that teams will know what they’re getting into.

Obviously the majority of conversation yesterday was dominated by the FIA regulation tweaks, and who am I to try and buck the trend? Here are some of the things on topics right now:

• The new points/wins tally things seems to be a halfway point between Bernie’s medals idea and the way it used to be. So far, we’ve seen a lot of instant reaction to this decision, but my only real concern is that the championship will be over too soon.
• At first, it seemed as though the FIA were relaxing the testing regulations, but it was not to be. What they have said is that teams can indulge in a specific number of straightline tests at a specific set of tracks. The problem is, this starts from Jan 1st 2009. Can you really backdate regulations like that?
• Finally, the budget cuts seem to be awfully low, and as they are not mandatory, there’s a worry that F1 will become almost two different beasts in the same show.

So, it’s fair to say that none of the new regulations have been greeted with joy, but are they really that bad? Share your thoughts today, and we’ll keep our eye on any new stories and paddock reactions as they filter out during the day. I will see you in the comments.

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• Torrent: panel3.torrent 

Another guest host takes the lead in this edition of Sidepodpanel, as Andy Taylor chairs the topical show, covering all manner of F1 related items. This week we discuss the championship results, Bernie’s medal table, and there are some musical references as well.

Joining us on tonight’s panel:

• Ollie
• Steven
• Lou
• Gavin
• Scott
• Journeyer

We welcomed two brilliant new panellers on this show, with Ollie and Lou both taking up the Sidepodpanel challenge for the first time. If anyone else is interested in having a go (and more importantly a laugh) on a Sunday night, then sign up via the Wiki.

This article was originally written for BellaOnline, but is republished here for posterity.

The whole season has been building up to this Grand Prix. The last few races have escalated the championship battle Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa, and this was the final title decider. In the end it came down to the very last moments. Here’s how it played out.

Hamilton and Massa both looked very strong in the practice sessions ahead of the Grand Prix, but Massa managed to hold off the competition to take pole position at his home circuit. The crowd were behind him all the way. Hamilton lined up fourth on the grid, as both Raikkonen and Trulli managed to get in front of him. Trulli was a complete surprise, as Toyota haven’t looked as strong as the front runners all season, and there was no reason for them to run a super aggressive strategy.

Nevertheless, race day dawned, and as our cars lined up for their formation lap, a sudden shower took everyone by surprise. The start was delayed by ten minutes as the rain passed, and the tyre strategies were suddenly paramount. All but Kubica started on intermediate wet tyres, with the BMW diving into the pit lane as soon as they got going.

The first corner was relatively clean, with only two incidents further back in the field. Coulthard was tapped by Rosberg and spun off, colliding with Nakajima in the other Williams on his way. The Red Bull driver was out of the race, and bowed out of the sport on a low note. Piquet also spun off, and even he isn’t clear exactly what knocked him out of the race.

Things settled down somewhat, with Massa scampering away in the lead, and Hamilton just managing to cling on to fifth place – exactly what he needed to take the championship by one point. There were plenty of pit stops and tyre changes, and things remained pretty much the same. Then with just eight laps to go, the rain returned. Most had to pit again, unscheduled this time, to put the intermediate tyres on. The only two drivers remaining on dry tyres were Glock and Trulli.

In the last few laps, Hamilton fell behind Vettel on track, meaning he was in sixth, just outside of a championship winning position. He chased after the Toro Rosso but it didn’t look like he was going to make it. Massa crossed the line in first, and believed he had won the championship but on the last corner, Glock began to fall back, unable to get the grip out of his tyres to make it up the hill. Hamilton got past him and beat him to the line by just 5 seconds, meaning he did finish fifth and secured the world championship.

An amazing race to finish off an incredible year.

We’ve been building up to this for an entire season, and really, it all comes down to the first corner. Massa has the edge over his rival and starts from pole position. Hamilton is where he needs to be in terms of points, but in the middle of a very busy pack. 100 yards and a left hand bend, and the race can be won or lost.

Of course there are 71 laps after that, and with uncertain conditions, it really is anyone’s guess as to what is going to happen. Amazingly, Trulli put his Toyota in second position on the grid. I have no idea what their strategy is, are they really that competitive, are they running light to get into the mix, do they even have a plan? I will be fascinated to know what Trulli’s gameplan is and whether he will become the Ultimate Trulli Train for yet another Grand Prix.

Aside from that, we have Kovalainen just ahead of Alonso, meaning their battle is going to be intense. My money is on Alonso, of course, but perhaps Kovi will put in a last ditch super drive to save the face of himself and his team.

Further back, Kubica couldn’t qualify well for the second weekend in a row. He’s obviously struggling with his car, which is unfortunate, as Heidfeld has just started to get to grips with his. He’s just in front of Coulthard, who was also hoping for better for his last race. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that he can stay out of trouble and have a nice clean race. It doesn’t look like scoring points will be an option, but you never know, and it’d be nice for him to go out in style (because the new livery isn’t helping).

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It’s the last Grand Prix of the season, and we’re hosting a two-hour bumper edition of the Parade Lap as an introduction to the deciding race. However, no one wants to talk about that pesky sport business, we all want to know how the cupcake is going.

For those not in the know, the other half of Sidepodcast, the one that doesn’t know an oven from an iron, promised to bake a cupcake in order to get two regulars onto tonight’s Sidepodpanel. This is where we find out how he got on.

We’ll also have the usual weather forecasts, race predictions, thoughts on qualifying, and chilled out music, to lead us nicely into live commenting the race itself.

We’ll be going live at 2pm GMT, but feel free to make yourselves at home beforehand, and get those cupcake-gate discussions going. See you soon.

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• Transcript: Coming soon 
• Torrent: episode81.torrent 

The post-China race podcast in which we discuss all the track happenings, including Hamilton’s flawless performance, and the Ferrari switch. We also delve into the mysteries of the FIA, once again.

Intro

It was just a shout out or two on Radio 5live, I’m not moonlighting really.

Good Week / Bad Week

A good week for drivers with Force India’s confirmations, and Ferrari’s young programme. A bad week for us as we have to contemplate yet another feeder series.

News and Views

France have pulled out of the calendar as well, but it doesn’t look like Canada will be returning, and what timely news alongside the Abu Dhabi complex. There just aren’t enough pages. Also, we debate the standard engine tender.

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• Length: 9:45 
• Size: 9.0 MB 
• File: digest68.mp3 
• Transcript: digest68.pdf 
• Torrent: digest68.torrent 

It couldn’t be billed as the most exciting race of the season, but it had it’s moments, and F1 Digest is here to fill you in on the Chinese Grand Prix.

The Race

Perhaps we built it up to much, but the penultimate round of the 2008 championship really didn’t live up to expectations. It wasn’t the worst race of the season, but it certainly wasn’t thrill-a-minute either. The Ferrari boys struggled, the BMWs tried to make their way through the field, and all the while Hamilton just pulled away at the front.

Conclusions

Trulli and Bourdais start a war with each other, whilst Raikkonen says he knew what to do. The other teams all seemed to struggle with most drivers having tyre issues, trying to fix it with clever strategies, and failing miserably.