Rally De France 2012 Video Highlights - Day 3

So a perfect day for Loeb and the supporters as he ties up his 9th championship on home soil. We will have the best of the action when we find it.

Congrats to Loeb

Rally De France 2012 Video Highlights - Day 2

A nasty accident on day 2 for Petter was the talking point of the day.

And here's some highlights from the day.

Rally De France 2012 - Solberg Off

Here is the footage from Petter Solbergs off on the 2nd day of Rally France. A nasty incident and thankfully nobody was hurt.

Rally De France 2012 Video Highlights - Day 1

First bit of video from this years Rally France. Its feels like a while since you real tarmac action. Looking forward to it.

Here's some more highlights from day 1.

WRC 2013 Changes

The WMSC approved for the FIA to proceed with an agreement with The Sportsman Media Group and Red Bull Media House to become the new global Promoter of the FIA World Rally Championship from 2013. The Promoter will be responsible for investing and developing the WRC with a view to increasing its profile, reputation and commercial value. In particular, the Promoter, working in close collaboration with the FIA, will be focused on introducing live television and an innovative digital media strategy in the next years.

As part of a cost-reduction process and to attract greater entries, WRC Teams competing in the 2013 FIA World Rally Championship will now only have to contest one non-European event. WRC Teams must however still nominate and take part in a minimum of seven events.

The structure of the support Championships has been revised to reflect the interests and demands of the competitors. From 2013, the current Championship for S2000 cars will be replaced by the WRC-2 Championship including cars with four-wheel drive (R5, R4 and S2000). A specific cup for cars in the Group N category will also form part of the FIA WRC-2 Championship, and titles for teams, drivers and co-drivers will be awarded to those who have scored the most points in six of the seven events in which they have taken part.

The current Production Car World Rally Championship will be replaced by the FIA WRC-3 Championship, including Group R cars with two-wheel drive (R3, R2 and R1). Titles for teams, drivers and co-drivers will be awarded to those who have scored the most points in five of the six events in which they have taken part.

The current FIA WRC Academy will be re-named the FIA Junior WRC Championship.

For safety reasons and therefore with immediate effect, each crew that is entered with a WRC car is permitted to use a route note car on asphalt events.

To limit costs and encourage participation, from 2013 the use of the latest evolution of parts homologated by manufacturers will not be mandatory for WRC cars entered by drivers not scoring points in the Manufacturers’ Championship. This also applies to all cars in the S2000 category with a 1.6L turbo engine.

The 2013 FIA World Rally Championship calendar is confirmed as follows:

20/01 MCO Rallye Monte Carlo
10/02 SWE Rally Sweden
10/03 MEX Rally Mexico
14/04 PRT Rallye de Portugal
05/05 ARG Rally Argentina
02/06 GRE Acropolis Rally
23/06 ITA Rally d'Italia
04/08 FIN Rally Finland
TBC DEU Rallye Deutschland
15/09 AUS Rally Australia
06/10 FRA Rallye de France
27/10 ESP Rally de España
17/11 GBR Rally of Great Britain

Note: The finish date given is the Sunday of the rally weekend. Itineraries are however subject to final confirmation by event organisers.

Hamilton's 2013 Move to Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton will make a switch to Mercedes from McLaren next year it has finally been revealed. Speculation has been rife for a few years that the Brit would leave McLaren and after so many years of association with the team you can see why he may want a change.

Lewis has gone through all emotions in his career so far and seemed to have picked himself up from the bottom this year with 3 wins and seemed to have a generally better outlook on his life.

So why move from proven race winner to an inconsistent performer. Well anything can happen in this sport and generally has this year, but Mercedes are a team on the move and with plenty of cash for development. Mercedes have struggled this year with certain choices they have made regarding their double DRS and they have suffered from rear tyre wear almost constantly. Without these issues they could be a lot closer to the top 3 teams.

But what Hamilton must remember is that this team is built from the faltering Honda team who struggled with so much investment to make any moves to challenge for titles. Yes Ross Brawn turned them into a dominant team for half a season and they struggled through to hang on to constructors and driver championships but that was based on one great idea. Since that time they have struggled behind the top 3 and have now fallen behind to Lotus.

With the same problems though it only takes 1 idea and they could be back to the top. It is always a gamble in F1 and Hamilton is going for it, he wants championships and so do the team. He will help move them forward and next year will have a another great driver to battle with in Rosberg, so until they whip the covers off next year we will continue to speculate.

This could work for Hamilton though in terms of himself, he has shown the need to escape from the old when he dropped his Dad as manager and you get the sense this is another one of those moments.

Where Should Hamilton Go 2012 - McLaren or Mercedes??

McLaren ups Hamilton offer | F1 News | Sep 2012 | Crash.Net:

'via Blog this'

So are McLaren really getting desperate for Hamilton to stay on. Hopefully we get the answers soon as the intricacies of his future seem to get more tangled as the weeks roll on.

The main complication could be an agreement to show his intention to move to Mercedes which he signed earlier this year though this is all rumour.

The other issue appears to lie around sponsorship, with McLaren he is stuck with a lot of McLarens partners and he can't be associated with any of their competitors. But surely this guy is all about racing not who he's get to appear in ads for.

Simple facts, if he's a real racer he stays with McLaren, why go backwards with a team who has 1 win in its current guise and a handful from its past history. He must remember essentially he is from a faltering Honda team who had a good year.

Great Motorsport Photography Articles

Here's my list of some great articles if you are looking for some improvements in the world of photographing speed machines.


http://www.exposureguide.com/motor-racing-photography-tips.htm
Great article with 6 key tips to getting the right shot plus some recommended equipment.

http://www.photoanswers.co.uk/Advice/Search-Results/Techniques/Top-Tips-for-Rally-Photography/
Some great tips on what to do at the event.

http://www.photographymad.com/pages/view/motorsport-photography
General motorsport photography tips on this one.

The Importance of Pacenotes

The importance of pacenotes is obvious but especially so at Rally Finland due to the high speed. Here's a great example of how important it is!

Wales Rally GB 2012 - Highlights Day 1

Coverage from Day 1 of Rally GB

Wales Rally GB Qualifying Stage 2012

Hello and here is the footage from the qualifying stage of Rally GB. Think of this as the best of YouTube so you don't have to trawl through to find it!

IRC - Rally Barum Results 2012 - Review

So here is a clip of winner Juho Hanninen onboard. Will be catching up with the action myself tonight after a busy weekend but here is the top man on a slippy stage.

Rally Barum Zlin - Super Special Stage 2012 Preview

So here's what the IRC and ERC crews will be facing tonight. Plenty of kerbs to knock a wheel out of line by the looks of this footage.

IRC Rally Barum 2012 Preview

Rally Barum is based in the town of  Zlín in the Czech Republic. Here's our quick guide to the event.

The event has been running since 1971. Unsurprisingly for the Czech Republic a Skoda was the first winner and 13 times has a skoda of some variety won the event. This year the rally will play host to the Intercontinental Rally Championship and the European. 20 S2000 crews will be taking part with the headline act Mr Mikkelsen aiming to better his best finish on this event so far of 5th. Historic class will also be running and unusually will feature a Jaguar XJS. If Jan Kopecky takes the win he will have the hounour of most wins at the event with 4.

Some action from last years event.

Dani Sordo ADAC Rally Germany 2012 - Crash

Not a great weekend for Dani Sordo. Hopes were high with a podium looking within sight even with a limited program for Dani this year.

Things were going well on Day 2 with a stage win on SS8 but a deflating tyre caused him to drop down the order on the longest stage of the rally Panzerplatte. To add to that he then hit a hinklestein which finished the day off.

He did come back under super rally rules to take a 9th place finish.

Here's the accident that finished his rally off.

WRC Germany 2012 - Crashes and Mistakes

Here is Mads Ostberg and Martin Prokop incidents from Rally Germany on the last round of the WRC.

WRC Germany 2012 - Review

So Rally Germany provided no surprises in terms of the overall winner with Sebatian Loeb bringing it home for his 9th win in Germany. An amazing stat to add to his others when you consider how close these guys can be in some of these stages, the man is just faultless.

The big performance was from Jarri-Marri Latvala. Probably his best performance on tarmac and proof that while others are falling he can keep on going. He can't do it over a season but his crazy mistakes seem to be getting less and less.

Great performances by other drivers such as Andreas Mikkelsen taking 3rd overall in the power stage in the S2000 car. If that isn't a sign of intention i don't know what is. Will be looking for incar of that one.

Here's the highlights for you anyway, enjoy!

The Problem with Driving Games

So Grid 2 will be released next year and i've been reading through the previews of it I thought I would share a bit of my thoughts on driving games in general.

AI - We hear a lot about how advances in AI will increase the enjoyment but none i can remember have come close to making it feel anything less than racing a pre-programmed system. In Grid 2 apparently the cars around you will make mistakes, but if it happens in the same place its just as bad as not being there at all as you will start to feel when its going to happen. Though at least it is something we can see rather than the talk of how improved AI is in racing games when it comes to new releases with no quantifiable evidence to see it for yourself.

Personally i am more interested in the competitiveness of the AI in comparison to the user, too many times do i buy these games and then have to give myself setup problems just to make the game a bit of a challenge. I can't do the perfect lap but a computer can. We should be able to keep moving the level of difficulty right up to that point. I don't want to stroll away from the start of a race knowing if i make a mistake that i can just push it and take seconds out of anyone. While its fun once it isn't doing it for a whole season in F1 say. Hence why my copy of F1 2011 sits on the shelf unused and ready for ebay.

I understand that making AI like a human is impossible, much the same as it is making a human like a computer. We just need to be able to adjust the challenge more than having to fit into easy, medium and difficult.

F1 2011 impressed me in that you had to work at the setup on the hardet level to make yourself competitive. But once you worked a few things out it became all too easy to come back into the pits seconds ahead of everyone.

Perhaps if online racing had taken up the lead then people like me wouldn't have so much of an issue. But online racing is ridiculous due to the fact 99% of people prefer to treat it as destruction derby. The argument would be that i am stuck in between organised leagues and the casual user, and they are right. But i don't have time to get together with a select bunch of people in an evening as for me life is not scheduled in advance. But on those odd moments i fancy a race with people i don't bother because i know it will end in frustration and annoyance. So maybe they need to pay attention to the way racing online takes place. I want to race not try and avoid the cars trying to take me out while they eat crisps and laugh with friends on headsets. But i fear this middle ground i'm looking for doesn't really exist.

Best start looking at some online simulators for the PC then i think. Goodbye codemasters.

Colin McRae

COLIN MCRAE

WRC Record

Wins - 25

Podiums - 42

Stage Wins - 477

Colin McRae is without a doubt the biggest name in rallying. Here is my collection of favourite videos i've found on the fastest rally driver ever in some peoples eyes.

In this clip Colin is taking his Metro 6R4 round the Garrygort Stages. Some mega commitment in this legendary car including carrying on with the throttle jamming.

Colin McRae & Subaru Legacy RS

Some clips from the early parts of McRae's career during his progression through the ranks.

Here's McRae in his prime on the Col de Turini in 2002. A great upload here of pretty much the whole stage 20min+.

Finland Rally 2012 - Talking points

Latvala not happy with pace - "I need to accept this year we were not on the speed. We have work to do. Citroën seem to do an improvement on the suspension. I need to improve, we need to improve, that's all I'll say."

Atkinson Misread Notes - Chris Atkinson has a massive scare after mis-reading a pace note and turning the wrong way.

Neuville Makes but impresses with pace - Thierry was able to show pace with the top drivers this weekend but did retire on Friday after rolling on a tight corner.

WRC Finland 2012 Review

Here on YouTube we have the full review of the WRC Round in Finland.

F1 Qualifying Report Hockenheim 2012

Qualifying Hockenheim




Q1 Session

The teams headed out into the first session and all went for long stints of 5 or 6 laps. After the first run it was Hamilton, Kobayashi and Button in top 3 positions. 

Niko Hulkenberg was struggling and according to team radio made mistakes on his fast lap, he was lying in 18th after the 1st runs though he quickly resolved the problem by moving to the softer rubber to move up to 3rd putting all the field back under pressure all the way through the field.

Grosjean seemed to be struggling with his Lotus, not a great weekend for the Frenchman with a 5 grid drop penalty already pending.

Caterham don't appear to have made any advances on the teams ahead. Still over a second and a half away from the teams ahead.

Mark Webber appeared to be struggling, with just over a minute to go he crosses the line in 15th. Schumacher also struggling ends the session just managing to push Vergne into 18th and scraping into Q2.

Q2 Session

A session that was decided in the first few minutes after the rain started to fall. The winning combination seeming to be to go out on inters with the Ferrari taking advantage. Those out first with slicks were also able to set a time but the biggest loser was Rosberg who struggled in the small window to set a quick time and then spent the rest of the 15 minutes lapping a vain attempt to set a quicker time even on full wets.

Q3 Session

All cars out on full wets, the session started off watching Hulkenberg fly off the track on the long straight down to turn 6. After 5 minutes of the session it was Vettel, Alonso and Hulkenberg top 3.

The remainder of the session was just a lapping process waiting and hoping for track conditions to improve.

With 2:30 to go Schumacher started the improving times going 1.7 quicker than Alonso and from that point the times started to tumble. Vettel passed to beat MSC time.

So into the last minute and Webber moves up into 1st, he's then put down into 2nd by Alonso and manages to cross the line for another flying lap with 10 seconds of the session left. On final laps Webber failed to improve while Vettel pipped him into 2nd place. Meanwhile Alonso appeared and improved his pole time even with it safely in the bag.

Both the Mclarens ended the session showing a complete lack of pace in the wet conditions, they will be hoping for a totally dry session.

Grid

1. Alonso
2. Vettel
3. Webber
4. Schumacher
5. Hulkenberg
6. Maldonado
7. Button
8. Hamilton
9. Di Resta
10. Raikonnen
11. Ricciardo
12. Perex
13. Kobayashi
14. Massa
15. Grosjean
16. Senna
17. Rosberg
18. Vergne
19. Kovalainen
20. Petrov
21. Pic
22. Glock
23. De la Rosa
24. Karthikeyan

Rally Miglia 1000 2012

So here are some highlights from the Rally 1000 Miglia. Based around Brescia it was too eventually finish with Giandomenico Basso in a Fiesta S2000 taking the win from Andreucci in a 207 and Scadola in a Fabia. I was most surprised at Juho Hanninen in only 4th considering his strong performance on tarmac in Ireland only a few weeks ago.

A good result for Harry Hunt and Robbie Durant in their DS3 R3T Citroen coming 3rd in 2WD.

Some more highlights linked below.

The week of continued electrical gremlins

So not much time this week to do work on the car but more time wasted trying to work out French car electrics. A couple of hours spent nestled into the seat with a Haynes manual and a trusty companion to pull connections out for me. The problem we have is that horn and indicators and brake lights are intermittent and it won't turn off with on the key (has to be battery cut off).

We discovered two things mainly. It hurts pulling connectors out of fuse boxes and taping the gap around the external pull for the fire extinguisher will mean your fuse box has water marks. At this point I would like to point out that was the previous owner and the task is in hand. So a spare fuse box on the way and some more time making sure all connections are working.

Alongside that a nice shiny front bumper to fit which hopefully fits and a fuel relay switch that was £90 at motor factors. With a saving of 88 pounds I'm taking that as an epic win as long as it works.

So this week is more electrics and ripping some more trim off in preparation of its makeover, and preparing some plans for our website to help promote the rallying. Wish us luck!

And a good luck message to the people doing the Pirelli Rally this weekend. Enjoy!

F1 Driver Of The Day - Bahrain

So a few candidates go this.

Vettel - Has no doubt been an influence in helping get this car running at the top of the field. Some alterations to the aero appears to have gone some way to sorting out the balance of the car and Vettel took full advantage. He didn't appear to struggle with the race at all and held the two lotus cars at bay with ease.

Raikonnen - Jumped from 11th witha brilliant 2nd place. Could have won it but didn't go through with the move and that cost him the chance to make a break for it. Fell away after the last set of pit stops for he and Vettel but a very good performance.

Grosjean - Showed he's got the pace to out qualify a world champ in the same car and had the race pace to back it up. A great performance to back up the first podium. Isn't falling away with the pressure of having a world champ alongside him
But did fall away in the race.

Di Resta - Another solid race after a great quali lap. Made up good spots during the race with a more difficult race plan on 2 stops, he defended well when needed too and threw down a marker for his teammate to follow for the rest of the year.

Difficult but I'd say my driver of the day goes too Raikonnen. A great performance as mentioned and I hope for more of the same the rest o the year. Can anyone see this championship not going to the last round. It's like BTCC at the moment, minus the punting off.

The week we went too far with the dash.

This week was all about trying to get back on track with getting the rally car ready. Nothing sets you back as losing the ability to stand and walk around for a potential few months. So we are a few months down the line and its time to get back on it and get this rally car ready.

So first things first, where are we. Well its had a water pump change, a bit of a spring clean and a new fan to aid with de-misting though some would say this isn't needed i disagree. 

This week was all about electrics. The car would be a lot further down the line had we not wasted a lot of hours staring at the ignition system trying to work out why it won't turn off. So after a few more hours and we came to a team decision that it was time to take the dash out while i went and fed the crew with the BBQ. So dash out i then saw this as a great idea for the exterior aswell so now we are minus a rear bumper and some trim.

So we seem a lot further away from being ready than we were before i decided to crop myself but i guess you've gotta go there to come back. To be able to rely on the electrics completely in a 20 year 25 year old french car is doubtful but it will hopefully be a whole lot better than before. Now the big decision is do we put the dash back in or try and create something a bit better and a bit smarter.

So for the next week we'll be having fun with soldering iron's and heat shrink while i try and hammer the bumper mounts back into anything like the original shape. 

Historic Rallying on the Bulldog

Historic rallying from the Bulldog rally. Not a lot better than watching escorts and other classic sliding round the forests.

Webber takes off

Mark Webber having the most painful moment of the Chinese GP by far. He'll be feeling this one in the morning.

Plato vs Shedden Donnington

Just in case you missed the action at the last race here's the clip. Plato drove a brilliant race up until this point and then it all got a bit messy at on the last corner. Plato given a penalty to drop him back down to 3rd which most will agree with.

Some Bad Rallying

I'm not one to go for the crazy crash videos as they are everywhere, but this set of clips is different to that. It seems somewhere in the world someone has to put together clips of some genuine accidents mixed in with people who should not be driving in any kind of competitive event. Just watch these group of clips. I was amazed, maybe you have to have competed or at least now about car control to see that some of these people are genuinely dangerous and should really start with the basics of car control. One of the truly strangest clips I have ever posted.

Highlights from the Circuit of Ireland Rally. Action packed with an epic battle with Juho Hanninen and Andreas Mikkelsen. A great rally with a lot of top performances from some of the local drivers alongside the big boys.

Tasmania Race 1 & 2 V8 Supercars

Here we have a full re-run of both races from Tasmania at the weekend. As always great action from these guys. This has got to be up there with BTCC for me in terms of action.

Starting in Rallying

So I'll treat this like the very start, which for my co-driver it is. Motorsport is all about preparation, and this starts from the moment you plan to start competing. You have to make sure you get everything that is required in place. I'll run through the main things you need to get started and my experiences with them.

License - You need to go to MSA's website to get the Go Rallying pack. http://shop.msauk.org/product_details.asp?id=4073

You'll find some more info on the website if you have a look round.

BARS Test - Ultimately this is the thing you want to get sorted. If you haven't got any experience of motorsport at all don't worry too much. When i took my test I'd had no experience of a rally car but i had been racing karts through my teens which probably helped a bit. The main thing to remember is that they aren't expecting you to be able to be able to perform it is more to check that you aren't driving beyond your capability. If you are worried i would suggest a rally day or something before to give you a taste, plus its all experience towards the first stage rally. The test itself is only a few minutes of being in the car, with a test to take at the venue as well. I took my test at Phil Price rally school (http://www.philprice.co.uk/) and had a good day, though a little tip is make sure you're seating position is right, they don't take kindly to you grinding the gearbox. If you think they are going to help you with techniques and things then think better. They are just testing you can drive. You'll have to pay more if you want advice and training too, nothing comes for free in motorsport.

Equipment - The basics you need for yourself are helmet, overalls, boots and gloves. Personally i never felt at ease with gloves on. Its worth trying them out, i found i didn't feel as in control with gloves on and you don't need them to start with. I never really gave them a go, its little things like this that can affect how confident you feel while driving. I've had issues with boots since having to get rid of my karting boots which were a few sizes too small I've found it difficult to get a pair I'm happy with. You need to feel everthing through your feet to be exact and its difficult. So make sure you try a few on.

Overalls are difficult as the sizes don't really cater for some people. If you are tall and thin be prepared to wear a massive set of overalls. Unless you are going to pay the extra for made to measure which after the experiences I've had trying to get the balance right i may do next. That is more of an image thing for me though, i don't like looking as if I've borrowed overalls from the Michelin man.

The best place to start when looking for all this is Demon Tweeks but there is plenty of other sites just do a google search on what you're after and have a search round for a deal. Don't forget ebay as well, you might get lucky. For overalls and helmet which is all you need really to start with you are looking at about £400 i would say for the basic stuff.

Next is the car but i think that deserves its own article. So many different options depending on so many of your factors. Money, ambition and confidence probably being the main ones.

Hope this helps someone looking to get started, its just my own experiences with starting in this sport. Feel free to get in touch here by leaving a comment or emailing if you have any questions or on twitter @edge_of_grip

Me in action a few years ago in Sherwood Forest

Some archive footage of me in action in 1400 205 with my dad co-driving. Good times.

Crazy end to Nascar Sprint Cup at Martinsville

A very hectic end to the Nascar race at the weekend. Here is the action from the last 20 laps. With a bit of teamwork it could have been a whole different story, but who wants that when you can have this much fun.

Another documentary on the Group B Rally cars. If the documentary on BBC Four wasn't enough for you.

Polo WRC Testing Vid

Just came across this little video of the polo testing session from last year. Sounds evil, almost reminds of the craziest rally car i've ever heard which was the Octavia WRC. Now that was a car.

Indycar Highlights Barber Motorsports Park

Check out the highlights of the Indycar round from Barber Motorsports Park. Good race and a good result for Barrichello.

Rally Portugal Day 2 - A little bit of rain

Some action from day 2 of the Rally Portugal, it seems a lot of crews struggling and many going off the road leading to an unusual looking order.

Rally Portugal Day 1 Highlights and Loeb's Crash

Another bad to start to a rally for Loeb. Check out some highlights of the action.

Rally Portugal Qualifying Stage

A bit of action from the qualifying stage of the Portugal Rally. Before they all started throwing themselves off into the undergrowth.

BTCC - Warm up for the weekend with some classic action.

This kind of action we can expect come sunday. Cannot wait. What are your best moments of BTCC?

Vatanen Skills in Opel Manta

If i was sat in this car i would be well and truly scared. What a 5 minutes of action from old school rallying.

Check out the highlights of WTCC Rounds 1 & 2. Some close racing and more to come for the rest of the season hopefully.

BTCC Touring Car Highlights 2011

If you need a reason to watch touring cars this weekend then check out this little highlights selection from last year.

Classic Solberg In-Car

A bit of classic action from Solberg back when Subaru were in the WRC and fast. Got to love a bit of rallying in-car.

Malaysian GP - Driver of the Day

So this weekend a few drivers really stepped up in the inclement weather. None more so than my driver of the day.

Sergio Perez - No surprises here. He took that car right to the top and with a few calls made differently by the team he would have walked away with that lead. He gets a few negative marks for throwing away a victory, while I'm sure wins are in his future it may be a while before Sauber are in that position again. However you can't let detract from his performance. He was able to get the most of the tyres and the car throughout the race, his pace on the intermediates was impressive towards the end taking on world champions. So while the nerves got him a bit with the mistake he still deserves and I'm sure will be most people's driver of the day.

Bruno Senna deserves a mention. His pace on the intermediates was great while moving through traffic too. This year is proving to be as competitive as we all hoped. So many teams so close to each other.

An Amusing Look at Maldonados Aussie GP

A rather amusing look into Maldonado's day. I hate to keep mentioning him as he had a great race but this made me laugh. Enjoy!

F1 Driving Styles Revealed

For those new to F1 you will hear comparisons to driving styles of different drivers. You may well think that a car must be driven in one way to be the fastest but this is not the case. No two people drive exactly the same, the way you drive is naturally evolved as you learn and while you can make changes the correct things its difficult to completely change.

Mr Brundle will explain it all much better than i can anyway, enjoy!

Fail of the Day - F1 Round 1

Maldonado losing it on the last lap of he GP with a great position in the bag but the prospect of getting Alonso got the better of him. A great drive by him up until that point though it has to be said.

Australia F1 Drivers of the Day

Well i've been thinking about who i would put as my top driver of the weekend and its a difficult one as so many impressive performances. These are the 3 that i've picked but could have written up so many others.

Button - From start to end he didn't make a mistake and built himself up a lead. Clearly he's got a fast car but more than that he looked more than equal to Hamilton which hasn't been the case before when they are both on form. If Hamilton gets the car working he's normally far and away quicker than Button but it seemed even.

Vettel - Fought well to get up the order and deserved his place. His determination was relentless and this earnt him a 2nd place. He did get lucky with the safety car though to get past Hamilton but you have to earn luck and he certainly did that.

Perez - Great performance from Perez even though he had a dissapointing qualifying day he came through strong in the race with a 1 stop race which worked well for him. He came through in 8th. Can't wait to see how Perez and team mate Kobayashi can do this year if they have the pace to challenge Mercedes and Ferrari. Some of the old guard will get a real test from these two for sure.

Aussie Qualifying - Finally we know who's fast

So what did we learn from today. Well the biggest story arguably is Ferrari. The rumours were all true. Terrible car by the looks. The desperation to deliver a car has gone too far and it looks undriveable. Listening to the commentary there was mentioned watching them come through the pack. You would doubt that has a chance of happening as that's the pace they've got. Unless its race pace is incredible they will be pushing for a few points. The only thing that will drag the car further up the fuel is the determination of Alonso.

HRT have no pace. That's enough on them. They are becoming a laughing stock. You don't get a feeling of any determination to get performance just that they are happy to turn up. Shoul they even be there?

Good to see the Lotus has pace, whether they can mix it up in the race is another question but let's hope they keep it up and not fade away like last year.

I've not mentioned Red Bull. They haven't quite got the pace but I'm sure that will change. No doubt their aero package is up there but this circuit doesn't reflect that strength.

Aside from I think Caterham need a mention, the impression was they'd made a step towards the midfield but that doesn't look like its happened. They still seem to be off that pace and I was hoping for better.

Cannot wait for tomorrow morning. Let's hope for some action. I can see a Hamilton win but I can't help but think the Mercedes will have something to say about it.

Wait Is Over

Well for me it's been a long week after Picking up a pretty major knee injury. Having spent the week off work not able to move around its felt like a long week building up to the weekend. Hopefully plenty of memorable and wonderful moments.

Could we see some surprises on Sunday in Melbourne? Doubtful, from testing the only team out of the ordinary with some pace looks like lotus, I'm sure most will be expecting a a Red Bull win and would be no surprises. I just hope for some good racing, with Massa and Hamilton getting back on form.

In other Motorsport we have the next round of the IRC. Mikkelsen setting the pace at the shakedown and with his form in Mexico last week in WRC I would be expecting him to carry that into the weekend. He's going to be sharp and no doubt raring to go. I doubt he'll have an easy ride though and the regulars will all be challenging.

Now I'll get back to my hospital bed for another few hours before taking up permanent spot on the sofa ready for some F1, IRC and 6 Nations action. I should be in Twickenham this weekend but I'll settle for the sofa and what hopefully turns into a mega weekend. With a strong cocktail of painkillers to go with it.

Enjoy!

This is an amazing piece of work and really gives you the goosebumps when you're watching it. Some of these quotes from people who've dedicated their lives to motorsport in some form or another.

This is a truly amazing piece of work put together and really captures the imagination.