Anyway… enjoy and do let us know what you think. We’ll be back on air later this month or early next month with another guest so ’stay tuned’.

Many immediately suggested it had been a mistake to get rid of refuelling and demanded immediate changes, some of which had merit, some not. Bernie Ecclestone counselled against knee-jerk reactions, and anyone with half a brain agreed with him.

Race two, in Melbourne, was as diverting as Bahrain had been bland, and much of this – rightly – was put down to uncertain weather conditions, which have spawned exciting races since the beginning of time. It isn’t much of an intellectual stretch to understand that when you get a wet race track – even a damp one – you have less grip, and when you have less grip you get more driving errors and therefore changes in the order.

Not rocket science, is it? Which makes it the more unbelievable that, between them, the FIA and the Formula 1 teams – all of which have recently wakened up to the fact that racing fans like racing – cannot between them come up with a set of regulations to promote it. Last year, those teams which designed ‘trick’ double-diffusers into the concept of their cars deliberately ignored the aims of the FIA Overtaking Working Group – and the governing body then shamefully declared them permissible.

All concerned knew of the adverse effect this would have on the sport’s appeal, and all – for reasons of self-interest – chose to ignore it. A plague on their houses, as far as I’m concerned – but the FIA Court of Appeal stands especially culpable, for while it is in the DNA of F1 designers to look for loopholes in the rules, it is the interests of the sport which should always be paramount to the people who run it.

Patrick Head once pointed out that the Monaco Grand Prix would be highly diverting if all the cars ran with ‘Hockenheim wing settings’, and on another occasion even more radically suggested that wings be banned altogether – although that, he smilingly admitted, would never be accepted by the team owners given the amount of ‘sponsorship area’ on the car that would be lost.

For the fans, the people to whom manufacturers and sponsors are trying to sell things – and therefore, in the end, the people who pay for this sport – what constitutes the ideal racing car? No one ever defined that better than Tony Brooks, the great Vanwall and Ferrari driver of half a century ago: “A Grand Prix car,” he said, “should always have slightly more power than the chassis can comfortably handle…”

Simple, isn’t it? And the abiding problem of contemporary F1 is that the ratio between power and grip is out of kilter. The ban on traction control was a good move, but still the fact remains that F1 cars race today with 300 horsepower fewer than we have seen in the past – and don’t tell me that the grip levels in the 1980s (during the turbo era) were anything like those of today.

Some years ago Max Mosley decided that horsepower was getting out of control, and declared that the 3-litre V10 engine should be replaced by a 2.4-litre V8. He then imposed the ‘frozen engine spec’ rule, and that was probably essential, given the amounts of money being spent on the endless quest for another 10bhp.

Unfortunately, attempts to change the aerodynamic rules – so as to cut back on grip – have proved far less effective, and thus we have a situation where a dry day means a procession, where only adverse weather conditions can guarantee a memorable afternoon. Can’t be right.

After Bahrain, there was hand-wringing by some of the team principals, who had apparently become suddenly aware that a Grand Prix can be boring, and were demanding all manner of instant changes to spice up ‘The Show’. One instant change might be to be receptive in future to technical changes proposed by the Overtaking Working Group, rather than ignore them for the sake of self-interest.

And to think there was a time when we used to joke about spinklers…

He played a big hand in securing the British Grand Prix at Silverstone and has an interesting perspective on Formula 1 at the moment, a perspective he’s not afraid to air.

Enjoy… We all certainly did.

Now, I know better than anyone that making ‘greatest ever’ claims risks the wrath of many readers! So let’s be clear here: we’re not saying the 2010 is the greatest ever – we’re just asking the question! It should at least provoke some debate…

What isn’t in doubt is that this is the most anticipated F1 season for many a year – because of the strength of the line-up. Schumacher in a Mercedes versus Alonso in a Ferrari versus Hamilton and Button in McLarens versus Vettel and Webber in Red Bulls, not to mention true strength in depth throughout the supporting cast… We can’t wait for Bahrain on March 14.

As always in Motor Sport, we have one eye on the past as we look to the future, which is why we’d like to know how you think the grid compares to the great years of F1. Which is your favourite F1 season and which years featured the strongest line-up of aces? Do let us know what you think.

One decision for our season preview issue was particularly easy this year: who to put on the cover. Michael Schumacher isn’t exactly as well loved as some era-defining drivers from the past, but it cannot be denied that his comeback captures the imagination of anyone with even the slightest interest in F1. “So how will Schumacher get on, then?” is the question I’ve most been asked in recent weeks by anyone I’ve met who finds out what I do for a living, mostly from people with little interest in the sport, too.

In our preview, Adam Cooper has spoken to Schumacher’s closest aide to get the background story on the comeback of the century. Sabine Kehm has worked with Schuey for 10 years and she offers a fascinating insight into the sequence of events that led to the big return. The preview also features editor-in-chief Nigel Roebuck in typically entertaining and forthright discussion with Martin Brundle, Anthony Rowlinson on that ‘greatest ever’ grid and that man Cooper again on the new rules that will change the face of the races in 2010.

Away from modern F1, Simon Taylor meets Derek Warwick for lunch in Jersey, Eoin Young profiles Louis Klemantaski – one of the sport’s greatest photographers (and I’m safe on that hyperbole) – and design legend Tony Southgate brings us tales of Shadow, from his forthcoming autobiography.

All this, plus a review of our inaugural Motor Sport Hall of Fame, an event that promises to become an established curtain-raiser for many racing seasons to come.

Enjoy the issue.

Dear Nigel,

I am thoroughly enjoying reading your work online and in the mag, and I very much appreciate your views.

I was wondering if you have ever understood what it is some stewards have against racing?

Last year’s Massa/Bourdais non-incident in Japan was one example, but following the Kubica/Vettel contretemps in Melbourne, Vettel was awarded a grid penalty for the next race in Malaysia. Don’t the ‘powers that try to be’ know that in the course of racing cars will, from time to time, trip over each other? In my view Vettel was blameless (as was Bourdais last year, for what it’s worth) – he was on the inside of the corner on fading tyres, Kubica tried a slightly risky move which didn’t come off, and that should have been the end of it.

It’s all very well for certain people to come up with incentives to encourage drivers to race, but until there are stewards who demonstrate evidence of having seen a motor race rather than watching nice orderly parades, there seems little point in changing anything. Nobody wants to see stupid or dangerous driving on the track, but for heaven’s sake, it’s racing!

David O’Dell

Afterwards the words tumbled out in a smiling, almost disbelieving, rush: “For sure this is the best day of my life. I kept saying to myself, ‘Still P1 on my board – how can it be?’ The reaction of the crowd on my slowing-down lap, being on podium… it was all even better than I thought it could be. In fact, I had a lot of fun from the first lap to the last. It was just… a very nice race!”

Vettel’s victory could hardly have been better received, for it is always good to see new winners in the sport, and Sebastian is a personable young fellow with a very ‘English’ sense of humour – you don’t find many Germans who can quote great chunks of Fawlty Towers.

In recent weeks the Toro Rosso team has progressed strongly, but still it was a surprise when Vettel took pole position. Yes, his Ferrari engine was in its element at the fastest circuit in Formula 1 use, and yes, as we saw at Spa, the Toro Rossos invariably show well in wet conditions, which was what we had at Monza throughout Friday and Saturday, but still to see the name of Vettel, rather than Hamilton or Massa, at the top of the list was unexpected.

On race day it rained again, but not too many in the paddock believed that Vettel and Toro Rosso would convert pole position into victory – indeed most people’s money was on Heikki Kovalainen, who joined Sebastian on the front row.

In this day and age, it was more or less inevitable, given the conditions, that the race would start behind the safety car, but after two laps like that they were given the signal to go, whereupon Vettel got away perfectly, and that was crucial, for on a day like this only the leader could properly see where he was going. Sebastian certainly made the most of that advantage, and in the early laps his car was as much as 20kph faster than any other on Monza’s long straights. By lap 18, when he made his first stop, he had built up a lead of 12 seconds over Kovalainen.

By now the worst of the rain had passed, but still there was no question of switching from ‘full wet’ tyres to intermediates. Vettel temporarily dropped to fourth place, but as Kovalainen, Webber and Massa came in for their stops, he retook the lead, and thereafter never lost it.

By the time of Vettel’s second stop, on lap 36, conditions had improved to the point that now intermediates were the thing to have, and this worked much to the interests of drivers such as Kubica who started the race with a load of fuel on board, and planned only on a single stop. By the time their stops came around, it was a straightforward decision to put on ‘inters’.

Kovalainen duly finished second to Vettel, and seemed dejected after a race he had clearly expected to win for McLaren: “In today’s cool and wet conditions, I struggled to keep temperature in the brakes – it’s normally a problem that goes away after a few laps, but today it didn’t. I also had problems with the ‘full wet’ tyres in the first two stints, and it was only at the end, when we were both running ‘inters’, that I was able to run at Sebastian’s speed. By then, of course, there was no time left to do anything…

Kubica, Alonso and Heidfeld benefited from their one-stop strategies, switching from wets to intermediates at the ideal time, and consequently finishing ahead of such as Massa and Webber, who were on two-stoppers, and for part of the time at least were on tyres not ideal for the changing conditions.

The World Championship situation changed little at Monza, for the two leading protagonists finished only sixth and seventh, Massa gaining a single point on Hamilton as a consequence. At no stage, indeed, were either in serious contention, thanks to tribulations in qualifying.

Two major surprises had awaited in Monza. First, Ferrari announced that Raikkonen’s contract had been extended by a year, to the end of 2010, and in light of a string of substandard performances in the recent past, not many had seen that coming.

The second surprise, of course, was the weather. No sign this year of the sun and long autumnal shadows traditionally associated with Monza in September: every day the rain came down, and hard, and we became used to lightning cracking across the dark skies.

The conditions were awful for qualifying, and, in light of his remarkable speed in the wet at Spa, Hamilton had been widely regarded as the likely pole man. As it was, though, Kovalainen was McLaren’s pacesetter throughout, and Lewis failed even to get through to Q1, qualifying a lamentable 15th, far and away the worst grid position of his F1 career.

Hamilton may have been only one place behind Raikkonen, but crucially he was nowhere near Massa, who didn’t have the greatest session himself, but still set sixth best time.

Between them, Lewis and his team could not have got it more wrong. At the beginning of Q2 everyone, fearful that another have fall of rain was imminent, dashed out, but McLaren clearly expected conditions to improve, for Hamilton did not immediately go out – and when he did, his car, amazingly, was on intermediates, rather than ‘full wets’. By this time, too, conditions had actually worsened, so that Lewis, in spite of stopping for wets, was always chasing his tail, with every lap a little slower than the one before.

For whatever reason, he never looked at ease throughout his qualifying session, and afterwards said that, in the poor visibility, it was difficult to pick out the braking points. No argument there – but it was the same for everyone, and such as Kovalainen and Bourdais and Rosberg were impressive throughout. No one, though, had any answer to Vettel, who was very swift, very composed, and entirely free of serious error, just as he was to be on race day.

On Sunday Hamilton drove a typically muscular race, taking no prisoners at all as he marched through from 15th to an eventual seventh, and he left Italy still in the lead of the World Championship – but only by a single point.

Monza, though, will be remembered as the scene of a first victory by a team and a driver. Toro Rosso employs a total of 168 people, about the same number some teams appear to have in their marketing departments. Chassis by Adrian Newey, engine by Ferrari: it’s a potent mix, and all handled by a smiling 21-year-old who looks increasingly like the next great driver. At the end of the season he leaves Toro Rosso for Red Bull, the ‘mother team’ (which has still to win a race); one inevitably wonders how long it will be before Luca di Montezemolo and Ron Dennis come calling.

The Formula 1 circus has come to Monaco and so far, apart from a few gentle brushes with the walls, the whole grid has managed to complete the opening two practice sessions.

The forecast is for rain and what better race to have it at than Monaco, when none of the drivers have raced without traction control in the wet yet. If the promised rain does arrive, the race – I fear – will be won by the most level headed and cautious driver on the day.

Hamilton seems to love the circuit through the Principality and spent much of the day at the top of the sheets. Raikkonen did respond with a flurry of quick laps at the end of the first session and nudged the Brit from 1st place; however, Hamilton was even quicker in the next session and was only briefly knocked off the top of the sheets by Rosberg, who seems to be in great form in the Williams.

Piquet still seems to be struggling with the Renault – Alonso was 1.5 seconds quicker in P1 and then a second quicker in P2. Last year Briatore was very publicly vocal about Kovalainen taking time to get up to speed yet remains silent on Piquet’s pace. I doubt he is as relaxed as he looks but I suspect it is only a matter of time before the pressure of needing to perform further hampers the young Brazilian.

The McLarens do have the measure of the Ferraris for the time being, but as speculated the Scuderia is certainly not as far back as last year. As for the race – well, thanks to the overtaking possibilities in Monaco, much of the result depends on how the drivers do in qualifying. I would have thought, bar a problem or a mistake, Hamilton will take pole, with either one of the Ferraris or Kovalainen lining up alongside him.

However, with the likes of Rosberg showing the pace he is at the moment and the BMWs going well, I will no doubt be completely wrong. (When Hamilton does get pole I’ll delete this last sentence).
Practice 1

Practice 2

As expected the Ferraris seem to be roughly half a second quicker than the McLarens. Although the times are much closer than that, the long runs suggest that the Scuderia’s cars do hold a clear advantage. As for Hamilton’s time in P2, well… he went out right at the end and completed just the one flying lap so who knows how much fuel he had in.

The Renaults showed that their pace in Barcelona wasn’t a one-off with two strong sessions from Alonso and it’s good to see Red Bull up in the top 5. Webber clipped the grass early on in the second session which sent his car spinning into the barrier. The Australian was unhurt but the armco certainly did a pretty good job of short-wheel basing the car.

As for the rest, Kovalainen seemed to have left his sense of self-preservation in the hospital, as he was straight back on the pace. A quite remarkable feat considering he suffered a 26G crash less than two weeks ago. The BMWs don’t seem to be as close to McLaren as they have been promising but, as I said before, the practice times can be a little misleading.

So predictions for the Grand Prix on Sunday? Short of a breakdown or moment of madness from Raikkonen or Massa, the Ferraris look as though they could take another 1-2. As for the last place on the podium, I would have thought that both Hamilton and Kovalainen have the pace to take it.

Having bad mouthed the ITV F1 live feed the other week, I am pleased to say that it is vastly improved. Last time I watched something on there I spent an hour and a half staring at a frozen screen with snippets of flying laps sped up a hundred times so that the ‘feed’ could catch up again. However, its gremlins seem to be cured and you can now sit back and soak up the sound of the V8s. Whether this was down to me and my blog, I very much doubt, but it is now a pretty good place to catch the practice sessions.

Practice 1

Practice 2

So the European season has begun. Almost all 22 cars completed the two Friday practices without incident and the Ferraris look like they are the pace setters at the moment. The Scuderia occupied the top two spots in the opening practice and were just under half a second quicker than Hamilton. Massa managed (after I had said that his ‘moments’ would become less frequent from Bahrain onwards) to spin twice, once at the chicane on his flying lap and then on the exit of turn 8 later on in the first practice.

The most interesting part of the two opening practice sessions? Well in the first, a second covered the first 4 cars and in the second, it covered a quite remarkable 12 cars. Indeed, if you ignore the Super Aguris, all the cars were within two seconds of Räikkönen’s fastest time. It may surprise you even more that in the second Friday practice in the French Grand Prix last year, the top 15 cars set times within 1 second of each other. And they say Formula 1 isn’t interesting…

On the subject of Super Aguris, it is great to see them on track as up until today they were still in talks with Honda over whether or not they could actually compete this weekend. With the rule changes next year, the Japanese manufacturer has made it quite clear that they aren’t prepared to keep shelling out inordinate amounts of money to keep Aguri Suzuki afloat. After one possible backer dropped out at the last minute the team is again looking for a sponsor. Let’s hope that they find one otherwise this may well be one of the last times we see them on the Grand Prix circuit.

I was actually quite surprised to see them leave the garage this morning as competing over a race weekend amounts to what us mere mortals would consider a cash bonfire. Of course, they don’t want to miss out on the money they receive for competing in a Grand Prix.

As for the rest… The Renaults certainly looked quick in the second session but watching the onboard footage it looked as though both drivers were pushing pretty hard. Whether they can keep that sort of pace up over the whole weekend, I doubt. Force India, after saying mid-week that they are ready to get into Q3, have taken another step forward with strong finishes in the second session.

Whether all the teams were actually trying to set quick times, I am not convinced. I suggest that the Ferraris are going to be hard to beat come Sunday and the McLarens seem to have the edge over the BMWs for the time being.

The good news for all of you is that Nigel Roebuck is getting ready to write his first www.motorsportmagazine.co.uk Grand Prix Report and will share his views with us, here, after the race on Sunday. For a far more insightful and interesting read… log back on, Sunday evening and go via the ‘Grand Prix Reports’ link on the homepage to read it.

Practice 1

Practice 2

Well, Massa needed a win, or at the very least a strong performance with all four wheels staying firmly on the Tarmac, and he delivered. From when the red lights went out he dominated a fairly uneventful race for the two Ferrari cars and finished over three seconds ahead of his Finnish team-mate.

He has a good record in Bahrain, having won there last year ahead of Hamilton and Raikkonen, but the fact that he managed to drive such a dominant race after so much criticism was a testament to his mental and driving ability. I am not saying he is cured of his moments – but if he can drive like this for the rest of the reason, they will be forgotten by many.

As for the McLarens, Hamilton had yet another disastrous race. He was extremely slow off the line, his car looking as though he tried to draw away in 3rd, and dropped back to 10th place. He then slammed into the back of Alonso and consequently had to pit for a new nose cone. With the rest of his race hampered by a heavy fuel load and traffic he came home a disappointing 13th.

His team-mate, however, drove an undramatic race to finish 5th. It is obvious that the BMWs are quicker than the McLarens now (or at least in Bahrain) and hopefully for the Woking-based squad they will have found more speed from somewhere, come the European season. If not, they will be the ‘BMWs of 2008′ – the team that is relying on others not to finish in order to score good points and finish on the podium. Something that none of them would accept.
But well done Kovalainen, he may not have the raw pace of Hamilton but his lows are much higher than Hamilton’s when things go wrong. Something that, come Australia, may well count towards beating his team-mate in the Championship standings.

The BMWs both looked strong with Kubica finishing 3rd, and Heidfeld only three and a half seconds behind him. They have had a remarkable start to the season – lets hope they can continue competing for the podium. They certainly have one of the strongest driver line-ups on the grid.