WRC » Latvala keen to aid Hirvonen’s challenge

Olli Haapalainen's tutoring seemed to have a pretty good effect on Jari-Matti's performance in Spain and Corsica last year. Hope he builds on that for this event.

WRC » Solberg: I can do the job for BP Ford

Cheeky, Henning. Very cheeky. I agree it's tough for him with next to no pre-event testing, and if he had more testing he'd get "settled in" earlier in a rally. At the same time, some of that has to be partly his responsibility because he keeps tinkering with settings and kind of uses up the Friday of a rally on that.

F1 » Raikkonen to make WRC debut.

He'll have fun, but I wouldn't expect him to finish very high up the rankings. The roads round Jyvaskyla are ones that you have to get to know in depth - you have to be familiar with the lines to take over every crest and jump. He's barely done any testing on gravel, even. That said, he has a natural talent, obviously. I guess he'd be fair to good in terms of the other group N cars, not as fast as the more experienced group N and S2000 drivers. (and I guess a good bit better than fair to good at the after-rally party. Will we see a Raikkonen v Hirvonen beer drinking contest?) I'd love to see him make the move to rallying full time. Face it, he's got enough money to fund himself.

WRC » Henning: I gave it my all

If only Henning and the car could be totally awake and ready on the first day of a rally.

WRC » Richards: No warning on Subaru pull-out.

Can't really get behind Dafydd's use of language ("nips" etc) but I agree with the sentiment that Toni and PG have been badly let down by Suzuki. A few weeks ago (going by something on his website guestbook, if I understood it correctly that is) Toni was thinking that things were looking pretty much OK for 2009 although nothing signed yet, then the drivers heard absolutely nothing from Suzuki. Getting back to Subaru, pulling out of the season with such short notice to the team does leave one with a really bad feeling. Very similar to the Honda F1 situation - the actual team knew nowt about it.

F1 » Hamilton loses Belgian Grand Prix win.

You know, if the stewards had been clever, this would have been the perfect opportunity to create a smokescreen. Investigate the incident, find Hamilton guilty of nothing, and thus "prove" that there isn't a bias in favour of Ferrari. But they aren't clever, just bloody greedy, self-serving, in-Ferrari-pockets *word that you can't say here*. Sport? You must be joking.

WRC » Duval fastest in New Zealand shakedown.

Looking at the detailed shakedown results (which I, er, can't link to) - Duval and Latvala were the fastest, but not the most consistent... Both seem to have spun on one run: I guess that's what you get for being on the edge.

WRC » Who should replace Galli in New Zealand?

I should partially correct my earlier comment. I had a better look at that Finnish article I mentioned, and it seems more non-committal than I first thought. Marcus hasn't decided anything *yet*. I think. And it does say that he was the first person whom Malcolm Wilson called...

WRC » Who should replace Galli in New Zealand?

It would be beyond excellent if Marcus Grönholm were to come out of retirement, but I'm pretty sure he won't. (My Finnish is very poor, but I saw something on mtv3.fi that seemed to say that Marcus had said he wouldn't be doing it). Manfred Stohl was driving for Henning Solberg's gravel crew this weekend, and is absolutely desperate for a drive, so he's an option. I don't know that he'd get a good enough result, though.