World's first Formula 1 night race.

[Singapura]

All of Singapore is turned into a  track as the island is preparing for the first ever night race. It's almost impossible to get to work! Anyone here going to watch?

[patrickl]

I guess I might. I'm a bit depressed with Formula 1 right now though. Hamilton gets slammed with an utterly BS penalty (and then is even denied an appeal), Raikkonen is driving like a wet newspaper, Alonso is in a slow car and the completely boring twit Massa seems to be the one with the fastest car.

On the other hand, it's cool that they are trying a night race.

BTW McLaren have a secret weapon for the race. It's accidentally revealed in this interview:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOl_p3gyrD0[/youtube]

[ratzz]

I never miss a GP. Its my sport of choice!

Can't wait for this weekend! My Dad lived, worked and raced push bikes over there in his youth.

What time is it kicking off local time Singapura?

[ratzz]

It looks and sounds FANTASTIC!

Just watching Practice 1 now.

The circuit looks a little slow (and bumpy), and should prove difficult to overtake, but with the prospect of a wet race it should be right up there with the best.

Next stop is the supermarket for the beer and chicken wings! Looking forward to this weekend!

[patrickl]

Qualifiying is done with the two biggest title contenders on the front row. Guess that means we know the result of the race now too. Maybe some cars break down or hit a wall, but I doubt there will be much overtaking.

[Singapura]

A friend of mine had 2 spare tickets for the training rounds on Friday. The track is amazing! The race is on at this very minute and it looks like Massa has a very bad night.

[patrickl]

Well looks like a lot more eventful than I would have imagined. Forgot about the safety car situations when the boys drive on a walled track.

Massa was brilliant indeed. Amazing how he can be fast if there is nothing else bothering him, but the slightest disruption and he just completely falls apart.

[Singapura]

That was one of the most eventful races ever. You're right, Massa completely falls apart if he's brought out of his zone. Rosberg was amazing. My employer is sponsoring the McLaren team, so he visited us a few times and his car was in the lobby for a few weeks. Tomorrow I'll be using part of the track myself (in the bus though...   )

[patrickl]

Well we were lucky with the events that were brought on by the safety car. Otherwise it would probably have been utterly boring (like the Valencia race).

I've visited most tracks in Europe already. I'd love to visit an F1 event again. I'd have to say it's usually most fun on friday though. On friday you can go look around and see a lot. On Saturday it gets pretty busy already and on Sunday it's almost frightening how crowded it gets. It's quite demanding to sit (or even worse stand) there all day. Usually in the blazing sun or pouring rain

For some reason they rarely sell only friday tickets though. Like the tickets you got. Or at least on-line I don't see them being sold.

[ratzz]

Qualifiying is done with the two biggest title contenders on the front row. Guess that means we know the result of the race now too. Maybe some cars break down or hit a wall, but I doubt there will be much overtaking.

I don't buy into that philosophy.

I've watched hundreds of Grand Prix and only a couple have been really dull, dull, dull. There are just too many variables for it to be dull.

My brother has often been quoted as saying to me that its over after lap one, and yes, Valencia was one of the dullest we've seen in a long time, but Singapore was a fantastic race, great weekend, and very eventful.

  Singapore

Roll on next year.

(Oh, and the buffalo wings were fantastic!)

[patrickl]

Well I feared another Valencia since the track is rather similar (ie overtaking is next to impossible)

I have to say that most of this years races have been pretty nice. Mostly due to changing weather or safety car situations. There have been lots of different people winning races too.

[Samstag]

It's a shame that such a beautiful track makes for such a dull race.  Safety cars really spoil the race in my opinion.

[shmokes]

I don't follow racing.  It seems extremely boring to me.  I'm sure it's not . . . bajillions of people love it.  And I think watching tennis is all kinds of exciting, but I remember growing up feeling the same way about tennis when I saw it on TV as I currently feel about racing.  I'm sure if I got into it, and learned the rules and understood how it all works, it'd be fine. 

Rally racing is an exception.  F1, stock car, that sort of thing is just a bunch of cars going in circles for a few hours.  But rally racing is about the coolest thing on the planet.  I'm always amazed that it isn't more popular in the U.S.  I suppose it's just less popular because it can't be done in a stadium where tens of thousands of tickets can be sold

[Samstag]

In the US you really need an oval to be successful.

Rallys are interesting for a little while, but it's hard to get excited when only one car competes at a time.  What they do is amazing, it just doesn't make for good television (in my opinion).

As far as I'm concerned, it ain't racing unless braking is as important as going fast, there must be both left and right turns, and there must be more than one vehicle on track simultaneously.  F1 is my favorite because it attracts the best drivers and engineers and pushes technology further every year. 

[vorghagen]

Samstag, I get exactly what you mean about Formula 1 pushing technology further but recently I think they're putting technology in just for the sake of it, Ferrari's new pit system being a prime example. Much more complicated and much more that can go wrong, as was spectacularly shown in Singapore. Lollypop man worked fine - why change it?
For me, the best racing is the European Touring Cars. About 6 or 7 different manufacturers on course with strengths and weaknesses for each car, very close racing with the lead changing 5 times every lap, plenty of overtaking and not much interference from management and committees.
Being Australian, I'm supposed to think the V8 Supercar series is the best racing but there just isn't enough overtaking. It's a single file line from start to finish and having only 2 manufacturers (Ford vs Holden) doesn't help either.

[mynetdude]

I think i won't miss it

[patrickl]

Did anyone watch the final? Holy cow that was heart stopping. First Hamilton loses his position (and thus the championship) because someone unlaps himself, but then in the last corner he passes a guy so het gets back the championship.

Massa fans were already cheering. Look at the faces of his father and brother when they get the news