Captain Slow turns off the charm

Unless you’re a billionaire, in which case it doesn’t matter what you say to girls, it’s best not to use a slightly creepy “Hello…” as your opening flirt gambit. And especially not when your victims targets are a good 15 years younger than you.

More Top Gear awards after the jump…

Boy, it’s good to hear that bass again…

This is how Roadworks TV suggest the BBC should introduce coverage of F1 next year. Looks good to us, but then footage backed with Fleetwood Mac’s instantly recognisable The Chain is guaranteed to get our pulse racing.

Do you think the BBC should keep The Chain for its newly branded coverage? Vote below or leave us a nice juicy comment…

Lewis favourite to win BBC gong, but does he deserve it?

Lewis Hamilton was favourite to win last year’s BBC Sports Personality of the Year, despite throwing away the world title in his first season in F1. In the end Lewis lost out to Joe Calzaghe, a boxer from Wales who is yet to taste defeat. So, two agonising second places in one year for Lewis - although losing out on the drivers’ title was, we imagine, slightly more galling than losing out to Calzaghe (and at least he didn’t lose out to Zara Phillips).

This time around, with the world title tucked into his racing overalls, Lewis is an even stronger favourite to win the Beeb’s annual award. But there is even stiffer competition in 2008, in the form of several gold medal-winning Olympians from Beijing (Chris Hoy and Rebecca Adlington offer the biggest threat), not to mention tennis star Andy Murray, who has had a fine year (see the full short-list here).

Does Lewis deserve to win the award? Does he have more personality than a daffy blonde swimmer or a dour Scottish tennis player? What constitutes personality anyway? So many questions, which you can answer by leaving a witty comment. If you can’t be arsed to leave a comment, you can just vote…

The voice of motorsport returns… to our laptops

Murray Walker will be part of the BBC F1 commentary team next year, although he’s only being let loose on the web. The Beeb said Murray would be a “regular presence” on the BBC Sport website offering his “expert insight” and “passionate perspective” on the sport, as well as interacting with fans online.

In other words, some young web journo will speak to Murray before and after each grand prix, then ghost a column in his name. The man’s 85 (!!), after all, so we can’t expect too much from him.

Crasher bonus! Watch a compilation of Murray’s most memorable cock-ups:

Beeb confirms commentary team for 2009 coverage

After much speculation, the BBC has revealed its team to cover F1 next season. This is how they roll:

Studio anchor: Jake Humphrey
Crasher verdict: The Beeb’s golden boy is likeable but bland and inexperienced. A weak choice, but he’ll be fine as long as he leaves most of the talking to…

Studio pundits: David Coulthard, Eddie Jordan
Crasher verdict: A great partnership in the making. Jordan is always outspoken and DC has great potential

Chief commentator: Jonathan Legard
Crasher verdict: Legard is a safe pair of hands and knows his stuff, but he is rather uninspiring

Mr Grid Walk reveals he is off to the Beeb

Speaking at the Autocar Awards in London this week, Martin Brundle confirmed what we all suspected - he will be part of the BBC’s F1 commentary team next season (and, presumably, throughout the station’s five-year contract as Britain’s official F1 broadcaster).

“I’m delighted to be able to tell you all that I’ll be joining the BBC next year,” Brundle said.

“I’ve been commentating on Formula One for the past dozen years, and I briefly considered calling it a day. But in the end I decided to take up the BBC’s offer and I’m now very excited about working for them next year.”

Excellent, Smithers. We won’t miss the puppyish James Allen or cheesy Steve Rider, both of whom have a whiff of Alan Partridge about them, but we would have missed the excellent Brundle.

Crasher bonus! Watch Brundle’s last grid walk for ITV, made before this year’s heart-stopping Brazilian Grand Prix:

British swimmer claims she deserves gong more than F1 champ

Lewis Hamilton is the odds-on favourite to win this year’s Sports Personality of the Year. But double gold medal-winning swimmer Rebecca Adlington thinks that an Olympic champion from Beijing is more deserving of the Beeb’s annual award:

“I think that Chris Hoy, with his three cycling golds, or myself, have better claims than Lewis. I’d like to see someone from our Olympics team win it. Olympics only come round every four years and it takes constant effort throughout that time to win. Lewis gets a shot at the world championship every year.”

Hmm, not sure that Adlington’s dubious argument is going to be enough to persuade the Great British public that Lewis shouldn’t win.

Do you think Lewis deserves to be crowned Sports Personality of the Year? Vote below:

Formula 1 stars embarrass themselves in tribute to network

Emotions were high in the ITV studios yesterday, as viewers in Britain were treated to their final Grand Prix filled with disruptive advert breaks (for the time being, anyway). Before handing over to the BBC, however, the folks at channel three decided to have a bit of fun by singing along to a track by emo chumps My Chemical Romance.

While it’s a questionable song choice (is the refrain “We’ll carry on” appropriate when they obviously won’t be carrying on?), it’s worth it to see Murray Walker singing a tune he had almost certainly never heard before, and to see Lewis Hamilton being far too cool for school.