Russia GP - "well worth the wait"

Another race full of retirements, how much longer can this go on for?

Alonso stopped on the warm-up lap. I think in the olden days we would have seen him racing back to the pits to see what can be done.  Now he's keeping his head down and checking his online banking.

During the first lap, Grosjean and Palmer collided.  I remember a time when we would have automatically put that on Grosjean, now we automatically blame Palmer.  How long can he keep his seat?  I'm also wondering why it is now so acceptable to have a good swear on team radio, they wouldn't in the press pit.  Stroll also spun.

On Lap 5, Ricciardo's brakes caught fire. He was out.  So when Hamilton said: "There's something wrong, I'm getting sensations", there was hope.  Instead he spent the race radioing over and over about "struggling with his temps".

After those opening laps, nothing happened.  At all.  Well, on Lap 33 Raikkonen confused Hamilton and Bottas.  Massa had a slow puncture on Lap 43.  On Lap 44, Bottas requested less radio communications.

Hooray for Bottas, getting his maiden victory, I'm just very disappointed that it wasn't for Williams.

Eddie Jordan then proved he has dementia when he jumped on to the podium shouting: "Sochi, thank you for giving us an unbelievable race!"  Perhaps he was worried that he was going to be sent to the gulag.

Russia GP - Results

1. Evel Marque - 272*
2. Bernie is a hobbit - 230
3. Two World Champions, two future World Champions and, um, two other guys - 229
4. The Pitstop Princess - 223
5= Hoping for an Indian Summer - 210
5= Torque of the Devil - 210
7. No Vices Now - 195
8. Moneyball - 193
9. BOT-RAI-PER - 178
10. Slightly Slower Racing - 173
11= Jenson's Whinging Legacy - 166
11= Even more hopeful - 166
13. Beauty & the F1 Geek - 162
14. Hippy F1 - 146
15. Burn after racing - 116

Bahrain GP - "What a race...you were the quickest"

It was an interesting build up to the race.  Predictably there was a lot of discussion about Alonso's decision to race the Indy 500.  Less predictable was Webber's constant analysis of who has "big minerals".

Looking back, only 13 cars finished the race.  This seems very retro, when did reliability fail?  It all started on Lap 9, when K Mag went off.  Although this was just after Massa showed us that really he came out of retirement to drive for Ferrari as he let Raikkonen straight through.  Verstappen's brakes failed and no one batted an eye lid.  Stroll and Sainz crashed.  Mercedes took 6 second pit stops (another retro step).  There were high fives when Hamilton was given a 5 second penalty for his "pit lane incident".

Fortunately, the Safety Car restart provided lots of action.

Alonso gave us an insight into the Fernando-McLaren-Honda relationship when he told them "Do whatever you want mate".

Surprisingly, everyone was still on the same lap until Lap 50 of 57.

Best retirement of the day, goes to Ericsson and Sauber.  After expressing distress, Sauber asked "Oh, what's up?".  Ericsson's reply was: "Gearbox broken".

Then McLaren had another double retirement.

Final thought on the race, why is the race in Bahrain held at night?  How does it improve the spectacle?

Bahrain GP - Results

1. Evel Marque - 205*
2. Two World Champions, two future World Champions and, um, two other guys - 178
3. Bernie is a Hobbit - 162
4. The Pitstop Princess - 156
5. No Vices Now - 155
6= Hoping for an Indian Summer - 147
6= Torque of the Devil - 147
8. Moneyball - 146
9. BOT-RAI-PER - 122
10. Beauty & the F1 Geek - 119
11. Slightly Slower Racing - 118
12= Jenson's Whinging Legacy - 117
12= Even more hopeful - 117
14. Hippy F1 - 110
15. Burn After Racing - 88

*Home track played

China GP - "Absolute masterclass"

So many people picked Stroll this year, yes he was cheap, but didn't his exit on Lap 1 show he was worth every fantasy penny?  Giovanizzi also proved an expensive mistake for Sauber this weekend, crashing in both Q1 and Lap 4.  Bottas proved his position at Mercedes with a spin under the safety car.  Verstappen confirmed why he was a better choice than Kvyat (he used to drive for Red Bull).  The double McLaren retirement continues to signal the beginning of the end.  Once again the internet is full of "Raikkonen?" chat, he insistence on new tyres means we will never know whether he would have finished on the podium.  You would have thought drivers would be trying a lot harder in the "here today, gone tomorrow" world of Formula 1.  Bottas's engineer called him Nico and Hamilton hasn't bothered to learn Verstappen's name at all - why bother with names when it's all so transient?
I will be encouraging all my drivers to the take the "anywhere you like" approach to grid boxes from now on - the nearer the front the better.  As Vettel received no punishment for starting in the middle.  Overall, it wasn't a bad race, especially the nose-to-nose action from the Red Bulls towards the end.