Patronise F1

Prologue

Welcome to the start of a potentially massive weekend for English sporting pride. By around 7pm GMT tomorrow, England could be the proud owners of the Rugby World Cup for another four years, despite having been written off as a bunch of useless fat men in unnecessarily skintight lycra a mere few weeks ago, and the F1 World Championship, despite Lewis Hamilton's youthful lack of experience and the pressure of a two-time world champion team-mate and a mumbly drunkard in a rival car. On the other hand, let us not forget the great English tradition of the choke, and hedge our bets with large sums of money placed on the Saffers to run up a cricket score against England's stodgy defence and Hamilton to end the race parked in the boonies somewhere past half distance. You know, just in case.

Especially after the sign of portent that was the England football team being abjectly humiliated in Moscow on Wednesday. Woe is Steve McLaren and the FA. Though the plastic pitch that the game was played on has offered a convenient excuse for the ginger-fringed one. In the interests of sparing the nation's blushes, let us hope that tonights rugby takes place on a pitch covered in bathroom tiles and the Interlagos circuit is coated liberally in custard overnight. You know, just in case.

Before we can turn our bandwagon-jumping attention to the rugger, mind, there is the small matter of the qualifying session for tomorrow's Grand Prix. To garble out a tired old cliché, the title can't be won here today, but it can certainly be lost. The title contenders are driving to different percentages this weekend. Hamilton realistically just needs to finish ahead of Alonso, while Alonso and Raikkonen basically must go all out for the win. Will that affect their approaches to qualifying? Probably not, to be honest.

Some more details to ponder. Felipe Massa won here last year, but in his supporting role to Kimi this weekend, he's unlikely to repeat that. Also, the last two Brazilian Grands Prix have seen Alonso wrap up each of his back-to-back titles. Spooky.

Even spookier the last time we had a three-way title fight going into the final race (some 21 years ago), it was between an Englishman riding a wave of patriotic hype, his moody hispanic (ish) team-mate and a quietly-spoken outsider from a rival team. Back then, the Englishman's tyre went pop, his team-mate pitted once too often, and the outsider won through. Good news for Kimi? Well possibly, though the other way of looking at it is that the winner that year, Alain Prost, was driving a McLaren.

The Foot - In other news, the fierce back of the grid battle to come up with the most hilarious team name has a new contender for next year. Squderia Torro Rosso and Super Aguri will next year be joined by Force India F1, the rebadged Spyker team. Force will be making a strong charge at Super Aguri and STR no doubt, at this stage it's hard to see who will win this battle, though an Indian flag style livery could push FIF1 across the line first in this all important sub race.

The Elbow meanwhile, has staked five whole Sterling on local hero Felipe Massa to take his 2nd consecutive home Pole, in the hope he will qualify on fumes, allowing him to do a bit of synchronised swimming at Turn 1 to let Kimi past, and hold up the Maccas.

Conclusions from the ITV pre-race show: Nelson Piquet is a dirty old perv, Lewis Hamilton circa 1998 WAS the kid out of Heroes, and Ted Kravitz should never again be given editorial control on a pre-recorded feature.

First Session

17:00 GMT - Here we go then. May the Force(India) be with Team Sellout. Incidentally, I'm suffering from the consumption of a weak Relentless rip-off, called Cilgin Boga, which I can only assume is Austrian for Cillit Bang and tastes like the devil's own homebrew.

17:02 GMT - They haven't fixed the caption on the Sellouts yet, sadly, as Admiral Yamamoto gets some screen time. I'm intrigued to see how they're going to fit "Force India F1 Ferrari" into the small box available to them. Speaking of small boxes, Webbo is stationary in the garage. Spyker's proud final race is starting well as Yamamoto beats the time of nobody.

17:05 GMT - Possibly the dullest start to a qualifying session ever, as the two Spykers toil around by themselves. This is officially becoming tedious now. Ooh, look here's Ralfie, whose pace all season has been up and down like a kangaroo shagging a spacehopper on a trampoline.

The Foot - In an effort to keep ahead of Red Bull Racing in the chase for 4th in the WDC Williams are running two cars for the first time this year, Nakas is alongside Nico Rosberg.

17.08 BST (Happy?) - Time issues for us here, as I gets my GMT muddled with my BST. Time issues for Jarno Truli, as well, who goes slowest. Hamilton is getting rather lairy into turn one, like a pub drunk trying it on with every woman who walks into the bar. Awright, gorgeous?

Meanwhile, in Canada - The Canadian coverage features an impossibly muffled and noisy phone line featuring Gerry Donaldson's "always insightful" statement of the obvious. "Lewis Hamilton has never seen this track." No shit.

17:10 BST - All action now, as everyone's out there on track. Williams stand-in Nakajima is glacially slow at the moment. Interestingly, Kimi has totally spooned up his first lap. 16th for the Finn. Kovalainen, Ralf and Fisi also struggling. Hamilton fastest, for what its worth.

17:12 BST - Kimi sorts himself out and pops his Ferrari in fastest of all, for about five seconds. He's immediately beaten by local hero Massa, who delights the Brazilian faithful, and doubtlessly, the Elbow. Everyone pits for a final mad dash as the clock counts down.

The Elbow is indeed feeling comfortable with his prediction thus far.

17:15 BST - Here comes the madness! For a glorious moment, the Admiral is inside the top 16 time. Then he locks up into a corner and generally messes up. Ralf up to 11th and he times his run perfectly to get one last lap in. The world feed seems to be giving Ralf a lot of attention in this first session. Extra help showcasing him for a job next year, perhaps? Button in trouble, 16th for the Brit. Surely Kovalainen will edge him out. But no! Heikki the first big gun to fail, only 17th for the Finn, and his forehead will be stuck at the back of the grid. Button sneaks into Q2 by the skin of his pearly whites.

The Foot - It appears that Alex Wurz has come out of retirement to fill in for Nakas in Q1. RBR will be happy with that. For the first time in, something like a bunch of years, this race features 3 Japanese drivers. They decided to stick together and all be eliminated in the first session.

The Elbow - Alonso finally got his act together to beat Hamilton in a session for the first time this weekend.

Second Session

So Massa, Alonso, Raikkonen, Hamilton, Webber the top 5 in that session. I've gone and done a top 5 instead of a top 4 to give The Foot a bit of a massage.

17:20 BST - Q2 underway, and there's less car action here than the average bus lane gets. At least with one of them theres a chance an uptight exec will lose his cool and go for a fine-producing dash down it every now and again.

17:25 BST - Tedium has set in again. Jallen and Brunders have been reduced to inventing a "Kovalainen to McLaren" rumour. Here's a car! Ralfie!

17:28 BST - Hammy's on softs, as it were. Ralfie pops in the first time of the session after nearly 7 of the 15 minutes. This is going to be another "carnage at the end" sort of session.

The Elbow - Boobens is doing a good job this weekend in a last desperate bid to avoid his first ever pointless season in Formula One, sitting in 9th place in Q2.

The Foot - Webber continues his fine form and pops in an initial time to put him best of the rest, I know he's always wanted to lead the mad rush for whatever crumbs Hamilton wipes off the table so this will be putting him in a good mood.

17:31 BST - The timing may be down, we're having technical issues. Ooh, there we go, Kimi, Hammy, Massa, Fred, Webbo, Jarno the top 6. Yoda looking almost good. NNIICCOO on the "bubble" as Jallen would say, in 10th. Danger, danger.

17:35 BST - Right, last two minutes and everyone floods out onto the pitch. Speaking of floods, a post flood between Friki's various parts is forcing a number of angered exchanges between foot, elbow and me. Good job we've got a few months off after tomorrow.

17:37 BST - All the drama of the fair. Bazza, Rozza, Cozza, Buzza, Razza and Vezza in the "drop zone". Then Rosberg improves! Fisi in trouble, Webber comfortably 6th. Boobens sneaks in, but gets immediately forced out. No top ten for the (possibly) retiring Barrichello. And we're done. Raikkonen, Hammy, Massa, Alonso the top four.

The Foot - We're having trouble sorting our arse out from our elbow at the moment, so excuse the infighting. As I've always said, when walking your foot should go first to avoid embarrassment. Oh, and go Webber!

Final Session

So the top ten shootout will be between Massa, Hamilton, Alonso, Raikkonen, Webber, Rosberg, Trulli, Kubica, Ickle and the redoubtable Mr Coulthard. Thriller.

17:45 BST - Here we go then. For the final time this season, ten cars head out onto the track for the pointless "fuel burn" session. Yawn, yawn, shocked faces on behalf of the environmentalist inside me.

The Foot - 3,247 Iraqis died to bring us this part of qualifying, the aforementioned infamous fuel burn.

17:50 BST - Hamilton is leading the train at the moment, fastest from Kubica, Massa, Heidfeld, and NICO! Incidentally, I've got to make it from Manor House to Mile End after this, and before the rugby starts. Now THAT will be a fuel burn.

The Elbow - Tyler almost screws it on a fuel burn lap, running wide over the kerb out of Descida do Lago, but getting away with it. Although it wasn't anywhere near that dramatic.

17:53 BST - As an aside, my non-F1 supporting friend has busied himself while quali has been on by setting up the internet browser settings on my spanking new PSP. His first google search? "Tits". Words fail me.

17:55 BST - Ferrari pit for fresh tyres. Hammy still fastest, but everything up to here was meaningless, really. Bring on the new tyres! Presumably the FIA are operating Hammy's pitstops on a "one set in, one set out" basis.

17:56 BST - Lewis gets out of Kimi's way as the Ferrari storms through on a flyer. He goes fast, into the 1:12s, but Massa's on a stonker. 1:12.1. Lordy. Could that have sealed Elbow's bet?

The Elbow - Felipe goes quicker than Kimi even did in Q2, meaning he probably is on the fumes the Elbow thought he would be.

17:58 BST - Hammy up to second. Webbo is storming around, up in fourth. And Alonso is limping, can't even beat the Red Bull and is stuck in 5th. Two and a half minutes to go, Webber is the massive spoiler in front of Alonso, and Hammy is sitting pretty right now.

17:59 BST - This is a mighty end to this session. Kimi needs to get ahead of Hamilton, Alonso needs to get ahead of everyone, and Hamilton needs to hold them both off. Nails are being chewed all around the world.

18:00 BST - Kimi up to second! Massa is absolutely driving off his tits here, into the 1:11s for the Brazilian. Hamilton and Alonso still bombing round.

18:01 BST - Hamilton has a storming middle sector! Can he get pole? Not quite, but he's in second, ahead of Raikkonen! Another storming lap from son of Senna. Alonso improves to 4th but is all out of position for the race tomorrow. That was a heck of an ending to quali.

The Elbow just had a minor heart attack as Tyler pulled out a purple mid sector, but was much slower up the hill, meaning Felipe holds onto Pole. Now, off to Ladbrokes to collect my winnings...

The Foot - Webbeeeeeeeeeeeer! *fap* *fap* *fap*

Epilogue

So, Hammy is in the box seat for tomorrow. Somehow Kimi and/or Alonso need to get past him and hope he somehow messes up. Bring it on.

The Elbow - DC taking 9th on the grid maybe just makes him slight favourite for TUFFCIAWCC, although in this competition, who knows. I can't wait for tomorrow!