"Welcome to 2009!"

RACE TRACK: Good Vibrations - The Beach Boys

I realise I am later with this race review than Kobayashi is on the brakes, but may I tentatively say... the blog is back! ...Place your bets now for when I'll go off the rails again.

But anyway: F1 IS BACK BABY! And the best part of the start of a new season for me (aside from ditching the F1 withdrawal symptoms) is the unpredictability. After a few weeks of fairly meaningless testing, where no team wanted to show their true potential, we finally get to see a new order establish itself in qualifying. I think Kimi speaks for himself, Felipe and Fernando when he says:

 

That poor a qualifying effort certainly worried Ferrari fans - and for Alonso to outqualify Massa despite being stationary and throwing a strop in the gravel, well, I think Felipe just needs a unicorn plaster on his head and a cuddle. I'm sure Rob would oblige. Or me.

To further confuse the Raikkonen fans, we find Romain Grosjean, in an identical Lotus, THIRD on the grid! Before this weekend, I was pretty indifferent to him. I felt like he had a chance to impress in F1 at Renault and had failed to - but I'm a firm believer in second chances (hope to see you soon Jaime!). To rejoin F1 after a fairly miserable first attempt, and to be driving alongside a former world champion, must be pretty damn daunting. And yet we find him beaming in the top three press conference alongside the McLaren duo! I tweeted at the time that he looked like the happiest giraffe in the zoo. This picture does nothing to refute that statement:

 

Look at his little face! When qualifying was over, I could just hear Will Buxton in the distance (from Melbourne) shrieking "SHUT UP. THAT IS RIDICULOUS."

But the other surprise of qualifying came from the man with the beautiful serial killer face, Pastor Maldonado. I'm well aware that I am the SOLE member of the Maldonado fan club, but if you can't be happy for him, be happy for Williams. Following their worst season in F1 history, to have a driver qualify as high as eighth is wonderful in my opinion. And so this weekend, what really grinds my gears is that inch or two of artifical grass that sadly brought Pastor's race to an end with only half a lap to go. 

I think it's safe to say that if my hotel room neighbours weren't already awake, they were after that happened. I know it was a driver error, but it's just a bit devastating that Williams could have had more points in that race than in the WHOLE of 2011, if it wasn't for that tiny mistake! Such a shame, but I'm looking forward to seeing what Williams can do next weekend and in the rest of the season. Other notable disappoints were the retirements of the Caterhams, the fighty Brazilian mafia of Felipe and Bruno, as well as Grosjean and Schumacher who had both been running well. But again, it was good to see some more midfield teams/drivers competing higher up the grid - I want to see more than the top 5 drivers on the podium this year!

But on with the rest of the race. In an interview with Coulthard on the grid, Jenson said it'd be difficult into Turn 1, but that he'd "give it a go". And he bloody did! The Girl With The Button Tattoo was naturally very happy with that - I reckon the race was won and lost in that first corner, and what a result! Button promptly "did a Vettel" and pulled out enough of a gap to rarely be bothered by his teammate or either racy Red Bulls. Now I'll admit Vettel was lucky with the timing of his pitstop and the safety car, but Hamilton didn't make much of an impact this race. Although I guess we should be grateful he kept his head down, like he promised? As for Button, he did try to scare us with a radio message sounding worried about a vibration and, listening to the exceptionally shouty Ben Edwards commentary, this was obviously HIGH DRAMA and Jenson was DOOOOOOMED (he did seem to like an overreaction did Ben). But it can't have been a real problem because the smooth operator Mr. Button sailed to victory uncompromised. And so, for the first race after a tortuous winter break, we have someone other than Seb on the top step of the podium! Judging by his team radio after the chequered flag, he was as happy as me about this: "Welcome to 2009!"

Also on the last lap there were plenty of reasons to be excited about the midfield battles for 2012. As Button crossed the line victorious and Maldonado exited his mangled car, the Saubers, Toro Rossos, Di Resta and Raikkonen were swapping places for the entire final lap. Perez and Raikkonen in particular had done EPIC jobs to get up into the top ten from their dismal grid slots (Sergio in last place after a penalty) and the numerous overtakes in the final turns were great!

So anyway, it really is about time I shut up (so much tl;dr) but I think it's safe to say that this was a fun race, and hopefully the start of some great battles for the 2012 season! I shall leave you with this, because they are just impossibly cute:

 

As the commentator for Star Sports said during the champagne shower, "the chemistry between these two champions is absolutely great". ...I'll let you take from that whatever you like.

Until next weekend pals! Feel free to leave a comment (agree, disagree, call me a raving lunatic - whatever you like), or tweet/follow me at @F1_Obsessive. :D

Dull Down Under

Warning: All this may be explained by my being tired and grumpy.

RACE TRACK: Woke Up This Morning - Alabama 3

First off, news from qualifying: congratulations to Albert Park for overcoming its menopause, as it no longer requires HRT! Nice job BBC on your not-at-all harsh graphics, crossing out the faces of Liuzzi and Karthikeyan like an assassin crosses off his hits. Only other interesting event of qualifying, Sutil trying to take over from Hamilton as top 'hoon' in Melbourne, but performing his doughnut far more gracefully (and legally) than the Aussie rozzers deemed Lewis to have last year.

And so to the race. A bit of a disappointment really, especially given the appalling hour I had to wake up.

For starters, my boys Button and Barrichello were acting very strangely.

I have no idea what on earth provoked either of them to attempt such idiotic moves, but I'd really rather they stopped the madness. I mean I was screaming at Jenson to just give it back to Massa before Alonso rolled up and the pitstops started. But no, he had his wise and experienced Mclaren strategists in his ear who decided to arse about and ask the FIA for some friendly advice instead. And as for Rubens, well the most experienced man out there seems oddly distracted by the scenery this weekend, smashing into Rosberg in the same random way that he drifted into the gravel in qualifying. Still, it's not like anyone missed Nico a great deal.

Next up in my list of disappointments, the Sauber disqualifications! My pessimistic soul became that little bit less jaded when Perez and Kobayashi came in in 7th and 8th, but that of course was snatched away after the race - something to do with their rear wings being a millimetre or so out in some dimension. A shame, because I liked Perez for being the random rookie pulling off some kind of miracle. Plus, he has some kind of Rufus (the naked mole rat from Kim Possible) vibe to him, don't you think?

(Perez is on the left by the way)

And what else really grinds my gears... oh yes, dear Mr. Camera Man, can we please focus on the race occasionally, instead of checking every five minutes whether Nicole Scherznfmkxtlzminger can still jump, hoot and clap like an ape? I'd quite like to have seen Paul di Resta being asked to move out of the way for Sutil, or the state of Hamilton the Plank Hamilton's plank, or why Webber had to dump his car immediately after the chequered flag. But never mind, she's more important.

For a dull race I've found a fair bit to rant about. I'm hoping next time around in Malaysia we might get a bit more excitement than one of Britney's Nico's pristine golden hairs being out of place. Until then, to keep us going for two weeks we have the joy of having seen a fair bit of Vitaly Petrov's sensational face.

Terrifying. Only kidding Vitaly, congratuwelldone today!