Sidepodcast

Frequent commenter, and BMW fan, R.G. sent us this email which was an excellent, and very complete and thorough round up the year. I wanted to read out on the show, but then it occurred to me that it’s quite long and would work better as a blog post. Take it away, R.G.

Well, what a race that was. Couldn’t have asked more for a championship showdown in Brazil. Though I may have accidentally jinxed Felipe Massa by announcing he was the champion thirty seconds too early. Needless to say, not long after, Hamilton passed Glock to win it. Well done to Hamilton nonetheless. Shame Coulthard retired on the first lap, especially since it appeared it was not his fault, he’s had a great career. Just a pity his retirement will be overshadowed by Hamilton. Massa was unlucky, and I’m impressed with him that he took it on the chin and didn’t wail his eyes out.

Shame for BMW to finish the season with no points from Brazil, but I’m optimistic for 2009, and I think we will be able to fight the big guns right to Abu Dhabi in a year’s time, hopefully with both Kubica and Heidfeld battling for the title. And with Renault likely to be more competitive, we could see a Raikkonen, Massa, Hamilton, Kubica, Heidfeld and Alonso battle for the title. And I thought 2008 was good.

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BMW have been on the radar all season, but only as a support act, there to pick up the pieces when it all goes wrong at the front. Kubica collected his and the team’s first win at Canada this year, and even though it was an important moment, it didn’t mark a defining improvement for them. In fact, BMWs fortunes dropped slightly after that impressive 1-2.

Nevertheless, and much to Bernie’s dismay, consistency keeps you near the top, and with only two races left, Kubica is still in contention for the driver’s title. If you had to choose between Kubica or Raikkonen making it to the final battle, wouldn’t you have picked the defending champion?

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• Length: 03:41 
• Size: 42.2 MB 
• File: video24.m4v 
• Transcript: video24.pdf 
• Torrent: video24.torrent 
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Last weekend in Canada there was a new man standing upon the top step of the podium, Robert Kubica. It was also the first time his team BMW Sauber F1 had won a Grand Prix and they did it in style with a perfect 1-2.

Formula One has been dominated by just two teams and a handful of drivers for the past 18 months, so we figured this was an event worth documenting. In the process, we catch up with Kubica and teammate Heidfeld along with big boss man Mario Theissen on their way back from the podium celebrations. But don’t you go pretending that a gutted Nick Heidfeld doesn’t make you want to cry, you know he does.

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