Hi all.
Probably no top ten predictions from me for the Hungary GP, simply because I won’t have time.
I do predict the following though:
Kimi might make a few mistakes; it sounds like he’s not 100% healthy.
Jenson will be in the points, so will Michael and Fernando.
If anyone else want to make some predictions, please do so in the comments. Kaz? Anyone?
CBits Tech Support 
Are you psychic!? How did you know Kimi would make a mistake!? That was a great race, and I expected Schumi and Alonso would be in the points too (Schumi is classified 8th now, after Kubica’s disqualification), and Alonso might have won it if it were not for mechanical failure.Schumi should have settled for 4th. Easy to say now, but he has done this before; push so hard for position and lose more than he needed to. Then again, that character makes him what he is, and perhaps it was the team’s responsibility to bring him in for dry tyres when he was losing 4 seconds per lap on the leaders, with 15 laps to go. So, if he was classified 8th, was his bald tyres legal after all?I’m looking forward to a single tyre formula though, especially after seeing that race. Rain is supposed to be the great leveller, but even the rainmaster Schumi was 6-7 seconds off the pace at some stages. Amazingly, overall he was still competitive, but it doesn’t seem right…I think Button’s win makes him the first bearded F1 winner! There have been plenty of moustachioed ones, but I can’t think of a bearded winner…I really enjoyed that race.Kaz
Yeah, what a great race! It would have been good even if Jenson hadn’t won.I bet he’ll keep the beard now. Sad really, ’cause he reminds me of Catweazle with it. I’m showing my age now.I heard Kimi’s pre race interview, and he sounded like he had a cold. I bet he’d taken something like DayNurse to dry up the cold, but he seemed a bit fuzzyheaded to me. 90 mins or so is a long time to race when you’re unwell, and maybe that contributed to his error.After the race he said he didn’t expect Liuzzi to slow, and that he (Kimi) was looking behind to let his team-mate Pedro through (who was faster at the time).Now, M Schumacher – don’t get me started on him (oops, too late). I agree, he should have settled for fourth. I can’t remember the times for the drivers behind him at that point in the race, but a pit stop would have cost him 20 seconds. Would that have put him back a few places, or at least into the clutches of the drivers behind? I think staying on old inters was better than dry tyres.[Rant starts]How did he get away with a point??? Until your comment, I hadn’t heard about Kubica’s disqualification. MS doesn’t deserve a point. His tyres were bald. If they had been dry tyres, he would have been DQ’ed I’m sure. Also, his chicane-cutting antics (first time around) were a blatant disregard for the rules; if you cut a corner and it gains you a place or stops you from losing a place, you have to cede that place. His argument might be that he didn’t have anywhere to go, but that doesn’t wash with me because he’s very keen on forcing other drivers off the track on the exit of a corner when he’s just passed them, and they can’t benefit as a result. How he wasn’t penalised for the tyres or the the chicane (or both) is a mystery to me.[Rant ends]I quite like the tyre war as it is. It adds to the complexity of the tactics at some races; three stops or two, inters or dry. But one tyre for all will mean that it’s more about the cars and drivers than about the tyres. To be honest, I was a bit ‘tired’ of all the pre-race tyre-talk.Now, Kubica – what a good drive. Sadly his inexperience might have let him down. He was DQ’ed for his car being 2KG underweight due to tyre-wear. Did he pick up enough marbles on the in-lap? Did he drink enough when he got out of the car and before weigh-in? In the dry, you can pick up about 2kg marbles on the way home, and gulping 1 litre of water adds another 1kg. It’s sad to see such a good debut count for nothing.Still, a good race indeed. Here’s to rain in Turkey!
I didn’t notice that Kimi was off colour; well spotted, Colin.Yeah, it’s a shame about Kubica’s DQ, but now that Jacques Villeneuve is gone, he should get a good chance to impress again. I don’t think the drivers are allowed to drink before their weigh-in, precisely because it could easily be planned to gain the weight that the car is underweight by…I’m guessing Schumi got away with the chicane indiscretion because he lost the position on the next lap anyway. The stewards have a committee meeting for every decision they make, so they probably just decided to let it go. As for the tyres, I was interested to see if he would get DQed, so I was disappointed to see him retire, and for us not to find out. What I then thought was that perhaps the groove depth rule only applies to dry tyres. The legality of the wet tyres (including inters) may not be governed by groove depth, as long as it is up to its task; a loophole, basically, and Ross Brawn may already have done his homework, because otherwise that would have been another reason to bring MS in for a stop.It’ll be great if it rains in Turkey! Also, there should be good chance of rain in both Japan and Brazil; I hope it pours!Kaz