F1 On NBCSN: Hungary 2013

It's been three long weeks since the Grand Prix of Germany, and after this weekend, we'll have a full four weeks off for the annual F1 summer break.  So what single race do they give us to make us hungry for more?  What historic track do we get to make us long for the days of races on consecutive weekends?  Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you... the HUNGARORING!

A slow, high downforce circuit, it's called "Monaco without the glamour."  Which is a total lie, if you think that dusty and hot are glamourous.  For whatever reason, though, the Hungaroring is Hungary's #3 tourist attraction, behind the Danube and Lake Balaton, but ahead of Budapest.

Which says something about Hungary, I think.  For heaven's sake, this is one of the few tracks that doesn't rubber in as the weekend goes on... the dust comes on too quickly for that!  They seriously need to talk to the folks at Bahrain about using their "sand binder" thingy to keep the dust down.

Okay, let's be honest here.  I hate this place with a passion.  The only time this place coughs up a good race is when it rains, and then Jenson Button wins.  This is the place where Felipe Massa took a spring upside the helmet, and lost his mojo (and nearly his life) in the process.  This is the place where, many years ago, the Legendary Announce Team had their heads superimposed over those of people going down a waterslide that's just beyond the track... and that was the highlight of the race.

Well, it's only one weekend a year.  Surely I can muster up the enthusiasm for this one outstanding Formula 1 race?
The good news is that it's back to normal for the TV broadcasts.

FRIDAY
Practice: 7a - 830a live
SATURDAY
Quals: 7a - 830a live
SUNDAY
2013 Grand Prix of Hungary: 630a - 9a live

All broadcasts are on NBCSN.  We'll be watching... will you?  See ya then!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:05 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 335 words, total size 2 kb.

Graphics Card Weirdness

Okay, so here's the gig.  I had time today to finally install the new graphics card... and it wouldn't.  Let me explain.

The first time I tried, I got a black screen.  Okay, didn't get the card seated correctly... not hard to do when the PCI-E slot's locking lever is broken.  Pulled it out, stuck it back in, voila! 

Windows froze during boot.  Never even made it to the desktop.  Hold down the power button and try again.  Yay, desktop!  I wait for the computer to finish trying to find the mouse and keep hitting cancel on the driver search function, then plop the install disc into it and voila!

Windows froze during install.  It was at this point that I began to think that this wasn't going to go as smoothly as the other two times I've installed graphic cards.  Power button, reboot, bluescreen before POST.  As I was too flustered at what was going on, I didn't write it down (of course) but the relevant part that I remember was this: Machine Check Exception.

 Power button, desktop, cancel cancel cancel cancel install disc it makes it a little bit farther before lockup.  At this point, I give up, pull the brand new GeForce GT630 out, put the SPARKLE GT240 back in... it functions as long as I don't have it do anything more strenuous than Minesweeper... and everything works right as rain.  Sighing, I send eVGA an eMail, asking for advice.

Response: install the drivers under safe mode, and how much power does your PSU put out at the 12v rail?  B-b-b-b-but if I install the drivers under safe mode, that'll kill off the SPARKLE, and for me to read the label on the PSU, I have to remove the PSU... and I remember having the devil's own time physically installing it in the first place.  Oh, and it's seven years old, it may not be putting out that much power anymore, right?

Suggestions, anybody?  This sound similar to anyone?  I really don't want to sink more money into this if I don't absolutely have to, but I'm willing to invest in a new PSU if need be... I'll just put it into the new computer that'll be coming down the pike soon enough.

UPDATE: And all this after I splurged on Steam's summer sale, too.  Saints Row 3, the DLC for Skyrim, and Kerbal Space Program... and I can't play any of 'em!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 07:01 PM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
Post contains 409 words, total size 3 kb.

Saturday Night Tunage XVII

Oh no!  Look out!  It's another installment of Saturday Night Tunage with your host, DJ Wonderduck!

It amazes me that I've managed to go seven months since the last one of these, or at least that's what the search feature says, but it does appear to be true!  I do believe that I've deprived you, my faithful readers/listeners, for much too long.  What you believe, on the other hand,  is up to you!  I make no promises that these songs haven't been featured before, but I don't much care... I like 'em all the same!  With all that out of the way, let's get on with the tunage!

more...

Posted by: Wonderduck at 05:26 PM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
Post contains 789 words, total size 6 kb.

Wanderduck's Missing Pictures

A few of you may remember the pictures from my trip to Orlando last month.  I was just going through the (metaphorical) pile of snapshots unused from the journey, and I realized that I didn't use my two favorites... because they didn't fit the narrative as well as some others.  In lieu of actual content, I aim to rectify that oversight right here, right now.

The first:

Just a duck somewhere above the middle of the country... far, far above the middle of the country.  Probably Indiana or Kentucky, as it was fairly early in the flight.  Love the clouds, and the somewhat wistful view of Wanderduck looking out the window.  Just a fun little picture.

The second:

Wanderduck with the biggest, cheesiest sh*t-eating-est grin you've ever seen on a rubber duckie.  He's such a ham.  Which, to be sure, is what makes him an ideal companion for journeys. 

For either picture, click to get a big version.  I'm sure Wanderduck'd love to be your desktop wallpaper for a while!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 09:39 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 173 words, total size 1 kb.

The Gleam Is Off... um... EVERYTHING

Look, I know I occasionally whine and complain about stuff here at The Pond.  Stuff happens, and sometimes you just have to react.  But today... today, I have a legitimate cause to complain, and there's no way anybody would disagree with me.

My assistant manager gave her two weeks' notice today.

Classes start in four weeks.

No way I'm getting a replacement in time.  I'm going to be working open-to-close all the way through Rush, which'll take us into September.  I'm actually scheduled for 57 hours the week before classes start.

I'm doomed. 

And if that wasn't enough, my DVR appears to have coughed up a hard-drive and died.  Thankfully, I just rent it... I think.  But I lost all the movies and stuff I'd recorded.  Like the entirety of Firefly in HD.  Don't let nobody tell you different, "Our Mrs Reynolds" is worth watching in HD.  Oh yes, yes it surely is. 

I'm already there, I think.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 07:53 PM | Comments (14) | Add Comment
Post contains 164 words, total size 1 kb.

The Sparkle Is Off The Rose

Some of you may remember back nearly two years ago when I went through that joyous time I liked to call "graphics card hell".  That was the time when my old Nvidia 7600GT went all pear-shaped and I had to replace it.  The first attempt was with a 9800GT... which failed because it was a two-slot card and my case would only support a single.  The second attempt was a PNY GT240... which failed because it was out of stock with no return-to-stock date, which is a nice way of saying "never."  The third and final attempt was the acquisition of a GT240 from a company calling itself Sparkle.  By this time it was very much a case of burning down, falling over, then sinking into a swamp, but it did work.  And it worked very well indeed!  I was quite pleased by my purchase, and to be sure it was a lovely card and all was bacon and chocolate and chocolate-covered bacon.

However, three months ago I had my first inkling of a problem: a high-pitched squealing noise issuing from the innards of my computer.  When it occurred, the first couple of times, a sharp rap on the case with my knuckles ("Bap!") usually made it stop.  Then it stopped for good on its own.  Since everything seemed to still work, I let it go with a shrug and a muttered oath: "Computers."  Which was fine, until I decided to play me some Skyrim.  Booted up the game, began to walk around, saw a bear come at me, drew my sword... and the screen went blank with a "no signal" message on it.  Meanwhile, the sounds of a bear eating my character began to emanate from the speakers.  Since I couldn't actually see anything, the only way I could reboot was to do the old "hold down the power switch" gig.  Then I tried it again, thinking that I must have accidentally done something to glitch the game.  Nope.  Same thing occurred, but faster this time.  Over the next few days, I experimented with other games.  Trine went for about 5 minutes before it did the same thing.  Hell, Motocross Madness 2 blacked out after about 15 minutes.  Some research pretty much confirmed my problem: overheating.  The squealing sound?  Death of the cooling fan on my Sparkle.  So I hied myself off to Amazon and got myself a new graphics card.

The GT630 is hardly a powerhouse... it may not even be as good as the Sparkle, to be honest.  But I don't much care at the moment as this whole experience has just pointed out to me that Chiyo-chan, my smart and lovely computer, is seven years old and essentially un-upgradeable anymore.  So the GT630 is only a stopgap card (and at $65, not an expensive one, either).  In about a month, the new school year begins at Duck U.  I think that as a "huzzah, you've survived!" gift to myself, I'll be getting a new computer... and that's if I don't get one before that.  I already have a name for it picked out... and that's the important bit, y'know.  I will, of course, keep you updated as the process goes on.  God help us all.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 11:08 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 560 words, total size 4 kb.

The Evangelion Movies: 1.11 You Are (not) Alone, pt 2

A little over a month ago, I released the first part of the writeup for the first of the new Evangelion movies.  For a while there, I wasn't altogether sure there'd be a second part... this may come as a surprise to many of my readers, but these writeups often aren't the most fun things in the world to work on!  I'm sure you're shocked by this revelation, but it's really honestly true!  I mean, let's face it... it's not like the series I do writeups for are the best ever.  Then you get nominally good shows, like this one, that are sometimes unjustly lionized for their depth and subtle character analysis, when in fact they're just giant robot shows.  I exaggerate for effect in the case of Evangelion, but nobody who has seen the actual TV series can legitimately argue that, at its core, Gainax was just throwing crap at a wall to make pretty pictures.  Sometimes it stuck, sometimes it didn't, sometimes it hit walls in other rooms altogether.  In some ways, the movies improved on this technique so at least they're consistently hitting the wall.  That's a plus.

So if you remember correctly, at the end of the first writeup, Shinji Ikari, Our Hero, had just agreed to pilot the giant Eva Unit 01 after having Teh (hot, blue-haired) Rei literally dumped in his lap.  Well, yeah.  We pick up the action from that very point...

...or from the pr0n version of Tron, one of the two.  No, nothing phallic about the "Entry Plug" the pilot rides in, or that there's a graphic for "Plug Depth Status."  Nope... it gets worse when you realize (in the show at least) that the Evas are inhabited by the souls of the pilot's mothers.  Here, let me just stick two large pins into my eyeballs now.

I'm also not going to say anything about how, once the Entry Plug has reached maximum Depth Status and is fully seated, it begins to fill up with a sticky liquid called LCL.  I'm not going to say anything about it because I'm not as perverted as I seem to be... I'm fond of not plucking my eyes out of their sockets.  Though if I did, I could stop watching crappy anime and occasionally blogging about it for your enjoyment.

Libbets and Bunnymen, I present to you Unit-01 in all of its purple and green glory.  Looks kinda like a walking bruise, actually.  Well, standing bruise, as it hasn't actually moved on its own yet.  Like the Space Shuttle being taken to the launch tower, Unit-01 is loaded onto a platform under a tube that leads to the surface.  The command is given, and vwoosh!  Up the tube it goes, propelled by the power of ELECTRICITY!  HUZZAH!!!

This may not be the most subtle sallyport ever, seeing how the act of opening is accompanied by blaring klaxons, flashing lights and a massive rumbling sound as Unit-01 is propelled by the power of ELECTRICITY!  HUZZAH!!! to face the Alone Angel.  Stealth is, apparently, not an issue.  Which makes sense; we are talking about giant robots here... to them, stealth is hiding behind a skyscraper going "oh god, did he see me?"

We'll discover the answer to that question when you click...

more...

Posted by: Wonderduck at 10:43 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
Post contains 1873 words, total size 15 kb.

Ducks In Anime Want Friends, Too!

-WATAMOTE!, Ep01

Okay, yes, WATAMOTE! is a horribly realistic look at the seamy underside of high school life, the side only those unpopular kids ever get to see.  Yes, it's sort of depressing how accurate it is, and how much I identify with the main character even after 27 years.  All of these things are true.

But it's got a duck wearing a headset.  A cute duck, too.  And that makes it all okay with me.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:46 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 82 words, total size 1 kb.

All I Want... Is For It To Be Cool. Is That Too Much To Ask?

I don't get excited about movies much anymore.  It's been a long time since I eagerly awaited some big Hollywood blockbuster... I outgrew that sort of thing, I think.  But then, almost a year ago, I caught wind of something that sounded cool, if they did it right.  Then a couple of months ago, the trailers started to hit the web.  And tomorrow, July 12, 2013, the first movie I've been really excited about in years is hitting the movie screens.  Ladles and girlymen, allow me to introduce to you...

WANT.  OH SO WANT.  Mecha!  Kaiju!  Heck, GLaDOS!  It may not be Sharknado, but it'll do.

(note: longtime readers will point out that I did get excited about Tintin.  While true, that was an excitement mixed with deep-seated fear that it would suck.  It was that fear that kept me from seeing it in the theatre.  Nothing of the sort is going to happen to me with Pacific Rim.  I grew up with Tintin.  I learned to read with Tintin.  It would have seriously hurt if that movie was bad.  This one?  If it's bad, I'm out $10 and two hours or whatever.)

Posted by: Wonderduck at 07:30 PM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
Post contains 208 words, total size 2 kb.

Random Anime Picture #80: I'm Confused

-Love Lab, Ep01

Love Lab is a perfectly inoffensive show, revolving around the wacky hijinks of the girls from the Student Council of Fuji Girls School.  It's nothing earth-shaking, and it's also nothing that's forcing me to watch it.  I might be losing my taste for "cute girls doing cute things in cute ways" shows, particularly when there isn't anything behind it, like interesting plot.  The above character, Riko, has proven to be particularly hard for me to deal with, though.  We all know about the "cute little fang" trope, right?  Riko is a rare example of someone with two of them... or, at least, she's supposed to have two cute little fangs.

In reality, she just comes off as looking evil and demonic.  She's not, she just looks like it... which isn't a plot point, it's a mistake.  She's a "sporty, athletic" girl, not the spawn of evil!  The rest of the show was "meh," but the twin fangs drove me up a wall, confused and wondering when she was gonna shiv someone.  I'll probably watch another episode to see if it gets better, but yeesh.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 11:22 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 193 words, total size 2 kb.

F1 Update!: Germany 2013

A brilliant blue sky welcomed the assembled masses as the Thundering Herd formed up on the grid at the Nurburgring's F1 circuit.  Mercedes' Shiv Hamilton was on pole, with hometown boy Hannibal Vettel next to him. Vettel's Red Bull teammate Mark Webber was directly behind Hamilton, in what could be considered a precarious situation for the Mercedes driver.  Still, the Silver Arrow has proven to be the equal of the RB9 as late; would the status quo be upheld?  Or would the other status quo, that of Vettel running away and hiding, gain preeminence?  Or would the Ferraris, lurking two rows behind, make their gamble on the harder tires pay off?  THIS is your F1Update! for the 2013 Grand Prix of Germany.

*LIGHTS OUT!:  The start of any F1 race is always a frantic scramble for position... either improving it, defending it, or losing it.  Polesitter Hamilton, obviously concerned about the Red Bull of Vettel, immediately cut across the circuit when the lights went out to begin the race.  The young German was having none of it, however, and stood his ground as he quickly came alongside the Mercedes driver.  All of this had the effect of opening a clear path for the other Red Bull driver, Mark Webber.  Normally, this wouldn't be an issue... Webber is the only person on the grid with his own named starting technique, after all (the legendary "Mark Webber Lousy Start^©").  For once, however, the Australian had a clean, nearly perfect getaway from third... and found nothing but empty asphalt ahead of him.

The Red Bull wave quickly swamped Hamilton, relegating him to third by the time they reached Turn 1, the two Lotus drivers hovering just behind him.  Meanwhile, Ferrari's HWMNBN and his medium tires tried grimly to hang on to the cars with the faster soft tires.  This proved to be easier said than done, as he was 10 seconds behind by Lap 7... and he was having to drive the rubber off of them to manage even that much.  Instead of the 20-25 laps he expected to do, he only managed 13, pitting before the Lotus of Lettuce Grosjean on softs.

*SAFETY CAR... HUH?:  On Lap 24, the proceedings were interrupted when the Marussia of Jules Bianchi blew its engine in a massive volume of smoke, followed by an impressive amount of flame.

Bianchi brought the car to a halt, then under instructions from the pit lane, triggered the fire extinguisher and headed for the hills.  A track worker approached with a portable extinguisher, as did a tractor to carry the stricken car behind the barriers.  We then discovered another way in which F1 cars are unlike road cars: no parking brake.

Gravity: it's not just a good idea, it's the law.  Parked on a rise, the empty Marussia began to roll backwards and across the circuit, not coming to a halt until it made it to the other side where it was brought to a halt by an advertising sign.  Fortunately, this occurred with no other cars around, though not by much: that's Vettel's Red Bull at the top of the screencap there.  The Safety Car was summoned as the wild Marussia was brought to heel.  At this point, the order was Vettel, Grosjean, Raikkonen, HWMNBN and Jenson Button, having a great drive for McLaren.

*FINALLY:  The safety car stayed out for five laps, then racing resumed.  For the most part, the order remained as above for the next 20-odd laps, until the final pitstops.  There, Kimi Raikkonen pitted with 10 laps to go for a set of used soft tires, reemerging in third, a mere 3.5 seconds behind Vettel, with teammate Grosjean between them.  As the laps ticked down, Raikkonen narrowed the gap, his medium-shod teammate being told to get out of his way on Lap 55, with 2.5 seconds between him and the Red Bull.  Every lap, the Finn shaved off a little more of the gap, trying desperately to bring it down to less than a second so he could use the DRS and pick up that extra speed advantage over the Red Bull.  Finally, going into the last lap of the race, he did it: 1.0 second exactly.  He could get no closer than 7/10th of a second, however, and Vettel took the win, followed by Kimi and Grosjean.  HWMNBN crossed the line in 4th, then came to a halt on track by turn 1.

*DRIVER OF THE RACE:  Mark Webber.  He started third, nearly got the lead at the beginning, and was a serious contender for second place today, until a pit screwup (see below) put him dead last and a lap down.  He then got the free pass from the safety car, putting him back on the lead lap, then fought his way up the field to finish 7th.  Pretty good result, all things considered.

*TEAM OF THE RACE:  Lotus.  They may be second-guessing the need to bring Raikkonen in for that set of soft tires on Lap 50, but he probably wouldn't've had the speed to bring Vettel to heel otherwise.  And a 2-3 finish is pretty sweet anyway.  Good job.

*MOVE OF THE RACE: On the final lap, Shiv Hamilton came up behind the McLaren of his ex-teammate Jenson Button, suffering on old tires.  A try at Turn 1 didn't work, so Shiv decided to give a run around the outside of the long Turn 2 a go.

Much to everybody's surprise, including perhaps Hamilton himself, his less-than-stellar tires held traction well enough to let him power past Button.  He then remembered to leave Button racing room in the next turn as well, instead of cutting across his nose.  A fine job of driving from both Brits, and our favorite Move of the Race.

*MOOOOOOOOOO-OOOOVE OF THE RACE:  On Lap 9, Mark Webber brought his Red Bull in for his first stop.  The team had problems with the right rear wheel, however, and were not able to get it fastened onto the stub axle.  Maybe it was a tire gun problem, maybe the nut wouldn't engage, whatever, the upshot was that the Lollypop man let the car go without the tire being attached.  It stayed on the car long enough to allow him to get some speed up before it fell off and went careening down the pit lane.

The Lotus pit crew had just finished servicing one of their cars and were in the pit lane when the tire assembly tore through them; fortunately they were all able to avoid the missile.  Unfortunately, FOM cameraman Paul Allen, who had his camera focused on the Lotus driving away, had no idea that the rubber-and-metal beast was coming for him.

It caught him on the shoulder, sending him face-first to the ground.  He apparently suffered a broken collarbone in the incident, which is about as lucky as you could possibly get.  A video of the incident is here.  The team ran down, collected Webber's car, pushed it back to their pitbox, put another set of tires on, and sent him on his way... a lap down, but still in the race.  To everybody involved on the Red Bull pit crew, congratulations, here's your Mooooooo.

*SELECTED DRIVER QUOTES OF THE RACE:


more...

Posted by: Wonderduck at 11:59 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
Post contains 1372 words, total size 9 kb.

I Just Lost A Nearly Completed F1U!

I am very annoyed with FireFox right now.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 06:23 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
Post contains 15 words, total size 1 kb.

The 100th Ducks In Anime Entry

-Stella Jogakuin Koutouka C3-bu, Ep01

Immensely entertaining, just awesome music in the battle scene, a buncha goofballs... what's not to love? 

Posted by: Wonderduck at 10:21 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 27 words, total size 1 kb.

F1 Quals: Germany 2013

As with Friday Practice here at the Nurb Jr, once again there were no issues with tires pretending to be bombs, for which we are eternally grateful.  There was, unfortunately, another issue with a Williams KERS unit pretending to be a campfire.  About two hours before Practice 3, the KERS unit for Maldonado's car burst into flames in the Williams garage area.  With the help of Force India mechanics, who were practicing pit stops at the time, the fire was extinguished with minimal damage.  One would think that the Williams drivers will be somewhat skittish about pressing the "go fast" button tomorrow in the race, that's for sure.  Speaking of which, let's take a look at the provisional grid for the 2013 Grand Prix of Germany:

Pos	Driver	Team	Q1	Q2	Q3
1	Shiv Hamilton	Mercedes	1:31.131	1:30.152	1:29.398
2	Hannibal Vettel	Red Bull Racing-Renault	1:31.269	1:29.992	1:29.501
3	Mark Webber	Red Bull Racing-Renault	1:31.428	1:30.217	1:29.608
4	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus-Renault	1:30.676	1:29.852	1:29.892
5	Lettuce Grosjean	Lotus-Renault	1:31.242	1:30.005	1:29.959
6	Daniel Ricciardo	STR-Ferrari	1:31.081	1:30.223	1:30.528
7	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1:30.547	1:29.825	1:31.126
8	HWMNBN	Ferrari	1:30.709	1:29.962	1:31.209
9	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	1:31.181	1:30.269	No Time
10	Nico Hulkenberg	Sauber-Ferrari	1:31.132	1:30.231	No Time
11	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:31.322	1:30.326
12	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	1:31.322	1:30.697
13	Sergio Perez	McLaren-Mercedes	1:31.498	1:30.933
14	Esteban Gutierrez	Sauber-Ferrari	1:31.681	1:31.010
15	Adrian F'n Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	1:31.320	1:31.010
16	Jules Vergne	STR-Ferrari	1:31.629	1:31.104
17	Valtteri Bottas	Williams-Renault	1:31.693
18	Goði Maldonado	Williams-Renault	1:31.707
19	Charles Pic	Caterham-Renault	1:32.937
20	Jules Bianchi	Marussia-Cosworth	1:33.063
21	Giedo van der Garde	Caterham-Renault	1:33.734
22	Max Chilton	Marussia-Cosworth	1:34.098

Shiv Hamilton was the last guy on track and shot down Hannibal Vettel's pole-sitting time with a blisteringly hot lap, depriving the German the pole for his home race... again.  Meanwhile, Hamilton's teammate Nico Rosberg was bounced out of Qualifying in Q2 in what was just a simple case of overconfidence.  See, Rosberg had set a perfectly reasonable time on his first run in the session, the team brought him in for a new set of tires, pulled him into the garage, as is normal, to perform little adjustments, get the fuel level exactly where they wanted it... and there he sat, in the car, waiting to go out for his second run.  And he sat.  And sat.  Then, once it was too late for him to do an out lap and get around to the start/finish line to begin a hot lap, times began tumbling.  He fell from, if memory serves, 2nd on the time sheet to tenth with only one car left on track: Kimi Raikkonen, at the time sitting in 14th.  Yep, that didn't work out for Rosberg at all.  Raikkonen jumped above Rosberg, bumping him out of the session.  Rosberg, ever the gracious driver, later threw the team under the bus, blaming them for the mistake and whining that he's got no chance to do anything in the race now.

The Force India boys just sneered at him.

If there's a team to watch out for in the race, it's Ferrari.  Everybody ahead of them are starting on the soft tire, which are expected to last maybe 10 laps.  The red cars, however, are on the medium rubber, which seem to run for 25 or so before giving up the ghost.  They're also maybe a second a lap slower.  IF, and that may be a big "if", Ferrari can stay close to the front group, they'll be able to make up the time in the pitstops.

The race is Sunday morning, and F1U! will be along sometime afterwards.  See you then!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:38 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 618 words, total size 16 kb.

F1 Practice: Germany 2013

Normally, I will say that nothing occurred during Friday Practice, and it'll sound world-weary and jaded.  I mean, I've seen literally hundreds of practice sessions, and nothing of importance occurs in the vast majority of them... of course I'm going to sound somewhat beaten down and bored by the whole thing.  You've seen one practice session, you've seen 'em all.  Truly, there's very little in this world more depressing than the sight of a jaded, world-weary duck.

However, today's practice sessions at The Nurb Jr were somewhat different.  Today, nothing important or dramatic occurred, and that's exactly what we wanted.  There were no wild tire blowouts, there were no drivers boycotting the race due to safety concerns, no Pirelli executives being strung up by their wheel nuts, nothing like that at all.  For this race, the tire company from Italy has a Kevlar-backed tire, as in 2012, just with 2013's rubber compound bonded to it.  Which, coincidentally, is what they wanted to bring to Silverstone last week, but such a massive change needs to have unanimity from the teams to be approved.  Three teams (Lotus, Force India, and another that I can't find right now) refused to allow the change, saying "we built our cars to work with these tires, if the others didn't, that's their lookout." 

Well, after the issues at Silverstone, the FIA stepped in and said "make the changes, Pirelli."  They also made mandatory a number of things that Pirelli could only suggest the teams do: run the tires at a certain PSI level, limit negative camber amount, prevent teams from reversing tire sides, so on and so forth.  Methinks Jean Todt, current President of the FIA, is running for reelection.  So that's where we stand on the tire issue for this race... there'll be a new tire altogether at the next race in Hungary.  I suspect it'll be made out of wire-wrapped armor plating dipped in cyanoacrylate... no way it'll come apart.

Oh, and Marussia's Jules Bianchi had an upset tummy today and missed P1 and most of P2.  I can't tell if the foam padding has been lightly browned or not...

Quals in the morning... see you sometime thereafter!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 04:08 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 368 words, total size 3 kb.

July 4th, 2013

Enjoy Independence Day, everybody!  Or, for my overseas readers, have a nice Thursday.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:35 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 16 words, total size 1 kb.

F1 On The NBC Networks: Germany 2013

It is called by many names.  Nordschleife.  The Ultimate Track.  Nurburgring.  The Toughest Circuit In The World.  It is best known, though, by the name Jackie Stewart gave it in 1970:  The Green Hell.  12.93 miles long.  154 turns.  Over 1000 feet of difference between the lowest and highest points on the track.  Man and machine race here.  Man and machine die here: somewhere between three and 12 drivers are killed on the Nordschleife, or "North Loop" every year.  A modern Formula 1 race here would be roughly 12 laps long, and be the most exciting spectacle we've ever seen.   Which is why they don't race F1 there anymore.  Instead, for the Grand Prix of Germany, they race on the purpose-built F1 track, which has many names of its own: GP-Strecke.  Green Party Ring.  Ersatzring.  Or, as we here at F1 Update! call it, Nurb Jr.  Let's take a look at this massive letdown, shall we?

This circuit has two strikes against it right from the start.  First, it actually has a turn named after Slappy Schumacher.  Second, it's not the Nordschleif.  It was, however, the site of one of my favorite moments in F1 history, the 2007 Grand Prix of Europe.  Everybody and their brother started the race on dry-weather tires, and by the time the Thundering Herd reached Turn 4, the skies had opened up and most of the North Sea had deposited itself upon the track.  Many, many cars went slithering into the kittylitter at Turn 7, including Vitantonio Liuzzi going down the hill to 7 backwards to gently end up nuzzling a mobile crane.  Meanwhile, Marcus Winklehock, in his first and last F1 drive, had started the race on full wets and had a thirty-second lead on the field... in a SPYKER, no less... when the red flag was thrown.  Ah, good times, good times.

But I digress.  This year's excitement will be all because of tires.  Specifically, Pirelli tires that seem to have a propensity to explode... at least, if you ask the teams, they do.  If you ask Pirelli, the tire failures are down to the teams using them the wrong way.  Now how, I hear you asking, can they be using tires the wrong way?  Well, it's easy if you're in Formula 1.  F1 tires are "handed," if you like: they're designed to be run one way and one way only.  If a tire is made for the right-rear, that's where it's supposed to be put.  Some bright spark discovered that if you switch sides with the rears, they last a little longer, and you might get a little bit of speed bonus, too. So you've got a bunch of teams running around with their rear tires on the wrong sides, with tire pressures too low (16 - 18psi is normal), and then they run over the backside of a curb and they're shocked that the tires fail?  But it's Pirelli's fault.

Drivers were talking about boycotting the race.  Teams were rumbling ominously about being cross with Pirelli... even though if they had agreed to the proposed changes that Pirelli suggested a few races back, these tire failures probably wouldn't have occurred.  And on and on.  In the end, I'll be shocked if Pirelli willingly comes back next year.  "A pox on all of you."

Speaking of poxes: due to the interference from the Tour de Drug Dealers, the race weekend is again all a-jumble.  All I know for sure is that the 2013 Grand Prix of Germany will be on CNBC at 630am on Sunday.  Oh, and that F1U! will be watching everything.  See you soon!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 07:49 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
Post contains 611 words, total size 4 kb.

F1 Update!: Great Britain 2013

We here at F1U! didn't notice the skies over Silverstone today, but it wasn't raining, that's all that's really important.  So it wasn't raining when the cars formed up on the grid behind polesitter and "hometown lad" Shiv Hamilton.  One could only assume, however, that points leader Hannibal Vettel was feeling confident and relaxed as the 22 drivers waited for the lights to go out.  But what happened after that?  That's why you're here!  THIS is your F1 Update! for the 2013 Grand Prix of Great Britain!

*LIGHTS OUT!:  Here at F1U!, we understand that Red Bull driver Mark Webber has a problem.  We call the "Mark Webber Lousy Start^©" and are just amazed every time it happens.  Other than in Australia, however, he's been pretty good this season.  Not today, though... today, he made up for lost opportunities.  When the lights went out, Shiv Hamilton made a clean getaway from pole, as did Hannibal Vettel in his Red Bull.  Hamilton's teammate Nico Rosberg's start wasn't quite as good as Vettel's, which dropped him into third.  And then, there was Webber.  Our first thought was that he had been balked by a slow-starting Rosberg, but replays proved us wrong: it was a classic "MWLS^©," and a real doozy at that.  As they approached Turn 1, he was already down to 10th, and soon to be playing the part of pinball.  He was plonked by the Lotus of Lettuce Grosjean, kicked off the track and into the runoff area of Turn 1 with quite a bit of damage to his front wing.  Dropped to 15th, it looked like he was out and gone from view.  Meanwhile, Felipe Massa apparently woke up today feeling like the man he was before the incident with The Spring.  He jumped to 5th place from 11th on the grid and was looking quite racey indeed.

*ONE TWO THREE!:  Hannibal Vettel's modus operandi when he starts a race from the pole is "get away clean, do everything possible to get one second ahead of second place by the time they turn on the DRS system, then run away and hide."  It's a good plan, and has worked very well for him.  Upon occasion, it's worked for other drivers as well.  Today, Shiv Hamilton was giving it a shot, and sure enough, everything was coming up roses for him.  He had a 1.5 second lead over Vettel when DRS was activated for the field, and was over two seconds ahead on Lap 7.  It was early, but things at least seemed like they were going well for the Mercedes driver.  Then, suddenly, everything went south.  His left-rear tire nigh-on exploded, sending pieces of rubber spraying across the racetrack and greatly reducing the amount of traction available.  He managed to limp his car around half the circuit back to the pits, but dropped from first place to last in the time it took to do so.  One could only imagine the glances down to the Pirelli office on the pit lane.  Of course, this promoted Hannibal Vettel into the lead, Nico Rosberg to second, the Force India of Adrian F'n Sutil to third, and Felipe Massa to fourth.  Until Lap 10.  It was on Lap 10 that Felipe Massa's Ferrari blew his left-rear tire in almost the same place as Hamilton.  The glances at Pirelli's office suddenly changed to stares.  Then, on Lap 15, while Jules Vergne was under attack by the Lotus of Kimi Raikkonen, we saw our third tire failure of the day.

It goes without saying that it was a left-rear, of course.  That made three in seven laps, and four on the weekend (McLaren's Sergio Perez suffered a left-rear failure during practice).  The stares at the Pirelli offices had become glares.  Unsurprisingly, given the amount of carbon fiber and rubber debris strewn around the circuit, Race Director Charlie Whiting called out a Safety Car, only the third we've seen at Silverstone since 2006.  Whiting later admitted that he considered red-flagging the race at that point.

*HOO-BOY:  A number of drivers came in for new tires at this point.  Soon we were hearing radio calls from Ferrari and Red Bull to HWMNBN and both Hannibal Vettel and Mark Webber, saying the same thing: we see cuts on the inside of your left-rear tires, stay off the curbs.  Tire pressures were duly increased and drivers tried to be slightly less aggressive.

*YOU'RE KIDDING:  When the race resumed on Lap 21, it was very much like we've been used to at the beginning of a race: Vettel rabbitting off into the distance, Rosberg grimly keeping in touch but failing to do anything to close the gap.  For the next 15 or 16 laps, that's the way it stayed; Vettel with a two or three second lead over Rosberg, while Vergne retired his Toro Rosso.  The damage it suffered when the tire let go was too much for safety's sake.  When Vettel came in for his last tire stop and resumed in the lead, it looked like the race was won.

*AND THEN...:  On Lap 42, the partisan British crowd at Silverstone reacted before the announcers did, a huge cheer coming up from every throat on the front straight: Hannibal Vettel slowed, then stopped, just past the start/finish line.

His gearbox failure brought out the second safety car of the day, sending many of the leaders scrambling for the pit lane again for a new set of tires.  The lone exception was Kimi Raikkonen, who quickly was saying to the Lotus pit box that "they'd made a mistake."  In many ways, Nico Rosberg was the big loser from all this: while gifted first place, he also lost a thirteen second lead.  The standings were Rosberg, Raikkonen, Sutil, Ricciardo, Webber, Perez, Button and HWMNBN.

*GO GO GO OH NO NOT AGAIN: The safety car came in on Lap 45, giving us a seven-lap sprint to the finish.  Mark Webber, he of the Lousy Start back at the beginning of the race, began to gun down those ahead of him: first Ricciardo, then Sutil, putting him in third and hunting himself some Finnish Lotus driver.  And then, on Lap 46, Sergio Perez suffered a failure of his left-rear tire.  Again.  The fourth tire failure of the race didn't bring out a safety car, but the glares at the Pirelli offices had become daggers. 

*THE END:  Webber fought his way past a recalcitrant Raikkonen (and if that looks hard to type, you're right) to take second on Lap 48, and he began to track down Nico Rosberg, a mere 1.37 seconds ahead.  Meanwhile, the Finn's old tires proved to be too much for him to overcome.  First HWMNBN, then Shiv Hamilton, got past him, dropping him to fifth.  Back up at the front, Webber cut the lead to Rosberg down to 0.765 seconds, but could get no closer as the race ended.  HWMNBN finished third, with a charging Hamilton 0.632 seconds behind him.  Both the Aussie and the Brit had to be ruing what had happened at the beginning of the race.

*DRIVER OF THE RACE:  Boy, is this one hard to call.  Webber started 4th, dropped to 15th, and finished 2nd.  HWMNBN started 10th, dropped to 11th, and finished 3rd.  But Mercedes' Shiv  Hamilton started on pole, suffered the first tire failure, dropped to dead last, then worked his way back to fourth place.  That's a pretty decent performance, all told.

*TEAM OF THE RACE:  Mercedes.  1st - 4th is a pretty good way to finish, particularly given all that went down with Hamilton during the day.  Honorable mention goes to Force India for finishing 7th and 9th, with Sutil holding a podium position for a good chunk of the race.

*MOVE OF THE RACE:  On Lap 49, Shiv Hamilton was behind Adrian F'n Sutil's Force India, and looking to get past in a hurry.  When he made his move, it looked like there was no way he could make it work... he was so far back.  Sutil braked, Hamilton didn't, and he still made it look like the car was on rails as he zipped up the inside and blew the doors off the Force India.  Just an astonishing pass on TV.  After watching it frame-by-frame on my computer, it wasn't as impressive, sure... but at the time, we here at F1U! Central dropped our forks into our deep-dish pizza in amazement.

*MOOOOOOOO-OOOOVE OF THE RACE:  On Lap 31, HWMNBN had come in for new tires.  The 2.8 second stop seemed quite impressive, and the Ferrari lollypop man released him to rejoin the race... right into the path of the incoming Lotus of Lettuce Grosjean.

How he avoided the Lotus, the McLaren pit crew, the Lotus lollypop man, and an unsafe release penalty is entirely beyond me.  Here's to Ferrari's pit lane crew, and here's your Mooooo!

*SELECTED DRIVER QUOTES OF THE RACE:

more...

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:59 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
Post contains 1659 words, total size 11 kb.

F1 Quals: Great Britain 2013

British weather didn't happen all over Silverstone today!  It was hardly a beautiful summer day, unless you think gray and cloudy and meh is beautiful, but it wasn't raining.  So what effect did having acceptable climactic conditions have on the F1 Circus?  Here's your provisional grid for the 2013 Grand Prix of Great Britain:

Pos	Driver	Team	Q1	Q2	Q3
1	Shiv Hamilton	Mercedes	1:30.995	1:31.224	1:29.607
2	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:31.355	1:31.028	1:30.059
3	Hannibal Vettel	Red Bull Racing-Renault	1:31.559	1:30.990	1:30.211
4	Mark Webber	Red Bull Racing-Renault	1:31.605	1:31.002	1:30.220
5	Paul di Resta	Force India-Mercedes	1:32.062	1:31.291	1:30.736
6	Daniel Ricciardo	STR-Ferrari	1:32.097	1:31.182	1:30.757
7	Adrian F'n Sutil	Force India-Mercedes	1:32.002	1:31.097	1:30.908
8	Lettuce Grosjean	Lotus-Renault	1:31.466	1:31.530	1:30.955
9	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus-Renault	1:31.400	1:31.592	1:30.962
10	HWMNBN	Ferrari	1:32.266	1:31.387	1:30.979
11	Jenson Button	McLaren-Mercedes	1:31.979	1:31.649
12	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	1:32.241	1:31.779
13	Jules Vergne	STR-Ferrari	1:32.105	1:31.785
14	Sergio Perez	McLaren-Mercedes	1:31.953	1:32.082
15	Nico Hulkenberg	Sauber-Ferrari	1:32.168	1:32.211
16	Bishop Maldonado	Williams-Renault	1:32.512	1:32.359
17	Valtteri Bottas	Williams-Renault	1:32.664
18	Esteban Gutierrez	Sauber-Ferrari	1:32.666
19	Charles ToothPic	Caterham-Renault	1:33.866
20	Jules Bianchi	Marussia-Cosworth	1:34.108
21	Giedo van der Garde	Caterham-Renault	1:35.481
22	Max Chilton	Marussia-Cosworth	1:35.858
	Q1 107% Time		1:37.364

Every fiber of my being wants to say that Force India has a chance at a podium tomorrow.  Paul di Resta is driving like the reincarnation of Jackie Stewart (who isn't dead, details details), Adrian F'n Sutil is driving like Adrian F'n Sutil, and the car is proving to be pretty good.  I want it to happen.  I want it to happen so badly I can practically taste it (though I think that's just the chicken tandoori I had for dinner last night). 

I just don't think it'll happen.  I can imagine a lot of scenarios where it DOES occur, but they're all kinda far-fetched: the Red Bull drivers collide with each other, Hamilton runs his tires bald then skids into the kittylitter trying to get to the pits, Raikkonen flatspots a tire and the vibration shatters his suspension, that sort of thing.  No, I just don't think FI is ready as a team to have a serious podium chance.  Soon... very soon, perhaps... but not yet.

I also don't expect to see the Mercedes teammates on the podium, either.  One of them, perhaps... Hamilton seems particularly driven this weekend, and his pole position breaks Rosberg's streak of four in a row.  I expect that the Red Bull Whaaaaaaaaambulance is warming up as we speak, getting ready to complain about how the Silver Arrows gained an unfair advantage with that tire test and the punishment didn't fit the crime and so on and so forth.  I've actually lost a lot of respect for the team recently; they really used to be a model team showing how to do it right.  Then they started to dork over Webber, now they've whined about this Mercedes/Pirelli thing so much that it has become embarrassing.  In the immortal words of just about every fan ever, "shut up and drive."

Which I expect Vettel will do.  Particularly with his chief competitor HWMNBN qualifying in 10th place, the World Champ has a golden opportunity to put the 2013 championship out of reach this weekend.

As an aside, I'm no longer surprised by McLaren's performance.  They just done goofed this year, and I'm assuming they've written off they year and are working towards 2014 and the new rules and engine.  As an another aside, Tooned is coming back this weekend, so we've got that to look forward to.  As an another aside altogether, the race will be shown LIVE on CNBC at 630am on Sunday.  Tune in, and we'll see you then!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 11:50 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
Post contains 629 words, total size 17 kb.

F1 Practice: Great Britain 2013

We had lovely British weather today at Silverstone, so you can guess what that means:

Yup!  Rain, and lots of it!  First practice was practically wiped out.  P2 saw teams out and about, but the track was just wet enough that there was something of a feeling of restraint the entire session.  Even that wasn't enough to save Felipe Massa from wrecking again.  Twice at Monaco, once in Canada, now at Silverstone... dude has something against his Ferrari mechanics, I think.  While the teams did try to get some new parts tested on their cars, they probably didn't get accomplished.  So let's skip over practice and talk about the really big news of the day.

Mark Webber announced his retirement from Formula 1, effective at the end of the season.  He's not retiring from racing; he'll be joining Porsche's newly reborn LMP1 program in the World Endurance Championship series, which includes, of course, the 24 Hours of LeMans.  Arguably, this is a step up for the Aussie, as he'll be heading what should be a serious contender right away.  It's also a return to endurance racing for him, as he first came to the attention of the racing world via the long races.

Unfortunately, the loss of Mark Webber means that the man called "The Conscience of Formula 1" will no longer be speaking truth to power.  He's always been outspoken... he stepped out against racing at Bahrain, quite loudly in fact... and he certainly stood his ground against his teammate.  Red Bull's support of Hannibal Vettel has often come at the expense of Webber (consider Helmut Marko's attempt to blame the 2010 incident at Turkey on the Aussie), and at this year's Malaysian Grand Prix, Vettel ignored team orders, took the win from Webber, then got no penalty from the team in return... well.  It was pretty clear at that point that Webber had had enough.

We here at F1U! don't have a favorite driver at the moment... but if we did, we could be convinced that Webber would be worth supporting.  He'll be missed from F1, and I suspect from Red Bull as well... but at least we'll see him during LeMans.

Quals sometime tomorrow!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:00 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 372 words, total size 2 kb.