Serial motorbike crasher Michael Schumacher was inexplicably entrusted with a Honda Fireblade and an empty Magny-Cours track yesterday. The Hannspree Ten Kate team let Schumi loose for a day of testing on Carlos Checa’s World Superbike Championship bike.
“Riding the world superbike has been a step up for me and it’s a lot more difficult,” said Schumacher. “My target for the test was to enjoy it, but at the same time to learn. I think with more time things could have been even better because the team have a lot of possibilities, and there are a wide range of changes to make. Perhaps may be in the future we can do something together and I can increase my experience.”
In which a few pictures of girls, taken at last weekend’s GP at Magny-Cours, have been hastily thrown together to create the amazing illusion of a video.
Or, as one YouTube commenter puts it: “I will bust a skeet skeet on all of you bitches at Silverstone.”
Nick Heidfeld and Bobby Kubica enjoy a cheese and wine tasting session. Nick, in particular, seems to be having a fine time. Question (we have asked it before): why do the poor BMW drivers always get to do the shittiest PR set-ups? You wouldn’t catch Kimi Raikkonen sat in a field before a GP, with a wooden tray of brie and grapes laid out in front of him.
Valerie Begue, the current Miss France, was a guest of Toro Rosso at Sunday’s French GP. She wore a few more clothes than in her day job though, as the pics below show…
A poor performance by both McLaren drivers in yesterday’s qualifying session for today’s French GP means that a Ferrari 1-2 is almost inevitable, reliability permitting. Kimi Raikkonen (pole) and Felipe Massa (second) did a solid job in locking down the front row, but they were put under no pressure from Lewis Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen. Hamilton was fastest of the non-Ferrari cars, but he ran wide and could have possibly grabbed a vital pole. He later apologised to his team, saying “I didn’t do a good job at all”.
With Hamilton already pushed down the grid, this was seen as a chance for Kovalainen to step up and put some heat on Ferrari, but he did an average job, qualifying only sixth-fastest. At this rate, we’d be surprised if McLaren hang on to him for 2009.
Ferrari’s Felipe Massa dominated Friday morning at the French Grand Prix. The Brazilian set the pace at Magny-Cours with a lap of 1:15.306, some 0.696 seconds quicker than second-placed Lewis Hamilton - both McLarens struggled for grip on a mild, partly sunny morning in central France.
Hamilton’s team-mate Heikki Kovalainen was third fastest, ahead of world champion Kimi Raikkonen.
McLaren to use splash-and-dash pit strategy this weekend?
The highest Lewis Hamilton can start on the grid in France this Sunday is 11th, thanks to a 10-place grid penalty, awarded after the pit-lane incident in Montreal two weeks ago. That’s a best-case scenario.
Hamilton has been in bullish moood about his chances in France, so we presume he’ll want to start as high up the grid as possible, to give himself the best chance of clearing some mid-field traffic early on. But he can only start from 11th if he runs light on fuel, drive brilliantly and qualifies on pole position, presumably ahead of the Ferraris and Bobby Kubica’s BMW Sauber. That suggests McLaren will put their No.1 driver on an aggressive three-stop strategy.
Felipe Massa, Kimi Raikkonen (back row), Lewis Hamilton and Robert Kubica (front row) look delighted to be stuck in Thursday’s pre-race press conference.
