Oops! I should have kept that to myself for a while or at least started it with a spoiler alert. To anyone who recorded it to watch later, sorry about taking away the surprise ending. And now, in an attempt to distract you from my blunder, here's one of the strangest F1 articles I've read this week. Massa threatened with jail over team orders (eurosport.yahoo.com)
I don't usually post links elsewhere but this one is worth an exception IMO. There's a great set of Lotus open wheeler pics over at Speed. Check it out. Lotus Livery Retrospective
I really like the idea of throw-back color schemes -- and asking for fan input -- though to me the green and yellow feels like the throw-back. In fact though I'd love to watch an original John Player Special doing hot laps I'd rather see the current cars stay green and yellow. Or they could do what some NFL teams do and use the throw-back livery only occasionally as something special/unusual instead of running the same scheme at every race. Seems like they'd get more exposure in the press that way as well. On the contrarian side, here's a snip from another article ... ... and a couple negative comments posted on crash.net:
Wasn't it Lotus bringing in the JPS sponsorship that heralded in the whole painting the cars to match the sponsor era in F1? If memory serves me well before the JPS livery all the cars were in their national country colors.
You are correct. From Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_international_auto_racing_colors Green was a color assigned to Britain. Hence the British Racing Green.
In 1968 Lotus ran the Gold Leaf red, white and gold livery...same tobacco company, different colors. The JPS livery didn't appear until 1972.
Hmmm, perhaps a new home for Petrov if he loses the Renault seat? Russian supercar firm Marussia takes over Virgin Racing (news.bbc.co.uk)
What a fantastic finish to a fantastic season on one of the worst tracks ever..... Great to see those world champs all on the podium.
The near decapitation on the first lap was a pretty comprehensive mash-up. I have to say I love to see guys in competition for the title actually racing to win the last race. I hate to watch a season ending race where the title leader is just puttering along conservatively in whatever position he needs to get title winning points. What a letdown that is. I get it, the title is more important than the win, but I still don't like it. Not this time though! Four drivers technically in contention and all of them driving at the limit. That's the way the season should end.
Happy for the winner... Disappointed for my boy and his combo of bad strategy and meek performance today... Good thing Gran Turismo 5 is coming this month! _Dave_
Yes it was nice seeing the 3 years worth of champions on the podium. Congrats to Seb & Red Bull. I'm very happy Micheal was so very lucky today! Yikes that was too close.
I predict I'll be complaining about the new rules, but still addicted to the series again next year, just like this year... _Dave_
Yep with all my criticisms on the rule changes the final race with the drivers championship actually being contested, was one of the best finishes in recent years!!! Vettel proved himself a champion today with a dominating win with many a great driver reduced to getting nothing but distant glimpses of him. Thank goodness Micheal wasn't hurt or killed, that was a bad wreck..... Still think Bernie brain dead; many of the new tracks stink and that the soap opera that F1 can be will continue...and I'll predict that I watch every lap again next year!!!
Hulkenberg has been officially dropped by Williams. Sad to see but hopefully he'll be picked up by another team.