Bahrain Banter

As the first few bars of The Chain played out, my spine tingled. If only the race could have lived up to such excitement. Perhaps John Major could hum it for the next race if they're all going to be like this. You know a race is boring when they have to cut to Coulthard for comments to spice it up.

Rosberg was not at all happy about being joined at Mercedes by Schumacher, what is he anticipating? At a head shorter that Schumi, I wonder who the car was be built for? And doesn't Schumacher look gaunt and tired? Like Webber. Getting down to the weight of the short guys takes its toll. He also looks smug. Obviously my favourite commentry snippet was "He's being held up by Schumacher".

Talking of uncomfortable team mates, just watch Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton. They should not be allowed to do press together, it's cringe-making. They try and josh but it's awful.

Alonso looked grim in the Qualifying press conference. He did not expect to be second to Massa. He got his revenge in the race.

Brundle and Ledgard are taking their time to warm-up. Brundle used his best line, "That's a virgin pitstop for the Virgin team" on the wrong car, Senna in an Hispania.

Anyway, I hope everyone enjoyed the return of the Silver Arrows. At Rosberg's pitstop I thought my TV had switched to black and white as everything was grey.

One more thing to watch out for: Hamilton and Domencali chatting on the podium. Alonso and Hamilton in the same team again? Probably not.

Bahrain Charts

Chart of Lust

1. (new entry) Fernando Alonso - for very obvious reasons, as Massa said "I catch him in a good way."
2. (new entry) Trophies - my Fernando, what a big trophy, he had to sling it over his shoulder to carry it off the podium.
3. (very new entry) Lotus - The Pitstop Princess's underdog of choice (and she is not just swayed by the pretty colours).
4. (new entry) Rosberg's whip - Eh? The one that Schumi bent over for. One-nil.
5. (new entry) Rosewater, pomegranite juice and sparkling water - yum.

Chart of Loathing

1. (new entry) Bitter Twist of Fate - poor Sebastian Vettel.
2. (new entry) Tiny Bits of Seconds - when Button was told that his pitstop was 4.5 seconds he was delighted "That must have been one of the best". "No, that was Vettel at 4.0", his face fell. Should half a second have so much impact?
3. (new entry) The New Graphics - truly awful, hard to read when they're actually displayed.
4. (new entry) BBC attempts to make F1 like Dr Who - as witnessed at the very start of the race coverage, we might be geeks but not on that level.
3. (new entry) Footage of the Hill/Schumacher "accident" in Australia - enough already.

Bahrain Results

1. Que Senna Senna - 118
2= Gurning Rubber - 63
2= Liuzzi goes bananas - 63
4. Birley Chassis - 61
5. Corpus Christi - Trimble - 58
6. The Pitstop Princess - 55
7. Blood on the tracks - 48
8. The Cake King - 46
9. Beauty & the F1 Geek - 45
10= The Young and the Restless - 39
10= You will never see me in Lederhosen - 39
12. Chew Chew Joe - 28
13. Stars in Reasonably Priced Cars - 27
14. Ferrari Fanatic - 26
15= The Lord of the Wings - 25
15= Wheely wheely fast - 25
15= Hippy F1 - 25

Team Listings

Before the race I thought you'd like to get hold of the team listings, if only to remind you who you picked. In alphabetical order:

Beauty & the F1 Geek: Vettel, Sutil, Mercedes, Ferrari (Toro Rosso) & Britain
Birley Chassis: Massa, Glock, Lotus, Ferrari & Singapore
Blood on the tracks: Glock, Vettel, McLaren, Cosworth (HRT) & Belgium
The Cake King: Alonson, Button, Toro Rosso, Cosworth (Lotus) & Abu Dhabi
Chew Chew Joe: Button, Alguesauri, Williams, Mercedes (McLaren) & Britain
Corpus Christi - Trimble: Hamilton, Buemi, Ferrari, Ferrari (Toro Rosso) & Singapore
Ferrari Fanatic: Schumacher, Massa, Toro Rosso, Ferrari (Toro Rosso) & Italy
Gurning Rubber: Alonso, Liuzzi, McLaren, Ferrari (Toro Rosso) & Malaysia
Hippy F1: Webber, Barrichello, Force India, Mercedes & Britain
Liuzzi goes bananas: Alonso, Liuzzi, McLaren, Ferrari (Toro Rosso) & Italy
The Lord of the Wings: Webber, Hulkenberg, McLaren, Cosworth (Lotus) & Singapore
The Pitstop Princess: Rosberg, Petrov, Ferrari, Mercedes (Force India) & Monaco
Que Senna Senna: Sutil, Senna, Ferrari, Renault (Red Bull) & Bahrain
Stars in Reasonably Priced Cars: Vettel, Kobayashi, Renault & Ferrari (Toro Rosso) & Japan
Wheely wheely fast: Button, Barrichello, Toro Rosso, Mercedes & Britain
You will never see me in Lederhosen: Massa, Petrov, Virgin, Mercedes (McLaren) & Belgium
The Young and the Restless: Trulli, Petrov, McLaren, Mercedes & ???

As you can see, Britain and Singapore are crucial races for the league. As there are 17 teams the prizes will be:
1st prize - £102
2nd prize - £51
3rd prize - £17

Tips, Hints & News

For those of you about to choose your team, I thought I should keep you up to date with the latest changes to the F1 line-up for 2010.

USF1 is no more. The FIA has removed them from the official list of teams. You can still choose them if you wish, but you won't score many points. There was talk of the place being taken by a Serbian team; no idea if this is still a possibility.

This means that Lopez, who was signed to drive for USF1, no longer has a seat. You can still purchase him for your team if you feel another team will sign him.

Campos has changed it's name to Hispania Racing Team or HRT. It is clearly going through a change of some kind.

HRT has announced the name of it's second driver, they will be Karun Chandhok. He will still cost £500,000.