motorsportmania

On the NASCAR front all is still quiet regarding Shrub Jnr following the parting of the ways with Penske of Shrub Snr. As we wrote here at the end of the season, the latter’s behaviour was pretty shameful, and especially so in the way it showed a lack of respect for the team’s heritage. Captain Nice would not have behaved that way and nor would Rusty. We’re always sad to see talent wasted, especially by the individual, but these two boys just do not seem to be able to contain themselves, and so the standards have to be set by others. We applaud Penske, and Shell, for taking a stand, but we also applaud JGR for trying with their man, albeit that his future may not be with the team.

The Darien Grubb story looks to have ended well with him going to JGR to work with Denny Hamlin. He deserved a decent job; just because he and Smoke didn’t gel to the latter’s satisfaction doesn’t mean that he hasn’t got talent and he did crew chief the #14 through to the title even if he knew he was under notice. The bloke is made of the right stuff.

In F1 the 2012 line up is starting to come together with the Iceman going to what will be Lotus and being joined by Romain who clearly deserved better than he got there in the time he was alongside Alfonso. Petrov is out, but he deserves to have a place on the grid and, being well-funded, maybe that can be at Williams. The Grove boys had a dire year in 2011, but maybe with Patrick moving aside things could improve. It would be hard to get worse, and the big man cast a long shadow.

Also in F1 we are still seeing a calendar silly season emerge. Austin may or may not hold a US GP, Bahrain may or may not be on and so on. Is this an attempt by Bernie to keep F1 on the sports pages? Who knows, but it all seems a shamble to us here at MM. Sort it out Bernie; they are in or they are not.

Returning to Lotus, nee Renault, is the top seat there cursed? Last year we had Robert putting himself out of action and now we have Kimi hurting himself falling off a snow mobile. Hopefully he is OK and can take his ride, but we do wonder if the team can pull round. If they can’t, then their linear progression backwards might suggest that the Iceman would have done better going to HRT.

Filed under: Drivers, F1, NASCAR | Tagged: autoracing, F1, formula one, motorsport, NASCAR, racecar | Leave a comment »

#NASCAR – well, the season may have ended, but the grace with which Carl Edwards accepted defeat was not reflected in the actions of the Elder Shrub. Once again there was a demonstration of why we don’t like this pair; they may be decent drivers, but they are a long way short on personal skills. Yes he was frustrated by an early equipment failure, but his team, sponsors and fans do not need to encounter that sort of behavior.

And so we again find a sponsor wishing to disassociate themselves from their driver. Penske Racing is a class act, built on the foundations of RP and Mark Donahue, and KB senior might like to to consider how his actions at Homestead are a grave dishonour to the memory of Mark.

#F1 – The Brazilian GP passes without a Hamiliton/Massa incident, albeit that it looked like one mught have been on the cards before Lewis gave up with mechanical problems, and it was nice to see that he went over to Ferrari after the race to make peace. Good to see Webbo add another win, even if it was slightly gifted. JB nailed second overall for the season as we thought that he would and Force India and Lotus (or Caterham as we’re going to call them next year) inked in 6th and 10th respectively in the constructor’s title.

But little news on who goes where for the teams that have not settled their line ups. Seems odd to have so many potential vacancies with the season over, although we know that Charles Pic will join the famous Irish driver Tim O’Glock at Marussia Virgin next year. It will be a shame if the Barra Boy is out of F1 after such a poor showing at home. The home fans didn’t have much to cheer about with Senna making a complete cods off it and Massa handicapped by a poor qualifying maybe. Still, they enjoyed his doughnuts after the race.

That is it for our weekend round ups for a while, but we will try and post at least weekly with news and views and we have a few articles almost complete that we need to dust off and publish here. Thanks for all the support,

Filed under: Drivers, F1, NASCAR | Tagged: autoracing, F1, formula one, motorsport, NASCAR, racecar | Leave a comment »

#NASCAR – Fun in Phoenix on the re-modelled track. Pleased to see Aric on pole for the NNS, but sorry that he got taken out in that big wreck when it looked like he was on for a decent finish. Still has a shot at 3rd in the title race though. Another favourite is FrontRowJoe and he too ran well enough. Also good to see Morgan Shep still lapping away out there. He was another to get caught up in the wreck that ended Aric’s chances and we hope that it didn’t hurt too much at his age.

Nice to See Sideways Sam get a win at last. The guy is a better driver than his results have maybe shown and we hope that this might be enough to help him find a full time next season; it’s the right time of year to be leaving an impression with sponsors.

In Sprint Cup, good also to see the #43 on the front row once more: Just like old times. In the race the #14 and the #99 seemed tied together again this time finishing 2-3 with Carl ahead and taking a 3 point lead into Homestead. The Dinger brought the #43 home to a good finish after swapping pit crews for the last 2 stops and a top 10 for Rooti will hopefully keep him in people’s minds for a decent ride in 2012.

#F1 – Where does Seb get these last minute laps from? Yet another one pulled out of the bag for pole. We were going to say that he was driving the wheels off that Red Bull, but he was only driving one tyre off as it turned out. Exit one Red Bull from the race and Lewis had the measure of Alfonso even if he couldn’t afford to relax. In the race for third JB did well to overcome technical problems to come in for that last spot at the press confernce and take a 10 point cushion into the finale.

Force India had a good day with both cars in the points as the battle for the second division runs down.  Barring something dramatic happening they should be able to retain that 6th spot in the constructor’s race. Is the lack of driver decisions a clumsy attempt to motivate the current drivers? Who knows.

Filed under: Drivers, F1, NASCAR | Tagged: autoracing, F1, formula one, motorsport, NASCAR, racecar | Leave a comment »