Grand Prix Rejects

You get a Sauber in the dark,
It's been raining in the park
But meantime...it's time for your rundown of the Singapore Grand Prix.

Formula 1's first night race, the Marina Bay circuit offers enjoyment at all angles, provided that angle is 90 degrees. I'd have asked WaffleCat for a guest spot in explaining "what is Singapore?" to all of you, but since he's off doing army stuff, I'll have a go at it.

I know nothing about Singapore, other than the fact that it's an island city-state off the coast of Malaysia.

A cursory google reveals that Singapore was colonised by the British in 1819 (bloody Brits, going over there, taking over their country), led by a man named Stamford Raffles. He also invented a popular village fete competition in which a winning ticket determines the prize won, which he named...that's right, the tombola! I have no source to back this up.


I'm pretty sure that bottle of Coke has been opened. What a shitty haul of "prizes"...

Singapore is known for the Singapore Sling cocktail, a heady mix of gin, liqueurs and various juices, the latter of which invites any middle-aged woman to quip "it's basically one of my five-a-day!".

The Formula 1 circuit, which snakes around the streets of Singapore (assuming snakes are quite angular, awkward creatures) also had a corner coloquially named the "Singapore Sling", a horrendous left-right-left contraption which spat more cars into the wall than El Hadji Diouf spits on a football pitch.


Diouf's alternative "dribbling" style caused something of a spitstorm...

The "Sling" has thankfully been removed, although the caveat is that it gives me nothing to complain about.

Last year, Mercedes ambassador and professional vlogger Nico Rosberg won, holding the fort from grin-enthusiast Daniel Ricciardo.


"So um, yeah guys, for sure it's great to be here, um, awesome to meet my fans..."

It was also the scene of Kvyat's Last Stand, in which the Russian produced an amazing defensive drive against Red Bull successor Max Verstappen. Unlike Custer's Last Stand, in which General Custer got killed, Kvyat remains very much alive - although one could argue that his 2016 season resembled Custer's Revenge in the way that he got shafted...

Then he makes it fast
With one more thing
"We are the Sultans –
We are the Sultans of Swing-apore"


Knopfler in his headband reminded me of the story when John McEnroe was asked along to view auditions for the third Harry Potter film. Gary Oldman came in to read for the part of Harry's uncle in The Prisoner of Azkaban, and the directors were impressed with the way he brought the character to life. Except McEnroe. He got up on the table pointed his finger at Oldman and shouted "you cannot be Sirius!"

Unsurprisingly I approve of the Dire Straits references.

How long have you been waiting to post that title?

Ataxia wrote:I know nothing about Singapore, other than the fact that it's an island city-state off the coast of Malaysia.

Tringapore can into shopping mall with badly fitting shoes, lah!



Not pictured: Perry McCarthy and Alan The Shoe Trader.

Singapore was also the setting for classic 80s TV show Tenko which told the story of the women POWs held there when the Japanese invaded and occupied the country.

At no point was Grand Prix racing mentioned during its run.

FullMetalJack wrote:How long have you been waiting to post that title?

Probably too long?

I was intending to do a full F1-themed rewrite, but hit some trouble - was gonna go with "Hammy doesn't mind if he doesn't make the scene / he's got his Instagram, he's doing alright", but having seen his face-like-a-slapped-arse too many times after a slightly iffy qualifying, that line became decidedly untrue.

Being more serious for a moment, I'm expecting/hoping for a bit more parity between Ferrari and Mercedes this weekend - perhaps with a Red Bull cameo at the front of the pack. Ferrari has been smart, and has identified where Mercedes are weakest (the tighter, slower circuits) and capitalised. Thing is, that's also Red Bull country.

McLaren needs a big weekend, especially having thrown Honda in the trash for Renault. Alonso's historically been good around here (and before you mention it, shush you), so could be a points-contending wildcard.

*sigh*

Was hoping we'd get a Red Bull pole (how times have changed) but Vettel has to pip both of them. And knowing Vettel, that's probably the win done and dusted already (the polesitter has taken P1 in the race in Singapore all but twice), hopefully Red Bull still has an opportunity to challenge or there's a badly-timed SC or something.

good_Ralf wrote:*sigh*

Was hoping we'd get a Red Bull pole (how times have changed) but Vettel has to pip both of them. And knowing Vettel, that's probably the win done and dusted already (the polesitter has taken P1 in the race in Singapore all but twice), hopefully Red Bull still has an opportunity to challenge or there's a badly-timed SC or something.

or a cleverly timed one if your name is Fernando.....

I feel the same way regarding qualifying. It would just be really nice to see Verstappen and Ricciardo do well in at least one race this year by merit and not by inheriting from others' mistakes. Hopefully they can both jump Vettel at the start, while Ferrari and Mercedes bicker over the last podium place.

Glad to see I'm not the only one feeling a bit glum after qualifying. Spent the day getting hyped up about a possible Honey Badger pole following Friday practise only to see him get beat into P3. Verstappen really turned up the heat in the inter team battle there.

Credit where it is due though, that was an almighty pair of laps from Vettel. Will Buxton said he could see Vettel was shaking while he was being interviewed by him after the lap.

There's just been a cloudburst in Singapore, I don't expect to rain during the race, but if there's still water on the track at the start that could be interesting. Accuweather however is predicting a thunderstorm for 10pm local time - roughly the end of the Grand Prix!

Lewis Hamilton confirmed as winning this title. It's over folks. Thanks a bathplug lot, Kimi.

Are you kidding me? Could Lewis be any more lucky?

East Londoner wrote:Lewis Hamilton confirmed as winning this title. It's over folks. Thanks a bathplug lot, Kimi.

Don't think it's anyone's "fault" per se. The gap is there when Kimi moves into it, and Vettel doesn't know Verstappen has a car on the inside when he moves across to cover him. But between them they conspired to hand Hamilton the lead and a probable minimum 2nd place as long as he doesn't lose the car in the rain.

And they managed to take out Alonso who'd been lightning off the grid too.

Holy moly that is one for the flashback videos in the future. That's one of the most destructive (both in terms of numbers and championship chances) starts I've seen in a really long time. I've been waiting for a wet Singapore race for years now, but it was worth the wait just watch this madness

Ferrari's Twitter is blaming Verstappen

Hamilton and Vettel have more luck than the rest of the field IMO (today isn't completely the case). Although I'm a little peeved that we had a fairly standard winner and podium finish after 3 safety cars and 8 DNFs, this was the best GP of the year behind Baku. Most of the race was enthralling, I was astonished at the chaos lap 1 brought.
Plus Palmer is a third of the way to unrejectifying himself

Perhaps Jeff Gordon gave Mercedes luck this weekend.

Enforcer wrote:

East Londoner wrote:Lewis Hamilton confirmed as winning this title. It's over folks. Thanks a bathplug lot, Kimi.

Don't think it's anyone's "fault" per se. The gap is there when Kimi moves into it, and Vettel doesn't know Verstappen has a car on the inside when he moves across to cover him. But between them they conspired to hand Hamilton the lead and a probable minimum 2nd place as long as he doesn't lose the car in the rain.

And they managed to take out Alonso who'd been lightning off the grid too.

I wouldn't say that it is a case of "game over" just yet, since Hamilton could easily DNF in a race himself due to mechanical issues or an accident - though I do agree that the situation has shifted in his favour after this race.

I do also have to agree that, overall, it was more of a racing incident, with perhaps Vettel being a bit more at fault as he was cutting quite far across the track to try and stop Verstappen coming through after his slightly poor start.

Stewards' verdict: racing incident, no one driver wholly or predominantly to blame. No further action required.

https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/head ... ident.html

Incredible. Emanuele Pirro is on the stewards' bench this time round - I was expecting all three of them to be banned from the next two races at least...

What a shame - the rain which you'd have thought would make the race exciting ended up making it really dull!

Ah well.

Paul Hayes wrote:What a shame - the rain which you'd have thought would make the race exciting ended up making it really dull!

Ah well.

Well, it did help contribute to the lap one chaos, so there's that...

With six races remaining in the season, Max Verstappen is already unable to win the championship...

Paul Hayes wrote:What a shame - the rain which you'd have thought would make the race exciting ended up making it really dull!

I'm inclined to suggest that the rain was not the cause of the start incident in any way. The cars were accelerating and had not started to brake for the corner, it was not the rain that cause Vettel to not see Raikonnen since Verstappen was between them, and once Raikonnen's car was disabled he would not have been able to stop wet or dry. Vettel's spin was apparently caused by his own fluids (oh er missus). And Kvyat's and Ericson's accidents later in the race were par for the course in any given street race.

Vettel's aggressive move to the right off the start line was punished by the outcome; it doesn't matter what the stewards' findings were, he likely lost the championship at that point. As Brundle said later of another driver, it is a vital skill to be able to avoid an accident even if you are the innocent party.

For me the worst outcome was not seeing a McLaren dicing up front with the usual suspects; Alonso's start was brilliant and it would have been interesting to see how long he could have held them off.

I'm really liking the content that F1 is putting up on Youtube these days. "best of" team radio, highlights of every session, pole laps, driver interviews.

Like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ob54czhnp2Q

IceG wrote:

Paul Hayes wrote:What a shame - the rain which you'd have thought would make the race exciting ended up making it really dull!

I'm inclined to suggest that the rain was not the cause of the start incident in any way. The cars were accelerating and had not started to brake for the corner, it was not the rain that cause Vettel to not see Raikonnen since Verstappen was between them, and once Raikonnen's car was disabled he would not have been able to stop wet or dry. Vettel's spin was apparently caused by his own fluids (oh er missus). And Kvyat's and Ericson's accidents later in the race were par for the course in any given street race.

Vettel's aggressive move to the right off the start line was punished by the outcome; it doesn't matter what the stewards' findings were, he likely lost the championship at that point. As Brundle said later of another driver, it is a vital skill to be able to avoid an accident even if you are the innocent party.

For me the worst outcome was not seeing a McLaren dicing up front with the usual suspects; Alonso's start was brilliant and it would have been interesting to see how long he could have held them off.

I suppose it could be said that the slipperier conditions contributed towards Vettel's particularly slow start, which in turn resulted in him defending quite aggressively against Verstappen.

That said, I do agree that the overall pattern of behaviour by those drivers wouldn't have made much difference whether it was wet or dry - we saw how, in 2016, Hulkenberg was involved in a fairly heavy start line crash due to similar defensive moves by other drivers.

Fetzie wrote:I'm really liking the content that F1 is putting up on Youtube these days. "best of" team radio, highlights of every session, pole laps, driver interviews.

Like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ob54czhnp2Q

It makes a welcome change from their past behaviour - incidentally, speaking of the driver interviews, I saw a clip of all three of the podium finishers laughing at something, with Bottas in particular laughing so much that he was struggling to finish what he had been trying to say. What was it that set them all off?

Here's an avatar idea

AdrianBelmonte_ wrote:

Here's an avatar idea

My old Palmer-related avatar is a bit outdated so I've claimed this instead.