I have been saying all along that this was the best F1 season I have ever seen in my life. That makes yesterday’s 6 car farce more painful. But no one can now argue with the fact that this has turned out to be the most surprise filled season of all time. Each race seems to spring up something interesting.

First of all Michelin should have done better. They screwed up big time, no question about that. But they had the guts to own up their mistakes. Commendable, that when so many millions are at stake, they were able to see the human side of it.

Ferrari must have thought,   we haven’t got plenty of points to play with, our tyres are all ok, better take this golden opportunity for that.  I can see that from their point of view. They are a racing team and had no reason not to race. But what about the FIA? Why didn’t   they  think of the big picture? There were 100,000 people who paid to watch a real race plus the millions watching at home. Don’t they have any commitment towards them? I was really disappointed with them especially when 9 out of teams, including Jordan & Minardi, were willing to make a concession. I just don’t believe that the FIA would not permit the changes, despite the teams willing to forfeit championship points for the race to go on for the sake of the fans. In their statement FIA says that the teams could have asked the drivers to go slow at turn 13. Are they out of their mind? They are racing drivers for heavens sake!! In a full-fledged race, how would you expect anyone to pull back on their pace, when they think the can get more out of the car!!

I don’t think the Michelin teams really had any other option, when FIA refused to introduce the chicane. I believe the teams did the right thing. They put safety first. Good thing that the team bosses had the common sense. This one was a real low point in F1 history, but had they raced and someone’s tyre had blown out, you never know what kind of tragedy would have played out.

Seeing the unity of the other teams, I now have big doubts about F1’s future. The alternate GP proposed by most major teams except Ferrari seems like getting more and more support with incidents like this. Too bad! I read that F1 has already lost out in US big time because of this. Nice way to woo the American crowds, Mr. Moseley.

One small “silver lining” to come out of all this – an Indian got F1 championship points for the first time in history. Congrats to Narain. Also felt nice that Minardi did score some points too. That should help them tremendously.

Hope F1 does recover from this deep ditch.

Further Reading:

• Race Report »     rediff.com/Reuters
• Mosley Plays Chess with F1 »     planet-f1.com
• Stoddart calls on F1 boss to resign »     Melbourne Herald Sun
• Venom »     f1talk.blogspot.com
• FIA Statement