Sidepodcast

F1 Advent Calendar 2009 - Day Twenty-Two

• Length: 3:48 
• Size: 3.5 MB 
• File: advent22.mp3 
• Transcript: advent22.pdf 
• Torrent: advent22.torrent 

Hello and welcome to Sidepodcast's F1 Advent Calendar 2009. This extended mini series is bringing you the highlights of the 2009 season - peering behind a door for each day of advent for another key moment. We're on to Day Twenty-Two - Injury Time.

With just three races left to go, there were still three drivers in contention for the title. Button maintained his lead in front, but Barrichello was closing up and Vettel mathematically still had a chance, albeit very small.

The Japanese Grand Prix weekend started out wet, and the Friday practice sessions were pretty quiet. The notable absentee was Timo Glock, who was taking a day of rest to try and recover from a fever he was suffering from. In his place was GP2 and Toyota test driver Kamui Kobayashi. He finished 19th in FP1 but improved to 12th in the second session.

On Saturday, Glock was back behind the wheel, finishing 14th in the morning practice.  Webber crashed heavily towards the end of the session, trashing his car so badly, he couldn't take part in qualifying. Buemi crashed at exactly the same place during qualifying 1, but his mechanics worked super hard to get the car fixed, and the Toro Rosso, which for the first time this season finally had good pace,made it through to the second session.

With Q2 underway, Alguersuari also crashed at the Degner Curve - that's three cars at the same corner now - and he was out of qualifying. Moments later, Glock crashed head on into the barriers at the final corner. His Toyota was buried deep into the barrier, and qualifying was halted while the marshals and medics attended the scene. It took them a long time to get him out of the car, and he was flown to hospital by helicopter, complaining of back pains. He also had a wound on his leg. Worryingly, Glock was taken to the wrong hospital - they weren’t expecting any incoming patients from the circuit, and the helicopter had to take off again soon after. Thankfully it wasn’t too serious an injury, but that reflected very badly on the circuit.

Qualifying continued, with Buemi crashing once again, scraping his way down the barrier of the long straight, leaving debris all over the track. His mechanics deemed that he'd gone a step too far this time, and his car couldn't be repaired. Kovalainen made it four drivers to crash at the Degner Curve, his session over as well. Finally, we learnt that Vettel was on pole.

Glock's leg was strapped and he was released from hospital but he was not cleared to race. He turned up in the paddock anyway to watch from the garage. Toyota requested that Kobayashi be allowed to fill in but the FIA declined, as to participate in a Grand Prix, a driver has to have taken part in at least one session on Saturday.

Vettel won the race, thus keeping himself in contention for the championship. Just.

Although initially, his main injury seemed to be the leg, Glock was ruled unfit to race in Brazil as well. Subsequent tests had revealed a cracked vertebrae that meant he needed more time to recover. This time, Kobayashi participated in all the sessions and got to have a go in the race. He finished 9th and proved himself to be pretty racy and a just little reckless as he went about it.

Abu Dhabi proved to be a similar story for Timo, although the excuses for keeping Kobayashi in the car grew slightly flimsier. Toyota suggested they had conflicted medical opinions on Glock's condition, so for his own safety, they weren't going to let him race. This time, Kobayashi finished sixth picking up some points and again putting on a pretty good show.

Just days later, Toyota pulled out of Formula 1, leaving both Glock and Kobayashi without a seat. Glock subsequently signed up for Manor Grand Prix, now called Virgin Racing. Hopefully, they will let him drive.

That's all for this episode of our F1 Advent Calendar 2009. I hope you will join me again tomorrow, when we open the door for Day Twenty-Three.

Live: Brazil - Qualifying

Free Practice 3 was a washout, with only 13 minutes of good running due to the weather and a red flag. What will qualifying hold in store?

Weather Update

I'm guessing rain will be the order of the day, as that is all we have seen so far. How much and how it will affect the sessions is the real question.

One to Watch

Grosjean trashed his car in FP3, so it will be interesting to see if his mechanics can get him ready for qualifying, particularly in the adverse and damp conditions.

Predictions Please

Will there be chaos as there was in Japan? Who will get pole position? Will the rain affect the running? Will there be any big names dropping out?

Daily: 6th October 2009

We are into Tuesday already, which means Monday is well and truly gone. I don't know about anyone else, but I found it to be quite a stressful one. Turning towards today instead, then, here are some of the things we're discussing:

• Alguersuari seems to think that this weekend saw a big improvement in his own performance, and that it was one of his best weekends in Formula 1. I can see what he's trying to say, that the car was good and he felt comfortable in it and everything was working well, until he crashed into the barriers - as illustrated here.
• We've talked about Harry's blog before, she's spending a year following Formula 1 around the world and writing about it as she goes... sort of. Posts have been missing in action recently, but there's been a round up of the last few races, and it's fair to say she's having a good time!
• We've not been shy about expressing our Jake love here at Sidepodcast, but I have to say his post-race blog entries are one of the best things about the BBC's coverage. He's got a genuine enthusiasm for the racing drama, but fills us in on plenty of behind the scenes gossip from the paddock as well. Far from showing off, Jake has a way of bringing us along for the ride without going over the top. Yay for Jake!

That should do for now. There's the possibility of an announcement or two today, but I'll save that for the potential breakout threads. I'll see you in the comments.

Daily: 4th October 2009

Hands up who knows what went on yesterday? Could you explain it to the rest of us? It was madness, and whilst I know we haven't yet unravelled it all completely, I'm kinda hoping for more of the same today. It's about time we had a race that wasn't straightforward.

• There seem to be rumours circulating that Glock won't be able to race tomorrow, and that the FIA have said no to Kobayashi filling in. I haven't seen this confirmed anywhere, but it sounds likely. We're pondering the point of having reserve drivers if they're not allowed to actually race.
• The FIA also haven't managed to produce a revised grid yet. They wanted to take some time to think about which order the five place grid drops are applied to ascertain who starts where. You would think they might be able to do this quicker than 24 hours, but there you go.
• I just wanted to once again say how supremely awesome the marshals were yesterday in Japan. They were at the scene of any accidents within seconds. Now, granted, a lot of the accidents occured at the same place, but that doesn't take away from the fact that they were on the ball and much better than we have seen at other, very recent, circuits.

That'll do it for now. Don't forget the Debrief stream will be along much earlier than normal, as we are moving bits and pieces of our house around. I'll see you in the comments.

Daily: 2nd October 2009

It's Free Practice Friday, and we'll be up in just a couple of hours to watch the first action in Japan. The drivers are all bigging up the weekend, so let's hope it lives up to expectations. Meanwhile, here are some of the things we're talking about:

• F1 Punter has taken a look at the possibility of a safety car at Suzuka. It looks like the chances are not exactly high, but a lot of the current crop of drivers haven't been on this track before, so anything could happen!
• James has written a post with his ideal F1 calendar on there, and is curious what you would put on your own calendar, if you could make the decisions. I'm more than happy to go with James' as he's only got 15 races on there.
• Pitlane Fanatic have their Japanese GP preview up, and take a look at the main challengers for the weekend, plus what to look out for on the circuit itself. The weather forecasts are still suggesting rain, which sounds suspiciously like Fuji!

That'll do it for now. We'll be back with live threads throughout the day, and the usual F1 Minute and Digest roundup later. Yay for Fridays! I'll see you in the comments.

Japan 2009 - Schedule

We have barely recovered from the night action in Singapore, before it is time to head on over to Japan for some back-to-back racing.

We've got two schedules for you this weekend, with the first being a guide to the BBC coverage, and therefore indicates when each live commenting thread will go live. The second is our much looser podcast schedule, particularly this week as we are moving house.

TV Schedule

We're all about Radio 5live, have you made the switch yet?

Podcast Schedule

Here are rough estimates of when the shows will be released over the coming few days:

We'll be around for every session in the live comments, and I hope you can join us when you can. Either way, enjoy the race!

Daily: 30th September 2009

It's the last day of September, which means there are just three more months until the end of the year. It also means all the shops are looking at Christmas already, which is ridiculous. Thank goodness we do our shopping online. Meanwhile, here are some things we're discussing:

• Hopefully, by the time you read this, all of the Sidepodradio podcasts should have been published and will appear in your podcast feed any minute now. We released them all as a batch, partly because they are repeats of already broadcast material, and partly because we didn't want to break the site. I think we did that anyway.
• All the talk is that we will have a Ferrari announcement today, confirming a certain driver being signed to their team. It's about time we had a breakout thread, although is it really necessary? This has been a long time coming!
• Back to Sidepodradio again, we'll be closing the poll for the Charity Vote today, so if you haven't already, get on over and have a look at where you would like the £680 to go. Also, can you remind me to close the poll? Cheers.

That'll do it for now. There should also be a Japan schedule up later today, so we can turn our attention towards the upcoming weekend. I'll see you in the comments.

Daily: 28th September 2009

Monday is upon us again, and we have only the briefest amount of time to recover from Singapore before turning our attention to Japan. However, it is still all about the night race, and here's what we've been talking about:

• F1 Wolf has been enjoying himself at the racetrack, and uploaded some pictures to his blog of Saturday. I do find it interesting that Wolf says he struggled to get pictures of the darker cars, such as Red Bulls and Toro Rossos.
• The replay of the live Debrief is up and available if you feel like watching the entire unedited process. Mr C was on top form, banning pretty much everyone from F1 and taking all their superlicences away. Meanwhile, I was struggling to form sentences. You'd think by now we might be good at this podcasting lark!
• Button is closing in on the championship, and in just seven days time we could be looking at a new World Champion. Do you think this is going to happen, or will it go down to the wire like the last couple of seasons?

That'll do it for now. Let us know what you're doing on this fine Monday, and how it's going. I will see you in the comments.

Daily: 30th May 2009

We're into Saturday now, which is quite a relief because it really has been one of those weeks. For whatever reason, four day weeks just seem to be harder than their five-day counterparts. Anyway, let's see what's happening in the world of Sidepodcast:

• Ollie is back to blogging, with two posts today - one on Prodrive, and one on the teams conditional entry to 2010. Both are excellent reads, and detail what's going on in the crazy F1 circus at the moment. Like Journeyer said yesterday, regarding the Concorde Agreement - haven't we had enough deadlines already?
• There is talk that Fuji won't want to host next year's Japanese Grand Prix due to financial troubles. Well, that's what they say, but I wonder whether it is because they saw how well Suzuka did in the first round of the Circuit Cup and realised they can't compete?
• On the subject of the wiki (because we were?), I have revamped the Website Bugs page. Now, obviously I am not trying to encourage you to find bugs and expand our growing to-do list, but if you do spot something not quite right, then this is the place to log it. The new layout will allow us to track and respond to the problems much better.

I think that'll keep us going for now. Don't forget to let us know what you're up to over the weekend, it looks like the weather is going to hold up in the UK, so you might be... gasp... going outside? Let us know, and I'll see you in the comments.

Bridgestone Goes Green

This article was originally written for BellaOnline, but is republished here for posterity.

Back at the Japanese Grand Prix 2008, we saw the introduction of green paint on the Bridgestone tyre. Last year, to distinguish between the hard and soft compound, the centre groove of each soft tyre was painted with a white stripe. To raise awareness of the FIA's "Make Cars Green" campaign, the white stripe was joined by green stripes in the other grooves for one race only.

As a fan, it was confusing, and generally it was not a good choice.

With the introduction of slick tyres, Bridgestone have been looking for ways to rehouse the stripe that would have gone in the groove. They have decided to place a stripe on the inside and outside of each tyre - on the sidewall. They have also decided that the stripe shouldn't be white, that it should be green.

So far, I haven't seen anyone suggesting this is a good idea - it doesn't look good by itself, and can only serve to detract from each team's livery. I suppose it is yet another thing we will get used to, but once again, this doesn't seem like a popular decision by Bridgestone.

The other difference between the 2008 and 2009 set of tyres, is that each race weekend will see a change in compounds combinations. Instead of adjacent compounds, there will be a gap in choice. For example, there are four compounds: hard, medium, soft and super-soft. Last year in Melbourne, Bridgestone brought the medium and soft tyres - two compounds adjacent to each other. For 2009, they will be bringing the medium and super-soft tyres - widening the gap between the compounds.

This should make the difference in tyres more pronounced. A driver has to run both sets of tyres over the course of a race, and has a limited number of each during the weekend. Tyre decision is crucial, especially when the softer compound heats up quickly, delivers a fast lap, but does not last long. The harder compound takes longer to warm up, but is more durable.

The changes are yet another thing the teams will have to think about this season, although the change to slick tyres is probably foremost in their minds, rather than a choice of white or green paint.