Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Is it me or has it rained on just about every race this year at some stage? The "best drivers in the world" if you believe NASCAR are sitting it out at Watkins Glen, a road course, 'cause it's raining. Put some treads on and race, it's not an oval.

In Brno yesterday's third practice was wet and saw a number of falls, including Friday' surprise package John Hopkins who will not race due to broken fingers. Hero to zero. Stoner won handily from Dovi and Simoncelli after Pedrosa crashed out early. He just tried harder in the race was Casey's comment on the win. Lorenzo chose the wrong tire and had to settle for fourth with team mate Spies riding shotgun for him. Only 13 bikes finished, with Rossi sixth in front of his team mate Hayden. Suzuki's weekend went from looking good to disaster as Bautista crashed out of 7th place. This cannot do Suzuki's chances of running a team next year any good.

The F3 Masters was run at the Zandvoort circuit, of which I have fond memories from growing up in England. It brings together all the various F3 series runners and is part of the new FIA F3 Championship, won by Merhi despite being disqualified after making contact with Juncadella as his nearest rival had a DNF. British F3 star Kevin Magnussen finished third despite a recurrence of a misfire problem with his VW engine in practice. This has plagued him all season and it is hard to understand why VW or the plug manufacturer cannot get on top of this. A bit like Trulli's power steering.

Kevin's dad Jan also had a bad break, a driveshaft actually on his Camaro while leading the GT class at Watkins Glen. 

After my "foot in mouth," or is it keyboard in mouth, comment about Ricciardo just keeping his hand in he goes and sets fast time, only to have it taken away because a bolt was found loose on the car after qualifying. This sort of thing sounds a bit over the top, like last year when a piece of tape was found on a car. Daniel was philosophical about it though, confirming he was there for the race experience. He did well in the first race, coming through the field from last to sixth, but with another potential problem as he and a few others are under investigation for possibly passing under a yellow.  American Alexander Rossi finished well down, let's hope for a better finish in race 2.

Jan Magnussen's son Kevin won his maiden British F3 race with a couple of great overtaking moves. Let us hope Kevin can catch the breaks better than his father did. Somehow to me F3 is still the class to be in and win. We have F2, GP3, FR 3.5 etc, but this still seems the best finishing school. Many top drivers went straight from here to F1, while it almost seems that with a few exceptions classes like GP2 are for guys who will not quite make it. Still, not everyone is going to be world champion and at least they are living their dream and hopefully having some fun. Speaking of F2, another son of a famous father, Alex Brundle, took pole at Magny-Cours.

Also in France, at Le Mans, Casey Stoner continued to dominate practice and qualifying from Simoncelli and the rest of the Honda gang. Fifth is Lorenzo in front of the two Tech3 Yamahas, with Ben Spies eighth. So four Hondas, four Yamahas, and then the three Ducatis with Rossi and Hayden, who could not repeat yesterday's form. Are we loading an Ark here?

Grand Am is at VIR today, and DMG bikes are at Sears Point, but I don't think anyone is noticing.