Oh my stars and garters! Let's not hesitate... ganbatte!

*SIX YEARS...: The last time Michael Schumacher had an engine failure was in 2000. Today, his first failure in 100+ races has probably cost him his eighth world championship. He was leading the race, with a good six second lead over 'Nando and pitstops completed, and ka-blammo! Have a nice retirement.

*TWO IN A ROW: It's going to take a miracle for Alonso to LOSE the championship now. For it to happen, Schumacher has to win Brazil, and Alonso has to earn no points. I just can't imagine that happening... but the results of today's race shows that just about anything CAN happen in a F1 race.

*TEAM OF THE RACE: Renault. First and third, a nine point lead in the Constructor's Championship, and a 10 point lead in the Driver's. It took a failure in the bulletproof Ferrari engine for it to happen, but they had a good race; can't keep that from them.

*DRIVE OF THE RACE: Takuma Sato, SuperAguri. Okay, yeah, 15th doesn't sound like much, but c'mon, this is SUPERAGURI we're talking about here. Nice job, Taku! Great to see ya on our screens again. (hat tip to Fuji TV's director)

*MOVE OF THE RACE: Fernando Alonso had been stuck behind Ralf Schumacher for the first 11 laps of the race. He had better straight-line speed, but had to keep falling back in sectors 2 and 3. Going down the straightaway towards Turn 1, he got a nice tow from the Toyota. He then went right to the edge on braking, slipped inside Ralf, and just outpowered him thru the esses. Very slick, very tight, and very well done.

*MOOOOOOO-OVE OF THE RACE: In a clean race, it's often difficult to name a winner of the MOOOOOOO-OVE , but today is different. On lap 40, coming off the final turn, Mark Webber made an unforced error, getting (in his words) "two inches" into the grass, at which point he lost the car completely. By the time the car stopped moving (and Webbo stopped mooooooo-oving), the left side of his Williams was mostly missing, scraped down to the framework and both tires hanging on only by their tethers. Nicely done, Mark! HONORABLE MENTION goes to the Spyker mechanic that forgot to tighten down the restraining nuts on that crankshaft that wound up tearing the rear off of Christijan Albers' car in one of the more dramatic breakdowns we've seen in a while. It looked like the right rear of the car just disappeared... and he still managed to get it to the pits.

*DRIVER QUOTES OF THE RACE: will be posted later Sunday.

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Quals have just ended and we've got an interesting layout for the grid:

Row One: Ferrari Ferrari (Massa Schumi)
Row Two: Toyota Toyota (Ralf Trulli)
Row Three: Renault Renault (Alonso Fisi)
Row Four: Honda Honda (Button Barrichello)

Massa's got his second career pole, but when was the last time we saw teams make up each row of the grid like this? Note the results of the tire wars. Bridgestone 1-4, then Michelins.

Another wild scramble to get out at the beginning of Q3, and if Massa could complain about being "blocked" by Alonso a few races back, then Alonso has an even better complaint, as Massa was within a few car-lengths for the first few minutes.

Then it started to drip rain a little bit, and everybody dove into the pits for new rubber earlier than normal, hoping to beat the heavier rain (that never came). Both Alonso and Massa were racing to get out of the pits, and 'Zo almost cut Massa off; could easily have been an accident if Felipe hadn't backed down.

Renault is feeling the pressure. They didn't even have Alonso's tires ready for him when he came in, and THAT is inexcusable.

Still and all, heck of a Quals session, and it's possible that tomorrow's race will crown Schumi champion. IF Schumi wins and Alonso DNFs, that'd give Mikey the championship, no matter what happens in Brazil.

Not likely, I admit, but... I wonder if Massa would wreck Alonso if that situation became possible? "Team Orders" y'know. Again, not bloody likely, but who knows? I don't put it past Ferrari to at least THINK such things.

See ya at Suzuka!

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Six years ago, Juan Pablo Montoya won the Indianapolis 500.

Last year, he won three Formula One races.

Today, he finished third in his first stockcar race.

He'd never driven at a superspeedway, never driven a 6000lb stockcar with 41 other opponents, never really experienced drafting the way they do it in NASCAR-type cars, and he did a great job.

At one point, he got caught up in a wreck (he took a car hard in his right door). The way the hit came, he easily could have lost it all over the track. Nope, he gathered his #4 car up, straightened it back out, and continued on with nary a bobble. Truthfully, if a similar accident had happened in F1, his car would have be DOA, even if he kept it from wrecking.

He impressed the dickens out of me. At the end of the season last year, I said that he could be a dark-horse for 'best driver in F1', along with Alonso, Schumacher and Raikkonen (in no particular order). It's looking more and more like his driving skill is natural... put him in a car, and he can drive the heck out of it.

At least, in ARCA/REMAX. That means it's the minor leagues... lets see how he does at Daytona in... March, is it? Still, great job.

And one other thing: in the post-race interview, he looked positively giddy! "The most fun I've ever had racing." It sounds like his pit-radio conversations were hilarious, too... too bad they don't let you listen in. It would have been a laugh.

Finally, there's one last thing I've got to point out. Somewhere at Talledega Superspeedway, there's a track worker with a big bullseye painted on the front of his jumpsuit. There were big accidents in the race: the one that Juan Pablo was involved in, and The Big One that ended the event (it was getting dark, and 'Dega has no lights). In both cases, cars ended up hitting the inside wall about ten feet from where he was ducking for cover. Poor guy.

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After reading THIS article at planetf1.com, it's official:

Michael Schumacher will win the Driver's Championship. Ferrari will win the Constructor's Championship.

Renault has cracked completely under the stress. Of course, the team has denied that they're 'sabotaging' Fernando's title bid, but what is life gonna be like in the Suzuka pits this weekend?

I'm actually quite bemused by Fernando Alonso's demeanor this season. Last year, everybody was praising the lad for his 'cool under fire.' Can you imagine him doing an Imola '05 this year? Holding back Schumi for 16 laps on dying tires and traffic staring him in the face? No chance in hell: this year he'd blow a gasket somehow.

Success has gone to his head. I'll come right out and say it... I'll be actively rooting against Fernando Alonso. I won't be cheering for The Evil One, don't get me wrong, but I WILL be anti-'Zo.

Sad, really.

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This week, we visit the wonderful Suzuka circuit, perhaps for the last time. Next year, Suzuka is off the schedule, replaced by the Mt. Fuji track. So lets settle in and enjoy this one, and wonder just which of the two big guys will be ahead afterwards!

On Thursday, at 1159pm, we get LIVE coverage of Practice.

Friday we get a little oddball entry on the F1 on SPEED! schedule, with Juan Pablo Montoya's debut in the ARCA/ReMax series at Talladega, live at 7pm. ARCA is basically two steps below NASCAR (with the Busch series in between), but still incredibly competitive, and 'Dega is far and away my favorite oval track, so this should be a ball to watch. Let's see if 'The Pope' can handle a car that weighs three times as much as a McLaren with another 40 of them bumper-to-bumper!

But then we get REAL racing at 1159pm, with Live coverage of Quals. Even more important than normally, he who ends up on pole (or highest on the grid) has got to be favored to win the championship.

Then, finally, we get the Grand Prix of Japan at 1130pm on Saturday night, LIVE. One of the few races we here in the US get to watch at a semi-decent hour. The replay is at 1230pm on Sunday.

Please note that there are NO replays for practice or quals... boo, SPEED!

All times, as usual, are central. Add one hour for the east coast, subtract two for San Francisco, add 12 hours for Kuala Lumpur.

And enjoy the saki and sushi!

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My friend The Librarian sent me an e-mail today.

The e-mail contained a link. THIS link.

Click only if you won't miss your sanity.

Go ahead, I'll wait. When you're done, click below: more...

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Holy hannah, now THAT was an interesting race! Lets just get right to it... it's F1 UPDATE! time!!!

*IT'S HARD TO DRIVE...: with your hands firmly around your throat, and that's sure what it looked like was happening at Renault today. Alonso's mysterious loss of speed (or "conserving his tires" as an unnamed Renault pitcrew member told Peter "Smarmy" Windsor), the right-rear screwup during the pitstop, even the failure of the monitors on the Renault team wall... all indicators of a team choking under the pressure. And what was that display on the podium? They couldn't even catch the champagne bottle that Alonso dropped to them!

*THAT GUY IS GONNA LEAD FERRARI?: I wonder if Luca diMontzemelo is wondering if he can talk Schumi out of retirement? Where the heck was Felipe Massa all weekend?

*TEAM OF THE RACE: Renault. Yes, we know we branded them as chokers at the start of this F1 UPDATE!, and we stand by that. However, they still had both drivers on the podium, and took the lead back in the Constructor's Championship. Credit where credit is due.

*DRIVE OF THE RACE: Michael Schumacher. He didn't have a chance in hell of winning this one. The weather was wrong for his tires. He was too far back on the grid. He's never had any success on this track. So all he did was pull out a drive that should have made your eyes water. No question, hands down, the best drive of the day and possibly the season.

*MOVE OF THE RACE: Jensen Button. Last lap of the race, he had already lost a spot due to a slight bobble and was staring at a 7th place finish. Then the 'gang of four' came up on Takuma Sato. Zip! Button dives off the dry line, sticks Heidfeld on a spit behind 'Suicide' Sato, and manages to keep the car pointing the right way despite worn tires and wet track. HONORABLE MENTION goes to a half-dozen others for a ton of impressive passes during the race, too many to list.

*MOOOOOOO-OOVE OF THE RACE: Celebrating the asinine, the NASCAR, the bovine in every F1 driver, the Moooooo-oove goes to the worst manuever of the race. We're considering changing the name of this to the Takuma Sato Memorial Award, as he's won this wayyyy too often, and today is no exception. While it allowed Button to earn his Move of the Race award, Taku's moo-ing and lowing on the last lap caused the only accident of the race and got him 'excluded' from the results. Lovely job, Taku!

*QUOTES OF THE RACE: more...

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