Dirty Side Deckchair

Please allow me to introduce myself I'm a man of speed and grace I've been around for a long, long year Stole many a point with my pace And I was 'round when Kate's dirty sister Had her glory moment in the rain Made damn sure that Red Bull Got their first win that race Pleased to meet you Hope you guess my name But what's puzzling you Is the nature of my game OK, so the lyrics don't completely scan well if you try to sing along but once I got the title for this weeks blog in my head, there was only one way I was starting it! Yes Seb, we are a bit puzzled by the nature of your game. Anyone new to the sport will be forgiven for not realizing who this bearded guy is that is trundling around the mid to back of the field in the Aston Martin.   Someone that did not seem able to pass Stroll of all people last weekend in the French GP. So, for the benefit of bringing those folk up to speed, and for anyone who just wants reminding, let's have a quick round of SapStat...

Ok – what in the world does next year’s F1 calendar hold for all of us fans?  It’s Brian here on the blog keys and when bloggin, I like the stream of consciousness approach.  So read it in my voice and here we go…   A.     How many races should we expect?      With absolutely no insider info, I’d bet on 24 races.  A – #WeRaceForMoney.  B – they tried 23 this year before losing Sochi (and the race contract).  C – there are discussions underway on a new approach to scheduling.  D – see letter A again.         B.     What is the new approach to scheduling?   Apparently, the FIA is looking to make the schedule less globetrotting of an effort and regionalize races so to avoid extreme Europe – Middle East – Americas – Asias hops on back-to-backs…  If this works, we could easily see more “pods” of races, such as Miami + Montreal or better Middle Eastern clusters or European back-to-bac...

  Just writing the title to this weeks blog still doesn't make it feel real. We were face to face (on Zoom) with a racing legend and about to start talking to him about his career. For many sports journalist this is a very simple task I imagine.  However, it's fair to say that neither Brian nor I have any media training or have any remote exposure to journalism. We do our podcast as a passion hobby and just have fun doing it. Back in late 2021 when we came up with the idea of doing it, there was never any thought given to one day having an F1 World Drivers Champion on our humble little show. This Sunday that's exactly what will happen as we drop our episode that contains our chat with Jacques Villeneuve. Woo-hoo, I made it onto the Dirty Side pod! We've sat on this for nearly two weeks as we did not want this to be a bolt on to a regular race review episode.   Our vision was to ensure it dropped on a non-race weekend so it could take center stage. Therefore it was on...

Last week we were reminded yet again of how important the halo device has been to the safety of F1 drivers.   The sight of Zhou upside down at speed left a tight knot in the pit of our stomachs which was thankfully untied when it was announced he was OK.   We covered how we felt watching that unfold in the latest podcast episode so go check that out if you haven't already. Right, back to this weeks blog. Watching the halo do it's thing made me wonder just how far thing have come since the sport started. It didn't take much research on the old world wide web before I discovered just how much more there was in the field of Formula 1 safety than I had first realized. F1 cars, and in fact F1 in general, have come a long way in the ongoing balancing act of making driving cars at very high speeds in a competitive setting thrilling to watch, something for the elite drivers of the world only, yet also something that does not come with the inherent risks to human life as it ...