lone star state

It was the inaugural US Grand Prix this weekend.

They've rather cheekily called the circuit the "Circuit of the Americas".  Note the plural in particular: clearly Mexico, Brazil, Canada, etc were all presumably signed off on such a name... ;).

Anyway, the circuit looked very interesting.  It's not fully Tilke - his company was involved, but I understand the basic layout structure was designed by the people who built it.  However, with Tilke being the only company that builds bespoke FIA circuits I guess it's difficult for anybody else to deign one that's fully up to spec: access roads, paddocks, etc.

It does feature big run-off areas, which is the modern circuit disease as they don't provide any way to separate the men from the boys.

The race sounded good.

I say sounded because I listened to it on the radio and have recorded the highlights with the intention to watch them tonight.  The BBC's US Grand Prix coverage was just bizarre as I mentioned last Friday.  It turned out that the race highlights were being shown as starting at 22:30 and were some 2 hours long, taking them up to half-past midnight.

Needless to say I didn't stay up to watch it (talking to those who are interested in F1 none of them did).  The race started at 7PM GMT and did last for the best part of the maximum 2 hours running time, which meant it ended at 9PM ish.  I was slightly delayed with the radio (partly to give me a buffer in case of safety cars) and so finished at 9:30PM.

I was pleased Lewis won - he was really on fire.  The drivers really seemed to enjoy the circuit and it seemed like a good race.  Also while not perfect from a championship point of view (Vettel did extend his lead) it means it's still all to play for in Brazil (the extension was small change).

Brazil is this next weekend and can be quite unpredictable.  It's an old-skool circuit where you get a lot of action.  Overtaking is very much a possibility and accidents are not uncommon, so thins like safety cars can come into play.  This is particularly the case if the weather is wet or changeable (current forecast is for rain!).

Luckily the BBC is also showing the full race live and while late in the day here in the UK it'll be on at teatime so is much more watchable than the US coverage.