F1 Fanatic round-up: 12/1/2010

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Today Michael Schumacher will be at the wheel of a racing car again as he samples a GP2 car at Jerez.

I had it in mind this would be the first time he’d ever driven a “feeder series” car, having skipped F3000 on his way to F1, but I discovered that isn’t the case. He did a single round in the Japanese F3000 series in 1991, finishing second at Sugo.

Digressions aside, on with the daily review:

Links

Ofcom broadcast bulletin 149 (PDF)

Media watchdog Ofcom cleared the BBC after it broadcast Jenson Button swearing after the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. The BBC says it may selectively dip the volume on future broadcasts to prevent a repeat. It hardly seems worth it given that only one miserable individual with nothing better to do bothered to complain.

US F1 granted extra testing days (Autosport)

“The 2010 Sporting Regulations originally limited teams to just six straight-line test days, and discussions recently further cut this back to just four. These days can be exchanged for one day of wind-on full-scale tunnel time – which equates to four-hours of running. Despite the latest agreement, which has yet to be put into the regulations, teams have agreed that US F1 can stick to the original six-day limit.” I can’t think of a good reason why USF1 should get this dispensation, and not the other new-for-2010 teams.

Comment of the day

Here’s Oliver’s take on Fernando Alonso joining Ferrari:

"So long as you don’t go red"?óÔé¼?ª

A comment made by Alonso three or four years back while on the radio to a departing team personnel. Seems he himself didn’t keep to that advice. But in all a welcome addition to the Ferrari family.

From the forum

Interesting to see what sports people watch apart from F1. I generally prefer my racing on four wheels and circuit-based (GP2, F3, IRL) but I’ll definitely watch some of the WRC this year since Raikkonen’s defection and I’ll keep an eye on the football World Cup as well.

Site updates

Cast your eyes to the page footer and you’ll see the lists of races, teams and drivers have all been updated. There’s still a couple of gaps to fill though – more on that later.

Happy birthday!

Today we are once again birthday-less. To let us know when your birthday is so you can get a shout-out please get in touch by emailling me, using Twitter or adding to the list here.

On this day in F1

It’s 35 years to the day since Jean-Pierre Jarier took a surprise pole position for the first round of the 1975 world championship at Buenos Aires in Argentina. It was the first time he and his team, Shadow, had come out on top in qualifying.

Unfortunately, he failed to start the race at all as his transmission failed on the warm-up lap. Defending champion Emerson Fittipaldi won the race.

Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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34 comments on “F1 Fanatic round-up: 12/1/2010”

  1. one miserable individual with nothing better to do

    Pretty harsh. I’m not miserable ;)

    1. If I had sworn on an International Broadcast, that one miserable individual with nothing better to do, would have been my mother!

      1. Actually it was a conversation between Button and Webber immediately after the race which the FOM cameras picked up. I think live events should be exempt from prissy restrictions on language like this.

        And that live censorship idea sounds nasty, hope it’s just something they said to placate Ofcom and the one person who gave a toss.

        1. Some one had too much time on their hands!

          1. Too true. I can never understand people who muster up enough energy to complain about something on TV, especially something like this where it was a live event and fairly uncontrollable.

    1. Cool – that last corner has a touch of the old Fuji about it.

  2. ‘Cast your eyes to the page footer and you’ll see the lists of races, teams and drivers have all been updated.’

    Keith- I hardly ever scroll down that far!!! I seriously think you should move the whole ‘categories/ about’ box area to the top of the page under the main headings/logo.

    (also where is all the ‘B, I, bquote, close tags etc.’ buttons for when writing a comment?) cheers!

    1. I think the footer is fine where it is, if you move it to the top of the page then it will just look messy and cluttered.

      As for the buttons for writing a post, I have been wondering the same thing for about a week now but I just thought it was only my computer.

      1. As Macca says, moving it all up to the top would cause design problems plus I’m not sure there’s the need for them to be that high on the page.

        Once the new design is up pages will be shorter so you’ll reach the footer more quickly: F1 Fanatic home page redesign

    2. The comment buttons (like the Gravatars) have gone temporarily while I try to resolve the performance problems we’ve got at the moment.

      1. ok cheers!

        1. The codes still work though – see? ;-)

          1. yeah but i can’t remember them!

  3. Re: US F1 and other teams: Perhaps because they asked?

    1. If that’s all it is, more power to them!

    2. Ooh, I’ve got a doppelgänger! Perhaps I should modify my name to avoid any confusion…

  4. I am still disappointed by the lack of Hamilton/Scherzinger break up. Then again that is quite literally yesterdays news :-)

    1. I think Hello will have that pretty well covered :-)

      1. “This weeks special guest columnist for Heat Magazine is Keith Collantine discussing the Lewis/Nicole break up”

        Come on Keith, this is bigger news than the Newtown and Minogue break up.

        the Lewis haters want all the dirty, did he leave the toilet seat up?, did he forget their anniversary because he was too busy racing around Monaco?

        1. …zzzZZZzzz…

          1. exactly. i couldn’t care less about her. it’s good that they’ve split. Nicole annoyed me with her jumping around and fake crying at the back of the garage!

  5. I miss the buttons also
    quotes were wonderfuly posted

    1. You can still do quotes:

      Just use blockquote tags

      Sorry for the inconveniences though.

  6. Keith,

    Dig the new layout design. You obviously put in a lot of time with your passion. Do you ever sleep?

    Hope the ‘new’ full time endeavour is paying off for you……….it certainly is for us F1FANATIC fans!

    1. Glad you think so Harry! I’m working hard on not going mad.

  7. [blockquote]These days can be exchanged for one day of wind-on full-scale tunnel time – which equates to four-hours of running.[/blockquote]

    So can we expect Virgin Racing to have a few extra days straight-line testing as they don’t need the wind-tunnel time??

    1. Okay, the quotes didn’t work. Keith, what’s the syntax for them??

      1. It’s written just above the box when you type your comment.

    2. adrian use instead of []

      1. strange, the symbol didn’t appear. was trying to say- use the arrow symbols rather than the square brackets.

  8. If you are watching the WRC this season, kepe an eye out for Ken Block as well. He’s only doing a few rounds here and there, but he’s the first American in some time to drive in the series. I have a good friend who has done some rallies with him and he’s quite a good dude from what I hear.

    1. Absolutely, I’ll be fascinated to see if he’s as good as his videos make him look!

  9. “only one miserable individual with nothing better to do bothered to complain” – lol lol lol

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