test2wa

Steve Slater

It says a lot for the way in which Kimi Raikkonen is revered by fans, that the return of the feisty Finn completely swamped any news from the 2011 finale in Brazil. He has certainly added an unprecedented buzz to the end of the season.

It is not just 2007 world champion's driving performance that marks him out. It is the way that Kimi goes racing that makes him special.

Unlike the chatty reigning champion Vettel, who is a PR man's dream, Kimi is equally monosyllabalic in both his native Finnish and English. However fans around the world love him anyway, because has never - and will never - fit in any mould.

This is the man who once used the pseudonym "James Hunt" when he took part in a snowmobile race, an activity specifically banned by his Ferrari contract and the morning after the 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix, the newly crowned Formula One world champion was apparently found fast asleep on a sofa in his hotel lobby, clutching a large inflatable dolphin. You can't imagine Vettel doing that, can you?

Rumours of Kimi's return to Formula One began in August when Raikkonen, who has spent the last two years contesting the World Rally Championship in a Red Bull-backed Citroen, was spotted visiting the Williams Grand Prix team. An announcement was expected around the time of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. However a silence indicated that all was not well.

It seems that Kimi was less interested in the financial transactions with Williams than in being offered a shareholding in the team. Clearly that did not appeal to fiercely independent team owners Sir Frank Williams and Patrick Head.

It had been rumoured that Kimi had spoken to Renault team principal Eric Bouillier back in 2010, so its not too surprising therefore that Raikkonen was promptly back in touch again. The 32 year-old Finn's return will no doubt be underwritten by Malaysian investment from Proton, owners of Lotus Cars, for who it will be an enormous boost have a world champion as an ambassador.

It will be a boost to the Lotus Renault GP Team too. It clearly needs a leader to replace the still-injured Robert Kubica (who I think is more likely to test with Ferrari some time in 2012) and it seems that Russian driver Vitaly Petrov has not lived up to the team's expectations.

Petrov and Force India's Adrian Sutil are the two drivers most likely to be on the move in the ‘musical chairs' among the mid-order teams. Each of the teams ahead of them in the Constructors Championship standings; Red Bull, McLaren, Ferrari and Mercedes, will keep the same driver line-ups for the 2012 season, while Force India is expected to confirm 2011 test driver Nico Hulkenberg alongside Paul di Resta.

If as most expect, either Bruno Senna or French GP2 Champion Romain Grosjean are selected to partner Raikkonen at Lotus Renault, the Williams team will have an added choice as they ponder their options.

Until Raikkonen's arrival, it was almost a forgone conclusion that Adrian Sutil would join Pastor Maldonado at Williams, replacing veteran Rubens Barrichello. If Petrov is on the market, that decision might be deferred.

Sauber and Marussia have already confirmed their driver line-ups, leaving India's two Grand Prix drivers fighting for an ever-shrinking number of seats. Frankly, I can't see either Narain Karthikeyan nor Karun Chandhok being keen to rejoin HRT, leaving Caterham (formerly Team Lotus), who are I believe still debating whether to draft in new talent to replace Jarno Trulli.

Chandhok, one would expect, should be in pole position having been the team's third driver. Then again Karthikeyan has the more effective management team, which raised a big budget from Tata and Hero Honda to allow Narain to start his home GP. Can either driver prevail? Watch this space!

Three drivers, Rubens Barrichello, Bruno Senna and Felipe Massa, will be lauded as home heroes at this weekend's Brazilian Grand Prix. But at the same time, each is driving to keep alive their Formula One careers.

For Barrichello, there is a real risk that his record-setting 322nd Grand Prix start on Sunday may be his last. As rumours continue to surround Williams F1's driver plans for 2012, it increasingly looks as if Barrichello is surplus to requirements.

It seems Kimi Raikkonen's continuing interest in a Williams drive next year may hinge on whether he can acquire part-ownership of the team. It remains to be seen whether Frank Williams or Patrick Head, long-term and fiercely independent owners of the team, can live with that.

In the absence of a high-profile ex-Champion, cash-strapped Williams' next best option is for a driver to bring both talent and money to secure a place. That is why we will almost certainly see Pastor Maldonado in a Williams again next season. The Venezuelan former GP2 Champion has proved his pace on track and as importantly, he brought significant sponsorship from the country's oil industry.

In contrast Barrichello has made it clear that he doesn't expect to pay to drive for Williams. The 39 year-old has believes there are other teams who are prepared to pay for his undoubted and still undimmed talents. It would certainly be great to see Rubens become the first Grand Prix driver ever to start a twentieth successive Formula One season.

If neither Barrichello nor Raikkonen fit the bill at Williams next year, who else could be in line? A prime candidate may be Adrian Sutil, who looks set to be usurped at Sahara Force India by Mercedes-backed drivers Paul di Resta and Nico Hulkenberg. Sutil is likely too, to bring sponsorship from Medion, the German electronics company whose name is currently on the side of the Force India.

Another driver who might be looking at Williams is Vitaly Petrov, who last week was openly critical of Renault, hardly a sign of a long-term career plan with the team. Petrov has the potential to unlock some potentially lucrative Sponsorship deals in Russia, as it looks ahead to being a Grand Prix host in the Crimean city of Sochi in 2014.

Meanwhile at Renault (shortly to be renamed Lotus), Bruno Senna is hoping that a good result at Interlagos will allow him to stay with his current employers. Senna has confirmed that he is not seeking a contract with any other team, adding that he believes: "In Formula 1 it is all about performance and the team is happy with mine."

If Senna were to stay on at Renault, who will be his team-mate. Sadly it seems that Robert Kubica's lengthy recovery from injury might preclude him for another season. Mmy best guess is that Frenchman Romain Grosjean will return to F1 alongside Senna.

There are also rumours that if Kubica were to return to F1, it would be with Ferrari, which piles the pressure on Felipe Massa. The Sao Paolo home hero will start his 100th Grand Prix with Ferrari this weekend, but he hasn't been on the podium this season and his last win came in Brazil in 2008, when he came within a point of winning the world championship.

While Massa has a contract for 2012, his loss of form has clearly rung alarm bells at Ferrari. This week in an Italian radio interview, Ferrari President Luca Montezmolo said he will need to prove himself to remain with the team.

"We expect a great 2012 from him" said di Montezemolo. "Let's say he is driving for a new deal next season." The pressure is clearly on.

Sebastian Vettel's tyre failure that pitched him into retirement on the opening lap of last weekend's Abu Dhabi might just have given us, and more importantly team-mate Mark Webber, a hint as to how Vettel has blitzed him with his race starts. Has Red Bull been tinkering with Vettel's tyre pressures?

The general theory is that Vettel was merely unlucky to suffer his blow-out. There had been an incident-packed series of supporting races ahead of the Grand Prix and maybe a shard of carbon fibre from a car's bodywork had remained on the track at Turn One, to slit Vettel's tyre.

The rapid loss of tyre pressure caused Vettel to spin. The damage which caused his retirement was then done as Vettel tried to limp around the 5.55km lap to return to the pits.

The flailing rubber wrecked sections of the Red Bull's floor, exhaust and lower suspension. It was Vettel's first non-finish since his engine failure in Korea last year.

However there is another hypothesis. What if Red Bull had been deliberately running a low tyre pressure on Vettel's first set of rear tyres to give them more grip off the start line?

Did they go too far this time? Did an under-inflated tyre simply slip off the wheel rim at the first corner?

Most Formula One cars run remarkably similar tyre pressures, within 1-2 pounds, during the races and there usually wouldn't be much reason to diverge from the norm. However slightly under-inflated rear tyres would place a little more rubber on the asphalt, which would give a fraction more grip for the launch to the first corner.

We have seen Vettel make superb starts in almost every race this season, trouncing his team-mate Webber and frustrating McLaren and Ferrari rivals. Could a lower initial tyre pressure be the reason? It is a trick drag-racers use all the time.

Of course, the lower tyre pressure is a liability once the car starts cornering, but I wonder whether Red Bull had thought of that too.

The rules state that air or nitrogen must be used to inflate the tyres. Most Formula One teams use nitrogen as the gas doesn't change in pressure with temperature. It means that grip and ride-height doesn't change as the tyres heat up, or cool down, such when as drivers slow if a safety car takes to the track.

What if Vettel's first set of rear tyres were filled with regular air? As the rear tyres heat up with the forces of the start, the air would expand and the pressure would return to normal.

Except, and this is of course just a hypothesis, the already high ambient temperature in Abu Dhabi meant they didn't heat up as much as planned. The tyres rely on the air pressure to hold the base of the sidewall, known as the ‘bead', on the wheel and an under-pressure tyre could simply be pealed off the rim.

Compared with some recent circuits, the Abu Dhabi track has a fast first corner which puts a lot of side-load on the tyres. Could it have been a load too far for Vettel?

I guess we shall never know, but it's an interesting conspiracy theory!

Meanwhile Vettel's non-finish means that Michael Schumacher continue to hold his record for 13 wins in a season, which he scored with Ferrari in 2004. Even if Vettel were to win the final race of the season in Brazil, his total will now be 12.

The great thing about this year is that though Vettel has trounced his opposition, we have barely had a dull race. Back in 2004 many viewers watched the start then switched channels, only rejoining at the end to confirm that Schumacher had again won. This season's incident- and interest-packed races have meant you barely dare look away from the screens - good news for F1 fans everywhere!

Whatever the outcome of any return from retirement by 2007 World Champion Kimi Raikkonen, the past few weeks have been a PR triumph for the struggling Williams F1 team. The build-up to this weekend's Abu Dhabi Grand Prix has been dominated by speculation that 32 year-old Finn, who last raced for Ferrari in 2009, will make a return to Formula One with the British team.

The prospect of a world champion in the driving seat certainly hasn't hurt William's ability to negotiate a major sponsorship deal with the Gulf state of Qatar. Its national bank, QNB, is set become a major supporter of the Williams team in 2012.

Not bad going for a team which is in the doldrums. Williams, who won nine world championships in the 1980s and 1990s, haven't won a race since 2004.

In recent years the team have produced some of the most innovative cars on the starting grid. The have led the way with creative aerodynamics (remember the walrus nose?) and this year a fielded radical new gearbox, smaller and lighter to that on any other car. The trouble is that those innovations have not given them results.

This season has been the worst in the team's history and they hold a distant ninth place in the Constructors World Championship standings. Only Team Lotus, Marussia Virgin and HRT have been less successful this season.

It was back in August that Raikkonen was first spotted visiting the Williams factory and the rumours had been growing ever since. It is believed that the Qatari funding has been the key to a deal.

Some see Raikkonen's return as being little more than a stunt to boost the Williams team's flagging image. Critics have pointed to Kimi's lack of motivation in his final season at Ferrari and wonder whether he will make sufficient effort if he doesn't achieve expected results quickly.

I personally think that Raikkonen's ability to develop a car is seriously under-rated. Some McLaren engineers will tell you that while Kimi may be monosyllabic while talking to the press, his engineering feedback is sharp, incisive and accurate. He could be just what Williams need.

Maybe we will see an intriguing ‘battle of the past champs' next season. It will be fascinating to see how any such comeback compares with that of his old rival Michael Schumacher and which can drive their respective team to greater things.

There are also some interesting rumours still surrounding Felipe Massa's future at Ferrari. The Brazilian, who trails team-mate Alonso by over 100 championship points, has a contract with the Scuderia for another year, but then again so did Raikkonen and he was paid to sit-out the 2010 season.

Although recent rumours that Nico Rosberg may jump ship to Ferrari from Mercedes have been quashed by the German signing a contract extension this week, there is little doubt that the last two races of this season and the first races of next will be pivotal to Massa's Ferrari future.

Rosberg's confirmation at Mercedes GP Petronas to the end of 2013 may also prompt a decision on Force India's driving line-up. I suspect that Vijay Mallya was holding back on his confirmation of di Resta and Hulkenberg for 2012 in case Mercedes decided to take up their option on di Resta.

Meanwhile let's not forget that there are still two races left of the 2011 season and our new double world champion is continuing to challenge the record books. Sebastian Vettel comes to Abu Dhabi with a perfect record of two victories in both the 2009 and 2010 twilight races.

Vettel has so far won eleven of the 17 races this season. If he were to win both the final rounds, he would equal Michael Schumacher's record for the most wins in a season, 13 wins with Ferrari in 2004.

Is that Vettel's new challenge? You can bet it is!

In terms of reputation, there is no doubt that the inaugural Airtel Grand Prix of India got Formula One in the country off to a flying start. Now Indian motor sport has both the opportunity and the challenge of building on that success.

Official TV viewing figures take some time to collate and are often hard to get. However I am pretty sure, as a personal opinion that viewing figures will break all records. I have even heard rumours of a global live TV audience of more than 130 million and in India itself, there are probably many millions of people who saw, heard or read about this exciting new sport for the first time, that maybe would like a little taste of the action.

At this point of course, we have to manage expectation. Many European countries which have a history of motor racing stretching back decades, don't have a single driver on the starting grid.

Germany leads the way, thanks to the Schumacher effect which spawned interest a decade ago, with five drivers; Vettel, Schumacher, Rosberg, Sutil and Glock. Then equal on three are the UK with Button, Hamilton, Di Resta and Brazil; Barrichello, Massa and Senna.

Italy, for many the heart of motor racing has just two drivers; Trulli and Liuzzi, both in the twilight of their careers. Meanwhile France, the country where the words ‘Grand Prix' were born, has not had a driver on the Formula One starting grid since Romain Grosjean's chequered performance for Renault in 2009.

So can India build on its Grand Prix success and add to its line-up of Karthikeyan and Chandhok? The contrasting success of the two drivers in achieving the race start in India perhaps tells its own story.

Narain Karthikeyan has had for many years a well-established management team, and from the moment that the Indian GP was mooted, quietly and diligently worked behind the scenes for raise money from Indian corporates to secure his seat at HRT this season. He was able to attract first Tata to fund his early season efforts, then Hero Honda to raise the funds to get him onto the starting grid.

At 34 years-old, Karthikeyan must know his future as a Formula One driver is limited. Even if he doesn't start a Grand Prix ever again, he will be recorded in history as in 2005, the first Indian driver to become a Formula One driver and as the first Indian to race in a home Grand Prix. That is something to be very proud of.

While Karun Chandhok experienced the frustration of not being granted a race start with Team Lotus last weekend, I think that in the short-term he clearly represents the future of the sport in India.

Frankly I am mystified why Tony Fernandes (and more likely Mike Gascoigne) felt that Chandhok wasn't a better bet than the lacklustre Jarno Trulli, who while personable and experienced, simply seems to be ‘going through the motions' each race weekend. Perhaps Chandhok's quiet persistence will be better rewarded (maybe with another team?) next season.

Ironically it is Chandhok's father, Vicky, who is at the forefront of finding his son's eventual successor. As President of Federation of Motor Sports Clubs of India, he has pledged to nurture new talent such as the young racers discovered by Force India's ‘One From a Billion' competition.

"The winners of One From a Billion hunt are young kart drivers who are being sent to Silverstone and there are more in the pipeline." said Chandhok. "It is too much to expect that now that Formula One is here, 1000 professional drivers will be up and running tomorrow. Motorsport is an expensive sport, but now there is the opportunity for the motorsport team managements across the country to raise sponsorship deals with companies that can now see the sport's potential."

There is a buzz leading into this weekend's Indian Grand Prix which I cannot remember any previous maiden Grand Prix generating. Not since the first floodlit Singapore Grand Prix have we seen such worldwide interest, but it runs deeper than that. There is an air of intense expectation.

Without doubt, the eyes of the world will be focussed on India. Motor sport desperately need a ‘good news' story after the sickening fatal accidents that have dogged the last two weekends. In addition, India is keen to prove that it can host a world-class event with equal brio and style to any other location in the world.

The first impressions are good. The track is finished and ready for racing and it looks as if it will become a driver's favourite. Architect Hermann Tilke, often blamed for bland, look-alike tracks seems this time to have got it right.

There are fast demanding corners aplenty and flowing, rolling, switchback changes of elevation. The final downhill sequence of corners is almost like Eau Rouge in reverse. It should give us a great race.

Of course Indian home expectations are running high. Sahara Force India (I have received a missive from their PR man that I must remember their new name) are of course at the forefront of attention. However I wonder whether there might be disillusionment if they don't immediately blow Red Bull, McLaren or Ferrari into the New Delhi weeds.

I hope that fans will manage their expectations. Sahara Force India (I remembered again) is a good team, but even the most hardened optimist cannot expect Paul di Resta or Adrian Sutil to do much better than a place outside the top half dozen.

Sahara Force India's (yes!) target this weekend will be to draw clear of Sauber and Toro Rosso in the Constructors Championship where just 12 points cover from sixth to eighth place. As most agree that the difference in prize fund in coming out on top of that battle maybe as much as 10 million dollars, getting both cars home in the points will be more important than any heroics.
India's two home-grown drivers meanwhile have demonstrated that money talks when in comes to securing a drive this weekend. With a gridlock of drivers queuing for any available seat, it has become a bidding war for a place on the starting grid.

While Narain Karthikeyan will be in the cockpit of his HRT on Sunday, it seems Karun Chandhok will be putting a brave face on things trackside. Chandhok's only outing will be as test driver for Team Lotus in the first practice session on Friday.

I fear that this has less to do with the relative pace of either driver than the amount of sponsor's cash they were able to bring to the table, and we are talking millions of dollars. Chandhok simply hasn't been able to raise sufficient funds to secure a seat this season.

Last year it should be remembered that Chandhok was in precisely the same HRT seat now occupied by Karthikeyan. Then at the British Grand Prix, Sakon Yamamoto arrived with a suitcase full of Yen and Karun was sidelined.

At this year's British Grand Prix, the pattern was repeated. The cash-strapped HRT team got a sniff of money in Red Bull's driver development budget to support protégé Daniel Ricciardo. Karthikeyan was dropped despite having brought what is rumoured to have been twelve million dollars of Tata sponsorship at the start of the year.

Karthikeyan though fought back, securing added budget from motorcycle maker Hero Honda to fund his return to the team. It is all credit to Narain's business acumen and resilience that he has fought his way back onto the starting grid - and perhaps it is appropriate that the man who in 2005 became India's first Formula One driver, should be the first to uphold his nation's honours in his Grand Prix.

Motor racing often brings bitter-sweet moments, but few are as dramatic or tragic as last weekend.

The Korean Grand Prix brought Red Bull Racing their second consecutive Constructor's Championship, with Sebastian Vettel again dominating, chased down by the McLarens of Hamilton and Button. Mark Webber beat Button to third and could so easily have made it a Red Bull one-two, had his team not made a tactical error in pitting him at the same time as Hamilton.

The shift in time zones then meant that it was late night in Asia when another major race started. The season finale of the Izod Indy Car series in Las Vegas USA, was billed as "The Big One", plenty therefore stayed up to watch the action.

The promoters had put up a multi-million dollar prize fund which attracted a record 34 cars to the starting grid of the 2.4 km banked oval race track. In hindsight, it proved a fatally flawed plan.

For those that have never seen Indy Car racing at the trackside, it is hard for TV pictures to give a sense of the raw speed. Pushed onto the track by the centrifugal force of the banking, the cars complete each lap at 360km/h, faster than Formula One cars reach on the longest straights.

While most Formula One overtaking moves are made under braking from high-speed straights into slower corners, in Indy Car overtaking is almost continuous. Racing flat-out in top gear, the drivers use the slipstream of the cars around then to gain an advantage.

It means racing in very close proximity. In Las Vegas, the majority of the field were racing in a pack three-abreast just centimetres apart. There are no run-off areas either. A banked oval track is surrounded by a deformable barrier, a concrete wall and a debris fence, designed more to protect the spectators outside the track, rather than the drivers on it.

Just a dozen laps into this gladiatorial race, two cars made contact and spun at the head of the field. The result was carnage, a nineteen car pile-up of unimaginable violence. One car, that of British driver Dan Wheldon, was flung high into the air before smashing upside down onto the track.

A couple of hours later, the majority of drivers had walked out of the track's medical centre after treatment for only minor injuries, but sadly not Dan. The announcement that he had succumbed to his injuries brought IndyCar's showcase race to a grief-stricken end.

Wheldon could so easily have been racing in Formula One rather than IndyCar. In the late 1990s when he graduated from karting with Jenson Button and Anthony Davidson, the three "Rye House Boys" had pretty much won every championship.

While Button and Davidson graduated to Formula One, Wheldon instead crossed the Atlantic to further his racing career. In 2005, he became a household name across the USA after winning America's biggest race, the Indianapolis 500.

In 2006, he was offered and declined, a chance to drive in Formula One as third driver with BMW Sauber. Had he done so, it might have been Wheldon rather than Sebastian Vettel, who made his F1 race debut in the 2007 U.S. Grand Prix at Indianapolis.

Wheldon went on to win the Indy 500 again this year in one of the most dramatic finishes ever. He took the lead on the last corner of the last lap of the 500 mile race.

Some have called Wheldon's death the "Senna Moment" for Indy Car. The death of the Brazilian three-times world champion at the San Marino Grand Prix in 1994 catalysed Formula One safety.

As we look forward to the Indian Grand Prix on the Buddh International Circuit, its wide run-off areas, gravel traps and deformable barriers, as well as the safety structures of the cars themselves, are testament to Formula One's subsequent commitment. One hopes America will learn its lesson too.

There can't be a greater contrast than between the fast, flowing curves of Suzuka and the tight, twisting and unforgiving confines of the Singapore street circuit. And Sebastian Vettel still has unfinished business.

He may have won in Singapore but the German wasn't able to clinch the 2011 championship. He needed a 125-point advantage to win the title, but Jenson Button's second place means that Vettel takes a 124-point championship lead to Japan.

That Vettel will claim that final championship point is almost a foregone conclusion. However as Formula One has so often proved, making predictions like than can be dangerous!

Meanwhile as the teams head to Japan and Korea, two drivers remain under the spotlight, long after the Singapore floodlights were turned off. Not for the first time this season, Lewis Hamilton's judgement is under question, this time after an early race collision with Ferrari's Felipe Massa and subsequent post-race paddock spat.

Hamilton was lining up in the media area to be interviewed by Star Sports' presenter Sanjeev Palar when the latter incident happened. Massa was still clearly incensed by the collision which punctured his rear tyre and forced a pitstop which dropped him down the order.

Hamilton literally gave Massa ‘the cold shoulder', turning his back on the Brazilian. When Massa put an arm on Hamilton's shoulder, the British driver barked "don't touch me" and stormed off. Poor Sanjeev never did get his interview.

There was further spice added to the controversy last weekend. The Singapore GP video on the official F1 website included a piece of pit-to-car radio from Massa's race engineer Rob Smedley, telling the Brazilian to "Destroy his (Hamilton's) race as much as we can. Come on, boy!"

Immediately conspiracy theorists jumped on the conversation, suggesting Massa was being told to deliberately try to cause an accident. What rot!

Anyone who knows anything about F1, knows that Rob Smedley is constantly on the radio to Massa; cajoling, encouraging and even berating the Brazilian to go faster. All that Rob was doing was telling Massa to stay ahead and spoil Hamilton's strategy. A conspiracy? Never.

Massa was right to be annoyed, but the difference between his on-track performance and that of Hamilton after the incident tells the true story of the Brazilian's 2011 season. After the on-track clash, Hamilton stopped to fit a new nose to his McLaren and then was given a fully-deserved drive-through penalty. He then fought his way back through the field to finish a feisty fifth. Massa's driving was lacklustre once he had hit adversity and he struggled home ninth.

Sadly, Felipe is simply not the gutsy driver he once was. Some blame the head injury he received in practice for the 2009 Hungarian Grand Prix. I think it more likely that Fernando Alonso's domination of the Ferrari team has destroyed Massa's self confidence.

Alonso has won six times for Ferrari over the past two seasons. Massa's last win came back in 2008, when he lost out to Hamilton in that dramatic championship decider in Brazil.

Massa has a contract at Ferrari to the end of 2012. However a recent Ferrari test drive for Sauber rookie Sergio Perez has only added to the speculation whether he will last so long.

Meanwhile Hamilton's catalogue of crashes has wrecked his 2011 championship. It could even force him to play second fiddle to team mate Jenson Button in the future.

While Button is second to Vettel in the standings, Hamilton is fifth, seventeen points behind his team mate. This week Button announced a multi-year contract to remain at McLaren with the words "I've never felt more at home at a team than I do at Vodafone McLaren Mercedes."

Meanwhile Hamilton responded with: "It's great news that Jenson has chosen to stay with Vodafone McLaren Mercedes." But you can almost hear that being said through gritted teeth!

Jenson Button's appearance on the Singapore Grand Prix podium meant that Vettel wasn't able to clinch the 2011 championship last weekend. The British driver's second place meant that Vettel now has a 124-point championship lead. He needed a 125-point advantage to clinch the title.

So instead of partying in high-rise splendour in Singapore (Red Bull Racing had booked the 70th floor Equinox restaurant for a possible celebration last Sunday), Vettel and his team will probably now settle for something more down to earth in Japan.

The Log Cabin karaoke bar at Suzuka would be the perfect location for the 2011 champion's victory party, appealing both to Vettel's senses of heritage and humour. In the days when Suzuka was the last race on the Grand Prix calendar, it was the traditional location for wild end-of-season parties.

Champions who have roistered their way into the night include Damon Hill, Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna, Mika Hakkinen and on several occasions, Michael Schumacher. The Log Cabin actually consists of several huts, each of which contains a powerful karaoke system and a high-octane mix of Japanese beer and rice wine as F1 luminaries sing themselves hoarse.

First though, Sebastian Vettel has to score that final championship point. Based on his performance at the Singapore Grand Prix, it is hard to bet against the result coming his way in Suzuka. It wasn't just that he won the Formula One night race, it was the way he did it.

Vettel stamped his authority on the race right from qualifying, even though Vettel was at pains to admit that the lap that put him on pole position wasn't perfect. In the first two of the three timed segments of the Marina Bay Street Circuit , he lost time to rivals.

The track is broken into three zones by timing beams and in the first segment from the start line to Turn 5, the bottom of Raffles Boulevard, Vettel lost more than a quarter of a second to the McLaren of Jenson Button, then In the second segment of the lap, leading to the Esplanade Bridge, Vettel was outpaced by a similar margin, this time by Red Bull team mate Mark Webber.

However in the process his rivals had probably taken the best from their tyres and on the tight, twisting section past the Bay Grandstand and around the Singapore Flyer, Vettel clawed back the losses to take his 11th pole position of the season. It left the competition reeling and once the race began, the German was never headed.

The line-up for last Sunday's race looked a little bit like the animals filing into Noah's Ark; in team order, two-by-two. Following Vettel and Webber, were the two McLarens of Button and Lewis Hamilton.

Next came the two Ferraris, with Fernando Alonso admitting that he was driving at the full potential of the car he wrestled into 5th place on the grid and third in the race.

Team-mate Massa's race was to be ruined by a collision with Hamilton. However while Hamilton fought back from a fully deserved penalty to finish a feisty fifth, Massa once again looked lacklustre once he had hit adversity, increasingly his days at Ferrari look numbered.

Seventh and eighth on the grid, Nico Rosberg again qualified ahead of illustrious Mercedes GP team-mate Michael Schumacher, who later in the race blotted his copybook with a collision with the Sauber of Sergio Perez, then the barriers.

The perhaps unsung heroes of the race were Force India drivers Adrian Sutil and Paul di Resta who qualified 9th and 10th. di Resta finished 6th and Sutil 8th, moving them well ahead of Sauber in the battle for 6th place in the lucrative Constructors Championship. The team is looking increasingly strong as they head to their "home race" in New Delhi, which is just as well as in less than a month's time "India Expects"!

As all eyes turn to the floodlit streets of Singapore for the fourth running of Formula One's only night race, some interesting rumours from Europe have travelled the 16,000 kilometres or so to the Marina Bay street circuit paddock. One of the most interesting has been the reported sighting of 2007 World Champion Kimi Raikkonen at the Williams F1 team headquarters at Grove in Oxfordshire.

Was he just sight-seeing? Visiting old friends? Or could he have been discussing a comeback drive with the British team?

Kimi drove for Sauber, McLaren and Ferrari driver before heading, disillusioned and bored, away from Formula One to attack the special stages of the World Rally Championship with a Red Bull-backed Citroen.

Attack is most definitely the best word to use, as both the scenery and the car bodywork have regularly born the scars of ‘The Icemans' no-holds-barred approach, even if he hasn't seen the podium, or even the finish line too often.

Maybe Kimi is getting bored with having to pick bits of tree out of his overalls, because earlier in the summer he headed out to the United States to sample NASCAR oval racing. In typical Kimi style, he chose one of the most intimidating tracks, Charlotte Motor Speedway, at which to make his Nationwide Cup debut.

Kimi thundered around the banked oval track pretty impressively. A lap at an average of 292 km/h put his ‘Perky Jerky' (seriously) Toyota Camry half way up the 42 car starting grid, just a second off the pace of NASCAR front-runners Matt Kenseth, Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch.

Despite rubbing the concrete wall a couple of times Kimi finished his debut race 27th. However since that race in May he hasn't been back. Perhaps the Perky Jerky dried beef didn't agree with him.

For Williams F1, enduring the worst racing season in their 36-year history, it must have felt like quite a complement to have a former World Champion making a house call. Kimi might see a new challenge in both returning to Formula One and helping a team such as Williams regain their former glory.

Despite Kimi Raikkonen's mono-syllabic performances in press conferences, Kimi has always been highly regarded by his race engineers. The Finn has a rare ability to deliver quick concise and accurate information on exactly what the car is doing. And better still for the engineers, he then leaves them to work on the solutions and unlike many drivers, actually listens to their advice.

However the Finn might want to look at Michael Schumacher, whose return at Mercedes has certainly been dulled by having to struggle with an uncompetitive car. One asks how long might Kimi persevere if the team wasn't performing. I guess that Frank Williams and Patrick Head might be mulling over that thought too.

It seems that despite their lack of results this season, there is no shortage of driver interest in the team. Veteran Rubens Barrichello, who this weekend clocks up his 317th Grand Prix start in Singapore, is keen to stay with the team if they offer him a contract for 2012.

Team-mate Pastor Maldonado has brought both pace and a healthy sponsorship budget from the Venezuelan oil industry and, despite strenuous denials from his management team, Adrian Sutil was also reported to have been seen at the Grove factory. He too brings both pace and budget, as the conduit to current Force India sponsor Medion.

Force India currently has three drivers chasing the two race seats for 2012. Paul di Resta has close links with engine supplier Mercedes and super-fast test driver Nico Hulkenberg could well be poised to take over a race seat.

It would therefore be logical for Sutil to look at his options. Or maybe as his management team tell us, he was never there. Or might the Williams F1 base just be becoming one of Britain's top tourist attractions?

By Steve Slater

For the second race in succession, Sebastian Vettel confounded all the predictions that the high-speed ‘power' circuits of Spa and Monza would be Red Bull's weakest link. Now it has ceased to be a question of ‘whether', rather ‘when' will he become Formula One's youngest ever double world champion.

Frankly, Sebastian could quite comfortably skip racing in Singapore if he wanted to party instead. He now has a 112 point championship lead over his closest rival with a maximum of 150 points available for the rest of the season.

Even if the German were to score no more points this year, it would require either Alonso, Button or Webber to finish in the top two of every one of the remaining races. The current form indicates that is very unlikely to happen.

And anyway, the Singapore Grand Prix is unfinished business for Vettel. In each of the previous three races he has performed strongly, but never stood on that coveted top step of the Marina Bay podium.

In the inaugural 2008 event, Vettel hustled his Toro Rosso to a creditable fifth place. In 2009, the Red Bulls and their sister Toro Rosso cars all struggled with brake wear problems. Vettel was the sole survivor, easing his almost brakeless Red Bull home in fourth as Lewis Hamilton celebrated victory.

Last year as Ferrari and Fernado Alonso dominated at Marina Bay, another cool, measured performance brought Vettel home in second place. This season Vettel has won on the street circuits at Melbourne, Monaco and Valencia. Oh yes, that Singapore win beckons.

In Monza, Vettel also showed he could raise his game when required. His overtaking move on Fernando Alonso in the opening stages of the Italian Grand Prix, certainly answered a few critics who had suggested that Vettel could only win from the front.

The Singapore Grand Prix should be a high-pressure thriller. Even if he wins, Vettel's two closest contenders from Monza could still force the German to delay any championship celebrations.

If I were Vettel, I would order the champagne for Singapore, but keep it on ice. To clinch the title in Singapore, Vettel needs to win and for closest points rival Alonso to finish outside the top three. That might be a challenge.

Whatever the circumstances surrounding Alonso's first win at Singapore in 2008, he drove the race superbly and last year too, his victory for Ferrari was a top-drawer performance. Last weekend in Monza also proved that, not for the first time this season, Alonso is capable of grabbing a podium place even when his car is second-best.

Then there is Jenson Button. Unlike team-mate Hamilton who bitterly bemoaned his being trapped behind the wonderfully determined Michael Schumacher in the early stages of the Italian race, Button kept his cool, snatched an opportunity and found his way past.

For much of the Italian Grand Prix, we had five world champions in the top five places. It is worth noting that at the chequered flag, Button was leading Vettel's pursuit. His second place at Monza now puts him equal third with Mark Webber in the title chase. It proves to me that yet again, while Hamilton provides the fireworks in the McLaren team, Button provides quiet, self-assured class.

Therefore it is no surprise that Button is now Formula One's hottest property. McLaren chief executive Martin Whitmarsh told journalists at Monza that he has offered Jenson a £ 50 million contract to stay with McLaren to the end of his career.

To me, it makes good sense. As a driver, Button has provided a balance to the team to match the feisty Hamilton. As an ambassador too, Formula One has few equals and Button might play a future role in developing McLaren's new line of road-going supercars.

But first, I just wonder whether he might spoil Sebastian's championship celebrations in Singapore?

After the Spa classic two weeks ago, everyone seems to be fully revved up for this weekend's encounter. The possible exceptions though could be Red Bull designer Adrian Newey and some of the Pirelli tyre engineers.

Newey described the Belgian Grand Prix as "one of the scariest races of my life". Quite simply, Vettel and Webbers cars started the race with front tyres so badly blistered in just their few laps of qualifying that Newey was seriously concerned that they might blow-out in the opening stages of the race.

So worried were Red Bull that they banned their drivers from using the DRS, drag reducing rear wing during the race. The side effect of the drag reduction on the straight is that it reduced the downforce and load at the back of the car. That in turn would have put extra load on the already critical front tyres.

The reason for this is that Newey had maximised the level of ‘negative camber' on the Red Bull's front suspension, with the tops of the front wheels leaning inwards. It means that when the front tyres were loaded by cornering, the outside front tyre which does most of the work was effectively leaning into the corner like a motorcyclist.

It isn't unusual to do this on performance cars. It enhances cornering grip and steering feel. However Newey as ever, was pushing the limits. He deliberately exceeded the maximum of four degrees of camber recommended by Pirelli, taking a gamble that ultimately paid off with Vettel and Webber's 1-2 finish.

Surprisingly, when a car is running such an extreme suspension configuration, it is generating tyre wear not just when it is cornering, but equally when it is running down the straights. At speeds of well over 330km/h, which will be reached at Monza, the combination of friction and aerodynamic downforce rapidly wears the inside edge of the front tyre treads when negative camber is used, generating similar tyre blistering to that experienced by Red Bull at Spa.

So worried are Pirelli, that they have advised the teams not to exceed more than three degrees of camber for the Italian Grand Prix. As Red Bull discovered in Spa, if any top ten team in qualifying now exceeds that amount and suffers tyre problems, they cannot change the damaged tyre without losing their place on the starting grid.

So will this mean that Red Bull's challenge is blunted this weekend? I suspect not.

Monza is effectively four long straights, abbreviated by a smattering of chicanes and just three ‘proper' fast corners, the two Lesmo Curves and Parabolica which put cornering load on the tyres. Newey may therefore decide to play it safe with his suspension geometry and rely on his car's aerodynamic efficiency to keep up the speed.

But let's remember last year, when Fernando Alonso, Jenson Button and Felipe Massa, pushed Vettel off the podium. Monza's long straights favour horsepower and Ferrari and the Mercedes engine in the McLaren last year comprehensively outgunned the Red Bull's Renault.

This year too, KERS will perhaps make the biggest difference to lap times of any circuit on the calendar, as much as half a second a lap. Mercedes and Ferrari once again are the heavy-hitters. Red Bull is a deliberate lightweight having decided as part of its design culture to use a smaller, less powerful KERS unit to save weight.

Mercedes tell us that the best-case scenario for KERS is a slow corner followed by very long straights - exactly what Monza features plenty of. There are four times in the lap (out of Turns 2, 7, 10 and 11) where KERS will likely be deployed.

My prediction is that Ferrari and the fearsome Alonso could be well placed for a repeat of their 2010 victory. McLaren too will be strong, as will Petronas Mercedes and the Mercedes-powered Force India cars. So saying, we bet against Red Bull and Vettel in Belgium - and Adrian Newey proved us all wrong!

Last weekend's Belgian Grand Prix as so often, gave us one of the best races of the season. Whether it was Sebastian Vettel's cool drive to victory, the charges through the field by Mark Webber, Jenson Button and Michael Schumacher, or Lewis Hamilton again acting as crash test dummy, the race gave us non-stop action.

It seems that great tracks will inspire drivers to great things. Mark Webber's ninth lap overtaking manoeuvre on Fernando Alonso at Eau Rouge was one of the best overtaking manoeuvres of any Grand Prix. Ever.

Webber had to drive his Red Bull around the outside of the Spaniard's Ferrari at over 280km/h on the entrance to one of the most daunting corners in the world. That the Australian tried it was brave, that he succeeded was awesome and, most tellingly, both he and Alonso left themselves just racing room to avoid disaster.

Jenson Button also pulled off a great pass on Alonso in the closing stages of the race, to secure his place behind the two Red Bull drivers on the podium. Once again, the mark of Button's outbraking manoeuvre at Les Combes was the mutual respect shown by both drivers.

Alonso, whose Ferrari had lacked front-running pace all weekend, kept the door firmly closed on Button until the moment that further defence was impossible. Then with perfect precision he kept a tighter line to avoid collision. It meant he still claimed fourth place and twelve championship points to keep him in the title chase.

One gets a clear feeling that few would trust Lewis Hamilton in such a situation. In fact the same Les Combes corner saw Hamilton prove just how NOT to do it when he moved over prematurely on Kamui Kobayashi and flicked himself into the barriers.

It was a pity because Hamilton's pace could at very least have split the Red Bulls or even taken victory. His opportunist overtaking move on Felipe Massa earlier in the race was another classic.

However the only consistent thing about Lewis Hamilton this season has been his involvement in incidents and visits to the FIA stewards. In 12 races Hamilton has won twice, crashed twice and been invited in front of the stewards at least seven times. Adding to the silliness was his Saturday qualifying wheel-banging nonsense with Pastor Maldonado. If Formula One had a ‘naughty corner', both these little boys would be in it.

In contrast Vettel and Webber have yet to spoil the stewards' slumbers and crucially, have finished every race in the points. So saying, few realised at the start of the race, how close Red Bull Racing were to disaster.

It seems that in qualifying Adrian Newey had exceeded the four degrees of front suspension camber recommended by Pirelli, the amount the wheels lean inwards vertically. This gives the steering more ‘bite' as the camber helps counteract the cornering forces, but it also puts more stress on the inside edges of the tyre treads which become overloaded on long straights.

After the Red Bulls qualified the engineers discovered the insides of the treads were badly blistered. Pirelli told the team that tyre failures could be imminent but that they could not say when.

The team tried to get the tyres changed without penalty, but were told by the FIA that as they had run more camber than the recommended maximum the team had two choices. To start the race and risk failure, or change the suspension and tyres and start from the pitlane, effectively ruling out any chance of victory for Vettel and Webber.

Newey elected to raise the tyre pressures on the starting grid, then bring his drivers in for a tyre stop as soon as he was able. Their 1-2 records the Red Bull gamble paid off, but a visibly emotional Newey said afterwards it was the scariest race he had ever sat through.

By Steve Slater

Formula One is back, at the magnificent Spa Francorchamps circuit in Belgium. The whole track is redolent of another era in motor racing as it switchbacks through the Ardennes mountains.

The track is named after the two small towns of Spa and Francorchamps and the roads between the towns used to form the track itself. Even today a major part of the track is the last Grand Prix circuit in the world where cars race on closed country roads.

For much of the year, the section between Stavelot corner and the pit straight is the public highway between the villages of Stavelot and Francorchamps, while the section including the spectacular Eau Rouge corner forms the highway to the town of Malmédy.

It is perhaps that integration with the countryside that makes Spa sure a pure circuit. The corners here aren't shaped by computer or an architect. These corners evolved, literally over centuries.

Eau Rouge for example wouldn't exist but for the fact a hundred or more years ago the river there formed the border between Belgium and Germany. The road's distinctive kink and climb back up the hill took it past the customs post at the bottom of the valley.

Ancient history or not, this is a track that every driver savours. Sebastian Vettel's eyes light up just at the prospect of the challenge:

"The Spa circuit has everything that a driver dreams of - unbelievably fast corners and slow chicanes, and it can be full of surprises due to the weather. Eau Rouge and Blanchimont are real highlights - in dry conditions they can be driven without any problems but in the wet it's a different story and you have to have dig deep.

"My favourite part of the track is the double-left Pouhon; you put the car into sixth, take your foot off the accelerator for a moment and then it's up to 280kph in the corner. The last chicane is difficult, the car pulls you all over the place; you need all your concentration to keep it on the track."

Both Vettel and team mate Webber are realistic about their chances though. If the Red Bull has a weakness it is the output of its Renault engine and Spa is a horsepower circuit. Over 80% of the lap distance is spent at full throttle, including a solid 23.5 seconds from the La Source hairpin, through Eau Rouge to Les Combes.

The two Red Bull drivers know too, that here they cannot depend on their qualifying performance. Last year Webber grabbed pole but was comprehensively outgunned by the Mercedes power in Lewis Hamilton's McLaren in the race.

The previous year was of course when Force India rocked everyone by grabbing pole position, but Giancarlo Fisichella was powerless to stop Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari blasting off into the distance. In fact the Belgian Grand Prix has been won from pole position just twice in the last ten years, in 2002 and 2007. On both occasions the winning car was a Ferrari.

The 2002 Ferrari victory was Michael Schumacher's fifth and last win (so far) at the track. This Saturday evening Michael is hosting a party in the Spa paddock to celebrate the 20th anniversary since his 1991 Formula One debut, when he was hired by the Jordan team and my co-commentator Gary Anderson.

Right from the outset Gary says, he realised he had a special talent on his hands. Even now, 20 years on, both Gary and I agree Schumacher is still delivering as much as pretty well any other driver on the starting grid.

Could Schumacher celebrate his 20th anniversary in style? Probably not with a win, but I think Spa will play more to the Petronas Mercedes strengths than its weaknesses. Schumacher could easily find his way back onto the podium this weekend and that would totally scotch the rumours of any impending retirement.

Getting a place on the Formula One starting grid has never been easy, but there probably hasn't ever been a tougher time for young drivers to find a seat. The current ban on in-season testing is certainly one of the main reasons for the gridlock.

Drivers such as Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg combined racing (and winning their respective titles) in the GP2 series with hundreds of laps of in-season testing with the McLaren and Williams Formula One teams. In 2006 and 2007 Robert Kubica and Sebastian Vettel both made mid-season debuts for the BMW Sauber team after stepping up from test to race driver.

Fernando Alonso, after making his F1 debut with Minardi in 2001 became Renault's test driver in 2002. In 2003 he replaced Jenson Button as Jarno Trulli's team-mate and in Hungary, won his first Grand Prix.

These days, the test driver's role, is if they are lucky, confined to an occasional Friday morning practice outing, as one of the team's race drivers sits thinly disguising their frustration, in the pit garage. The incumbent race driver probably rightly feels that he needs the extra practice and that he can better deliver feedback to the team.

Some ‘third' drivers, as far as I remember, haven't even got to drive a race car on a race weekend at all, so it's not surprising we rarely hear of them. Gary Paffett (who?) is McLaren's third driver, yet almost all his recent seat time has been in their simulator back in Woking.

Meanwhile, when Robert Kubica was sidelined at the start of the season, Renault deemed their lengthy line-up of test drivers insufficiently experienced to replace him. They left reserve drivers Bruno Senna, Romain Grosjean, Jan Charouz, Ho-Pin Tung and Faruz Fauzy on the sidelines, bringing in the Nick Heidfeld instead.

Even when a young driver gets into a race seat, there is still a tough challenge to keep it. While Team Lotus gave Karun Chandhok a chance to race in the German GP, it is clear that neither of the current incumbents, Trulli or Kovalainen are keen to give up their places in the long-term just yet.

Of course it does work to a team's advantage. The constant pressure means that every driver has to perform, both on the track and in many cases bringing additional funding to the team.

Force India is one of the teams where "three into two" is working in their favour. In addition to Adrian Sutil and Paul di Resta, they also field as their number three, Nico Hulkenberg, who claimed a pole position for Williams last season.

Force India is now in the enviable position of being able to pick two drivers from the trio for next year. Sutil brings money from German telecoms sponsor Medion and Mercedes Benz-backed di Resta no doubt helps cover the cost of Mercedes engines, while all three have proven talent. It is going to be an intriguing battle over the coming months to see which two of the three land the seats for the 2012 season.

Sebastian Vettel is proof the Red Bull driver development programme clearly works, but it also piles on the pressure. Toro Rosso principal Franz Tost says he and Red Bull driver development director Helmut Marko give each driver in Toro Rosso three years to prove themselves, or make way for younger talent.

That could be bad news for Sebastian Buemi, who made his F1 debut at the start of 2009, although Jaime Alguersuari made his debut just a few months later. Both drivers are now under the microscope as one is almost certain to make way for Red Bull's latest protégé, Daniel Ricciardo.

Tost expects the Australian rookie to start beating HRT team-mate Liuzzi after not more than three or four races. If he can handle the pressure, who can bet against him joining Toro Rosso in 2012 and maybe replacing Webber at Red Bull in 2013?

In the past months, fans in the UK have been graced with two fantastic festivals of historic motor racing. At Goodwood and a couple of weeks after the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, enthusiasts savoured the spectacle of old Grand Prix cars being driven as hard as they probably were in their heyday.

However it is not just the sight of these cars that thrills. It is the sound - and here lies a lesson that current Formula One rule makers should heed.

These old cars make music. First there is the basso profundo of the 1950s. Cars such as the six-cylinder Maserati 250F and Lago Talbot are complemented by the bellow of huge Ferrari V12s.

A decade later, with the introduction of the Ford Cosworth DFV, Formula One began to sing to a different beat. The green and yellow Lotuses of Jim Clark and Graham Hill began the three-litre V8 engines' winning streak and their distinctive howl was matched by shrieking V12s and the deeper tone of ‘boxer' flat-12 engines, in a period of unprecedented variety.

Then at the end of the 1970s Renault introduced a strange, belching, burbling 1.5-litre, turbocharged V6 engine. It initially overheated so often that it was nicknamed ‘the teapot', but eventually it developed unprecedented horsepower. Through the 1980s Renault, Honda and BMW embarked on a turbocharged ‘engine war', creating units of unbelievable ferocity.

The most powerful engines of the era developed as much as 1,400 horsepower, twice that of a current Formula One car. By the end of the eighties, the FIA intervened, banning the turbo engines on grounds of safety. However within the new formula for unboosted 3.5 litre engines, the engineers developed some of the best sounding engines ever heard in Formula One.

Teams opted for a variety of cylinder configurations, with the customary V8 and V12 engines being joined by a new layout, the V10. Developed to offer the compactness of the V8 yet the power of the V12, the odd number of cylinders on each side of the crankshaft gave the V10 a distinct off-beat warble at low revs, followed by a rising tide of savage, howling horsepower.

In 2006, the V10 era came to an end when the FIA implemented a standard category of 2.4-litre V8 engines for all. It limited rising speeds and development costs, and the current crop of Formula One cars still sound good. However the next round of rule changes threatens to remove that aural backdrop.

The latest FIA technical regulations for 2014 will introduce muted, but eco-friendly turbo-charged 1.6 litre V6s. The FIA will tell you it is a necessary sacrifice, part of the continuing effort to "green" the sport, but do we really need that?

The biggest shock (forgive the pun) is that the cars must move using only electrical power in the pit lane. Engine ignition and fuel systems will be shut off until the car leaves the pits, while a bigger KERS system will provide 120kW to power the car during the pit stop.

It will be weird thing to see, but not hear a thing. The cars will drift silently into the pits, then back out to the pit exit when the engine fires up again.

It poses some odd scenarios for the future. Maybe Jenson Button's McLaren will need a bicycle bell on the front to warn mechanics in case, as in Shanghai this year, he drives silently into the wrong pit garage. Or will we see a stack of drivers fuming at the end of the pitlane as they desperately try to restart hot recalcitrant engines?

One thing is for sure. From 2014, it could be Formula One, but not as we know it. Meanwhile in a couple of week's time, the hills around Spa in Belgium will again be alive with the sound of F1 music. Catch it while you can!

You might remember that last year F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone made a wry comment that all we need to do to get good racing is to artificially wet the race tracks. It was, I am still convinced Bernie having fun, seeing which journalists were daft enough to seriously report something so outrageous.

However after the last three races, I am starting to think that Bernie had a point. The British, German and Hungarian Grand Prix were all held in conditions that ranged from damp to torrential, and the three races gave us some of the best action of an already spectacular season.

There are three principal reasons why we see even better racing when we get rain-soaked, but it has to be said not flooded, tracks. The first is that the lower speeds and raised ride heights to cope with the conditions reduce a lot of the aerodynamic grip created by the cars. Cornering speeds are lower, there are often more different ‘lines' through a corner and the braking zones are longer, all creating added overtaking chances for those brave enough to try.

In addition, a wet track is rarely the same for two or three successive laps. If its getting drier, areas with more grip appear but as the cars go quicker, tyre wear becomes a feature too. It all adds to the number of variables in the race, which in turn give the drivers a chance to out think one another on strategy.

Finally, a wet track allows pure driving skill rather than engineering prowess to make the difference. The opening laps of last weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix offered a visual feast, as both Vettel and Hamilton battled at the head of the field, not merely for the lead positions, but simply to keep their cars on the track.

The sight of the Red Bull and McLaren, leaving rooster-tails of spray as they twitched and slid each time the drivers unleashed the horsepower was truly awesome. It is conditions such as those that one realises that Formula One drivers are not as you or I, their driving abilities are at an entirely different level.

We may be able to speculate on the theories of fast driving, but it takes some pretty special people to put it into practice, in a sliding car with 800 horsepower at 200 km/h. It is races like the Hungarian Grand Prix that show what makes a Formula One driver so special.

Lewis Hamilton provided the initial fireworks in Hungary by grabbing the lead from Vettel, but it was most definitely a ‘race of two halves' for the British driver. Poor radio communications probably contributed to the glitch in Hamilton's tyre strategy which lost him his lead, but simple driver errors saw Hamilton first spin then receive a drive through penalty, ruining any chance of fighting back.

Hamilton was quick to apologise after the race to Paul di Resta for forcing him onto the grass as he recovered from the spin. Hamilton simply hadn't seen the Force India car as he ‘doughnutted' the McLaren back into the right direction, right across the Force India's nose.

Meanwhile, as Jenson Button added to his ‘rain master' credentials in Hungary by scoring both McLaren's second back-to-back win and his second victory of the season, Force India rather than Ferrari, Red Bull or Petronas Mercedes, have been the team making the best mid-season progress.

Adrian Sutil's smooth drive to eight place in Germany was repeated by a similar result for di Resta in Hungary. The team have high hopes too, for further improvement on the low-downforce tracks coming up at Spa and Monza

The VJM04's aerodynamic package gives it strong straight-line speed, aided by a particularly effective DRS wing package and the power of the Mercedes engines. Sutil and di Resta might just be the drivers to watch when the teams return to the track after the mid-season break.

You've got to give Mark Webber his due. Even though he again failed to turn pole position into a Red Bull victory in Germany, even in third place he managed to steal the limelight from race winner Lewis Hamilton when he stopped to give second place man Fernando Alonso a lift back to the pits on the sidepod of his car.

The gesture triggered memories of a similar moment twenty years ago. In July 1991, Nigel Mansell, having won his home British Grand Prix at Silverstone, stopped his Williams in order to give his McLaren rival Ayrton Senna a lift.

Like Alonso in Germany, the Brazilian had run out of fuel. As Mansell celebrated victory, championship leader Senna was classified fourth.

By coincidence the current championship leader was also classified fourth. Sebastian Vettel cannot feel anything but disappointed with last weekend's performance, as his hopes of a home win withered in the cold wind at the Nürburgring.

Vettel's 14-race run of starts from the front row of the grid was ended by his three closest championship rivals, Alonso, Hamilton and team-mate Webber. The German could only start fourth.

Then on Sunday, Vettel's race went from bad to worse when he found himself struggling to stay ahead of the mid-field pack. German fans' hopes that the ‘wunderkind' might charge through the field to score an epic victory were thwarted as Sebastian made matters worse with a spin that flat-spotted his tyres at a crucial time in the race.

Perhaps Vettel can take some solace from the 1991 championship battle. That year Senna's McLaren won the first four races in succession. Then as the rival Williams car found its stride, Mansell won three times and Senna's championship lead dwindled.

Senna responded with back-to-back victories in the Hungarian and Belgian Grand Prix. Even though Mansell was set to score two more wins later in the season, Senna cruised to his third title.

Which races are coming up next? You guessed it, the Hungarian and Belgian Grand Prix - and the next race will potentially play to the Red Bull's strengths. Unless it offers torrential rain as in 2006 when rainmaster Jenson Button scored his maiden Grand Prix victory, Hungary is usually hot and the Red Bull seems to prefer hot races to cold.

With the exception of China when Hamilton's three-stop strategy simply worked better than Vettel's two, in the other three of the four races this season when Red Bull have been beaten, it has been on a cold, damp track. Hungary has been basking in a typically Central European heatwave in recent weeks, so who can bet against Red Bull and Vettel getting back on top?

In fact even if Ferrari and McLaren slug it out for victory, in each race they are taking points from one another, while Vettel continues to steadily add to his total. Despite finishing fourth, his championship lead only dropped by three points, to closest rival Webber. At a rough guess Vettel may clinch his second champions' title in September in Singapore, with five races remaining.

Further down the order, a little bit of history was made on Friday morning in Germany, as Narain Karthikeyan and Karun Chandhok headed down the pitlane and two Indian drivers took to the track for the first time. OK, it was only a first practice session run for Karthikeyan in the HRT and Chandhok's first race for Team Lotus was more a learning exercise than a demonstration of pace, but it perhaps marked an important turning point for the sport in the region.

It was therefore appropriate too that Force India scored their best result of the season at the Nürburgring. Adrian Sutil has had a rough season so far, but his cool unflustered pace vindicated Vijay Mallya's faith. While Hamilton, Alonso and Webber provided the headlines, Sutil's drive to sixth place was for me, one of the best drives of the race.

When is a rule change not a rule change? Apparently it seems, when it is an "interpretation". Or perhaps, when the FIA feels the need to flex its political muscles.

It used to be that once the rule book was settled ahead of a new season, the rules stayed unchanged till the start of the next year. The FIA regulations; the fabled ‘Yellow Book' states that the only time the FIA can change the rules without the agreement of all the teams, is if an issue directly affects safety. That was last invoked in 1994 after the deaths of Ayrton Senna and Roland Ratzenberger,

There was no safety issue in the past weeks. Yet the FIA invoked an "interpretation" covering exhaust blown diffusers; the blowing of gases through the exhaust pipe even if the throttle is closed, to boost airflow over the rear diffuser and enhance downforce.

At the European Grand Prix in Valencia, FIA Technical Delegate Charlie Whiting "interpreted" the use of the exhaust to influence the aerodynamic characteristics of the car as infringing regulations on driver controlled aerodynamics. At the British Grand Prix the FIA attempted to limit teams to 10 percent of the airflow in the cars' exhausts when the driver is off the accelerator.

This however, literally backfired. The teams pointed out different engines require different levels of ‘blow by' in order to ensure reliability.

The "interpretation" was then changed to allow Red Bull and the similarly powered Renault to keep 50 percent of the exhaust flow levels. That immediately led to complaints from the Mercedes-powered teams that they were being put at a disadvantage.

The whole affair spiraled into farce at Silverstone as the rules changed back and forth with a different "interpretation" for every practice session. Team Lotus driver Heikki Kovalainen summed up the drivers thoughts when he told me; "I've given up on the technicalities. All I do is when I get in the car, I ask my engineer do I have downforce in this session or not?"

Eventually after a race in which the Renault-powered teams claimed they were disadvantaged, the FIA backed down, proposing the field reverts to the blown diffuser throttle levels seen in the opening eight races of the season. In addition as in Valencia, changes to the engine's electronic control units between qualifying and the race remain illegal.

The rest of the races this season will run under these rules, while in 2012 all use of blown diffusers will be outlawed, with exhausts exiting upwards through the bodywork away from any aerodynamic devices. In other words, a rule change at the end of the season, just as the rule book stipulates.

The FIA is right in principal however. As well as downforce, the massive air turbulence generated behind a blown diffuser has probably been responsible for some of the processional racing we have seen in recent years, but many suspect there was political motivation behind the FIA's mid-season arm-flexing.

At the end of the 2012 season the "Concorde Agreement" which fixes the financial arrangements between the FIA, Formula One Management and the teams, is up for renegotiation. Faced with the teams' organisation FOTA more united than ever before, was this an attempt to ‘divide and conquer'? If it was, it spectacularly failed.

Meanwhile, according to statistics produced by the Petronas Mercedes GP team some FIA initiatives this year have worked. The combination of the DRS drag-reduction rear wing and the new Pirelli tyres have seen a total of 623 overtaking moves in the first nine races of the season, of which 180 (29%) were DRS-assisted.

Watch out for more of the same this weekend at the Nurburgring. As Ferrari, Mercedes and McLaren continue to close in on Red Bull, the Eiffel Mountains' fickle weather might add yet further to the total. Sebastian Vettel is hoping for a home win, but I suspect he will have to fight for it harder than ever. 

Fernando Alonso and Ferrari have scored their first Grand Prix victory of the 2011 season at Silverstone, but it was the late-race challenge from Mark Webber on Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel which has been the post-race talking point. Or rather, the absence of a challenge.

The radio message from team boss Christian Horner to Webber "Hold your position", could become just as infamous as Ferrari engineer Rob Smedley's "Fernando is faster than you" call to Felipe Massa at last year's German Grand Prix.

There are though, subtle differences. In Germany the Ferrari team cynically manipulated the result of the race merely to allow Alonso to score more championship points. Massa was the race leader and the message from the pits was a blatant instruction to move over and allow his team mate to take victory.

At Silverstone last weekend Vettel had headed Webber for every lap of the race since snatching the lead at the race start. It cannot be denied that Webber drove superbly and had managed his tyres more carefully into the closing stages of the race.

However with Alonso too far ahead to be caught and both Red Bulls on target for the remaining podium places, it was a logical step to ask the two drivers to hold their position. Had there been a Turkey 2010-style clash between the two drivers, I am sure the Red Bull team would have been roundly criticised for their indiscipline.

Certainly though it was a rotten piece of PR for Red Bull, who stand accused of robbing us of a late race spectacle. Formula One, Christian Horner needs to be reminded, is still a sport.

It won't have helped the relationships in the Red Bull Racing team either. It is clear that Mark Webber feels that his talents are undervalued in a team which is now aligned solidly behind their German protégé. You simply could never imagine the message, ever, coming from the pit wall, "Webber is faster than you".

Webber's current Red Bull contract finishes at the end of the season. He is reported to have a one-year contract on the table for 2012, but I suspect it is on the kitchen table of Webber's Buckinghamshire farmhouse, probably buried under electricity and telephone bills. Mark certainly doesn't seem to be too keen to sign it just yet.

The problem for Webber is that if he doesn't re-sign with Red Bull, where does he go next? In terms of equipment, every other team is inferior.

Some rumours have linked Webber to a driver swap with Ferrari's Felipe Massa. Intriguing, but Webber would inevitably find himself number two to Fernando Alonso, who Schumacher-like has moulded the team around him.

Massa certainly needs a move away from Maranello to reignite his self-belief, which has been dimmed as Alonso took charge. However if any such change were due, I might expect it to be back to the Ferrari-powered Sauber team where Massa started his F1 career.

In exchange, Maranello would pay Sauber to take on Kamui Kobayashi. The best driver yet from Japan and top rookie of recent years, he would be the ideal ‘apprentice' to master craftsman Alonso.

Paul di Resta, despite a pitlane bungle at Silverstone has reaffirmed his commitment to the Force India team. In a couple of years, I guess when Michael Schumacher steps aside di Resta will be his natural replacement at the Petronas Mercedes team, but in the meantime with Adrian Sutil under pressure, who would the Scot's team-mate be at Force India next year?

Could it be Webber? It is in some ways a big step back for the Aussie, but he would bring just the sort of experience Force India needs to move forward and his salary could be a worthwhile investment for Vijay Mallya. It is an intriguing, if distant prospect, but could be a rumour worth remembering!

If I were Bernie Ecclestone and looking for the next new venue for a Grand Prix there would be one stipulation. The race name should begin with the letter ‘M'

There are currently four races which begin with the letter and in every case they regularly deliver memorable Grand Prix race. Melbourne, Malaysia and Monaco are all thrillers, but this year's epic race in Montreal was something else entirely.

It can perhaps be best summed up in three words, also beginning with ‘M'. Magnificent. Monsoon. Marathon.

The Monsoon bit speaks for itself. Not since the abandoned race in Malaysia in 2008 (another memorable ‘M' race) have we seen a downpour of such ferocity. The Circuit Gilles Villeuve is on a fairly low island and at one point I was wondering whether it was going to become part of the St. Laurence River again.

All credit to the marshals and track crews. As drain covers lifted with the water pressure, turning some areas of the infield into fountains, they kept their cool and never stopped working. At one point they were even sucking the water off the track into tankers, then dumping it into the river.

Their efforts paid off as the track dried and we were given with a spectacular end to the marathon race. The chequered flag was finally waved 4 hours, 4 minutes and 39 seconds after the start, making it the longest Grand Prix in history.

Magnificent too, were the spectators. In the week ahead of the race, the organisers were able to announce that every grandstand seat had been sold, a remarkable turn around from 2009, when the organisers cancelled the event due to financial troubles.

Not only did the spectators come, they stayed. There were as many in the grandstands for those frantic final laps as there were before the deluge. Magnifique!

Of course, Jenson Button's meteoric charge through the field to hunt down and eventually force an error from Sebastian Vettel on the very last lap of the race was truly magical. Button was dead last on lap 40, yet went on to take victory after a puncture, a collision with his team-mate, a drive through penalty, five pits stops and a clash with the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso.

I doubt that if you wrote that in a movie script it would be sufficiently believable, but the two duellists for the top step of the podium weren't the only stars of the show.

Whether it was the equally spectacular charge by Mark Webber, also from the back of the field, to pass Michael Schumacher for the final podium place, or Kamui Kobayashi's desperate attempts to hang on to second place after the final restart, the Sauber eventually loosing out to the hard-charging Felipe Massa in a photo-finish for 6th, the drivers were all heroes in the conditions. Magnificent, in fact.

However while Button celebrated, Lewis Hamilton added more ‘M's to the Montreal weekend as he sparked off rumours of ‘Moving' with a meeting at a rival team's motor home.

Hamilton, whose contract with McLaren ends in 2012, made a very public point of sitting down for a post-qualifying chat with Red Bull team-manager Christian Horner. It prompted some to speculate, probably wrongly, on a potential driver swap between Hamilton and Webber.

More likely, this is an opening gambit in Hamilton's contract negotiations with McLaren, aimed at putting pressure on CEO Martin Whitmarsh to pay him more money. What is for sure, he wasn't just in the Red Bull motor home to shelter from the rain!

Formula One race steward is right up there with being a soccer referee in a major tournament, as the job I would least want to do. Any decision that is made by the FIA Stewards during the course of a Grand Prix is inevitably going to be analysed and most probably criticised by millions of fans around the world.

Thanks to the muddleheaded FIFA organisation, the poor soccer officials still have no chance of a second opinions or ‘hawkeye' cameras to help them along. At least the two FIA Stewards have some help in reaching their decisions. For a start the stewards have the assistance of an experienced driver on the panel.

In Monaco they were joined by Le Mans winner, ex-Toyota F1 driver and former commentary colleague Allan McNish. In addition, the stewards not only have the benefit of reviewing the footage we see on our TV screens, but also other camera angles that are not broadcast.

Yet during last weekend's Monaco Grand Prix, I certainly felt moved to criticism. Looking at my Star Sports mailbox I was not the only one.

The rot set in with a drive-through penalty to Force India driver Paul di Resta for a relatively innocuous contact with the Toro Rosso of Jaime Alguersuari at the Fairmont Hairpin. An over-ambitious move cost the Scot his front nose wing and would necessitate a pit stop, but once the officials added a drive-through penalty, it ruined di Resta's race.

It also boxed the Stewards into a corner. When a few laps later, Lewis Hamilton attempted a similar move on Felipe Massa and again contact was made, the officials had no choice but to impose a similarly dubious penalty.

Worse still, they appeared to overlook something much more dangerous. Moments later as the cars entered the tunnel, Hamilton forced his McLaren down the inside of Massa's Ferrari. Had the Brazilian held his correct racing line both cars would have collided and we would have seen an accident of precedented violence.

Instead, Massa moved wide, slid onto the dusty part of the track and rattled down the barriers on his own. The stewards did not formally investigate the incident. If they had and Hamilton had been found at fault, he might have been more heavily penalised.

Earlier in the race we saw Hamilton pull off a sensational move on Michael Schumacher into Saint Devote corner. It was fast, spectacular and decisive, but it required the skill of both drivers. Schumacher had seen Hamilton coming and left just enough room for both cars to race.

Later in the race at the same corner, Pastor Maldonado tried to keep the door closed to protect his fifth place and his Williams was unceremoniously hoofed into the barriers. Hamilton was penalised again for lining up an attack on the basis that the driver ahead would take avoiding action.

Hamilton called the stewards' penalties a "fricking joke" and pointed out that, unlike any other driver, he has been called in front of the stewards five times in the last six races. Now whose fault is that Lewis?

The stewards are elected on a race-by-race basis and rarely do the same stewards sit together at more than one race. The only constant in this equation is the driver.

Hamilton's car control and aggression are spectacular, but his self-confidence too often brims into arrogance. Contrast his demeanour with the way Paul di Resta handled the incident which spoiled his race.

"I have to hold my hands up, I was probably a bit too ambitious" said the Force India driver. "I'm going to be very critical of myself. I should have bided my time because there were quite a few points up for grabs. It was me to blame."

Whether the stewards are right or wrong, di Resta has risen further in my standings. That humility is the mark of a true sportsman.

There are just four days between the Spanish Grand Prix and the first practice session for this weekend's race in Monaco. An old tradition means that the first practice sessions are held on Thursday rather than Friday, so even as Sebastian Vettel was spraying his hard-earned champagne from the podium in Barcelona, the team trucks were already loading up in the paddock.

Ahead of their drivers was a 650-km run along the Costa Brava in Spain, then the French Riviera to the Principality. By Tuesday morning the teams were beginning the lengthy process of erecting their giant ‘race centres' on Monte Carlo's harbourside, while around them the cream of the world's super yachts were already purring at their moorings.

Some people still rushed back to Barcelona airport on the night of the Spanish Grand Prix in order to be back behind their desks on Monday morning. Then a couple of days later they rushed again to the airport to fly back to Nice, the nearest airport to Monaco. There are however better ways.

The short gap between the two races gives a good excuse to travel direct between the two venues and see a little of the scenery. Some take the train which runs along the coast and indeed, many use the rail services to commute daily from Nice to Monaco, to avoid the most expensive hotel rates.

Karun Chandhok is one of the drivers who clearly enjoys a drive along the coast road between the two venues. This year he extended his tour a little further, to visit Jarno Trulli's home province of Tuscany in Italy and enjoying some mountain biking with the Italian veteran.

Their Team Lotus boss, Mike Gascoigne found a more unusual way to arrive in Monaco. He helped to crew a sailing yacht between the two venues, but had to admit it took him 62 hours, as there was very little wind.

Whichever way one arrives in Monaco, this race is like no other. Wedged between high cliffs and the Mediterranean Sea, the cramped and narrow track would be laughed off if someone suggested it as a new venue. Monaco though, has been a part of the Grand Prix establishment since 1929.

The circuit has been modified here and there over the years but has retained its raw character and still follows the original design. Many of the corners, particularly on the tortuous hairpin bends twisting down from Casino Square to the sea front, have barely been altered.

An amazing six former winners will line up on the starting grid this weekend. While 2004 winner Jarno Trulli probably carries the longest odds for a repeat victory this year, any of the other five drivers could easily add to their totals.

Among them is Michael Schumacher, winner in the Principality in 1994, 1995, 1997, 1999 and 2001. A safer bet might be last year's winner Mark Webber, or his predecessors Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso.

However the relatively slow lap speeds and less dependence on raw power can create opportunities for less fancied teams. Team Lotus, Williams and Force India are among those worth watching in the pre-race practice sessions for giant-killing potential.

So far the closest that Sebastian Vettel has come to winning in Monaco was his second place last year, just 0.6 of a second behind Red Bull team mate Webber. The German well knows he needs more than at any other track, to kerb his enthusiastic style in the tight confines of Monaco.

A momentary lapse of concentration in 2009 ended with the Red Bull parked against the barriers with wrecked suspension. But equally, with four wins from the first five races of the 2011 season, it is not too difficult to imagine Vettel adding the most prestigious race of the season to his tally.

As Sebastian Vettel dominated the Turkish Grand Prix with his fourth pole position, a third win from the first four races of the season and clearly the best car on the racetrack, the word ‘Schumacheresque' springs to mind.

In contrast, the original Schumacher had a race to forget. Michael's 270th Grand Prix start produced a ragged, erratic race which showed absolutely nothing of his once great skills. Worse still, Schumacher's race-craft last Sunday was far from that of a seasoned veteran, more like a grumpy old man.

His clash with Vitaly Petrov, who had almost completed a clean passing move early in the race was just plain silly. Had Schumacher not closed the door so aggressively, Petrov would almost certainly have run wide and Schumacher regained the place.

Later in the race Schumacher's judgement again proved lacking. This time Force India driver Adrian Sutil was clipped by his German compatriot. Schumacher again came off second best, losing places to both Sutil and di Resta.

One of Schumacher's original contemporaries, Johnnie Herbert, who was Schumacher's team-mate at Benetton in his first world championship winning 1994 and 1995 seasons, believes it is time for him to give up. Writing in Abu Dhabi's ‘The Nation' newspaper, Herbert says he thinks Schumacher is still as good as he ever was, but is simply racing against better drivers.

"Schumacher has not lost any of his skill" says Herbert. "The new generation of young drivers are just better than him. The level required to win in F1 has gone up and he is not at that standard anymore. He is no longer the best guy in the field and he does not have the best machinery at his disposal and he is struggling to cope with a situation he is not used to. I would be surprised if he chose to continue."

There are unquestionably mitigating factors. The Petronas Mercedes GP W02 is an unwieldy tool, not least when it has a full fuel load early in a race and any of us can have a bad day at the office.

However it is notable that in Turkey team-mate Nico Rosberg again convincingly outperformed the seven-times world champion and Schumacher himself admitted after the race that he had "lost the joy" of racing.

Perhaps, even as a Schumacher fan, one has to accept that it is time for the ‘old guard' to move on. The three longest-serving serving drivers in Formula One; Schumacher, Rubens Barrichello and Jarno Trulli, have amassed over 800 race starts between them and there is plenty of talent waiting on the sidelines.

Some of this can be blamed on the in-season testing ban imposed by the FIA as part of its cash saving programme. In the past, drivers such as Fernando Alonso began their careers with a small team, then after a year of testing with a bigger operation, moved seamlessly into a potentially race-winning seat.

Today, with only a minimum of testing on the Friday of each Grand Prix, teams are unable to take the risk of having an inexperienced driver giving sufficient testing feedback. The smaller teams therefore have opted for older, more experienced drivers.

The average age of the drivers in Team Lotus and Hispania Racing is the wrong side of 30. Of the smaller teams only Virgin, with d'Ambrosio, has gambled on new driving talent.

There is similar (forgive the pun) gridlock among all the teams. At Team Lotus, where Heikki Kovalainen has outqualified Jarno Trulli in every race this season, test driver Karun Chandhok has so far driven just five laps for the team.

Nico Hulkenberg, who placed his Williams on pole position in Brazil last year, has been confined to four Friday practice outings with Force India. Meanwhile at Renault, latent talents such as Bruno Senna remain waiting in the wings.

So maybe it is time for a ‘changing of the old guard' in Formula One?

The news that Tony Fernandes and Team Lotus has acquired the long established, niche sports car maker Caterham, has added a further twist to the long-running saga surrounding the use of the Lotus name in Formula One. It is also a clever move which puts Fernandes into a position to repeat history.

Caterham sports cars owe their existence to one of the earliest Lotus sports cars to be built by company founder Colin Chapman. Introduced in 1957, the Lotus Seven simply offered more performance and better handling than any other sports car of its price. It was even offered in kit form, making racetrack performance even cheaper and introducing new drivers to motor racing.

Future world champions including Jim Clark, Graham Hill and Jackie Stewart all raced Lotus Sevens in their early years. Then in the early 1970s, as Colin Chapman aimed Lotus upmarket, the rights to the spartan two-seater were sold to an engineering company in the south of England. Renamed the Caterham Seven it has become a cult model, appealing to enthusiasts and racers for the past forty years.

Last year Tony Fernandes brought the Lotus racing name back into Formula One with a small, independent team which seemed to embrace all the classic early Lotus attributes. However Lotus Group, the builders of Lotus sports cars, suddenly revoked Fernandes' five-year licence to use the Lotus Racing name, prompting a legal battle which is still being played out in the London courts.

The Lotus Group were themselves developing plans to enter Formula One as the title sponsor of the Renault F1 team, now badged as Lotus Renault GP. It is an important step in raising international prestige for the Lotus brand alongside Ferrari, Porsche and Aston Martin as, backed by finance from Malaysian parent company Proton and a sharp, streetwise Chief Executive Dany Behar, Lotus has unveiled spectacular new models and grown in ambition.

Over the past decade, 38 year-old Bahar has built a reputation as a brand guru. He led the marketing at Red Bull when they arrived in F1 and from 2007 to 2009 was in charge of branding for Ferrari. Under his control, Maranello's previously laid-back attitude to the Prancing Horse brand became more adversorial, tightly controlled and much more lucrative.

Tony Fernandes initially neatly sidestepped Bahar. He struck a deal with David Hunt (brother of former World Champion James Hunt), who had acquired the rights to the Team Lotus name after the original Formula One effort fizzled out in 1994.

Team Lotus was the name given by Colin Chapman to the separate company he set up at the beginning of the 1960s to separate his racing team from the car making business. While High Court judges ponder in London, the renaming has so far allowed ‘the green Lotuses' to legitimately continue on track.

Meanwhile Bahar and the Lotus Group have attempted to regain some ‘old Lotus' prestige by fielding their cars in a black and gold livery reminiscent of the classic JPS Lotus cars of the 1970s and 1980s. But does that give them a true racing heritage?

One well respected colleague, Joe Saward, recently hauled me over the coals for calling the black cars Lotus. "One does not call a Ferrari a Marlboro or a McLaren a Vodafone" says Joe. "Lotus is the sponsor, not the car."

While Lotus Group are investing in Renault F1 as a high-end marketing tool, Tony Fernandes and his business partners have taken the opposite end of the spectrum. Just as Air Asia introduced low-cost air travel, Fernandes now has the means to create a low-cost sports car, with direct links to Team Lotus F1 technology. He foresees new cars in the future, both for fun driving on the road and as a means of developing motor racing talent in Asia. Whether it is called a Team Lotus or a Caterham, whatever the badge, who can bet against his ideas being a winner?

Despite being skirted by rain storms throughout the race, the Malaysian Grand Prix thankfully remained dry and delivered a spectacular race. It was the first chance to see what Formula One racing 2011-style is really like - and it is good!

The DRS drag reduction system rear wings and KERS hybrid power boost delivered probably more overtaking manoeuvres than we saw all last season. Meanwhile the rapidly changing Pirelli tyres led to a total, if my notes are correct, of 59 pit stops!

Red Bull boss Christian Horner described their car to pit radio as sounding like "an air traffic controller's nightmare".

"You are trying to look at where you are going to emerge, what the degradation is, what tyre you should be using and with two cars, the work rate is colossal" Horner told journalists after the race. "I think it added an element that was much more strategic. You could see it worked out for some and not for others."

Sebastian Vettel was able to control his pace with aplomb and even though the team asked him not to use his KERS for some of the race (overheating?) he was able to cruise to a well-deserved victory.

Mark Webber was less lucky. The failure of his KERS to operate on the run into the first corner squandered his row two starting position. Without the energy boost Webber's drive back from 10th place to an eventual 4th was probably one of his best drives ever, but it also shows that reliability is going to be the key to winning this year's championship.

Reliability very nearly lost Vettel his title last year. Faulty spark plugs and broken wheels meant that for the early part of 2010 he played second fiddle to team-mate Webber. Even when his late-season winning streak began, an engine blow-up in Korea meant he only took the championship lead at the final race of the season.

Meanwhile despite pre-season problems, the McLaren cars have been robustly reliable in the first two races and Red Bull's closest challenger. It is their pit wall race strategies that have let them down.

While Jenson Button had a strong race to second place in Sepang, Lewis Hamilton was left bemoaning a bungled tyre strategy that robbed him of a podium finish and put him in conflict with the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso.

Hamilton's had looked good until the team's third pit stop when mystifyingly the team fitted a set of already used, hard compound tyres to the McLaren. Had they been brand-new there was a chance that Hamilton might have stretched them to reach the chequered flag without a fourth pitstop. However the used tyres started to lose performance rapidly, allowing Alonso to close in and make the misjudged bid for sixth place that let to the collision.

Once again, Ferrari proved the more astute team tactically. After the race the FIA Stewards gave Alonso a 20 second penalty for causing the collision with Hamilton.

Immediately it seems the Ferrari team countered by accusing Hamilton of weaving on the previous lap. On reviewing the video evidence, the stewards had no alternative but give Hamilton a 20 second penalty too.

The crucial difference is that Alonso did not lose a position as a result of his penalty, while Hamilton's penalty dropped him from 7th to 8th place. Just as in Australia when the Ferrari team trapped Button into a drive-through penalty, they again played the rulebook in their favour.

It is notable that while Ferrari struggled in qualifying, their race pace has been strong. Adrian Newey himself has admitted that Ferrari as well as McLaren will be Red Bull's main threats in China.

Cooler track conditions may also work in Ferrari's favour, allowing them to show more of the pace they showed in pre-season testing. My guess is that the scarlet cars could deliver a 'Shanghai Surprise' to Red Bull and McLaren this weekend.

Despite a paucity of overtaking on Abu Dhabi's Yas Marina track, the nineteenth and final round of the 2010 Formula One Word Championship was fascinating. It may have lacked gung-ho passing, but it more than made up for it with drama, tension and more mathematics in the commentary booth, than when I last sat a school exam!

Even Sebastian Vettel admitted that, until his race engineer Guillaume Rocquellin told him on the slowing down lap, he didn't know he was world champion. It was I suspect, astute management by the Red Bull team to try to keep the pressure off the 23 year-old, on his way to beating both Alonso and Hamilton's respective records as the youngest-ever world champion.

"I think I sounded like a little baby or a girl on the radio" said Vettel as he celebrated his title. "I really did not know, until I crossed the line. Rocky said it is looking good, but to wait till the all the cars cross the line at the finish. Then there was silence, I thought the worst, then he said "you are the champion" and I had tears. Unbelievable."

It was the perfect cliff-hanger of an ending, to what has been a cliff-hanger of a season. In fact, unlike Webber, Alonso, Hamilton and even Button, Vettel hadn't even led the title race before the final round

Heading into the last race, Alonso looked the favourite. In the previous four races the Spaniard had scored an impressive 80 championship points compared with 58 for Vettel, 54 for Webber and 40 for Hamilton.

All four drivers started the final race with a genuine chance of winning the championship. However most speculation seemed to focus on title leader Alonso and his nearest rival Mark Webber, eight points behind.

Even after scoring pole position on the Saturday, the title was by no means assured for Vettel. In fact the biggest question seemed to be, would Vettel give up his title bid, to allow the Australian to beat Alonso to the title? In hindsight we weren't the only ones to be totally wrong.

It seems that even Ferrari's race plan was focussed on Alonso's closest title rival. It proved a flawed strategy.

Even if Vettel were to win or even finish second, fourth would have clinched the title for the Ferrari driver. However as the safety car deployment following Michael Schumacher's scary first lap collision with the Force India of Toni Liuzzi threw carefully planned strategies awry, Alonso's tactical team opted to shadow Webber's early change onto the harder-compound tyres rather than cover Vettel's strategy.

The fact that following Webber's pitstop on lap 11, both Alonso and Massa stopped respectively on laps 13 and 15 set the destiny of the race - and the championship.

Their stops placed them on track behind drivers such as Nico Rosberg and Vitaly Petrov who had dived into the pits as the safety car was deployed. It lost them vital touch with the later-stopping race leaders, allowing Vettel, Hamilton and Button to take the critical podium places.

"We concentrated too much on what Mark was doing and we then were left bottled up in traffic and that cost us the title" said Ferrari strategist Chris Dyer. "You could say we looked too closely at what was going on behind us without seeing what was in front of our nose. It's a shame because losing like this hurts, it hurts a lot."

However this was not a title that was merely lost. It was one that was despite all the pressures, emphatically won - by Sebastian Vettel.

Ever since his arrival in motor racing Vettel has been blessed with two key attributes: One is a winning smile, the other is stunning, natural pace. Add to that a third one, the ability to work under pressure. There is steel behind that smile.

The Yas Marina circuit last year added a new dimension to the Formula One calendar when it hosted its debut race. Situated in a kind of ‘grown ups Disney World' on the man-made Yas Island about 20km for Abu Dhabi city centre, it is a totally self-contained resort with top-class hotels and restaurants, a spectacular yacht marina and of course, the amazing Ferrari World Abu Dhabi theme park, all right next to the track.

Throw in the dramatic transition from daytime sunshine to a spectacular Arabian sunset and you have a race which matches Monaco and Singapore in terms of glamour and spectacle. Then you add the final topping of the four-way shootout for the Drivers' World Championship and it is no surprise that every one of the 41,000 grandstand seats is sold out for the entire weekend.

So who will come out on top? Fernando Alonso arrives with 246 championship points, eight ahead of Mark Webber and there are 25 points available for a win, 18 for second and 15 for third. It is (forgive the pun) pointless discussing any lower scores, because unless one of the championship contenders is in the top three - they are history.

Even if Webber were to win in Abu Dhabi, second place would still give Alonso the title by a single point. Only if the Ferrari driver were to finish third or lower would the Australian win the championship.

If Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel were to head a Red Bull 1-2, Vettel and Webber would tie on 256 points while third, fourth or even fifth place would allow the Alonso to snatch the crown.

Meanwhile there are several wild-cards. Lewis Hamilton will arrive in Abu Dhabi as the outsider in the title chase after claiming fourth place in Brazil. That takes his tally to 224 points and should his rivals hit trouble, a win could still give Hamilton his second drivers' championship. Meanwhile the improving Mercedes, Massa's Ferrari, Kubica's Renault and Button's McLaren could easily push the championship contenders down the order and out of contention.

However the formbook has to favour Red Bull. They dominated last year's inaugural race at the Yas Marina track, with as last week in Brazil, Vettel heading Webber in a team 1-2. Meanwhile neither Ferrari nor McLaren featured in the top ten.

Vettel could and will, still bid to win the title for himself. However were he to be leading with team-mate Webber and then Alonso close behind, allowing the Aussie though to take the win and the title wouldn't be team-orders. It would be a sensible, sporting gesture.

Whatever one may say about Ferrari's ‘team orders' in Germany; their single-minded focus has put Fernando Alonso firmly into the driving seat into the last lap of the title race. Much as I would love to see Webber win the championship, I just have a feeling that Red Bull's previous lack of team strategy could hand the title to the Spaniard.

Meanwhile the dramas in Abu Dhabi won't just be confined to the track. It is going to be fascinating to follow the continuing story of what Lotus Racing (as is) will be called next year. Tony Fernandes' team believes they secured the rights to the Team Lotus name for 2011, having bought it from the owners of the original Lotus F1 team.

However the Proton-owned Lotus Group which makes the road going sports cars is contesting that. The company's aggressive new boss, former Ferrari brand manager Dany Behar, is reported to be looking at taking a EUR 60 million stake in the Renault F1 team that could involve that outfit being renamed Lotus-Renault in 2011.

Watch out for the two sides facing off for a war of words in the Abu Dhabi paddock this weekend, even as Red Bull and Ferrari fight it out on the on the circuit. This could be set to be a battle that goes on long after the chequered flag.

The Yas Marina circuit last year added a new dimension to the Formula One calendar when it hosted its debut race. Situated in a kind of ‘grown ups Disney World' on the man-made Yas Island about 20km for Abu Dhabi city centre, it is a totally self-contained resort with top-class hotels and restaurants, a spectacular yacht marina and of course, the amazing Ferrari World Abu Dhabi theme park, all right next to the track.

Throw in the dramatic transition from daytime sunshine to a spectacular Arabian sunset and you have a race which matches Monaco and Singapore in terms of glamour and spectacle. Then you add the final topping of the four-way shootout for the Drivers' World Championship and it is no surprise that every one of the 41,000 grandstand seats is sold out for the entire weekend.

So who will come out on top? Fernando Alonso arrives with 246 championship points, eight ahead of Mark Webber and there are 25 points available for a win, 18 for second and 15 for third. It is (forgive the pun) pointless discussing any lower scores, because unless one of the championship contenders is in the top three - they are history.

Even if Webber were to win in Abu Dhabi, second place would still give Alonso the title by a single point. Only if the Ferrari driver were to finish third or lower would the Australian win the championship.

If Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel were to head a Red Bull 1-2, Vettel and Webber would tie on 256 points while third, fourth or even fifth place would allow the Alonso to snatch the crown.

Meanwhile there are several wild-cards. Lewis Hamilton will arrive in Abu Dhabi as the outsider in the title chase after claiming fourth place in Brazil. That takes his tally to 224 points and should his rivals hit trouble, a win could still give Hamilton his second drivers' championship. Meanwhile the improving Mercedes, Massa's Ferrari, Kubica's Renault and Button's McLaren could easily push the championship contenders down the order and out of contention.

However the formbook has to favour Red Bull. They dominated last year's inaugural race at the Yas Marina track, with as last week in Brazil, Vettel heading Webber in a team 1-2. Meanwhile neither Ferrari nor McLaren featured in the top ten.

Vettel could and will, still bid to win the title for himself. However were he to be leading with team-mate Webber and then Alonso close behind, allowing the Aussie though to take the win and the title wouldn't be team-orders. It would be a sensible, sporting gesture.

Whatever one may say about Ferrari's ‘team orders' in Germany; their single-minded focus has put Fernando Alonso firmly into the driving seat into the last lap of the title race. Much as I would love to see Webber win the championship, I just have a feeling that Red Bull's previous lack of team strategy could hand the title to the Spaniard.

Meanwhile the dramas in Abu Dhabi won't just be confined to the track. It is going to be fascinating to follow the continuing story of what Lotus Racing (as is) will be called next year. Tony Fernandes' team believes they secured the rights to the Team Lotus name for 2011, having bought it from the owners of the original Lotus F1 team.

However the Proton-owned Lotus Group which makes the road going sports cars is contesting that. The company's aggressive new boss, former Ferrari brand manager Dany Behar, is reported to be looking at taking a EUR 60 million stake in the Renault F1 team that could involve that outfit being renamed Lotus-Renault in 2011.

Watch out for the two sides facing off for a war of words in the Abu Dhabi paddock this weekend, even as Red Bull and Ferrari fight it out on the on the circuit. This could be set to be a battle that goes on long after the chequered flag.

Another great race and with eighteen of the nineteen races in the 2010 calendar now complete, we are still no closer to knowing who will be the 2010 Formula One World Champion. The shootout goes into the final round in Abu Dhabi next weekend with four drivers still in contention.

Quite simply, the two Red Bull cars were the class of the field in Brazil and race winner Sebastian Vettel was plainly faster than Mark Webber. Thus Vettel was a worthy winner and fully deserves to arrive at the final race with a genuine tilt at the driver’s championship title.

Webber, second in Sao Paolo still has a better chance of fighting for the crown and could perhaps have fought his team-mate for the lead, but he had to drop his pace in the later stages of the race to preserve an overheating engine. Could that be a potential problem for the next race in Abu Dhabi? I suspect not.

Meanwhile Red Bull and Renault can also celebrate winning the 2010 Constructor’s Championship in Brazil. It is the first title for Red Bull - one should remember, a privately-owned team - and it is the 19^th title for the French car maker since they arrived in F1 in the 1970s.

All credit to Red Bull on a superb achievement, but despite what is said by various team managers including the jubilant Christian Horner, I think that most race fans share my opinions that the Driver’s Championship is what matters to most race fans. So what about the two non-Red Bull contenders?

Despite race-long complaints that his McLaren lacked grip, Lewis Hamilton drove a surprisingly strong race to claim fourth place and twelve championship points. That takes his tally to 224 points, fourth in the title standings and a win in Abu Dhabi could still give Hamilton his second drivers’ title.

However Fernando Alonso’s solid drive from fifth on the starting grid to third place 71 laps later, keeps the Ferrari driver in the top spot in the title race. The Spaniard now has 246 championship points, to 238 for Webber and 231 for Vettel.

“All things considered, I am pleased with this result” said Alonso after the race. “We have only lost three points to our closest rival and, given how things turned out yesterday in qualifying, it went well. If this morning, I had been told it would finish like this, I would have happily signed for it!”

The accident to the Force India of Vitantonio Liuzzi which brought out the safety car could sadly, have ended the immediate F1 career prospects of the erratic Italian. His accident added strength to rumours linking new drivers, including current test driver Paul di Resta and Indian home hero Karun Chandhok, to the seat for the 2011 season.

Another driver whose 2011 seat was in doubt ahead of the Brazilian Grand Prix is the Nico Hulkenberg, whose place at the Williams team was tipped to be usurped by the 2010 GP2 champion Pastor Maldonato, who is alleged to bring a multimillion dollar budget from his Venezualan backers.

That was of course, until Hulkenberg nailed together ‘the lap of the gods’, not once but twice to place his Williams Cosworth on pole position on Saturday. While the fairytale didn’t last beyond the first lap of the race on Sunday, he eventually finished eighth, it may be that those two laps might just have kept him in Formula One next year.

Meanwhile we can look forward to a spectacular season’s finale in Abu Dhabi. The inaugural race last year saw a Red Bull Racing 1-2, with Vettel ahead of Webber, while neither McLaren nor Ferrari featured among the leaders. However a mere victory may not be enough for the Red Bull drivers this year, it all depends on the hard-charging Alonso.

The only thing I am prepared to predict this weekend in Sao Paolo is that the Brazilian Grand Prix will spring a surprise. After all, this is the track where world championships have been won and lost on the last corner of the last lap.

It is also a track you may remember, where falling advertising hoardings, stray dogs and even a collision between safety cars have added to the challenges. My co-commentator Gary Anderson will also point to his last victory there with the Jordan team.

Gary designed the car which in 2003 gave Giancarlo Fisichella his first win, but it took the FIA a week to sort out who was the winner. The chaotic rain-hit race finished under red flags, after Alonso crashed into debris left by Mark Webber's Jaguar.

Kimi Raikkonen was hailed as the winner on the day before a timing error was revealed and the Finn had to hand back the trophy. Adding to the dramas, Fisichella's car had caught fire in the pits as the race ended. It could only happen in Brazil!

The Korean Grand Prix returned the normally mollycoddled F1 world to racing in the raw because the track was barely finished in time for the race. Interlagos was last upgraded about 20 years ago and its creaking infrastructure will provide similar challenges, for exactly the opposite reasons.

Korea though literally turned the championship on its head not least for the Red Bull team. Their double non-finish, along with a victory promoting Ferrari's Fernando Alonso into the championship lead, means that the Scuderia arrive in Sao Paolo with a crucial advantage.

If Alonso were to win again in Brazil and Webber, Vettel or Hamilton not score, then I think the championship could be over. So saying, it is clear that Red Bull still have the fastest car on the track, but they need to turn that speed into solid results.

Of the four championship contenders, Mark Webber has the toughest task. He of course won last year's race, but will still be inwardly furious for the driving error that put him out in Korea and also faces the pressure of knowing that after a decade in F1, this is probably his one chance of being champion.

Vettel can be sure that he'll be champion one day, even if he misses out this year. Webber I suspect feels this is his one big chance, win or bust.

Teamwork will also play a major role in this year's world championship. Ever since the controversial Ferrari 1-2 in Germany in July, it has been clear that Ferrari have focussed all their attention and no doubt the pick of new developments on Alonso's car. Results show that it has worked, in contrast to the muddled strategies at Red Bull.

Ferrari has won three out of the past four races at Interlagos and 2008 winner Felipe Massa is of course home hero. Even were he to win and not Fernando Alonso, it would still aid the Spaniard by preventing his rivals from scoring maximum points.

Sadly I think we can discount McLaren, unless it rains. All season their car been a handful on a bumpy track and Sao Paolo is one of the worst. So saying, it's Brazil. Anything is possible!

I suspect that we will see the Red Bulls at the front, but you simply can never discount Alonso. He is currently at the top of his form, clinched his first title here in 2005 and although he has never won in Sao Paolo, has been on the podium in four of the last five years.

However even were Alonso to win, fourth place or better would keep Webber in the title chase into the final round. And it is Brazil. Anything could happen!

Two weeks ago, Red Bull Racing were celebrating a 1-2 in the Japanese Grand Prix while in Yeongam, contractors were frantically applying asphalt to an unfinished race track.

Then again, things change fast in Formula One and the teams now leave the inaugural Korean Grand Prix with a new championship leader in Fernando Alonso.

The virgin track caused lengthy delays, red flags and protracted safety car periods as a result of the combination of heavy rain and the brand-new track surface generating blinding spray. However, once the racing got underway we were treated to a race which could potentially have changed the destiny of the championship.

The first casualty was title leader Mark Webber, just two laps after the safety car had pulled off the still rain-soaked track. The Australian was in second place behind team-mate Sebastian Vettel when the tricky change of camber between Turns 11 and 12 forced his car over the kerbs and into what Mark referred to a "slow motion" spin.

After hitting the barrier on one side of the track, the car then rolled backwards into the path of the following traffic. Alonso rode both the kerbs and his luck to avoid a collision, but Nico Rosberg was less lucky, the errant Red Bull wiping the side off the Petronas Mercedes.

Webber was typically forthright in confessing to his driving error, but it was of little consolation to Rosberg, who had just passed the McLaren of Lewis Hamilton and was in all probability destined for a podium finish. Nico summed up his frustration in just two words as he headed for the airport. "It sucks."

The mechanical mayhem triggered yet another safety car period for the long-suffering, rain-soaked, yet still enthusiastic Korean fans, as Vettel's Red Bull circulated ahead of Alonso and Hamilton.  Once racing resumed, the lead trio rapidly pulled away from a pack now led by Michael Schumacher, driving with a renewed feistiness which gained him fourth ahead of Robert Kubica and Jenson Button.

For Button in the second McLaren, both the race and any lingering title hopes slipped away fast. The reigning champion's smooth style often gives him an advantage, but on the cold, wet and slick track, he was unable to generate sufficient heat in his tyres to gain the optimum grip, and slid helplessly back down the order. He will now almost certainly now have to focus on supporting Hamilton's late bid for the title.

As track conditions improved, Vettel remained in control at the head of the field. His main concern was that the delayed race, now in failing light, should pass its 42^nd lap. That was the vital 75% point at which full championship points would be scored, allowing the German to take the title lead.

However just three laps later, Vettel would find himself as frustrated as his Red Bull team-mate. On the 45^th lap, the note of the Renault engine altered as his car passed the pits.

Into Turn 1, a wisp of smoke appeared. By Turn 2, Alonso's Ferrari was already past and into the lead, followed by Hamilton's McLaren as the Red Bull's engine literally disintegrated, leaving a trail of oil, water and pieces of cylinder block and crankshaft down the length of the 1.2km straight.

Meanwhile, as the late evening dusk rapidly turned to complete darkness, Alonso and Ferrari celebrated a victory which moves him into the driving seat for the final two races. The Spaniard now has 231 points, eleven ahead of Webber, while Lewis Hamilton moves up to third on 210, four ahead of Vettel.

Vettel and Webber are still, forgive the pun, remarkably 'bullish'. However they are both well aware that any further failings could see them lose the title to a late-season charge from the Prancing Horse. The final two races in Brazil and Abu Dhabi are set to be truly epic!

As the first members of the Formula One circus arrive in Yeongam on the southernmost tip of South Korea, it is becoming increasingly obvious that the 2010 Formula One Korean Grand Prix is going to be an adventure. The core of the track is, it has to be said, remarkably complete, but while the pit and paddock are fully functioning it is clear there is still a lot of cosmetic work to be done.

It remains to be seen too, whether the race will attract very many spectators. To an outsider it seems as if the circuit's marketing programme has been as tardy as the construction work.

The track is literally hours away from Korea's capital of Seoul. In fact the province is so isolated that it once housed political dissidents. The nearest city, the ferry terminus of Mokpo hardly offers the levels of glamour and entertainment of Singapore or Abu Dhabi.

This weekend will therefore be a return to racing in the raw. No distractions from the action on the anti-clockwise, 5.62km, 18-turn track.

Of course, other than Karun Chandhok, who drove some cautious exploratory laps in a 2009 Red Bull RB05 on the then only part-finished track at its official opening, none of the F1 grid will truly know what to expect until they head out in first practice on Friday. The teams though have all been working on track simulations ever since the FIA provided all the teams with a detailed blueprint several months ago.

Renault engineering chief Alan Permane predicts a lap time of 1m 44s and the cars will be on full throttle for 55 percent of the lap and on the brakes for 20 percent. The average speed will be 195 km/h, with a top speed of 315 km/h on the 1.15 km straight between turns two and three.

As for the corners, Permane predicts that turn eight will be the quickest of the lap with an apex speed of 235 km/h. Turn three is the slowest corner, expected to be taken at just 65 km/h.

Those of course are merely the numbers. What does that mean for the drivers, and more critically for the world championship as it enters its final three rounds?

Karun Chandhok believes that the three long straights in the early section of the lap may prove critical, not least for the Red Bulls of Webber and Vettel, whose cars otherwise have proved the class of the field in recent races.

"The Red Bull is quick everywhere" said Karun. "But specifically though the first sector of the lap with the three long straights, they may not be as quick as some of the others. Ferrari and McLaren will be strong. Even if the Red Bulls qualify one-two, it will be interesting to see because of the long straights in sector one if they hold that advantage into turn four on the first lap."

McLaren and Ferrari, along with Renault and Red Bull may also be pinning their faith on the F-Duct, the controversial feature that blows air onto the rear wing to increase pressure and reduce drag, adding to straightline speed. However another factor may come intpo play.

The Yeongam track surface is literally just two weeks old. Regardless of some team's fears on the potential longevity of such a new surface under the huge loads of the Formula One cars, one characteristic of all new asphalt is that the surface is always slippery as oil rises to the surface as part of the curing process.

Show me a slippery track and long straights and one driver is always worth watching; Lewis Hamilton. This year's Belgian Grand Prix provided exactly the same scenario - and Lewis won. This weekend could once again swing the championship balance in a new direction.

The Red Bull walkover at Suzuka, where neither McLaren nor Ferrari could match their pace, was rightly regarded as one of the best races of the season for the team and continues to leave the championship wide open. Webber's 18 points for second place in the race, keeps him at the top of the scoreboard, with a 220 point total.

Meanwhile Vettel's 25 points for victory moves him onto 206 points, equal second in the standings with Ferrari's Fernando Alonso. The Spaniard expressed satisfaction in achieving his target of third place in Suzuka on the high-downforce track which clearly suited the rampaging Red Bulls.

Meanwhile the McLarens were comprehensively outpaced. It was a weekend to forget for Lewis in particular.

First he crashed out of the first practice session on the Friday, robbing him of vitally needed track testing. Then as qualifying was washed out on Saturday his engineers had found a gearbox fault, which meant the unit had to be changed, incurring a 5-place grid penalty.

The drivers' parade in classic cars from a local vintage car club then gave Lewis an embarrassing moment. As Webber and Vettel reclined in Bentley convertibles and Alonso swanked in a multi-million yen 1950s Ferrari, Hamilton to his horror discovered his ride was a tiny, 175cc, 1950s Messerschmitt ‘bubble car'.

To be fair to Lewis, he saw the funny side as the other drivers thinly disguised their mirth. I suspect the organisers didn't realise the effect it would have on the image-conscious Hamilton, but for me it was one of the great moments of the race!

More serious for Hamilton was a further gearbox problem that robbed him of third gear and a chance of challenging Alonso. Lewis was left to limp home in fifth place, behind team-mate Button whose strategy of starting on the harder compound tyre failed to pay off.

At least McLaren's two drivers are working well together, complementing one another as a team. That cannot be said to be the case in either Ferrari or Red Bull.

Scuderia Ferrari has made it clear that their championship priority is Alonso, and it could be argued that it is having an effect on team mate Massa's motivation and focus. The Brazilian should be scoring points which Alonso's rivals can otherwise claim, but instead his performance in Suzuka was that of a rank amateur.

First Massa qualified a lowly 12th, blaming ‘traffic'. Except we were following him in-car on his so called fast lap and we didn't see any. We did late turn-ins, understeer and missed apexes though. Then came the race. All 400m of it.

Anyone can make a mistake, but no driver at his level should blow it at the first corner, bouncing off the back of Barrichello and cannoning into the Force India of the unlucky Liuzzi. Come on Felipe you can do better than this!

If Alonso lacks support from his team mate, Red Bull Racing must be getting worried about the pressure between Webber and Vettel. It is looking increasingly as if the two might be fighting among themselves for the title.

Remember 2007, when Kimi Raikkonen claimed the title for Ferrari? A series of mechanical failures blighted the scarlet car's early season progress, while the championship battle looked like a straight fight between McLaren team-mates Hamilton and Alonso. Does it sound familiar?

The McLaren drivers went into the final race with Hamilton on 107 points and Alonso on 103, with Kimi on 100. Even if Raikkonen won the race, second for Alonso or sixth for Hamilton would have made them champions.

History of course records victory for Raikkonen. Alonso finished 3rd and Hamilton 7th, meaning that the title went to the Finn by a single point. There is still a strong chance the same scenario could be enacted in 2010, this time with Alonso and Ferrari in the driving seat.

Even by the cliff-hanger precedents of previous Formula One seasons, the 2010 Formula One World Championship is showing every sign of clicking down to another last race, last corner finale.

This weekend's Japanese Grand Prix marks the fourth from last event of the season, and given that there are still major question marks hanging over the Korean Grand Prix, the title could be decided over just three.

The readiness of the track at Yeongam to host any kind of race, let alone motor racing's premier level, is still a major issue.

The organisers only started laying the critical top layer of asphalt on the track in the past week and there is a real risk that the surface may not cure in time to be sufficiently robust to withstand the massive forces imposed by F1 cars, particularly in the braking zones.

Even if the track does pass its belated FIA safety inspection next Monday, just 11 days ahead of the race, I fear that even if the race starts any deterioration in the track surface could lead to the race being stopped prematurely.

That in turn could mean half - or even no points from one of the final rounds!

All of which has to make Mark Webber smile.

Assuming (remembering assumption has been a dangerous thing this season) that the formbook runs true, the three races that we know will go the distance should be a Red Bull benefit.

Last year the Red Bulls began a clean sheet of three wins in a row with victory in the Japanese Grand Prix and continued through Brazil to the season finale in Abu Dhabi.

Vettel was last year's winner in Suzuka, but it could have been different. Mark Webber started from the pit lane in a repaired car after a heavy shunt in qualifying. He proved his pace with fastest lap but only finished 17th.

The Australian arrives in Japan eleven championship points ahead of his nearest rival Alonso and equally importantly, more than 20 points ahead of both Lewis Hamilton and his potential Red Bull nemesis Sebastian Vettel.

However, the sheer pace of Fernando Alonso and his Ferrari has to be a headache for the Red Bull team.

Alonso and his Ferrari came, saw and conquered, on both the flat-out straights of Monza and in the tighter confines of Marina Bay. That means Fernando Alonso is chasing his third win in a row and 26th of his career.

Only five drivers have won more races than the Spaniard; Michael Schumacher with 91 victories, Alain Prost (51), Ayrton Senna (41), Nigel Mansell (31) and Sir Jackie Stewart (27).

Alonso also has the formbook firmly on his side. He last won three in a row in 2006 with Renault, in fact it was four; Spain, Monaco, Great Britain and Canada.

Likewise Ferrari last won three races in a row in 2008, when they two notched up four successive victories in Malaysia, Bahrain, Spain and Turkey.

Should Ferrari and Alonso prove capable of scoring three or even four in a row again this season, it would be tough on Webber, but they would be worthy champions. But enough of Webber and Alonso, what about the other three rivals.

Of these, Vettel should perhaps feel the most pressure. As with Webber at this race last year, he is just one poor result away from losing even the slightest chance of beating his team mate to the championship.

Meanwhile both Hamilton and Button's hope depend on McLaren delivering them a car with which they can match the Red Bull and Ferrari onslaught.

Meanwhile watch out for one other driver who could be pivotal to the title race. Felipe Massa is clearly playing a support role to Alonso in the Ferrari camp and his role particularly in qualifying could be critical.

If the Brazilian can position his Ferrari ahead of any of the other contenders, he is stealing track position and potentially championship points from his team-mate's rivals. Watch out for a sizzler in Suzuka!

The 2010 SingTel Singapore Grand Prix was well worthy of the spectacular night time skyline which formed its backdrop. From the race-long duel between Alonso and Vettel through the clever pit stop strategy and gritty racing which gave Webber his third place and eliminated Hamilton, to Kovalainen's fiery Lotus finale, the entire race was an action-packed stunner.

For the many Ferrari fans who lined the Marina Bay circuit, Fernando Alonso's lights-to-flag victory ahead of the pursuing Red Bulls was the perfect result. From being the title outsider, Alonso now with 191 championship points, is the prime challenger to championship leader Mark Webber's 202 points tally.

Meanwhile Lewis Hamilton's second non-finish in two races, along with a relatively lacklustre run to fourth for Jenson Button, means that the two McLaren drivers, third and fifth in the championship must now be feeling the most pressure.

Lewis Hamilton's 35th lap clash with Mark Webber may prove pivotal for both drivers' championship hopes. Webber had gambled on an early tyre stop to make up ground after a tardy start, relying on moving up as other drivers made their stops closer to half-distance. The strategy moved him ahead of Hamilton, but a safety car period allowed the McLaren driver to close within striking distance of the Red Bull.

On the run up Raffles Boulevard to Turn 7, Hamilton took his chance as Webber was forced to hesitate by a back-marker. Webber held the inside, defensive racing line, forcing Hamilton to take the long way around the outside.

No doubt McLaren supporters will claim that Webber forced Hamilton wide at the exit of the corner causing the damage which led to the Briton's retirement after his McLaren bounced over the kerbs. Equally Webber fans will point out that the McLaren driver forced Webber onto the inside kerb of the corner, making a collision almost inevitable.

On balance, one can say that is what proper, wheel-to-wheel motor racing is all about. In this case Hamilton was unlucky, while Webber was lucky. In hindsight, he was very lucky indeed.

Inspecting Webber's car after the race, the Red Bull engineers were horrified to discover that Webber had been within millimetres of his rear tyre, damaged in the clash with Hamilton, slipping off the rim.

The collision had pushed the tyre off its normal mounting on the rim and there was just 5mm of tyre left holding it on the rim. If it had slipped it would almost certainly have resulted in a blow out. Had that occurred Webber would almost certainly have failed to score points, putting Alonso into the championship lead!

Red Bull Racing still holds the championship lead with Webber, and the second place for Vettel in the Singapore night race ensures his third place in the title standings, but the team will have reason to feel concerned about their pace relative to Ferrari. Despite their strong result, the feeling in the team was that they simply failed to find a rhythm with the street circuit's corners.

Meanwhile the fun didn't stop at the chequered flag. First we had Heikki Kovalainen joining the ranks of Singapore's fire marshals in a DIY attempt to stop his Lotus conflagration.

There were also frenzied activities around the stewards room as Adrian Sutil was given a 20-second penalty for having benefited from going around the outside of Turn 7 on the opening lap of the race. Then following vociferous complaints from Force India, a similar penalty was applied to Nico Hulkenberg, who the team felt had also gained from cutting a corner.

Sutil, who finished the race eighth, was demoted to 10th, but was then re-promoted to ninth following Hulkenberg's penalty, which dropped the Williams driver to 10th. And the reason for all this? It means that Force India is back in front of Williams in the Constructors' Championship!

Even by the close fought standards of the last three world championships, the final races of the 2010 title race are shaping up to be something special. The Singapore Grand Prix marks the start of a final five-race series of long-haul races which will settle the championship.

Fernando Alonso's victory ahead of Jenson Button in the Italian Grand Prix, as well as a fourth place for Sebastian Vettel, has put all three drivers back in the title chase after their failure to score in the previous round in Belgium. At the same time Lewis Hamilton's first lap crash in Monza was combined with a relatively lacklustre run to sixth place for Mark Webber, to allow their rivals to catch up once more.

With just 24 points covering from first to fifth in the championship and 25 points for a race win, Singapore could prove make or break for any of the title leaders. I suspect that while no one driver will clinch the title in Singapore, one of the five contenders will almost certainly leave the Lion City knowing he will be out of contention. You couldn't arrange a reality TV show script better than this.

The formbook favours either Fernando Alonso or Lewis Hamilton as the most likely victors in Singapore. Alonso's two races at the track brought victory (albeit tarnished by his team-mate Nelson Piquet's deliberate accident) in 2008 and a fine third place last year when he and the Renault team were under the maximum possible pressure following the disclosures.

This year Alonso is at the wheel of a fast improving Ferrari. He comes fresh from victory at Monza and another win for him under the floodlights would but him back among the front runners in Championship contention.

Lewis Hamilton meanwhile claimed third place in the inaugural race and scored an emphatic victory from pole position last year. Both Hamilton and reigning world champion Jenson Button's fortunes though will depend the ability of their McLarens to ride the bumps and ridges of the Marina Bay street circuit, as handling issues have given the drivers a hard time this year.

In contrast, current championship leader Mark Webber has yet to finish a race beneath the floodlights of the Marina Bay circuit. In previous years the Red Bulls have proved twitchy and suffered transmission and brake problems. However the team's 1-2 result in Monaco this year shows that the current car is far better suited to a street circuit.

Behind the five championship rivals, the battle is no less intense. Felipe Massa still waits in the wings in the second Ferrari and who could forget his sublime pole position lap in 2008 and his race-leading pace before that bungled pit stop robbed him of victory?

Watch out too for the Petronas Mercedes team, battling to stay ahead of Renault for fourth place in the Constructor's Championship. Upgrades for Singapore may boost the cars performance and Rosberg has proven pace in Singapore.

In 2008 Nico, on his way to 2nd place, pulled off one of the best overtaking moves seen on the track when he barrelled past Jarno Trulli's Toyota at the end of Raffles Boulevard. Last year Rosberg ran Hamilton close for the win, before he messed up the pitlane exit and had to serve a drive-through penalty for prematurely crossing the line demarking the edge of the racetrack.

Of course though, all eyes may be on Rosberg's team-mate. Despite being a veteran of 262 races, Michael Schumacher will be making his Singapore night race debut and seems genuinely excited at the prospect. He is however a man under pressure and I fear that a poor performance in Singapore, could mean that Michael will question the wisdom of his comeback.

Whatever happens, the 2010 Singapore Grand Prix is set to be a race to savour.

For Fernando Alonso, Scuderia Ferrari and the roaring, adoring ‘tifosi', the Italian Grand Prix was a dream come true. For McLaren, in particular Lewis Hamilton, it was a nightmare. Even Jenson Button's delight in finishing second was moderated by the feeling that a flawed pitstop strategy had robbed him of victory.

For Button and fourth placed Sebastian Vettel, as well as race winner Alonso, their race results have put them back in the title chase after their failure to score in the previous round in Belgium. At that time we thought that the championship battle has become a two-horse race, but Lewis Hamilton's first lap crash and a relatively lacklustre run to sixth place for Mark Webber now means that the Formula One World Championship is back to five contenders.

For Webber, even leading the championship with 187 points to Hamilton's 182 was no consolation for a race which he sees as an opportunity missed. A messy start saw the Red Bull driver squeezed back from fourth to ninth on the first lap, before fighting his way back to an eventual sixth place after being locked for much of the race behind rookie Nico Hulkenberg in the closing stages.

"Obviously I lost a lot of time behind Hulkenberg," said Webber. "We could have capitalised and got more points, but we sniffed around just getting a few. You've got to make the most of opportunities, so this wasn't the best day."

Hamilton was furious with himself at the error which saw the McLaren wreck its steering against Felipe Massa's Ferrari on just the fourth corner of the race. He is well aware of its potential consequences, allegedly commenting to one journalist "that's how you lose championships".

"I was too close to Felipe and his left rear clipped my right front" said Hamilton. "There was nothing I could do; you try your best, but some things just don't go your way. Today was a shame, and I want to say sorry to the team. But the championship certainly isn't over - although I have to admit that days like today don't help."

Hamilton will no doubt be relieved that his closest title rival Webber didn't score more points. However the ‘great escape' of the race surely has to go to Sebastian Vettel. The German clearly thought that his race was over on the 20th lap when he reported an apparent loss of power on his Red Bull and as he slowed, he was overtaken by team-mate Webber.

The team's telemetry data showed however that the suspected engine failure was no more than a sticking brake pedal. Once the problem was identified Vettel gambled on an ultra-late, last lap, tyre stop to maintain track position and with it, a fourth place finish that puts him back in the championship running.

Jenson Button had also gambled. Using a higher-downforce specification than McLaren team-mate Hamilton, he was able to turn his front row starting position into the lead which he held for the first half of the race. It was lost though, through no fault of Button's when the McLaren team called him in for his tyre stop ahead of the pursuing Ferraris.

That decision left Button as bewildered as the rest of us, as the conventional wisdom is that a leading driver will normally wait for his pursuers to stop first, then adjust his strategy accordingly. Even McLaren boss Martin Whitmarsh later admitted that "the timing of pitstops is always an inexact science".

Alonso took the opportunity to set a storming lap, then stop a lap later before snatching the lead for Ferrari, while in third place Felipe Massa made the Italian fans' delight complete. Whether you are a Ferrari fan or not, the fact that five rivals will arrive in Singapore with the title race still in the balance, sets up a stupendous finale to the 2010 world championship. It just doesn't get better than this!

Some called it ‘The Great Escape' as Ferrari dodged further penalty in Paris. Now the big question is will Monza give Fernando Alonso the chance to close back in on the McLaren and Red Bull drivers who have locked out the top four places in the championship?

The decision announced by the FIA World Motorsport Council in Paris on Wednesday evening may not have been popular, but it was the logical and pragmatic one. Their investigation into Ferrari's ‘team orders' which gave Fernando Alonso his victory ahead of Felipe Massa in Germany in July, elected not to enter into a further debate over the details of the incident, which would have continued to discredit the sport with controversy for months and have been unlikely to unearth any new evidence.

Instead they simply agreed that the stewards had been right to fine Ferrari US $100,000 for the misdemeanour and decreed that Ferrari will have to handle all the legal costs for the hearing. Given the number of high-profile lawyers involved, it is doubtful that those fees will be much less than a million dollars.

FIA has also announced that it will review the regulation banning team orders. It is generally accepted up and down the paddock that the rule is unenforceable and that if Ferrari had been penalised further, it could have started a complex legal battle bringing in other teams, such as McLaren for their "save fuel" radio message, which was interpreted by many as a coded instruction to hold station behind Hamilton at their 1-2 in Turkey.

Meanwhile back to Monza and after the incident-packed 44 laps of Spa, it could be said that the number of contenders in the title race has fallen from five to just two.

Fernando Alonso's late race retirement after spinning out over the rain soaked kerbs has dropped him to the tail-end of the five drivers still with a chance of the title. At least Alonso's error was self-inflicted, unlike Jenson Button who was hit by Sebastian Vettel in a rash piece of late breaking that might have ended both those driver's 2010 title hopes.

Vettel now lies third and Button fourth in the championship with 151 and 147 points respectively, while Alonso's tally is 141. However the two lead title protagonists have now forged ahead, with Lewis Hamilton leading on 182 points and Mark Webber close behind on 179.

Ferrari's fiasco in Germany at least demonstrated to us that there is a clear team strategy of favouring Alonso in his bid for the title. If Red Bull and McLaren don't adopt similar tactics overtly or otherwise in the final races and their drivers split points between them, it could cost either team the championship.

Monza is always one of my favourite races of the season. It is Formula One's oldest and fastest circuit, with cars reaching speeds of more than 360kph and averaging more than 240kph a lap as they hurtle through the tree-lined park of one of Italy's old royal palaces. It has atmosphere by the ton.

Last year was a Brawn GP benefit, with Rubens Barrichello claiming victory ahead of eventual champion Button. Lewis Hamilton meanwhile crashed out on the last lap, in a typical no-holds-barred attempt to catch the leaders. Button's second place and Hamilton's shunt, effectively set up the order of the 2009 world championship.

McLaren clearly demonstrated their pace with Hamilton's win in Spa, while Red Bull surprised many, including me, with their speed against expectations. Ferrari's was a flawed race in Belgium, but I suspect both Alonso and Massa to be in contention this weekend.

Meanwhile Force India will hope their run of form from Belgium will hold at Monza. Last year the team was at its best on the two low-downforce tracks of Spa and Monza and with Sutil 5th and Liuzzi classified 10th, in Belgium, the portents look good for another strong run in Italy.

Although none of the top three drivers had a perfect race in a dramatic and incident-packed Belgian Grand Prix, they all kept their cool as others fell by the wayside. Hamilton, Webber and Kubica all overcame adversity to score well-deserved podium positions.

For Webber, achieving pole position was in itself a stunning overturning of the formbook, which had favoured McLaren and Ferrari. The Australian was lucky to be in the right place at the right time to set his qualifying lap.

A lap later, his rivals all hit rain at La Source Hairpin. It was also notable that Vettel admitted to a mistake on his one lap while the track was still dry. Had it not been for that he might have done better than fourth.

All that though, was negated. Webber's Red Bull's engine revs died just as the Aussie fed in the clutch.

"The start was a mess" said Mark, "Fortunately I was able to overtake a few guys on the first few laps and get some positions back. To get second place was a good result."

Likewise, for Robert Kubica, it was far from an easy race. He too beat the formbook by qualifying third in his Renault, then took advantage of Webber's slow start to hold second place for much of the race. However an error in the pitlane dropped him back to third.

"As I came into the pit lane, I told myself to take it easy because it was so slippery, but there were a number of controls I had to change on the steering wheel" said Kubica. "I was distracted. I locked up the front wheels and collided with some of the mechanics - fortunately without hurting anybody. That cost me one position, but it was a race in which mistakes were very easy to make, so we can be happy that I maintained my position from the start."

Even race winner Lewis Hamilton admitted to a late scare. His McLaren ran wide and brushed the barriers at Les Combes corner, before rejoining the track still in the lead.

"At the start, I was able to pace myself and maintain the gap" said Hamilton. "Then, when the conditions changed, I had a wide moment at Turn Eight - and I was on the edge of my seat! I was so relieved to cross the line at the end of the race - it was an overwhelming feeling! It almost feels like this is my first win - it's just phenomenal!"

In contrast however, three of the five World Championship contenders now must reassess their hopes after disastrous races. Jenson Button almost certainly has now lost his chance of keeping his title, through no fault of his own.

"As everyone knows, I had an incident with Sebastian Vettel" said Button. " All I know is I suddenly felt a big bang in the sidepod, which ripped the radiator out. Clearly, he didn't do it on purpose, and I gather he's now apologised, but I have to say I've got no idea what he was doing."

Vettel's clash with Button led first to a pitstop for repairs, then a drive-through penalty for causing the collision. He now faces spending the rest of the season merely being a supporting act to the likely battle between Hamilton and Webber for the title.

Meanwhile Ferrari's top challenger Fernando Alonso was first punted out of contention by Rubens Barrichello, a sad end to the Brazilian's record-setting 300th GP, but Alonso alone was responsible for his own demise. His spin over a damp kerb in the race's closing stages, left Massa upholding the Scuderia's honours with fourth place.

The Italian team will of course be hoping for better results in their home Italian GP in two weeks time. Meanwhile Force India will hope their run of form will hold at Monza. With Sutil 5th and Liuzzi classified 10th, their result was a rare ray of sunshine at a soggy Spa.

Mark Webber will arrive at the Belgian Grand Prix with a slender four point advantage over Lewis Hamilton in the World Driver's Championship. However I am prepared to wager that by the end of this coming weekend, he may not still be championship leader.

Both the formbook and the particular characteristics of Spa Francorchamps, the longest lap on the F1 calendar, point to Ferrari or McLaren coming out on top.

If Webber does remain at the top of the leaderboard, he and Red Bull will thoroughly justify the world champions title. It will also be because of one or more of three things.

One, that the Australian has driven a stunning race. Two, that Adrian Newey has developed a Red Bull car that is just as strong on the long straights as its silver and scarlet rivals and, three, either Ferrari or McLaren have missed a golden opportunity to forge ahead.

In recent races the big strength of the Red Bull car has been its ability to generate exceptional downforce and cornering speeds on long sweeping curves. However at Spa, the majority of the track is made up of long straights, short ultra-fast corners and tight slower turns. In other words this is a track which does not play to the Red Bull's strengths.

Ferrari's performance at Hockenheim indicates that they will be the team to beat. Fernando Alonso's victory ahead of team-mate Massa may have raised the spectre of team orders, but the 1-2 victory was an impressive testament to the Ferrari teams aerodynamic development programme.

Past history also hints that the Prancing Horses could be stepping out in style this weekend. Ferrari and McLaren both have dominated at Spa in recent years, with no other team having won at the track since 1998, but Ferrari has won all the last three Belgian Grand Prix.

That Ferrari tally of course includes Felipe Massa's controversial win in 2008. The stewards handed the Brazilian victory after penalising Lewis Hamilton for jumping the chicane in a dramatic final lap melee after rain showers drenched the track.

Ferrari took victory more conventionally last year when Kimi Raikkonen won his final Grand Prix before leaving the sport for rallying. Currently the tally for the last nine races stands at five for Ferrari and four for McLaren.

So could McLaren redress the balance and come out ahead of Ferrari? The British team have struggled for mid season form, with handling problems stemming from a rushed development of an exhaust-blown diffuser.

The team hasn't won a race since Hamilton triumphed in Canada in June and reigning world champion Jenson Button last won in Malaysia in April. In Hungary the team reached what it hopes will be its nadir, Button started eleventh and finished eighth, while Hamilton failed to finish at all due to a gearbox problem.

However McLaren has more experience than any other team with the F-Duct, which will direct air onto the rear wing, stalling it and reducing drag on the long Kemmel straight. While almost every other team in the paddock has now copied the technology, McLaren seem to make it work better than anyone else and the straight line speed advantage it gives could be a winner.

Spa though, is a track which always springs a surprise. Last year it was the unexpected pace of the Force India cars, which allowed Giancarlo Fisichella to claim the team's maiden pole position, then chase Raikkonen's Ferrari all the way to the chequered flag.

Sadly I cannot see Force India repeating that this year, but if the fickle mountain climate of the Ardennes brings rain, watch out for Rubens Barrichello. The Brazilian will this weekend become the first driver in F1 history to start his 300th Grand Prix and, acknowledged as a wet weather ace, could just celebrate by giving Williams a points-scoring or even a podium finish.

The Australian's victory in the Hungarian Grand Prix could be deemed by some as fortuitous, but Mark Webber simply didn't put a wheel wrong. Red Bull also demonstrated the value of team-work, rather than team orders.

Even after the stewards penalised Vettel for his too-tardy restart behind the safety car, it was the perfect way for Red Bull racing to celebrate their 100th Grand Prix. That it was also Webber's 150th GP start was the icing on the cake.

Second to team-mate Vettel in qualifying, Webber had lined up on the inside of the front row of the starting grid. He was therefore on the ‘dirty' side of the track where the dust and tyre debris isn't cleaned by the passage of cars on the racing line and thus had to slot into third place behind Vettel and the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso.

Locked behind the scarlet car on the twisting track, it seemed that Webber's weekend would end with a frustrating drive to third place. Then on lap 15 the yellow flags and safety car boards came out as a result of Tonio Liuzzi's Force India shedding a large chunk of front wing.

As almost the entire field dived for the pitlane for their compulsory tyre change, Webber and race engineer Ciaron Pilbeam hatched a cunning plan. In some other forms of racing such as NASCAR, they have a word for the driver who stays out behind a safety car as the rest of the field makes for the pits.

They call it the ‘sucker hole', but Webber and his crew planned that if they stretch their soft-compound tyres past half distance, they might have a chance of pitting and rejoining ahead of Alonso.

For Webber's strategy to work, it also needed team-mate Vettel to play his part. The German, now second on the road after making his tyre stop during the safety car period, was I am sure told that he had to delay the rest of the field while Webber set a series of flying laps to give him time to make his pitstop.

Sebastian later blamed his penalty on being ‘asleep' as the safety car came into the pit lane. I see it differently.

I am sure that Vettel was determined to hold the field while Webber made a smart getaway. Sebastian though unwittingly broke the rule that a car should not be more than 10 car lengths behind Webber, leading to the furious German receiving a drive-through penalty which dropped him back to third place behind Alonso's Ferrari.

Webber meanwhile was required to deliver more than 20 laps at near-qualifying speed to allow him to make his pit stop without losing his lead to Alonso. That he achieved it in style is the best possible endorsement both for Webber and the Red Bull team.

Meanwhile McLaren were all at sea with a car whose choppy ride did little to help its lack of aerodynamic downforce. While Button struggled home in 8th, Hamilton scored no points and lost his championship lead with a rare gearbox failure.

However, all the front runners were lucky to get in and out of Hungaroring's crowded pitlane intact. The mayhem that ensued when the Renault ‘lollipop man' released Robert Kubica into the path of Force India's Adrian Sutil, was only matched by Nico Rosberg's low-flying rear wheel.

It was relief that there were no serious injuries in either incident. However Michael Schumacher took the crown in terms of danger. His attempts to defend tenth place from Rubens Barrichello were a delight, until he attempted to drive the Brazilian into the pit wall at maximum speed.

It was cold-blooded, stupid and could have had fatal consequences to both drivers and spectators. Forget disappointing race results, if Schumacher wants to ruin his reputation, he went about it precisely the right way in Hungary.

The Ferrari team will no doubt brace themselves for a stormy reception from media and fans alike this weekend in Hungary. However as in Germany, the weather forecast looks bleak too, with heavy rain showers set for the early part of weekend although there is a lesser likelihood of rain for the race on Sunday.

Many teams in Hockenheim found the bad weather early in the weekend had knock-on effects in the race itself. Both the Petronas Mercedes team and Force India blamed their respective lacklustre performances on an absence of dry-weather track time to allow them to test new developments.

Both teams had brought components including new rear wings and exhaust-blown diffusers to the German race. However the rain-soaked track on Friday and Saturday morning meant that the first time the components were properly tested was in qualifying itself.

In Force India's case things then got even worse when Tonio Liuzzi wrecked his car at the start of qualifying. Not only did that mean he was denied the chance to improve his grid position, but the team was also robbed of feedback from his car to further aid fine-tuning of their cars.

The frustrations were obvious in the Petronas Mercedes camp too, with Michael Schumacher bemoaning the lack of in-season testing that would otherwise have allowed his team to develop their chassis. The seven-times world champion was left fuming as he struggled with the balance of the Mercedes chassis through the weekend.

"It is completely ridiculous to do zero testing" Schumacher told journalists. "Some kind of testing should be implemented. I hope there is common sense and we find a solution.

"With no testing it's tough to fight your way through the development. As a consequence here and there you have some issues. I understand why we have ended up where we are right now, but as it was ridiculous to do 90,000 kilometres of testing during the year of testing, but it is completely ridiculous to do zero."

Even McLaren were forced to admit that the lack of dry track running on their blown diffuser arrangements meant they hadn't been able to fully optimise their cars. Hamilton and Button were clearly a class below the Red Bulls and Ferraris although their resilience paid off with a clutch of championship points that keeps them at the top of the standings.

This weekend, McLaren return to a slow-speed track which may better suit the traction characteristics of their cars. In total, McLaren have won nine Hungarian GPs, including the last three years in succession.

However the track is probably closest to Monaco in its characteristics, with most of its fifteen corners taken in second or third gear and an average lap speed of under 200kph. History records that McLaren were beaten into fifth place in Monaco this year, behind a Red Bull 1-2, a gritty drive to third by Robert Kubica in the Renault and Felipe Massa in his Ferrari.

But for Fernando Alonso's practice accident meaning he failed to start qualifying in Monaco, I have little doubt that he too would have challenged Webber and Vettel in the Principality. That would therefore point to a continuation of a Red Bull and Ferrari battle again this weekend.

Which finally brings us to Ferrari and their controversial 1-2 in Germany. There is little to be added to the debate on the ethics or otherwise of the ‘request' for Massa to allow Alonso to pass him for the lead. Nor would I think it right to penalize either driver.

Alonso personally did nothing wrong and Massa surely is as much sinned against as the sinner. Ferrari do need though to look beyond mere championship points and ask themselves whether their cold cynical decision by senior race management robbed them and their sponsors of precisely the goodwill that they have gone racing and spent millions of dollars to cultivate.

In the aftermath of the German Grand Prix, Ferrari fans should be celebrating a sparkling return to form and a 1-2 for Alonso and Massa. Instead the sport is again reeling over allegations of race-fixing or team orders.

Race officials in Hockenheim may have fined the Scuderia US$100,000 for having broken the rules, but the damage to Ferrari's reputation is inestimable.

Of course the Scuderia are not alone in scoring PR own-goals. Mark Webber's infamous Silverstone quote of "Not bad for a number two driver" sprung to mind when Felipe Massa received the second place trophy from the dignitaries on the podium.

Webber's public fury at parts being taken from his Red Bull at Silverstone to boost the chances of "team mate" Vettel pales into insignificance, to the Ferrari team management's cynical disregard of the rules regarding team orders in Germany. One should understand Ferrari's logic however.

Alonso, fifth in the championship behind the Red Bull and McLaren drivers, represents the team's best chance of winning the title. Massa, 8th, simply doesn't.

Add in the fact that while Massa had taken advantage of a lightning start to take the lead, Alonso was faster.... and Sebastian Vettel was closing in.

A few laps previously, Alonso had attacked Massa as he attempted to get heat into his new, harder-compound tyres after his pit stop. The Spaniard was clearly lining up to attack again.

No doubt mindful of what happened when Vettel and Webber got together in Turkey, someone on the Ferrari pitwall gave the instruction to let Alonso through. It probably robbed all of us of a great battle for the lead. It was certainly a PR disaster.

That instruction will have come from either team principal Stefano Domenicali or team manager Massimo Rivola. It was certainly not well received by Massa's English race engineer Rob Smedley.

His disgust came through loud and clear in his minimally coded instruction to Massa. Just in case the world did not get the hint, he also rubbed it in with an apology to Massa after Alonso had taken the lead.

Depending on where you stand, those comments either point to indiscipline or integrity. I favour the latter. Among the sportsmen in F1 whom I rate for integrity, there is little doubt that Rob Smedley would be among the top among them.

However, just as if Webber hadn't made his comments at Silverstone, no-one would have known or cared about his front wing, he won anyway, Rob Smedley's radio conversation with Massa publicly highlighted an issue which would otherwise at worst have been the stuff of rumour. The one thing Ferrari does not need at this stage of the season is indiscipline in the ranks.

The ultimate irony is that this incident came exactly a year to the day that Massa suffered his potentially career-ending injury in qualifying for the 2009 Hungarian Grand Prix.

Then the Ferrari family closed around the Brazilian, ensuring that he had the best possible chance of returning to winning form with the Scuderia. It is sad that short-term championship contingency spoiled a possible dream win that would have enhanced Ferrari's reputation far more than mere championship points.

Meanwhile further proof that contingency overshadows loyalty was, provided by Hispania Racing's decision to again split the balanced partnership of Bruno Senna and Karun Chandhok, in favour of Sakon Yamamoto.

No disrespect to the affable Japanese driver, but he as well as everyone else, knows that he is on the grid (a second a lap slower than even his team mates) more due to the estimated $5 million he has brought to the team, than to his lap times.

The good news is that Karun has already made his mark. Paddock rumour is linking Chandhok's name to not just Force India, but to Lotus, Sauber and even Williams for 2011. It must be nice to be wanted!

The European summer weather is expected to hit the Hockenheim with a Wagnerian thunderstorm or two as a prelude to the German Grand Prix. Even if it should clear in time for the race itself, there is often a sultry atmosphere about the paddock around this time of year.

The beginning of August is the time that speculation usually begins on "who goes where" for the forthcoming season. However this year it is more a case of "is anybody moving at all?"

All the top teams' line-ups will look remarkably familiar for the 2011 season. McLaren are sticking with Button and Hamilton, Ferrari have firm contracts with Alonso and Massa, likewise Mercedes with Schumacher and Rosberg.

Assuming that the Red Bull duo of Vettel and Webber get to the end of the season without murdering one another, one can assume that they too will be back next season. It leaves a stalemate in driver line-ups.

In seasons gone by, with in-season testing, the role of third driver was much more high profile. It was an accepted career route for an upcoming driver such as Fernando Alonso to race for a season in a team further down the grid (in his case Minardi), then become a test driver with a front-running team (Renault) before graduating to the race seat.

Now the lack of on-track testing means that "third drivers" spend their time driving high-tech simulators rather than sitting in a racing car. It is not just rookies. Driver's careers seem to be stalling too when they want to move up from mid-field teams.

Force India's Adrian Sutil is perhaps the prime example. The talented German would normally be looking beyond his existing team at this stage of his career, but at the moment his only option would seem to be alongside Robert Kubica at Renault.

The Renault team is clearly strong, but there is a feeling that their car development would be better served by someone like Sutil's experience despite Vitaly Petrov proving one of the best of the rookies. However Sutil might just be better off staying where he is.

Petrov's predicament is the same as all the new drivers. They are being squeezed by the experience of older figures above, and the pace and budgets of new arrivals below.

A seemingly rotating door at Hispania Racing has seen both Bruno Senna and Karun Chandhok heading in and out, to make way for Sakon Yamamoto. He is reported to be paying the team US$ 2.4 million per race for the privilege. At this rate watch out for the team offering a seat on e-bay!

Chandhok is in the difficult position of having been offered the seat as much on merit as on the size of his budget. Surely his being sidelined is simply wrong for the sport, maybe it is time to look at moving on.

The logical tie up for Chandhok would be with Force India. They may be looking to replace Tonio Liuzzi whose erratic performance has failed to match Sutil's this season. Of course, Force India's decision will rest with Dr Mallya, but as an alternative if I were Chandhok I would beat a path to Lotus Racing, ideally arriving ahead of HRT team-mate Senna!

The team is the best of the new operations and there is a possibility that Jarno Trulli might hang up his helmet at the end of 2010. If so, Lotus might just be the place to be.

Meanwhile we can look forward to a repeat of the battle between Red Bull and McLaren this weekend and most likely a continuation of the conflict between Webber and Vettel.

Webber won the race in 2009, his maiden F1 victory. Last year Vettel finished second and was philosophical about being beaten by his team-mate. Now I suspect Sebastian has other ideas!

The British aren't normally used to high temperatures, so in the 35+ degree heat it was not too surprising that the medical services at Silverstone reported treating hundreds of race fans for the effects of sunburn and sunstroke.

It seemed too, that a few decision makers on the pitwall also suffered from too much sun. Red Bull Racing came perilously close to snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

The debacle of their removing a ‘trick' front wing from Mark Webber's car ahead of qualifying and using it to replace a damaged one on Vettel's, smacks both of favouritism and, not for the first time this season, bad management at Red Bull.

Actually I can understand that, despite Webber's undoubted talent, the team might wish to favour Vettel. For Webber, this season and possibly next, may be his last chances of winning the title. Then he'll be headed for retirement.

The young German clearly represents the future and it is only a matter of when, rather than if, he becomes World Champion. ....And Red Bull wants to make sure he is still in their car.

Mark was clearly furious about the internal politics ahead of the race, but come the start he did what he does best and let his driving do the talking. The Aussie didn't ever put a wheel out of line in every one of the 52 laps at Silverstone.

It was a masterful performance and a thoroughly deserved victory - and he made his point to all with his "not bad for the number two driver" comment on the slowing down lap.

Vettel meanwhile showed a mercurial mixture of brilliance and blunder through the whole race weekend. His final qualifying lap (new wing or not) was stunning on Saturday, even if his performance in the post qualifying media scrum was less so.

His attempt to explain that the reason for his having a different front wing to Webber was because "some men prefer blondes, others brunettes" didn't cut any ice with the media pack. Come on Sebastian pull the other one!

Vettel's race start was as disastrous as Webber's was perfect. Beaten by his team-mate off the line, he tried an ill-advised lunge to pin Webber against the pitwall into Copse Corner, so he shouldn't have been too surprised went at the exit of the turn his team-mate eased him onto the grass.

Sebastian was unlucky to suffer a puncture, but it gave him the opportunity to thrill us all with a brilliant comeback drive from 24th and last, to finally win a slugging match with Force India's Adrian Sutil for 7th place.

Another driver who was forced to attempt a fight back was Ferrari's Fernando Alonso, who was forced into an unintentional shortcut at Club Corner when battling for fourth place with Renault's Robert Kubica. The rules in such a situation are clear cut, no matter why the shortcut is taken, if a place is gained it has to be given back.

Why Ferrari didn't immediately get Alonso to back off is a mystery. Instead they tried to debate the issue with the FIA Stewards, who ultimately gave the Spaniard a drive-through penalty.

The Ferrari strategy backfired even further when a safety car took to the track to allow debris to be cleared. It meant Alonso was forced to fight from 18th place. He finished just ahead of equally troubled team-mate Massa in 14th.

Meanwhile McLaren demonstrated how to keep clear heads in the Silverstone sun. Hamilton's heroic 4th place qualifying lap had come despite serious handling issues which left their cars riding the bumps like a bucking bronco and had Button starting 14th.

Yet come the race, some neat fine tuning, cool strategies and gritty driving saw the two British drivers finish in second and fourth places, flanking the Mercedes of Nico Rosberg and keeping the two McLaren drivers 1-2 in the championship.

Every driver dreams of Formula One's holy trinity. Pole position, fastest lap and victory all in a single race, but few ever achieve it.

A year ago at Silverstone, for the first time in his career Sebastian Vettel did just that. He dominated last year's British Grand Prix weekend with the top spot in each area and with team-mate Mark Webber, led home a Red Bull Racing 1-2 which marked the end of the Brawn GP stranglehold of the 2009 championship.

Two weekends ago Vettel came close to doing it again with an equally emphatic victory from pole position in Valencia, as Webber stole the headlines with one of the most spectacular accidents in recent F1 history. Only a flying lap in the closing stages of the race by Jenson Button robbed Vettel of another German hat-trick.

Whatever happens in Sunday's World Cup final, which is being relayed live to Silverstone's big screens after the race, the capacity crowd of British fans may be forgiven for not looking forward to a German race winner.

The popular mood of the moment is to eradicate the disappointment of England's soccer defeat with a home win for either Lewis Hamilton or Jenson Button. If comes at the expense of a German driver, so much the better. Wembley, 1966 and all that.

Whether that can be achieved may hinge on the success of upgrades which the McLaren team will unveil at Silverstone. While this year a revised track layout, adds a series of sweeping curves across the former infield, followed by a hairpin bend at the Arena, what has not changed is the super-fast nature of the track. It places an emphasis on aerodynamic downforce combined with straight line speed - and the ‘blown diffuser' could be the key.

McLaren are following the lead set by Red Bull with a system which blows exhaust gases onto the rear diffuser, pressurising the low mounted airfoil between the rear wheels and adding to its downforce, which in turn aids traction and cornering.

When the ‘blown diffuser' is working well as on Red Bull, the results speak for themselves. However it can be fickle, with the level of grip varying dramatically with the throttle position.

McLaren though are confident that they have done their homework, so perhaps Hamilton and Button will give the British fans something to cheer. Hamilton in particular comes to Silverstone with the best possible credentials.

In 2006, driving at Silverstone in the GP2 championship, Hamilton became the first driver in the series to win both back-to-back "double header" races in the same weekend. In his F1 rookie year of 2007, he claimed pole position before finishing third behind Raikkonen and Alonso. Lewis dominated the race in 2008 on a rain-soaked track, perhaps the best win of the six he scored on his way to the champion's title.
However Hamilton and McLaren are not infallible. Last year his McLaren was thoroughly trounced. As Vettel celebrated victory, Hamilton finished a disgruntled 16th, a lap down.
However, the true Silverstone home heroes are perhaps less obvious. The Force India team is based right on the doorstep, opposite the track entrance and while Button and Hamilton will jet into the UK from their respective tax havens of Monaco and Switzerland, the F1 driver who actually lives closest to the track is none other than Karun Chandhok.
The Indian racer lives in the small market town of Brackley, within earshot of the track. Today when Karun isn't heading for some more distant venue, an Indian restaurant opposite his house now features a range of Chandhok's southern Indian favourites on its menu, supervised by the driver himself.

As a result it is now a regular host to round-table gatherings which read like a Who's Who from the sport. So forget Button or Hamilton. If you want to cheer for a true hometown hero at Silverstone, Karun's your man!

It wasn't quite as bad a howler as Uruguayan referee Jorge Larrionda and his officials somehow missing Frank Lampard's goal, but the FIA stewards' team in Valencia certainly didn't cover themselves in glory.

In fact the decisions, when they made them, were actually spot-on. It is just that it seemed to take them forever to make up their minds.

The results of their final rounds of decisions only appeared at 7 o'clock on the evening of the European Grand Prix by which time most sensible people were enjoying local tapas. Perhaps an F1 equivalent to the Wimbledon tennis hawkeye is in order.

As Sebastian Vettel converted his pole position into a flawless victory, the round of FIA dithering began when Red Bull team-mate Mark Webber amazingly walked away from a spectacular accident. He had slipped from second on the grid to ninth place after a poor start, then made an early pit stop in the hope of using the strategy to work back up the order later in the race.

That dropped him to the tail of the field, where he was fighting his way back past the slower cars of the ‘newbie' teams, HRT, Virgin and Lotus. It seems that the Australian simply misjudged the earlier braking of Heikki Kovalainen's car and made heavy contact, flipping the Red Bull into a complete somersault before, still travelling at 200 km/h, it slammed head-on into a tyre barrier protecting the hard concrete wall surrounding the track.

The strength of the Red Bull's chassis thankfully ensured Mark was able to simply climb out of the car and walk away, but the deployment of the safety car created chaos as drivers attempted to head for the pitlane and an early tyre stop.

Lewis Hamilton in second and race leader Vettel were the only two drivers to gain an advantage by being on the track ahead of the safety car when it was deployed. It meant that they were able to gain time before make their tyre stop before taking their places behind the safety car.

However after a lengthy eighteen-lap delay, the stewards announced that Hamilton would serve a drive-through penalty for havingpassed the pace car as it left the pitlane. It was a close-run thing, but a fair decision.

However the gap Hamilton opened while the stewards deliberated over their decision, meant that the penalty once given, was meaningless. When Hamilton took his drive-through penalty on the 27th lap, he was able to get back out again before the third-placed Japanese driver Kamui Kobayashi.

Kobayashi had moved up as a result of staying on track while all around him made an early tyre stop. It was a clever strategy from the Sauber team, but the source of frustration for those who trailed in his wake and it highlighted the paucity of overtaking opportunities at the Valencia track.

The ponderous decision making by the stewards went on. Just before the chequered flag, some 45 laps after the original incident, they informed all concerned that that Button, Barrichello, Hulkenberg, Kubica, Petrov, Sutil, Liuzzi, Buemi and De la Rosa were all to be investigated for the speed of their laps behind the safety car following Webber's accident.

Ultimately it was announced that all nine drivers had five seconds added to their final race time for speeding. In addition Timo Glock had 20 seconds added to his race time for ignoring blue flags, meaning that Fernando Alonso moved up a place to eighth, Buemi dropped to ninth and Nico Rosberg moved up to tenth at the expense of De la Rosa. The decisions were fair and clear cut, so what took the stewards so long?

Not that this should detract from Sebastian Vettel's stunning victory. It took many, including me by surprise, as the Red Bull cars showed unexpected pace on what was expected to be one of their bogey tracks. It raises the question of what will come next, when the team gets to tracks such as Silverstone and Hockenheim which are expected to favour their cars!

The third running of the Grand Prix of Europe in Valencia this weekend raises the question of just what really constitutes a street circuit.

It sounds obvious but a real street circuit uses the same roads used by you or me, as we go about our daily business. That makes the resulting race tracks bumpy, cramped and unforgiving. Sadly I don't believe the Valencia track really cuts it. It isn't really a street circuit.

It is not alone. In this year's Formula One World Championship there are officially six tracks that make the claim of being street circuits. In reality four of these are ‘wannabees' and only two, Monaco and Singapore, properly live up to the billing.

Albert Park in Melbourne is, as its name suggests, a park. We don't as a rule drive our road cars around a park.

A road around a park isn't a street. Therefore great though Albert Park is - it's not really a street circuit.

The same can be said for the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. A great track and it gave us a brilliant Canadian GP, but its roads simply don't lead anywhere. The track is on a one kilometre island in the middle of the St Lawrence River. Nice try Canada, but no.

Valencia, along with Abu Dhabi, is created around a vast newly-built yacht marina, in this case originally devised to host the America's Cup. Worse still its outlook presents TV viewers and visitors with vistas of industrial suburbs and container parks. Monaco it ain't!

Even though Valencia may be wide of the mark in terms of purity and atmosphere, it doesn't mean though that we can expect a dull race. On the contrary, as in Canada we can expect a battle royal between the McLaren and Red Bull Racing teams, with Lewis Hamilton perhaps as the favourite.

The Briton has finished second in both previous races and neither of the drivers who beat him have the machinery to do so again. 2009 race winner for Brawn, Rubens Barrichello is comprehensively outgunned in his Williams Cosworth. In fact he'll be lucky to make the top ten in a car that hates this kind of track.

In 2008, Felipe Massa was at his stunning best when he brushed the concrete walls with his Ferrari on his way to a devastating pole position. It was followed by an equally emphatic victory.

This year, I am not sure whether Massa is still suffering the effects of his Hungaroring accident, but he has been lacklustre so far in comparison with his Ferrari team-mate Alonso. I would love to see Massa return to his 2008 form in Valencia, but I just don't see it happening.

Ferrari fans can certainly look to Fernando Alonso to give everything in what is a home race for him. However although Ferrari is improving, their car is still no match for the Red Bull or McLaren opposition.

Alonso's attempts will be interesting to watch though, but I suspect that the top four places will be dominated by the usual suspects. Button and Hamilton, Webber and Vettel - you pick the order!

With aspirations of a potential first podium, Force India could however spring a surprise. Canada, along with Monaco, was the second race in which the team got both their cars into the championship points and they certainly could repeat the feat again in Spain.

With the team making it clear that they want to retain Adrian Sutil for another season, Tonio Liuzzi is under pressure to maintain a more consistent form. The rumour mill is increasingly linking Karun Chandhok with a potential seat in 2011.

Such a deal in the lead up to the 2011 Indian Grand Prix has been described as a ‘no brainer' for Force India from a publicity point of view. I suspect though that Dr Mallya will, as indeed will HRT driver Chandhok, be keeping his focus firmly on the Valencia track this weekend.

It is two years since the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal last hosted a Formula One Grand Prix. Welcome back, to a race seemingly always packed with drama and incident.

This weekend the initial focus of attention will be less on the cars, but on the body language of the Red Bull Racing drivers. Quite simply after the "Istan-Bulls-Up", the team faces the biggest challenge of its five year history.

Their car is the class of the field - a Red Bull has been on the front row of the starting grid for every Grand Prix this season - and their two drivers are proven race-winners and championship contenders. Yet if their run of success is to continue, they need to reassert discipline across the entire team.

The debates will rage for months over Webber and Vettel's respective actions. But the outbursts by Red Bull Racing driver development manager Dr. Helmut Markko inflamed rather than defused the pressures in the Istanbul paddock and undermined the authority of team principal Christian Horner.

That Markko blamed Webber for the incident and took sides with Vettel isn't too surprising. Markko was the man who ‘discovered' Vettel and with the aid of Red Bull funding, assisted him into Formula One.

Frankly, having supervised the spending of millions of dollars of Red Bull money on funding a series of young drivers who largely failed to make it at the top level, Vettel's success has probably kept Markko in a job. The term ‘meal ticket' springs to mind.

Markko's comments demonstrate the most dangerous fall-out that could come from the Istanbul incident; the creation of factions within the team. Remember Alonso and Hamilton at McLaren in 2007? Their animosity created a rift which tore the team apart.

It could, heaven forbid, be even be worse. The name of the circuit which hosts this weekend's Canadian Grand Prix reminds us of a chilling warning from history.

In 1982 Gilles Villeneuve felt that team-mate Didier Pironi had tricked him out of victory by reneging on a pre-race agreement and diving past as he was cruising to a Ferrari 1-2 in the San Marino Grand Prix.

The Ferrari drivers' rivalry became a bitter feud. In qualifying for the next race, on a wet track at Zolder in Belgium, the pair were 1-2 on the grid, but Villeneuve set out on one final lap, determined to outqualify Pironi at all costs. In blinding spray, the Ferrari hit a slower car and Villeneuve died.

This weekend, the phenomenal speed of the McLarens may prove critical to beating the Red Bulls on Montreal's long straights. McLaren precedents certainly look good. Hamilton scored his maiden victory here in 2007 and before retiring after tailgating Kimi Raikkonen in the pitlane (oops!) in 2008, he had dominated the race from pole position.

Expect an equally close-fought battle between Mercedes GP, Renault and Ferrari for the next slots. Their cars don't seem to quite have the aerodynamic refinement of the front-runners, but their battle will be no less intriguing.

Force India seem destined to battle at the tail of the top ten and there are rumours of frustration within the team at the performance of Vitantonio Liuzzi. If the Italian were to be dropped, who would be in?

Team test-driver Paul di Resta lacks race experience, so how about Karun Chandhok, who now has plenty of race practice, but is wasted in the uncompetitive HRT car? The rumour-mill is increasingly hinting that Karun might be given the chance. I personally hope so, an Indian in a Force India car would dominate the headlines across the subcontinent and may prove just the fillip Force India needs!

It is easy to dismiss Lewis Hamilton's first race victory of the 2010 season as simply good luck. However, as Formula One regularly demonstrates, you make your own luck, good or bad. Just ask Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber.

At the start of the Turkish Grand Prix, we could be forgiven for making three assumptions. As the track basked in baking sun, we could be sure it wouldn't rain and as it is a modern Herman Tilke-designed track, that there wouldn't be much overtaking.

Finally, based on their domination of the last two races, the race would be a Red Bull benefit. Superbly, we were proved wrong on every point!

Right from the start we were treated to some of the best F1 action of the season. Michael Schumacher coupled revs, clutch bite and traction superbly to blast alongside fourth placed Jenson Button into the first corner.

Likewise ahead of them Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton jostled for position, while down the order Fernando Alonso began what would turn into a race-long battle with the Force India of Adrian Sutil and the Renault of Russian rookie Vitaly Petrov. Further back Bruno Senna was locked in combat with Timo Glock. There was action everywhere you looked in the field.

Of course though, the prime focus post-race will be on the four cars that for 39 of the 58 laps of the Istanbul Otodrom, occupied the top four places. More specifically the spotlight on the two Red Bull drivers who contrived to throw away what looked to be a secure 1-2 victory.

As Webber opened a gap of five seconds or more in the early stages of the race, it looked as if the die was cast. A slow pit stop had dropped Hamilton behind Vettel, but any prediction of a Red Bull 1-2 was set to be proved as inaccurate as the 'will it/won't it' weather forecasts as a rain shower skirted the track.

At the start of lap 40, it now seems that Webber had been instructed by his engineer to reprogram his engine management to save fuel. That in turn meant a slightly slower speed on the back straight to the final sequence of corners.

Behind him Vettel, who had conserved his fuel running in Webber's slipstream, seized his chance. As Red Bull team boss Christian Horner later explained, it was probably the young German's only chance of victory.

"He had managed to save an extra kilogramme of fuel" Horner told Autosport magazine. "Effectively he had one more lap of the optimum engine mode, but we couldn't back him off because he was under pressure from Lewis Hamilton behind."

The rest, as they say, is history. But who was to blame?  

Vettel must bear a significant proportion of the blame. Whatever his feelings, at the end of the day, the basic responsibility of any driver overtaking another is to carry out the manoeuvre safely. Vettel certainly didn't to that!

Horner said that he did not feel either driver was any more responsible than the other for the crash - but he was clearly disappointed they had not given each other enough room.

"I think Mark gave Sebastian just enough room and Sebastian came across obviously quite aggressively - but he was quite a long way down the side."

Adding to the Red Bull team's frustration, as Webber rejoined in a distant third after fitting a new nose, we were treated to the sight of the McLarens racing each other, cleanly, on their way to their 1-2 finish.

"It was like watching the action on widescreen TV" joked Hamilton on the Red Bulls. Then he turned serious. "We're allowed to race out there, but we have to be sensible. That's the great thing about racing with Jenson. We know we have that respect for each other, so we don't really have a problem with it."

Based on past evidence, we should be able to safely predict that one or both Red Bull drivers will be standing on the podium on Sunday afternoon. Certainly those in charge of the victory celebrations will have made sure that 'Advance Australia Fair', or 'Deutschland Uber Alles' are at the top of the list of national anthems.

Just I am pretty confident that the arid heat of the Turkish summer will make the race a painfully hot and dry affair, equally I am sure that Red Bull's pace will be hard to match on the Istanbul Otodrom's long fast corners.

The 2009 race marked the point when Red Bull's latent form began to turn into results. The team then headed into Vettel's win at Silverstone and Webber's maiden victory at the Nurburgring.

Last year the Red Bulls were the only 'normal' cars to match the pace of Jenson Button's race-winning 'super-diffuser' Brawn. Webber's second place and Vettel's third made them the only cars in the top five not using the trick aerodynamic aid, with the other places being taken by the similarly-kitted Toyota of Jarno Trulli and Williams of Nico Rosberg.

Red Bull's design continues to have the balance of high aerodynamic downforce against straight-line speed, something which this Herman Tilke-designed track favours. Normally mention of the German track designer's name makes people groan in anticipation of a dull race. This track though is different.

The anti-clockwise circuit unashamedly copies some of the great corners at other tracks in the world. The first three corners are similar to the Senna-S combination at Interlagos. However the double apex left hander at Turn 8 stands alone as one of the most challenging corners in the world.

Drivers and their machinery strain against a sustained left hand cornering load of over 4G, flat-out at over 320 km/h. Because Turn 8 is such a long, fast corner, if you don't get the line exactly right you get bounced off the circuit. The tyres, in particular the right front tyre, have to be hard enough to cope with that corner but still have to compromise for the generally low grip of the asphalt.

As you can imagine, that means that both reliability and driver finesse is as important as pure speed in Turkey. The former could be good news for Red Bull's rivals as mechanical issues, particularly for Vettel, have compromised three of his races so far this season.

Equally the need to preserve that right front tyre may work against Vettel's more aggressive driving style. Mark Webber has so often proved in similar conditions that his silky smooth approach prolongs tyre life and allows more flexible pit stop options.

In Turkey last year, despite Vettel claiming pole position, an early fumble allowed Button and Webber through. As the frustrated Vettel counter-attacked, he wore his tyres so hard that he needed a third pit stop to the others' two and had to be happy with the final podium place.

It is the same in other teams. McLaren and Hamilton have been hampered in the last two Turkish races by excessive tyre wear in Turn 8 and one would expect team-mate Button to be easier on his tyres. At Ferrari, Felipe Massa's smooth driving allowed him to trounce more aggressive team-mates Schumacher and Raikkonen, to score three successive wins in 2006, 2007 and 2008.

However if you are looking for a surprise or two, watch out for Force India, whose aerodynamically efficient cars look increasingly likely to overhaul Williams as the best of the teams outside the 'big five'. They might even spring a surprise on Mercedes or Renault. And while Karun Chandhok may now be battling at the tail of the field in his HRT, in 2007 he set the fastest lap and before retiring, was leading the GP2 race at the track. Once again, it proves reliability as well as pace, is what you need in Turkey.

There couldn't be two bigger contrasts in the respective race weekends of Mark Webber and Karun Chandhok. Yet both claimed it was among the best of their careers.

As in Barcelona, Mark Webber's drive to victory began with his qualifying lap on Saturday. It was sublime, prompting team-mate Vettel to comment that there was nothing wrong with his own qualifying lap, except that Mark was faster!

Come the race, a flawless start ensured Webber kept his pole position advantage. Meanwhile Vettel bundled the gutsy Robert Kubica back to third on the run into Saint Devote corner and that - as far as any change in the top three order - was that.

Or was it? Although Webber had a race pace superiority equivalent to his qualifying, there was always the expectation that safety cars would play a part. We didn't have to wait long, Williams driver Nico Hulkenberg was pitched into the barriers in the Monaco tunnel on the opening lap after a front wing support failure.

Williams will be worried that mechanical failures caused crashes for both their drivers. Just before half distance Rubens Barrichello played a terrifying game of pinball with the barriers when a suspension component failed on his car.

Thankfully the strength of modern Formula One cars ensured that neither driver was hurt. But on both occasions, plus another when a loose manhole cover brought out the safety car, Mark Webber's hard-earned advantage was lost as the rest of the field was allowed to close up behind him.

Webber though was undaunted. Each time he was released from behind the safety car he extended his advantage once again. It was an exhibition of peerless pace that was truly spectacular.

In fact Webber's biggest scare of the day almost came just three laps from the chequered flag, when tail-enders Karun Chandhok and Jarno Trulli clashed just as he was coming up to lap them.

"I saw Jarno doing a lunge down at Rascasse and thought 'what the heck is going on here?'. They interlocked wheels and I hoped I would have some room to go" said Webber. "I worried if Karun was okay because it all looked like it was around his head."

For Chandhok ironically, the clash with Trulli's Lotus marked an end to his best race of the season so far. Disappointment after qualifying was changed to a mood of optimism when a faulty differential was diagnosed and the Hispania Racing car proved capable of battling with its fellow 'newbie' team rivals.

"Jarno hit me out of nowhere but he has apologised for the incident" said Karun. "I had a good start and managed to jump both Di Grassi and Trulli during the pitstop. After that I was catching Senna until he retired, "We were looking good to finish in thirteenth position, the best of the new teams. It has been my strongest race of the season".

Meanwhile there was still one final twist. As the safety car pulled into the pitlane, Michael Schumacher sprung a surprise overtaking move on Fernando Alonso to snatch sixth place. Or had he? The rulebook is surprisingly nebulous.

Ferrari believes that as the safety car had been on the road during the last lap, overtaking was banned until the chequered flag. Mercedes point out that as the safety car was back in the pitlane and green flags were being shown on the run to the line, Schumacher's move was legitimate.

Three hours after the race, the FIA stewards including Schumacher's former arch-rival Damon Hill, found that Schumi's move was against the rules and gave the German a 20 second penalty, dropping him out of the points. Mercedes promptly appealed against the ruling and the results now remain provisional until a meeting of the FIA Court of Appeal.

Webber though was already in party mood, celebrating by leaping from the Red Bull hospitality area into Monaco harbour. "A special day" said Webber. "Up with the best. Now to find something to wear at the Monaco ball!"

This weekend five former winners will line up on the starting grid for the Monaco Grand Prix. While Lotus driver Jarno Trulli, winner for Renault in 2004, is probably one of the longest odds for a repeat victory this year, any of the other four drivers could easily add to their totals.

Prime among them may be Michael Schumacher winner in the Principality in 1994, 1995, 1997, 1999 and 2001. He silenced many of his critics in Barcelona where the handling of the upgraded Mercedes W01 allowed him to frustrate Jenson Button, with whom he enjoyed a superb race-long battle to finish fourth.

Button does at least have the consolation of arriving in Monaco both as the Championship leader and as the defending race winner. Last year in Monaco, Jenson's qualifying margin of just 0.025s over Raikkonen's Ferrari was an indication of just how small any Brawn performance advantage may have been at this track.

Yet come the race, Button was simply stupendous, mixing pace with canny tyre management to score one of his best-ever victories. In fact the only mistake that Button made all weekend was after the chequered flag, when he parked in the wrong place, forcing him to sprint down the finishing straight to the waiting royal party!

Button would at least this year know the right place to find the award-toting dignitaries, as indeed would team mate Lewis Hamilton, winner in 2008. That was the year, on a streaming wet track, when Lewis hit the barriers on lap six, then hit lucky as the safety car came out. Hamilton was able to limp back to the pits for a new rear wheel and continued to victory in a race which was ended two laps early after the two hour mark was reached.

A year earlier Hamilton had fumed when his then team-mate Fernando Alonso won for his second year in a row completing a dominant McLaren one-two. Alonso had started on pole and set the fastest lap, but Hamilton was convinced that he was faster and could have won. The triggered a fall-out with comments by McLaren boss Ron Dennis, triggering an investigation into team orders and the start of a feud between Dennis, Alonso and the FIA. .

And what about Alonso's first win in 2006? His was a pretty straightforward drive from pole position to the chequered flag in the Renault, after Ferrari and Michael Schumacher provided the main talking point after qualifying. Schumacher was stripped of pole position and sent to the back of the grid after stewards found the German guilty of deliberately blocking the track in the dying minutes of qualifying.

Even today Schumacher won't comment on that race, yet ironically the Ferrari with Alonso aboard has to be a prime challenger for this year's race. The Spaniard has an aggressive ‘grab the bull by the horns' style, which seems to work at Monaco, perhaps rather better than the less errr., bullish finesse of Felipe Massa.

Speaking of Bulls, the Red variety of Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber could easily add to the lengthy list of winner's names on the trophy. Vettel is fast and brought the Toro Rosso home 8th in the 2008 race, but maybe too furious. His rapid tyre wear put him in the barriers last year.

If pressed, my money will go on Mark Webber. He first showed his Monaco potential in 2005, when he took the unfancied Williams to third place. The following year claimed second place to Alonso in qualifying, only to retire with an exhaust fire.

One cannot be anything but impressed by Mark Webber's winning performance in the Spanish Grand Prix. Yes, he had the best car on the track, but from his stunning pole position lap on Saturday, until the moment he took the chequered flag on Sunday, he was simply unstoppable, in a class of his own.

In contrast, Webber's team-mate Sebastian Vettel, for many the favourite to win in Barcelona, failed to deliver and was lucky to salvage third place. It would be premature to say whether the brake problems which slowed the German in the closing stages of the race was a result of his driving style, but once again it showed even Red Bull's spectacular pace cannot guarantee success.

Meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton's late-race blow-out ended an unbroken run of two-car finishes for McLaren in the cruellest manner possible. The British driver matched Webber in terms of the drive of the day, his overtaking move to grab second place from Vettel was perhaps the most spectacular of the race, but it seems that debris damage to a wheel rim precipitated the puncture that ruined Lewis's day.

Hamilton's blow-out, leading to his collision with the barriers on the penultimate lap of the race, gifted second place to Fernando Alonso and Ferrari. However it is said that one makes one's own luck and Alonso certainly did that.

The Spaniard was simply unrelenting all the way through the race weekend, but it was clear that along with Mercedes, the Ferrari chassis remains some way behind the downforce and hence, pace of the Red Bulls and McLarens. It took some clever tyre management by Alonso to maintain a constant pace which delighted his home fans with the second place.

Equally importantly, it is becoming increasingly obvious that Alonso is assuming dominance within the Ferrari team. Felipe Massa's drive to 6th place, showed clear marks of frustration, both with his ill-handling car and his race position.

Massa's error in clipping the back of backmarker Karun Chandhok's car was a typical example. It damaged his front wing, yet seemingly improved the Ferrari's understeering handling and gave us one of the best lines of the race. "You're going half a second faster" said Massa's engineer Rob Smedley. "Looks like you've found the solution!"

Massa wasn't the only driver to feel frustration in Barcelona. A tardy pitstop due to a dropped wheelnut meant that Championship leader Jenson Button rejoined the race hot on the heels of the Mercedes of a revitalised Michael Schumacher. The German gave us one of the battles of the race as he defended his fifth position from Button. It was later to become fourth with Hamilton's demise.

Button's irritation at not finding his way past Schumacher will no doubt be mitigated by the fact that his eventual fifth place gave him ten points, allowing him to maintain a three point advantage over Alonso in the Drivers Championship standings. It sets up a great Monaco Grand Prix next week, with the 2006 and 2007 winner Alonso, head-to-head with 2008 winner Hamilton and 2009 winner Button.

Meanwhile away from the front runners, two of the top drives of the race netted mid-field finishes. Rubens Barrichello was clearly frustrated when he failed to get his Williams beyond the first leg of qualifying, but come the race he let his driving do the talking. From 17th on the grid, Barrichello passed five cars on the opening lap alone. His eventual ninth place was a just reward.

Another fast starter was Adrian Sutil, who had qualified 11th in his Force India. By the end of the opening lap he was already up to 8th ahead of the Renault of Robert Kubica, and he hounded Massa's Ferrari for the entire race. Seventh place at the flag gave Force India its fourth points-scoring result from five races, proof if it ever were needed, that the team has now graduated to being a force to be reckoned with.

Conventional wisdom has it the Bore-celona circuit, home of this weekend's Spanish Grand Prix is one of the least likely to provide riveting on-track action. Although the Circuit de Catalunya is a driver's favourite with its challenging sweeps and changes of camber in the turns, it has rarely provided spectacular overtaking and wheel-to-wheel action.

However there is still plenty to look out for. This race could be make or break for six-times Spanish Grand Prix winner Michael Schumacher.

Schumacher, who between 2001 and 2004 marked up four successive back-to-back victories in Barcelona, is having to dig deep in his reserves both as a driver and in self-belief. Schumacher's less than impressive comeback has clearly acted as a blow to his reputation.

"At the first races, when Schumacher walked into the driver's meetings there was a definite ‘wow' factor" said HRT driver Karun Chandhok. "He was above eye-contact, on another level. Now he's just one of the guys."

Not surprisingly the Mercedes team is rushing through a series of updates, both aerodynamic and mechanical to attempt to make the W01 car more appropriate to Schumacher's driving style. If Schumacher can't make it work, particularly if Nico Rosberg continues to deliver results, one wonders how long it may be before Michael decides the comeback was all a terrible mistake.

Interestingly, the one driver who, Karun Chandhok confides, does have that special presence among his peers is Fernando Alonso. It is not arrogance, more a combination of self-confidence and poise. A winner's edge.

Even despite the qualifying pace of the Red Bulls and the racing resourcefulness of Jenson Button and McLaren, it is hard to bet against Alonso for victory in his home Grand Prix. Even though Alonso last won the race in 2006, he has always managed to generate something for his home fans to cheer.

Last year he fought his way from eighth on the grid in the unfancied Renault, to snatch fifth place from his current Ferrari team-mate Felipe Massa. The previous year, even though an engine failure sidelined his Renault, his low-fuel qualifying run to take second on the grid was truly spectacular.

Fernando's big concern must be reliability. In contrast to McLaren's apparently rock-solid finishing record and Red Bull's seemingly random problems, there has been a worrying trend in a string of Ferrari engine failures.

The Scuderia claims that a solution has been found to leaks which led to the engine losing the pneumatic pressure which closes the engine's valves at the extreme revs used in a Formula One V8. However the fact remains that Alonso has already used three of the eight engines to which he is entitled this season.

That could hamper his title charge later in the season. However I do not believe that he'll be unduly hindered in Barcelona. On the contrary Alonso knows that a victory in Spain will be more than just a ‘home win', it would position him as Ferrari's best contender in what remains a wide-open championship.

As the first race of the European home season for most teams, Barcelona is also the race where we will see significant developments unveiled on most cars. The effectiveness of these developments is equally important whether one is at the front, middle or the tail-end of the starting grid.

Just behind the Red Bull, Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes battle, Force India are pinning high hopes on gaining on Renault, while maintaining their early superiority over Williams and Toro Rosso. Behind them, struggling Sauber need to raise their game to avoid being outpaced by Lotus Racing and Virgin.

Meanwhile the Hispania Racing Team will now have the chance to feed in technical improvements to their completely unsorted car, which forced Karun Chandhok and Bruno Senna to make their respective debuts in probably the hardest-to-drive car on the grid. For the HRT drivers, any improvement will be a worthwhile improvement!

Looking at the form book, the China Grand Prix should have been easy to predict. Red Bull had again dominated qualifying with a 1-2 for Vettel and Webber, while challengers McLaren were tucked away on row three of the grid.

However, once again the weather played its hand, creating a tyre choice lottery that the front runners lost. Jenson Button and his crew, as in Australia, simply got the calls right every time. Jenson's win at the head of a McLaren 1-2 was fully deserved.

Lewis Hamilton once again drove his heart out, but his performance was patchy. In his best moments his driving was sublime. Lewis's race up the order, passing among others, Barrichello, Sutil, Schumacher, Webber, Vettel, Kubica and finally after a spirited battle, Rosberg was spectacular.

However banging wheels in the pitlane with rival Vettel showed a distinct lack of common sense. Both drivers were later reprimanded by the stewards for their actions. Vettel, for squeezing Hamilton as he came out of his pit box, Hamilton for not backing off and carrying on wheel-to-wheel at 100kph as mechanics wisely stepped back into their pit garages to take cover. It was supremely dangerous.

Hamilton wasn't the only driver to be hobbled by poor tyre timing. Neither Red Bull driver recovered from their premature change to intermediate wet-weather tyres, a subsequent pit stop to revert to dry tyres, then fast-wearing intermediates.

Michael Schumacher always seemed to be on the wrong tyres at the wrong time. He stopped four times on his way to a tenth placed finish, but still didn't hold the record for most pit stops. That dubious record went to Williams' Nico Hulkenberg and Toro Rosso's Heime Alguersuari who each notched up six stops as their teams dithered about whether it was wet or dry.

One of Fernando Alonso's five recorded visits to the pitlane was to serve a drive through penalty, for ‘anticipating' the race start a little prematurely. Once again, we saw another spectacular drive through the field by the Ferrari driver, not least against his team-mate!

When the safety car was deployed for the second time, the two Ferraris were in convoy, but Alonso muscled his way past, forcing Massa onto the grass as the two cars headed into the pitlane. It wasn't pretty, but it was effective. It gave Alonso a track position that allowed him to continue his fight up the order to an eventual fourth place, while Massa was left at the tail of a traffic jam which meant he was only able to finish ninth.

Meanwhile Nico Rosberg had, like Button, elected to stay on slick tyres when the first of the rain showers precipitated (sorry) the initial round of pit stops. It was a strategy that saw Rosberg take the Mercedes GP car into the race lead and, although the McLaren fightback gave Hamilton and Button their ultimate 1-2, Rosberg held on for his second successive third place.

Also benefiting from the strategy, Robert Kubica, who finished fifth and the Russian rookie Vitaly Petrov again punched above the Renaults metaphorical weight.

For me, Petrov, who ran in fourth before a late race spin dropped him to seventh, delivered one of the drives of the day, unfazed by mixing it with the likes of Alonso, Webber and Vettel in just his fourth Grand Prix.

Some other rookies would be happy to emulate that, given suitable machinery. Hispania Racing's duo of Bruno Senna and Karun Chandhok, struggled with a lack of downforce and in Chandhok's case, power too.

However the biggest disappointment may have been Force India, who failed to score championship points for the first time this season. For Adrian Sutil it was close. 11th place was just one away from a point, but Vitantonio Liuzzi had a weekend for forget, with locked brakes precipitating a three-car accident on the opening lap. Things, as they say, can only get better in Barcelona!

As Karun Chandhok stepped off his plane from sunny Chennai, he shivered in the chill and looked at the grey skies with disgust. "I might just as well be back in England" was his comment. The prospect of another wet race in China though, does give us the prospect of more red-hot excitement.

This weekend two drivers, by coincidence, both German and both former winners in Shanghai, will line up at the track where they both drove perhaps their most memorable races.

Last year, Sebastian Vettel dominated on the rain-soaked track, to give the Red Bull Racing team their first-ever Grand Prix victory. We now think of them as established Championship challengers. It just shows how quickly things change in Formula One.

Looking back at my report from last year's race, I wrote. "Vettel showed a pace in the atrocious conditions which was simply spellbinding. He seemed to be able to stretch his advantage at will".

"It was a masterful drive that has raised comments that Vettel might be a successor to Michael Schumacher as the next German world champion" I concluded. "I can think of no reason to doubt the logic."

If I couldn't doubt the logic then, I certainly can't now. Vettel has shown us that he is not just the master of a rain-soaked track, but capable of blistering pace in the dry too.

He drives with an abandon and a confidence you see in few other drivers. It stood out recently in the spectacular qualifying lap which gained him pole position in Melbourne. Vettel seemingly has that special ability to literally grab the car by the scruff of its neck and make it defy physics.

Of course, a driver needs luck too and that has been in short supply for Vettel this season. He was robbed of likely victories in the two opening races, but it was a case of 'third-time lucky' with victory ahead of team-mate Mark Webber in the Red Bull 1-2 in Malaysia.

Interestingly, Vettel needed a bit of luck to win in Shanghai last year. On lap 19 of the race, the safety car intervened after Robert Kubica hit the back of Jarno Trulli's Toyota. The field was running in convoy when Toro Rosso rookie Sebastien Buemi drove into the back of Vettel's car. Luckily no damage was done. It was the only serious threat to Vettel's success all weekend!

Roll back the clock to 2006 and another equally dramatic race where rain also played its part. The race started on a wet, though drying track with Fernando Alonso in pole position and Renault team-mate Giancarlo Fisichella alongside.

Michael Schumacher's Ferrari was down in sixth place at the start, but the race saw a relentless charge that saw the German pass Button, Barrichello, Raikkonen and Alonso, before closing in on race leader Fisichella.

On lap 41 as Fisichella left the pits, Schumacher pounced and rocketed down the inside of Turn One to take the lead. A lap later the German was a devastating 7.6 seconds ahead.

The race is regarded as one of Schumacher's best-ever victories. It was also his 91^st and so far, his last. Sadly this year's comeback has till now been blunted by a Mercedes car which simply doesn't match his driving style and it may be too much to ask him to roll the clock back to 2006 just yet.

For Vettel though, it is another story. He has to be hot favourite to win again in Shanghai and if he does, he would take over the championship lead. His biggest challenge will come again from McLaren and Ferrari, while Mercedes need to regroup to avoid being humbled by the pace of Renault and Force India.

Whether or not the weather plays its part this year, I simply can't wait for the Shanghai dramas to begin again!

As commentary gaffes go, I am sure it wasn't one of my worst ones, but I will hold up my hand for my error in the closing stages of the Malaysian Grand Prix. I said that Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber were on their way to their first one-two with the Red Bull Racing team.

The team's first-ever one-two actually came last year in the third round of the season at Shanghai. Then, just as this year Vettel's season had started badly, with no points at all scored in the opening rounds.

Vettel nonetheless fought back. Red Bull Racing scored a total of four one-two wins last season and Sebastian was the closest contender for Jenson Button's 2009 title. He is tipped by many including me for the 2010 crown, but so far this year mechanical issues blunted his bid so far.

Then came Sepang's legendary rain and bewildering bungles by both McLaren AND Ferrari in qualifying which meant four of Red Bull's main contenders started at the back of the grid. Meanwhile Vettel and team-mate Webber locked out the front row of the grid.

The race was described as an 'open goal' for the team. The only question, which driver would score?

Webber claimed pole position thanks to an inspired choice of intermediate wet weather tyres in Saturday qualifying. However it was Vettel who 'connected' with his car perfectly off the startline, matching the clutch take-up, engine revs and throttle for a perfect start, giving him sufficient momentum to snatch the lead at Turn 1.

While the Red Bulls stampeded over the horizon, Lewis Hamilton was demonstrating both the best and the worst sides of his determination. His opening laps were spectacular as he vaulted from 20^th place on the starting grid into the top ten by lap 4.

A couple of laps later, Hamilton showed a more negative side to his character when after passing the Vitaly Petrov, the Russian rookie fought back. The McLaren driver set up an outrageous series of weaves on the start straight, in breech of the rules which restrict a driver to a single defensive move off the racing line. It earned Hamilton both ninth place and an official warning from the race stewards.

He was lucky, such misdemeanours in the past could have been penalised by a pit lane drive-through which would have ruined his race. Instead his progress up the field continued. He would ultimately finish sixth after a robust defence of the place ahead of him by Force India's Adrian Sutil.

In Australia Jenson Button's early pitstop gave him victory. This time however the same strategy didn't work and his McLaren slipped behind to eighth behind Massa's Ferrari as his tyres wore out.

There were mixed fortunes for Alonso and Massa. While Massa recovered from his 21^st place start to finish an eventual 7^th, Alonso increasingly struggled with a gearbox that was missing gearshifts.

The mechanical stresses perhaps contributed to an engine failure that saw Alonso forced to retire with just a single lap remaining. The non-points score saw the Spaniard cruelly lose the World Championship lead.

While Nico Rosberg finished a fine third, Michael Schumacher was unable to finish as a result of a wheel nut failure on his Mercedes. Although he again had been outpaced by his team-mate, I am less worried than some.

After more than three years away from the sports and driving a car which handles very differently to the Ferraris he previously raced, I think Schumacher's performance is actually pretty impressive. Rosberg is one of the best drivers on the grid and in my view capable of matching Hamilton or Vettel given the right machinery. I do not believe that the Schumacher story is over yet, particularly if Mercedes can deliver both he and Rosberg a race-winning car.  

Meanwhile there were celebrations akin to a race win at the other end of the pitlane as Hispania Racing delighted in both their cars reaching the chequered flag. Fifteenth place for Karun Chandhok will be all the sweeter because after a poor start he passed both the Lotus of Jarno Trulli and his team-mate Bruno Senna on his way to his second race finish.

If, as many predict, rain could again be a feature of the Malaysian Grand Prix, watch out for a repeat of battle royal between Jenson Button and Sebastian Vettel to become the new ‘rainmeister'.

Last year in Sepang it was Button who won the shortened race with another flawless performance in the wet. We should not have been surprised. Back in 2006 it was Jenson Button's abilities on a wet track in Hungary which gave him his first victory in an unfancied Honda.

The one driver capable of spoiling Button's day should rain return to Sepang is Sebastian Vettel. He too scored his first Grand Prix win, back in 2008 for Toro Rosso, on a streaming wet track at Monza.

Vettel's pole position qualifying lap at Melbourne was awesome. It was perhaps one of the best single qualifying laps by any driver this decade. That the German's retirements in both Bahrain and Australia have been due to the failure of relatively minor components is quite simply, cruel.

For more than a decade of course, there was one driver unchallenged for the ‘rainmeister' crown, but Michael Schumacher sadly failed to live up to his reputation in Melbourne. He was unlucky to get caught up in Fernando Alonso's first corner clash with Button, but after dropping to the tail of the field his lacklustre race was in marked contrast to Alonso's spectacular fight back.

He made heavy weather of passing combinations such as Lucas di Grassi in the Virgin Cosworth and Jaime Alguersuari in the Toro Rosso. Worse still, after the race he seemed laid back about his lowly tenth place finish, five places behind team mate Nico Rosberg.

Has Schumi's fire gone out during his three years away from the sport? This weekend, on Mercedes GP sponsor Petronas' home track, we will certainly find out. But it looks to me that Schumacher's ‘rainmeister' crown is definitely up for grabs.

Storm clouds, come rain or shine, are probably on the horizon at Ferrari. Team boss Stefano Domenicali resolutely refused to even hint at team orders after Fernando Alonso in a clearly faster car, climbed all over Massa's gearbox in the closing stages of the Australian Grand Prix.

Had Alonso found his way past his team-mate, I suspect he could have given Robert Kubica a strong challenge for second. But there was no way that Massa was giving way, the three point difference between third and fourth places might be critical come the end of the season. Massa lost the 2008 title by a single point you may remember.

Massa also won't have forgotten the way in which Alonso barged past him into second place at the opening corner in Bahrain. In addition, we are reaching an important time in the season, when the ‘pecking order' is created between each pair of drivers. If Massa had rolled over in Australia, Alonso would have ensured he remained flat on his back for the rest of the season!

There is clearly a similar dynamic at work in McLaren following Lewis's erratic performance in Melbourne and to a similar extent in Force India. Adrian Sutil has twice failed to turn a top ten qualifying slot into championship points, while Tonio Liuzzi hasn't made the final qualifying shoot-out yet, but he has still scored points in both races.

If you want to see two team-mates enjoying themselves, look to the back of the grid and the Hispania Racing Team. They know they have a long way to go to find competitive performance, but Karun Chandhok and Bruno Senna are clearly savouring every moment of their F1 experience.

They are working hard too. The night after completing his first-ever Grand Prix Karun was up late. Not out on the town celebrating his success, but in technical meetings with his engineers till 11pm!

It has to be said that, had Sebastian Vettel not retired after a wheel failure on his Red Bull, Jenson Button would probably have been celebrating second place rather than victory. However it was notable that McLaren team boss Martin Whitmarsh went to great lengths after the Australian Grand Prix to point out that Button's early pit stop gamble was the driver's personal decision, while Hamilton's two stop strategy was devised by the team.

Button's inspired choice, to become the first driver to switch from intermediate wet weather tyres to dry-weather slicks could so easily have backfired. In fact it almost did, as he promptly slid straight off the still-wet track on the first corner after leaving the pits.

Having recovered, Button took on the challenge of making the soft-compound ‘option' tyres last for a further 50 laps, when most pundits expected them to last at most for twenty. Whitmarsh's comment perhaps hints that it even went in the face of advice from the McLaren team.

If that is the case, all credit to Button and to his race engineer Jakob Andreasson for holding to their plan. It paid off and it was notable that a similar strategy benefited Renault's Robert Kubica and the Ferrari duo of Massa and Alonso.

The highest-placed car to run the two stop-strategy was 5th placed Nico Rosberg, although that could so easily have been Lewis Hamilton, had he not been torpedoed by home-hero-turned-zero Mark Webber, who demonstrated that gutsy drives don't always pay off.

After the race Hamilton was relatively sanguine about his late race clash with Webber, but bristled with indignation when asked about his second pit stop. Lewis clearly would like us to think that it was an error of judgement by his team, but I suspect his engineers were right.

The fact is that Jenson Button has a silky-smooth driving style which allowed him to conserve his tyres while at the same time, maintaining a crushing pace. Hamilton's more aggressive style, not to mention the fact that he was battling for almost the whole race with Webber, Alonso, Massa and Rosberg, probably ensured his first set of dry weather tyres were never destined to go the distance.

Button's win was a masterly performance, but it was not for me the drive of the race. That accolade should go to Robert Kubica, whose wet weather charge from ninth on the starting grid propelled him into fourth place on the opening lap.

Kubica then resolutely fought off all attacks, while at the same time conserving his tyres to bring the unfancied Renault home in second place. It was a brilliant performance, demonstrating that he is one of the best pure racers on the starting grid.

In terms of racing, Melbourne had the lot in terms of action. Sometimes it was a bit too fast and furious - and no, I am not referring to Hamilton's street burnouts on Friday night!

‘Too fast, too furious' perfectly sums up Mark Webber's race. A strategic bungle, making the first pit stop too late, wasted his front row start, meaning that the home hero had to fight his way back up the order. A string of incidents, culminating in his collision with Hamilton and an eventual ninth place was small reward for obvious effort.

Fernando Alonso's spin at the opening corner was self-inflicted when he moved across the track into Jenson Button's path, but his fight back from the tail of the field was awesome, in contrast to a lacklustre performance from Michael Schumacher when he found himself in a similar position.

It was notable though, that when the Spaniard closed on team-mate Felipe Massa, there was no way that the Brazilian was giving way. Whatever the team press releases may say, we were witnessing a true battle for pecking order in the Ferrari team. It will be fascinating to watch as that battle develops again in Malaysia in just a week's time.

There really couldn't be a greater contrast between the dry, arid and dusty expanses of Bahrain and the green parkland setting of Melbourne's Albert park track, the venue of the second round of the Formula One World championship. Dare one say it, we are probably all hoping for a similar contrast in the level of track action too.

Despite the very best efforts of its energetic organising team, Bahrain simply failed to put on a show where it matters, on the racetrack. The race never lived up to pre-season expectations, frustrating those hoping for wheel-to-wheel racing.

Bahrain though, is historically never a track where we expect overtaking. With the exception of the end of the long start-finish straight, there are few places where drivers can get close enough to attack. Adding to the difficulty, the less used areas of track also get a liberal dusting with sand, making any potential passing zone slippery.

Melbourne should tick all the boxes for action. It offers a short, sharp run from the starting grid to the first corner, the Jones chicane, with drivers braking hard to negotiate the tight and often action packed first turn. There is a repeat of the same at Turn 4, before a mix of slow to medium speed corners, interlinked with short straights.

It is a track which demands lots of hard braking, followed by equally hard acceleration, which could mean that some front runners will fail to reach the chequered flag. This year's heavier fuel loads will place even more of a strain on the brakes and drivetrain, exacerbating the problems caused by the relatively low levels of grip. The track also poses a challenge for engine cooling, due to the reduced air flow at slower speeds.

It could even be that with no refuelling in the race, some drivers may simply run out of gas before they reach the chequered flag. Any road driver knows that thrashing a car at high revs in a low gear causes any engine to gulp fuel. And that is just what the Formula One pack will be forced to do this Sunday.

McLaren boss Ron Dennis believes that one team has already fallen into the ‘out of gas' trap. He suggested to journalists earlier this week that Sebastian Vettel's race-leading Red Bull, which officially slowed in the latter stages of the Bahrain due to a faulty spark plug, had exhibited all the signs of the cars electronic control unit, dropping into ‘limp home' mode to save the last drops of fuel.

Frankly, it wouldn't be the first time that Ron has said something deliberately ‘tongue in cheek' to pile pressure on a rival, but he has a point. Whatever Vettel's problem, he and the Red Bull looked to have the race in the bag in Bahrain. He stormed to pole position, led from the start line and was controlling the pace of the race, before the car beganto lose power on the 32nd of the 49 laps.

Assuming Ron is wrong and the Red Bull has the fuel capacity to go the distance, I suspect Sebastian will be the man to beat again in Melbourne. One cannot however rule out McLaren, who will be keen to lay to rest the memories of last year when, a week after the event Lewis Hamilton was disqualified from his third place, after the revelation that Hamilton had provided "deliberately misleading" evidence to race stewards in a post-race enquiry into his passing Jarno Trulli while following the safety car.

Politics aside, one has to remember that Trulli's Toyota, far from trailing the two dominant Brawn GP cars for the entire race last year, had actually fought its way from 20th place at the start. Proof indeed that overtaking is possible at Melbourne!

Of course one cannot rule out Ferrari or Mercedes as possible race winners in Melbourne and in both cases it is going to be just a fascinating to watch the battle for supremacy between the team-mates. Can Nico Rosberg continue to usurp the mighty Michael Schumacher? Will Felipe massa be able to fight back against the flying Fernando Alonso? It will be fascinating to find out.

Spread your net a little wider and two other drivers could easily be contending a podium place. Mark Webber is regarded as one of the best street-circuit fighters yet the last two Australian Grand Prix have seen him hobbled by other driver's errors at the first turn. A change of fortune could easily see an Aussie home hero in the top three.

Likewise, Robert Kubica is simply awesome on this track. Last year the BMW Sauber team believed that he was on his way to a possible victory in Melbourne when Vettel's over-enthusiastic defence of second place. There is no doubt that Kubica was the fastest man on the track in the closing stages of the race and he was gaining on race-winner Button by two seconds a lap with four laps to go.

Wouldn't it be great to see action like that again this year? Here's hoping that one dull race does not a season make!

During my commentary on the Bahrain Grand Prix, I jokingly suggested that what we needed to catch the flying Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel was the matador, Fernando Alonso. A few laps later the prophecy was fulfilled. Sorry Sebastian!

Vettel, his car slowed by what was later found to be not a broken exhaust, but a failing engine, was caught and summarily passed by the Ferraris of Alonso and Massa, as well as Lewis Hamilton in the McLaren. The junior German driver was lucky to hang on to fourth place from his fast-closing compatriots Nico Rosberg and Michael Schumacher, the latter making a realistic rather than a riotous return.

Meanwhile in 7th and 8th places, Jenson Button and Mark Webber were forced to give best to their respective team-mates. Completing the top ten, Force India with Tonio Liuzzi and Williams with Rubens Barrichello proved ‘best of the rest', while Lotus alone among the ‘newbie' teams, brought both their cars to the chequered flag.

I suspect that we could be seeing a trend which will develop through the 2010 season.

Unless something crazy happens, we can probably safely bet that all the 2010 wins will come from the four teams and eight drivers who dominated the first race of the season. Using a football analogy, they form ‘the Premier League', while teams such as Williams, Toro Rosso, Sauber and Force India are clearly ‘the Championship'.

A bit like Newcastle United, they will come up with occasional feats of brilliance, but not have the long-term staying power of the big guns. Meanwhile, what about Virgin, Lotus and Hispania?

Well I guess the best football parallel may be an FA Cup third round game. A smaller side sometimes gets to humble the top teams. A top ten performance by them this season would be a bit like Leeds United's 1-0 against Man U at Old Trafford. Everybody will cheer it, in the knowledge it won't happen every day.

For Lotus Racing, merely getting both cars to the chequered flag in their opening race will be seen as a notable achievement. One that the two other rookie teams most clearly did not manage.

Virgin Racing, with former Toyota driver Timo Glock, actually briefly outpaced Lotus. However by the 16th lap of 49, the team were already starting to pack away their garage equipment, with both their drivers sidelined by the recurring hydraulic and transmission issues which have bedevilled the team since the start of testing.

Talking of testing, or the lack of it, Karun Chandhok probably made Formula One history on Saturday. He had the dubious privilege of being the first ever driver to take part in his first F1 qualifying in a brand-new car, which hadn't even turned a wheel under its own power until he took to the racetrack!

As an adventure it was audacious. As a race plan, it was a bit of a disaster.

All credit to the Hispania Racing Team for getting two cars into the opening race of the season, just nine days after the team was formally unveiled. But for Chandhok, making his first Grand Prix start in a car which he had never even driven with a full tank of fuel, it wasn't too surprising that an off-road excursion ended his race on lap 2.

Team-mate Bruno Senna at least managed to hang on a little longer. In the words of HRT's quaintly-worded press release "On lap 18, a cloud of smoke forced the Brazilian to retire." Our trackside sound effects of a million or so dollars of Cosworth engine reducing itself to scrap perhaps gave the more accurate reason for his demise.

Looking back to the top of the order, do I expect that Alonso or Ferrari will run away with the 2010 world championship? Probably not, although the Spaniard made his initial mark at Ferrari with a perfect performance, had it not been for Vettel's engine problem, the race could have had a different result.

McLaren and Mercedes both need to find an added edge in qualifying - and I am sure they are trying. Likewise, Schumacher needs to find an added edge to beat team-mate Rosberg. He will I am sure. He will!

The final F1 test session in Barcelona was the last chance for us to try to work out who is hot and who is not - and the simple fact is that, as in the previous two seasons, the difference in ultimate performance between the top teams is almost too close to call.

We can probably predict that Bahrain's race winner will come from one of four teams; McLaren, Red Bull, Ferrari or Mercedes. Ironically the rules that restricted pre-season testing to save money have given the advantage to the established front runners.

With only fifteen days of testing allowed, and ten of them compromised by bad weather and rain-soaked tracks, the teams with the biggest design and production resources have inevitably had an advantage. However there still may be surprises in store.

Lewis Hamilton's McLaren MP4-25 headed the timesheets by the tiniest of margins when the teams all carried out qualifying simulations at the end of the Barcelona test. However a look at the McLaren, with its thin, high nose, heavily sculpted sidepods and complex front and rear wings, reveals a car in which the aerodynamicists have had a field day.

In comparison the Red Bull and Ferrari cars look simpler, and more user-friendly. Last year Ferrari learned the hard lesson, that while their car was theoretically the fastest on track, it turned out to be so complex and hard to drive that even Railkkonen and Massa struggled for competitiveness.

This year the Ferrari looks a much happier package and in comparison to Hamilton's sometimes ragged, wheel-locking, kerb-hopping test laps in Barcelona, there was never a time when the Ferrari looked anything other than smooth - and fast.

Likewise the Red Bull looked like a car that its drivers were enjoying. So much so that Sebastian Vettel simply couldn't resist bounding over rumble strips, clipping apexes and hanging the tail out. If there is one driver who simply oozes self confidence it is Vettel - and don't underestimate Webber either.

Meanwhile Michael Schumacher is taking great pains to handle expectations of an instantly victorious comeback. Both in and out of his new silver Mercedes, I have no doubts that Michael is every bit as capable as when he retired at the end of 2006.

However even Schumi admitted that "we are not, competitively, in the position where we would like to be, in order to win." But as Michael also concluded, "testing is one thing, races are another thing."

As well as the ‘big four', watch out for a couple of teams that might spring surprises. One is Williams, who are almost certain to be the top team running the Cosworth ‘customer' engine this season.

The FW32 has consistently looked good, particularly on lightly-fuelled qualifying runs where their new rookie driver, GP2 champion Nico Hulkenberg has proved every bit as quick, if not quicker, than his experienced team-mate Rubens Barrichello.

I'm less sure about the Renault, Sauber and Toro Rosso teams. Renault have a star driver in Robert Kubica, but still seem to have performance to make up and frankly, the Sauber looked a twitchy handful every time I saw it on the track. Toro Rosso in contrast has a gem of a car, but I am not too sure how much testing feedback can be gained from the relatively inexperienced pairing of Buemi and Alguersuari.

I will make a rash prediction too, that Force India has the machinery to snatch a surprise first race victory this season. I suspect that as last year, the team will focus their efforts on specific races, perhaps the low downforce, low drag tracks like Spa and Monza. It certainly makes sense for a team with fewer resources than the big boys.

Indian racing fans may also have something else to cheer as Karun Chandhok makes the transition from GP2 (and the commentator's chair) to the newly-formed Hispania Racing Team. Don't get too excited too soon, the team's late start will mean they will arrive in Bahrain with a totally untested and untried new car. Don't expect too much from Karun in the early races, but watch for steady improvement.

The two other new teams we have seen on track have demonstrated the trials and tribulations you always get with unproven machinery. Both Virgin Racing and Lotus Racing still lack the pace to trouble even mid-field teams, but there will be an interesting battle between three ‘newbie' teams down at the back.

So who is my tip for the top in Bahrain? The track has favoured Ferrari in the past, so I will make a guess at Alonso - but then again, Massa? Or a Red Bull... or a McLaren... or Mercedes could equally be in the frame!

Catch STAR Sports’ LIVE commentary of the F1 with veteran race commentator Steve Slater, ex-F1 driver Alex Yoong and former Jordan Grand Prix chief designer and technical director Gary Anderson during the upcoming Bahrain Grand Prix.

It seemed somehow appropriate that 22-year-old Sebastian Vettel scored a victory in the final round of the 2009 season against the sci-fi backdrop of the Yas Marina circuit. In many ways it was as if the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix marked a new beginning for the Formula One spectacle.

Or is the spectacular new track merely the ultimate extension of the state-sponsored 'vanity' facilities which began in Sepang a little over a decade ago and extended to tracks in Bahrain, Shanghai, Istanbul and to a lesser extent, Singapore?

Each of these tracks has in its turn redefined the way that Formula One has projected itself to the public. Sepang was the first Grand Prix in the Far East and the first all-new track in a generation.

Over the past decade Sepang has matured gracefully, thanks mainly to its being a great driver's circuit. The future might be less promising for Bahrain, Shanghai and Istanbul.

In Bahrain's case, it has clearly been upstaged by its Arabian neighbour. In response the track's management have astutely reached a deal with Bernie Ecclestone to host the opening round of the 2010 season, which will they hope will maintain its profile.

Sadly in the case of Shanghai and Istanbul, great facilities though they are, they are simply too remote and their ticket prices too expensive for locals, for them to fill their huge grandstands. Both have more to do with making political statements than attracting a paying audience. One wonders how long that will last.

Singapore is something else. Although Abu Dhabi might have snatched the 'wow' factor this year, the fact is that Singapore offers the unique experience of Formula One cars racing through the heart of a vibrant city. More than that, it s a race with a soul, a character, thanks mainly to the number of Singaporeans who are genuinely excited and involved in the event.

Abu Dhabi though, blew the mind with the scale, quality and spectacle of the facilities. It was also a good race track too, with overtaking opportunities, challenging corners and of course, the longest and fastest straight in F1.

If that wasn't enough, then you had the amazing 5000 LED 'grid shell' on the Yas Hotel which straddled the track. It illuminated in a continuously changing light show to the 'ooohs' and 'aaahs' of those in the neighbouring grandstands.

As might be expected, Bernie Ecclestone summed it up perfectly as he stood in the Paddock. "Just like Silverstone" he quipped, drawing a direct comparison with the spartan British circuit's bid to regain the 2010 British Grand Prix.

Bernie knows that the British track, without any government resources, simply can never spend on the scale of Abu Dhabi. The recent British Grand Prix experience is a sad but cautionary tale.

Last year it was announced that the 2009 race would be the last at Silverstone. A consortium of investors had leased the Donington Park track in the English Midlands and won the bid to host the British GP for the next fifteen years.

However the financial recession meant that the deal turned sour. Bankers pulled out their support. The construction work was abandoned. Last week it was revealed that the Donington bid for the British GP was over.

It is therefore all the sadder to note that as the cars raced in Abu Dhabi, Tom Wheatcroft, original owner of the Donington Park track passed away at the age of 87. Tom was a five-star enthusiast who built up the biggest privately-owned collection of Formula One cars in the world.

In 1993, determined to hold a Grand Prix at Donington, he spent his own money to upgrade the track and personally paid Bernie Ecclestone the rights fee to host the European Grand Prix.  It was of course, the legendary race when Ayrton Senna dominated to score one of his most emphatic victories.

The race made a massive financial loss. Tom, when asked how much it had cost him, allegedly said "Oh, millions, but its only money."  

When one looks at the Abu Dhabi facility, spectacular though it is, one wonders whether the same passion is behind it, as Tom Wheatcroft gave on a rainy afternoon in Leicestershire sixteen years ago.

In a way, it seems right that the Formula One World Championship arrives at the final round of the 2009 season with both the drivers' and constructors titles already settled.

The inaugural Abu Dhabi Grand Prix is as much about creating a show business 'wow' factor as it is about pure racing. It seems silly to let something like a championship battle get in the way of the entertainment.

Of course I am writing this with my tongue, as they say in Britain, firmly in my cheek. The competitive element in this weekend's race will be no less strong as in Brazil two weeks ago or for that matter in Australia when the season started back in March.

In the past few months we've enjoyed some great racing, but it is most noticable that the older, more mature tracks still deliver the best racing. Think of the great battles we saw at Spa and Monza, the spectacular action at Suzuka and amid the puddles and peeling paintwork at Interlagos. These are tracks with action in their DNA.

Abu Dhabi is revolutionary for the sport in that for the first time the track is at the core of a leisure complex. The start straight runs under the lobby of the 500 bedroom, five-star Yas Hotel whose outer walls feature an amazing LED 'Grid-Shell' panel, which is programmed to change colour, generating light shows over the course of the weekend.

Will it be spectacular? Absolutely yes.

Will it redefine the sporting spectacle? Probably.

Will it add anything to motor racing in the long term? Possibly not.

It all depends for me, simply on how good the track will be for racing. While I think it is one of the great things about motor racing is that we constantly visit new locations, they have to be backed by a real commitment to delivering action.

A little over a decade ago you may remember the excitement when Sepang hosted the first Malaysian Grand Prix and the shining new track was regarded as the last word in modern cool. Thankfully, it has matured into a great driver's track too, always delivering a drama and a worthy winner.

The same cannot be said about the dry, dusty (and rather lacking in spectators) Istanbul Otodrom, or the European Grand Prix in Valencia. It has all the excitement of a container park, as well as grandstands situated only on the straights, well out of sight of any possible action, should any happen to occur in the corners.

It is notable that the spectators vote with their feet on these venues and that in the fullness of time they may be replaced with something better. However there is also a real risk that some of the great Grand Prix may disappear.

The collapse of finances to back the reconstruction of the Donington Park circuit in the UK has placed the British Grand Prix in jeopardy. Unless a deal is struck in the next few weeks with Silverstone, the race may not happen in 2010 - or ever again.

The Italian Grand Prix at Monza and the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa also face real threats to their futures. In both cases, local residents are apparently complaining to the European Commission about the noise and disruption caused by racing.

Now, both these great tracks have been hosting races since the 1920s, so it is highly unlikely that any of these residents moved in before the track was built. Do you mean that they moved in next to Spa or Monza and didn't know it was there, or what it was used for?

All the more reason therefore why motor sports governing body needs a firm hand in control. Jean Todt, who won the election to replace Max Mosley will I hope provide that leadership.

Certainly his management credentials in winning Le Mans, the Paris-Dakar Rally-Raid and the World Rally Championship for Peugeot, before moving to Ferrari and cementing the team that gave Michael Schumacher his run of titles, are impeccable.

Nor do I think, despite his recent past, that he will be overtly pro-Ferrari. Todt is his own man and will I think change the FIA into a stronger body by evolution, rather than the revolution Ari Vatanen promised.

Meanwhile I still have to answer the oldest question of them all. Who will win on Sunday?

You can't rule out Red Bull's two drivers, nor Lewis Hamilton's on-form McLaren, but I reckon that Brawn GP could still be the car to beat. If Button were to win on Sunday, it would certainly .make him a worthy 2009 World Champion!

Well, at last, Jenson Button has done it. For the third year in succession, the Brazilian Grand Prix delivered a Formula One World Champion title and, along with it, a plateful of action and drama.

From the first rain-soaked practice sessions, we were pretty sure we were going to be once again treated to one of those unpredictable, chaotic and frankly bonkers, Brazilian Grand Prix weekends. When the 50km-wide tropical storm blew into Interlagos on Saturday afternoon bringing torrential rain, it guaranteed it!

I cannot remember ever, in more than a decade of F1 commentaries, a qualifying session that meant I had to spend nearly three hours on the microphone. Nor a scenario in which the championship contender was set to start the race in fourteenth place, with one of his main rivals in sixteenth and his other rival on pole position!

Of course, being Brazil there was comedy as well as drama. On Saturday, TV technicians rushed around with polythene bags, desperately trying to keep equipment dry as roofs leaked in the downpour. In the press room, scribes writing for the world's newspapers and magazines beavered away, surrounded by mops and buckets!

There couldn't have been a greater contrast between stormy Saturday and the blue skies on Sunday afternoon. But as in previous years, the tortuous Interlagos track gave us an action-packed race, plenty of drama and, ultimately a new champion.

Home hero Rubens Barrichello, delighted the ranks of fans by converting his pole position into an early race lead. His lightly-fueled strategy was to build sufficient lead to take off the pressure at the first round of pit stops.

Unfortunately for the Brazilian, chaos in the pack behind him meant he would be thwarted by the intervention of the safety car. The initial clash between Jarno Trulli and the Force India of Adrian Sutil wasn't too much of a problem.

Then Sutil spun back onto the track into the path of a hapless Fernando Alonso. The explosion of debris and three laps behind the safety car would ultimately end Barrichello's hopes for victory and his chance of beating Button to the title.

As the safety car circulated, there was more drama in the pits when Heikki Kovalainen's McLaren ‘did a Massa' and pulled out into the pitlane with the refuelling hose still attached. Just as with Massa's incident in Singapore last year, it was a team rather than a driver error, but this time it was even more spectacular.

Fuel sprayed from the McLaren was briefly ignited by the following car, Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari. Amazingly, both cars were able to rejoin the race, but Kimi's race had already been spoiled when a bid to pass second pace man Mark Webber had forced him to drop back with a wrecked front wing, while an early contact with Sutil had also cause the Ferrari to puncture a tyre. It was that sort of opening lap!

The safety car period was bad news for Barrichello, but equally a source of joy for Jenson Button and Sebastian Vettel, whose Brawn and Red Bull were able to close up on the leaders. As the cars filtered through the race pit stops, the lightly-fuelled Barrichello lost his advantage to eventual race winner Mark Webber and the BMW Sauber of Robert Kubica.

With ten laps remaining Button meanwhile was happy to tuck into sixth place behind former title rival Vettel. That should be enough to give the Briton the champion's title, but this being Brazil, who would make a firm prediction?

As it turned out, it was Barrichello, perennially unlucky at his home track, who was set to be robbed even of a chance of the podium.

An attempt to parry an attack from the hard charging Lewis Hamilton resulted in a punctured tyre and an unscheduled third pitstop. As the Brazilian limped home eighth, it was left to Webber to celebrate victory and to Button to cruise home fifth to claim a hard-won and worthy World Championship title.

After the floodlit splendour of Singapore and the squeaky-clean, newly refurbished Suzuka track in Japan, there couldn't be a greater contrast as the Formula One circus arrives in Sao Paulo. This is most definitely a circuit of the old school.

You can guarantee that even as mechanics unpack the cars, painters are still trying to tidy up the peeling décor. This is the track where timing screens go mysteriously blank, advertising hoardings have fallen onto the start straight, stray dogs have sprinted across the raceway, the winner of a race has not been given the trophy till the next GP and where the safety cars have even collided.

Yet Interlagos is also a track which has brought some of the most memorable motor racing moments of recent time. Little wonder that every driver, team member, journalist and race fan enjoys a love/hate relationship with the Brazilian Grand Prix. In the sometimes sterile world of Formula One, it brings us back to motor racing in the raw.

The track itself is an amalgam of fearsomely bumpy surfaces and stunningly good corners. The 320kph approach to turn 1, the Senna-S, is one of the greatest overtaking points anywhere in the world. Add to this the roaring passion of the fans and the continuous samba beat, which begins on the long access road to the track. The Brazilian Grand Prix has a party atmosphere like no other.

The question is, come Sunday evening, which driver will be enjoying the party most? Would it be Rubens Barrichello, hoping for a home win almost certainly in his penultimate drive with the Brawn team before moving to Williams next season?

Could it be Sebastian Vettel, whose domination of the Japanese Grand Prix has raised his championship chances from a minor mathematical probability to become a real threat to Brawn in the final two races.

Or will it be Jenson Button, who arrives in Brazil with a fourteen point advantage over team-mate Barrichello and a sixteen point lead over Vettel.  Third place or better in Brazil will mean that Jenson could be celebrating the 2009 World Championship title in Sao Paolo.

Except in the Brazilian Grand Prix, it doesn't ever seem to work like that. Back in 2007, feuding McLaren drivers Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso arrived with a seven point lead over Kimi Raikkonen.

A second place for Alonso or sixth for Hamilton would have made them champions. History of course records that victory for Raikkonen, at the head of a one-two for Ferrari ahead of Alonso, and a disastrous race to 7^th for Hamilton, meant that the title went to the Finn.

Last year of course, the chase went event closer. Hamilton, trying to play the numbers game in the final laps of a rain soaked race, very nearly didn't achieve the fifth place he needed for the title. Meanwhile Massa's charging performance nearly gave him the crown.

This year, Brazil is no longer the final round of the championship. Even if Jenson fails to score any points in the race, he would still take a four point lead into the final race of 2009 in Abu Dhabi. That could be a strong probability.

Overcast conditions and even rain could be likely for the coming weekend. If that happens, it exposes the Brawn BGP001 cars weakness, its inability to get sufficient temperature into its tyres. Meanwhile I suspect that Vettel's run of form may continue, which combined with the likely advantages of KERS for Ferrari and McLaren and the improved performance of Toyota in recent races, could squeeze the Brawn drivers out of the points.

That would set up a championship finale in Abu Dhabi, every bit as tense as those delivered by Sao Paulo in the past. In the meantime, Brazil is going to be as highly-charged, exciting and unmissable as ever!

Even as rain lashed the Suzuka paddock on Friday, you could still sense an enthusiasm among drivers. This is a track every Formula One driver relishes.

Along with Spa, Monza and Sao Paolo, the host of the next race; Suzuka's 5.8km figure-of-eight lap is one of the most challenging, most rewarding tracks on the calendar ....and potentially the most unforgiving.

This was proved by a crash-fest which saw wrecked cars litter the pitlane on Saturday, even though dry track conditions prevailed. First Mark Webber slid off the track and so heavily damaged the monocoque of his Red Bull car that he had to sit out qualifying as his mechanics rebuilt the car around a spare chassis.

Then in qualifying itself, a spate of spins and crashes saw Romain Grosjean, Heikki Kovalainen, Jaime Alguersuari, Sebastian Buemi and Timo Glock all fall victim to Suzuka's no-compromise corners. For Timo Glock, a heavy impact with the wall opposite the pits meant an airlift to hospital.

Timo was then the centre of more mayhem. It seems that the medivac helicopter took the Toyota driver to the wrong hospital, where he was initially greeted with bewilderment rather than treatment!

Although the Toyota driver was found to have only superficial injuries to his leg, the medics vetoed any chance of his racing. It meant only a single Toyota took to the starting grid for the Japanese car maker's home race.

As it turned out, the massed ranks of Toyota employees in the Suzuka grandstands were rewarded with a fine drive by Jarno Trulli to a deserved second place. The veteran Italian, possibly in his last three races in F1, proved that experience is a virtue as he and his team combined clever racecraft and a pacey pitlane strategy to take the advantage from Lewis Hamilton's McLaren.

While another monster accident to Jaime Alguersuari demonstrated that Suzuka is not a track for rookie errors, there was proof too that youth is no impediment to success. Neither Lewis Hamilton nor Sebastian Vettel had ever raced at the track before, yet both rose to the occasion in fine style.

Some might argue that the race result might well have been different had the KERS energy recovery system on Hamilton's car not malfunctioned. However although Lewis might have been robbed of a power boost that might have conceivably taken him past Trulli for second place as the pace car released a bunched field with five laps to go, I do not think that he would have unduly troubled race winner Vettel.

Quite simply, Sebastian Vettel came, saw and conquered the Suzuka circuit. Aided by Adrian Newey's sweet-handling Red Bull chassis, the German was fastest in all three qualifying sessions before turning his pole position into a convincing victory.

As a result, Vettel continues to maintain a numerical possibility of snatching the World Champion's crown from title leaders Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello. But he will need to win the two final races in Brazil and Abu Dhabi to do so.

It is a tough goal, but one which Kimi Raikkonen in 2007 proved is attainable. That year he grabbed the title as then McLaren team-mates Alonso and Hamilton tripped each other up at the final hurdle. Who is to say it cannot happen again?

Meanwhile Vettel can be proud to come out on top of the circuit that sorts the men from the boys. At the age of just 22!

Well, it has happened at last. The worst-kept secret in Formula One history is now official.

Fernando Alonso will start the 2010 season as a Ferrari driver, paired with Felipe Massa.

The writing was firmly on the wall as long ago as the Italian Grand Prix at Monza. That was when Santander Bank, the long-time sponsor who followed Alonso from Renault to McLaren, announced that in 2010 they would sponsor both Ferrari and McLaren teams.

Most industry insiders reckoned that would fund Alonso's move to Ferrari. However the Scuderia elected not to announce their future driver line-up at the time, because of Felipe Massa's condition following the Hungary accident.

Those of a charitable disposition will believe that the delay was to ensure undue pressure wasn't put on the recuperating Brazilian.

More likely, cynics like I think, they were hedging their bets in case Felipe was unfit to race; in which case they would have honoured the final year of Raikkonen's contract.

Now, although no official announcement has yet been made, it will only be a matter of days before the Santander money smoothes the way for Kimi to join Hamilton at McLaren. And that, I believe will be not just good, but BRILLIANT for us Formula One fans.

It will set up a fantastic, if potentially highly explosive environment in the team. You simply couldn't have a greater contrast between smooth-talking, urbane Hamilton and the hard-line, racer Kimi. I think it will be a clash of contrasts that could propel either driver to the 2010 title.

Don't just take my word for it. This is what top F1 photographer and insider Darren Heath had to say of Kimi. "He doesn't do PR, he doesn't do polished, we haven't seen his wife for ages, and I can't imagine having to step over a slumped-on-the-floor Lewis to get to my hotel room the morning after the race - as I had to with Kimi in Montreal a few years back.

"That, though, is part of the appeal of the man. He does his thing, he fights with photographers, he enjoys a drink or three, and he gets in a race car and drives its nuts off."

We know that Alonso is already planning a Schumacher-style ‘home team' to join him at Ferrari. Fernando is growing into a natural leader, and he has insisted as part of his deal that some of his favourite engineers from Renault and even McLaren, be invited to join him at Maranello.

Meanwhile, now that Alonso, the key in the lock of the 2010 driver market, has clicked into place. Who else goes where?

Well, watch for an announcement soon that Nico Rosberg, favoured by Mercedes, will join Jenson Button at Brawn next year.

I believe that Ross Brawn is more interested in the number one on his car than the British driver. If Barrichello pips Button to the title there might be a rethink. Otherwise the Brazilian could well be on his way to join Williams.

Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld may also be on the move from Sauber. My money puts one of them, maybe both, at Renault.

However former Renault driver Heikki Kovalainen could also be angling for a return. Rookie Romain Grosjean needs to make a compelling case for the French car maker to keep him on.

I will frankly be surprised if either Toyota driver remains with the team, which in itself may be considering a future away from F1. If it does stay for the 2010 season, watch for Kazuki Nakajima moving across from Williams.

Meanwhile it will shortly be open house in the driver market at Force India and Toro Rosso, not to mention the three new teams. I bet Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel are pretty relieved that they signed their contracts early with Red Bull!

Once again the Singapore Grand Prix delivered a stunning visual treat. It may not have ambushed our senses in the same way as it did in its inaugural year, but it surpassed even high expectations as the city shone out from the darkness as a backdrop to another intriguing race.

The bumpy and dusty Marina Bay circuit, combined with the air turbulence from cars running in high-downforce configuration was never going to give too much wheel-to-wheel racing. However there was certainly plenty to talk about.

For example the comedy of errors in the pit lane that robbed both Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel of their chance of victory. Rosberg was all set I think, to run Hamilton close for the win, before he messed up the pitlane exit.

A simple drivers error, but crossing the white line as he overshot the exit road earned him a drive-through penalty. It was then compounded by his being forced to take his punishment just after the safety car had been deployed, bunching up the field. Instead of losing one or two places he lost more than a dozen, writing off any chance of even scoring points.

In contrast, Vettel, who earned had arrived too fast at the opposite end of the pit road, took his penalty under normal racing conditions. It merely dropped him from third to fourth position, giving Fernando Alonso and the beleaguered Renault team the final podium place.

Behind Vettel, whose five points for fourth still give him a theoretical chance of claiming the drivers championship title, the two Brawn drivers finished fifth and sixth to continue their battle for the crown. However the title race could have been over in Singapore, with Button crowned Champion.

Remember back at the start of the season, Bernie Ecclestone advocated a new way of settling the championship, based on 'gold' medals for a win, 'silver' for second and 'bronze' for third? Thankfully the teams vetoed the idea.

Otherwise this weekend, if that (I think rather daft) notion had made the rulebooks, Jenson, courtesy of his six wins at the start of the season, would have claimed the title. The tally with three races remaining would have been Button 6, Hamilton, Vettel and Barrichello 2, Raikkonen and Webber 1.

While Singapore would have been a great place for Jenson to party in celebration, I am rather glad that the champagne has to remain on ice a little longer yet. Next weekend, the Japanese Grand Prix could see Button turn his 15 point lead into the title, but I doubt it.

Jenson will need to finish 1st with Barrichello 4th or lower. If Rubens wins in Suzuka the battle could go to the Brazilian's home track in Sao Paolo, or to the final round in Abu Dhabi.

We could be set, as in the last two years, for another Championship cliff-hanger. So please Bernie, save your medals for the London 2012 Olympics!

Around the Singapore GP circuit there is bustle. Journalists cluster around drivers at media events, decorators put the final finishing touches to hospitality suites and the pitlane garages are alive with the sound of mechanics unpacking and assembling the cars for this weekend's race.

However for three men, that buzz and excitement is over.

Flavio Briatore's lifetime ban from motor sport is the harshest-ever punishment meted out by the sport's organising body. The FIA ban extends far beyond Formula One. Quite simply Briatore is not allowed to take a part in any FIA-affiliated sport.

Organisers have been instructed to bar him from any event. Any team or company that deals with him in the future would face losing their licence to compete.

That even extends to the drivers contracted to his management company. In recent years Flavio has had a nice little earner from the percentage of wages of drivers including Heikki Kovalainen, Fernando Alonso and Mark Webber.

The FIA has ruled that if those drivers don't sever their contacts with Briatore, they will not renew their Superlicences for the new season.

Not that Flavio will suffer too much. He made his fortune in the 1980s as a partner in the Benetton fashion group. He then with typical modesty, he started his own fashion label, Billionaire.

Last year he spent over GBP 68 million on his yacht Force Blue. Before marrying one-time Wonderbra 'face' (did anyone look at that?) Elisabetta Gregoraci, Flavio dated a string of supermodels. No, he won't suffer for things to do.

Meanwhile Nelson Piquet Junior may have been granted immunity from further sanction by the FIA, but no right-minded team will take him on after this - unless of course he comes with a large raft of his father's money.

Nelson Junior has been trying hard to position himself as a weak-minded kid who was brow-beaten into being the fall-guy, then blew the whistle to allow justice to be served. Who does he think he is kidding?

I feel if Piquet Junior had continued to race for Renault, he would have said nothing. The first conversation between his father and an FIA official came the day he was told, in Hungary, that it would be his last Renault drive.

That is either a coincidence as wild as the connection between pit stops and crashes in Singapore. Or cold-blooded vindictiveness to bite back at the people who had just sacked him. You choose!

There is no doubt that Piquet has talent, but he simply didn't cut it in the current generation Formula One cars. Throughout his career he achieved his ultimate pace by doing more testing than any other driver, mostly in teams funded by his three-times World Champion father. This year, with the ban on in-season testing his best result was a lowly 12th.

Among the 91 pages of evidence that the FIA have made public there is even a suggestion that Piquet himself suggested the accident, after Alonso only qualified 15th following a fuel pump failure.

That is denied by the Brazilian, but a mysterious fourth man, "Witness X", is quoted as having overhead the remark on the Saturday, directly contradicts Piquet's statement that it was Chief Engineer Pat Symonds' idea, just before the race on the Sunday.

The witness apparently said he didn't want to hear any more of it and walked out of the meeting. He did not know the plan was to be put into effect until the crash happened. It seems that it was left to Symonds, we guess under instruction from Briatore, to put the crash plan into action.

Symonds will serve a five-year ban, which given that he is now 56 years old, may mean we never see the talented engineer in F1 again. His next stop may be the USA where races are run outside FIA sanction. Or his garden in Oxfordshire, England.

Meanwhile controversy has surrounded the Renault car company being merely given a suspended sentence. I actually agree with the FIA on this.

The Renault company while bearing corporate responsibility for the debacle, had the wool pulled over their eyes just as much as we did. Nonetheless, the Renault brand around the world has been seriously tainted.

It should be remembered that through their junior formulas and young driver programmes that almost half the drivers on the grid were helped by Renault early in their careers. A more swingeing penalty could have seen all that come to an end.

Meanwhile, we have 20 cars, including Renault on the starting grid for this weekend's race in Singapore. Here's to a repeat of the spectacle of last year - with none of the scandal!

A terse six-line statement issued by the Renault F1 team set the events surrounding last year's Singapore Grand Prix on their head.

Until the Renault statement, it had simply been a case of one person's word against another. Nelson Piquet Junior, sacked by the team after a series of undistinguished performances, was clearly a disaffected ex-employee.

On the other side, Flavio Briatore and Pat Symonds, now dropped by the team, represented one of the longest-established partnerships in Formula One. In the 1990s, they helped Michael Schumacher become double world champion and likewise a decade later, they helped Alonso win his two titles.

The full details of the rights and the wrongs will, we hope, emerge from the FIA World Council meeting next Monday. However the Renault statement could be interpreted as an admission of guilt - perhaps sacrificing Briatore and Symonds in the hope of mitigating potential penalties.

If Renault have done this, I think it is a grave mistake. It is notable that Renault have not said whether the two executives jumped, or were pushed out.

I speculate that the Renault car company lawyers came up with this daft trick. Briatore and Symonds, regardless of what happened in Singapore last year, would have been forced to resign rather than sanction such nonsense.

So whose reputation will suffer in all this?

Well, the Piquet family stock must be at an all-time low. If Nelson Piquet Junior really was instructed to deliberately crash in Singapore, it matters little whether the FIA has granted him immunity form further action on their part, to allow him to participate in the enquiry.

Piquet cheated and placed other people's lives at risk by deliberately driving into the wall. I can't believe any team would wish to hire him again.

I also still believe the timing of Piquet's allegations, whether found true or false, indicates his motive for telling the world was never a sense of justice. It was vindictive, purely a means of leveling the score with the team and team-manager that sacked him.

I doubt that anyone around F1 has an opinion that Flavio Briatore is some form of angel. His reputation goes ahead of him as a ruthless operator. However, he will survive. A multi-millionaire in his own right, he will no doubt find much else to do, not least his part-ownership with Bernie Ecclestone, of Queens Park Rangers football club.

Pat Symonds, I cannot imagine being outside racing for long. He is too much of a talent to waste. Most people within the sport also seem to share the opinion that he has been stitched up by those around him.

Will the reputation of Formula 1 suffer? I think not. It should no more be damaged by this than cricket has from ball-tampering, rugby from artificial blood injuries, or football from players diving in the penalty area.

Nor should the Singapore Grand Prix be worried about its reputation. While we may muse that the outcome of last year's race can now be deemed artificial, did that detract from the spectacle of what we saw around the Marina Bay circuit, or the anticipation of this year's race? Not a bit of it.

Fernando Alonso will of course either be implicated come Monday, or vindicated, in which case he will be rightly aggrieved. Alonso's drive in Singapore last year was stunning, with or without Piquet's ‘accident'. The former double world champion will find a hollow victory deeply distasteful.

The big loser in this is Renault. This gauche, semi-admission, before any guilt is proven, is in my opinion a big mistake.

The decision by Force India to release Giancarlo Fisichella to join Scuderia Ferrari for the last five races of his F1 racing career, is a dream come true for the driver dubbed 'the Italian whippet'.

Next year, the plan is for diminutive Roman to assume a permanent testing role with Ferrari, allowing the recuperating Felipe Massa to return to the driving seat for the new season. But for now, Fisichella has an opportunity to rewrite history if he can win the Italian Grand Prix.

Although Ferrari have won five of the last 10 Italian Grands Prix at Monza; with the exception of American expat Mario Andretti in 1977, the Italians have to look back to Ludovico Scarfiotti in 1966 to find a home race winner. It is nearly as bad as Englishmen talking about the soccer World Cup!

This is Giancarlo's big chance and I believe he is capable of stepping up to it. He has come close before, most notably in 2005 and 2006 when he finished third and fourth respectively for Renault. In his final drive for Force India, his spirited chasing of Kimi Raikkonen at Spa showed that when the car allows, the spark is still there.

In addition, Monza is a track where KERS, the kinetic energy recovery system, can be deployed to maximum advantage. The Ferraris will use the system with its 90 horsepower boost for up to seven seconds each lap.

Although they may suffer on the fast corners as a result of its 30kg weight penalty, at the race start, engineers believe that the KERS-boosted cars will gain a 15metre advantage over their rivals by the time they reach the first corner.

The bad news for Giancarlo and Kimi, is that the KERS system is also being used at Monza by the McLaren and Renault teams too. That means six cars, Raikkonen and Fisichella, Hamilton and Kovalainen, Alonso and the rookie Grosjean, might all be hustling into the first chicane up to 20km/h faster than the rest of the pack.

Even if they all manage to come out of the corner with their cars intact, Giancarlo's challenges still might not be over. I suspect that in straight-line speed, the McLarens might just have the advantage over the Ferraris at Monza. Remember the 2007 race when Alonso and Hamilton trounced the scarlet opposition with a devastating 1-2? It could happen again.

Meanwhile the race could prove another high-pressure challenge for championship leader Jenson Button. His nearest rival, team-mate Rubens Barrichello is still sixteen points behind him, but there are big doubts now whether he can hang onto his advantage much longer.

The last few races have seen the man who scored six wins from the first seven races, struggle to show any signs of his early-season pace. In contrast Barrichello looks the stronger driver of the two, with victory in Valencia boosting his championship aspirations.

Jenson's big problem in recent races is that he has struggled to find an elusive 'sweet spot' in the handling of the Brawn BGP001. The latest aerodynamic upgrades on the car simply don't suit his aggressive style of driving.

He has suffered in particular with rear-end grip in the crucial turn in to slower corners. Meanwhile Barrichello, who brakes earlier and has a more flowing driving style through the corner, better suits the car's current set-up. So saying you can guarantee that Jenson will be working flat-out with his engineers to get the most out of the car at Monza.

Meanwhile, Red Bull Racing drivers Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber, third and fourth in the championship will approach Monza with high hopes of again scoring more points than their Brawn rivals. Vettel's win at Silverstone and third place in Belgium demonstrates the pace of their cars on high-speed tracks, while Webber too would have been in the top four in Spa, had he not been given a pitlane penalty.

So that makes ten drivers so far, who all have a chance of winning at Monza. That is without mentioning Force India, whose drivers Sebastian Vettel and Vitantonio Liuzzi also can't be ruled out given the cars Spa performance, nor Toyota or BMW, who also promise improvements in pace.

In other words, it is simply too close to call. But wouldn't it be great to see Giancarlo's dream come true?

While this weekend's Belgian Grand Prix certainly gave us an exciting race, it also highlighted a major - and potentially lethal - flaw in the Formula One rulebook.

You may remember that the FIA introduced a ban on in-season testing at the start of this year. That means that since the Australian Grand Prix in March, no team has been able to lap any track other than during the Grand Prix weekends.

In many ways the rule has achieved its primary purpose. It has cut costs as many F1 teams effectively used to run a second ‘test team' as well as their main race operation. However the dangerous flip side of this is that there are an increasing number of so-called F1 test or reserve drivers who have little or no experience of driving a current-specification racing car.

The Friday tests are used by the race drivers, who rightly need the maximum amount of practice. As a result there are some test drivers who will admit that they haven't driven an F1 lap for more than ten months.

Ferrari's Luca Badoer is one example, some of which explains his tardy pace. Toro Rosso rookie Jaime Algesuari hadn't even lapped a track at all in his car before he took to the starting grid for the first time in Hungary.

Romain Grosjean, although a front-runner in the GP2 series, admitted his only experience of the latest Renault had been driving it up and down an airport runway!

Is it any surprise therefore that the two rookies caused the mayhem at Les Combes on the opening lap of the Belgian Grand Prix? Grosjean braking too late, hit Jenson Button's Brawn. Algesuari reacting to the incident, drove into Lewis Hamilton's McLaren. All four cars wound up in the wall.

One could say that the reason that the two British drivers had consigned themselves to likely accidents by qualifying so poorly, but the fact remains that the inexperience of the rookies was a prime reason for the pile-up. And I guess the only reason that Badoer missed out on the accident was that he was so slow, the accident was over and done with by the time he got there!

For Button, it could have spelt disaster in terms of his championship ambitions. Had either his team-mate Rubens Barrichello or either of the Red Bull drivers scored more strongly this weekend, he could have been in trouble. As it was they conspired to give him a stay of execution.

Barrichello, who started from fourth was thwarted by a clutch problem (again) on the start line. His recovery drive to seventh place was made into a cliff-hanger who the Brawn's Mercedes engine began to smoke in the closing stages. It proved to be an oil-leak, which promptly caught fire as the car drove into the pits at the end of the race. Nice timing for the Barbie Rubens!

Mark Webber could also have profited from Button's misfortune, but he was hobbled by a drive-through penalty after being released by his pits crew into the path of Nick Heidfeld's BMW. The Aussie could potentially have claimed Heidfeld's eventual fifth place and four points. As it was, he finished ninth. Pointless.

It was left to Sebastian Vettel to vault back ahead of his team mate to third in the championship, with a fine drive to third position in the race. For Vettel, who suffered two engine failures on successive days in Valencia, the result has brought his title challenge back to life.

However the big memory that everyone will take away from the Belgian Grand Prix will be the race-long duel between Ferrari and Force India. In my opinion Kimi Raikkonen drove one of the best races of his career.

While Kimi had won at Spa, his favourite circuit, three times before - this time he did not have the quickest car on the track. It took a great KERS-boosted overtaking move to gain the advantage on the fourth lap - and then he was not allowed a single moment of relaxation as Fisichella hounded the Ferrari for every lap of the race.

Meanwhile, pole position and second place may have been beyond the wildest dreams of Vijay Mallya and the Force India team at the start the weekend, but amid the post-race celebrations there was almost a feeling that this team could do better still.

Force India has never been lacking in ambition. The team brought a raft of aerodynamic improvements to Spa and the revised car immediately found a sweet spot with the medium downforce nature of the track.

Ironically, before the Belgian Grand Prix, most of the rumours surrounding Fisichella had been whether he might be loaned to Ferrari for the last five races of the season to stand in for Massa and Badoer. Now some are even wondering whether Fisichella might beat the Ferraris, with the Force India.

I personally think that might be stretching credibility a little too far. But there again, Toro Rosso and Sebastian Vettel won last year's Italian Grand Prix. As always in Formula One, anything might happen!

There really couldn't be a greater contrast between the hot, dusty, concrete-lined man-made Valencia street circuit and the cool, possibly damp, tree-lined Spa Francorchamps track, high in the Ardennes forest in Belgium. It is a perfect illustration of the variety of challenges that face the F1 teams each season.

The Spa circuit is, along with Monza, one of the oldest on the calendar. The first time Spa hosted a grand prix was the European GP of 1925, won by Antonio Ascari, driving an Alfa Romeo run by a team manager called Enzo Ferrari.

Since the arrival of the Grand Prix world championship in 1950 Formula One, Spa has hosted 40 Belgian Grand Prix events. Of those, Ferrari has won eleven, a phenomenal performance.

That Ferrari tally of course includes Felipe Massa's controversial win last year. If you remember the stewards handed the Brazilian victory after penalising Lewis Hamilton for jumping the chicane in a dramatic final lap melee after one of the seemingly inevitable rain showers drenched the track.

Some still believe the penalty had more to do with the FIA's antipathy with then McLaren boss Ron Dennis, than any on-track indiscretion. Whether true or not, it added yet more high drama to what is always an unmissable race.

McLaren and Ferrari both have dominated at Spa in recent years, with no other team having won at the track since 1998. Currently the tally for the last eight races stands at four all. However I wonder this year whether either will win.

One thing might work in their favour is the two team's continuing use of the KERS system. Both McLaren and Ferrari engineers believe that KERS will have more of an impact here than at any other circuit on the calendar.

Overtaking is possible at Spa because of the slipstreaming effect and this year, those cars running KERS will probably be able to run slightly more aerodynamic downforce than those without, thus having a power advantage on the faster sections and more grip on the slower ones.

However I suspect that, as on the wide-open spaces of Silverstone, the phenomenal aerodynamic efficiency of the Red Bull Racing cars will again come to the fore. Adrian Newey and his team ignored KERS, concentrating instead on creating a car for Vettel and Webber which has generates both low drag for good straightline speed, while still generating sufficient downforce to shine on the corners.

Ahead of both Ferrari and McLaren, I suspect that Red Bull will be the team to watch. And with thousands of German fans streaming across the nearby border, this will almost be a home race for Sebastian Vettel, who could reward them with a popular victory.

Brawn GP, will I suspect once again be dependent on the vagaries of the weather. Should Spa Francorchamps experience one of its rare hot, sunny, still days, then the Brawns will generate sufficient heat in their tyres to bid for victory.

If however, it is cool, windy or even rainy, Button and Barrichello may struggle. In that scenario they simply have to hope that they gain a few championship points to allow their title race to continue to the warmer climes of Monza and Singapore. A look at the weather reports indicates that it might not be Brawn's weekend.

Two teams could however still surprise. Both Renault and BMW have transformed their rather lacklustre cars by a series of mid-season aerodynamic modifications which have made them both easier to drive and possible front-runners.

One can never discount either Fernando Alonso or Robert Kubica and last year Nick Heidfeld, so often overlooked drove one of the best races of his carrer in changing conditions to be rewarded with second place.

Of course, results apart, simply savouring the action on Spa Francorchamps is a reason to watch this weekend's event. The 7km lap is a unique throwback to the very earliest days of racing with cars racing on a track which is still partially made up of closed country roads.

The famous La Source hairpin, the spectacular swoop of Eau Rouge corner and the blast through the woods at Blanchimont are all used as highways for much of the year. The purpose-made section of track, linking Les Combes and Stavelot, winds down the valley in a flowing series of curves, the most challenging being the long Pouhon left-hander.

Pouhon is perhaps the toughest corner in F1 today. Taken at over 250km/h it is almost, but not quite full throttle. It rewards those with a sensitive touch, and the brave.

As always the Belgian Grand Prix will prove as unpredictable as the mountain weather systems which can change the track from sunshine to rain showers in just seconds. It is motor racing in the raw, just as it used to be, and all the better for it.

For Rubens Barrichello, victory in Valencia was a moment to savour. It came after a five year absence from the winners circle and for Barrichello, so long the bridesmaid, never the bride, it was just the tenth victory of a career spanning 281 race starts.

As in his six years at Ferrari, it looked this season as if once again the Brazilian would play the role of understudy to his team-mate. Just as with Michael Schumacher in the past, Barrichello seemed fated to once again follow in the wheeltracks of championship leader Jenson Button.

This time however, it was Button who faltered, a mistake in qualifying meant he started fifth on the grid, two places behind his team-mate. Then he got forced further down the pack in the opening lap melee. On a track which seems purpose-built to prevent overtaking, Button was lucky to salvage two points with his eventual seventh place.

The race though, turned out a lot better for the Brawn team than their closest championship rivals. Red Bull simply never looked like winners all weekend and come the race, things went from bad to worse, with neither Webber nor Vettel scoring championship points.

Worse still, Sebastian Vettel suffered not one, but two Renault engine blow-ups during the weekend, one in practice and the second in the race. Vettel has now used seven of the eight engines in the season which the 2009 regulations allow before penalties are invoked. The team will almost certainly have to reduce the power of his surviving units to ensure reliability.

At the start of this race, I commented that the Grand Prix of Europe was potentially McLaren's to throw away. And, guess what, they did. The silver cars were undoubtedly the fastest on the track and Hamilton led for more than half the race, before a pitlane bungle dropped him to second place.

The team wilted under the pressure of trying to out-think their rival Ross Brawn. On lap 36, they made a snap decision to keep Lewis on track for an extra flying lap as he was running faster than Barrichello and had just enough fuel to complete another circuit.
However, they told Lewis just too late and he was already committed to entering the pitlane. As a result, the pit crew hadn't fully readied his tyres and he was delayed while they were being unwrapped from their tyre-warmers.

The 13.4 second stop lost Hamilton a vital five seconds to Barrichello - and with it - the race.

Heikki Kovalainen had chased his McLaren team-mate in second place from the start, but was passed by Barrichello during the first round of pit stops, then by the flying Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen when the second pit stops came. Kovalainen's fourth place was however his best result of the season and his third successive points finish.

Once again, Kimi Raikkonen was back on the podium for Ferrari, with third place in a car which clearly still struggles early in the race on full fuel tanks, but steadily improves as the race goes on. The improving fortunes of the Ferrari team were hardly reflected by their second car however.

Test driver Luca Badoer's return to a Formula One starting grid after a ten-year absence, sadly looked more like a nightmare than a dream come true. Despite being a veteran of thousands of laps of testing, he blundered around the Valencia track, not just off the pace, but seemingly overawed by the experience.

Badoer left a trail of mistakes and errors, recording an unprecedented four pitlane speeding violations in practice, spinning on the opening lap, then gaining a drive-through penalty when he wandered slowly out of his second pit stop, across the safety line on the exit road as he rejoined the track

One could call them rookie errors, except the real rookie in the race, Renault debutant Romain Grosjean, was sharp enough to overtake the tardy Badoer in the pitlane. Although the Swiss-French driver's race was spoiled by a damaged nosewing on the opening lap -his Grand Prix debut was regarded by most as a promising sign of a strong new team-mate for Alonso.

With the Belgian Grand Prix coming up just next weekend, leaving barely enough time for a new seat to be made for another substitute driver, it seems that Ferrari have little option but to stick with Badoer for the moment. Meanwhile, a revitalised Barrichello could even start to hustle team-mate Button, for the title!

It hardly seems as if they have been away, yet for the past two weeks or more Formula One has been in a state of enforced shut-down, taking a compulsory summer break to fit in with the FIA's cost-cutting rules.

Between 3rd and 16th August all the F1 team headquarters were closed and all production, design and car build stopped. The cars, which had been rebuild and checked after the Hungarian Grand Prix had to be loaded into their trucks by 2nd August to comply with the strict guidelines of the shutdown. Only the factories' PR personnel were allowed access to email, in case of emergencies.

Yet despite that, there were plenty of rumours and stories to speculate on. Some ended in disappointment, such as the plans for Michael Schumacher to return to the sport as a substitute at Ferrari for the recovering Felipe Massa.

Schumacher's inability to reach his required fitness level is now well documented. But one man's loss is another man's gain, in this case a huge opportunity for one of the unsung heroes of the sport, long-time Ferrari test driver Luca Badoer.

Luca is one of the good guys. His work behind the scenes has played a key part in Ferrari's success over the past decade, pounding round countless laps of the Ferrari test track at Fiorano, to help develop the cars which gave Schumacher, Barrichello and latterly Raikkonen and Massa their success.

However, I see his nomination to race the second Ferrari in Valencia and, almost certainly at Spa a week later, as being very much a caretaker position. Much as I respect Badoer, I don't think he'll prove up to the pressures or pace of the race weekend.

Luca hasn't raced an F1 car since he stood down from the Minardi team at the end of 1999, almost a decade ago. And thanks to this year's ban on track testing cars during the racing season, he hasn't done as many laps in the Ferrari F60 as many might imagine. Most of the test mileage was given to Raikkonen and Massa to allow them to adapt to the new car's quirks.

In fact it could be argued that Ferrari would have been no worse off putting a ‘rookie' such as Bruno Senna in the car. Or a reasonably current, but newly unemployed driver such as Sebastian Bourdais or Nelson Piquet junior.

The last time that Ferrari put a substitute driver in their race car, when Michael Schumacher broke his leg in 1999, they did just that. They chose Mika Salo in preference to Badoer, and he was ten years younger and had recent race experience back then.

I suspect there is still a hope in Ferrari that Schumacher might still regain fitness in time to make a popular appearance at Monza and Singapore, before Massa maybe makes a dramatic return at his home Grand Prix in Brazil. Even if not, Badoer will at least buy Ferrari some time to look at their recruitment options.

Meanwhile, having successfully overturned the ban that was levied on them by the FIA Stewards at the Hungarian Grand Prix, the Renault team will field alongside Spanish home hero Fernando Alonso, a driver whom I think could be a true star of the future.

The team have replaced the under performing Piquet with 2008 GP2 Asia series champion Romain Grosjean, who could potentially prove a Vettel-like talent.

The 23 year old Swiss-French driver has had a meteoric run of successes since he first started racing single-seaters, just on his 17th birthday. In his first ever season he dominated the Formula Renault 1600cc category in 2003, becoming Swiss champion with 10 wins from 10 races.

In 2005 he became the French Formula Renault Champion, then won 2007 F3 Euro Series and last year claimed the 2008 GP2 Asia Series crown. Already this year, racing in the GP2 series supporting the Grand Prix, he has scored two wins in Barcelona and Turkey.

It is notable that in the GP2 Asia series he drove for the ART team, run by Nicolas Todt, son of former Ferrari boss Jean. His connections are therefore impeccable.

While I don't expect Badoer to shine in Valencia, I will expect Renault and Alonso to excel in qualifying and Grosjean might easily spring a surprise too. Come the race though, watch out for a three-way fight between Brawn, Red Bull and the KERS-boosted McLaren of Lewis Hamilton.

My money for the win will go on the wily old street fighter Webber, but watch out for plenty of dramas on the dusty, concrete wall-lined track.

A quick look at the results sheets for the Hungarian Grand Prix and you could be forgiven for thinking that we were back in 2007. Alonso on pole. Hamilton the winner. Raikkonen, Ferrari, second. It was just like the ‘good old days' again.

Only Mark Webber's Red Bull in third place served to remind us of the new status quo this season. His podium result could be pivotal in the Championship race, bringing him closer to title leader Jenson Button and equally importantly, placing him ahead of team-mate Sebastian Vettel, whose non-finish dropped him to third in the points.

For Button and the Brawn team, this was a race that they should have won - and didn't. Previously, tracks with slow and medium speed corners such as Melbourne and Monaco, Barcelona and Bahrain, have been the team's happy hunting ground, giving Button four of his six wins this season.

The warmer track temperatures this weekend too should have given Brawn GP a further advantage over their rivals. Yet they were little more than makeweights. And particularly worryingly for Button and Barrichello, no-one seemed to know why.

Little wonder that Button was almost screaming with frustration over his car-to-pit radio. Just a couple of races ago we were speculating on when the Briton would clinch the title. Now we are wondering who might beat him to it!

Given the strength of the McLaren fighback, one cannot even rule out Hamilton getting back into contention either. It has to be said that the Hungaroring track throws up a very particular set of requirements, in particularly favouring the KERS-boosted cars, but then again, so will the next race in Valencia too.

Meanwhile it was a mixed weekend for Ferrari. Starting positively, Kimi Raikkonen's second place marked a performance boost for the Scuderia, which was the equal of that at McLaren. At last, the ‘old' Kimi reappeared to drive a strong, aggressive race. It was again, just like the good old days.

Sadly the spectre of the ‘bad old days' of motor racing were revived too, by the freak accident to Felipe Massa in qualifying. A lot of hot air will no doubt be expended in the coming weeks by so-called safety experts, but frankly I cannot see how any driver can be better protected from a component failing and falling from a car, then being hit by a car following just four seconds behind.

Massa's head injuries though grave, could have been so much worse. It is thanks to current Formula One safety technology, including the modern carbon-fibre helmet construction and the crashworthiness of the Ferrari in the following full-throttle, head-on 200kph impact that Felipe owes his life.

Ironically given the rare nature of this accident, the problem of flying debris was already at the forefront of many minds following the tragic death a week previously of 18 year-old Henry Surtees, the son of former F1 and motor cycle world champion John Surtees, who was killed while racing in the FIA Formula Two Championship at Brands Hatch.

A wheel from another car which had hit the barriers, bounced back onto the track and hit Surtees' car, which then speared off the track, its driver already unconscious. The events in Hungary, six days later were chillingly similar.

The scenario could potentially have been repeated on the Sunday at Hungaroring too. This time though the situation was avoidable, as it was a bungled pitstop that allowed Fernando Alonso to return to the track with a loose wheel, which subsequently flew off his car, ending up resting against a crash barrier.

Alonso, who had led the early stages of the race, lost more than a potential podium finish from the debacle. After the race the FIA stewards found that the team "knowingly released car no. 7 from the pitstop position without one of the retaining devices for the wheel-nuts being securely in position, this being an indication that the wheel itself may not have been properly secured."

The stewards statement added that Renault, "being aware of this, failed to take any action to prevent the car from leaving the pitlane....failed to inform the driver of this problem or to advise him to take appropriate action given the circumstances".

The FIA stewards found that the team's actions had compromised safety in breach of the Sporting Regulations and have banned the Renault team from taking part in the next race, the Grand Prix of Europe in Valencia.

The ING Renault team have of course the right to appeal this penalty. However the repercussions extend beyond Alonso being able to take part in a home race. The event is already on record as struggling to attract spectators, just 32,000 tickets have been sold and the lack of a home hero driver, will be a bitter blow to organisers.

Mind you, I've got a solution. There is no way that Massa is going to be fit to race in Valencia, so Ferrari will need a driver. Alonso needs a drive?  Sounds perfect doesn't it?  Mind you I can't see either Kimi Raikkonen nor Flavio Briatore sharing my enthusiasm, but if it happens, remember you saw it here first!

The build-up to this weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix has served to remind us all of the fickle nature of motor racing.

On one hand the Red Bull-backed Toro Rosso team are set to give teenage Formula Three champion Jaime Alguersuari his Formula One debut. The 19 year old Spaniard will thus become the youngest-ever driver to take part in a Grand Prix.

Sadly though, the darker side of the sport revealed itself at Brands Hatch in England last weekend, when Henry Surtees, the son of former world champion John Surtees, was killed while racing in the new FIA Formula Two Championship.

It was, by all accounts, a freak accident. A wheel from another car which had hit the barriers, bounced back onto the track and hit Surtees' car, which then speared off the track, its driver already unconscious. Henry was just 18.

The tragic irony of this is that his father survived some of the darkest years of motor racing safety. John raced motorcycles for Norton and MV Augusta in the 1950s, when frankly, it was little more than a novel form of suicide.

He survived to win the motorcycle world championship title four times, before switching to Grand Prix motor racing, itself almost as dangerous in that era. He won the F1 World Championship with Ferrari in 1964, and he remains the only man to clinch titles on both two-wheels and four.

In contrast to the fragile machines of yesteryear, Surtees junior was driving a state of the art car, designed by the Williams Formula One team and not too far removed from current F1 machinery. It serves to remind us that the sport can still be dangerous no matter how safe and up-to-date the design of a modern racing car.

Meanwhile all credit must be given to Dietrich Mateschitz and Red Bull for supporting their latest teenage protégé all the way to the top. Alguersuari, who last year became the youngest-ever winner of the prestigious British F3 championship, takes over from the under-performing Sebastien Bourdais, lining up alongside fellow young charger Sebastien Buemi at Toro Rosso.

It is a fantastic endorsement of Red Bull's young driver programme, which over the years has also given support to other rising stars including Robert Kubica, Karun Chandhok and Bruno Senna. There are others too in the pipeline, you may not have heard of Jean Eric Vergne, Daniel Ricciardo, Robert Wickens or Mirko Bortolotti yet, but I will take a ready bet that in a year or two, you will.

Their immediate predecessor in the Toro Rosso team may well be gunning for victory this weekend, at the wheel of his Red Bull. Sebastian Vettel's first place at the head of a Red Bull 1-2 at Silverstone, followed by his second place to team-mate Mark Webber in Germany, puts him in a strong position not only to bid for his third win of the season, but also to potentially battle with Jenson Button for the champion's title.

The Hungaroring has in fact got something of a reputation for favouring young drivers. It was here in 1993, that British driver Damon Hill scored his first victory. Last year it was McLaren driver Heikki Kovalainen's turn to score a maiden win. 

In 2003 Fernando Alonso claimed his first victory, to become at the age of 22 years and 27 days, the youngest-ever winner of a Formula One Grand Prix. The record stood until Vettel's victory at Monza last year.

The tight twists of the Hungaroring don't offer many chances for overtaking, but that doesn't mean that races are boring. Far from it. 

Back in 1989, Nigel Mansell, driving for Ferrari, fought his way from 12^th on the grid, then duelled with and out-foxed Ayrton Senna. On the last lap of the race he boxed the Brazilian in behind a back-marker to take a sensational victory.

In 2007 the race was dominated by the feud between Fernando Alonso and well, anybody that didn't agree with him. Alonso claimed pole position, but deliberately baulked McLaren team-mate Hamilton in the pit lane to prevent him making a final qualifying run.  The FIA stewards penalised Alonso and Hamilton went on to win the race, but an outburst by Alonso to the FIA officials is said to have triggered the "Ferrarigate" investigations, leading to McLaren's record fine.

But it was the 2006 race that was one of the wackiest I can ever remember. First, Felipe Massa spun off the wet track on his way from the pits to the starting grid. Then Pedro de la Rosa spun his McLaren on the warm-up lap.

Kimi Raikkonen's McLaren took an early lead, as Michael Schumacher leapt from 11th on the grid to 4th on the opening lap, only to have to pit and replace a damaged nose. Then Raikkonen hit Liuzzi while lapping his Toro Rosso. Alonso took the lead, only to suffer a loose wheel nut. That handed the lead to Jenson Button, claiming his and Honda's maiden win, from 14th on the grid!

Will this weekend's race be as wacky? I somehow suspect not, but the warmer track conditions might well play to the Brawn GP team as tyre wear may prove critical. I suspect that Button may be the man to watch for victory this weekend to keep his championship hopes alive, but watch out for those charging Red Bulls right behind.

Mark Webber's win has been a long time coming. According to my records, the Australian last won a motor race of any description back in 2001, when he won the Formula 3000 race which supported the French GP at Magny Cours.

Webber won three races that season, among a series of strong results which propelled him into Formula One. The following year, 2002, Webber made a dream debut at the Australian Grand Prix, driving for the Minardi team which was then owned by fellow Aussie Paul Stoddart.

It didn't seem to matter that, like so many rookies Webber was starting his career with a back-of-the-grid team, home expectations were high. Webber arrived for his debut race in Melbourne, waving from the cockpit of one of his team boss's jumbo jets with his Minardi F1 car in the cargo hold.

Then in the race itself, Mark pulled off the seemingly impossible. From eighteenth place on the starting grid, he claimed fifth place and two championship points on his debut.

It still seems amazing to me that Mark has taken so long to progress from that day to this, more than seven years and 130 races later. It has been a roller coaster ride, taking him through the Jaguar and Williams teams, before joining Red Bull in 2007.

Since then he has been a key part of the team's renaissance and in typically straight fashion he has responded to all the media hype surrounding German ‘wunderkind' Sebastian Vettel. He has let his driving do the talking.

Red Bull racing are now in the perfect situation. Their second successive one-two finish shows they have undoubtedly the best car on the track at the moment. Their two drivers are pushing one another to the limit, yet still working in harmony.

In contrast, championship leaders Brawn GP are suddenly looking more vulnerable. The last two races, held in lower ambient temperatures, have exposed a weakness in the Brawn BGP001 car's ability to get its tyres to a high-enough working temperature and chinks are appearing in the vital relationship between its drivers.

Rubens Barrichello's disappointment after dropping from the race lead to finish sixth might be understandable. But his outburst to media in the paddock after the race, that he felt that the team had let him down was as inappropriate as it was factually incorrect.

I respect the Brazilian hugely, but this time he was out of order. His Brawn team were thwarted by a faulty fuel rig which could not have been predicted. Their only failure was perhaps to have failed to tell him this in time, to avoid his making a fool of himself.

Rubens should count himself lucky that he has a cool and calm team boss in Ross Brawn. If Barrichello were driving for someone like Briatore, the tantrum might well have cost him his drive.

Meanwhile Jenson Button is like Brawn, a pragmatist. He's been through the bad times and driven some bad cars, for long enough to recognise when his lucky star is in the ascendant.

Earlier this season he divulged that he didn't know how long his luck might hold, but he was going to make the most of it. Even though the Brawn has been outpaced in the last two races, Jenson still sits on a commanding 21-point championship lead.

If one were to assume that Jenson were to maybe win two more races in hotter climates, such as Hungary and Valencia. The Red Bull drivers (or the fast-recovering Ferraris or McLarens) may force Button into third or worse, in cooler climes such as Monza or Spa. I suspect that the title showdown will be at earliest, the Singapore GP in September.

The question is will the title go to a Button and Brawn, or to a Red Bull driver? It is still not too late for a dramatic change of fortunes. Just as in the past two seasons, we might savour a finely balanced title battle right to the last race.

Blooming typical. I'd just written this column saying that I am looking forward to Formula One getting back to business as usual, with focus being on track action at the German Grand Prix this weekend.

Then on Wednesday afternoon Max Mosley did it again with another precipitous change in direction. With no warning and contradicting the FIA's own statements at the end of June, the eight current FOTA teams were told by FIA officials that they "are not currently entered into the 2010 world championship and have no voting rights in relation to the technical and sporting regulations thereof".

They had no choice but to walk out of a planned meeting with the FIA boss. In one way, this can be laid at the feet of the FOTA team-managers, they gloated too soon at their perceived victory when Mosley said that he would plan to step down in October. This move serves as a reminder that till then at least, Mad Max is still in charge. Like it or not.

Thankfully, it is business as usual as far as the German race fans are concerned. Even a week before the race, the camper vans containing vast quantities of pilsener beer and wurst sausages have been pouring into the campsites in the woods around the track. This is the start of the holiday season in Germany and it could be that the vacations may start on a high note with a German race winner.

Just as the (ultimately forlorn) hopes of victory for Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button packed the grandstands at Silverstone, the thought of a likely ‘home hero' race winner in Sebastian Vettel is likely to make the Nurburgring race a sell-out for the first time in recent years.

Amazingly though, although the Nurburgring hosted the European Grand Prix in recent years, this is the first year since 1976, a decade before Vettel was born, that the track will have hosted the German Grand Prix.

In those days the track was the notorious ‘Nordschleife', a perilous 22km lap through the Eiffel mountains known by some drivers as ‘the green hell'. F1 racing on the old track was abandoned after the 1976 race when a near-fatal accident to Ferrari driver Niki Lauda highlighted its many safety issues. Since then the cars have raced either at Hockenheim or on the shorter, but still technically demanding ‘new' Nurburgring.

Not since Michael Schumacher bowed out in 2006 with his fifth victory at the Nurburgring, has there been a home win in serious prospect. While there are four other German drivers on the grid, neither Timo Glock, Nico Rosberg nor Adrian Sutil have had the machinery or the good fortune to bid for victory.

Nick Heidfeld has come closest. He finished second at Nurburgring in 2005, after claiming pole position for the Williams team. This year he has so far been hobbled by his ill-handling BMW and paddock rumours have already hinted that he might be eying a switch from the team for 2010.

However just as Sebastien Vettel spoiled the hopes of the Jenson Button fans at Silverstone, I suspect that the Nurburgring's medium speed corners may better suit the Brawn chassis than Red Bull. Certainly the Brawn target will be a strong points-scoring performance to take Jenson closer to the title

However, we can certainly look forward to a great battle this weekend as Sebastien struts his stuff at the Nurburgring, while given the lack of results for McLaren this season, Mercedes-Benz wouldn't be too unhappy if their engine was seen to power the Brawn to victory this weekend.

Of the other German drivers, Toyota could yet spring a surprise with Timo Glock, watch Rosberg for the customary heroics in practice with the Williams and then there's Adrian Sutil ...

A week ago at a media event in Mumbai, I got into some hot water for suggesting that Sutil isn't aggressive enough in the Force India car. However I'll stick to my guns.

Adrian Sutil is in my opinion one of the good guys in the Formula One paddock. He's certainly one of the most talented. In addition to being a quick Formula One driver, he is an equally good concert pianist and will talk about arpeggios just as fluently as he does oversteer.

Both he and Giancarlo Fisichella are I think, virtuoso performers in their Formula One cars too. They are both a joy to watch on the track; fast, fluid, accurate. But are they race winners?

Perhaps Force India need their current skill-set more than a brutal, aggressive Kubica-type driver at the moment. However when that attacking style is needed it will be interesting to see which, or indeed whether either Force India driver will deliver.

As I know that Sebastian Vettel is fond of British comedy such as John Cleese's infamous ‘Don't Mention the War' sketch in Fawlty Towers, I make no apologies for the headline. Nor to point out that the plucky German chap trounced the best of British, in the form of Hamilton and Button, on their home track.

Carrying on the movie theme, June 21^st is also in the northern hemisphere, The Longest Day. It certainly seemed appropriate this weekend, as Formula One lurched towards Apocalypse Now.

The announcement on Thursday evening that the Formula One Teams Association members were indeed going to form a breakaway championship, rather than cave in to Max Mosley's ultimatums really did push the series to I fear, the edge of self destruction. If I may bring back the war-movie theme again, how about Catch-22?

History in various sporting codes shows that every time such a breakaway has happened, neither side truly benefits. The ultimate reaction usually comes from us, the fans. Past experience shows we will take just so much. Then we get fed up with the politics and walk away. Then the sport dies.

While some consider this weekend as an end-game, I suspect that there is still room for The Great Escape, allowing both parties to resume a working relationship. Next Wednesday, the FIA World Council meets in Paris and one of the items on the agenda is Max Mosley's proposed retirement.

Thereby sits the hidden agenda. Not one of the team bosses would admit it openly, but the clear hint is that the one thing that could stop this breakaway would be for FIA President Max Mosley to go. It is his dictatorial stance and intransigence that has brought this whole disaster to a head.

The rulemaking and direction of Formula One has increasingly become Mosley's personal fiefdom. The FIA World Council, which is supposed to reach a balanced consensus is regarded by many as impotent. The sport has for the past few years been ruled by Presidential edict.

A year ago Max said he would step down and retire in October. However some say that he believes that he doesn't want to leave the FIA in the midst of crisis and may reverse his original decision.

Although he doesn't seem to see it. Rightly or wrongly, Max IS a part of the crisis. If he elects to stay, I think the FOTA breakaway will accelerate with tracks and additional teams being announced in rapid succession. However if Max elects to retire and names a successor, I suspect and hope that we might see the FOTA teams reunite with Formula One.

Thankfully this weekend we also had a cracking motor race. Sebastian Vettel came, saw and conquered, with pole position, fastest lap and of course, an emphatic victory, ahead of team-mate Red Bull Racing team-mte Mark Webber.

Brawn honours were upheld by a beautifully controlled drive from Rubens Barrichello, to a well-deserved third place. Championship leader Button however had to be content with sixth place on a track where the Brawn, for the first time this season, was simply outclassed.

I sense a wind of change in the 2009 World Championship. No longer are Brawn running away from the field with the fastest car on the track. This is the point where Jenson Button needs to dig in and start defending his championship lead.

The Red Bull wasn't the only car to be superior to the Brawn. Despite a disappointing practice, the Ferrari of Felipe Massa came back on form for the race itself. Massa delivered a fine drive that took him from 11^th on the grid, past Button and into fourth place.

Meanwhile down in tenth place, due credit should be given for an unsung performance that for me, was one of the drives of the race.

Force India driver Giancarlo Fisichella had started a lowly 16^th, after his best lap in qualifying was disrupted by the yellow flags being waved after a monster accident to team-mate Adrian Sutil.

Fisichella took two places on the first lap and overtook two more cars in Stowe Corner on the second. He then lapped at the same pace as the front runners on his way to an eventual tenth place.

At the chequered flag, Fisichella was just two seconds behind Kimi Raikkonen's eighth place Ferrari. I have little doubt, that had Giancarlo started a little higher up the grid, he'd have scored the team's first points of the season.

Based on Jenson Button's domination of the first half of the Formula One World Championship season, one would have to be crazy to tip anyone other than the Briton, or his Brawn team for the 2009 Driver's and Constructor's titles.

Certainly a win this weekend would be much now than ten more championship points added to the tally. The 2009 British Grand Prix is set to be the last-ever held at Silverstone before the race moves (assuming the track is finished) to a new venue at Donington Park, for 2010 and beyond.

Not only is Silverstone a home track for the British driver, it is also for the team. Brawn GP are based at Brackley, just 10km from the circuit.

They say that a home race adds pressure. Jenson in fact has already coped with one 'home fixture' this season. He won convincingly in Monaco, where he lives. Jenson himself said that was the race that has meant most to him as a driver.

I believe that Button's wins in six of the first seven races allows him to approach the British Grand Prix in a relaxed frame of mind. He's been constantly reminded by helpful media like me, that a win would match fellow Briton Nigel Mansell's 1992 feat of winning five races in a row. That year Mansell went on to win both the British Grand Prix and the title.

Last year Lewis Hamilton dominated the rain-soaked event to claim his third win at that point in the season. He too went on to be champion. However I believe that win or lose at Silverstone, Jenson already has the satisfaction of knowing he is on his way to the title.

I wonder though, whether Button may be the last driver to be crowned FIA World Drivers Champion, a title which has been awarded continuously since Nino Farina was first awarded the crown in 1950?

The continuing feud between the teams organisation FOTA and the FIA could easily come to a head this weekend. The FIA are determined to force through cost-cutting regulations which the bigger teams say are unattainable in the short-term, while FIA boss Max Mosley is determined that either the teams submit to his wishes or they won't compete next year.

In the past Mosley has operated a policy of 'divide and conquer' among the teams. Most notably buying off Ferrari with a commercial agreement which remained secret til last month and more recently, it could be speculated that the penalties which emasculated McLaren have had more to do with power struggles than the punishment fitting the crime.

This time though, the teams with the exceptions of Williams and Force India, who have signed unconditionally for the 2010 series, have so far maintained a solidarity unthinkable a few years ago. Then, the different team bosses couldn't even agree on when to hold their next meeting. Now there is talk that the teams themselves may form a breakaway series.

Mosley has responded by offering places on the starting grid to a string of new teams. Perhaps not for the first time,he holds the whip hand in a bizarre game of musical chairs. This time when the music stops, I suspect that Ferrari, Toyota or Renault could be left standing - without a place on the starting grid.

The Silverstone paddock is going to be a very interesting place this weekend. I've already even heard wacky rumours of a possible strike by the eight FOTA teams, to remind us what a starting grid would look like with just Force India and Williams on it.

Personally I think that is rubbish - the teams as much as anyone know their future depends on being able to put on the best possible show. Alternatively, it could be Force India's best chance of a win all season!

My money will go on Button to continue on his winning ways. But watch Red Bull and maybe Ferrari chase him home!

I know, it is a shocking pun, but I fear it won't be the last time I use it.

Jenson Button's winning performance in the Turkish Grand Prix took him another step closer to a world championship title.

His victory took him into the realms of Formula One legends Michael Schumacher and Jim Clark, as one of only three drivers to win six of the first seven races of the season. Added to that, he has now scored 61 of the potential 65 World Championship points so far on offer.

It is a sobering thought that had Bernie Ecclestone and Max Mosley had their way in introducing their ‘winner takes all', gold-silver-bronze medal, championship formula, Button would potentially have zipped up (sorry!) the title at the next race.

As it is, Jenson hasn't got it quite stitched up (aaagh) yet. Even now, a couple of non-finishes would see the Briton still having to fight to the final rounds of the title race.

Mind you, based on Button and the Brawn GP team's performance in Turkey, they will fully deserve the title, if and when it comes to them. Although Sebastian Vettel snatched pole position for Red Bull on Saturday, the race remained a salutary reminder that the real winning is done on the Sunday.

Vettel looked good - for the first two laps - before a mistake dropped him briefly off the outside of Turn 10 - and put him behind the flying Brawn. However, even at that point the race could easily have gone either way.

Red Bull have clearly developed a car that is now a match for Brawn GP in performance on the track. Where they perhaps need to be a bit sharper is on the tactical front.

While Mark Webber drove a solid (for me the drive of the day) race to a well-deserved second place, the decision of the team to switch Vettel to a three-stop strategy was a gamble which lost him two championship points, despite the German's best efforts to catch his team-mate in the closing stages.

Meanwhile Rubens Barrichello's performance in the second Brawn, revealed a chink in their armour. Not for the first time, a mistake by Barrichello's engineers in programming the clutch release mechanism left him crawling off the startline.

The man in charge of Barrichello's car is big-name race engineer Jock Clear, who has previously taken drivers such as Jacques Villeneuve to the world championship title. Barrichello has though been on the receiving end of repeated mistakes and poor tactics this year. It cannot be helping the relationships in the team.

Certainly, the furious Barrichello's subsequent driving was more the mark of a hooligan than the sport's elder statesman. First he bounced off Heikki Kovalainen's McLaren, then wrecked his wing on Sutil's Force India before damage to Barrichello's gearbox from the botched the start forced his retirement.

While Rubens scored no points, he still lies second in the title chase, but the boys from Red Bull are closing in fast. Vettel is just six points behind and Webber a mere 1.5 points behind him. Meanwhile Ferrari and BMW continue their fight back to form, expect them to feature in later races too.

Even were Jenson to continue an unopposed winning streak, it would be the Hungarian Grand Prix at earliest before he could clinch the title. And he probably faces more pressure in the next race than in any other this season.

Remember the ‘Hamilton-mania' that took over the British Grand Prix last year? Well this year the British fans are switching their loyalties en-masse from the struggling World Champion, to their new hero, Button. There is ‘home team' pressure too. The Brawn BP team is based just ten kilometres from the track at Brackley. Engine builders Mercedes Benz have their factory at Brixworth just 25km away.

The weight of history also sits on Jenson's shoulders. If Button were to win in Silverstone he would match Nigel Mansell's 1992 feat of winning five races in a row. That year Mansell went on to win both the British Grand Prix and the title.

So saying if Jenson were to win at Silverstone, I suspect it would delight fans around the world. Not least because I promise I'll Button it. No more shocking puns.

It seems ever more ironic that one of the most interesting Formula One World Championship seasons on the race track, continues to be overshadowed by the politics off it.

In any other sport it would be called gross mismanagement. In some, the organising body might even have threatened the ringleaders with bringing the sport into disrepute. However as one of the prime people in the impasse is FIA boss Max Mosley, I can't see that happening here.

The fact is that despite Mr. Mosley's best efforts to ‘divide and conquer', the alliance created by the Formula One Teams Association is largely holding together. So far.

Led by Ferrari, nine FOTA teams beat the May 29 deadline to enter the 2010 championship by just hours, but their entries came with strings attached. They said that they were entering on the basis that the 2010 regulations will be the current 2009 regulations, amended in accordance with additional cost-saving proposals that FOTA has submitted to the FIA.

While the FIA has kept relatively silent on this move, it is suspected that Mosley could simply exclude the FOTA teams' conditional entries as invalid on June 12.

So who would be on the starting grid for the 2010 World Championship?

Well, there's Williams. The independent team so far are the only ones to have made an unconditional entry to the 2010 series. One could cynically say its their best chance of a world title in years!

To further pressurise the teams, Max has cleverly set up a situation where a host of newbies are likely to fill up the starting grid, if he excludes the ‘conditional' teams. Some, including Prodrive, Lola, Campos Meta 1 and Litespeed already have strong records in other formulae. Others including USF1, Team Superfund and the almost unpronounceable Epsilon-Euskadi team, bring in people with past Formula One expertise.

Mind you there are some dodgier names too. One entry has been received from the company which bought the assets of the old Super Aguri team last year. Another owns a long-established team name, but has never entered a race at all. A group of Italians have placed an entry in the name of a team which last ran some Alfa Romeo touring cars two years ago.

Could it be that the FIA is playing ‘musical chairs'? Will the FOTA team find all the chairs occupied when the music stops?

The outspoken website ‘Paddocktalk' sums up what many are thinking.

"This whole Formula One entry process by the FIA is done without any transparency and clearly is a perfect opportunity for shenanigans" they wrote. "Not only do we not know exactly who has filed entries, but no one knows who exactly is evaluating the teams and based on which principles. We have to trust an organisation that in our view is completely untrustworthy."

Says it all really.

More worryingly Max has been quoted by the Swiss magazine Motorsport Aktuel as not really caring. "If you want to make the rules, then go and organise your own championship," he was alleged to have said. "Formula One is ours, we make the rules. We started 60 years ago and we will continue like that."

Thankfully we look set to have an absolute cracker of a Grand Prix this weekend to take our minds off the politics. The Turkish Grand Prix is run on one of just three anti-clockwise tracks currently in the championship, the others being Interlagos in Brazil and the Singapore Marina Bay street circuit.

The track also features probably the most demanding corner in Formula One, the triple- apex left hander at Turn 8 has the drivers straining against a sustained left hand cornering load of over 4G and it will probably be taken flat-out.

Because Turn 8 is such a long, fast corner, if you don't get the line exactly right you get bounced off the circuit. The tyres, in particular the right front tyre, has to be hard enough to cope with that corner but still have to compromise for the generally low grip of the asphalt.

Therefore, I guess Brawn will still be the team to beat, but Ferrari could potentially be the team to beat them. The Ferrari F60 is easy on its tyres, which may mean they will have a tactical advantage in the race. My money goes on Massa's smooth driving style to give the Scuderia their first win of the season.

Jenson Button's victory came as the result of flawless driving, not just on raceday Sunday, but for the whole weekend of the Monaco Grand Prix.

We now tend to forget that on Thursday in the early pre-race practice sessions he was struggling. Languishing near the bottom of the timesheets he was outpaced by team-mate Barrichello, his car lacked grip and consistency.

Jenson nonetheless worked solidly with his engineers and by the end of the day had made significant improvements.

"It's the big difference between last year's car and this" said Button before the race. "This year, when we talk to the car, trying new settings, the car listens".

In qualifying Button delivered a ‘lap of the gods' that even baffled his own team with its blistering pace. I suspect even Jenson doesn't know where the performance came from.

His fastest lap was two tenths of a second faster than team mate Barrichello. More importantly he was 25 thousandths of a second faster than the Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen. Those fractions are tiny, but vital. It was the difference between pole position and row two of the starting grid.

But come the race itself the margins opened up to whole seconds, then tens of seconds as Button simply drove away from the rest of the field. And that included his Brawn GP team-mate.

Barrichello made a superb start to spring ahead of Raikkonen into Saint Devote corner, but against the run of past form at Monaco, he was powerless to match Button's pace.

Jenson's secret I think was his ability to manage the performance of his tyres. This year, tyremaker Bridgestone have introduced a bigger difference in performance between the regular ‘prime' and the softer ‘option' tyre, the one with the green band on the sidewall.

It has been a masterstroke. Costing nothing extra, it has added a new dimension to every dry race we have seen this year.

In Monaco, the Prime tyre delivered its performance for a longer period with more stability. The Option tyre was initially faster, but then its performance began to deteriorate more quickly.

Button and his race engineers were able to manage the performance of both sets of tyres perfectly. The result was a seamless run to victory as rivals struggled.

If you want to look at how not to do it, look at Sebastian Vettel. The Red Bull was all over the track after overheating its tyres in the early part of the race and was losing nearly four seconds a lap as he trailed the top three.

Bottled behind him, a frustrated Felipe Massa could only fume, as any chance of a podium place evaporated when the leading threesome disappeared into the distance.

The second Ferrari even lost out briefly to the Williams of Nico Rosberg as a traffic jam formed behind the struggling Vettel. Eventually both Rosberg and Massa got by, just before Vettel planted the ill-handing Red Bull in the barriers, much I suspect to everyone else's relief!

Even Barrichello struggled to manage his tyres as consistently as Button. The Brazilian's Brawn looked a handful in the last ten laps before each of his pitstops. It could have even meant that he lost his second place to Raikkonen. A slow Ferrari pitstop however, meant that Barrichello was able to maintain his track position and cement a Brawn GP 1-2.

For Ferrari the day was, I suspect a mixture of frustration that niggling problems, such as Raikkonen's fumbled pitstop, robbed them of a better result, but relief that the car is once again a true contender.

The Ferrari clearly demonstrated that it is the most-improved car of the pack of big-budget early season underperformers. McLaren, BMW and Toyota all had weekends to forget, with miserable performances that made their mark on the crash barriers more than on the results sheets.

Meanwhile Jenson Button cruised serenely to victory. His only mistake of the weekend was when he parked his car in the wrong place after the chequered flag, driving back into the paddock rather than parking on the start line.

His jog along the track kept Prince Albert and the Royal Party waiting, but it was noteworthy that the forest of hands extended in congratulation from the pit wall included members of every team, including Ferrari.

All those hard-bitten professionals appreciated that Button was a worthy winner and were happy to show it. The term ‘a racer's racer' full applies to Jenson. I wonder whether it might even be time to call him champion-elect?

The Monaco Grand Prix, along with Singapore, is the jewel in the sport's crown. For many big companies, entertaining VIP clients in Monaco is the sole reason they invest money in Formula One.

So the current meltdown of Formula One, on the eve of one of its most important events, smacks (sorry Max) of spectacular mismanagement by both the teams and the sports governing body. Instead of headlines anticipating one of the most closely fought Monaco Grand Prix in its 80-plus year history, they are full of legal wrangles and the threatened boycott of the series by Ferrari in 2010. What an own goal!

I think that whatever the good or bad of Max Mosely's previous actions, he has with his recent attempts to rule by Presidential edict, done irreparable damage to the sport his is supposed to administer. His proposal that teams slash budgets by over 75% overnight, are simply unrealistic.

The FIA proposals for 2010 include a budget cap of 40million pounds, excluding the cost of engines, drivers' salaries, hospitality and marketing. Ferrari, Renault, Toyota and the Red Bull-backed teams, who have all threatened not to signup to the 2010 championship, spend at least twice, in some cases more than four times that amount.

They each employ as many as 700 people to design, develop, build and run their cars. It is excessive, true, but to expect them to sack over half of their highly skilled and successful staff in the space of the next few months, is just not on.

I mean, could you tell someone who has spent the last decades of his life dedicated to working in a race team that he no longer has a job? Simply because Max Mosley has issued a unilateral edict? Ferrari, for example, would face doing that to around 300 people.

The first big question is, would the sport survive without Ferrari? It is unique, a team which has been a part of the Grand Prix scene for six decades and is probably the most successful luxury brand name in the world. There are more Ferrari fans around the world than for most of the other teams put together.

I suspect Formula One would continue to limp on for a year or two without their presence, but it would be like a ship holed below the water line. Another storm would sink it.

Equally though, could Ferrari do without the sport which is at its heart? I suspect not either.

Ferrari has built its brand, its fan base and its customers, thanks to Formula One and its TV coverage. Certainly the Scuderia has raced and won in other categories, most notably sports car racing, but I cannot believe that winning even the most famous sportscar race of all, the Le Mans 24-Hours (which Ferrari last won in the 1970s) would raise much more than a brief blip in global awareness.

The Le Mans race attracts maybe 3 million TV viewers in its native France and I guess less than 20 million around the world. It is also just a single race on the calendar.

Compare that with F1. Seventeen events around the world. Each has a TV audience of well over 50 million people. The biggest F1 audience, last year's Singapore GP, attracted more than 100 million viewers. It is worth spending big money to get your brand in front of that many people. That's why all the teams are on the starting grid.

My suspicion is that the teams will force mad Max to tone down some of his crazier demands and then they will commit to 2010. In fact I would not be too surprised to hear that peace has been declared by this weekend's Monaco GP.

Which (at last) brings us to this weekend's race.

The tight confines of Monaco mean that the cars are less dependent on aerodynamic downforce and rely more on mechanical grip and traction out of slow speed corners. The third and final segment of the Barcelona track, therefore gives a good hint of what can be expected.

In which case watch out again for Brawn - and equally Red Bull. Both were strong in that third sector in Barcelona. Past form indicates that Barrichello could potentially beat team-mate Button, although the two best street fighters of all, I reckon are Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber.

Of the four drivers my money goes on the Aussie. Remember this is a guy who got a Williams into second place on the grid in 2006 - a true hero.

Ferrari I suspect will improve, but may not necessarily have the pure pace or reliability to shoot for a win. Finally, don't rule out Lewis Hamilton.

The 2009 McLaren will be less hobbled in Monaco by its poor downforce and in Barcelona the MP4-24 was competitive in the traction-dependent sector 3. Add in the fact that Hamilton has won in Monaco in every car he's driven. You simply can't rule him out for a return to the podium!

Sadly, I think the Scuderia still has a long way to go before we can consider them likely winners, but Felipe Massa at least started the Spanish Grand Prix from fourth place and spent the majority of the race battling among the top three positions.

I really feel for Massa. The Brazilian drove his heart out in Barcelona. He used the power boost provided by his KERS energy recovery system to blast ahead of the two Red Bulls into the opening corner, then held them back for all but the last dozen laps of the race. Sixth place was a poor reward for his efforts.

The Brazilian's drive was ruined by a refuelling problem which prevented his car getting enough fuel on both his pit stops. My co-commentators Damien Smith and Alex Yoong, and I were all surprised when Massa made his second stop about six laps before we expected. Little did we know he would not get sufficient litres in his tank for a second time.

One can only imagine Felipe's thoughts when he was first forced to give up his pursuit of Sebastian Vettel, then he had to slow and let Fernando Alonso through to fifth. Still it gave the Spanish race fans something to celebrate.

The refuelling glitch is typical of the many 'quality control' issues that have bedevilled Ferrari this season. One simply cannot imagine them being tolerated in the era when Ross Brawn, Jean Todt and, dare I mention his name, Nigel Stepney, were ruling Maranello.

Brawn and Todt of course, elected to step down at the same time as Michael Schumacher retired. Nigel Stepney, chief mechanic, was of course implicated in the 'McLarengate' spying scandal. Whatever the reasons for their departure, their absence has clearly left a vacuum that has still not properly been filled.

One can sympathise more on the mechanical failings that have come with the team's rush to integrate the previously unproven KERS technology in the cars. In that respect Ferrari are no worse and, possibly responding slightly better, than rivals McLaren, Renault and BMW.

The KERS system may have given Massa the power boost which gave him an early third place in Barcelona, but the system is heavy and compromises the car's weight distribution, leading to poorer handling. The reliability of the system and its effects on the cars' gearbox and engine management were clearly demonstrated in Spain by Kimi Raikkonen's erratic and short-lived race.

I'm still cynical about the supposed tactical blunder which left Raikkonen languishing in the pits instead of progressing through qualifying.

I believe that despite what has been said, the team knew of the throttle control issues which eventually led first to the loss of Kimi's KERS system, then his retirement from the race.  The 'tactical error', I believe was a smokescreen, as they hoped that reducing the running on the car, then 'tweaking' the electronics on the starting grid, might have cured the problem.

That's a positive sign in a way. The team know they have a car that is getting better and don't want rivals to know exactly where they stand. The fact is that Ferrari is now close to having a car which can match the Brawn or Red Bull's pace.

Meanwhile if you are looking for a an old Ferrari-style, Schumacher-esque performance, look no further than the team headed by former Ferrari technical director Ross Brawn. Jenson Button has now won four races out of five. Sounds a bit Schumacher-esque doesn't it?

It has been suggested that, given current form, Jenson could win his first title, possibly as early as the British or German GPs. This is almost a repeat of 2002, when Michael had the title sewn up with six races remaining.

Or even 2004, when Schumi won 12 of the first 13 races.

Aside from Red Bull, Ferrari could still be the only other team that could stop that happening. A Ferrari spoiling a Schumacher-esque performance?

Seems a little ironic really!

It is no exaggeration to say that Ferrari face a critical weekend as the Formula One circus sweeps into Barcelona for the Spanish Grand Prix.

The opening four rounds of the World Championship have seen the Scuderia make their worst start to the season in their sixty year history.

Now they hope, will come the turn-around. Barcelona is the track where Raikkonen scored a clean-sweep of pole position, fastest lap and victory in 2008. He left Spain last year as the Championship leader. How things have changed.

The Ferrari team is of course not alone in struggling to come to terms with the new raft of regulations for 2009. Their principal rivals for the past seasons, McLaren, BMW and Renault, have all been left looking similarly flat-footed as smaller faster-moving design teams at Brawn and Red Bull found novel new solutions.

Ferrari though has had particular problems. Not only have their cars suffered from a lack of aerodynamic downforce and hence, grip, but they have also been woefully unreliable.

Even when it has looked like a good finish was a possibility, strategic errors on fundamentals such as tyre choice again robbed the Prancing Horses of their competitive edge. Behind the scenes at Ferrari, you can only imagine the frantic efforts to reverse the trend.

The team's decision after the Malaysian GP, to keep former head of strategy Mario Almondo at the factory, wasn't a punishment. He, along with the car's designer Aldo Costa, are spearheading a task force to improve both the performance and the reliability of the Ferrari F60.

Meanwhile Australian Chris Dyer has taken over Almondo's place on the pit wall. Formerly the race engineer who took Kimi Raikkonen to his 2007 title, he now makes the strategic calls for both the team's cars, working closely with Felipe Massa's English race engineer, Rob Smedley.

Speaking of Felipe Massa, one can only imagine how he is feeling, having come so close to winning the world title last season, yet this year, he has still to score a single championship point.

The very closeness of the title race last year, which saw both McLaren and Ferrari continue to throw huge resources at their 2008 cars right until the last race of the season, has clearly been one of the reasons why they have struggled so far this year. In contrast, Brawn (as Honda), Toyota and Red Bull all focussed on developing their 2009 cars considerably earlier - and have reaped the rewards.

Ferrari too have had another unique hurdle to overcome in their preparations for the 2009 season. Back in the Schumacher ‘golden years' they invested heavily in a full-size wind-tunnel which allows a complete car to be run at speeds up to 350kph.

They also have two test tracks, one beside the Ferrari factory at Fiorano and another at Mugello. The usefulness of those investments was almost wiped out by the FIA's precipitous introduction of cost-reducing rule changes at the end of 2008.

They banned the use of full-size wind tunnels for F1 development and the ban on in-season testing of race cars means that the two test tracks are being used only for road car development.  Now as they play catch up, Ferrari lack two of the most important weapons in their armoury.

Having said that, Ferrari, along with Renault and BMW, will unveil new aerodynamic aids in Barcelona, to help them catch the ‘diffuser three' of Brawn, Williams and Toyota. Of the teams introducing the new parts, I suspect that Ferrari will benefit the most.

Many insiders believe that the controversial ‘double deck' diffuser - which will be fitted to the Ferrari in Spain - does not make such a massive difference to the speed as some think. What it does achieve, however, is that it allows the car to be more ‘user-friendly' for the driver, allowing a bigger ‘sweet spot' where the car keeps its balance on faster corners.

The highly-technical Barcelona track demands that of a car. I suspect that McLaren and BMW, whose cars show a fundamental aerodynamic imbalance, will continue to struggle in Spain.

Ferrari and Renault should improve, while Toyota, Brawn and Red Bull, each with very different approaches to aerodynamic efficiency, are still the cars to beat. It should make for an intriguing Spanish Grand Prix - and you can't rule out Ferrari just yet!

I think that my fellow ESPN STAR Sports pundit Alex Yoong summed up Sunday's race perfectly when he said: "Today Jenson Button, not the Brawn team won the Bahrain GP."

He was absolutely right. The Brawn-Mercedes wasn't the fastest car on the track. Both Vettel's second place Red Bull and - robbed by a staggering mid-race tyre choice blunder - and Jarno Trulli's Toyota, were demonstrably quicker cars.

However a combination of cool heads on the Brawn pit wall and Jenson Button's tigerish determination on the track, gave the British driver his third victory in four races.

Button, for so long overlooked as the ‘star in a unreasonably slow car', now leads the World Championship for Drivers with 39 points, 11 ahead of his nearest rival, team-mate Rubens Barrichello.

Button is 12 points ahead of Red Bull racer Sebastian Vettel, meanwhile the expected Championship front-runners; McLaren, Ferrari and Renault, remain in the doldrums. Even when they fight back, as expected with further aerodynamic refinements in Barcelona, Button is in the great situation of having a comfortable championship lead to defend, as all the others play catch-up.

At least until the FIA World Motorsports Council convenes next Wednesday to discuss his conduct in Australia, the defending champion Lewis Hamilton is the best of those once tipped for the 2009 title. He is however a distant seventh in the standings, with a mere 9 points.

Hamilton's drive to fourth place in Bahrain was gutsy stuff. It may not be fashionable in some quarters to praise Lewis, but I'm going to anyway.

Right from the race start, his KERS-charged lunge into Turn One was spectacular and effective. It put the McLaren briefly ahead of both Button and Vettel, and right on the tail of the two early race-leading Toyotas.

It couldn't last however and Hamilton was forced to give best to the eventual top three. His fourth place though, was in marked contrast to team-mate Kovalainen's twelfth. Heikki drove his heart out all afternoon, but frankly the finishing position of his car was where both McLarens really deserved to be.

Fernando Alonso is another driver who so often these days has to flatter a second-rate car - and he did so again this weekend on his way to the final championship point for eighth place. All credit too, to his Renault team-mate Nelson Piquet, who matched the pace of his illustrious team-mate for the entire race, eventually finishing 10th.

Alonso's drive was all the more heroic, because from the start of the race, the electric pump feeding drinking water to his helmet had failed. Racing for over 1½ hours in temperatures of over 50 degrees, Fernando was so dehydrated by the end of the race, he was on the point of collapse and had to be treated by medics after literally falling out of his car at the finish.

Ferrari's fortunes are starting to look just a little better. Kimi Raikkonen wryly commented after the race that "he'd been in Formula One long enough not to get too excited about sixth place", but at least the team had scored their first World Championship points of the season.

For Felipe Massa though, the race was another disaster. He was forced to pit on the second lap with handling problems, it turned out because he'd damaged his front wing on the tail of Raikkonen's car at the first corner. In addition the KERS system was operating only erratically and the car's telemetry link with the pitlane had also failed.

The result? Fourteenth place, a lap down. It must seem a long time for Felipe since he was fighting for the World Championship last year in Brazil, but, as my grandmother used to say, "there is always someone worse off than yourself".

In this case, it was BMW. The word shambolic doesn't even start to cover it.

They somehow managed to lack grip, downforce and straight-line speed all at the same time. The fact that the cars were reliable was probably rued by their drivers, as it meant they had to plough around Sakhir in these shockers all afternoon.

Clearly Kubica and Heidfeld tried hard to put themselves out of their misery, by contriving to drive into one another at Turn One. No luck though, the tough BMWs only needed new noses before they rejoined a lap down and even less competitive.

Jenson Button should look at them and remember though. Last year Robert Kubica was on pole position in Sakhir and after the race, we were tipping both him and Nick Heidfeld as potential Championship front runners. That's how fast fortunes can change in Formula One.

For the last two seasons the Bahrain Grand Prix has marked a turning point for Ferrari and most notably Felipe Massa's fortunes. Now, with Ferrari's form approaching an all-time low, one wonders whether history can repeat itself.

Back in 2007, Massa had started dead last in Australia and been humbled by the pace of teammate Kimi Raikkonen in Malaysia, but in Bahrain he fought back with the perfect race. Pole position, fastest lap and victory.

It was the same again last year. Massa arrived having failed to score a point and, after throwing away the benefit of pole position with a spin in Malaysia, questions were being asked about his future in Ferrari. He answered those critics with another win and went on to battle for the title.

There will be plenty of Ferrari fans who will hope that history will repeat itself a third time. Sadly, I think it will take some time longer before the Prancing Horse regains its stride.

Ferrari, along with McLaren, Renault and BMW, have so far been surprisingly stumped by the biggest raft of rule changes to be thrown at Formula One in a decade. As new wings, slick tyres and the KERS energy reclamation system were simultaneously introduced, teams which relied on evolutionary design and huge testing resources have shown a weakness.

They have been out-manoeuvred by Brawn, Red Bull and Williams, with smaller faster-moving design teams that have gambled on putting their ideas into action while others were still having meetings about them. I think that is brilliant for the sport.

Mind you, I think it is only a matter of time before ‘the diffuser three' of Brawn, Williams and Toyota, are caught by the rest, who are now fitting aerodynamic upgrades which also match the three teams' controversial interpretation of the FIA Technical Regulations.

McLaren and Renault fitted new ‘interim' aero packages that showed a marked improvement in Shanghai. BMW struggled in both wet and dry in China, but you can guarantee they will fight back, with new components for Bahrain, where Kubica last year scored the team's first pole position.

Ironically the one team which will take longest to fit any aerodynamic upgrades will be Shanghai winners Red Bull Racing. The innovative design of the RB05 uses an ultra-narrow central ‘keel' in the cars floor as a mounting point for slimline pull-rod suspension. It optimises underfloor airflow perfectly, but to fit the larger ‘double-deck' diffusers which are now the rage, will mean the complete rear chassis has to be redesigned.

Adrian Newey's absence from the China GP demonstrated that work was already underway while the cars were finishing 1-2 in Shanghai. The team aims to have the new components available for Round 5 in Barcelona, meanwhile I reckon the current spec will have Webber and Vettel again near the front in Bahrain.

Which brings us back to Ferrari. Sadly, the team need much more than a new diffuser to cure their lack of pace. The team has made some howling tactical errors, their KERS system has struggled to survive for more than 40 laps at a time and an electrical failure while following the safety car robbed Massa of a possible, inspired third place in Shanghai.

Much has been made of the fact that so far, this is Ferrari's worst start to the season since 1981. If the team fail to score points in Bahrain this coming weekend, it will be their worst season start ever.

Even in 1969, the least productive season in their history, New Zealander Chris Amon gained a podium place in round four, the Dutch GP. It was however their only podium of the season and Ferrari finished last in the Constructors Championships with just seven points.

There is some good news for Ferrari fans though. There has been a Ferrari starting from the front row of the grid for all the previous five races in Bahrain, with the Italian team qualifying first and second in 2004 and 2006, second to the Renault of Fernando Alonso in 2005, on pole with Massa in 2007 and Massa was second on the grid to Kubica in 2008.

Already there are signs that the major shake-up initiated after the Malaysian GP is starting to bear fruit. Most notably the promotion of Chris Dyer, formerly Kimi Raikkonen's race engineer, to become team tactician on the pit wall.

It was Dyer, who last weekend produced a strategy that in the rain-soaked Chinese Grand Prix allowed Massa to vault up the order from 13th to third before his car failed. Even when they are down, you can't count against Ferrari - and Massa, who celebrates his 28th birthday on Saturday, could desperately use a birthday present!

Button and Brawn may have been the stars of the first two races, but now there's a new kid on the block. As rivals slipped and slid on the rain-soaked Shanghai International Circuit, Sebastian Vettel dominated the China Grand Prix in what was quite simply, a perfect performance.

It was a masterful drive that has raised comments that Vettel might be a successor to Michael Schumacher as the next German world champion. I can think of no reason to doubt the logic.

As at Monza last season, Vettel showed a pace in the atrocious conditions which was simply spellbinding. He seemed to be able to stretch his advantage at will. Just before half distance, a slip-up dropped his team-mate Mark Webber to third behind Jenson Button.

Vettel immediately sensed that he could extend his advantage as Webber battled to re-pass the Brawn car. Sebastian immediately raised his pace to a full seven seconds a lap faster than any other car in the field. It ensured he had a 13 second cushion over his hard-charging team-mate the rest of the way to the chequered flag.

While a wet race can sometimes disguise a second-rate car, the Red Bull team have created a car that was equally impressive on a dry track. Despite suffering drive shaft problems that restricted him to just ten laps in the whole of qualifying, Vettel still nailed pole position.

The pace of the Red Bull cars in Q2, the second leg of qualifying when all the cars carry a minimum fuel load, was even more impressive. Vettel and Webber were 1-2, ahead of the Brawn of Rubens Barrichello. He led a pursuing pack which was covered by just half a second. The Red Bulls were in a class of their own over a third of a second quicker.

Vettel also had lady luck riding with him. When the safety car intervened on lap 19 after Robert Kubica had hit the back of Jarno Trulli's Toyota, the field was running in convoy when Toro Rosso rookie Sebastien Buemi, drove into the back of Vettel's car.

For a moment, it was like a repeat of Japan 2007, Vettel's rookie year, when he clashed with Mark Webber behind the safety car, robbing them both of likely podium finishes. This time though, both the Red Bull and the Toro Rosso survived. It was the only serious threat to Vettel's success all weekend.

If Vettel was lucky, there were plenty who could count themselves unlucky too. Frankly, for anyone with a connection to Ferrari, Shanghai will be a weekend to forget.

Felipe Massa fought his way up the order after starting a lowly 13th, only for his engine to die while following the safety car. Kimi Raikkonen struggled home in 10th, with a misfiring engine and excessive tyre wear adding to his woes.

Behind the Red Bulls and Brawns, fifth and sixth places may mark the start of a renaissance for McLaren. Meanwhile Renault, Williams and Toyota sank without trace in the Shanghai puddles, Timo Glock was the only points scorer from the three teams, taking 7th after starting from the pitlane.

Adrian Sutil looked all set to score Force India's first world championship points, running in a strong sixth place with just a handful of laps to go. Instead there was anguish in the team garage when the car caught just one pool of water too many and aquaplaned into the tyre wall.

Sutil though, I don't think was the unluckiest driver on the track. While Mark Webber was clearly delighted to claim his career-best second place and to be part of Red Bull's 1-2 victory, look at another way.

Mark has been involved with the team since 2003, when the Milton Keynes-based outfit was known as Jaguar and has for the past half decade, been regarded as the most talented star waiting for a good car. Now that car has arrived, but so has the supremely talented Vettel as his team-mate. How unlucky is that!

In the week leading into a long-haul Grand Prix such as China, the flow of news stories normally goes quiet as the key F1 team members embark on the lengthy flights to Shanghai from Europe. Not so this week.

First we had a courtroom battle at the FIA in Paris, followed by an even bigger stir as McLaren boss Ron Dennis effectively offered himself up as 'fall guy' over his team's conduct at the post-Australian Grand Prix stewards' meeting.

I simply can't remember a start to the Formula One world championship quite like it. If it is high-pressure now, what is it going to be like as we get to the end of the season?

For Brawn GP, and for Williams and Toyota, there was vindication in Paris.

The three teams had started the season with a radically different interpretation of the regulations defining the diffuser, an aerodynamic aid that generates downforce and hence, grip at the rear of the car.

Their interpretation was protested by the Renault, Ferrari, BMW and Red Bull teams, who of course hadn't come up with an equally effective device. All of a sudden, diffusers, normally all but invisible pieces of carbon fibre, had become big news.

A month ago, even a number of drivers couldn't tell you exactly what a diffuser actually did, but now the world seemed full of aerodynamic experts.

Particularly in Paris, where hordes of lawyers and expert witnesses descended on the FIA International Court of Appeal to pick through the rule book with a fine-tooth comb.

Given that Formula One is looking to save money, one wonders just how much all these highly-paid counsels cost. With the exception of Toro Rosso and Force India, every team was represented. The debate ground on for a whole day and was apparently so mind-numbing, an FIA delegate reportedly fell asleep!

The 2009 rules demand a maximum diffuser height of 175mm above the reference plane, this is measured from below - using 'bodywork facing the ground' articles in the rules. However, the actual diffuser structure can be taller provided it maintains a continuous line where it meets the flat floor of the car at the axle line.

Brawn, Williams and Toyota it seems, simply raised the level of the floor to allow a double-deck structure to be created.

The most vocal howls of indignation came from Ferrari, whose legal counsel Nigel Tozzi QC, used to defend Ross Brawn in FIA hearings. Now he went for his former client's jugular, saying ""Only a person of supreme arrogance would think he is right, when so many of his esteemed colleagues would disagree."

Actually, it made Brawn seem even more clever, because the FIA found in his favour, not Ferrari's.

The Ferrari team are probably glad all this has been going on, as it has been a good smokescreen for their worst start to a season in two decades. In addition to a lack of pace, unreliable KERS electronics and some howling tactical errors have hobbled the Prancing Horse.

The team arrives in Shanghai after a major shake-up. Former race tactician Luca Baldiserri has been moved to a factory role, working with designer Aldo Costa to improve the cars' performance, while Chris Dyer, formerly Kimi Raikkonen's race engineer, moves into the hot seat on the pit wall.

Meanwhile, McLaren still reel from the lying scandal in Australia. Not was Lewis Hamilton disqualified from the opening race of the season, now seemingly in an effort to try and exonerate the team from any further repercussions, Ron Dennis has relinquished all F1 commitments to concentrate on leading the growth of McLaren's new sports car business.

Dennis has led the team since 1981, but his long-running feud with FIA President Max Mosley is believed by many to have contributed to the record US$100 million fine meted out to McLaren and disqualification from the constructors' world championship over the 'Ferrarigate' spying row back in 2007.

I wonder though will his sacrifice be enough? At the start of this season he had already handed over the role of team principal to Martin Whitmarsh, although Dennis was present in Australia in an advisory role. Big penalties, even disqualification could still be on the cards for the team.

The FIA World Motor Sports Council meets on April 29 to discuss the matter.

More lawyers and more off-track dramas are sure to come.

Another reason for Ron's departure might be to re-secure the relationship between World Champion Lewis Hamilton and the McLaren team. Hamilton's father and manager Anthony is said to be furious about his son's involvement in the lying scandal and was rumoured to have been looking at offering his son to other teams.

Meanwhile, on the race track in Shanghai this weekend, my tip has again to be Button, to make the best use of his Brawn machinery before his rivals catch up. Toyota too will be strong, maybe on target for their first GP win?

Meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton is fully fired up by all that has gone on in the past two weeks. Watch him, because whatever happens, it will be spectacular.

Meanwhile, for Ferrari and the rest? Back to the drawing board!

It may have been frustrating to have first, the monsoon, then bad light stopping play, robbing us of the full race distance in the Malaysian Grand Prix. The decision to stop the race at the end of the 32nd lap was absolutely justified. A Malaysian monsoon and F1 cars simply do not mix.

However, the action on the track really showed up some heroes and zeros this weekend. Among the drivers and even more so, among the teams.

The clear winners were, once again Brawn GP and Jenson Button, who as in Australia delivered a flawless performance. Actually, as far as the team were concerned, Brawn didn't have quite as good a race as in Melbourne.

If they had, it might have been another Brawn GP 1-2. Once the race was declared over Rubens Barrichello walked off up the track looking as if he was searching for a tin can to kick.

Barrichello had looked set to grab a podium place at least, but slow pitstops, four of them, dropped him down the order. Rubens was eventually a frustrated fifth.

"We lost a little too much time on my side of the garage with the pit stops" said Rubens. "We'll talk about that next week."

If any team could be said to have scored ten out of ten in Sepang, it is Toyota. Jarno Trulli was just a tenth of a second away from pole position, battled for the lead, and would for an over-conservative early choice of full wet weather tyres, have been on the podium.

As it was, Toyota team-mate Timo Glock took third place. Despite being dropped from 3rd on the grid, to eighth by the end of the opening lap, the German fought back and his gamble on the less heavily treaded intermediate tyres before the heavy rain started, allowed him to leap up the leaderboard and steal the podium place.

In fact when the red flags came out Glock was running second, but because the results were counted back to the end of the preceding lap, his German compatriot Nick Heidfeld was awarded the runners-up spot.

It would be easy to right off Heidfeld's run from 10th on the starting grid as a lucky fluke, but I think that the beauty of the rather ungainly looking Sauber BMW runs rather more than skin deep. Despite losing their sixth place car of Robert Kubica to an engine problem at the start of the race, the team kept their cool and Heidfeld calmly delivered then a well-deserved second place.

Off the podium, mention should also be made of initial race leader Nico Rosberg, Mark Webber and Lewis Hamilton. All delivered potential podium performances and but for the pitlane poker as the rains were predicted, came, went, then came again with a vengeance, all three could have been better rewarded.

I make no excuse for making particular mention of Lewis Hamilton. He and his team could not have a tougher lead up to the race and I think that quite rightly, Lewis is going to have to bear the stigma of his dishonest statements to the stewards for the rest of his career.

However once in the car he let his driving do the talking. Despite starting a lowly twelfth and carrying a heavy fuel load, he was in the points contention almost from the start. It may not be a popular thing to say it, but it was an excellent drive.

So if they were the achievers, who were the under-achievers? Among the drivers, for the second race in succession Hamilton's team-mate has to qualify as top loser.

As in Australia, Heikki Kovalainen didn't even get past lap one. This time he couldn't blame anyone else. He simply spun off the track. Come on Heikki, we know you are better than that!

But if you want top loser, sadly, look no further than Ferrari. The rot began in qualifying when the team, rather arrogantly, thought that Felipe Massa had gone fast enough in just four laps, to progress into the second stage. They thought wrong and Felipe Massa could barely contain his frustration when he found himself 16th on the grid.

Then come the race, what were they thinking of when the put Kimi Raikkonen onto the full wet tyres, at least fifteen minutes before it even started raining. At the time I argued that maybe it was a brainy gamble. In retrospect it was bonkers.

By the time the rain had started Kimi had worn his fully treaded tyres almost to slicks. It totally negated any advantage he had gained. For a top team in motor racing's top league, that sort of decision making simply isn't good enough.

Now a couple of weeks will allow the teams to regroup, continue their arguments over Brawn's aerodynamics and prepare for the Grand Prix of China. I simply can't wait for Shanghai. Based of what we've seen so far, anything could happen.

The opening round of the 2009 Formula One World Championship was a cracker. While for many, Brawn GP's success in Australia was a surprise, there is little doubt that the team's pace will make them clear favourites for a repeat victory in Sepang.

Meanwhile the season could not have had a worse start for reigning World Champion Hamilton.

Despite struggling for pace all weekend in Melbourne and starting at the back after a gearbox failure, Hamilton was awarded third spot after Jarno Trulli was adjudged to have passed the McLaren under Safety Car conditions. The Italian though was adamant he had done nothing wrong.

"New evidence" saw stewards re-open their investigation in Malaysia on Thursday, and following the revelation that Hamilton had provided "deliberately misleading" evidence to race stewards in the post-race inquiry; he was, quite rightly in my opinion, disqualified from the Australian Grand Prix.

So Brawn gained a jump on the opposition, but who is closest to them? Whatever the stewards deliberations, neither McLaren nor Ferrari ever looked strong contenders. Ferrari were forced to gamble on a radical and ultimately disastrous tyre strategy in order to get near to the front in Australia.

Renault fared little better, with Alonso struggling with a car not even good enough to make the top ten in qualifying, while Nelson Piquet was eliminated by a brake master cylinder failure that "sent the brakes haywire". Not exactly confidence inspiring at 300kph!

Williams and Toyota promised much in pre-race practice, but come the race; Williams in particular struggled with uneven handling and excessive tyre degradation. That was in the cooling temperatures of an autumnal Melbourne evening, one shudders to think what will happen to the tyres in the heat and humidity of Sepang.

While the dramas in the FIA Stewards room in Sepang have meant that Jarno Trulli regained the third place he gained on the track in Melbourne, Toyota were generally disappointed though that they weren't running closer to the front for the whole of the race. I wouldn't be surprised to see Trulli or Glock on the podium in Sepang too.

However, if you are looking for a challenger to Button and Barrichello in Sepang, I think you can choose between two teams, Red Bull Racing and BMW. The new Red Bull is a very clever piece of design, with a completely different front to the car's monocoque to its rivals, designed to boost airflow under the car and aid handling. It is also in my opinion the best looking car on the 2009 grid.

Mark Webber was unlucky to be caught up in the inevitable turn one melee, but crucially was still running at the chequered flag, demonstrating a level of reliability that previous Red Bulls have often lacked. Both cars would have finished had it not been for Sebastian Vettel's over-enthusiastic defence of second place, which put himself and Robert Kubica in the wall. Watch out for the two blue cars at the front again in Sepang.

While the Red Bull may be the best looking car on the grid, the BMW, with it's squared off nosewing and beer-crate rear airfoil is perhaps the ugliest. But beauty is more than skin deep and certainly the BMW Sauber team believe that Robert Kubica was on his way to a possible victory in Melbourne when he tangled with Vettel's Red Bull.

There is no doubt that Kubica was the fastest man on the track in the closing stages of the race and he was gaining on Button by two seconds a lap with four laps to go. My guess is he might have caught the Brawn car, but he'd have had a heck of a fight on his hands to get past Button. 

It would have been great to watch - and I have a feeling we might see a similar BMW - Brawn battle brewing this weekend!

Forget the financial recession. Forget the pre-season politics. Forget, for the moment at least, even the deliberations of the FIA Stewards, the claims, counter-claims and protests by some of the teams. Where it matters most, on the race track, the 2009 Australian Grand Prix delivered a stunner of a race.

In what has to be the feel-good story of the year so far, ‘the three Bs'; Brawn Button and Barrichello, delivered a dream result. The Brawn GP operation, which only announced a month ago that it would be able to contest the 2009 World Championship, frankly trounced their opposition in practice and qualifying, locked out the front row of the starting grid, then dominated the race to score a 1-2 on the team's debut.

Back in the early 1990s I met the veteran German racing driver, Karl Kling, when he was demonstrating a historic Mercedes Benz ‘Silver Arrow' Grand Prix car at the Nürburgring. The proudest moment of his life he confided, was with Mercedes, when he followed the legendary Juan Manuel Fangio home in the 1954 French Grand Prix, to score the first-ever 1-2 victory for a team making its Grand Prix world championship debut.

Fifty five years on, I never dreamt that I would see history being repeated. One can assume that Ross Brawn, Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello feel a similar sense of pride and fulfilment.

It should be remembered of course, that the story behind this performance began long before Brawn GP was created. Over the past few years, immense resources were invested in the team by Honda. The team won its first Grand Prix in 2006, with Button in Hungary. Then it went on a slide, dogged by wind tunnel problems, ill-handling cars and management infighting.

Former Ferrari man Brawn became Team Principal in late 2007, too late to influence the design of their 2008 car, which proved an even more spectacular underachiever than its predecessors. Early in the 2008 season, Brawn took the decision to effectively abandon all further development on the Honda RA108. It left Button and Barrichello trailing at the back of the field, but crucially it meant that Honda, now Brawn GP would have nearly a six month head start over their rivals on developing a car for the new 2009 rules.

It is that car, ironically no longer bearing a Honda badge and now powered by a Mercedes Benz engine, that took the Brawn team to victory in Melbourne.

"The BGP 001 car is the result of 15 months of intensive development work and the team have been nothing less than fantastic in their commitment to producing two cars in time for the first race" said Brawn in the lead up to the event.

"The facilities we have here are among the best in the sport as a result of multi-million pound investments over the past 24 months. We have a fantastic workforce and a car that could be one of the best.  We've had all the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle for some time, now may be the time they fall into place."

Boy oh boy was he right. One key area of course, which had Brawn's rivals howling with indignation was his team's interpretation of the rules regarding the shape and size of the underbody ‘diffuser' which generates downforce at the rear of the car.

I believe that the team has merely done what good teams have done for years. They have cleverly exploited a loophole in the new aerodynamic regulations in order to generate greater downforce and therefore grip.

The Brawn diffuser is a 'double decker' design. The 'U' -shaped centre section visible between the cars' rear wheels is simply the lower deck. An upper deck is formed by the car's chassis and is a few centimetres higher than the diffuser height limit of 175mm. This extra area is critical in gaining downforce, but in the letter of the rules is not officially part of the diffuser.

While this area will remain the focus of debate in future races and in an FIA Tribunal once the F1 circus gets back to Europe in early April, I thought Rubens Barrichello's comment in the post-race press conference was particularly noteworthy.

In contrast to Jenson Button's drive to victory on a relatively clear track at the head of the field, Barrichello's race to second place was done the hardest possible way.

First, he nearly stalled on the starting grid, then as he slipped down the order into the first corner, he was hit by Heikki Kovalainen's McLaren, pushing him in turn into the BMW of Nick Heidfeld. Barrichello's Brawn picked up more battle scars when he clashed with Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari, then narrowly avoided the melee which eliminated Sebastian Vettel and Robert Kubica, promoting him to his second place as the cars finished behind the safety car.

"I never thought I could finish on the podium after the start, I hit anti-stall and recovered quickly, then I was hit from behind by a McLaren and that put me sideways and I hit someone really hard" said Rubens. "If people think our car is only good because of the diffuser, that big hit broke the diffuser completely, so the car was strong without it."

Guess which team I'll be backing for another win in Sepang next week? You got it!

Changes in the rulebook, some surprising reversals of form and a likely battle between those who have and those who have not decided to use the sport's new secret weapon. Welcome to the start of the 2009 Formula One World Championship season.

Of course you might think that I am referring to the likely battle on the track in Melbourne. However it equally applies to the politics going on behind the scenes!

I predict that the power games between Max Mosley and the FIA, Bernie Ecclestone and Formula One Management, and the teams association FOTA, could have just as many twists and turns this season as the Albert Park track which hosts the maiden Grand Prix.

But enough of that for the moment, lets have a look at who might be the heroes and the zeros this year. The biggest shift in technical regulations in more than a decade means that the cars racing in the 2009 World Championship look radically different to their predecessors.

The new regulations are designed to improve the quality of racing and in particular, to increase the likelihood of overtaking, by placing increased emphasis on mechanical grip. The new rules will at the same time keep lap times in check by reducing the role of aerodynamics in aiding the cars' cornering performance.

As designers focussed their attention on aerodynamic aids in recent years, overtaking has become increasingly difficult. If a car was closely following another through a corner, the air turbulence from the car ahead would disrupt the airflow over the pursuing car's wings, forcing it to run wide. It made it very difficult to get close enough to challenge on the straights.
A series of sweeping changes to the rules covering the aerodynamic aids has therefore been initiated.

New Wings and Fewer 'Things'

The most obvious changes are to the front and rear wings. The front airfoil is now mounted lower and is 400mm wider than before, now the same width as the whole car. The front wings now also feature driver-adjustable flaps.

Drivers will be allowed to make two wing adjustments per lap, altering the wing angle over a six-degree range, it is anticipated that these may be used when following another car, to allow front wing grip to be maintained.

The rear wing is taller, level with the top of the engine cover, but has been reduced in width to reduce its efficiency. In addition the diffuser, which controls the airflow around the rear axle, has been moved rearwards and is mounted higher, reducing its ability to generate downforce.

Slick Tyres

For the first time since grooved dry weather tyres were introduced in 1999 to reduce cornering grip, the cars will race on full slick tyres, with a solid area of rubber forming the contact between the car and the asphalt.

Many people seem to think that these smooth tyres have no treads. Not so.

The tread is still there, but without any grooves or patterns cut in it. A full slick tyre has the maximum amount of rubber in contact with the road - and hence maximum mechanical grip.

For 2009 the slick tyres will increase mechanical grip by around 20 percent, with the gains in cornering speeds being offset by the reduced downforce levels of the revised aerodynamic package. The aim is to make the cars more responsive to driver input, more spectacular to watch.

Drivers will still have the choice of two dry tyre compounds and will still have to use both compounds during a race. Wet weather tyres will of course be used when required too. It should add up to closer, even more exciting racing.

KERS

The biggest technical change for the 2009 season is that teams have the option of employing a Kinetic Energy Recovery System (KERS) to boost their car's performance. KERS recovers energy generated from the rear wheels by the car's braking process.

Previously this energy was simply lost has heat from the red-hot brake discs, now the energy can be stored using either a mechanical flywheel or an electrical battery and then made available to the driver, in set amounts per lap, via a 'boost button' on the steering wheel.

Under the current regulations the power gain equates to around 80 horsepower, available for just under seven seconds per lap. It could give a driver a vital boost, for example to aid overtaking, but the extra weight of the system and its impact on the car's weight distribution, also have to be taken into account.

So far McLaren, Ferrari and Renault have confirmed that they will use the KERS system in Australia. Red Bull and BMW are also expected to likely follow suit. Toro Rosso won't for the first two races at least, while Toyota, Williams, Brawn and Force India won't use the new technology at all, preferring to optimise their cars to take advantage of their lighter weight.

In the final pre-season testing, three of the teams that eschewed the new KERS technology have so far set the fastest lap times in testing. Toyota, Williams and Brawn GP (the team formerly known as Honda) have stolen the advantage from their rivals by cleverly finding a loophole in the rules surrounding the underbody diffuser, which creates additional downforce at the rear of the car.

The FIA regulations were hazy, so the three teams shaped the rear of their car's chassis to aid the diffuser's effectiveness. Already some rivals are calling foul.

"We are convinced certain interpretations that have been applied do not correspond to the nature of the rules," said Ferrari boss Stefano Domenicali and Red Bull Racing has already threatened to protest the legality of these teams diffuser designs during the season opening Australian GP this weekend.

Meanwhile McLaren have simply struggled to match the pace of any of their rivals so far. It could be that defending champion Lewis Hamilton, may for the first time in his career be forced to start the season with an inferior car to his rivals. It could be a true test of his mettle.

So who will be on top in Melbourne? My money goes on Ferrari, with maybe Kimi Raikkonen finding the new car more suited to his style than last year, although Massa too cannot be discounted.

For a surprise winner, look to the Brawn GP duo of Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello, but whether any win would be allowed to stand, might depend on the deliberations of the FIA Stewards - and we know how predictable that may
be!

Tune in on Sunday, to find out whether I've got it right - or just as likely to see where I've got it wrong!!

While the form book is probably stacked in Hamilton's favour, don't rule out Felipe Massa just yet. He has the ability and the resilience to keep a cool head in what will be a frantic few days of intense pressure. He has grown up hugely this season and his performance in the last few races has shown he is a very much different, tougher and better, driver than even at the start of the season.

The mistakes and disasters in the Ferrari camp this year have generally come from within the team. Bungled pit stops and blown engines robbed the team of vital points in Australia, Hungary and Singapore but more worrying has been their inability to get the most from their tyres in changing track conditions.

We tend to forget that in the vacuum following the departure of Michael Schumacher, the driver gap was filled quite painlessly. The gap on the pitwall vacated at the same time by Jean Todt and Ross Brawn has proved harder to fill.

In contrast McLaren has had stability within their team and reliable cars. Its points losses fall more at the feet of their drivers. Hamilton has allowed himself to get suckered into situations in France, Belgium and Japan, which all gained him penalties from the FIA Stewards. And as for tailgating Raikkonen in the pit lane in Canada.....well!

Whatever happens this weekend, it has been a great championship and, whoever takes the title - they will have thoroughly deserved it. It may surprise some, but of the two drivers, I'd personally prefer to see Massa take the crown.

Of the two, he's probably the greater purist's driver. He drives with his heart and he's breathtaking to watch in his best moments such as his pole position lap in Singapore. I also think that this year is his best - possibly only - real chance of taking the title.

Next year, if the expected KERS, kinetic energy recovery systems deliver their promised power benefits, I think Ferrari will be at a disadvantage. The team certainly hasn't invested the resources of McLaren, BMW, Toyota or Honda in the technology. Also I expect that after a fallow year in 2008, Kimi Raikkonen will have woken up. If he doesn't, I would not be surprised to see a deal struck to have Fernando Alonso as a team-mate for Massa - and you know what that would mean!

No disrespect to Hamilton mind you. He is a complete package, awesomely fast, delights his team with his feedback and he is a consummate PR professional. If he claims the title in Sao Paolo he will at the age of 23, take over from Alonso the mantle of being the youngest World Champion ever. All he needs to do this weekend is finish fifth or better.

Obviously I am British and would be delighted to see a fellow Briton win the sports' premier title. But Hamilton is a great ambassador for the sport regardless of nationality or race.

When he first entered Formula One at the start of 2007, much was made of the fact that he was the first black driver in Grand Prix racing history. Today, potentially on the eve of his becoming World Champion, hardly anything is mentioned about it - and that is a very good thing. Hamilton has proved that Formula One is above issues like race - it is racing that counts.

For that alone, whether Lewis becomes champion or not on Sunday - I think we should all be celebrating.

Meanwhile in Sao Paolo we'll say adios to Red Bull racer and ‘top bloke' David Coulthard who will hang up his crash helmet after his 246th Grand Prix start. He of course won the 2001 Brazilian Grand Prix, in perhaps his most competitive season ever when he finished second to Michael Schumacher in the World Championship.

It seems amazing to realise that it was almost 20 years ago while I was reporting on the junior formulae that I first got to know the fresh-faced young Scot who was graduating from karting to Formula Ford, the GM Euroseries and Formula Three.

His class of 1989-91 was quite an amazing one. In addition to Coulthard, there was his team-mate, Indy 500 winner Gil de Ferran. Among his rivals were Rubens Barrichello, Mika Hakkinen, Juan Pablo Montoya and fellow Scots Dario Franchitti and Allan McNish. Even those who didn't make it to F1 became Indycar and Le Man champions!

‘DC' at the time looked surprisingly like the cartoon character Bart Simpson and I remember he was less than amused to find a ‘Bart' sticker on his Formula 3 car. What would his mechanics have thought, had they known he'd one day make F1 history by wearing a Superman cape on a GP podium.

Typically DC did, after finishing 3rd in Monaco in 2006. Now there's a fact to throw into a Formula One quiz!!

As a result Hamilton takes a seven point lead to the final race of the World Championship in Sao Paolo, Brazil. There, in two weeks time, he needs to perform as flawlessly once again.

Felipe Massa now has it all to do, in his home race in perhaps the most passion-filled, dramatic Formula One locations on the calendar. Sao Paolo is always a race that piles the mental pressure on the drivers. One can only imagine how it might affect home-town hero Massa.

Even a year ago, I would have said that Massa would crumple under the pressure. Now I don't think so. Under the influence of his family, his wife Rafaela, not to mention the tutelage of Michael Schumacher, Felipe is a much more resilient character this season.

Massa bounced back from spinning out of the two disastrous opening races of the season, with a convincing victory in round 3, Bahrain. Likewise after another ‘spinfest' with an undrivable car set-up at Silverstone, Massa fought back again with a tremendous performance in Hungary, only to be thwarted by a blown engine. Then he dominated the European Grand Prix in Valencia.

Now Massa heads to his home track with a still strong chance of claiming the title if for any reason Hamilton were to stumble in the final race of the season. If that were to happen, the Brazilian would be a worthy World Champion.

Meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton will not need reminding that last year he arrived in Sao Paolo with a seven point championship lead - and came away empty handed.

Gearbox glitches for Hamilton, combined with an early race tangle with then ‘team-mate' Fernando Alonso, effectively allowed McLaren to drop the ball and gave Kimi Raikkonen a shot at an open goal in Sao Paolo last year. Of course the Finn took full advantage

This year, Hamilton has still shown the inevitable signs of inexperience. After all, he is still just 23 years old and in just his second season of Formula One.

There was his pitlane debacle in Canada. Then there were the two situations in which he short-cut chicanes, in France and Belgium, incurring penalties from the FIA Stewards.

Then of course, there was Japan, where he was lambasted by his fellow drivers for his over-aggressive driving. His overshoot at the first corner after muffing his start, then a spin when attacked by Massa, plus a Steward's penalty meant he failed to score a point.

Frankly, Hamilton has never come so close to losing the championship as that weekend. As it was, Massa was penalised too and couldn't take full advantage. He only pulled two points back on Hamilton's advantage.

This weekend in China, Hamilton demonstrated he can show humility and learn from his mistakes. This weekend he made not one. Now he has to repeat that feat, just one more time this season.

Meanwhile Felipe Massa can thank Kimi Raikkonen, rightly for promoting him from third place and six points, to second place and a score of eight. Of course it raised the spectre of ‘team orders' which are expressly forbidden in F1, but there is nothing in the rules that prevents drivers using their own initiative.

In fact there was no difference in the Ferrari drivers' actions in Shanghai, to Heikki Kovalainen allowing Hamilton to pass on his way to victory in Germany or Robert Kubica passing Nick Heidfeld to win in Canada. Or for that matter, Massa allowing Raikkonen through in Brazil last year to claim the 2007 title.

It was amusing though, to see how the two Ferrari drivers tried to cover themselves in the post-race press conference. They stumbled and shuffled their feet like two naughty schoolkids as they tried to justify the swap.

Felipe ‘yes but, no but' Massa, looked guilty, as he told the massed media "That was my best stint of the race and I was able to catch him." Meanwhile Kimi ‘am I bothered' Raikkonen sat alongside sporting a huge grin, before telling the press: "It made no difference to me. It didn't affect my championship situation and I know what the team expects of me."

Meanwhile, sporting the biggest smile of all, Lewis Hamilton could barely conceal his mirth as he sat between them. But the big question is which of the drivers will be smiling the most in two weeks time.

Shanghai has, since it opened in 2004 been a track that suits the Ferrari chassis. It demands a combination of straight-line aerodynamic efficiency on its 1km-long main straight, along with high levels of downforce on the fast sweeping section between turns 6 and 9 in the first half of the lap. McLaren have caught up in some respects, but the formbook shows the Ferraris to be the cars to beat.

In 2004, a Ferrari won the inaugural Grand Prix of China with Rubens Barrichello at the wheel. (His now team-mate Jenson Button claimed second, how long ago that must seem for the two Honda drivers today!). In 2006, Ferrari won again giving Michael Schumacher his final victory and last year Kimi Raikkonen scored Ferrari's 200th Grand Prix win.

Last year's race will of course also be remembered as the one in which Lewis Hamilton slid into the gravel trap at the pit lane entrance on the 31st lap. It really wasn't his fault.

In a race of rapidly changing track conditions, the McLaren team miscalculated when to bring him in for new tyres and the rear treads had worn right though. Areas of the tyre carcass were flailing as he approached the tight bend in the pit lane before losing control and beaching the McLaren.

To retire from likely victory in any race is heartbreaking, but to lose a race and as it transpired the world title, by slithering off the road into the pits is cruel beyond words.

Yet Hamilton's conduct in defeat was exemplary. He returned to the pits to shake hands and commiserate with every one of his pits crew. He refused to blame his team, despite continually being asked who was responsible for the mistake.

One wonders whether Lewis would respond in the same way today. The pressures of this year's world championship battle do seem to be getting to him. His driving in Japan showed signs of a more ragged, over-aggressive, even arrogant Hamilton, which were not exhibited a year ago.

Lewis would I am sure, never admit to have been the paragon of perfection that some people try to build around him. ‘Saint Lewis' he is not.

No Grand Prix driver has ever got even as far as sitting in an F1 car merely by being nice. You need a killer, winner-takes-all, instinct to be successful in the face of such competition. Previously Lewis has maintained a balance between that and his amiable public persona. Currently he is showing a little more of the hard edge.

Perhaps it's not too surprising. He is a 23 year-old guy. A winner, and one of the great talents. However I suspect that the almost unanimous criticism of his driving in Japan will come as a well needed reality check. I hope so.

Equally, Felipe Massa has taken a new harder edge - and it suits him. His much publicised contact with Hamilton in Japan and subsequent drive-through penalty were one sign. His unrelenting and aggressive fightback to claim championship points was, well, Hamilton-esque. More of that please Felipe!

The biggest enigma in the past few races has been Fernando Alonso. Victory in Singapore was a surprise, but his performance in Japan proved it was not a fluke. Renault engineering boss Bob Bell insists that there is no great secret, putting it down simply to the team's better understanding of the cars chassis - and a lot of hard work by the boys back home at Enstone in England.

The double world-champion's driving credentials speak for themselves. His experience and intuition at the first corner in Japan, when he slipped through into the lead, was a masterstroke. But there is much more to Alonso than that. The Spaniard is a driver who provokes wildly differing views on his personality. To some he is arrogant and aloof, over-keen to criticise when things aren't going his way.

To others, Alonso is a very straight guy, with a great sense of humour and a strong sense of loyalty. My co-commentator Alex Yoong who was his team-mate when they both started out at Minardi, rates him as one of the best.

Fernando stays close to those he knows and trusts. Many people don't realise that Alonso spends a lot of time at the Force India motor home. Nothing to do with racing, he's playing poker with his best buddy Giancarlo Fisichella!

Alonso is also the only non-Ferrari driver to win the Grand Prix of China. He dominated the 2005 race to crown his championship-winning season with pole position and victory. In 2006, he claimed pole position and second place for Renault and last year, second again for McLaren.

This year as Hamilton and Massa will undoubtedly slug it out in Shanghai with the title at stake, I won't rule out Alonso for another trip to the podium!

His seven-point deficit to Lewis Hamilton means that effectively the Ferrari driver needs to win all three races. Even if he does, if Hamilton were to finish second each time, the McLaren driver would be crowned champion.

Massa is at the wheel of the fastest car in the championship and he is at the top of his game. His drives in Monaco, Hungary, Valencia and his pole-position lap at Singapore were all spell-binding. He'd be a worthy champion....but......

Even after the debacle over the fuelling rig ‘traffic lights' in Singapore. It is to Massa's eternal credit that he hasn't criticised any member of the Ferrari team. Yet so often this year it has been the lack of discipline and strategy on the pit wall that has blunted both Massa and Raikkonen's performance.

Ferrari would of course have probably finished 1-2 in Singapore on sheer pace, but it was their strategy that let them down. Even before the pit lane blunder in Singapore, I was surprised that Ferrari hadn't planned a strategy for one of their cars to be more lightly fuelled in case a safety car was deployed early in the race.

Renault with Alonso, Williams with Rosberg and McLaren with Hamilton, clearly had thought of that scenario and it paid off. The gulf left by the departure of Ross Brawn and Jean Todt from the pitwall has I think been more keenly felt than the absence of Michael Schumacher from the Ferrari drivers seat.

McLaren haven't been perfect either, though the more glaring mistakes have come from their drivers. Lewis Hamilton is not perfect. His mistake in Canada, when he tailgated Raikkonen was one shocker that merely serves to remind us that he is only in his second season of racing at the sports top level.

McLaren too, won't need reminding that just as last year, they enter the final three races of the championship with a lead in the title race. And last year Ferrari snatched it from their grasp.

However the one thing that perhaps may give Hamilton his winning edge is his almost ferocious competitiveness and determination. If Massa gets dropped to the tail of the field you'll see him seemingly make a decision whether its worth it, then he'll start to cruise. If Hamilton drops to the back, we've seen him fight like a tiger to pass rivals for 13th or 14th place.

In fact that aggressive edge in Hamilton's driving is the one thing that McLaren perhaps need to kerb. It would not be untypical of Hamilton, who only needs to finish second three times, to risk his title bid by trying to battle for the lead.

In short, there is nothing between Hamilton and Massa going into the last lap of the world championship. May the best man win!

Before I go. Three short comments on the (forgive the pun) brilliant, Singapore Grand Prix. First, Fernando Alonso. He drove stupendously all weekend and a clever strategy from the Renault team gave him a worthy victory.

Second. In my inbox last week there appeared a conspiracy theory suggesting that Nelson Piquet had deliberately crashed his Renault, to give Alonso a tactical advantage.

What rot! Nobody in their right minds would want to deliberately crash a racing car at close to 200 km/h - and certainly not in a place where it went like a pinball between concrete walls!

For Renault, Piquet's shunt was a blow. They're seeking constructors' championship points for fourth in the championship, worth a few million dollars to the team. The last thing they wanted was for Piquet to wreck when he could have scored points. I suspect that shunt might just have ended any chance of the Brazilian racing at Renault in 2009.

That theory is nearly as daft as the alleged reason for Mark Webber's gearbox failure, when the Red Bull team suggested that static electricity from a passing MRT train in a tunnel beneath the track might have affected the car's electronics.

Having travelled on Singapore's MRT many times, I've never seen a passenger getting off the train with their hair standing on end, or sparks coming from their finger-tips - the signs of static electricity build-up.

If static electricity was to blame, maybe Red Bull should consider the effect of their ultra-low ride height, which had their cars striking sparks as the underbelly scraped along the track - that would generate static electricity quite nicely!

The cynic in me though detects the hand of Red Bull press director, Eric Silberman, one of the cleverest PR men in the paddock. He's kept his team in the headlines for an entire two weeks while all the other press officers have been on holiday. Nice one Eric!

After a fuel pump failure in practice forced him to start from fifteenth on the grid, Alonso's storming drive through the field really was the stuff of dreams. Even though other front runners suffered crashes and penalties, Fernando won the race on merit. The Spaniard's pace and commitment, as well as the Renault team's strategy gave them a well-deserved victory.

As much as Alonso's prowess behind the wheel, Renault technical boss Pat Symonds should also claim some of the credit. It was he, who with Alonso, gambled on the likelihood of an accident triggering a safety car period early in the race.

The normal strategy with a car starting near the back of the grid, is to load the car with fuel and run as long as possible, hoping to make up ground during the pit stops. Renault in fact took the opposite strategy, a huge gamble. It paid off.

The team gave Alonso a light fuel load and the ultra-soft ‘option' tyres for the opening stages of the race, allowing him to make up four of five places before he pitted early, on lap 12.

The stop dropped him to last place, but when his team-mate Nelson Piquet junior hit the wall and brought out the safety car on lap 15, the cars ahead of him were all now low on fuel. As they dived into the pits, Alonso steadily rose to the head of the queue behind the safety car.

Ultimately the only cars in front of Alonso were those carrying loads of fuel on a one-stop strategy and Kubica and Rosberg, who had run low on fuel, made pit stops when the pit lane was closed, and were due to make a drive-through penalty.

Once those cars had cleared out of his way, the Spaniard was uncatchable.

If this was a fortuitous race for Renault, the opposite was clearly true for Ferrari. They had the fastest cars on the track and should have trounced Lewis Hamilton and McLaren. They blew it.

It is the first time the team has failed to score any points since in a race since Michael Schumacher and Felipe Massa both crashed out of Australian Grand Prix in 2006. What a time to get a no score.

Kimi Raikkonen's demise was at least a normal racing accident. The Finn had an odd race, with a slow start, then suddenly a series of fastest laps. It seems that it could have been due to his tyre pressures being slightly wrong at the start. When the tyres warmed up and the pressures increased, the car was flying.

Then, with just four laps remaining, Kimi simply overstepped the limits at the Turn 10 chicane in his pursuit of Timo Glock's Toyota. Into the wall, out of the race, sadly not for the first time this season.

Also not for the first time, Ferrari's pitstop discipline deserted them with catrastrophic results for Felipe Massa. Having led from pole position, the Brazilian led the field into the pitlane during the safety car period - and the pressure of the situation seemed to get the better of a member of the crew.

We understand that the light signals which tell the driver when to leave the pits were under manual control, so it was simply human error that switched the lights to green. Massa did as he was told and left the pits with the fuel hose still attached.

Members of the pit crew were bowled in all directions, then Massa had to wait at the end of the pitlane to have the hose removed. In addition, he had dived out into the pit road right into the path of Adrian Sutil's Force India car and therefore had to serve a drive-through penalty, dropping him to last. Massa eventually finished a lowly 13th.

It was a great escape for Lewis Hamilton, whose McLaren never matched the pace of the Ferraris. His third place behind Alonso and the Williams of Nico Rosberg means that he scored six Championship points, while Massa scored none.

Hamilton's seven point lead means he can now finish second to Massa in the remaining three races and still win the title. That puts yet more pressure on Ferrari and the Singapore race could have settled the fate of the 2008 title.

Surprisingly, we've got all this way without talking about the race itself. It was simply phenomenal.

The Marina Bay street circuit and of course, its unique night-time illumination were amazing. The spectacle of the cars running under the perfect lighting, with the spectacular backdrop of the city was a three night-long TV commercial for Singapore, delivering an unprecedented level of global TV coverage.

It was everything that the Grand Prix organisers promised and then some. For Singapore, Formula One and for Fernando Alonso....It worked like a dream.

OK. Be honest. Until this weekend, how many of you really knew anything about Sebastian Vettel? As takes over the mantle from Fernando Alonso as the youngest-ever driver to win a Formula One Grand Prix, life for the 21 year-old German driver is never going to be the same again.

Vettel's victory came after a drive where he simply did not make a mistake in the treacherous conditions. It may have been a lucky fluke of the weather on Saturday that put the Toro Rosso onto pole position, but Sebastian won the Italian Grand Prix on merit.

Whether in the heaviest of the rain just after the race start, or nursing his wet weather tyres on a drying track, or persuading his intermediate tyres to give their grip through the remaining wet patches late in the race, Sebstian Vettel delivered. With aplomb.

His rivals meanwhile struggled. The Ferrari's now infamous inability to generate sufficient heat in their tyres meant that their best result was for Felipe Massa, who started and finished, 6th. Raikkonen, all at sea, struggled home 9th.

Lewis Hamilton drove with massive aggression, I believe too much, to charge from 15th on the grid to 7th, right behind Massa. There is justifiable criticism I think, for the way that Lewis carved up rivals including Alonso and Mark Webber. It was unnecessary, maybe a sign of the pressure that Hamilton is feeling.

The good news for Lewis is that he still leads the championship, by a single point from Massa. But this will go down as a race which McLaren should have won and didn't. The second place for Kovalainen, is hardly compensation.

Interestingly this year marks the 20th anniversary of the first Italian Grand Prix I attended. It too had a surprise winner. That year, McLaren arrived at the track as the clear favourites and left empty handed too.

Their drivers Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna had won every race of the season and promptly stitched up the front row of the starting grid. The nearest Ferrari was a distant third. Come the race though and everything changed.

The Honda engine in the back of Prost's McLaren blew up, their only failure in 12 races. That left team mate Senna in the lead till, unbelievably, the Brazilian collided with a backmarker at the Rettifilo chicane and spun into retirement. To the vocal delight of the ‘tifosi', the Ferraris finished 1-2 - and the winning driver was Gerhard Berger.

This weekend, Berger was back on the podium, this time receiving the constructors trophy as the team owner. Back in 2005 Berger put together a deal with Red Bull entrepreneur Dietrich Mateschitz to buy the struggling Minardi team.

The success story this weekend might make cheering reading for Force India boss Vijay Mallya. It demonstrates just how well shrewd investment can turn a team around.

Toro Rosso was created to provide a proving ground for young drivers from the Red Bull ‘stable', honing their skills before feeding them into the senior team. As such it follows on the from the precedents set by Minardi, who gave ‘the big break' to drivers including  Giancarlo Fisichella, Jarno Trulli, Mark Webber and of course, twice World Champion Fernando Alonso.

Toro Rosso uses a lot of Red Bull technology, the latest car, the STR3 is closely related to the Red Bull RB4, both were designed by Adrian Newey. However the Faenza-based team also took over the contract to run customer Ferrari V8 in 2007 when Red Bull switched to Renault power. In hindsight Torro Rosso seem to have got the best deal!

Another big boost for Toro Rosso was in hiring Franz Tost, formerly of BMW's motor sport division, as their team principal. It was he who spotted the talent of Vettel, then BMW's third driver, and negotiated his release from his testing contract to become a race driver for Toro Rosso. The rest as they say, is history.

As the latest chapter in that history was written at Monza this weekend, Berger was justifiably a very proud man.

 "It's an unbelievable feeling, different to winning as a driver" said the Austrian who scored ten Grand Prix victories in his career. "Sebastian proved today he can win races, but one day he is going to win world championships. He is that good."

Coming up this weekend, is probably my favourite Grand Prix of the season. The Italian Grand Prix at Monza always offers drama and speed in full measure.

With an average lap speed of close to 250km/h, Monza's credentials as the fastest track in Formula One are without doubt. The track is also steeped in history.

Walk out from the back of the pitlane and first you pass under the remains of the awesome banked ‘Monzanapolis' track built in the 1950s. Beyond that you come to a narrow road built of brick cobbles. It is the original track, first used for an Italian Grand Prix back in 1922. You can sense the atmosphere in every grain of dust.

Back to 2008 though and as last year, with Ferrari and McLaren locked in battle both on the track and in the FIA courtrooms, the Italian ‘tifosi' fans will be at fever pitch. The going's on at the end of last weekend's Belgian Grand Prix, which saw Lewis Hamilton demoted from victory to third and Felipe Massa awarded the victory, have polarised both the world of Formula One and fans alike.

I've never had a mailbox so full of comments from fans. A lot are clearly ardent ‘tifosi' who feel I was unduly praising Hamilton. The other half though are clearly McLaren fans incensed at Lewis's penalty. Sometimes you just can't win!

I have no intention of making any further comment on the rights and wrongs of the penalty. One thing I will say is that I totally disbelieve any conspiracy theory that the FIA are somehow in league with Ferrari. What rot.

I've met many of the FIA Stewards over the years and the one thing I am sure of is that they are impartial. The three stewards in Spa, as always, were specifically chosen from countries without a vested interest.

In this case Nicholas Deschaux, Yves Bacquelaine and Surinder Thatthi are respectively from France, from Belgium and from Kenya. All are experienced officials who made the decision on Hamilton for the best of reasons and they'll now have to answer for that at a full tribunal of the FIA.

Likewise, Ferrari has made a big effort to keep clear of the controversy. While previous team managers have been aloof, current team boss Stefano Domenicali is one of the straightest guys in the pit lane. Ask him a straight question, you get a straight answer. Asked whether Ferrari had initiated a protest against Hamilton's driving, he gave a clear and explicit "No".

Not that it will calm the atmosphere in Monza's already stormy paddock. I actually feel that more pressure is on Ferrari at the moment, particularly as the track conditions look likely to favour McLaren.

It may be Ferrari's home track, but as Alonso and Hamilton demonstrated with a McLaren 1-2 last year, the silver cars work particularly well in ultra-low downforce trim, with the wings set almost horizontally to minimise drag down the long straights.

Crucially too, with likely rain showers at Monza this weekend, the McLarens demonstrated at Spa, their ability to outpace the Ferraris if they're caught on a wet track with dry weather tyres.

Believe me, I'd love to see Raikkonen or Massa on the top step of the podium this weekend, but technically I can't see how it will happen. In fact, unless Ferrari have found a boost in performance since testing at the track three weeks ago, they could be beaten into third place.

The fastest driver of all during the tests was BMW driver Nick Heidfeld, once again demonstrating that in terms of straight line speed the BMW is as good as its rivals. The BMW also might be favoured by Monza's three chicanes, Rettifilo, Roggia and Ascari, each of which sees the cars decelerate from over 330 to around 100km/h

The headline for this was really going to be "Lewis Rains on Kimi's Parade", reflecting how with two laps to go, after a thrilling pursuit over the final leg of the Belgian Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton hunted down race leader Kimi Raikkonen.

I should now be talking about then how fate intervened and in treacherous conditions, Hamilton's luck held and he scored a landmark victory. Poor Kimi meanwhile had to walk home after hitting the barriers.

The trouble is, I'm not. Nearly three hours after the chequered flag, I and several hundred journalists were still waiting on the decision of three FIA Stewards, who as Lewis was spraying the champagne, issued a statement that they were "investigating an incident involving car number 1 and car number 22." 

That is of course FIA-speak for Raikkonen and Hamilton, and it eventually turned out that as expected, they were talking about their clash at the final chicane three laps from the finish. That's when Lewis caught Kimi under braking for the final chicane.

A 'firm defence' from Kimi sent Hamilton straight across the run off and ahead of Raikkonen. But then Hamilton lifted off to let the Finn back through, before retaking the lead with a move down the inside at the La Source hairpin.

I don't necessarily believe that the stewards understood the fury that they would cause in the press room. Journalists, particularly Belgian ones, are particularly averse to being delayed from their late evening rendezvous with the staples of Ardennes diet; steak, frites and bierre brune. As a cold damp dusk settled over Spa, one sensed a hint of revolution in the air!

Then came the bombshell. The stewards announced that they were handing a "retrospective drive-through penalty" to Hamilton after the race had ended.

That would mean 25 seconds added to his finishing time.

The win therefore goes to Felipe Massa, second in the race. The penalty dropped Hamilton to third place behind Nick Heidfeld. For local and international media alike the frites went on hold.

I'm sure that the stewards saw something we did not. I'm equally sure they were driven by the best of motives, but equally I believe that, not for the first time in Formula One history, a group of faceless officials have robbed the spectators of an honourable and deserved victory. That's bad news for F1.

For a moment, forget Bernie Ecclestone, forget Max Moseley. The best motor racing promoter in the world was an American called Bill France.

He took NASCAR racing from being the domain of 'Good Ole Boys' in the southern states of the USA into being the richest and most successful motor racing series in the world. The sort of place Jacques Villeneuve and Juan Pablo Montoya look to as their retirement fund.

Bill France, no matter how outrageous the bending of rules, or driving tactics, had one simple premise. "The guy who passes the chequered flag is the winner". He felt he owed that to the fans.

A misdemeanour would later be punished by a hefty fine or even exclusion from starting the next race. However, and I repeat it deliberately: "The guy who passes the chequered flag is the winner". That respect for the fans is vitally important in my opinion.

I bet that I'm not the only person tonight who feels robbed. Bernie Ecclestone should take note of that. The simple fact that millions of fans like you and I feel robbed of a justified winner after one of the best races of the season is VERY bad news for F1.

I'm not saying this because I'm a Lewis Hamilton fan. I'm mightily impressed by his skills and personality, but clearly if there was a moral victor in the 2008 Belgian Grand Prix it wasn't Hamilton, it wasn't Felipe Massa, it was Kimi Raikkonen.

Kimi at least threw the race away for the right reasons. For the uncompromising Finn, second wasn't good enough.

"I was prepared to win or lose, but unfortunately I went off," said Raikkonen to reporters. "I only wanted to win. I slid wide on the fast left hander, and tried to come back on the circuit but I went off. I didn't want to finish behind we would have lost points. We see what we can do."

Compare that with Massa's comments: "I was slower than I wanted to be because I saw many people going off, especially Kimi, and Lewis was a little bit in front and I thought I don't want to risk eight points because eight points is eight points."  Does that sound like the moral victor?

Ron Dennis and McLaren have announced that they will appeal against the FIA Stewards decision. McLaren won't need reminding that the last time they relied on a decision from an FIA tribunal, it cost them $100 million.

Sadly I'm reminded of another old Ron Dennis quote from a few years ago.

"Sometimes our cars just aren't red enough."

Looking positively at this, we still have a fantastic world championship battle ahead of us. Next weekend Hamilton heads into the next race at Monza with a slender two point championship lead over Massa and the McLarens are expected to have the edge over Ferrari at the super-fast Italian track.

But I feel disappointed. Not for Hamilton, not for McLaren, but for Formula One.

This weekend and next might well be the last chance to enjoy some old favourites if the Formula One rumour mill is true. The Belgian Grand Prix at Spa is held on one of the oldest tracks, but there could be big changes in store.

A week later the similarly historic track at Monza hosts the always emotive Italian Grand Prix. And again, if rumours are true, a well known favourite might be saying farewell.

But first, the Belgian Grand Prix. With a lap distance of over 7km, Spa Francorchamps is a throwback to an earlier, more heroic, but definitely more dangerous era of motor racing. It is the last Grand Prix circuit in the world where cars race on closed country roads.

For much of the year, the section between Stavelot corner and La Source Hairpin is the actual public highway between the villages of Stavelot and Francorchamps, while the section including the spectacular Eau Rouge corner is the highway to the town of Malmédy. And the "Bus Stop" chicane?  Well it used to be used as the school bus stop!!

While Spa-Francorchamps is the longest circuit on the F1 calendar, it is today less than half the length of the original public road course, which offered the drivers a truly daunting challenge due to the sheer speed of the corners. Despite having only one a couple of true straights, the average lap speed was nudging 250kph by the late 1960s!

Those awesome speeds, coupled with the changeable Ardennes weather - which frequently saw cloudbursts on one side of the circuit while the other side stays dry - led to serious safety concerns.  After a series of fatal accidents, Spa was replaced by the safer but bland, Zolder track in the Flemish-speaking part of the country.

The race returned to its traditional home in 1983 and, to the delight of purists, the new, shorter Spa track incorporated some of the most exciting parts of the original, including the famous La Source hairpin, Eau Rouge and the final blast through the woods at Blanchimont. The new section, linking Les Combes and Stavelot, winds down the valley in a flowing series of curves.

While everybody rightly raves about the spectacular swoop up Eau Rouge, the amount of grip generated by the current breed of F1 cars means that it is no longer the knife edge of heroism that it once was. Spa though offers another truly challenging corner.

As you head down the valley from Malmédy, you hit the Pouhon left-hander at well over 250km/h and its long radius makes it the toughest part of the circuit. It really is a corner that separates the heros and the zeros.

The tragedy is, that the organisers of the Belgian Grand Prix have indicated that they want to cut out the majority of that corner in the future, cutting through in a straight line back to the pits. I hope plenty of others as well as I, will remind them that if they do, it will tear the soul out of Spa.

By cutting out two kilometres of track, the shorter lap would mean that the corporate guests in the hospitality suites would watch the cars pass them about 60 times instead of the current 44. But the shorter track would turn Pouhon into a little kink, then bypass the left and right flicks of the Pif-Paf, miss out the flat out blast through Stavelot and make the current 300km/h left hander at Blanchimont, well.....ordinary.

The word ‘emasculated' might well be applied to the proposed track. Hopefully our Belgian friends will think twice before committing such heresy.

According to this week's rumour mill, another ancient icon of motor racing may well shortly disappear too. The word is out that David Coulthard may well make the Italian Grand Prix his last, allowing the talented Sebastian Vettel to make an earlier move across to the Red Bull ‘A' team alongside Mark Webber.

It has to be said this is speculation rather than hard fact at the moment, but it would make sense. It opens up a strong possibility that the ever popular Takuma Sato could be employed by Toro Rosso for the Far Eastern races and maybe Red Bull protégé Bruno Senna could make his Formula One debut in his home Brazilian Grand Prix?

Meanwhile back to Spa. In 2004 and 2005 the race was dominated by McLaren. In 2006, there was no race, but last year's race was dominated by Ferrari. All three races had one thing in common - they were won by Kimi Raikkonen.

I think that the 2008 Belgian Grand Prix might well be the acid test for Kimi. If he wins his fourth successive race at Spa his season might get back on track. But if he gets blown away by either Lewis Hamilton or Felipe Massa, we might we see another icon taking an early walk. Mind you in neither the case of Raikkonen or Coulthard, I don't think we'll ever use the word emasculated!

It was about this time last year that Ferrari were forced to make a tough decision.

Despite scoring three victories, a suspension failure in the 2007 Italian Grand Prix removed the last chance of Felipe Massa being able to bid for the World Championship title. Immediately Massa took on a supporting role to team-mate Raikkonen, who snatched the title from the duelling McLaren drivers in the final round of the series.

This year it seems Ferrari are going to have to make a similar decision. Only this time it is Massa who looks like the title contender and one suspects that Raikkonen might be less willing to play the supporting role.

Three weeks after being cruelly robbed of victory by a blown engine in Hungary, Felipe Massa received his due reward after dominating the European Grand Prix in similar style. The Brazilian drove a flawless race to take a comfortable victory and to move ahead of his team-mate in the points standings.

Behind Massa on the track, by 5.6 seconds to be precise, Lewis Hamilton's second place in the Valencia race was a damage limitation exercise. The McLaren driver admitted to being simply ‘blown away' by Massa and the Ferrari's pace. Hamilton still leads the championship though, with 70 points to the Brazilian's 64, with Raikkonen third on 57.

From the very start of qualifying, it was clear that Massa was going to be the driver to beat. His self-belief and commitment was breathtaking, particularly at in the opening series of esses, where he ran the car right up to the concrete walls.

It was the same story for every one of the 57 laps of the race. At the entrance to the Astilleras Bridge, no other driver got as close to the parapet as Massa. Yet he flawlessly skimmed the wall with millimetre precision every lap.

Massa it seems has an on / off switch. He is either hero or zero. Sunday was definitely a hero day.

Massa's performance may have been flawless, but worryingly, his team was far from trouble free. A few hours after the chequered flag, the result of the race still hung in the hands of the FIA Stewards, who had the power to penalise Massa after the team released his car into the path of Adrian Sutil's Force India car after his second pit stop.

The stewards deemed it an unsafe move by the team and could have invoked a ten-second penalty. It would have handed the win to Lewis Hamilton, which would have been a travesty. Fortunately good sense prevailed and the incident resulted in a reprimand and a hefty 10,000 Euro fine.

It wasn't the only pitlane debacle for Ferrari either. Kimi Raikkonen made an almost unbelievable error of judgement, when he began to pull out of the pits before his refuelling was completed. His ‘hose man' Pietro Timpini went along for the ride before being run over by the Ferrari and sustaining a broken foot.

Frankly Ferrari are no longer the rock solid, reliable organisation we used to see during the Todt/Brawn/Schumacher era.

That was further demonstrated a few laps after Raikkonen's pit stop when his Ferrari engine expired in a similar manner to Massa's had in the previous race. The Finn was in a lacklustre sixth when the engine blew, which must put yet more pressure on the team to give Massa his chance at the title.

In third place, Robert Kubica once again demonstrated his rock-solid racecraft in a BMW car outclassed by McLaren and Ferrari. A sign of the Polish driver's talent is given by Nick Heidfeld's performance in the similar car. He finished a lowly ninth. Fourth in the title standings, Kubica is now just two points behind Raikkonen.

Sadly for his adoring Spanish fans, who had thronged the Valencia track, Fernando Alonso didn't even complete a single lap of racing. He became the victim of a typical mid-field melee when his car was hit by Kazuki Nakajima's Williams.

Alonso was philosophical, blaming the accident on his poor qualifying placing him in the middle of the pack. It has to be said though that his underpowered Renault, never looked a likely contender. Again look at his team-mate's performance. Piquet finished a lowly 11th.

The new Valencia track delivered plenty of dramas, but little overtaking. Part of the reason is that the design of the track has curving approaches to many of the slow corners which preclude side-by-side running.

The good news is that the Singapore track while similar in width, layout and speed, has many of its slow corners at the end of long straights. I've got high hopes that the Marina Bay track will deliver just as much drama, plus overtaking too!

Of course all eyes will be on the continuing battle between McLaren and Ferrari as the championship shoot-out resumes in Valencia this weekend. But maybe, just maybe, we'll see a surprise winner from another team, as the vagaries of an all-new track might just lead to someone springing a surprise.

The street circuit which hosts the European Grand Prix sweeps around the King Juan Carlos I yacht marina that last year hosted the Americas Cup, yet the track is more likely to have similarities with Singapore's floodlit venue than with Monaco. 

It is wide, fast and flowing, but doesn't have sufficiently long straights to allow a horsepower advantage to show. That could be music to Fernando Alonso's ears. The Renault engine has a clear horsepower deficit to its rivals and this track almost seems ready-made to allow Alonso to show off his car control and racecraft to his adoring home fans.

Fernando has already joked about ‘getting up early' to beat his rivals, but he has a serious point. "We must do our best to find our reference points quicker than the others in order to spring a surprise" said he. In other words the faster you can learn the track, the more likely you are to qualify well and, if you do that, the odds will favour a good result.  

Which is where McLaren come in. Although none of the Formula One teams have been allowed to run any significant on-track testing during the three week-long ‘summer break', there hasn't been much evidence of anyone taking a holiday. Every team has been working flat-out behind the scenes to boost their performance.

Back at McLaren's technical centre at Woking in England, is a little spoken-of device called "the simulator". Its detail workings remain a closely-guarded secret, but in simple terms it can best be described as a complete, current F1 car, combined with a full-motion simulator similar to those used for training aircrews.  

It sounds like a multi-million dollar version of a computer game, but the hours spent in the simulator are deadly serious. Not only do the drivers fine-tune their knowledge of every single track on the calendar, but complex computer softwear attached to the machine allows the engineers to compare every aspect of its performance and adapt either the car or the driver's style to gain the ultimate efficiency.

Of course, almost every other team on the grid has a simulator of some form, but it is thought that none match the McLaren's sophistication - and success. Many in the paddock believe it is the simulator programme that has allowed the team to overhaul Ferrari in the last few races. 

Rumour has it that using the simulator allowed the engineers to propose a change in Hamilton's driving style before the British Grand Prix. Less aggressive use of the steering early in the corner allowed smaller front wings to be used, which in turn led to lower sidepods, which allowed a higher top speed. The results were most clearly seen in Germany, when the McLaren simply waltzed away from the opposition.

This weekend it will be interesting to see whether Ferrari have found an answer to McLaren's performance boost. Certainly there will have been no lack of effort at Maranello, but it seems that there is a clear difference in approach between their two drivers.  

Ferrari has been using a simulator at the nearby FIAT research centre and has been reported to have commissioned a ‘next generation' unit from American specialist MOOG. Felipe Massa is on record as a big believer in the technology. It seems however that Kimi Raikkonen is less of a fan and that, combined with a relatively lacklustre performance in recent races is placing increasing pressure on the reigning champion.

I personally think that Kimi will fight back. And it sets up a great prospect for Valencia.  

Will it be the scientific approach of Hamilton, Kovalainen or Massa that wins? Or raw talent from Raikkonen or Alonso?  Or even a real outsider like Red Bull's Mark Webber who always thrives on new tracks?  Only one way to find out, join us in Race Central this weekend!

Driver to watch:  Lewis Hamilton.

Yes I know it's a predictable choice, but Hamilton has a real opportunity to take control of the World Championship with a victory in Valencia. The McLaren arguably remains the superior car to the Ferrari and as Lewis proved by winning in Monaco, he can match aggression with precision. He is perfectly supported by team-mate Kovalainen too. The big question is will Ferrari have found something extra fight back with?

Budapest, perhaps the most beautiful city in Europe. ‘The Queen of the Danube' is full of ornate marble palaces, mostly built towards the end of the 19th century, when the city was one of the richest in the world.

If history isn't your bag, Budapest still delivers. Four bridges link the towns of Buda and Pest on each side of the river Danube. If Buda is known for the history and palaces, Pest is the party side of the river, famed for its bars and nightclubs!

About 20 kilometres north of the city, you'll find the Hungaroring. It isn't quite so pretty, but it is a track with a character all of its own. Built in the early 1980s when Hungary was still behind ‘the Iron Curtain' it is a concrete-lined bowl with the tight-twisting track squeezed into a narrow valley between surrounding hills.

With an average lap speed of under 200km/h it is the second slowest track after Monaco. And here, even more than Monaco, aerodynamic downforce matters more than anything else. So we get the season's ugliest Formula One cars.

For this race more than any other, a clean profile and straight-line speed don't matter. And the boffins in the wind tunnels get to play with all their inventions.

At the recent test sessions at Jerez in Spain, which has a similar layout, the cars looked awful.  Starting at the front, cars were sprouting more nose wings than Manfred von Richthofen had on his Fokker Triplane and as if they didn't look daft enough, stuck in the middle of the nose of some of the leading cars were what McLaren called ‘antlers.'

The rest of us call them ‘Dumbo Ears'. They're not new, Honda have been running them for most of this season, (a sure sign of their desperation!), but for this race, don't be too surprised if everybody tries them!

Even Ferrari, who at least seem to disguise their aerodynamic appendages with stylish Italian swirls and flourishes, fielded a car with the now ubiquitous ‘anvil' or ‘shark-fin' on the engine cover. The need to cool the very hot-running Ferrari engine at Hungaroring also means that the cars are likely to sport massive ‘chimneys' on the side pods. Functional I know, but hardly a thing of beauty.

The good news is that while the cars may look like something the cat dragged in, the racing at Hungaroring is usually excellent. The track is tight and twisty with 15 corners, most of which are taken in second or third gear, so overtaking is at a premium, yet the track has witnessed some great dramas.

Remember the 2006 race. That was the one which began with Felipe Massa spinning off the wet track on his way from the pits to the starting grid, then Pedro de la Rosa spun his McLaren on the warm-up lap.

2005 winner Kimi Raikkonen (then still with McLaren) took an early lead, until lap 26 when he hit Vitantonio Liuzzi while lapping the Toro Rosso. Fernando Alonso took the lead, only to suffer a loose wheel nut, handing the lead to Jenson Button and Honda. He'd started from 14th on the grid!

Last year of course, the race was dominated by the feud between Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton which almost brought the McLaren team to its knees.

Alonso claimed pole position, but deliberately baulked Hamilton in the pit lane to prevent his team-mate making a final qualifying run.  The FIA stewards penalised Alonso for impeding Hamilton, and while Hamilton went on to win the race just 0.7s ahead of the fast closing Ferrari of Raikkonen, the McLaren team scored no constructors' points as an additional penalty for the Alonso/Hamilton qualifying debacle.

It was also the race in which Felipe Massa's world championship bid effectively ended in qualifying. Why? Because someone in the Ferrari camp forgot to refuel his car - and starting from a lowly 14^th place, the Brazilian was unable to find his way through the traffic.

One of the constants in those drama-packed races has been the pace of Kimi Raikkonen and following his debut at the track in 2007, Lewis Hamilton. In sheer speed and aggression, no-one comes near them.

It will be just as close this year. Ferrari have expended a great deal of effort in the past two weeks in an attempt to catch back up with the leap in performance that took Hamilton and McLaren to victory at Silverstone and Hockenheim.

So saying, my money this weekend still be on Hamilton to score a third successive victory, but I think Ferrari have worked out their tyre management issues and will run them a lot closer.

Another constant in the past two years has been the third man on the podium.  BMW's Nick Heidfeld is good with tyres. (No, it isn't some Mosley style peccadillo!).

Heidfeld's smooth driving style pays off particularly well in comparison with team-mate Kubica, who admits he dislikes this track. Two other drivers are also going to be well worth watching on these slow corners.

Both Felipe Massa and Nico Rosberg seem to alternate between stunning pace and disaster on this sort of track. I guess on Sunday evening it'll be interesting to see which is hero or zero at the chequered flag!

I wonder. Just wonder, whether the last two successive victories for Lewis Hamilton really have set him up for this year's Formula One World Championship title?

Based on Hamilton's domination of both the British and German Grand Prix races, it would on the face of it, look good for the British driver.

At Silverstone, Hamilton simply found a level of pace that mystified his rivals. It was one of those rare occasions where the driver simply transcended the machinery.

At Hockenheim, it was a different story. On this occasion, it was a case of the McLaren finding a ‘sweet spot' with the track that simply eluded the Ferrari and BMW teams.

The fact also remains that Lewis had to dig deep into all his reserves of talent to retrieve the chances of victory after a huge McLaren tactical blunder regarding his second pit stop.

The deployment of the safety car was inevitable after Timo Glock's accident on the 34th lap of the race. The Toyota driver's rear suspension failure on the fast Sudkurve and pitched him backwards across the track into the pit wall, was a massive impact which left debris all the way down the start straight.

When the signal was given for the pit lane to open, someone on the McLaren pit wall committed an absolute howler. Whether through poor communication, indecision or simply a wrong call, they left Hamilton out on track, when he should have led the pack down the pit lane.

In addition to Formula One, I've spent a large part of the last ten years reporting on American motor sports on their oval tracks, where they have countless "full course yellows" behind the safety car. Whether it's the big V8 NASCAR stock cars or their Indycar single-seaters, they have a simple maxim.

If you're leading the race, you lead into pitlane and pretty well whatever happens, you're still likely to come out in the first half dozen. They have a word for the place behind the safety car when you stay out behind it. They call it the "sucker hole". If you're in it, you're likely to wind up at the back of the pack.

When the race restarted, only Hamilton, Nelson Piquet junior (more of him shortly) and Nick Heidfeld had stayed on track. Already Hamilton's hard-earned sixteen second advantage had been negated by the safety car. Now, with the rest of his rivals refuelled, he knew had to build a 23 second lead just to stay ahead when he pitted.

Hamilton set off like a rocket and drove a dozen successive laps at qualifying speed. He though, had only been able to claw back 15.7 seconds when he dived into the pitlane.

He rejoined in 5th place and was promoted by Heidfeld making his stop too and team-mate Kovalainen letting him by. Then he pulled off two of the best overtaking moves of the season, to pass Massa and Nelsinho Piquet who was leading a Grand Prix for the first time.

For Massa, it was must have been a particular blow. His pace consistently shaded team-mate Raikkonen all weekend in a Ferrari which was visibly much more difficult to drive than the McLaren. As at Silverstone, the Ferrari showed it is much more susceptible to gusting winds and a bumpy track. At Hockenheim, as at Silverstone the conditions threw up both.

However it was the manner in which Hamilton outraced Massa, which will haunt the Brazilian. You have to give Felipe 100 percent for his fightback, which got the two cars wheel to wheel for a second time.

However the way Hamilton simply forced Massa into a no win situation was masterful. It was noticeable that a deflated Massa had no mind for fighting with compatriot Piquet for his second place.

That for me is the essence of Hamilton's possible success in the World Championship. After he'd been blown away, Massa stopped fighting. Raikkonen knew he had a car that wouldn't win, so he didn't try. His mind was simply on getting a few more points.

But Hamilton simply never gave up. It would have been easy for him to finish third and make muted comments about McLaren's poor tactics, but he didn't. You have to admire not just his victory, but his racing spirit.

Talking of racing spirit, a few thoughts on Nelsinho Piquet. He started the race from 17th on the grid, but the Renault team took a gamble on a one-stop strategy - and it paid off.

Piquet, a driver whose form had led to some disquiet about his future, then drove an impeccable race, battling calmly and intelligently with Hamilton for the lead and pacing himself perfectly to deny Massa his second place.

Think back to Monaco, when running in fourth place boosted the confidence of Force India driver Adrian Sutil. He has outpaced team-mate Fisichella ever since. One wonders what finishing second will do for Piquet - and what those two stunning wins will do for Hamilton's self-confidence!

A surprise present often seems more enjoyable than something you expect to receive. Just ask Rubens Barrichello. His third place in the unfancied Honda at Silverstone was perhaps the biggest surprise yet this season, but a combination of Rubens' driving finesse in the rain and a gamble on fitting the most heavily treaded wet-weather tyres at just the right moment, paid off handsomely.

"It was fantastic to wake up on the Monday morning after Silverstone and see the trophy!" said Rubens early this week. "To step onto the podium again was an unexpected but deserved outcome. I was so pleased to have achieved the result for the team."

Back in 2000, Rubens stepped onto the top step of an F1 podium for the first time at Hockenheim, when he scored his first win for the Ferrari team. If you remember, he sobbed tears of joy as he heard the Brazilian national anthem played. This weekend, unless Ferrari can recover from their dip in form at Silverstone, they'll be sobbing again.

With a three-way dead heat at the top of the championship table, Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen desperately need to score championship points to stay in the title chase. Both failed to score any at Silverstone, for different reasons.

Kimi Raikkonen remains remarkable relaxed about the whole deal. After the formal pre-race interviews on Thursday, he sat down on the edge of the stage and candidly chatted with a pack of journalists about the last race - and this one.

"Unfortunately a mistake with the tyre choice cost us badly, which was a shame as we had very good speed before that happened" he explained. "Of course, the next day, it was easy to think we should have done things differently, but in the end we picked up some useful points and the result was not a disaster."

And for Hockenheim and the remainder of the 2008 season? A typically laid-back Kimi response. "I'm pretty relaxed about it. I will do my best and hopefully that will be enough. If it's not, then I can deal with that too, because there are more important things in life."

Massa too made a particular effort to talk to the press, although you could sense more tension. I suspect that if there are more important things in life for Felipe, he hasn't thought about them!

"When you see there are four guys all within two points at the top of the table it is such a small difference" said Massa. "Each one of us is in the same boat and many things can happen from one race to the next.

"Consistency will be the most important factor between now and the end of the season. My strengths are that I have a great car and I am working with a great team and I plan to make the most of those assets to get stronger all the time and fight for a good amount of points at every race."

Massa wouldn't be drawn on his lacklustre performance at Silverstone, when he spun five (or was it six, I lost count) times and finished thirteenth and last, two laps behind the race winner.

At the time, I put it down to the fact that Felipe was perhaps previously more reliant than other drivers on the now absent electronic traction control than other drivers. It made him more aggressive on the power and brakes, which cost him dear at Silverstone.

However I also think that he may have been more affected than even he admitted by a massive accident in practice on the Friday. Travelling at maximum speed, 300 km/h, he hit oil which had just been dropped as Fernando Alonso's Renault engine blew up.

The Ferrari went instantly out of control and hit the barriers at unabated speed. Perhaps it was unsurprising that Massa was never the same all weekend!

If Silverstone brought bad surprises for the Ferrari drivers, it brought a particularly sweet one for Lewis Hamilton. I've been accused of bias in praising him up, but there is no other way to describe his performance on the rain-soaked track as other than sensational.  Heck, he lapped every other driver on the Formula One grid, except his fellow podium finishers!

Being more objective, I doubt that he's going to achieve that again, possibly ever in his career, but in pre-race testing at Hockenheim he was consistently the fastest driver over runs of up to 30 laps, indicating that perhaps McLaren have found a slight performance advantage over Ferrari and BMW.

I would not be surprised to see Hamilton win again this weekend, but for Lewis and the McLaren team consistency over the next nine races will be the key to at the title.

If you want a further surprise this weekend, look to Toyota. The wet conditions, plus a scary rear wing failure in practice for Jarno Trulli, blunted their attack in Britain.

They've been quick in testing though and Hockenheim is the Cologne-based team's home track. I suspect that if there's any race where Trulli or Timo Glock may grab a surprise pole position or even a podium, this is it.

With both the Wimbledon tennis finals and the British Grand Prix on the same British summer’s day, you could probably have placed a safe bet on the storm clouds gathering. When they duly delivered their watery contents they allowed Lewis Hamilton to weave a bit of magic around the Silverstone circuit.

Given the circumstances of the likely future of the British Grand Prix, it is tempting to look back to the last time a Formula One race was held at the Donington Park racing circuit, which will host the GP once again from 2010. Back in 1993, the European Grand started in similar sodden conditions. It went on to see one of Formula One’s greatest drives.

In that race, Ayrton Senna started from fourth place on the grid in his McLaren. He then pulled off a stupendous move in the opening series of corners to vault into the race lead – and stormed away from his rivals. At the chequered flag, the Brazilian was over a minute ahead of his nearest rival. Damon Hill, in second place, was the only driver not to be lapped. Alain Prost finished third, a full lap behind.

Back to Silverstone. Lewis Hamilton started from fourth place on the grid in his McLaren. He then pulled off a stupendous move in the opening series of corners to vault into the race lead and then stormed away from his rivals. At the chequered flag, the Briton was over a minute ahead of his nearest rival ... I’m sure you get my point.

The interesting thing is that Hamilton’s victory came against a background of continually changing track conditions. The track started wet then, over the first third of the race, began to dry. Then another rain shower hit and the track became wetter than ever. One perfect description for the resulting conditions is “tyre poker”.

In the event, Hamilton played a straight hand impeccably. He started the race on less heavily treaded intermediate tyres. As the conditions deteriorated, he trusted to the McLaren’s compliant handling and ‘tip-toed’ his way around the deep water.

When track conditions improved he drove through the edges of the standing water to keep his tyres cool and minimise wear. It was a race that demonstrated that Hamilton has a perfect feel for his car and a light touch at the helm when required.

The same could be said for Nick Heidfeld, who finished in a well-deserved second place. In recent races, the German driver has been overshadowed by his BMW team-mate Robert Kubica, whose more aggressive driving style has worked better on dry tracks. In the Silverstone spray, Heidfeld’s silky smooth style paid dividends.

There were those who gambled in the tyre poker and won. Rubens Barrichello matched his wet weather expertise with a cleverly timed decision to switch to the heavily treaded, “extreme wet” tyres – and promptly shot up the leaderboard to score a surprise third place, the last driver on the same lap as the winner. We all know the result was a lucky fluke for Honda, but there was unanimous delight in seeing ‘Rubinho’ back on the podium.

Ferrari too played tyre poker – and lost. Their decision to leave Kimi Raikkonen on his worn-out tyres at the first pit stop could have been an inspired one, if only it had stopped raining.

In that scenario the worn out treads would have placed more rubber on the road and they’d have acted like slicks. If the track had dried they might have beaten Hamilton. But it didn’t and Kimi Raikkonen, like Fernando Alonso who’d taken a similar gamble, slithered back into the midfield.

More worrying was Felipe Massa’s performance. The Ferrari, more stiffly sprung to aid its dry-weather aerodynamic efficiency, was clearly the most knife-edge, twitchy car in the conditions, but the Brazilian once again proved that he was more reliant on the now-absent electronic traction control than other drivers. My washing machine doesn’t offer as many options for spinning as Massa demonstrated!

Finally, a piece of driving that perhaps even shaded Lewis Hamilton’s Silverstone performance. Mark Webber pulled off an awesome lap in qualifying to put the Red Bull second on the starting grid. But that was nothing in comparison with the opening lap of the race.

Imagine the scenario. Wet track, Hamilton and Kovalainen are fighting for the lead ahead. Webber is wheel-to-wheel with Raikkonen’s Ferrari in the Becketts Corner complex when the car spins. Suddenly Webber is facing backwards, with sixteen other cars heading right at him.

It should have been the recipe for carnage, but thanks to Webber’s cool head it wasn’t. Still travelling at over 200km/h, Webber calmly reversed the car off the racing line and out of trouble. He rejoined and eventually finished in tenth place, but that piece of reverse driving was maybe the neatest trick of the whole weekend!

The second day of the test provided a rare opportunity for my wife to visit the track with me. Such is the pace of a race weekend its never normally possible, nor practical, but last week I was given a completely different view of success or failure in Formula One, from a sartorial perspective.

First, the Renault team uniforms came under scrutiny. "Well you certainly won't miss them in a crowd" was the comment on the bright yellow, white and blue with prominent ING logos. Williams' dark blue almost put them on pole position, except for "too many logos", Red Bull scored well too, with smarter uniforms better than siblings Toro Rosso and a clearer livery for their car.

McLaren's clean-cut corporate silver and red was also approved of, although the choice of shiny materials was "trying a bit too hard". Toyota's look was thought "a bit ordinary, no imagination" and surprisingly, Ferrari's Italian style failed to shine through.

"The car's a disappointment. Looks great on TV, but it's the wrong shade of red when you see it for real". And as for the Ferrari team uniforms? "They look just like the attendants at our local gas station."

At the tail of the grid though, it was clear-cut. Honda's "Earth Dream" concept is a worthy one, but the way it is presented? Oh dear.

"No wonder the team is demotivated, being forced to wear trousers that colour. That shade of green is shocking. It's not natural, organic or anything like. Honda certainly won't win anything this season. Bernie won't let them onto the podium wearing trousers that colour!"
That left two teams jostling for the lead. Force India came close with their white, gold and black, very smart. It was BMW in top spot though. Their dark blue and white, "clean, simple and effective, just like their cars."

Out on the track the BMWs continue to look strong too and given Kubica's current form, I'll tip him for another podium place, but I suspect that at Silverstone will once again play to the strengths of the Ferrari cars. Their ability to combine aerodynamic downforce with high straightline speed is the key.

Despite gusting winds, both Massa and Raikkonen effortlessly strung together a series of laps which were faster than last year's race record, which was itself set by Raikkonen on his way to victory. My money though goes, not on the reigning champion, but on his team-mate Felipe Massa.

Massa's drive last year was one of the unsung highlights of the Brazilian's season. His race started in disaster when the Ferrari stalled on the grid, forcing him to rejoin 22nd and last. Massa's drive through the field to an eventual fifth was a true mark of his resilience and pace.

Of course, home hopes will hinge on Lewis Hamilton, who has ensured that Silverstone is a sell-out this weekend, not a single ticket remains. That heaps a lot of pressure on the 23 year-old and is if that pressure were not enough, this is probably the pivotal race of the 2008 season for the Briton.

After failing to score points in either Montreal or Magny Cours, Hamilton needs a safe, steady, drama-free, top three run at Silverstone to keep his championship hopes alive. Of course the Silverstone crowd will be roaring him on to victory. I actually hope that he doesn't win. He simply doesn't need to take the risk.

There are of course two other drivers providing home interest. I suspect that David Coulthard, twice winner at Silverstone and coming close to his 250th GP, may choose this weekend as an appropriate time to announce his retirement as a driver. Meanwhile one has to feel sorry for Jenson Button. A couple of years ago everyone was betting on him for a home win. Now such is the Honda's lack of pace that he wryly admitted last week that he'll "leave it to Lewis to do the winning this weekend". And he has to wear those green trousers!

Finally, an ‘outsider' might just surprise the front-runners this weekend. During testing Toyota consistently matched McLaren and Ferrari for pace and were ahead of BMW. Jarno Trulli's third place in the French Grand Prix might not have been a fluke. Watch out him again this weekend and in the second half of the season.

The FIA Stewards must be thanking heaven for the dramas involving Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa, and the spirited battle for third place between Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen that brought the French Grand Prix to life.

Without them, all the attention would have gone on what I think was one of the poorest penalty decisions in F1 history.

In terms of the letter of the law, there might have been a case for the drive-through penalty that ruined any chance of Lewis Hamilton making his expected progress through the field. Except that looking again at the video footage, Hamilton had already overtaken Sebastien Vettel's Toro Rosso before he arrived at the chicane, where he then slid off the track.

The penalty should only be invoked if a driver gains advantage by going off the track while overtaking. Well if Hamilton was already ahead, why was he penalised?

It was also suggested that maybe Hamilton might not have been penalised if he'd backed off to let Vettel back past him. That might work when the field's a bit more spread out, but on the opening lap - don't be so daft!

Hamilton, already dropped back to 13th on the grid after his misdemeanour in Canada, was up to tenth place mid way through the opening lap, slap-bang in the middle of the closely massed pack of cars, on a short 250 metre run to a hairpin bend. Can you imagine what would have happened if he'd backed off or braked suddenly? It would certainly have been a spectacular pile-up.

Sadly, not for the first time, the FIA Stewards have ruined a driver's race based on at best, a dubious decision. I actually don't blame them, they're simply not racers.

Amazingly, none of the three volunteer stewards who are delegated to oversee each Grand Prix, have to my knowledge ever driven a Grand Prix car or anything remotely like it. In fact I'm pretty sure that none of them have even driven in a motor race, certainly not in the last decade or two.

Until the end of last year, the FIA seemed to recognise that the volunteers which include lawyers, former government administrators and a cinema owner, needed at least one permanent official among them. Until his retirement, permanent race steward Tony-Scott Andrews operated alongside two designated race stewards - one international and one from the national sporting authority hosting the Grand Prix.

This year the FIA decided to use three nominated stewards at each event, chosen from nationalities that are totally neutral - so they are not the same as any of F1's competitors. This seems laudable enough, ensuring impartiality of decisions on national grounds, but at a stroke it means that British, French, Italian and German stewards, the ones who arguably know the most about the sport, can't be used.

The FIA also appointed a fourth, non-voting ‘official representative' of FIA president Max Mosley to assist in the stewards' decision-making. The problem is again, that Alan Donnelly, while an experienced sports administrator, knows little about motor racing. His previous job was with the International Olympic Committee!

There are some retired Formula One drivers, including World Champions who would be perfect recruits from the Stewards room. How about Niki Lauda, or Alain Prost? Both I'm sure could be trusted to be impartial and would certainly have the drivers respect. I also believe that no real racer would have sanctioned Hamilton's penalty.

Meanwhile, all credit to Ferrari. They had the best car for the job in Magny Cours and even when Kimi Raikkonen's broken exhaust meant he had to give up the lead, he had sufficient in hand to limp home in second place.

But the drive of the day has to go to Jarno Trulli in the Toyota. We'd all assumed he'd run light on fuel to qualify fourth and he'd stop early. Well that was the case, but having swiftly forged his way past Fernando Alonso into third, he grittily held onto the place through both of his pit stops until challenged by Kovalainen in the closing stages.

The McLaren driver had started tenth (after also being penalised!) and probably passed more cars than any other driver as he worked his way through the field. It was the classic case of the unstoppable meeting the immovable.

This time the immovable, Trulli, came out ahead after a brilliant twelve laps of wheel-to-wheel action. One bonus for Trulli was it happened at Magny Cours. A wine connoisseur and vineyard owner when not racing, he wouldn't have far to go to find a quality vin rouge to celebrate with from the burgundy vineyards close to the track!

With five victories at Magny Cours from the last seven races, you don't need to be a rocket scientist to work out that this is a track that suits the Ferraris perfectly.

Both the French and British Grand Prix play to the strong points of the scarlet cars with fast sweeping corners placing an emphasis on aerodynamics, while the Ferrari suspension compliance allows them to ride the kerbs with impunity at the slower chicanes.

McLaren of course run Ferrari close, but their strength continues to be on tracks where long straights place the emphasis on low downforce. A win in Canada should have been a walk in the park for Hamilton, which made his mistake in the pitlane potentially so damaging to his championship hopes. He'll now have a long wait till Monza in September, before he‘s likely to have such a car advantage again.

Adding to the pressure on Hamilton this weekend is the fact that he has a ten-place grid penalty. Check the results in last years race and you'll see that Fernando Alonso, in a McLaren, started from 10th on the grid. It took a gritty drive and an astute pit strategy for the double World Champion to finish seventh and salvage two championship points. I can't see Lewis doing much better this weekend.

I'm not expecting to see BMW Sauber trouncing the Ferraris either. While the Swiss-German team have improved fast and Robert Kubica thoroughly deserved his maiden win in Canada, I suspect that the highly technical Magny Cours track will expose the fact that the BMW F1.08 chassis is good, but not quite as good as the silver and scarlet front-runners.

So my money's on Ferrari. But which one?

It's still too close to call in the championship with just seven points covering the top four. I suspect that Kubica's points lead will disappear this weekend, and both Ferrari drivers may well move back ahead of Hamilton who shares second with Massa. But Kimi Raikkonen needs a win desperately

The points lost by his mistake crashing out in Monaco and Lewis' mistake, crashing into him in Montreal have dropped him to fourth in the title standings. Equally important, despite a relatively lacklustre race in to fifth place in Canada, team-mate Felipe Massa is ahead of him in the points and the French Grand Prix is the halfway point of the season.

That's when, officially or unofficially, teams will decide who to put their prime effort behind one or other driver in the title chase. I sense that Massa senses the opportunity. If he wins in France and Raikkonen doesn't - he'll become ‘Numero Uno' in Ferrari's thinking.

We're already seeing similar steps in the other teams. Heikki Kovalainen is clearly now playing a supporting role to Hamilton's challenge for McLaren. And did you see the almost petulant display of post-race disappointment from Nick Heidfeld when he was forced to settle for second place behind Kubica in Canada? There's no doubt where the BMW team's prime loyalty now lies!

Interestingly one team where it is still wide-open between two team-mates is Force India. A few races ago I admit, I'd consigned Adrian Sutil to the ‘why bother' pile after he'd been comprehensively outpaced by the experienced Giancarlo Fisichella.

Then came Monaco. That run to fourth place, till he was punted off the track by Raikkonen, boosted Sutil's self confidence to new levels. He outqualified Giancarlo again in Canada and now he's coming to a track that he loves, and Fisichella hates.

Giancarlo had the biggest accident of his career at Magny Cours in practice in 2002 and he admits it still haunts him. He also dislikes the slow chicanes and high kerbs. Sutil though reckoned this was his favourite track when he raced here in the GP2 series.

This is the race to watch the team-mates battle, all the way down the field!

If you ever want to be a petty official with a mammoth sense of power, try and get the job of switching on and off the traffic lights at the end of the Montreal pit lane. Other than actually driving a Formula One car, there's no better opportunity to change the course of races.

In 2005, the red lights went on as race leader Juan Pablo Montoya was exiting the pit lane. He ignored them and was promptly disqualified. Last year, the same fate befell Felipe Massa and Giancarlo Fisichella. And this year of course.......man that guy with the button has some power!

Ironically Lewis Hamilton had been joking with reporters before the race about his father crashing a Porsche supercar in a city street just a few days before the race.

"I said Dad, how do you wreck a car at just 50 km/h?" joked Lewis. Well now he knows!

Lewis looked to have the race in the bag as he comfortably led from pole position, but it all began to unravel on the 18th lap. Adrian Sutil's Force India car caused the safety car to be deployed when it ground to a halt on the track with gearbox problems, then the seven leading cars came into the pits.

While Hamilton led into the pitlane, a tardy stop meant that he was in third place once he got moving again. Ahead of him, Kimi Raikkonen and Robert Kubica were jostling shoulder to shoulder at the 80km/h pitlane speed limit, when suddenly they stopped at the red light.

Distracted, Hamilton thumped into the back of Raikkonen's Ferrari, putting them both out of the race, while Nico Rosberg's Williams then shunted the back of the McLaren, putting him beyond future contention too. All because of that red traffic light.

It was a narrow escape too for Kubica. It was a 50:50 chance which car Lewis would hit. History though will record that Lewis tweaked his wheel to the left and hit the Ferrari, while the Kubica went on to a brilliantly driven maiden victory. A stunning mid-race drive allowed the Pole to leap ahead of his BMW team-mate Nick Heidfeld as the two scored BMW's first race win with an emphatic 1-2 ahead of the hardy perennial David Coulthard in the Red Bull.

The win also puts Kubica at the top of the World Championship for Drivers, while adding insult to injury, both Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg were penalised for their accidents. Both will lose ten places on the starting grid for the next race, the French Grand Prix on 22nd June.

But I still can't understand why that red traffic light is there at all. The official rules state that the light is on to allow the convoy behind the safety car to pass unimpeded. Well frankly, if the best drivers in the world, in radio contact with their pits, can't be persuaded to keep to one side of the track and then slot in at the end of the line, Formula One isn't doing its job properly.

A couple of hours after the race I settled down in front of a TV to watch the NASCAR Sprint Cup event from Pocono, Pennsylvania. During the course of the 500 mile race there were eight pace car periods during which time up to 40 cars at a time headed into and out of pit lane.

OK, a few drivers traded paint, a few got penalised for speeding and one did nearly leave the pits with a mechanic as a hood ornament, but there wasn't a single silly shunt at a traffic light.

The FIA and the Formula One teams have been talking about getting rid of these daft pit lane rules for some time, but haven't got around to it. I suspect now that Ferrari and McLaren have a vested interest in getting something done, we might see some progress.

In contrast this week, there is an inevitability about the prime topic of conversation in the Montreal paddock. The fallout from the ‘vote of confidence' in FIA President Max Mosley may even threaten the future running of the Canadian race.

One of the most immediate fall-outs from the decision by the representatives on Wednesday is that some national motoring bodies in Germany, the USA, Canada and other countries have openly discussed pulling out of the FIA. If they do there will be no official international sanctioning powers for races in their respective countries.

This would mean that races including the German and Canadian Grand Prix may be placed in jeopardy. The strongly worded comments from the American Automobile Association may also end hopes of the United States Grand Prix being reinstated on the calendar in the near future.

In the country which hosts the opening Grand Prix of the season, 'The Australian' newspaper described Mosley as a ‘pariah' saying: "In this image-conscious sport, whose revenues depend on its reputation for sophistication and prestige, a man revealed to have a penchant for sado-masochistic bondage sessions with prostitutes is an unwelcome guest."

It was a sentiment supported by Bernie Ecclestone who went on record as saying: "There were many people who didn't want to speak to him before. I can't think they will want to speak to him now as a result of what has happened. Nothing has changed in that respect. Just because he gets a few clubs from Africa voting for him will not make the King of Spain want to shake his hand".

Whatever one's personal feelings on ‘Mosleygate', it seems that rather than giving closure to the issue, Wednesday's FIA vote is stirring up an even bigger storm.

Whatever happens behind the scenes, I believe we'll have another cracking Canadian Grand Prix to savour. Lewis Hamilton returns to Montreal with the best possible chance of adding a second Canadian victory to his maiden Formula One victory in 2007.

The reason for McLaren fans to feel confident stems from their car's traditional ability to make the most of mechanical grip and traction, in comparison to aerodynamic downforce. It is the same attribute that gave Lewis his winning edge in Monaco too.

At first there may seem to be little in common between the tight confines of Monaco, and the long straights of the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. In Monaco the cars simply never go fast enough for the wings to give a major effect. In Montreal the fastest chassis set-up is to ‘trim' the wings for the minimum drag and a maximum speed of down the long back straight, accepting the compromise of slower cornering speeds on other parts of the track.

McLaren have proved masters of this in past years. In addition to Hamilton's victory in 2007, the team won with Kimi Raikkonen in 2006 and the Finn would have won in 2005 too, but for a fumbled pit stop. The last time a Ferrari has won at the track was with Michael Schumacher in 2004.

In fact, if the form book is repeated, the Ferrari drivers might even struggle to make the podium on Sunday afternoon. The unique nature of the Montreal track traditionally seems to work well for the BMW and Williams teams too.

Last year of course, the headlines were dominated by Robert Kubica's BMW. It speared off the track after clipping the rear of Jarno Trulli's Toyota, hitting the barriers almost head-on at 280 km/h, before barrel-rolling to a halt on the outside of the track.

Thankfully the Pole escaped injury, which allowed BMW to celebrate a fine second place for Nick Heidfeld. The car will once again be one of the fastest at about 320 km/h on the straight and I would not be too surprised to see both BMW drivers on the podium this year.

Another driver not to be discounted is Heikki Kovalainen. Last year at Renault, Montreal marked the start of the turn-around in the Finn's season, with a brilliantly-judged drive from 22nd and last place, to finish fourth. This year he has a McLaren under him - need I say more?

Likewise Williams could spring a surprise in Montreal. Last year Alex Wurz was one of the stars of the race as he carved through the field on a one pit stop strategy to claim third place after starting 20th on the grid. His Williams team-mate Nico Rosberg might also have featured last year, but along with Fernando Alonso, was given a ten-second "stop-go" penalty for entering the pits at the start of a safety car period.

They at least fared better than Ferrari's Felipe Massa and Renault's Giancarlo Fisichella. They were both disqualified for jumping red "traffic lights" at the other end of the pitlane.

It seems that anything can happen in Montreal. The tight first corner has triggered at least two multi-car pileups in recent years and more than one world champion has ended his race sliding along the infamous "Champions Wall" at the chicane in front of the pits.

Last year also saw the unfancied Super Aguri of Takuma Sato blast past Alonso's McLaren on the straight to claim fifth place, while Anthony Davidson was robbed of a points-scoring finish after running over a squirrel!

However perhaps the ultimate late race drama came in 1991. The British driver Nigel Mansell had such a big lead he began waving to the crowd on the final lap, but let the engine revs drop too low at the final hairpin.

The car stalled and rolled to a halt, allowing Nelson Piquet senior (Nelsinho's dad!) to claim his third victory at the track. I told you this was a wacky race!

With more changes of fortune than the roulette wheel in the Grand Casino, the stories of two drivers, more than any other demonstrate the vagaries of the 66th running of the Monaco Grand Prix.

There was precious little difference in the pace or commitment of McLaren's Lewis Hamilton and Force India's Adrian Sutil. However one rode his luck to victory, as the other was forced to wonder ‘what might have been'.

Lewis Hamilton's race should by rights have been over on the sixth lap. Lewis had made a brilliant start to dive down the inside of Kimi Raikkonen and tuck into second place behind the leading Ferrari of Felipe Massa. Then the treacherous conditions got the better of the McLaren driver and he kissed the barrier at Tabac corner, bursting his rear tyre. But if ever an accident can be said to be a lucky one, this was it.

Firstly, the accident happened just three corners from the end of the pitlane, so Lewis lost the minimum of time getting back to the pits. Then, just as he made his pit stop, an accident brought out yellow flags, slowing the field, but Lewis left the pits just before the safety car was scrambled, otherwise he'd have been held in the pitlane. Such was the lucky break in his timing, he merely dropped to fourth place.

The accident that precipitated it (to forgive the pun) was classic Monaco. David Coulthard's Red Bull, which had proved skittish in the dry, was almost uncontrollable in the wet.

On the run up the hill to Casino Square it simply got more and more sideways, until DC ran out of ideas, opposite lock - and road. He hit the barriers and ground to a halt in what is usually the cab rank outside the Casino.

Behind him, Sebastian Vettel in the Toro Rosso lifted off the gas and instantly also lost control. He too cannoned into the barriers and into the back of the Red Bull. Typical isn't it? You can wait all day at a cab rank, then you get two at once!

When racing resumed on lap 11, Hamilton's fourth place became third when the stewards imposed a drive-through penalty on Kimi Raikkonen. Apparently the Ferrari mechanics had hit trouble fitting one of the Finn's wheels on the grid and had only completed the job within three minutes of the start.

Things got worse for Ferrari when Massa slid up the escape road at Ste Devote on the 16th lap. He slithered back onto the track in second place as BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica snatched the lead. From a 1-2 at the start, Ferrari were now second and fourth.

Hamilton's enforced pit strategy now worked even more in his favour. That, and some stunningly fast laps on the now drying track saw him in the perfect position to take the advantage of the improving conditions. He did not have to refuel until the 54th lap and as his rivals stopped, the McLaren driver moved back into a 37.6 second that allowed him to make his second stop, refuel, switch to Bridgestone's soft grooved tyres, and still keep the lead.

The race wasn't over yet. Nico Rosberg, who had since Thursday practice been easily the most spectacular driver on the track, rode his luck a step too far. On the 61st lap, the Williams driver who had already stopped for two new nosecones after hitting all and sundry, finally wiped his car into oblivion on the barriers at the Swimming Pool complex. It was, as my co-commentator, Tyrrell and Lotus F1 racer Julian Bailey described it, "a proper accident".

It sadly too, marked the end of the ‘drive of the race' for a driver of whom I've been critical in the past, but I'll freely admit to eating my words based on his Monaco performance. I don't know what Force India put into Adrian Sutil's water, but I think we'd all like some, based on his performance this weekend!

From 18th on the starting grid, Adrian overtook no less than seven cars in the opening laps (this is Monaco remember!) then in the changing track conditions steadily made his way up the order to an eventual fourth place. It was quite simply a brilliant drive.

The Force India car even lapped Heikki Kovalainen in his McLaren and looked good to hold the fourth place ahead of Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari. Then on the restart after the Rosberg safety car period, it was the reigning World Champion who lost control, hitting the back of Sutil's car and forcing the young German driver into retirement with just five laps remaining.

The result sheets will show Hamilton the hero, Sutil with zero. But that is not even half the story of the 2008 Monaco Grand Prix. I doubt that for a disconsolate Adrian Sutil it will be of much interest, but his not Hamilton's, was my drive of the day.

There are three things to watch out for in Monaco this weekend. The weather, barrier bashing and, perhaps, a surprise winner!

The tight, twisting Monaco Grand Prix circuit may be the slowest track on the Formula One calendar, but it is one of the toughest. The track demands a completely different approach to almost every other track, as the slow speeds mean that the car's aerodynamics are less effective, with ‘mechanical grip' (good old-fashioned suspension design) coming to the fore.

The close proximity of the barriers to the track really puts the emphasis on the drivers being able to drive to the limit, but not past it. Of course this year, the drivers don't have electronic traction control or braking assist to help their cars' stability. That might be a real key to the weekend's race if the weather forecaster's prediction of rain is proved correct.

Already, the initial practice sessions have seen veterans and rookies alike hitting the barriers, fortunately without serious damage. It was perhaps to be expected that rookies like Adrian Sutil and Nelson Piquet were paying for their mistakes, but former winners Jarno Trulli (twice) and Fernando Alonso, also became casualties of the opening day's action.

Despite his misfortunes, I still think that Fernando Alonso could be in a position to gain a podium place, if not a third successive victory at the track. It is quite simply Renault's best chance of the season to score a win.

One of the big problems for the Renault team over the past two years is that its 2.4-litre engine seems to produce less power than its McLaren, Ferrari and BMW rivals. The problem is, that under the FIA rules, the specification is frozen till 2010 and the team are not allowed to make any fundamental changes to the engine itself.

All Renault can do is work on things like the exhausts and inlet systems and hope for success on tracks where horsepower isn't such an issue. Monaco is just such a track and its demands for precision perfectly suit Alonso's sharp, aggressive driving style. He won here Renault in 2006, for McLaren last year and he still has high hopes of a hat-trick. Except...

Lewis Hamilton is on absolutely brilliant form and simply bursting with confidence, which shows in his driving. Not only were his Thursday practice laps fast, they were spectacular too, taking advantage of the absence of traction control to deliberately slide the car right up to the barriers and use the outer kerbs of the slower corners to gain extra time.

It was marvellous to watch and he was millemetre perfect every time. When a driver is on that form, he has to be favourite for a win,

The McLaren chassis proved last year to have a clear advantage over Ferrari when mechanical grip rather than aerodynamic downforce dominates. Ferrari boss Stefano Domenciali admits as much, but says that in the year since their trouncing in the 2007 race they have made big steps forward. It is going to be a close-fought battle.

Of the two Ferrari drivers, Felipe Massa is the better to watch around Monaco. Kimi Raikkonen is a former winner in 2005, so is no slouch, but the track seems to better suit Massa's style. He is nearly as spectacular, and as quick, as Hamilton.

We can expect some teams to struggle, others to surprise at Monaco. Neither Nick Heidfeld nor Robert Kubica looked comfortable with their hard-sprung, twitchy BMWs over Monaco's bumps. Jarno Trulli's two accidents (so far) tell their own story on the Toyota's drivability and the new Toro Rosso car, which makes its debut this weekend, can hardly be expected to be instantly competitive.

Two drivers to watch though will be Giancarlo Fisichella, who aims to celebrate his 200th race start by scoring a top ten finish for the Force India team and Nico Rosberg. The Williams driver is my personal Monaco hero so far, the only driver to match Hamilton for speed and spectacle.

Watch out for Rosberg chasing Hamilton home for a podium place!

A word of advice if you are a card player.

Never try to play poker against Lewis Hamilton and the McLaren team.

Their performance in the Turkish Grand Prix, when Hamilton finished second to Felipe Massa, came in a race where they knew they had been trumped by Ferrari even before they lined up on the grid. Felipe Massa literally held all the aces, but no-one in McLaren gave a hint of the gamble they were about to take.

The Istanbul Otodrom is fast, surprisingly bumpy and demands continuous monitoring of the state of each cars tyres. It is one of the few tracks were tyre strategy rather that the risk of running out of gas, governs the timing of the pit stop.

In particular, the infamous turn 8, the long left-hand bend taken at close to 300 km/h is torture on the tyres. In addition to subjecting the drivers to side-loads of over 4.5g, the same forces place huge loads in particular on the right-front tyre. They almost threaten to tear the tread off the sidewall.

If you remember that is precisely what happened to Hamilton in the 2007 race. On lap 43, some 25 laps after his first pit stop, the tread tore from the tyre.

Fortunately he was able to maintain control and limp into the pits. Dropping from third to fifth place was a disappointment, but in reality it was a great escape. By rights he should have had as big an accident as Kovalainen in Spain.

This weekend, tyre makers Bridgestone told Hamilton’s engineers that they again could not guarantee his tyres for more than 20 laps. The problem it appears, is specific to Hamilton’s driving style, which aggressively ‘points’ the front of the car into the corner, demanding a high camber setting on the suspension, angling the top of the wheel inwards to give more ‘bite’ to the steering.

Hamilton’s approach clearly works in terms of speed, but it comes at the cost of added load on the tyres. Interestingly, Kovalainen has a different driving style and doesn’t suffer the same tyre problems even though he’s driving the same car.

Whatever, with Bridgestone’s engineers unable to guarantee a longer tyre life, Hamilton was forced to gamble on running with three pit stops, sixteen laps apart while everyone else including the Ferraris of Massa and Raikkonen planned to stop just twice.

In order to make up the time for that extra stop, Hamilton had to effectively drive 58 low-fuel qualifying laps during the course of the race. Not only did he do that, he pulled off a brilliant move to pass Massa for the lead, then having made his extra stop, in the closing stages of the race he held off an equally determined Kimi Raikkonen to claim second place.

While he ultimately missed out on victory, Hamilton was justifiably proud of a drive which I rate as the best of his career.

“It’s not about winning, it’s about feeling that you extract 100% from yourself and the car and I did that today” said Hamilton. “Before the race our prediction was that all being well I would finish fifth, so second is such a bonus”.

Meanwhile Felipe Massa put his championship challenge back on track with a beautifully measured drive to his third successive victory at the Turkish GP. He and Hamilton are now equal second on 28 points, seven behind the title leader.

On the fast and flowing Istanbul track the Ferrari car was clearly the class of the field. Now we look ahead to the Monaco Grand Prix where on past form, McLaren will have the advantage over Ferrari.

Last year Fernando Alonso headed a McLaren 1-2, chased home by Hamilton, who was convinced he could have won. This year, I am expecting that Hamilton will. And if he does, the championship battle will be wide open once again.

Just ten teams will line up for the start of this weekend’s Turkish Grand Prix, following the withdrawal of the Super Aguri F1 team this week. In my opinion it is a sad loss to Formula One.

While Super Aguri may not have featured in the World Championship standings in their brief two years of existence, ‘the little team that tried’ quite often gave us some great sporting moments at the tail of the field, not least when Takuma Sato was in his regular fighting form.

Remember last year’s Canadian Grand Prix. That was the race when Sato overtook Fernando Alonso to claim sixth place. Not only that, the Super Aguri blasted past the Championship-leading McLaren on the straight. On the track, that was the team’s finest hour.

Ironically it was also about that time when the team’s problems began, when the cheque from their main sponsor, SS United Oil & Gas Company, failed to materialise. It was only thanks to the assistance of Honda that they made it to the end of the 2007 season. They've been on borrowed time ever since.

The team’s demise of course means that both Takuma Sato and Anthony Davidson are robbed of their places on the starting grid. I suspect that Sato might leave F1 altogether and head to the USA to race, with Honda support, either in Indycars or in the ALMS sports car series.

For Davidson, the future is less clear. He is thought to have turned down a job as test driver for BMW in order to race for Super Aguri this season. Unless another team makes him similar offers soon, he too may be a loss to F1.

More serious for F1, is another background reason which has led to the team’s demise. Since late last season, there has been an increasing amount of lobbying from independent teams to outlaw the use of ‘customer cars’ handed down from one team to another at the end of the season.

Although, on paper, the Super Aguri and Toro Rosso cars are produced by their respective teams, it is generally recognised in the sport that the former is last year’s Honda and the latter is a reincarnation of a Red Bull, albeit with a Ferrari engine. Teams such as Force India, who design and build their own cars from the ground up have always said that the use of customer cars is unfair, as is undermines their significant investment.

Right or wrong, the result of that lobbying is less cars on the starting grid. This season, there could have been twelve teams and 24 cars on the grid. Now we have just 10 teams and 20 cars. Even before the season started, the Prodrive team, which would have run second-hand McLarens, pulled out. Their boss, the ever-astute David Richards figured that this would happen and decided not to waste millions of dollars. Now Super Aguri has proved him right.

Perhaps the one redeeming feature of this, is that McLaren will have a little more space at the bottom of the Istanbul paddock. And speaking of this weekend’s Grand Prix, I believe that McLaren will have to fight hard to match the pace of the Ferraris once again.

The Istanbul track requires a little less downforce than Bahrain or Barcelona, so straight line efficiency – always a Ferrari strongpoint – is the key to victory. So is tyre wear. Last year if you remember, Hamilton punished his right front tyre so hard on the long, high-G, turn nine, that a blowout cost him the Championship lead, while Felipe Massa scored victory for the second year in succession.

This year too, my money is on Massa to make it three in a row and get himself back in the title race. The Brazilian will have a new engine in the back of his Ferrari, while Raikkonen is on the second race with the engine that gave him victory in Spain. Watch out for Robert Kubica too. He is a star in a car with low downforce and could give both the Ferraris and the McLarens a big surprise!

Ferrari delivered its rivals a double whammy in Barcelona, with the team's second successive one-two victory.

More than that, Raikkonen admitted after the race that he was cruising, with pace in hand.

Kimi's comment, that "If we had wanted we could have gone a bit faster but there is no point to push it when you don't need to" is probably the last thing that his rivals want to hear. They are already on the limit to match the Ferraris' current pace!

Equally interesting though, is the fact that it is no longer a two-horse battle at the top. There are now maybe as many as four teams that might just challenge Ferrari in the next few races.

McLaren made a good comeback after their lacklustre performance in Bahrain. Lewis Hamilton's aggressive start paid off, moving him from the third row of the starting grid, ahead of Kubica and into fourth place. When Alonso made his expected early pitstop on lap 17, Hamilton took over the third place and closed in on Massa's Ferrari on the the run to the chequered flag.

Heikki Kovalainen too, demonstrated that his McLaren too had front-running pace. But for his horrific accident, he would surely have been battling with Robert Kubica's BMW for fourth place. Thankfully the Finn has sustained no serious injuries from his head-on 250kph collision with the tyre barrier. It appears a damaged wheel rim was the initial cause, leading to the tyre blowing out, a very similar shunt to Hamilton's last year at the Nurburgring.

Ironically, if it hadn't been for Kovalainen's accident, Nick Heidfeld would have been battling for fifth, further demonstrating BMW's pace. The German was unlucky to be caught on his way to the pits just as the safety car was scrambled and, under a rule initiated this year, you are not allowed to stop while the pace car is on track until the officials declare the pitlane open.

Nick had two choices, run out of fuel and stop on the track, or come into the pits anyway and take a penalty. Unsurprisingly he did the latter and the penalty dropped him to 13th and last place. A pretty daft rule don't you think?

Two teams which have improved dramatically in comparison with the start of the season were Honda and Toyota.

Jenson Button's sixth place was a welcome sign that the Honda's aerodynamic package is at last working and although the Briton complained that the suspension wasn't riding Barcelona's many bumps as well as the opposition, he has high hopes for the smoother Turkish track in two weeks time.

Jarno Trulli's eighth place for Toyota could so easily have been better. The Italian was in fact heading for sixth place behind the Red Bull of Mark Webber when a mix-up led to his team calling him into the pits for an unnecessary extra stop. I'll bet that Jarno wasn't best pleased!

Of course the hero of the hour in Spain had to be Fernando Alonso. His qualifying laps, which came oh-so-close to pole position were heroic, but his race performance until the Renault engine wilted under the pressure was just as impressive. The Renault team say that it's a clear sign that the car is hugely improved. I hope they're right because it means we'll have battle royal for the rest of the season.

Yes, I think Ferrari are clear title favourites at the moment. But it's no long just a Ferrari-McLaren battle.

It's a Ferrari-McLaren-BMW-Renault-Red Bull-Toyota-Honda battle. Any of them could still challenge at the front - and I think that's just perfect!

...Could mainly be falling on the Spanish Grand Prix this weekend, if the gloomy predictions of the weather forecasters are anything to go by.

But for me, that could be one of the best things to happen at this weekend's race, as it would really add to the spectacle and could certainly spring some surprises.

Remember the wet races we had last year? The dramas at Nurburgring, in China and in Japan? Well Spain could provide the same again this weekend!

Actually, it has to be admitted that the Circuit de Catalunya needs the prospect of some rain to brighten up the racing. Technically it is a superb track and very demanding on both cars and drivers. The trouble is, it's not a good overtaking track. Despite attempts to upgrade it, unless a driver is VERY determined, passing moves are at a premium.

The good news is that there is no shortage of determination in the 2008 Formula One World Championship. In the Ferrari camp, the rivalry is immense, but so far under control. Felipe Massa silenced his critics in Bahrain, with a perfect drive to victory, but Kimi Raikkonen has the title race under control so far, cruising home in second place to his team mate and oozing cool self-confidence.

Meanwhile their main rivals have had, literally, a bumpy ride. Lewis Hamilton made more novice mistakes in the 20th Grand Prix of his career, than he committed all last season. Another race like that and the questions will start asking: 'has he blown it'?

Meanwhile his team-mate Heikki Kovalainen continued to impress with a solid fifth place in a McLaren, which somehow lost the competitive edge in Bahrain.

Ironically the driver Hamilton chose to hit at the start of the Bahrain Grand Prix, was none other than his former team-mate turned nemesis, Fernando Alonso.

So far his move back to Renault has only served to demonstrate the inadequacies of the 2008 car and ‘Fun Filled Fernando'(not) is already grumbling publicly. On the eve of his home race, Alonso is already hinting he'd leave the Renault team at the end of the year if the car doesn't get better, a step which hasn't exactly endeared him to some members of the team which took him to two world titles.

And at Fernando's favoured berth of Ferrari, senior executives moved very quickly to hint that ‘thankyou, but we're very happy with the drivers we've got'.

Meanwhile, as all that has been developing, two drivers have got on with delivering an exemplary performance and vindicating all the hard work by their team. That first-ever ‘Pole on pole' by Robert Kubica didn't happen by accident in Bahrain. It was the result of a tremendous effort that has transformed the BMW from being an oversensitive and ‘twitchy' car at the start of the season, into a fearsome competitor.

And to further demonstrate the step forward by BMW this season, look at the World Championship points to see who is second to Raikkonen by just three points. It is BMW driver Nick Heidfeld, who in contrast to Kubica, is rarely spectacular or stealing the limelight in races, but has ‘sneaked' up the Championship order.

I think that Ferrari will have the fastest car on the track in Barcelona this weekend, but remember last year when Raikkonen was forced to retire with an obscure technical gremlin?

If it happens again or we get a surprise turn-over if it rains, BMW could be due their first race win. And Nick Heidfeld could be the first man to become a world championship leader by stealth!

If you are a McLaren fan, whether a Lewis Hamilton or Heikki Kovalainen supporter, sorry! The Bahrain Grand Prix won't have made comfortable viewing.

Don't worry too much, remember that there is always someone worse off than yourself. Someone will have had to sit next to disgruntled team boss Ron Dennis on the flight home!

I bet he was not good company. I can't remember any recent race when the McLaren team so consistently under performed.

If Ron wasn't entirely a happy man on Friday, after Hamilton wrecked his car in an uncharacteristic practice accident, you can imagine his thoughts when Hamilton fluffed his race start. Then he almost banged his head on the pit counter in frustration as Lewis bounced off the back of Fernando Alonso in an early race error that effectively ended Hamilton's competitive weekend.

Meanwhile team-mate Heikki Kovalainen didn't exactly star either. His car struggled with understeer, which prevented it turning cleanly into the slow corners. That was compounded when Heikki locked a front wheel while battling for third place with Kimi Raikkonen. The resulting flat spot on his tyre meant that he struggled with severe vibrations too on his way to a lonely 5th place.

The big blow to McLaren though, was Hamilton's collision with former ‘team-mate' Fernando Alonso. Given the fact that they were hardly best buddies at the end of last year, at first I wondered whether Fernando had ‘brake tested' the McLaren driver on the straight. Now having looked at the footage again, I don't think so.

For a start, why would the double world champion risk damage to his car on the opening lap of the race? A cut tyre or more serious damage to the rear wing would have made his car undrivable.

Alonso was simply defending his tenth place against the hard-charging Hamilton, who had been able to carry a lot more speed through the previous corner. Alonso moved right to block, Hamilton moved right to attack and the two collided. A simple racing accident.

After stopping to replace the nose of his McLaren, Hamilton was not only almost a lap down, but his McLaren never seemed to have a strong race pace again. Even accounting for the fact that he was carrying a full fuel load for a one-stop strategy, he was humbled by the race winning Ferraris. Both Massa and Raikkonen lapped the McLaren on their way to the chequered flag.

Meanwhile, as last season, Felipe Massa proved the ‘comeback king'. After failing to score in the first two rounds, he bounced back to dominate the Bahrain Grand Prix from start to finish. Kimi Raikkonen, on his second race with his Malaysian GP-winning engine, clearly settled for second place to ensure reliability while the BMW team, having claimed their first pole position with Robert Kubica, proved that they are once again a strong contender, with their reliability moving them ahead of both Ferrari and McLaren in the Constructors Championship.

So what now for Hamilton, who has dropped from first to third in the driver's championship? Well, it is still early in the season, with 15 races still to go. And if Massa could bounce back in Bahrain, there is no reason that we won't see Hamilton back on top by Barcelona!