Ballistic Belgium

Spa-Francorchamps, many a Formula 1 fans favourite circuit. It never fails to deliver the goods.

Jenson Button, who started on pole, got a speedy getaway but in his mirrors an over-eager Pastor Maldonado jump started off the line while Romain Grosjean locked with Lewis Hamilton, sending the McLaren like a bowling ball down a very expensive alley, taking Fernando Alonso and Sergio Perez out with him. With carnage and Formula 1 debris spread over the track both Pastor Maldonado and Kamui Kobayashi pitted - a horrible race for Sauber after their best qualifying.

With the safety car out as the marshals cleared the track and several replays later Lap 5 and it was back racing.

Jenson Button left the rest of the pack and went on his merry way while Pastor Maldonado was in tangles once again, this time with Marussia driver Timo Glock. Maldonado pulled up and retired from the race.

Michael Schumacher, racing his 300th GP, showed he's still got the skills pulling a great move on kimi Raikkonen at the top of Les Combes meanwhile fellow German Sebastian Vettel was on a mission of gaining place... yep, Sebastian Vettel, you know the driver that can't overtake... well he put everyone in their place at Spa and showed he can definitely overtake! 

Trouble went from the track to the pit lane with Caterham performing an unsafe release of Heikki Kovalainen who went in to the back of a HRT about to pit. While further up a few laps later Mark Webber was also released in to the path of Felipe Massa, a close call but neither were affected.

Fighting for position were Marussia's Timo Glock and Charles Pic with some fine racing between them eventually Timo Glock makes his pass stick and stays ahead of his rookie teammate.

Out way ahead of the rest of the grid Jenson Button cruised (rather fast) to victory in Belgium followed by Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen - who's first time it was not winning or binning it at the circuit but a 3rd position instead.

Nico Hulkenberg had his best result this season finishing in 4th, a great result for the Force India team with team mate Paul di Resta in 10th. Toro Rosso also had a positive race with both their driver double point scoring, Jean-Eric Vergne finishing in 8th and Daniel Ricciardo finishing behind him in 9th.

Subsequently after the first corner collision at Spa Romain Grosjean was handed a one race ban and fined - the first ban since 1994! 

Pastor Maldonado was also given two penalty's for Monza; a five place grid drop for jump starting and another 5 place grid drop for colliding with Timo Glock. 

RESULTS:

Fastest Lap: Bruno Senna: 1:52.822

Podium:

[1st-Jenson Button, 2nd-Sebastian Vettel, 3rd-Kimi Raikkonen] 

48

Two years on, he may be gone but he's not forgotten, how could you ever forget someone like Shoya Tomizawa. His smile, personality and his racing talent are all greatly missed.

'On the track and beyond, we will always follow your line'

[The day his name went down in history -His first win in Qatar, the first ever win in the new Moto2 series. The look of disbelief, one of what should have been many more trophies] 

Race in Peaee Shoya ♥

Check mate in Brno

Back on European soil at Karel Abreham's circuit and home Grand Prix in the Czech Republic.

MotoGP:
On thursday it was announced that Honda rider Casey Stoner will be flying out to Australia after medical specialists confirmed he needed an operation on his ankle. He posted photo's of his injury to his Twitter account shortly after the Indy GP and how he managed to ride a 1000cc bike in his state i do not know - it's true MotoGP rider's are machine's. With all the intentions of riding this weekend Stoner now faces being out for a lengthy amount of time, he says he hopes to be fit and ready for the penultimate race at Philip Island, Australia (28th october) which will be his last home GP before his retirement at the end of this season.
As well as Stoner not being able to race at Brno, Ducati rider Nicky Hayden was also absent from the weekend. He stayed back in the US to recover from his hand injury as advised.
*Neither were replaced by test riders, however Jonathan Rea will be testing the Honda on Monday and is set to replace the Australian until he returns.

Jorge Lorenzo started from pole and had an impressive start, with the pocket rocket Dani Pedrosa on his exhaust. Both Tech 3 riders, Ben Spies and Valentino Rossi all got off to a good start too, battling for 3rd and 4th.
The black cloud loomed over Ben Spies once again, this time he faced clutch problems off the line and after momentarily battling for 3rd he rapidly dropped down the field in to 13th where he remained till he took a tumble in the gravel, another retirement for the Texan.
Who said MotoGP was always boring?! Jorge Lorenzo and Dani Pedrosa gave us some antagonising action for 1st place, countlessly changing the lead right to the end. Pedrosa definitely gave his team a taste of what he hopes next year will be like! Pedrosa took it down to the wire and won the race ahead of Lorenzo.
Away from the front two Cal Crutchlow had a lonely race in 3rd, where he finished the race on his Tech 3 Yamaha - he made history and became the first driver to step on the podium in 12 years!! Let's hope there's many more podium celebrations to come!
Rookie Stefan Bradl had his best MotoGP race of the year finishing in 5th after battling with Alvaro Bautista and Valentino for much of the race, hard to believe it's only his first season in the the premier class. Rossi finished the race in 7th after a blowout of oil in the early stages of the race meant he had no boot grip, he also dropped off the pace after tyre issues hampered his race.
Home rider Karel Abraham finished in 9th.

[1st-Dani Pedrosa, 2nd- Jorge Lorenzo, 3rd-Cal Crutchlow]

Next Up:

After back to back races MotoGP now has 3 weeks to recover from two eventful GP's. 

The next race will be a tough one as we head to San Marino otherwise known as Misano World Circuit  Marco Simoncelli, renamed in memory of Super Sic who lived a few miles away. The GP will be held from 14th-16th September.

The Doctor's back baby.

'Bye bye baby' was the slogan on every Yamaha team members t-shirts in Valencia 2010 when Valentino Rossi's 7 year love affair with Yamaha came to an end.
However, after a roller coaster two season spent at Ducati 'The Doctor' is returning back to the team he won several of his championships at: Yamaha. He's signed a two year contract with the team.

I'm not sure whether the move back to the blue and white machine is the best move but i really hope for Vale and MotoGP as a whole that it's a rewarding one.
Don't get me wrong i'd love nothing better than to see Valentino win (which i'm sure he will) and possibly bag another championship but he returns to the team where after he left Jorge Lorenzo settled in to and made his own to an extent, there's no denying he's their number 1 rider, up till now at least.
Even though Rossi's results at Ducati have been far from competitive, i was hoping it'd pick up, that some time soon he'd be back up the front winning races, i think it's even been evident in the few races that the Duc has been slowly improving. I guess we'll never know now.

With the greatest current MotoGP rider heading back to a competitive team, maybe 2013 is looking a little more promising for excitement, with Casey Stoner leaving the sport it's fair to say a lot of people thought it would be an easy championship for Jorge Lorenzo but now with Valentino Rossi, along with Honda riders Dani Pedrosa and Marc Marquez maybe it won't be one long parade, i hope they all have a lot of exciting, close racing battles at the top!

Good luck and welcome back to Yamaha Vale.

Low down's i've missed: Formula 1

Great Britain - Silverstone:

[1st- Mark Webber, 2nd- Fernando Alonso, 3rd- Sebastian Vettel]

*Post coming soon.

German GP - Hockenheim:

[1st- Fernando Alonso, 2nd- Sebastian Vettel, 3rd- Jenson Button]

Hungarian GP - Hungaroring:

[1st- Lewis Hamilton, 2nd- Kimi Raikkonen,m 3rd- Romain Grosjean]

News Update:

With the awful accident during the Marussia straight line test, day's before the British Grand Prix, involving Maria de Villota who sadly lost her eyesight in her right eye and had serious facial injuries, she's now back home in Spain on the road to making the best recovery possible!

So far as driver signing, F1 hasn't quite entered the silly season as quickly as MotoGP has but there's still the rumours of who'll end up where. The day after Silverstone Red Bull announced Mark Webber has signed another one year contract with the team, so Red Bull will continue with the same driver pair for another year.

Lewis Hamilton has been in the spotlight as to whether he'll be staying at the team with Jenson Button, making it known he hasn't been 100% happy with the team lately but a win in Hungary and maybe a few more to the end of the year as McLaren begin to pick the pace up might sway him...

The main talk has been firmly at Ferrari, in particular Felipe Massa, with recent form being far from competitive for the team, a big question mark is on where his future lie's. Currently, it isn't looking promising for the Brazilian to stay at Ferrari. 

When the second half of the season starts up in less than a months time i'm sure the contracts and swapsies will start being confirmed. 

Next Up:

The infamous Span-francorchamps in 27 days and counting. Will Kimi 'King of Spa' Raikkonen reign once more at the circuit or will another surprise winner taking to the podium?!

Low down's i've missed: MotoGP

With the summer break now underway in both Formula 1 and MotoGP i missed a few low down's in both series.

Assen TT:

[1st-Casey Stoner, 2nd-Dani Pedrosa, 3rd-Andrea Dovizioso]

German GP - Sachsenring:

[1st- Dani Pedrosa, 2nd- Jorge Lorenzo, 3rd- Andrea Dovizioso]

Italian GP - Mugello:

[1st- Jorge Lorenzo, 2nd- Dani Pedrosa, 3rd- Andrea Dovizioso]

US GP - Laguna Seca:

[1st- Casey Stoner, 2nd- Jorge Lorenzo, 3rd- Dani Pedrosa]

News Update:

Since Casey Stoner's announcement that he'll be retiring at the end of the season speculation as to who'll take his place and where other drivers will be staying or going has been all the talk. 

Well, a few weeks ago the MotoGP Rookie rule was dropped and within days it was confirmed that Moto2 rider Marc Marquez will be taking over Stoner's ride, with teammate Dani Pedrosa staying on at the team too. 

With the rumour mill already going crazy over where exactly Mr.Rossi will be next season, it went in to  over-drive when Nicky Hayden announced he'd signed another contract with Ducati next season, a long with that early last week Yamaha rider Ben Spies took to his Twitter to really ramp up the rumours by telling fans he will not be staying at the team next year, it's in doubt as to whether he'll be staying in MotoGP - where he has had a far from great 2012 season - and moving back to Superbikes. 

As of yet, no 2nd rider at Yamaha has been confirmed so the waiting game commences as to what Valentino will be doing next season.

Is it really a smart move for him to go back to a team that is now dominated by Jorge Lorenzo?! 

Next Up:

The next race is at the Brickyard - Indianapolis in just over two weeks time before it heads back to Europe and the fly away's to wrap up the 2012 season. 

Valencia low down

As the Spanish sun beat down on the Valencia street circuit, surrounded by beaches and expensive yachts, the Formula 1 world were preparing themselves for a weekend that last year was no doubt one of the less interesting races. This year i kept getting reminded that 'Valencia was going to be boring' and although i was in doubt i was also staying optimistic. This season has been incredible and after watching GP2 i thought 'if F1 is half as exciting as this we'll already be one up on last year'
Well, F1 2012 has been a surprise for many and Valencia was no exception.

*Time Glock didn't start the race after being advised not to when he fell ill during the weekend.
The first quarter of the race it was Sebastian Vettel that led the race and built up a gap to the rest of the pack. With the likes of  Lewis Hamilton, Romain Grosjean and Kimi Raikkonen all fighting for a spot on the podium the race was just getting going. Fernando Alonso made up several places from starting 11th on the grid to making it up to 4th by lap 28th - when the racing picked up the pace. Jean-Eric Vergne was reminding the racing world he was still just a rookie, with a costly rookie error move on Heikki Kovalainen, JEV punctured both his own and Kovalainen's tyre's after slicing across the Finn. Like in GP2, a lot of debris from the crash was sprawled across the racing line which meant... Yup, out came the safety car and bye bye to Vettel's 20 second lead!
With a lot of drivers taking the safety car as an opportunity to pit the drama continued on in to the pit lane. The problem? McLaren pit stops, surprise, surprise. The team yet again made a mess of Hamilton's pit stop with the front jack failing. He lost time and dropped down to sixth place after Fernando Alonso passed him. Safety Car in and it was Alonso who made a swift move on Grosjean and was up to 2nd place. Meanwhile more contact as Felipe Massa and Kamui Kobayashi had a get together, as a result Kobayashi retired from the race. *He'll also be facing a 5 place penalty at the next race.

The race got even more intense when race leader Sebastian Vettel started to slow down and eventually had to stop his Red Bull on the side of the track due to a mechanical failure. A frustrated and angry Vettel marched down the pit lane while Alonso took the lead.
Hamilton got pass Raikkonen, up to 2nd he looked in a strong position but was unable to challenge Alonso.
Red Bull's day didn't get any better with Mark Webber dropping down the order with Paul di Resta, Pastor Maldonado and Nico Hulkenberg all over taking him within a few laps.
A few laps later and Romain Grosjean was the next victim of a mechanical failure, he slowed to a hault on track, a big blow as he is had a great race.

With tyre's proving to be a struggle for many, Pastor Maldonado made up places and was looking like another podium was on the cards... until the calm, cool Maldonado snapped back to fiery, rookie-like Maldonado. In an attempt to take Hamilton, he went round the outside, the McLaren driver tried to shut the door on him, Maldonado ran off the track and on return t-boned Hamilton in to the barrier. That was the end of Hamilton's race, with a podium and a haul of points lost, he was no doubt very annoyed. *Maldonado got a time penalty at the end of the race, dropping him out of the points.

An emotional Alonso crossed the line to win the European GP. Joining him was Raikkonen in 2nd and Michael Schumacher in 3rd - taking his first podium since returning in 2010.
Fernando Alonso took a MotoGP and old F1 style celebration, stopping out on track in front of his home fans, punching the air and waving the Spanish flag.

So, it turns out Valencia can be very exciting!!

RESULTS:
Fastest lap: Nico Rosberg: 1:42.163

Podium:

Next Up:
Silverstoneeeee!!!! The next race is the British GP which means there will be no low down on what went on but i will be making a post of my weekend at the Grand Prix.
In the meantime action in Assen for the MotoGP has already started, with qualifying tomorrow (Friday) and the race taking place on Saturday so a low down may (or may not) be up on Sunday!

On a side note:
Congratulations to Romain Grojean and Marion Jolie on getting married yesterday, all the best to them both!!