Okay, so here is the story of the 2010 German Grand Prix: The positions were sorted out in the first corner of the first lap and the result fixed with 18 laps to go. That is it. Nothing more to see, nothing more really to talk about race wise. Read More»

Winter testing for the 2010 Formula One season is officially underway and the greatest sight of all is that of Michael Schumacher back behind the wheel of an F1 car regardless of the fact that it seems strange not seeing him in a Red Ferrari. Actually, I wonder how many people look at the Ferrari garage waiting for him to emerge only to catch themselves on?

The session at Circuit Ricardo Tormo also marked the comeback of Felippe Massa who returns from a serious head injury that at one point was not just career threatening, but life threatening and he proved there is no rust by setting the fast time of the day at 1 minute 12.574 secs.

Schumacher was on the pace from the get go, getting used to the latest brand of Formula One car and finished the day with the third fastest time of 1 minute 12.947 secs after 40 laps completed.

“In a way it’s like 91 again,” said Schumacher, “I felt like I had a toy in my hands. For the first day, the team have done a superb job.”

Still, you cannot read too much into the times set by drivers on the first days of testing. Many drivers are running many different set-ups and fuel loads and so the timings can be off for various reasons. An example of this is the fact that Pedro de la Rosa in his Sauber (great to see that name back) set the second fastest time and he has been out of the F1 racing game since 2006 (and he ain’t no Schumacher).

Often smaller teams use these tests as a chance to lighten up the car and put in a few quick times to potentially pull in sponsors while other more stable teams will immediately get ready for race type situations which this year will include no re-fueling and therefore very different handling cars compared to previous years. Don’t however expect it to take long for the runners and riders to get used to the new styles of the cars, these guys adapt very quickly as has been seen in previous years when rule changes have changed the dynamics of the cars.

Seven of the expected 13 teams took part, none of the four newcomers put in an appearance.

I often wonder what headline will be my sports story of the year, what incident, what event? Today without a doubt I got the headline, the event and the incident … the return of the great Michael Schumacher to Formula One. Schumacher is statistically the greatest driver in the history of the sport and, maybe along with Senna, my favorite driver of all time. I grew up watching Schumacher, I had his hat, Ferrari t-shirts, his sunglasses and a huge Ferrari flag growing up and in August 2000 I lived my dream of getting to see an F1 race in person and most importantly, Schumacher. I truly believed that if you hadn’t seen Schumacher in person before now then your chance had gone, until today.

Read More»

Massa is going to take time to recover that much is certain and he is likely to miss a number of races so the big question doing the rounds is who will replace him. The likely choice is one of the two Ferrari test drivers Luca Badoer or Mark Gene but the heart-felt dream of many F1 fans is that Michael Schumacher will get behind the wheel again. Read More»

In the midst of all my Tour de France watching this weekend I also managed to spare a thought for the Formula One that was taking place in Hungary. I tuned in for a little bit of the qualifying and the majority of the race but what Lewis Hamilton’s sudden rise back to the top of the podidum out of nowhere was not the talking point of the weekend like it should have been … no Felippe Massa’s ill health following a terrible crash in Saturday qualifying has grabbed the attention.

Read More»

I’ve been looking forward to this race ever since the last one that confirmed that the title championship would come down to the final race. Hamilton vs Massa it is all on the line. Hamilton is the big favourite simply because he leads the title into the race and only needs a 5th place or higher finish to ensure himself the championship (any tie breaker favours Massa) but this is F1, this is motor sport and absolutely anything can happen to throw a cat amongst the pigeons. This is going to be exciting. Can Hamilton make history by becoming the youngest ever Formula One World Champion?

Read More»

So here we go, it is time to start, it is time to find a champion and I am sitting ready to watch. I will do some updates as I watch it as I think it’ll be good to read back on down the line as this could be a pretty historic day. Read More»