Malaysia 2009-Rain helps cars finish!

Well today's Sepang GP race must go down as one of the rare occasions where heavy rain has actually helped keep up the number of cars holding classified positions. Had we continued a good 4 cars would probably have gone off, if not more.

It also is a great example of the interplay of various f1 rules.

The rapidly approaching 2 hour cut-off means there comes a point where it is not possible to complete the remaining laps even if restarted - the time limit will fall before then.

So all drivers still classed as running become classified 12 minutes before the 2hr mark. Sadly however most punters had removed their bets by this stage as we awaited the interplay of the later 10minute notice rule with the 2hr curtain.

TV commentary speculated that the restart delay was due to figuring out the order at that point. However, one wonders whether it was also an easy way to avoid a difficult decision.

Nick Heidfeld has now become the luckiest F1 driver of the season, jumping to 2nd place with only 1 pitstop that afternoon before the curtain fell.

Can he keep his luck up and take a win this season? Time, though hopefully not time itself, will tell.

BBC replays not replays

Don't rely on the BBC 'replay' programmes if you want to follow all the action this year.

Despite trumpeting the level of coverage they would give F1 the BBC have actually gone too far. Rather than simply repeating the earlier programme the BBC are completely repackaging the race, with different introductions and interviews.

Repeat viewers did not receive Brundle's grid walk or other essentials.

Set your videos, dvr, sky plus and thank god for the iplayer....

Austraila 2009: Memo to Jonathan Legard: "A picture is worth a 1000 words!"

As F1 returns to the BBC the simple fact of no adverts is the most marked improvement in Formula 1 coverage.

This is closely followed by an end to 'The Lewis Hamilton Show'. Hopefully this is a decided BBC position to cover the race field *in full* rather than simply being due to McLaren's performance in 09. I guess we will find out if we start to get 'The Jenson Button' show appearing over the next few weeks.

Sadly however while many people have welcomed the loss of James Allen from the commentary team, the BBC's Jonathan Legard who transfers from Radio Five Live is in desperate need of an explanation of the concept of television.

Most of us are in the fortunate position of being able to see for ourselves exactly what he is seeing so having him attempt to describe it after the fact - and while the story moves on - adds nothing at all, other than getting in the way of team radio and Martin Brundle's always insight full contributions.

While in radio people might get confused if you don't know that is a driver speaking in TV land we have this clever device called graphics. If team radio starts you can - and should - just stop mid sentence - we can figure it out.

Legard has a compulsion to finish everything he says as a fully fledged sentence - even if that gets in the way of actual coverage. In tele-vision, a shared reaction of 'wow' or 'that defies belief' contributtes far far more than telling me what I have already seen.

Watching on screen we have far more sources for what's happening than a description - we have on screen graphics, on board cameras and more - so just shutting up for 30 seconds when he doesn't have anything to say assits with that. Only talk when you have something to say, Brundle manages this - and could probably almost sustain the entire race himself doing this.

I guess we can only hope this improves for next weeks race, but we will have to wait and see!