Going to a Grand Prix was on MICHAEL KELLY's list of things to do before he died. But would the day turn out to be a bit of a slow death itself?
AFTER I GET my car serviced I spend a lot of time nodding sagely and trying to look intelligent as the mechanic explains the latest misfortunes to have befallen my jalopy. I am the antithesis of a petrol head: I know nothing about cars and have no interest in finding out more about them. Which explains why I felt like a man in exile on my first visit to a Grand Prix.
You might be familiar with the concept of a bucket list – things to do before you kick the bucket. The idea strikes me as curiously morbid, but I can empathise with the sentiment when it comes to Formula 1: I’d always thought it would be great to experience a Grand Prix.
So a couple of weeks ago I went along on an escorted five-day, four-night trip based in the Catalonian town of Calella, the highlight of which was attending the qualifying and race days of the Spanish Grand Prix, at Circuit de Catalunya.
There were nine people in our group, with a roughly 50-50 split between Curious Georges like myself and real fans. Take Ray as an example of the latter. He is a devoted Ferrari fan for whom a trip to a Grand Prix is a pilgrimage. He has an encyclopaedic knowledge of F1 – which, thankfully, is accompanied by a love of the sport and a generous willingness to share his expertise with the rest of us.
Spending a weekend immersed in an event you don’t really understand is a strange experience, and I spent a lot of the time with that befuddled look on my face that I usually reserve for my local mechanic. As a sport Formula 1 is all about skill and courage, but it’s also dominated by technical wizardry, so fans speak a language that is nigh on incomprehensible to the rest of us.
This year’s hot topic, for example, is the advantage derived by fitting a car with a rear-end diffuser – I have no idea what it does, but every time it was mentioned my inner monologue went in to a childish fit of the giggles.
In our group we talked about the new front wings on the cars, kinetic-energy recovery systems, the return of slick tyres and the changes in testing rules. I kept nodding and hoping that no one would ask me a question.
At breakfast on the morning of the Grand Prix the fans were festooned in the regalia of their teams. I sat there in my jeans and a grey T-shirt, wishing I had bought some of the gear. Supporting F1 is all about belonging: it’s about hitching your wagon to one of the teams and supporting it devotedly. With a team shirt I could have at least pretended to belong. Damn.
Our bus left for the circuit at the ungodly hour of 7.30am, to beat the crowds. The recession is biting hard in Spain, however, and attendance on race day was down this year to 92,000 (the track can host 147,770 people). Circuit de Catalunya is 4,700m long, which means there are plenty of good vantage points for general-admission ticket holders – that is to say, if you don’t have an expensive ticket for the stands – but you need to get there early to bag a good spot.
Although the race didn’t start until 2pm, the slopes around the circuit were starting to fill up when we arrived, at about 8.30am. Deciding where to sit at a Grand Prix is a science. Do you want to sit near a corner, so you can see the cars negotiating the bend? Or would you prefer to be sitting near a straight, so you can see them reach the speeds of more than 300km/h for which they are celebrated?
In the end we set up camp on a grassy knoll – apologies to JFK – between turns six and seven. This, according to the boffins, would give us good views of speed and deft turns. That sorted, we sat down and relaxed. It was 9am. “What do we do now?” I asked. Now, we wait.
In fairness, there was plenty to keep us occupied. The Formula BMW, GP2 and Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup championships, which run in tandem with the F1 season, act as warm-up races, to keep the crowds happy on both days.
The atmosphere around the circuit was pure carnival. The variety of nationalities among F1 drivers – the 20 of them come from 11 countries – guarantees a healthy dose of good-natur- ed national rivalry in the crowd (but none of the yobbishness you get at soccer matches). Our patch on the hill was like the EU in microcosm, and each group was marking its territory with the cunning use of flags.
Spaniards vocally support their former world champion Fernando Alonso – he won the 2006 Grand Prix here and is worshipped in these parts. The British support Jenson Button, of Brawn, or the current champion, Lewis Hamilton, of McLaren. In the case of the latter it is done quietly: Hamilton and his team were caught cheating at the Australian Grand Prix, in Melbourne, so his every appearance on the giant TV screens around the circuit was greeted with booing and interesting hand gestures.
Germans cheer for Nick Heidfeld, Timo Glock or Sebastian Vettel; Finns for Kimi Räikkönen; and Poles for Robert Kubica. Italians’ allegiance is split between idolising Ferrari and supporting their countrymen Jarno Trulli and Giancarlo Fisichella.
At one stage there was a hilarious row near us when Spanish fans tried to take down a Polish flag that they said was blocking their view.
As the morning progressed our enclave was gradually encroached on from all angles until we were but a tiny cog in a teeming mass of humanity. I went to the toilet at one point, and when I came back my personal territory had shrunk considerably.
I tried lying down to soak up the sun, but I was far too close to the people on either side of me for comfort. So I alternated between sitting and, when my own rear-end diffuser was causing me problems, standing. My advice is to bring a foldable chair or cushion and prepare for the weather – sunscreen, water and a hat in case it’s sunny; raingear and an umbrella in case it rains.
As the morning went on the sense of anticipation grew. Just after noon the F1 drivers went around the track in the back of a lorry – the first chance for fans to connect with the objects of their affections. I don’t know whether the drivers are forced to do this or whether they enjoy it; either way, it felt as if they were saluting us rather than the other way around, and we all agreed this was an entirely gracious gesture.
Then, before we knew it, it was 2pm and the cars were on the grid for the start of the 65-lap race. A spectacular pile-up at the first turn took out four cars. We roared our approval as if we were back in ancient Rome, baying for the blood of Christians. The safety car was dispatched, and the cars did a few laps in relative slow motion while the debris of crashed cars (and chastened drivers) was removed.
No word I can think of accurately describes the noise of these cars – except, perhaps, awesome. “Bring ear muffs” was the most common piece of advice I got when I told people I was going to a Grand Prix, and it was good advice indeed. Sitting at the race must be what it was like to sit in London during the Blitz as V2 bombs whistled down.
The roar of the engines waxed and waned around the circuit: it moved across in front of us as the drivers hurtled away from the grid down the first stretch, briefly subsided as they negotiated the first five turns, at the east end of the track, then, ominously, built gradually again behind our right shoulders as the cars came closer, getting ever louder until, eventually, there was a deafening roar as they whizzed past at 260km/h, followed by rapid-fire clicking down through the gears as they slowed into the next turn.
The fireworks at the first bend were, alas, to be the dramatic high point in what was by all accounts a pretty pedestrian Grand Prix. Button and his team-mate Rubens Barrichello, who more or less had a lock on it from the start, finished first and second, with Mark Webber, of Red Bull, in third.
As the laps counted down and the result of the race was increasingly a foregone conclusion, I gradually became rather bored. Round and round went the cars – neeeeeeeooooooowww – but there were no attempts at overtaking and no grisly accidents for us to get our teeth into. “A bit of rain might make things interesting,” someone said. But no rain came.
Lewis Hamilton’s girlfriend, Nicole Scherzinger of Pussycat Dolls, appeared on the TV screen and there was a roar – we would have cheered anything at that point. With about 10 laps to go people started to leave around us; I wished they would take me with them.
The home crowd got a brief moment in the sun on the final lap, when Alonso overtook Felipe Massa, of Ferrari. Another mighty roar went up. That an overtaking manoeuvre to secure fifth place was cause for cheer perhaps says it all about how disappointing the whole thing was.
Much of the post-race coverage centred on the verbal fisticuffs between Button and Barrichello – the Brazilian was angry that a change in their team’s race strategy helped the British driver to pip him for the top spot – but we were oblivious to this drama at trackside. And in some ways that’s the problem with watching a Grand Prix live. You are oblivious to most things – well, I was, at any rate.
For the first 10 laps or so it was easy to understand what was going on, but once the cars start to pit it becomes increasingly difficult, and this is where TV coverage and expert commentary come into their own. I kept thinking I was glad I wasn’t reporting for the sports pages. (After reading this, I’m sure they are, too.)
If I had one gripe about our trip it would be the accommodation. The package would have been immeasurably improved had we been based in Barcelona rather than being marooned 50 minutes up the coast. Apart from a spotless four-kilometre beach, Calella had little to recommend it. Our hotel, the three-star Catalonia, was average: my room was clean, but it was noisy at night, and the food was poor. That said, our group was a great bunch, and it was very sociable. The organisation on the trip was flawless, and our guide was friendly and efficient.
Formula 1 may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but a Grand Prix is certainly a worthy entrant on the bucket list.
** The Monaco Grand Prix takes place in Monte Carlo this weekend. See www.formula1.com. MichaelKelly was a guest of the Travel Department (01- 6371600, www.thetraveldepartment.ie). Its Formula 1 deals include three nights at the German Grand Prix, departing on July 10th, for €715 per person, including Aer Lingus flights, transfers, accommodation on a bed-and-breakfast basis in Cologne, and admission to Saturday's qualifying and Sunday's race