F1 Fanatic – The Formula 1 Blog

Guio Oblepias spotted Robert Kubica's impression of a locomotive at Sepang

Guio Oblepias was at the Malaysian Grand Prix and, as well as getting soaked to the skin, took this brilliant collection of pictures.

Have a look at them now and check out the F1 Fanatic drop.io for more…

Here’s what Guio had to say about the race:

The pictures I took were from a variety of locations… on Friday, all ticket holders were able to get into mall area so I took that chance to grab some shots of the pits. On Saturday and Sunday, my parents and I had to head back to the hillstands straddling turns 9-11 (tickets for that area were the cheapest if you wanted at least some measure of protection from the elements — something which we were very thankful of come Sunday). From our location we could see half of the circuit including the back straight and the last corner… great value for money if you ask me.

The race started exactly at 5, and I watched the first few laps on the part of the hill facing the back straight and turns 7-9. The start was pretty cool with Rosberg pulling away from Button off the line, and I caught Kubica’s engine blowing up a few laps into the race (I really got to appreciate how tall he was when he stepped out of the car). I could also see some pretty good following and overtaking (a testament to the ’09 regulations?) from where I was standing.

After a few minutes I heard the weather announcement on my headset… rain in 3 minutes. I got moving back to our shaded spot to save my equipment but it was still pretty bright so I wasn’t too worried. It was showering a bit, but it was nothing to worry about, so I hung around the bottom of the hill for a little longer and took some more shots. But when the rain started falling in earnest (and Kimi made his ill-fated switch to wets… being a Ferrari fan myself, it was very, very painful watching him pass by lap after lap on what was a very dry track), I met up with my parents and contented myself with taking shots from up there.

Pretty soon, the heavens opened up and everyone ran up the hill for cover. What I had earlier thought would be a light shower had turned into a biblical monsoon. Pretty soon the track surface was no longer asphalt, but a sheet of water, and everyone was slipping and sliding around the course. It was pretty entertaining at first, with a lot of overtaking going on in front of us (the battle between Webber was very entertaining to watch from where we were), and the hazard lights and rooster tails made for some pretty cool photos.

Then the safety car was called out, and after a few laps the race was stopped. You could see that everyone was restless, and after a few minutes of waiting, a half-naked Finn started running around at the bottom of the hill with a huge Finnish flag draped on his shoulders. Some other spectators decided that the hills made for excellent water slides (you can see them in the official video on Formula1.com), and somehow, someone managed to get the hillstand spectators to do ‘the Wave’. Pretty soon, news of the race being cancelled and Button’s half-point win reached us on the hillstand (by then we had already given up hope of a restart anyway).

Despite the fact that the race was cut short, I thought that it was pretty exciting and very eventful. It was also great to be able to see the ’09-spec cars live, and I’ve got to say, they look much better in person (that’s more than I can say for the R29… I still like the look of the ’08 machines, but the FW31 and RB5 look pretty sharp).

Have a look at Guio’s pictures below. If you’ve got any photos from F1 races old or new to share you can send them in via the Contact Form or the F1 Fanatic drop.io.

F1 pictures

• Your pictures: Australian Grand Prix
• Malaysian Grand Prix pictures
• Malaysian GP Pictures: qualifying
• Malaysian GP pictures: practice
• Malaysian GP pictures: Thursday
• More F1 pictures

Your pictures: Australian GP