Ah, the wildcard entry. There’s little better than seeing a rider or driver on an unfamiliar grid, beating the regulars. Unless you’re one of the regulars, of course.

Formula 1

Formula 1 doesn’t do wildcards. It’s a shame, but I can’t see how it could work.

Ferrari – famously keen on the idea of running a three-car team – would probably enter a wildcard at every race. Probably the same driver, if they could get away with it.

Instead, one driver getting a chance in F1 means another losing out. Karun Chandhok is the lucky one this weekend in Germany, taking the place of Jarno Trulli at Team Lotus. No bad thing.

MotoGP

Maybe it’s because there’s not as much spare cash sloshing around the sport, but there are no such restrictions on wildcards in MotoGP. And they can provide some real highlights.

Troy Bayliss, for example, winning the final race of the 2006 season at Valencia, on a wildcard entry for Ducati, having already won the World Superbike title for them. That was in place of the injured Sete Gibernau though, so perhaps not the purest example of a wildcard.

There’s a proper wildcard entry for AMA rider Ben Bostrom this weekend at Laguna Seca. He’ll double the number of riders at LCR Honda, persumably as a bit of a kick up the arse for Toni Elias. It’ll be fascinating to see how he gets on.

Hopper

The man LCR Honda really wanted was apparently John Hopkins – who suddenly finds himself in demand this season, after a couple of troubled years.

His performance in British Superbikes has been one of the highlights of the year so far. To so quickly return to winning ways, on the unfamiliar and – shall we say – idiosyncratic, circuits of the British Isles is hugely impressive. Hands up who wouldn’t love to see him win the championship? If your hand’s up, shame on you.

He’s already been rewarded by Suzuki with one MotoGP race – standing in for an injured Alvaro Bautista at Jerez – and he’s got a wildcard entry on a second Suzuki at Brno next month. Not only that, but he – along with his BSB team-mate – has a wildcard entry for the World Superbike round at Silverstone.

You can’t blame him for passing on LCR Honda, and not risking his clearly very good relationship with Suzuki. Already I can’t wait to see what he’ll be doing next season.

Superbikes

He’s by no means the only superbike rider to get about.

Tom Sykes had a wildcard entry for the Brands Hatch GP round of British Superbikes last year, with the Kawasaki World Superbike team, and won two of the three races. He’s doing the same again this year.

And before he made his MotoGP debut proper in 2010, Ben Spies had a clutch of wildcard entries: three in 2008 for Suzuki, when he was riding for them in AMA; and one in 2009 for Yamaha, when he won the World Superbike title with them. He scored points in every one of them.

Four wheels

Unless I’m being an idiot – quite possible – wildcards on four wheels don’t tend to be quite so high profile.

There’s a bit of it in touring cars – Colin Turkington at the Donington Park round of the WTCC last weekend, for example. But that didn’t go terribly well.

Rallying too. Volkswagen, for example, preparing for the debut of the Polo R WRC in 2013, by running Skoda Fabia S2000s for various young drivers this season.

But most enticing is The $5,000,000 Challenge in IndyCar – which will see five non-regulars race at the finale in Las Vegas. The lure is a $5 million payout if they win the race. How great an idea is that? Very great.

If only Formula 1 had an appetite for that sort of thing…

Apologies in advance for the length of this post. It’s the equivalent of the ’90s Saturday lunchtime ITV multimedia extravaganza Movies, Games and Videos – by which I mean it’s incoherent – but with less Steve Priestley. Sadly.

Senna

Senna is already the third highest grossing documentary ever at the UK box office (excluding concerts) – and deservingly so.

Top of that list is Farenheit 9/11, with what looks like an unassailable £6.5 million. Second place looks distinctly more achievable – March of the Penguins with £3.1 million (I think, though that disagrees with the figure quoted elsewhere).

As of last weekend, Senna was just shy of the £3 million barrier, which it should pass this week. Give it a couple of weeks, and I reckon it’ll take the number two spot. It should do, if you look at the trend.

TT3D: Closer To The Edge

There’s good reason to think that Senna will hang around in cinemas for a while yet, in the form of the also excellent TT3D: Closer To The Edge. After 12 weeks on release, it’s still taking money, albeit at only six sites last week. It’s grossed over £1.2 million to date.

Which means the DVD and Blu-ray release, which I am keenly awaiting, is still yet to be dated. The good news is that plans seems to be well advanced though, as there’s an extensive listing on Duke Video now.

More Guy Martin

But if you can’t wait for more Guy Martin, then this entry to the Relentless Energy Drink Short Stories film competition, entitled Isle of Man Tourist Trophy, is worth a watch. It’s a bit like TT3D, but about 100 minutes shorter.

The other Short Stories entries aren’t terribly easy to find on the Relentless webste, but a search on YouTube does the trick. They’re an interesting bunch.

In other Guy Martin news, he revealed in passing this week that he’s got another TV project in the works. And in ACTUAL RACING NEWS, also this week he won the Senior Race at the Southern 100. Which is good.

Games

Lastly, a game! Or perhaps more accurately, a promotional tool for Red Bull Speed Jam, which takes place in Cardiff on 3rd September. Amongst the attractions will be Red Bull Racing, aerial acrobatics from the Red Bull Matadors, and the finals of the Red Bull Kart Fight karting competition.

Red Bull Kart Fight is also the name of the game, which comes in iPhone and browser variants. Buy Red Bull – if you can stand the stuff – enter the code thereon, and you can win tickets to Speed Jam through playing the game.

The iPhone version is little more than glorified Scalextric: accelerate and brake are the only meaningful inputs; tilting only adds drift and modifies the racing line which you automatically follow. Not good. Still, better than the TT3D promotional iPhone game.

Thankfully there are proper controls in the browser version, which isn’t a bad litle “nod to Micro Machines” – to quote the company behind the game.

I’ve missed the last couple of races live, but quarks remain the best way to review a Formula 1 race. So let’s do it.

Up

A drying Silverstone made for an enjoyable race throughout, but it built up to quite the climax on the last lap.

The less said about Lewis Hamilton’s weekend the better, but at least he held on to 4th place from a rapidly catching Felipe Massa, even if it did involve some unfortunate trading of carbon fibre.

Equally exciting was Mark Webber chasing down Sebastian Vettel – at least until Christian Horner issued unnecessary team orders to call off the battle for 2nd place.

Down

It looked promising for Team Lotus. Heikki Kovalainen got through to Q2 on Saturday, and changing conditions always present an opportunity for the little teams. It wasn’t to be though: Kovalainen lost fourth gear and retired after just a couple of laps; and it wasn’t long until Jarno Trulli too retired with an oil leak. Bad, bad luck.

Charm

It was an especially informal build up to the race on the BBC. The first half hour was more like an episode of Top Gear than something from BBC Sport – partly because of a behind the scenes feature at Top Gear, but the jet-ski could virtually have been lifted from Top Gear. I’m all for entertaining features, but moderation in all things.

It was left to Martin Brundle to add some substance, which he did with a particularly strong grid walk. An interesting tyre situation was evolving, with the circuit dry around the start, but wet elsewhere, and Brundle expertly investigated and developed the story.

Sir Patrick Stewart, too, cannot help but add gravitas, whatever he’s saying. Not so Bernie Ecclestone, though, who made a hugely misjudged joke to Prince Harry about needing a pass, live on BBC One. The tiny idiot.

Strange

It was another odd day in the pits. Kamui Kobayashi drove through the wheel gun air line at the pit box in front of him, after a shaky exit from his stop; Paul di Resta had the wrong tyres waiting for him; a missing wheel nut put Jenson Button out of the race, when his front right started slipping off going out of the pit lane; and a fumbled pit stop arguable lost Sebastian Vettel the race.

Top

It was a very good day for Fernando Alonso. He was flying at the front when Vettel was stuck behind Hamilton, and continued to pull away when Vettel was running in clear air. A 16.5 second winning margin was bloody impressive.

Bottom

Not so good for his Ferrari team mate Felipe Massa, though. Apart from the feisty battle with Hamilton on the last lap, he seemed to mainly enjoy being overtaken by other cars. Or we have to assume so, given how little a fight he tended put up. Especially if your point of comparison is Hamilton’s efforts to keep Vettel behind him.

It’s been an unusually busy year for motorsport films. There was a little hype in the motorbike press around the mediocre I, Superbiker. The excellent TT3D: Closer To The Edge got slightly wider coverage.

But nothing like the widespread praise Senna has had since its first screenings last year. Two weeks after its UK release, it’s taken a million quid, and the film’s distribution is only increasing.

It’s success is richly deserved. Senna’s relationship with Prost is the central story, told through a wealth of archive footage, with contemporary interviews over the top where required. It’s fantastic stuff, with more than the odd modern day echo to be found.

That’s by no means all there is to the film though, and equally fascinating are Senna’s relationship with F1 doctor Prof Sid Watkins, and the huge importance Senna took on in his native Brazil. Some of the behind the scenes footage – from drivers’ briefings and the stewards’ room in particular – is simply staggering.

This all ensures that, whatever your prior knowledge, you’re utterly invested in Senna by the time the events of the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix come round. Needless to say Senna’s death is dealt with respectfully, and the scenes from the funeral and around Brazil are hugely emotional.

My fuller Formula 1 awareness only really began in the mid ’90s, so for me it was hugely satisfying to have some of the gaps in my memory filled in. And it’s only made me want to fill in more of those gaps, which has to be a good sign.

As is the fact that all bar two people of the Saturday afternoon audience stayed right to the end of the credits, then proceeded to file out of the screen in virtual silence. It’s that kind of film.

There have been a number of Formula 1 races this year when the TV direction has been less than ideal. There’s been plenty of shouting about it on Twitter, often aimed at FOM – meaning Formula One Management Limited. Wrong!

Some races are the responsibility of a local TV director, but even when they’re not – and I’m now donning my pedantic hat – it’s not FOM any more.

It’s Formula One World Championship Limited – or FOWC if you like – as the pre-race F1 ident indicates. What do you mean you don’t read it?

To be fair, it was FOM until the start of this season, and had been since something like 1999. Before that it was Formula One Administration Limited – which until this year was still the company behind the official website, but that now also falls under FOWC.

It’s the start of the famous 100 year commercial rights deal that has resulted in the change from FOM to FOWC. That was done by the FIA under Max Mosley, for about tuppence ha’penny. Under Jean Todt, the FIA seems to have realised it wasn’t a great deal.

I’m probably just about the only person in the UK who’s actually pleased that Senna is only being shown in a small number of cinemas from its release date of 3rd June – this Friday. Because that’s also when I go on holiday for ten days.

Widespread nationwide screenings will follow on the evening of Tuesday 21st June – much like I, Superbiker and TT3D: Closer to the Edge, which also had their widest distribution on a single Tuesday evening.

Details are on the film’s Facebook page, but it’s not comprehensive at the time of writing – for example, my local cinema will be screening the film this Friday and Saturday, but isn’t listed there.

So I’m pleased that I won’t miss out on seeing Senna at the cinema. But I will miss the Catalan and British MotoGP rounds, BTCC from Oulton Park, the whole of the Isle of Man TT, the Formula 1 Canadian Grand Prix, and the Le Mans 24 Hour. At least.

That’s some bad holiday planning right there.

My reaction to the Monaco Grand Prix via, as usual, the medium of quarks.

Up

After a strangely tedious pre-race show a week ago in Spain, the BBC were right back on form – thanks to a much shorter distance to the commentary box. That meant David Coulthard stuck with Jake Humphrey and Eddie Jordan longer, and more importantly that Martin Brundle was able to do his grid walk. The tight and packed Monaco grid always has the potential for rich pickings, and it really delivered this year.

Highlights included: Brundle paying more attention to his broken sunglasses than what Christian Horner’s had to say to him; mistaking music producer Stuart Price for Adrien Brody, then pretty much dismissing him for not being famous enough, before going on to warmly greet Geri Halliwell of all people; declaring that if Michael Schumacher doesn’t want to talk to him then he doesn’t want to talk to Michael Schumacher; wondering out loud whether he’s ever spoken to Pastor Maldonado, let alone on the grid; and virtually shoving a photographer out of the way before talking to Jean Todt. It was a good one.

Down

Driving standards were very variable. Paul di Resta was penalised for a rough move on Alguersuari at the hairpin, and later had contact in the same place with d’Ambrosio.

Lewis Hamilton started the race with a scary but superb move on Schumacher, but was also responsible for another bad move at the hairpin, this time on Felipe Massa – who then crashed out on the marbles in the tunnel while continuing their fight.

Hamilton’s worst crime, though, was taking out Pastor Maldonado, who was running in a fantastic P6 after the restart. He and the Williams team really didn’t deserve to have that strong result taken away from them. Hamilton, for his part, seems to be blindly blaming anyone but himself.

Charm

Bless James Allen. He was obviously busy this weekend, having TV unilaterals to conduct for the FIA as well as a race report to write for his blog. So busy, he mustn’t have heard that the race would restart after the red flag: up went that race report declaring Vettel the winner, while the rest of us were waiting for the race to get back under way.

It didn’t get better: his correction expected Vettel to continue on the same very worn tyres, when they’d already been changed on the red flag grid.

Never mind, eh? We all make mistakes. (Especially me.)

Strange

I don’t know what was going on in the pit lane during the first round of stops, but it must have been pretty distracting, because almost no-one had a clean tyre change.

There was a sticky tyre blanket for Vettel, which had a knock-on effect when on Webber when he stopped immediately afterwards; McLaren just weren’t ready for Hamilton, having gone in and out of position; Massa’s rear jack man missed his target on the first attempt; and Petrov failed to pull away properly after his stop.

Maybe Geri Halliwell was running through the garages screaming like an irritatingly excitable child.

Top

The race was an incredibly tense strategy-fest for about thirty laps – after Button’s third stop, until the accident which caused the red flag. Incidentally, I was quite pleased to see Adrian Sutil drop to 7th after his involvement in that: he’d been running in a quite undeserved P4 before then, a massive beneficiary of the earlier safety car.

In fact, it was a great strategic race throughout: and I’d have been glad to see any of Jenson Button, Fernando Alonso or Sebastian Vettel take the spoils. It looked like Vettel’s race after he disappeared into the distance at the start, until Button seized the initiative – and lead – with an early first stop. An early second stop for Button – which looked like it was pre-empting a safety car which wasn’t needed to recover Glock’s Virgin – didn’t work so well, particularly when the safety car did come out shortly afterwards, and brought the others back into contention.

After Button had stopped for a third time, it wasn’t clear whether Alonso and Vettel in front of him would stop again. They wouldn’t, so Button had to use his tyre advantage to catch and overtake them. He managed the first part of that, but we’ll never know whether he could have eventually overtaken them, because of the aforementioned red flag.

Bottom

Everyone assumed that the race wouldn’t restart, but the anti-climax was delayed when a restart was confirmed. It was only delayed though, because the teams were able to change tyres on the red flag grid. The top three inevitably drove to the chequered flag without incident, the variations in tyre wear having been eliminated. Shame that.

Pastor Maldonado! How the hell did I miss him when I was looking for someone who might spring a surprise at the Monaco Grand Prix earlier this week? I am quite the idiot.

Success!

His record in the principality speaks for itself. In four seasons of GP2, 2007-2010, he featured on the podium every year, taking two wins and two second places from seven races. The year before that, in 2006, he took victory in the Formula Renault 3.5 race. Pretty good, eh?

Let’s go on board with him in 2008:

Formula 1: Thursday practice

That neatly explains why he finished FP1 – his first session on the streets of Monte Carlo in a Formula 1 car – in 7th place. A full six places ahead of his vastly more experienced team mate.

But what happened in FP2? All he could manage was 15th – this time a couple of places behind Barrichello. The team was trying new parts, so that may have been part of it. But Maldonado hardly has an unblemished record in Monaco.

Not so good

The 2005 Formula Renault 3.5 race would have to be the low point: Maldonado failed to slow down under yellow flags at the scene of an accident, and ran into a marshal. He was banned for four races.

He’s not immune to cases of ambition outweighing talent either: here’s his unspectacular crash during qualifying for the GP2 race last year on YouTube. He picked up a drive through penalty in the sprint race for a jump start too. And in 2008 he crashed out of the sprint race after a collision with Karun Chandhok.

Formula 1: qualifying and the race

What can we expect from Maldonado on Saturday and Sunday then? Clearly it could go either way, but I’ve got hopeful fingers crossed.

Anyway, he’s looking like a better bet for a good result than my previous picks. Trulli was slower than Kovalainen in both of Thursday’s sessions, in 18th and 19th. Meanwhile Heidfeld is looking anonymously acceptable, with 11th and 10th.

Ah, the Monaco Grand Prix. Where the driver really makes a difference, and the machinery temporarily takes a bit of a back seat – if that’s not too mangled a metaphor.

For that reason, Robert Kubica will be especially sorely missed this weekend. Everyone was desperate to see what he could do in the promising Renault generally this season, but Monaco is where he could have shined brightest.

Fingers crossed he manages to get back behind the wheel before the season is out, even if only for a Friday practice session.

Back to the here and now though: who are we left with to spring a surprise around the streets of the principality?

The front-runners

It’s hard to imagine the victory not going to one of ‘the five’ – Vettel, Webber, Hamilton, Button or Alonso.

Of them, only Sebastian Vettel hasn’t won in Monaco. So curiously, it would almost be a surprise if he makes it five wins in six races.

But it wouldn’t be a shock to see any one of them on the top step of the podium come Sunday afternoon.

The just behinds

Felipe Massa has been on the Monaco podium twice, but has never won there, and a sudden flash of brilliance from the Brazilian doesn’t look hugely likely. A win for him would be a surprise. And a delight.

What about Mercedes? They’ve got the next best car, but does either driver have it in them to pull something out of the bag? Michael Schumacher is a five-time winner, but 12th place last year was hardly the highlight of his season. And Monaco hasn’t been Nico Rosberg’s most successful stomping ground. Probably not, then.

And Renault? The car was on the podium last year thanks to Robert Kubica, and if anything it looks stronger this year. Nick Heidfeld has been on the podium at Monaco before – a 2nd for Williams in 2005 – and has looked the stronger of the team’s current line-up of late. Maybe the softly spoken German is our best bet for an upset.

And the rest

I think it’s worth watching for a Team Lotus surprise. Not a win, obviously, but beating some of the established teams – and maybe, just maybe, some points? It seems to be the way they’re headed, and Monaco should level the playing field a little.

Heikki Kovalainen has tended to have a slight edge over his team mate, but it’s Jarno Trulli who has the better record here: he won the race for Renault in 2004. I’m looking forward to seeing if one of them can summon up a bit of Monaco magic on Sunday.

Photo Credit
Jochen Wolters, flickr – Some rights reserved

As usual, my instant review of the Spanish Grand Prix is via the medium of quarks. It’s the only way to review a Formula 1 race, I think you’ll find.

Up

Jenson Button finally made an alternative strategy work! So many people have told him that he’s kind to his tyres, that he seems to feel the need to try to save a pit stop every race, despite the fact that it’s a strategy which has failed to work for him this year. The final podium position was his reward today, for blindly sticking with that strategy. Well done.

Down

Poor Mark Webber. Beating his team mate to take pole position was a great result, but he slipped straight back to P3 at the start, and then P4 after the first set of stops. Alonso dropped behind Webber, but Button got ahead of him at the same time, so 4th is where Webber finished.

Charm

It was a fantastic start for Fernando Alonso, scything through from P4 on the grid to lead after the first corner. Like just about everyone else using #BBCF1 on Twitter: I don’t much care for Alonso, but it was a storming bit of driving. He may not win us over with his personality, but it’s he does some good stuff on track.

Strange

There was more cryptic fun on the team radios, with McLaren telling Hamilton to use first the blue button, and then the yellow button in an attempt to pass Vettel for the lead. They didn’t tell him to use the Red Button though – presumably because, according to my TV, that would have switched him to ‘Live Tennis’.

Top

It was a close battle between Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton, Vettel marginally taking the win. It was a superb battle in the closing stages, Hamilton less than a second behind Vettel. Moreover it was a tense battle, since DRS and KERS might have given Hamilton a chance. They didn’t, but that’s not the point.

Bottom

The only thing that spoiled it was Vettel throwing in Flintstones and Crazy Frog impressions over the team radio after he passed the chequered flag. Idiot child.