Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Who would have thought! It rained in Melbourne, spoiling the fun and stopping us from seeing who is really fast. Mercedes looked good in both sessions, with the morning drying out enough to see some respectable times and Button fastest. It was really a story of who was out last to set a time as the track improved. Star of the day was Kobayashi who had a massive spin coming out of the last corner and managed to keep it off the walls, although Ricciardo managed the same thing at the Turn 11-12 complex with a bit more room available. Daniel did a lot of laps and put in some good times.

A lot of the big guns like Hamilton chose to do very few laps, and Vettel said he did not like his car today and was well down the order. The fact that Glock in the Marrussia was mid-field this afternoon tells you what was going on. Poor Pedro de la Rosa did one sighting lap all day in his HRT, while Karthikeyan did a few more, but the best that can be said is that the paint job looks better. Inside the 107%? I would think not, and I don't think they expect to race.

The Lotus boys did few laps, Kimi not liking his power steering, but throwing in a couple of decent laps at the end. Not sure what is going on at Ferrari.

Anyway, McLaren looked pretty confident that they have a good car and did not need to run much, and don't count out Red Bull. Mercedes said they were not running their new F-Duct, but there are photos of it. It is a hole in the rear wing end plate that is uncovered when the top element opens during the DRS deployment, allowing air into the rear wing mainplane which is then dispersed to stall the wing further. Ross says it is not a big gain on the DRS alone, but every little bit is gold in today's restricted rule book.

There is chatter about big news on the commercial side of F1, with a major announcement due soon. Joe Saward thinks it is that Ferrari and Red Bull have stolen a jump on their mates and done a deal with Bernie. This leaves the rest picking up the crumbs, divide and conquer. Pit Pass was hinting at something far more radical and comprehensive, a game changer for the future. Is Bernie going to try floating F1 again?

Over at Sebring the night practice saw a crash fest with the session extended due to so many red flags. Let's hope the race does not go this way. The Audis, despite being involved with two of the cars, still top the time sheets, with the Muscle Milk HPD and the Brabham driven JRM sister car next, but a few seconds off the pace of Kristensen. The Dyson Lola is surprisingly well down the order. In GTE Joey Hand snuck his ALMS BMW in front of the Bruni 458 Ferrari, and the two Corvettes, but you could throw a blanket over them on time. Should be fun. Qualifying today at 3:15 pm EDT.