Wonderduck's Pond

April 30, 2007

Okay, One More...

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April 29, 2007

F1 Update: The Comic Strip.

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Ballplayer Killed

Josh Hancock, relief pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals, was killed in a car accident early Sunday morning. Reports say that Hancock's Ford Explorer drove into the back of a parked tow truck, which was assisting a disabled car in the left lane.

Tonight's game against the Cubs has been postponed. A few seasons ago, the Cardinals lost Darryl Kile to a drug overdose the night before a Cubs game (though in Chicago).

According to WSCR-AM out of Chicago, the Cardinals had a scare with Hancock earlier in the week. He overslept, and didn't wake up until the 20th call to his house. With the death of Kile, the Cards are justifiably twitchy to players falling off the face of the earth, so...

I'm a Cubs fan, and I hate the Cardinals Team intensely. I do not hate their players, though, and I offer my condolences to his family, friends, and fans.

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April 26, 2007

SACRILEGE!

This is dedicated to the Duck U. student that didn't believe me when I told her.

Katie Casey was baseball mad,
Had the fever and had it bad.
Just to root for the home town crew,
Ev'ry sou
Katie blew.
On a Saturday her young beau
Called to see if she'd like to go
To see a show
But Miss Kate said "No,
I'll tell you what you can do:" more...

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April 24, 2007

Ikkitousen Dragon Destiny - For SDB

A fate worse than death has befallen our beloved Kan-u Unchou! Tremble in fear at the visage of... more...

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The Kanon Project: Update 3!

I hit a brick wall around 10 days ago. I couldn't get past the first 15 seconds of the AMV-in-creation, and got REALLY frustrated.

...and then I got smart and said "$*&@# it, it's called a non-linear editing system for a reason."

So, I started jumping around inside the AMV, doing chunks that I was secure with. Three seconds here, a chorus there, guitar solo in the corner, hey presto! I've suddenly got about half the video done and still have a bunch of the easy parts to go!

Suddenly the frustration has been replaced with a feeling of elation! There's a lot of work left to do, but there's been major progress made.

Anybody want to volunteer for betatesting duties?

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April 23, 2007

39 Years Ago, At 719pm, April 23rd...

Momzerduck deserves all the praise, I deserve all the blame. Momzerduck also deserves pity: I was a month late and nearly 10 lbs.

UPDATE: Thank you, Brickmuppet!

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April 22, 2007

Full Throttle '07

On Saturday, the Spyker F1 team and the Royal Netherlands Air Force Demonstration Team put on a joint display, in the form of a race between Christijan Albers' car... and a F-16, over a 1km track.

From all reports, Albers had the lead for 300 meters, but had to pit to replace a damaged nose, then retired from the race.
*rimshot*

Actually, the F8-VII did lead for 300 meters: "All I could see was the F-16 in my mirrors, but then he just ran away from me," said Albers. "I've never been close to a F-16 before, and seeing him pull alongside, then pass, me was awesome!"

Albers has a lot of experience with being passed.

The F-16 and the Spyker then put on a show afterwards, with the Spyker doing donuts and skids on the runway (and who better than Albers for that, what with his experience on going off-track?) while the F-16 put on an airshow.

The Spyker Automotive Company has a history with the RNLAF, having built airplanes for the fledgling air force during WW1... and, of course, F1 cars are about the closest you can come to building a plane without having wings and a jet on it.

Hopefully some video will become available sometime soon.

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April 21, 2007

Blue Angel Down

Aw, hell.

The news is still breaking, so hopefully the one dead is a mistake, and everybody is okay. Hopefully. Knock on wood. Please?

The Blue Angels were scheduled to be the headliners at this summer's Duckford Air Show, after the USAF Thunderbirds were here last summer.

UPDATE: Unfortunately, there wasn't a mistake. The plane crashed into a residental area, damaging houses and cars, and killing the pilot. It appears, though, that nobody on the ground was badly hurt.

Obviously it's way too early to tell what happened, but one thought from the scene is that there may have been a bird ingested into an engine (according to the article I was reading, birdstrike is not uncommon in the area). Conflicting with that, though, is the report from a man who was mowing his lawn a short distance away from the crash site and saw it happen; he said he didn't hear anything obviously wrong with the plane. Not sure if you could tell that an engine was out just by listening, but.... More as warranted.

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April 20, 2007

Ah-HEM!

Steven:
"And to the kind person who shared this with me, I'd give you an 'Order of the Duck', except that I'm not a duck and anyway you already have one."

That's Order of the Honorary Duck, my friend.

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April 18, 2007

"Brigade"? Where'd THAT come from???

Over at Chizumatic, Steven is asking:
How much of the legend, or perhaps "cult" would be more accurate, of Suzumiya Haruhi is the creation of the fansubbers? For instance, the fansubbers have translated the name of Haruhi's club as "SOS Brigade"... ...So where did "brigade" come from? Well, it's funny, of course. But did the original author make it funny, or did the fansubbers make it funny?

I think Steven forgot that the anime ISN'T the source material: the novels are. In the first book, there's an explanation as to why they're using 'brigade' as opposed to group or association... unfortunately, I'm rushed for time and can't find the exact quote right now. IIRC, it goes something like "we don't have enough people to be a group or an association...".

Of course, the version I've read is fan-translated, too, so is therefore suspect, right? Yes, but... the 'offical webpage' of the US anime release is using 'brigade' too, so SOMEONE got something right.

I will point out that two or three fansub groups, working independently of each other, all wound up with the same translation (brigade). No 'regiment', no 'army', no 'squadron' (actually, that one would have been funnier)...

UPDATE: Steven responds, saying that since the source could have been a fan-translated effort, it may very well be wrong, which I acknowledged. However, I'll point out that, without actually having the original novels (in the original Japanese), we don't really know. Either way, it certianly appears that the various companies involved accept it.

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1 My guess is that someone looked in their dictionary and found uncommon words like ???? (kuuteiryodan = "Airborne Brigade") and ??? (shouboudan = "fire brigade") and thought "brigade" sounded cooler than more obvious choices, no doubt on the theory that Haruhi rejects the ordinary.

This probably happened when the first preview came out, well before multiple groups started fansubbing the actual series.

I'd say the most likely words would have been association, gang, team, or band, not anything with a military slant.

-j

Posted by: J Greely at April 18, 2007 06:44 AM (9Nz6c)

2 Sounds reasonable to me, particularly since I don't know Japanese, save for the few words I've picked up via anime.

In other words, I don't know Japanese.

Posted by: Wonderduck at April 18, 2007 09:10 AM (svIB9)

3 Well, my first thought was "what does the Japanese military call a brigade?" Based on J.Greely's comment, I'd say they were headed in the right direction. However, if Wikipedia is to be believed, "dan" is better translated as "division."

At a guess, the fansubbers selected Brigade, because it is, in English, the only possible mostly military term around the appropriate size. "Regiments" are smaller, "Battalions" smaller yet, and "Platoon" just isn't grandiose enough for Haruhi. "Company" and "Division" are too easy to confuse with their civilian meanings.

Brigade somewhat ambiguous; it also has civilian uses: "bucket brigade" etc., where military regimentation is only implied. If there was any of the modern Japanese anti-military mindset at work, this might explain part of it. (A longshot, I know.)

In the end, "Save the World by Overloading It With Fun Haruhi Suzumiya Division" sounds a bit too corporate, even if it's more accurate.

Posted by: ubu at April 18, 2007 09:57 AM (dhRpo)

4 I think Steven's mistake here is that he assumes the original author must have had some specific English translation for SOS-dan in mind. I'd suspect the author didn't even consider the issue.

And I don't buy the idea that "brigade" is an erroneous translation run amok, given that Kadokawa is using it to market the property in North America. After all, Kadokawa holds the distribution rights to both the novels and the TV series in Japan. It's their property. Always has been. If they decided on "brigade", then "brigade" it is. I suppose it's possible they merely followed the lead of fansubbers, but if no official translation existed in the first place, why not? "Brigade" is a perfectly reasonable translation, after all.

Posted by: Jeff Lawson at April 18, 2007 10:57 AM (YUrs6)

5 What Jeff said.

IIRC there were three different groups which released Haruhi fansubs, but two of them didn't start until well into the broadcast, when a.f.k.'s translation was already established. It's still a fine translation, though; one should remember that "literal" doesn't always mean "accurate".

Posted by: Andrew F. at April 18, 2007 12:44 PM (Whe4p)

6 I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that Jeff did a better job of saying what I meant than I did.

It's writers like him (and Steven) that make me want to just chuck the whole blogging thing sometimes... except for the F1 thing, I'd say there wasn't anything worth saying that they don't say better than me.

Posted by: Wonderduck at April 18, 2007 01:17 PM (cQPTX)

7 Well I just cracked my Nelson to see what the entry for dan #940 had in it, and nowhere does the word "brigade" appear in the definition. But I'm ok with brigade, given how militaristic Haruhi is about ordering about her subordinates.

Posted by: Will at April 18, 2007 04:12 PM (olS40)

8 Speaking as a dilettante student of the military, in the US a regiment and a brigade are the same thing. It's the echelon between battalion and division and US army divisions have three of them. In the last hundred years sometimes that echelon was called a "regiment" and sometimes a "brigade" but it was always commanded by a brigadier general.

However, the word "brigade" has been seriously abused in recent years, and subjected to rather serious inflation in some cases for propaganda purposes. For instance the "al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades" (note the plural) is likely much less than a battalion in total strength, and probably was less than a company when the name was chosen.

The word is a favorite among irregulars, especially Arab militant groups. Every once in a while a new group shows up and claims to be thus-and-so brigade; in a lot of those cases the total we never hear from them again, and the likelihood is that the "brigade" was one or two guys who forged a threat letter.

So the word "brigade" leaves a sour taste in my mouth. That, combined with the fact that it actually isn't a correct translation of "dan", was why I reacted to it the way I did.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 18, 2007 05:14 PM (+rSRq)

9 If the Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi were a military drama, I can see how the distinction between "brigade" or "division" or whatever would be relevant... but it's not. In this context, "brigade" is a perfectly reasonable translation. It's reasonable enough that the fine folks at Kadokawa signed off on it for the North American marketing campaign. But what do they know? They're just native Japanese speakers. Perhaps you'd like to lodge a complaint?

Seriously, Steven... if you haven't figured it out by now, Japanese is not the sort of language where a dictionary is going to provide every possible definition to every possible word you encounter. A lot of Japanese words and concepts don't even HAVE standard English translations. It's a rough process to begin with, and if you're looking for absolute perfection, you're going to be disappointed.

Honestly, if you have a problem with the usage of the word "brigade" simply because it's been abused by people you don't care for (or because you're a "dilettante student of the military"), that's YOUR problem, not the translators'.

Posted by: Jeff Lawson at April 18, 2007 05:59 PM (YUrs6)

10 But what do they know? They're just native Japanese speakers.

That doesn't make them any more obviously qualified to choose the best English word than the native English speakers, especially if they're not bilingual. We don't know anything about the process by which the English name was chosen, but there's plenty of reason to believe that the US licensee was aware of the "existing fan preference".

A kanji that's used in common words for orchestra (gakudan), baseball team (kyuudan), public corporation (koudan), choir (gasshoudan), criminal gang (bouryokudan), and the Japanese Space Agency (uchuukaihatsujigyoudan) is certainly versatile, but it's not the word for "brigade".

It's not a word at all, and that's the root of the problem. The correct choice for the translation depends entirely on the context it was used in, and in my experience, the first few episodes of a translated series (professional or fan) often suffer a great deal from lack of context.

If I recall correctly, Haruhi came up with the name SOS-dan after reading all of the official rules for school clubs, and couldn't call it a "club" (I'd guess -kai) because she didn't have enough members. Kyon eventually registered it as an undersized club. I don't have the Japanese dialog handy, and I can guarantee that it would take me a while to find the right scene in my copy of the novel, but I suspect that the characters were thinking in terms of those school rules. "We can't call ourselves a -X, so we're a -dan".

If that's the case, then "brigade" does not accurately convey the same feeling that -dan did to the original target audience.

But that's not necessarily a problem, since we're not much like the original target audience. In the end, it comes back to Steven's question: did the choice of words affect the perception of the quality of the series?

In this particular instance, I think the answer is no, because most people have only a very vague mental picture of a "brigade", and I suspect most fans recognized the desperate attempt to spell out SOS that led to the inappropriate translation of the full name. Personally, I tend to assume that there's always something wrong with a fansub's translations and ignore the obvious quirks (which is precisely how I responded to both "brigade" and the nonsense invented for SOS).

I'm just curious enough to ask the five Japanese natives in my class tomorrow morning, to see what flavor they think -dan conveys for a group, in and out of a school context. Depending on what they say, I might consult my friend with thirty years of J-E translation experience.

-j

Posted by: J Greely at April 19, 2007 10:13 AM (9Nz6c)

11 The problem is, "-dan" doesn't really have a literal translation (and I've discussed this with a couple of fluent Japanese speakers). All it does is signify that you're dealing with a group of "something". No literal English equivalent exists. So, when translating into English, pretty much any "group" related term is fair game. The only thing to guide you, really, is context. That, and you wouldn't want to get too fancy or specific with your choice of words.

Is "brigade" too fancy or specific a word to choose, however? I don't think so. Is it inappropriate in this context? I don't think so. I mean, if we ARE going to depend on dictionaries here, Webster's lists "a group of people organized for special activity" as an acceptable definition for the word. And I'm sure you've seen "brigade" used in the context of "group" on various occasions.

Now, does that mean "brigade" should be the official translation with regard to Haruhi? Why not? After all, if no literal translation for "-dan" exists in the first place, and the Japanese publisher decided "brigade" was good enough for their English-language marketing of the series, it's as official a translation as you're ever going to get.

And that's the point I tried to make earlier... looking for some sort of original and official English translation that predates "brigade" is a waste of time, because no such translation exists. For all intents and purposes, "brigade" IS the original and official translation. I don't know who the first person was to come up with that particular translation, but whether it was a fansubber, a Haruhi fan, or Jesus himself, it doesn't change the fact that it's the official translation. And it's just as correct a translation as party, group, company, or whatever else you'd use to translate -dan.

And for what it's worth... the JSDF's elite paratrooper unit, 第1空挺団 (Dai-ichi Kūtei-dan) refers to itself in English here as the Japanese 1st Airborne BRIGADE. And they're merely using the 団 character alone (as opposed to 旅団, which would be a more specific of referring to a military brigade).

Posted by: Jeff Lawson at April 19, 2007 03:13 PM (YUrs6)

12 I don't recall anyone requesting an "original and official English translation that predates 'brigade'", and even if one existed it wouldn't prove much. There's an original and official translation of the series title "Shichinin no Nana", and it even appears in the credits, but it does nothing to convey the feel of the original title. IMHO, that makes it a poor translation, and its provenance is irrelevant.

I think we've passed the point where we've put more effort into discussing this than went into choosing "brigade" in the first place. As translation-induced flaws go (and, yes, I think it is one), it's pretty trivial, below the level of, say, the English title of Mahou Senshi Louie, which spoiled a joke in one episode, or the handwritten notes in the ROD OAV that were signed "up! up! up!" because the translator didn't know that Nenene was a character in the original novels. [and both of those are from official releases, so I don't just pick on fansubs...]

As for the paratroopers, I'm not surprised that a military brigade would use dan and not ryodan, for the same reason I'm not surprised that Toukyou Daigaku is commonly referred to as Toudai. The first thing the Japanese seem to do after constructing a new compound word is contract it. :-)

-j

Posted by: J Greely at April 19, 2007 06:06 PM (2XtN5)

13 Wonderduck focuses in on the word "dan" and my comments about translating that word.

That was, in fact, the least important element in that particular post of mine, and before anyone else decides to send me irate email about it, I'd appreciate it if you'd go to first sources.

If I'm going to get reamed out, I'd at least like it to be for what I myself wrote, not for what someone else said I wrote.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 20, 2007 03:42 AM (+rSRq)

14 Hmm- I like the translation "brigade". It has a certain ring to it. Also, though as Jeff Lawson points out "dan" can be translated as "brigade" even as a military term of art, I think the better parallel is with things like flood brigades or fire brigades (as J Greely mentions), both of which are "dan" in Japanese. That seems closer to the nature of Haruhi's little group than a military brigade.

SDB is right that the fansubbers have taken some liberties with the name, mainly in terms of the "save the world" bit. But the "Save" part is implied by the whole SOS motif, and as you say they needed to make it match SOS.

I also think that this is one case where Jim Breen's otherwise excellent wwwjdic (which seems to be the original source of SDB's definitions) may be a bit off. "Stir up" is an odd primary definition for that sense of moriageru, I think. "Overload with fun" is also a bit odd, but may actually be closer. Moriageru tends to have a sense of brightening the atmosphere, or raising someone's spirits, as far as I can tell, while in English "stir up" tends to have negative connotations.

[By the way, the use of Breen's dictionary is also likely why tame didn't show up for SDB. For some reason JDIC has a hard time with words written in kana. If you search it for ため you get no results, but if you search for the kanji 為 it works. This is a bit of a pain though, as tame is generally written in kana. I'm not sure what the relationship is between the dictionary SDB is using and JDIC is, but the source seems to be the same at least.]

Fansubs are all over the place in quality, but in my experience the best of them are generally better than commercial subs (and given what I've heard about the rates the industry pays subbers it's not surprising that this is the case, particularly as it is possible to make quite a bit of money translating J-E in some fields). Japanese maps poorly to English though, so there will always be some liberties taken.

I've read some Japanese novels alongside English translations. Even when very well known literary translators had done the translations, the differences were very noticeable. I did this with Birnbaum's translation of "Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World" (incidentally this seems to be the source of some of the imagery in Haibane Renmei) and whole paragraphs were elided in the English text.

I don't recall which group's sub of Haruhi I watched, but I was actually really impressed by the translation- I recall laughing out loud a couple of times at it, just because they found a really nice way to capture the feeling of a certain sentence.

Posted by: Tagore Smith at April 21, 2007 06:55 AM (RHuBz)

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April 17, 2007

Ducks In Anime Redux*

Mahou Sensei Negima Natsu OVA more...

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In Memoriam.

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Great Moments in Animation

Duck Amuck, 1953

Completely unrelated, happy birthday to occasional commentor Vaucaunson's Duck! What's it like on the far side of 39?

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April 15, 2007

First Episode Thoughts: Lucky*Star

There comes a time in any anime fan's viewing life when he or she comes across a show that they find a show that... well... that they can't make up their mind about. Do I hate it? Do I dislike it? Do I like it? Do I love it?

For this duck, that time is here. And Lucky*Star is that anime.

People are saying that it is Azumanga Lite, in that it's based on a 4koma about high school girls that has no visible plot. They also say it's the Seinfeld of anime, in that it's about nothing. Like both of these shows, my initial reaction towards Lucky*Star is, at best, 'meh.' I actually didn't like Azumanga Daioh the first time I gave it a shot (now it's my favorite anime), and I never did learn to like Seinfeld.

Like many other people out there on the intartubewebb, I really wanted this show to be good, and maybe it will be. After an episode where 10 minutes is spent discussing the best way to eat desserts ("Do you eat the strawberry on a strawberry shortcake first or last?"), I'm leaning more towards the "...the hell?" camp.

I can praise two parts of Lucky*Star unreservedly, however. First is the animation, which is quite lovely to look at. From all I've read, it follows the source 4koma very closely, which is a plus, which results in a... well, cartoony appearance quite different from other shows done by KyoAni (Haruhi and Kanon 2006, to name the two most recent).

Second would be the OP, which you can view by clicking this linky right here, and may St. Fangio The Quick have mercy on your soul. It's like sugar-coated, chocolate-covered crack for your eyes and ears, as the Brickmuppet has already learned.

As of right now, I can't recommend Lucky*Star. There just isn't enough THERE there, but I'll watch a few more episodes, see what comes of it and let you know.

There is one thing I noticed, however:

... sometimes I wonder about KyoAni. Are they doing this on purpose, or is it just a coincidence?

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F1 UPDATE!: Bahrain!

Good stuff today, so lets get to the crackin'!

*FELIPE MASTERS: Felipe Massa got the win today, but not without a lot of heat from Lewis Hamilton. The last two races have been runaways, but not this one, with the Ferrari being unable to pull away until after the final stint. Even then, the McLaren was able to hack away at the lead over the last few laps. This should be pretty tight all year.

*EVERYBODY LOVES A THREE-WAY: After today's results, we now have three people tied for the driver's championship lead; Fernando Alonso, Kimi Raikkonen and Lewis Hamilton all have 22 points. Remarkably, you would have to say that Hamilton has been the most consistent of all three, with two seconds and a third. Both Raikkonen and Alonso have wins, but they've also been all over the finishing grid. This is shaping up to be MUCH more interesting a battle than we've had the past few years, to say the least.

*RED BULL MAY GIVE YOU WINGS... ...but it sure didn't give their teams stability. None of the four cars running under the Red Bull banner finished the race: American Speed was out after three turns, Liuzzi some laps later, The Chin had a hydraulic fire around lap 30, and Mark Webber had a jammed fuel door that so badly ruined the aerodynamics of his car that the t-wing ripped off, which looked like it damaged the rear of his RB3. Bad news all around.

*DRIVER OF THE RACE: We here at F1 UPDATE! really want to bend the unwritten rules and give this to David Coulthard's Chin. He started from the last row of the grid, and when his car gave out, was up to seventh or eighth... and it wasn't a fuel strategy thing, it was outdriving the others. However, the unwritten rules state that the DotR has to go to someone that actually finishes the race. So, instead, we'll give the award to Grizzly Nick Heidfeld for his 4th place finish (which included passing Fernando Alonso). Dr. Mario Theissen had a huge grin on his face after that one...

*TEAM OF THE RACE: Ferrari gets the award for finishing 1st/3rd, but we're not excited about it. There just really isn't any other team that deserves it, to be honest.

*MOVE OF THE RACE: On lap 31, Nick Heidfeld, who'd been dogging Fernando Alonso for a few laps, made a seemingly doomed move to the outside of the McLaren into a turn. Somehow, Grizzly Nick kept his BMW glued to the track, and just forced Alonso to make a decision: either relinquish the place, or wreck both cars. 'Nando gave up, and Heidfeld would finish ahead of Alonso when the checkered flag flew. Honorable mention goes to Giancarlo Fisichella's pass of Rubens Barrichello around lap 21 where he started outside in a turn, but tightened up and passed the Honda to the inside.

*MOOOOO-OVE OF THE RACE: All F1 drivers have their 'duh' moments, and the MOOOOO-OVE celebrates the worst of them, performed on the largest stage in motor racing. Today's award goes to Anthony Davidson, for his lapse of concentration in the closing laps of the race. The Honda engine in his SuperAguri began to tear itself apart without immediately dying, but the thin blue oil smoke trail coming out showed that it was just a matter of time. Instead of pulling off the driving line, Ant continued driving as if nothing was wrong, laying down an oil slick that extended over half the track. To make matters worse, Lewis Hamilton was right behind Ant, and that may have prevented him from making more of his charge at Massa. Lovely job, Ant, here's your Mooooo-ove! Dishonorable mention goes to the engine staff at Honda, for deciding that an ounce of C4 is a good way of cooling their engines this week (three of the four Honda-driven cars this weekend had engine failures; Button during practice , Sato around lap 40 [with a huge plume of smoke], and Ant, as mentioned).

*QUOTES OF THE RACE: more...

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April 14, 2007

Grand Prix of Bahrain QUALS!

Wow, what a shocker! Ferrari, McLaren, Ferrari, McLaren? Who'd have thought!

As you can guess, there's no huge surprises in quals this time around... in fact, it's pretty much the same way it's been the previous two races. Massa, Hamilton, Raikkonen and Alonso will probably be taking long-term leases on the first four slots in the grid for the entire season. The real excitement will be who's behind them, and in this race, it's the two BMWs (Grizzly Nick and Robert Heidfeld), who were looking very strong (though, obviously, not as strong as the Big Two).

There was (finally!) a Renault sighting in Q3, as Giancarlo Fisichella dragged his steed up to 7th. Mark Webber's RedBull ended up in 8th, a smidge ahead of Jarno Trulli's Toyota and the Williams Boys of Rosberg and Man-Mountain. Heikki Koveinalieninenlain was 12th, and ANT kicked a huge portion of arse to get up to 13th (in fact, he just barely missed getting into Q3, being bumped right at the end). Ralfy-boy was 14th.

The factory Honda team of Rubens and Jensen were next, glaring balefully at Ant's SuperAguri. SuperSato was less than .200 behind Button, which really IS a surprise; he's usually faster than Ant.

Fashion-Victim Liuzzi and American Speed, the Toro Rosso duo, came up behind them. Spyker got a thrill when Adrian ("No Cute Nickname") Sutil made it off the last row of the grid, just ahead of David Coulthard's Chin. The Chin's car seems to be having problems, perhaps a repeat of the brake pedal fiasco from last race. There really isn't any reason that the RB3 should be this low on the grid, and should be at least in Q2 every race... unless DC'sC has lost the proverbial "it"?

Finally, inevitably, Christijan Albers is tail-end charlie, rounding off another great qual session for Spyker. Too bad they don't have any personality, I could really like a team that's this bad...

I suppose I should be more excited about Lewis Hamilton's 2nd place. He's a rookie in F1, it's only his third race, and if 'Nando wasn't his teammate, he'd have a decent shot at winning this one. As is, he might become the first driver ever to podium in his first three F1 races. That's pretty amazing, though it just means that he was plopped into a great team and a great car. If you think back, most new drivers in recent times have debuted for lower-level teams (Alonso for Minardi, Michael Schumacher with Jordan, Raikkonen with Sauber, just to name a few). Anybody think that Hamilton would be within sniffing distance of the top of the grid if he was driving for, oh let's say, Spyker?

So that's the grid for the GP of Bahrain, huh? I really hope BMW picks up a little bit more speed somewhere... I want to see SOMEONE beat the Big Two ONCE this year.

Oh, and in a completely unrelated note, this is post number 500 here at Wonderduck's Pond. Have some cake, everybody.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 09:59 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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April 13, 2007

Friday Practice: Bahrain

Only two important things to mention about today's practice at the sand-covered track in Bahrain:

1) Honda's cars may stink this year, but the engines have the sterling quality they've always had. Jensen Button got another taste of what having an afterburner is like today, with an absolutely brilliant case of the Ka-Blammo!s. Poor Felipe Massa, trailing behind the remains of Button's engine, wound up losing control when he hit the oil slick left behind as it pretended to be a fragmentation grenade. Ouch. In the one bit of good news for Jense, at least he won't take a 10-spot penalty due to the rules changes for this season...
(UPDATE: In comments, SDB asked if we got to see the engine go kablammo, and indeed we did. In the reply, however, I mentioned it's only the second-best Button kablammo of all-time. Both are shown below the fold!)

2) Jean Todt was spotted without his Ferrari sweater. I submit that it's a symbiote, similar to Spiderman's black costume/Venom... how he managed to seperate it from his skin, we'll (hopefully) never know. Electrical shocks tended to disrupt the symbiote in the comics, maybe Todt's is affected by McLaren victories? Still, very, VERY creepy to see him in a shirt and slacks. more...

Posted by: Wonderduck at 10:45 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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1 That must have been pretty spectacular. Did you actually get to see that engine blow up?

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 13, 2007 10:59 AM (+rSRq)

2 Indeed! The car was going through a S-bend complex in a rather sloppy fashion (fishtailing, waaaaay off-line, etc etc etc), basically looking like Button had blown the turn. Suddenly, there was a huge fireball behind the car, and in slow-motion, you can see decent-sized chunks of aluminum and carbon fiber flying off into the desert.

Not quite as good as the one he had last season where it really DID look like he had an afterburner going (jet of flame about half-a-car long), but impressive indeed.

Posted by: Wonderduck at April 13, 2007 11:05 AM (2nDll)

3 LOL about the hardway "global warming."

Posted by: Mallory at April 13, 2007 11:53 AM (bpzDp)

4 Almost forgot...

On the subject of Jean Todt without his sweater, I had begun to think that he actually had red wool skin.

Posted by: Mallory at April 13, 2007 12:18 PM (bpzDp)

5 The engine is behind the driver, right? (I honestly don't know.)

When I was a kid, the drivers in Top Fuel were all the way at the back of the car, behind the rear wheel. But that meant that if anything happened to the engine, even a partial failure (like a blown piston head, which is quite common) had a chance of nailing the driver with burning fuel and/or debris.

They eventually changed the rules so that the drivers sat in front of the engines, which cut way down on injuries and deaths.

Of course, funny cars still have the engines in front and there's nothing that can be done about that without abolishing the class entirely, which isn't going to happen.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 13, 2007 02:24 PM (+rSRq)

6 Steven, here's a fantastic photo that shows exactly where the engine is locate in a F1 car.

Basically, yes, behind the driver (though not immediately behind him).

I've seen those older Top Fuelers; remarkably cool designs in my opinion (but I prefer the older F1 cars over the newer ones, too).

Posted by: Wonderduck at April 13, 2007 02:48 PM (h/YdH)

7 Those old Top Fuel dragsters give me the willies. I'm really glad they changed the rules.

I think this Jensen has got good reason to be really pissed off at his crew boss. Having that happen once is an accident. Twice is incompetence. (Three times would be a conspiracy.)

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at April 13, 2007 03:40 PM (+rSRq)

8 Conspiracy it is, then. In 2005, Honda had engine failures a-plenty. Not quite as impressive as these, though Takuma Sato's failure at Monaco, and it's resulting smoke-screen, was pretty awesome.

F1 engines are rev-limited to 19,000 RPM, and are designed to last for two race weekends; when something goes wrong, the results are usually pretty catastrophic... and EVERY team has at least one or two during a year.

Honda's are just more impressive, visually, when they let go.

I have no doubt that Jensen Button IS pissed, though.

Posted by: Wonderduck at April 14, 2007 12:46 AM (A5s0y)

9 Odd that Honda's F1 engines would be so fragile, given that their production cars are all but indestructible. I know, the racing engines are more highly stressed designs with thinner safety margins, built for performance and not durability, but still . . . .

Posted by: Mike at April 14, 2007 03:33 AM (0csIn)

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April 10, 2007

It's not easy being green...

Just ask Honda.

Remember the rumor I mentioned a few days ago, where Honda is going to scrap the RA107 and bring in a completely new car halfway through the season?

Planet-F1.com is saying it's true, with no less a person than Jensen Button coming out and saying it'll happen at Montreal.

Just how much difference will it make? That's not much time to design, create and test a new car. Even SuperAguri didn't manage it last year; they had to drag out the old Arrows chassis, and just updating it to the 2006 spec took three months. Honda is starting over, with TWO months.

Hoo-boy, this'll be interesting.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 12:53 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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F1 on SPEED!

Can we stand the excitement of having TWO Grands Prix in one week?!?!?

Friday the 13th brings us LIVE coverage of the Grand Prix of Bahrain's Practice #2 at 6am. The new F1 recap show, which SPEED's website calls "F1 Plus", then runs at 11pm.

To be honest, F1 Plus isn't a bad show at all. Even the F1 UPDATE! crew enjoyed it... even if one of them did tell me that cars had turbochargers. Obviously some sort of "let's make fun of the old guy" thing.

Saturday, April 14th, has LIVE coverage of the Quals at 6am, with a replay at 130pm.

Sunday, April 15th, brings us coverage starting at 230am with ANOTHER replay of the Quals session. That leads right into the first GP2 race of the season on SPEED at 4am. THAT event takes us up to LIVE coverage of the Grand Prix of Bahrain at (you guessed it) 6am. There will be a replay of (no, not quals again) the race at 9pm.

And, of course, the F1 UPDATE! gang will be all over the entire race weekend. Except for the Turbocharger guy... he's got some 'splaining to do...

Posted by: Wonderduck at 12:10 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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