After two weeks away, it’s hard to know where to plunge back in - especially when so much seems to have happened in that time.

I kept an eye on the Formula 1 2010 nonsense, but despite all the teams having now entered, it still seems to me more like a lull or a ceasefire than a lasting peace.

I first saw the news that the FIA confirmed the entry list, and FOTA called off their breakaway series. It all looked good.

But the following day there was anger from Max Mosley over comments made by FOTA. I expected further rumblings over the following days, but for a week now it’s all been rather quiet.

Too quiet? I’m sure 2010 is secure now, but it seems inevitable that there will be another explosion of political rubbish when further discussions are called for. But with a bit of luck, for now at least, we can just get on with a bit of racing.

I’m about to go off on a two-week holiday, so there’s little chance that I’ll watch the British Grand Prix live, and I certainly won’t be at Silverstone for the last Formula 1 race there for the forseeable future. This is a shame. But I’m going on holiday, so I’ll really get over it.

Anyway, I’m pleased to have been to the British Grand Prix at Silverstone before. I went to qualifying in I think 2002, and watching the cars change direction at incredible speed through Maggots is something I’ll probably never forget. It was good enough to convince me to go to the race in 2003 - which has gone down as one of the best British Grands Prix in history.

It was a constantly fascinating race, and trying to keep up with the movers and shakers - including a memorable Toyota one-two at one point - made the time absolutely fly by. Fortuitously I was sat at Bridge, so saw at first hand Rubens Barrichello take the lead - which he would hold on to - on lap 42, after Kimi Raikkonen ran wide.

What was a lot less clear on the day was what happened on lap 12. The safety car was deployed, and on the big screens we could just make out a man in green and orange running on track. It later transpired that the track had been invaded by a religious protestor, but at trackside we hadn’t much clue what was going on.

I’ve mixed feelings about Silverstone. It’s a classic circuit, and I’m a big fan of the traffic management, especially compared to Donington Park in the past. Maybe I’ll see the MotoGP at Silverstone when it moves across, but for any national series, Formula 1 safety requirements mean the crowd is just too far removed from the track, compared to smaller circuits.

So hopefully the 2009 Formula 1 race will be a fitting finale. Jenson Button has to be the favourite, but that man Barrichello should feature strongly, and let’s not forget Sebastian Vettel. Pushed for a prediction, they’re my (predictable) choices for the podium - though not in any particular order.

The weekend saw action from the BTCC, WRC, and MotoGP. On recent form, I would have put money on the BTCC providing the most exciting racing, but that was far from the truth.

There was a time when MotoGP practically guaranteed close, exciting racing. That’s not been the case for a while, and detractors have enjoyed pointing out that not since 2006 have we seen a rider overtake for the win on the last lap.

That drought ended in emphatic fashion on Sunday in Catalunya, with a quite stunning climax to the race, Valentino Rossi ultimately triumphing over Jorge Lorenzo after the pair fought magnificently to the line. It has to be seen.

Almost as remarkably, the result leaves Rossi, Lorenzo and Stoner tied on 106 points at the top of the championship.

The World Rally Championship is looking close now too, with Mikko Hirvonen’s victory closing the gap to Sebastien Loeb to just 7 points. That’s because Loeb crashed out spectacularly. Again, it has to be seen.

I was slightly traumatised to see that the guest on Dave’s coverage of the rally was going to be Ben Shepherd. But, contrary to expectations, he was by a country mile the best guest they’ve had. He was a lot of fun and - being a presenter himself - utterly relaxed chatting away in front of the camera.

It was left to the BTCC to disappoint. The first two races were completely dominated by the Team RAC BMWs, and the third was plagued by safety car periods, thanks to cars skating off the track in the wet conditions.

A quick word about ITV4’s Le Mans 24 Hour coverage. The last half hour of the race in the middle of the BTCC broadcast was a bit dull, but the podium is always a thing of joy at Le Mans. The hour and a bit of live coverage before the BTCC, however, was surprisingly worthwhile - it managed to cover the progress of the most important entrants, and many of the issues surrounding the race. Well done to the commentators - John Hindhaugh and Graham Goodwin.

The Le Mans 24 Hour is the big jobby this weekend. After extensive and impressive coverage of another legendary event this week - the Isle of Man TT - ITV4 has coverage of it. Sort of.

Qualifying highlights are on Saturday morning from 11.20am to 11.55am. The race gets under way on Saturday at 2pm UK time. ITV4 has race coverage only between 10.30am and 11.45am on Sunday morning.

After that Le Mans makes way for the British Touring Car Championship from Croft.

But it means that ITV4 won’t be showing the end of the race, either live or in highlights form. Unless it’s going to interrupt the BTCC programme, or highlights are going to be broadcast later than next weekend - which is when we have TV listings until. It’s all a bit odd.

In any case, Eurosport naturally has hours and hours of coverage.

And don’t forget that MotoGP is in Catalunya - for its second of three visits to Spain in 2009 - too.

Another busy weekend, then.

As I posted on Twitter this morning, the FIA has issued the entry list for the 2010 Formula 1 World Championship.

Williams and Force India are both on the list, having lodged unconditional entries. Williams is “pleased”.

Ferrari, Red Bull Racing and Toro Rosso all have unconditional entries, despite having entered only conditionally with the rest of FOTA. All three teams are less than chuffed about this. But the FIA has entered them, because they have previously committed to Formula 1 until 2012.

The other FOTA teams - McLaren, BMW Sauber, Renault, Toyota and Brawn GP - all have conditional entries. They have until the end of Friday 19th June 2009 to lift the conditions.

Three new teams are included on the entry list, but that number will expand if those conditions are not lifted.

Team US F1 was practically guaranteed to be on the entry list, and is. Campos Grand Prix, run by Campos Meta, was another of the pre-announcement favourites, and it’s there too.

The surprise is Manor F1 Team, run by Manor Grand Prix Racing. This is where Wirth Research - having been mentioned in the Ferrari / FIA legal case - comes in, designing the Manor car.

No Prodrive is a bit of a shock, given that the team was successful last time the FIA opened the doors to a new team a couple of years ago. But, like several of the other so far unsuccessful teams, Prodrive is waiting to see what happens, and whether there will yet be more room for new teams.

That’s as brief as I can manage, anyway. There’s masses more on autosport.com and the like, if you’ve got countless hours to spare.

ITV4’s nightly coverage of the Isle of Man TT races hasn’t been perfect, but by god it’s been very good. The camera shots they’ve been getting, in particular, genuinely deserve some sort of award.

The slow motion footage from high motion cameras has been nothing short of stunning. A bike hitting the ground after a jump is the obvious candidate for the high motion treatment, and indeed it’s been well worth the effort of capturing that - seeing the bike squirm on landing and the rider regaining control in such clarity is an absolute treat. But other details have been highlighted by the high motion cameras as well, like the screen being buffeted by the air at high speed. And it all looks brilliant.

On board cameras have provided some great pictures too - specifically of riders’ faces, and of the scenery flying by at close quarters.

The TT is about the spectacle of motorbikes lapping the Mountain Course at high speed, as well as the races themselves. And it’s that spectacle which ITV4 has captured near-perfectly through outstanding camera work.

Coverage of the races has been further from perfect - though certainly not bad. Like rallying, it’s hard to convey the story of the race through split times - but that’s the nature of racing against the clock.

BBC MotoGP pit lane man Matt Roberts has been a better presenter when he’s stood in for Craig Doyle, but Doyle is hardly offensive. As for commentary, James Whittam and Steve Parrish has, as suspected, proved an odd combination. Neither man has been poor, but a lack of familiarity - in terms of not working together regularly - perhaps conspires against them.

One extremely odd moment, however, was Parrish interviewing Valentino Rossi at trackside. It was as if Rossi had no idea what Parrish was doing there. Maybe Rossi just wanted to spectate in peace, but given that Parrish is there in the MotoGP paddock every race, you’d think that there would have been more congeniality. By comparison, Rossi seemed entirely at ease talking to Matt Roberts.

But for top quality interviews, there’s only been one man: Guy Martin, the rider who is never far from a cup of tea. Thinking about it, give him a medal too.

The future of Wales Rally GB has had downs and ups over the past few months. The problem is that the Welsh Assembly Government has pulled its sponsorship.

The good news is that the event will now definitely run in 2009. What will happen for 2010 may depend on the result of the legal case against the Welsh Assembly Government.

But the surprising news is that the MSA - motorsport’s governing body in the UK - is underwriting the 2009 event itself. Says MSA chairman Alan Gow:

“In recent years, the MSA has exercised prudent management of its finances to create a surplus in order to protect the sport against unforeseen circumstances.”

According to autosport.com, it costs about £2.2 million to put on the rally. That’s some pretty extreme prudence for the MSA to have that much in its back pocket.

It makes me wonder whether the MSA ought to run a circuit or two. If it had been in charge of Silverstone or Donington Park, maybe we wouldn’t have all the current faff around the Formula 1 British Grand Prix.

Jenson Button continued his seemingly inexorable journey towards the Formula 1 world championship at the weekend, winning in Turkey. But the question is: how much longer can we stomach his success?

We’ve had Bernie Ecclestone - and others - saying that it’s boring already, but I quite disagree.

I’ve thought about this a bit, and come to the conclusion that the length of time we can tolerate success is proportional to the preceding period of failure. Because we like the underdog, don’t we?

So Lewis Hamilton’s immediate success in Formula 1 was entirely unacceptable, because he had not earned it by first enduring a period of failure.

Jenson Button, on the other hand, hadn’t really been at the front of the grid in his nine previous years of Formula 1. So I’ll gladly see him dominate the entire season, and take the world title by a country mile.

Next season, of course, is a different matter. There’s no need for Button to go back to 2008 levels of awfulness, but a more modest campaign will be required to maintain support.

It’s unlikely that Brawn GP will be anything like as strong next year anyway, since their car won’t have been developed by Honda for about a year before the start of the season.

Conversely, if Hamilton takes his tough times with good grace - as he seems determined to after Turkey - then public support could well come to him for 2010.

Unfortunately, after behaving for the practice sessions, the weather for the Isle of Man TT has taken a turn for the torrential. So today’s races have been postponed to Monday - because it’s not expected to get any better tomorrow - with the other races shuffling back accordingly.

Watching some practice highlights this morning, it struck me quite how special an event the TT is. The Monaco Formula 1 Grand Prix was just a fortnight ago, and is trumpeted as a raw, dangerous, exciting street race. But it’s very tame by comparison to the Isle of Man TT races.

There’s an official promo video on YouTube, which is well worth watching. Superbikes speeding down narrow roads with buildings on either side is just jaw dropping.

So I’ll look forward to watching the race highlights on ITV4 next week. Commentary is from Steve Parrish and James Whittam - an intriguing combination, and I’ll be interested to see how well it works. There’s a programme on every night, though obviously this weekend’s are a bit screwed now.

But it’s the spectators who made the journey over to the Isle of Man for the weekend who I really feel sorry for. It’s just not fair for them.

Twitter is taking off in motorsport circles. On the one hand it’s intriguing to hear more from those working in the sport; on the other, it’s no better than a legitimised form of stalking.

Either way, there’s a lot to learn from Twitter. And since it’s Follow Friday, I thought I’d share what I’ve learned from a few of the more enthusiastic contributors.

BBC Formula 1 reporter Lee McKenzie mainly seems to have a lot of fun jetting around filming features for television. But she also thinks that The Killers are the “best band around”. She is sorely mistaken.

Tremendous commentators Martin Haven and Toby Moody are both getting excited about the Le Mans 24 Hour. But I’ve also learned that Martin Haven clearly loves gardening, and Toby Moody has had a wisdom tooth out. And did a voice over for Boots.

There is such a thing as too much enthusiasm though. BBC MotoGP presenter Suzi Perry doesn’t seem to stop tweeting, and Force India tweets more detail about the team’s progress through each session than anyone could ever want.