All-action Button thrills in Canada

One of the most spectacular races in a very long time produced an appropriately stunning win from Jenson Button in the Canadian Grand Prix.

The McLaren driver came from last place to first in the space of 30 amazing laps on a track that, while it regularly produces the best race of the Formula 1 season, has never produced a race quite like this one.

It will surely go down as one of the most amazing grands prix in history and Button's performance matched it.

For a long, long time, Sebastian Vettel appeared to be on the way to another imperious victory, but the German made his first mistake in what has been a virtually flawless season to hand his English rival a fully deserved victory half way around the last lap.


"An amazing day," said a scarcely believing Button as he sat down in front of the media a few minutes after climbing out of the car.


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And as if to underline just how incredible it was, how much the end result turned on the right decisions and the right breaks at the right time, the heavens opened again no more than an hour after the end of the race, in even more dramatic fashion than they had in the course of an afternoon that left almost everyone involved dizzy.

For more than half the race, Button appeared completely out of contention.

He collided with team-mate Lewis Hamilton - an incident for which he apologised even though it appeared to be at least as much Hamilton's fault; made five pit stops to change tyres; survived a collision with Ferrari's Fernando Alonso; and visited the pits a further time to serve a drive-through penalty for going too fast when the safety car was deployed.

Button was last at the penultimate of four restarts under the safety car, with 30 laps to go.

And yet he sliced through the backmarkers with the clinical precision he displays when he is on top form and timed a final pit stop to change to slick tyres perfectly - only one lap after Mark Webber made the call himself, one that was instrumental in moving Vettel's team-mate from the midfield into podium contention.

Those final 20 laps were some of the most exhilarating I have witnessed since I started watching F1 30 or so years ago, as Button closed in on the lead at a pace Webber described as "on a different planet from the rest of us".

With 15 laps to go, Vettel looked unassailable as he pulled away in the lead and Button homed in on a battling Michael Schumacher, who produced by far the most convincing drive of his comeback so far, and Webber.

A final safety car on lap 57 was what put Button into victory contention. He would have easily passed Schumacher and Webber, but the safety car reduced Vettel's lead from a probably uncatchable 10 seconds to zero.

At the restart, the German pulled it out to 3.1 seconds again while Button battled to get past Webber and Schumacher but the Englishman was in range.

He closed remorselessly in - 1.6secs, 1.3secs, 1.1secs, 0.9secs - and Vettel buckled under the pressure.

Hamilton paid generous tribute afterwards. "Jenson drove absolutely amazing," he told BBC F1 pit-lane reporter Ted Kravitz as he filmed his behind the scenes report for this website.

"With all the commotion going on, the pressure he put on Vettel at the end, I knew he was going to get him."

Despite his error, Vettel is still in a very strong position in the championship. He actually extended his lead by two points and is now two wins and a fifth place clear of his closest rival, which is now Button following Hamilton's retirement.

His mistake proves that he is beatable if he is pushed hard enough, as was the case last year.

But Hamilton - who still seems the man with the biggest chance of overhauling him for all Button's genius on Sunday - will need to get his act together again if he is to do so.

His controversial collision with Button led to his visiting the race stewards to explain his actions for the sixth time in seven races - an extension of a record that led to the McLaren driver coming out with his now-infamous Ali G remarks after the last race in Monaco.

In the midst of Hamilton's reaction, one phrase was particularly telling. Where does your season go from here, he was asked. "Onwards and upwards," he replied. "Go to the next one and try to stay out of trouble."

Hamilton at least finished an incident-packed race in Monaco. In Canada, where in hindsight he could have won, there were more errors.

He was in the wars as soon as the drivers were released following a safety car start, colliding with Webber in an incident Hamilton admitted was his fault.

Two laps later, as he fought to make up lost ground, came the collision with Button.

It was a racing incident - Button should probably have seen Hamilton, who should probably have realised the gap was going to close.

But who was to blame is not really the point. Hamilton does seem to have turned into a magnet for trouble this year, and there seems little doubt that the situation is arising out of frustration at helplessly watching another title slip away.

Be that as it may, a slight change of approach is required if Hamilton is to deliver fully his fantastic potential.

"It's the nature of Lewis's attacking style," said David Coulthard as he analysed the Button-Hamilton collision on BBC One. "It's easy to knock someone when they're involved in a series of incidents, but it's why Lewis has so many fans around the world.

"This is just a phase he's going through. He believes he's the best driver in the world. Right now McLaren are not able to give him a winning car, and he's getting frustrated.

Lewis Hamilton was penalised twice by the stewards at the Monaco Grand Prix a fortnight ago

Lewis Hamilton was penalised twice by the stewards at the Monaco Grand Prix a fortnight ago. Photo: Getty

"He wants to win, and that passion, that drive, is what's causing him to get up close and personal with other cars. If I was his management, I'd be saying: 'Chill. Everyone knows you're a great driver, just enjoy it.'"

Heading into the weekend, Hamilton named Ayrton Senna and Gilles Villeneuve as two legendary drivers to whom he would like to be compared.

Undoubtedly Hamilton shares their speed, their verve, their charisma, and their good looks. But he also shares their occasional tendency to go over the limit.

That is, of course, what has given all three their enormous global appeal but in all three cases it also led to races lost through going too far.

Hamilton might well think he fancies his chances against Vettel in a Red Bull.

And, brilliantly as the world champion is driving at the moment, Hamilton is not alone in thinking that is with good reason. What a battle it would be.

But, apparently under contract to McLaren until the end of next season, that prospect is probably not a possibility for the foreseeable future.

Hamilton has to do battle with what he has and make the most of it. If he is to do that, he must stop fretting about Vettel and relax into his racing. In that, he could learn a thing or two from his team-mate.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2011/06/all-action_button_thrills_in_c.html

Ken Kavanagh Rupert Keegan Eddie Keizan Al Keller

NASCAR Tickets - All-Star Race to Feature 10-Lap Final Sprint

$1 million is at stake for the winner of this year's NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race, but the money isn't even half of what draws such huge throngs of fans to Charlotte's Lowe's Motor Speedway for this famed stock car rumble. While the All-Star Race has been running annually since its inception in Charlotte in 1985, this year's competition has been rousing tons of speculation, as the track previously disclosed that this year's format for the 25th anniversary of the race would slightly differ in format than recent years.

In this midst of this mystery format change, NASCAR has just come out with the answer to the conjectures flying around the racing realm, as the website reported this week that the change taking place in the NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race this upcoming May will be the addition (and revival) of a 10-lap final sprint at the tail end of the all-star race. The thrilling element of the 10-lap final sprint as the end segment to the all-star race is already scoring high-fives around the racing realm, as the sprint is an exciting end to cap off the already-exhilarating race.

Robin Pemberton, the vice president of competition, recently made a statement concerning this addition to the all-star race, saying, "Some of the NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race's most spectacular finishes have come using the 10-lap shootout as the final segment, and what better way to celebrate the 25th running of this great event than incorporate that element back into the format. I can tell you from personal experience, I was Kyle's [Petty] crew chief in 1992 when he and Davey Allison battled all the way down to the wire and that has to go down as one of the most exciting All-Star Race finishes ever. The 10-lap shootout there at the end was something else from a competition standpoint. That was quite a night; one I'll never forget."

Fans with NASCAR tickets to this year's All-Star Race will get to see all qualifying Sprint Cup Series pros zoom around the racetrack in four different segments, all building in a crescendo of excitement for fans at Lowe's Motor Speedway. Segment 1 of the race will be the beginning 50 laps with a mandatory pit stop at Lap 25, while Segment 2 features 20 laps with the optional pit stop. Segment 3 is 20 laps with a 10-minute break at the end, and Segment 4 will bring the return of the much-anticipated 10-lap shootout with only green-flag laps counting.

Just like every year, this May's NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race is open to any and every race winner from the previous year (and winners from this year up through May 9) as well as past champions of the All-Star Series from the previous 10 years. The top two finishers of the 40-lap Sprint Showdown are also eligible for the All-Star Race, as is the winner of the Sprint Fan Vote. Look for heavy hitters like Kurt and Kyle Busch and Matt Kenseth, who have all won Sprint Cup races this year, to dominate the track at Charlotte on May 16, 2009, when these stock car racing favorites start their engines. Tickets to this huge event are still available, so check online to secure your seat in the grandstands this spring!

This article is sponsored by StubHub.com. StubHub is a leader in the business of selling NASCAR tickets, sports tickets, concert tickets, theater tickets and special events tickets.

Article Source: NASCAR Tickets - All-Star Race to Feature 10-Lap Final Sprint

Source: http://www.articlespan.com/article/252996/nascar-tickets-all-star-race-to-feature-10-lap-final-sprint

Gary Hocking Ingo Hoffmann Bill Holland Jackie Holmes

Has F1 made overtaking too easy?

There have been five grands prix so far in the 2011 Formula 1 season and every single one of them, in its own way, has been a cracker.

The introduction of faster wearing tyres from new supplier Pirelli, the DRS overtaking aid and the return of Kers power-boost systems has led to a perfect storm of close racing, overtaking and pit stops.

This has made for an exciting season even though Red Bull driver Sebastian Vettel is running away with the championship after four wins and a second place in five races.

Yet there is disquiet in some parts of the Formula 1 paddock.

There is a purist view that what the world is seeing is some kind of pale shadow of what F1 really should be. Superficially the racing has improved, some are saying, but is it real? Is this F1 or a tainted, cheapened version of it?

After years of complaints about overtaking being too difficult in F1, about races tending towards the processional, about a general lack of entertainment, it might seem a somewhat perverse thing to say.

But the sense, in some quarters, is that in trying to spice up the show, the sport has veered a little too far towards showbiz and lost some of its true essence.

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He is careful about he expresses it, but Vettel's team-mate Mark Webber is one of the chief exponents of this view.

Ironically, Webber has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of the new rules so far.

In China, where he qualified close to the back, the Australian used a clever strategy to benefit from the huge grip differences between new and old, hard and soft tyres, as well as the DRS, to climb up to third place by the end of the race, just seven seconds behind winner Lewis Hamilton.

So great was his pace advantage over his rivals in the latter stages that had the race been three laps or so longer Webber would have won. From 18th on the grid. In a race in which there was only one retirement. Even allowing for the superiority of the Red Bull, that is astonishing.

And yet Webber said afterwards that it felt a little hollow. Sure, he had enjoyed himself, and he was pleased with the result. But passing tough, world-class competitors such as Fernando Alonso so easily when they were effectively defenceless did not feel quite right. The racing, he says, is "less intense" than it was.

Webber brought up the subject again in Spain at the weekend, pointing out that the lap times F1 cars were doing on worn tyres and high fuel loads were only eight seconds faster than those of the GP3 cars, two categories down the motor racing ladder.

"We still need to be the pinnacle," Webber said. "We need to be able to push the cars to the limit throughout a grand prix and have very strong lap times, man against machine.

"Pirelli are working hard but we need to make sure the degradation and pace is still of a sensible magnitude and the cars can be put on the limit and not get too far on the showbiz side of things."

It's not just Webber, either. Last week, influential Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo weighed into the debate, too.

Di Montezemolo said: "Listen, I want to see competition, I want to see cars on the track. I don't want to see competition in the pits.

"A little bit, yes - but in the last race (Turkey) there were 80 pit stops. Come on, it's too much. And the people don't understand anymore because when you come out of the pits you don't know what position you're in.

"I think we have gone too far with the machines, too many buttons. The driver is focusing on the buttons, when you have the authorisation to overtake. We have gone too far."

Much of the criticism has, as Di Montezemolo said, focused on the DRS. This is a clever device that moves a part of the rear wing, reducing drag, and therefore increasing straight-line speed.

A driver can use it in a specified zone on the track, on the longest straight, when he is within a second of the car in front at a predetermined point before the DRS zone. The driver defending his position cannot use it.

The idea was to make overtaking easier - but not too easy. The problem is that people have looked at the Turkish race, and the number of times drivers sailed past rivals down the long back straight, and concluded that DRS is making overtaking like driving past someone on the motorway.

That, though, is a misunderstanding of what is actually happening. In Turkey, as in so many of the other races, what promoted the overtaking was the differing grip levels of the tyres at various stages of their lives.

As Charlie Whiting, the race director, points out, in a lot of the cases in Istanbul, the driver behind already had a massive speed advantage over his rival even before he got to the DRS zone. Because his tyres were providing him with so much more grip, he could slingshot out of the preceding corner so much faster.

In those circumstances, the pass would have been easy regardless, DRS or not.

"Our view has always been we shouldn't make it easy, we should make it possible," Whiting says.

"In Melbourne we didn't have quite enough length (in the DRS zone). I think it worked perfectly in Malaysia and China. But we're all learning here. I definitely don't think we've made it too easy.

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"I don't think anyone is under any illusion that it's the DRS that's allowing the overtaking. Opinions vary presumably, but tyres probably have a bigger part to play at the moment. I don't think we've gone over the top with the DRS, and we certainly don't want to. We've got no intention of doing that. We believe it's a good tool and hopefully you agree."

Although I share some of Webber's reservations, I also do not want to see fast cars stuck for ever behind slow ones just because the laws of aerodynamics dictate that drivers cannot follow closely enough to overtake. The DRS is a way of using technology to get F1 out of a hole that technology has got it into.

So, fundamentally, as long as governing body the FIA can find the right balance, I think Whiting is right on this, and the proof came in Sunday's Spanish Grand Prix.

Vettel spent the first 18 laps bottled up behind the fast-starting but slow Ferrari of Alonso. Red Bull tried to jump the Spaniard with an early first pit stop, but just failed when Ferrari responded and got out in front.

So they tried again and despite Vettel having to pass three cars on his out lap and Ferrari responding next time around, the German blasted past the pit exit just as Alonso was emerging.

Last year, with much slower wearing Bridgestone tyres meaning smaller pace differentials between the cars, Vettel would never have been able to pass three cars on his out lap, and he may well have spent the entire race behind Alonso.

At the same time, the difficulties all drivers had in passing down the main straight, the DRS zone, when they were able to pass elsewhere - around Turns Four, Five, 10 and 11, for example, where overtaking was previously very rare - proved that it was the tyres not the DRS that were making the difference.

"Barcelona had the possibility to be a drone-a-thon," Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said after the race. "Two years ago here, Sebastian drove around looking at the exhaust of (Ferrari's) Felipe Massa for the whole grand prix.

"This has really changed the dynamics of that and a track where it's traditionally difficult to overtake and produce close racing has produced an absolute thriller. The regulations have obviously contributed and created that. They're working."

It's true that the tyres' fragility is stopping the drivers exploiting the full potential of their cars all the time. This may not always be desirable but, as my colleague Mark Hughes points out in his column, this season it probably is.

If the cars were all on rubber that allowed them to push to the limit in the race, Red Bull would probably be able to tap into more of the speed that gives them such a huge advantage in qualifying. In which case Vettel wouldn't just be winning, he would be driving off into the distance. The tyres appear to be making the racing close, and introducing competition that might not otherwise be there.

Despite Vettel's domination, all the races have been close and exciting to watch and that is having a startling effect on the television audience.

You might expect, for example, that a German winning nearly everything would cause TV audiences to switch off in the UK, but in fact the opposite has been the case.

The BBC F1 audience has been up at all but one race so far this year. China had the highest number of viewers that race has ever had. During the Spanish race, the peak audience was 1.2 million higher this year than last.

But far more telling is the behaviour of the audience during the race. In the past, there would usually be a peak at the start, a significant dip in the middle, another peak at a moment of high excitement - a crash, a pit stop etc - another dip and a peak at the end.

This year, though, the audience has started higher than before - and stayed there throughout the race. People dare not switch off for fear of missing something. Far from the races being too confusing - as some newspapers have said - they are proving to be gripping from beginning to end.

I'll leave the final word to Jenson Button. He was asked if F1 had veered too far towards 'showbiz'.

"There are more positives than negatives," he said. "Of course it's a show; that's what any sport is. We need viewers to exist and the viewers have gone through the roof supposedly. I don't think we've done anything wrong. We've definitely gone in the right direction."

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2011/05/has_f1_made_overtaking_too_eas.html

Mike Harris Cuth Harrison Brian Hart Gene Hartley

Hamilton looking to get back on track

In Valencia

Lewis Hamilton knows as well as anyone that the best way to answer criticism is to come back stronger and prove the naysayers wrong.

Odd, then, that in Valencia the McLaren driver has seemed uncertain about his intention to draw a line under a difficult month with a strong performance at this weekend's European Grand Prix.

In a television interview, Hamilton talked confidently about "turning over a new leaf", adding: "I'm looking forward to another opportunity to score points this weekend."

A few minutes later, Hamilton's mood towards the weekend had U-turned as he shrugged: "If it's another bad one, it's another bad one and there's nothing you can do about it."

It didn't look like being a bad weekend on Friday, as Hamilton finished the day as the second fastest man, just 0.2 seconds behind Fernando Alonso's Ferrari.

But when he got out of the car to face the media, Hamilton again sounded flat and when asked whether he could win his first pole of the season he answered: "I'm not going to get my hopes up, that's for sure."

It is hardly surprising that Hamilton finds himself with conflicting emotions. The last two races in Monaco and Montreal have been little short of disastrous for the 2008 champion.

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It began with road rage on the streets of Monte Carlo, where Hamilton criticised the race stewards and called his fellow drivers "ridiculous".

Hopes that the fall-out from his outburst could be assuaged at the next race in Canada - a favourite track where he has twice won - were quashed when Hamilton sent Mark Webber's Red Bull spinning before crashing out as he tried to squeeze past his McLaren team-mate Jenson Button.

Former Ferrari driver Eddie Irvine has claimed Hamilton has "lost the plot" while three-time world champion Niki Lauda went as far as suggesting the Englishman's aggressive driving could "get someone killed".

As if that wasn't enough to take on board, Hamilton has had to face questions about his future after a tete-a-tete with Red Bull boss Christian Horner in Montreal led to renewed speculation Hamilton was actively looking for a way out of McLaren.

While Horner may have played down his keenness on Hamilton in Valencia, there has been plenty of support for the embattled driver.

McLaren have backed him to win this weekend, and some of the F1 fraternity - including Alonso, Webber and driver-turned-BBC analyst Anthony Davidson - urged Hamilton not to change his driving style.

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Hamilton himself seems to be flip-flopping between emotions in his response to the criticisms and questions about his future.

The concept of 'backing yourself' may be an adage of former England cricket captain Michael Vaughan but it might just be the best way of Hamilton seizing control of the spiralling situation.

Hamilton is regarded as a naturally fast racer who is capable of pulling off overtaking moves with flare and control - and it is those positive attributes the 26-year-old knows he has to focus on, following chats with Button and McLaren bosses Ron Dennis and Martin Whitmarsh.

"I've stood back and had a look at things," he reflected in Valencia, on the back of his joke that it had taken only "one night out" to recover from Canada.

"The team are always supportive, as are Ron, Martin and Jenson, but when you have tough days in the office you have to try and analyse things and take a step back.

"I like the way I drive but you can always have better judgement and make better calls in the future.

"We are still in the middle of the season and the most important thing is to motivate my team and myself to do better."

McLaren and Hamilton - who has finished second in every European GP staged around Valencia's harbour - have every reason to be confident they will again be competitive this weekend.

The team have demonstrated superior race pace over rivals Red Bull and Ferrari in the last three grands prix and McLaren arrived in Valencia with an upgraded aerodynamic package.

But the momentum within McLaren has, for the moment, swung in Button's favour after the 31-year-old battled his way to victory in Canada and moved up to second in the championship, with Hamilton slipping from that position down to fourth.

Hamilton is already 76 points behind Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel in the title race - and that's more than the equivalent of three race wins.

Hamilton may have stopped short of saying it in so many words in Valencia but, with a deficit like that, the future has to start now.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/sarahholt/2011/06/hamilton.html

5 hour Energy Toyota Brendan Gaughan Loan Max Toyota Tony Raines

NASCAR Tickets - NASCAR Angels to Host Earnhardt's Lucky Charm

Dale Earnhardt may be in heaven now, but he's still got angels here on earth. Wessa Miller, a Kentucky native and Make-A-Wish child who made NASCAR history alongside the legendary Earnhardt several years ago, is getting more recognition now for her courageous story, and it has recently been announced that the spina bifida patient will soon featured as part of the NASCAR Foundation's NASCAR Angels television program.

Miller has a long history with NASCAR, as she met Dale Earnhardt in February of 1998 before the '98 Daytona 500 through the Make-A-Wish Foundation when she was just six years old, giving the famed racecar driver a penny that he glued to the dash of his No. 3 car prior to winning the prestigious race for the first time in 20 attempts. After winning Daytona for the first (and only) time, Earnhardt considered Miller's gift his lucky charm and gifted her family with a new van to help with transportation needs to doctor visits across their home state of Kentucky.
It's been 11 years since Earnhardt's magnificent Daytona win and eight years since his tragic death after crashing in the final lap of the Daytona 500 in 2001, yet the story of Wessa Miller is still very much alive. The inspirational story of this little girl with spina bifida is still cemented into NASCAR history, as Earnhardt's winning No. 3 Chevrolet remains on display at the Richard Childress Racing Museum in Welcome, North Carolina, complete with a shiny penny glued to the dashboard. Although the 1998 Daytona race is standing still and frozen in time, life has gone on for Miller and her family, who have in the meantime started the Pennies for Wessa Fund to help aid hospital bills and the costs of treating Miller's medical conditions.

The NASCAR Foundation, the racing league's support for charitable efforts, has recently announced its teaming with the NASCAR Angels television program in helping aid Wessa Miller and her parents, starting with an online auction through the Motor Racing Outreach benevolence fund that will raise money for Pennies for Wessa by auctioning off autographed memorabilia by NASCAR Sprint Cup drivers, as well as various fire suits and VIP packages. The foundation will also feature Miller on its NASCAR Angels television show, which is a program that is a self-proclaimed "Extreme Home Makeover meets Pimp My Ride, NASCAR-style" and transforms broken automobiles into drivable cars. Wessa Miller will be filmed at Tennessee's Bristol Motor Speedway on March 21 as part of the "Heart of NASCAR" segment of an upcoming NASCAR Angels episode.

While NASCAR's charitable efforts are currently focusing in part on Wessa Miller, the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series are both well underway for the 2009 season. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. continues carrying on his late father's legacy (despite a nasty crash at Daytona last month,) and Roush Fenway Racing's No. 17 driver Matt Kenseth has taken the early lead in the Sprint Cup Series, winning the league's first two races at both Daytona and Fontana. The 2009 NASCAR season has already elicited unpredictable excitement from racing fans across the nation, so get in on the excitement and nab NASCAR tickets online to catch these speedsters zooming around the racetrack!

This article is sponsored by StubHub.com and was written by Brent Warnken. StubHub is a leader in the business of selling NASCAR tickets, sports tickets, concert tickets, theater tickets and special events tickets.

Article Source: NASCAR Tickets - NASCAR Angels to Host Earnhardt's Lucky Charm

Source: http://www.articlespan.com/article/243803/nascar-tickets-nascar-angels-to-host-earnhardts-lucky-charm

Morgan Shepherd Kroger Ford Kenny Wallace Jason Keller

All-action Button thrills in Canada

One of the most spectacular races in a very long time produced an appropriately stunning win from Jenson Button in the Canadian Grand Prix.

The McLaren driver came from last place to first in the space of 30 amazing laps on a track that, while it regularly produces the best race of the Formula 1 season, has never produced a race quite like this one.

It will surely go down as one of the most amazing grands prix in history and Button's performance matched it.

For a long, long time, Sebastian Vettel appeared to be on the way to another imperious victory, but the German made his first mistake in what has been a virtually flawless season to hand his English rival a fully deserved victory half way around the last lap.


"An amazing day," said a scarcely believing Button as he sat down in front of the media a few minutes after climbing out of the car.


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And as if to underline just how incredible it was, how much the end result turned on the right decisions and the right breaks at the right time, the heavens opened again no more than an hour after the end of the race, in even more dramatic fashion than they had in the course of an afternoon that left almost everyone involved dizzy.

For more than half the race, Button appeared completely out of contention.

He collided with team-mate Lewis Hamilton - an incident for which he apologised even though it appeared to be at least as much Hamilton's fault; made five pit stops to change tyres; survived a collision with Ferrari's Fernando Alonso; and visited the pits a further time to serve a drive-through penalty for going too fast when the safety car was deployed.

Button was last at the penultimate of four restarts under the safety car, with 30 laps to go.

And yet he sliced through the backmarkers with the clinical precision he displays when he is on top form and timed a final pit stop to change to slick tyres perfectly - only one lap after Mark Webber made the call himself, one that was instrumental in moving Vettel's team-mate from the midfield into podium contention.

Those final 20 laps were some of the most exhilarating I have witnessed since I started watching F1 30 or so years ago, as Button closed in on the lead at a pace Webber described as "on a different planet from the rest of us".

With 15 laps to go, Vettel looked unassailable as he pulled away in the lead and Button homed in on a battling Michael Schumacher, who produced by far the most convincing drive of his comeback so far, and Webber.

A final safety car on lap 57 was what put Button into victory contention. He would have easily passed Schumacher and Webber, but the safety car reduced Vettel's lead from a probably uncatchable 10 seconds to zero.

At the restart, the German pulled it out to 3.1 seconds again while Button battled to get past Webber and Schumacher but the Englishman was in range.

He closed remorselessly in - 1.6secs, 1.3secs, 1.1secs, 0.9secs - and Vettel buckled under the pressure.

Hamilton paid generous tribute afterwards. "Jenson drove absolutely amazing," he told BBC F1 pit-lane reporter Ted Kravitz as he filmed his behind the scenes report for this website.

"With all the commotion going on, the pressure he put on Vettel at the end, I knew he was going to get him."

Despite his error, Vettel is still in a very strong position in the championship. He actually extended his lead by two points and is now two wins and a fifth place clear of his closest rival, which is now Button following Hamilton's retirement.

His mistake proves that he is beatable if he is pushed hard enough, as was the case last year.

But Hamilton - who still seems the man with the biggest chance of overhauling him for all Button's genius on Sunday - will need to get his act together again if he is to do so.

His controversial collision with Button led to his visiting the race stewards to explain his actions for the sixth time in seven races - an extension of a record that led to the McLaren driver coming out with his now-infamous Ali G remarks after the last race in Monaco.

In the midst of Hamilton's reaction, one phrase was particularly telling. Where does your season go from here, he was asked. "Onwards and upwards," he replied. "Go to the next one and try to stay out of trouble."

Hamilton at least finished an incident-packed race in Monaco. In Canada, where in hindsight he could have won, there were more errors.

He was in the wars as soon as the drivers were released following a safety car start, colliding with Webber in an incident Hamilton admitted was his fault.

Two laps later, as he fought to make up lost ground, came the collision with Button.

It was a racing incident - Button should probably have seen Hamilton, who should probably have realised the gap was going to close.

But who was to blame is not really the point. Hamilton does seem to have turned into a magnet for trouble this year, and there seems little doubt that the situation is arising out of frustration at helplessly watching another title slip away.

Be that as it may, a slight change of approach is required if Hamilton is to deliver fully his fantastic potential.

"It's the nature of Lewis's attacking style," said David Coulthard as he analysed the Button-Hamilton collision on BBC One. "It's easy to knock someone when they're involved in a series of incidents, but it's why Lewis has so many fans around the world.

"This is just a phase he's going through. He believes he's the best driver in the world. Right now McLaren are not able to give him a winning car, and he's getting frustrated.

Lewis Hamilton was penalised twice by the stewards at the Monaco Grand Prix a fortnight ago

Lewis Hamilton was penalised twice by the stewards at the Monaco Grand Prix a fortnight ago. Photo: Getty

"He wants to win, and that passion, that drive, is what's causing him to get up close and personal with other cars. If I was his management, I'd be saying: 'Chill. Everyone knows you're a great driver, just enjoy it.'"

Heading into the weekend, Hamilton named Ayrton Senna and Gilles Villeneuve as two legendary drivers to whom he would like to be compared.

Undoubtedly Hamilton shares their speed, their verve, their charisma, and their good looks. But he also shares their occasional tendency to go over the limit.

That is, of course, what has given all three their enormous global appeal but in all three cases it also led to races lost through going too far.

Hamilton might well think he fancies his chances against Vettel in a Red Bull.

And, brilliantly as the world champion is driving at the moment, Hamilton is not alone in thinking that is with good reason. What a battle it would be.

But, apparently under contract to McLaren until the end of next season, that prospect is probably not a possibility for the foreseeable future.

Hamilton has to do battle with what he has and make the most of it. If he is to do that, he must stop fretting about Vettel and relax into his racing. In that, he could learn a thing or two from his team-mate.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2011/06/all-action_button_thrills_in_c.html

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Has F1 made overtaking too easy?

There have been five grands prix so far in the 2011 Formula 1 season and every single one of them, in its own way, has been a cracker.

The introduction of faster wearing tyres from new supplier Pirelli, the DRS overtaking aid and the return of Kers power-boost systems has led to a perfect storm of close racing, overtaking and pit stops.

This has made for an exciting season even though Red Bull driver Sebastian Vettel is running away with the championship after four wins and a second place in five races.

Yet there is disquiet in some parts of the Formula 1 paddock.

There is a purist view that what the world is seeing is some kind of pale shadow of what F1 really should be. Superficially the racing has improved, some are saying, but is it real? Is this F1 or a tainted, cheapened version of it?

After years of complaints about overtaking being too difficult in F1, about races tending towards the processional, about a general lack of entertainment, it might seem a somewhat perverse thing to say.

But the sense, in some quarters, is that in trying to spice up the show, the sport has veered a little too far towards showbiz and lost some of its true essence.

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He is careful about he expresses it, but Vettel's team-mate Mark Webber is one of the chief exponents of this view.

Ironically, Webber has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of the new rules so far.

In China, where he qualified close to the back, the Australian used a clever strategy to benefit from the huge grip differences between new and old, hard and soft tyres, as well as the DRS, to climb up to third place by the end of the race, just seven seconds behind winner Lewis Hamilton.

So great was his pace advantage over his rivals in the latter stages that had the race been three laps or so longer Webber would have won. From 18th on the grid. In a race in which there was only one retirement. Even allowing for the superiority of the Red Bull, that is astonishing.

And yet Webber said afterwards that it felt a little hollow. Sure, he had enjoyed himself, and he was pleased with the result. But passing tough, world-class competitors such as Fernando Alonso so easily when they were effectively defenceless did not feel quite right. The racing, he says, is "less intense" than it was.

Webber brought up the subject again in Spain at the weekend, pointing out that the lap times F1 cars were doing on worn tyres and high fuel loads were only eight seconds faster than those of the GP3 cars, two categories down the motor racing ladder.

"We still need to be the pinnacle," Webber said. "We need to be able to push the cars to the limit throughout a grand prix and have very strong lap times, man against machine.

"Pirelli are working hard but we need to make sure the degradation and pace is still of a sensible magnitude and the cars can be put on the limit and not get too far on the showbiz side of things."

It's not just Webber, either. Last week, influential Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo weighed into the debate, too.

Di Montezemolo said: "Listen, I want to see competition, I want to see cars on the track. I don't want to see competition in the pits.

"A little bit, yes - but in the last race (Turkey) there were 80 pit stops. Come on, it's too much. And the people don't understand anymore because when you come out of the pits you don't know what position you're in.

"I think we have gone too far with the machines, too many buttons. The driver is focusing on the buttons, when you have the authorisation to overtake. We have gone too far."

Much of the criticism has, as Di Montezemolo said, focused on the DRS. This is a clever device that moves a part of the rear wing, reducing drag, and therefore increasing straight-line speed.

A driver can use it in a specified zone on the track, on the longest straight, when he is within a second of the car in front at a predetermined point before the DRS zone. The driver defending his position cannot use it.

The idea was to make overtaking easier - but not too easy. The problem is that people have looked at the Turkish race, and the number of times drivers sailed past rivals down the long back straight, and concluded that DRS is making overtaking like driving past someone on the motorway.

That, though, is a misunderstanding of what is actually happening. In Turkey, as in so many of the other races, what promoted the overtaking was the differing grip levels of the tyres at various stages of their lives.

As Charlie Whiting, the race director, points out, in a lot of the cases in Istanbul, the driver behind already had a massive speed advantage over his rival even before he got to the DRS zone. Because his tyres were providing him with so much more grip, he could slingshot out of the preceding corner so much faster.

In those circumstances, the pass would have been easy regardless, DRS or not.

"Our view has always been we shouldn't make it easy, we should make it possible," Whiting says.

"In Melbourne we didn't have quite enough length (in the DRS zone). I think it worked perfectly in Malaysia and China. But we're all learning here. I definitely don't think we've made it too easy.

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"I don't think anyone is under any illusion that it's the DRS that's allowing the overtaking. Opinions vary presumably, but tyres probably have a bigger part to play at the moment. I don't think we've gone over the top with the DRS, and we certainly don't want to. We've got no intention of doing that. We believe it's a good tool and hopefully you agree."

Although I share some of Webber's reservations, I also do not want to see fast cars stuck for ever behind slow ones just because the laws of aerodynamics dictate that drivers cannot follow closely enough to overtake. The DRS is a way of using technology to get F1 out of a hole that technology has got it into.

So, fundamentally, as long as governing body the FIA can find the right balance, I think Whiting is right on this, and the proof came in Sunday's Spanish Grand Prix.

Vettel spent the first 18 laps bottled up behind the fast-starting but slow Ferrari of Alonso. Red Bull tried to jump the Spaniard with an early first pit stop, but just failed when Ferrari responded and got out in front.

So they tried again and despite Vettel having to pass three cars on his out lap and Ferrari responding next time around, the German blasted past the pit exit just as Alonso was emerging.

Last year, with much slower wearing Bridgestone tyres meaning smaller pace differentials between the cars, Vettel would never have been able to pass three cars on his out lap, and he may well have spent the entire race behind Alonso.

At the same time, the difficulties all drivers had in passing down the main straight, the DRS zone, when they were able to pass elsewhere - around Turns Four, Five, 10 and 11, for example, where overtaking was previously very rare - proved that it was the tyres not the DRS that were making the difference.

"Barcelona had the possibility to be a drone-a-thon," Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said after the race. "Two years ago here, Sebastian drove around looking at the exhaust of (Ferrari's) Felipe Massa for the whole grand prix.

"This has really changed the dynamics of that and a track where it's traditionally difficult to overtake and produce close racing has produced an absolute thriller. The regulations have obviously contributed and created that. They're working."

It's true that the tyres' fragility is stopping the drivers exploiting the full potential of their cars all the time. This may not always be desirable but, as my colleague Mark Hughes points out in his column, this season it probably is.

If the cars were all on rubber that allowed them to push to the limit in the race, Red Bull would probably be able to tap into more of the speed that gives them such a huge advantage in qualifying. In which case Vettel wouldn't just be winning, he would be driving off into the distance. The tyres appear to be making the racing close, and introducing competition that might not otherwise be there.

Despite Vettel's domination, all the races have been close and exciting to watch and that is having a startling effect on the television audience.

You might expect, for example, that a German winning nearly everything would cause TV audiences to switch off in the UK, but in fact the opposite has been the case.

The BBC F1 audience has been up at all but one race so far this year. China had the highest number of viewers that race has ever had. During the Spanish race, the peak audience was 1.2 million higher this year than last.

But far more telling is the behaviour of the audience during the race. In the past, there would usually be a peak at the start, a significant dip in the middle, another peak at a moment of high excitement - a crash, a pit stop etc - another dip and a peak at the end.

This year, though, the audience has started higher than before - and stayed there throughout the race. People dare not switch off for fear of missing something. Far from the races being too confusing - as some newspapers have said - they are proving to be gripping from beginning to end.

I'll leave the final word to Jenson Button. He was asked if F1 had veered too far towards 'showbiz'.

"There are more positives than negatives," he said. "Of course it's a show; that's what any sport is. We need viewers to exist and the viewers have gone through the roof supposedly. I don't think we've done anything wrong. We've definitely gone in the right direction."

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2011/05/has_f1_made_overtaking_too_eas.html

Carl Long Willie Allen Derrike Cope Kevin Harvick

How To Turn A Child's Room Into A NASCAR Pit

If you have a little NASCAR fan in your home, a great surprise for him or her is to redecorate his or her room in NASCAR items. There is a variety of NASCAR bedding products available for kids of all ages.

If the child you are decorating for is a younger child you can even find toddler size bedding for the sport. Although it may be easier to get at least twin size bedding so your child will not outgrow the room to quickly.

Licensed Nascar bedding coordinates are available in many different styles. If you have a certain driver in mind, chances are there is a bedding set with their name and number on it. You can then match sheets sets, pillows, valances and window coverings and wallpaper border.

If you were thinking about NASCAR in general, you can find that also. The racecars on the bedding make great coordinating room scenes for small children, while the logo bedding is appropriate for older children.

In a small child's room you can get more creative with decorating. Once you have all the NASCAR bedding coordinates you can use some washable paint to paint a racetrack all around the room on the walls. Of course a racetrack wouldn't be complete without cars, so make some car cutouts from sturdy craft foam. These will not harm the walls and the kids can race cars all around the room. If you put some Velcro tabs on the back and a few dots on the track, when the kids are finished driving the cars around the room they can find a spot of Velcro on the track and stick the cars up for later use.

For an older child or teenager there is a great selection of NASCAR Bedding that will show off their favorite sport yet will still look grown up. With the matching NASCAR accessories and coordinates they can have a room where their favorite sport lives on. Wall borders are easy to hang, most using only water and a sponge, yet look as though they were made for the room.

If you have a bathroom in need of a quick makeover you can also get shower curtains, towels, and other bathroom accessories. Painting the bathroom a neutral color then the NASCAR licensed coordinates will add a bit of flair to a previously boring room.

So whether you are an old or new NASCAR fan, you can bring new life to your bedroom or bathroom by adding some NASCAR licensed accessories and coordinates. The prices are no pricier than a traditional bedding set. So go ahead and indulge your child or your self by being the next NASCAR driver if only in your dreams!

Gregg Hall is an author living in Navarre Florida. Find more about this as well as sports memorabila at http://www.sportscollectiblesandmemorabilia.com

Article Source: How To Turn A Child's Room Into A NASCAR Pit

Source: http://www.articlespan.com/article/3857/how-to-turn-a-child-s-room-into-a-nascar-pit

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