BriSCA F1

Skegness Saturday 9 April
Is it going to snow?

BTCC who?

Donnington Park Sunday April 10
Weather check

Needless to say I'll be absent from both - too cold and skint!

Understand that there will be 100000 free tickets up for grabs for the World Series by Renault meeting at Donnington Park the weekend of September 10/11. The cost being underwritten by Renault themselves.

I hope the day will be a fabulous success and rewards the regular motorsport fans and attract (and keep) the casual observers.

This year's Melbourne GP was the 10th at Melbourne and they celebrated with free tickets. At the time I thought a great idea that would never catch on here. WRONG. High praise to Donnington and every success to them. On the one hand It'd be great to see Rockingham do something similar but if I go for a season ticket again that will devalue the benefit of having one to the extent of completly nullifying the benefit. Perhaps BriSCA could come up with a deal - Chevrolet have started an advertising campaign in the UK so with the number of Chevies on the short ovals perhaps they'd like to return the compliment??

"Win Sunday Sell Monday" is phrase that cropped up in a book about NASCAR history I read a while ago. Another blog discussed whether this is still the case which set me thinking to what extent I'm influenced by the sponsors in what I buy.

I enjoy my motorsport and the last 11 vehicles I've bought have all been Ford. Why? Because I've hardly had a problem with any of them. They've been far more reliable than any of the others I've had ~ in my time, I've blown a couple of engines, numerous head gaskets, bought radweld by the ton, etc....

I've never once had an incling to buy a Ferrari, BMW or a Mercedes because of what happens on 16 or 18 Sundays a year. Fords performance under the Jaguar badge hasn't made me think my next car should be a Skoda. So its difficult for me to see why manufacturers now want to run an GP series independent to Mr Ecclestone. Over the years the car companies have come and gone. F1 GP is about the players, by that I think of the team owners. The drivers come and go as well but Frank Williams and Ron Dennis etc have been the backbone for years. The late Ken Tyrrell was another stalwart until the cash situation forced him out. (Thinking about it; his successful partnership with Jackie Stewart was powered by Ford and the Cosworth name, so did this has a subliminal influence? Naah!). The politics of the 'Piranha club' is far more interesting than the on track activitity and I can't see that manufacturers becoming the stakeholders of the ruling body of the sport improving the situation.

Drifted away from the title so will probably come back to this. (Chevrolet springs to mind!!)

Lets just say racing events won't dictate what I buy. The big BUT does have to be that as a smoker my preferred brand used to sponsor an almost all conquering black and gold lotus that was just soooo smart & kewl. This didn't make me start smoking but did it influence changing to that brand? To be honest, it probably did, in that I tried them why a shop didn't have my usual and I've been loyal ever since. Am I the reason for banning tobacco sponsorship?

Yes I probably am.