Grand Prix Rejects

Dear all,

Hope you all had a Merry Christmas, and as our holiday punishment to you, we have released our Season Review podcast!!
So much reject goodness, including our ONE-WORD season reviews of all driver and teams, the Reject Podium, and, of course, the Reject of the Year 2011.
Then we ran with our debating topics:

$ That 2011 was better rejectwise than 2001
$ That Bernie's biggest love is money
$ That HRT should sign Milka Duno v Maria de Villota

What convincing arguments did we leave out?
Finally, we bid adieu to the 2011 season and this holiday season with our interpretation of We Three Kings, with appropriate organ accompaniment.
In total its 1:11:32 beats out the 2008 Spankish GP edition by over 1 min as our longest standard podcast ever! Will you make it through?

Have a great New Year, look forward to your thoughts on the above, below!

Cheers,
Jamie

New podcast

Today has just became epic.

And my Winners from the debates are:

1st Debate: 2001 (2011 wasn't rejectful all that much in my eyes, more underwhelming than anything)

2nd Debate: It's a split decision. That house, that bribe. That Brabham, those F1 drives. It's too close too call.

3rd Debate: Neither of You. Because I still hold on to the firm belief that Luca Badoer should get the drive, even if he isn't Spanish. But i guess the token victor will be Maria de Villota.

As always, I enjoy your work especially the Season Review and Preview Editions.

That is the SECOND best rendition of We Three Kings ever (James May did a better job of it in last year's Middle East special )

Nice podcast, great late christmas present.

Glock's ranking was a bit harsh though. Although Williams is fully deserving of ROTY.

Terrific podcast and your driver and team rankings were, of course, completely wrong. I enjoyed the debating section, it reminded me of the finale of a BBC radio show called Fighting Talk, which you may or may not be familiar with, where participants have 20 seconds to make an argument in defence of a ludicrous and clearly wrong statement. I was disappointed, though, that you never quoted Murray and Martin during that section: "Some people are beginning to debate whether Ricardo Rosset is really F1 material." "Well it's a fairly short debate Murray."

Very good. I would have given the ride to Armaan Ebrahim for Force India. Ebrahim and Chandhok. Narain Karthikeyan, yes, but America wants him back in NASCAR. He was Most Popular Driver in the Truck Series when he was there.

European handball is an awesome manly sport, and we don't call it European over here.

Australian handball, on the other hand, is hilarious.

I am, alas, not (yet) a doctor (although my dad is!). My first name is David and my middle name is Richard...

Great job! (Even if my dad did nearly collapse from laughing. Which would be fine, but he was driving at the time)
I did a few days work experience at Williams this year- can I too be included in their rejectdom?!

Mister Fungus wrote:European handball is an awesome manly sport, and we don't call it European over here.

Australian handball, on the other hand, is hilarious.

Actually European Handball is a pretty cool sport. Saw it played at the 2000 Olympics.

Not sure what you're referring to as Australian Handball. The only game I've ever known as handball, Wikipedia refers to as "downball": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_square#Downball

As for this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_handball
I have never heard of that sport being played, ever!

Warren Hughes wrote:Terrific podcast and your driver and team rankings were, of course, completely wrong ... I was disappointed, though, that you never quoted Murray and Martin during that section: "Some people are beginning to debate whether Ricardo Rosset is really F1 material." "Well it's a fairly short debate Murray."

Well our long-form explanations will be available later this week re the team and driver rankings. As for the Murray quote - what a great idea. If we revisit the section that will definitely get a run since we will need a non-Xmas intro!

I agree that my proposed debate about whether or not Nick Heidfeld is slightly boring is a bit one-sided. Clearly he's not boring.

Brilliant as usual guys! I spent most of a five-hour drive listening to you guys and I scared my family quite often with spontaneous laughter for no apparent reason. Thanks!

dr-baker wrote:I am, alas, not (yet) a doctor (although my dad is!). My first name is David and my middle name is Richard...

I always thought it was Doctor Baker myself.

I was very surprised to see Petrov in 4th; I would have put him around 14th! And rosberg I reckon should have been higher. Nonetheless it was another great podcast chaps!

Wizzie wrote:

dr-baker wrote:I am, alas, not (yet) a doctor (although my dad is!). My first name is David and my middle name is Richard...

I always thought it was Doctor Baker myself.

I wish... Maybe one of these days, after I've completed my second undergrad degree... But the I could be dr-dr-baker!

dr-baker wrote:

Wizzie wrote:

dr-baker wrote:I am, alas, not (yet) a doctor (although my dad is!). My first name is David and my middle name is Richard...

I always thought it was Doctor Baker myself.

I wish... Maybe one of these days, after I've completed my second undergrad degree... But the I could be dr-dr-baker!

And an F1Rejects forum myth gets busted.

By the way, it was a great podcast! Looking forward to more!

About the arguments:

1- 2001 won. Only because it brings a nostalgic feeling.
2- No doubt for me as I am now sure that Bernie's love for money is above everything else.
3- I got convinced that HRT should not sign any of the two!

DanielPT wrote:And an F1Rejects forum myth gets busted.

By the way, it was a great podcast! Looking forward to more!

About the arguments:

1- 2001 won. Only because it brings a nostalgic feeling.
2- No doubt for me as I am now sure that Bernie's love for money is above everything else.
3- I got convinced that HRT should not sign any of the two!

Was my title really that much of a forum myth? (But only because I knew the truth all along...

And I disagree with who won each of the arguements! 2011 won the first debate in my opinion, Bernie loves wheeler-dealing (and the money just happens to be a major bonus!) and, well, I did suggest the third topic for debate! They would both be prime reject-material for a reject team! (Plus one of them is the daughter of a reject!).

Nicely done guys, the podcasts seem to come so easily for you now, even though I know that each one is hours of work


Thanks for discussing my topic, it was a reaction to Enoch's announcement about dropping his pen on the written race reviews and how

"it has become increasingly difficult to find meaningful things to write about"

I know there are many more important reasons why the race reviews can't continue, but I liked hearing Enoch have to argue that 2011 was a better season for reject moments than 2001

Cheers boys. Merry Christmas and see you next year.

Can't believe how high Webber is ranked compared to the other top-team number 2s - and Hamilton ranked lower than Liuzzi? WHAT!!

Also Glock getting on the rejects podium was a massive surprise as I didn't think he'd done anything terribly wrong, oops.

James1978 wrote:Can't believe how high Webber is ranked compared to the other top-team number 2s - and Hamilton ranked lower than Liuzzi? WHAT!!

Also Glock getting on the rejects podium was a massive surprise as I didn't think he'd done anything terribly wrong, oops.

Glock didn't do anything terribly wrong, although he didn't really do anything, and was incredibly anonymous.

Liuzzi was a bit high.

redbulljack14 wrote:

James1978 wrote:Can't believe how high Webber is ranked compared to the other top-team number 2s - and Hamilton ranked lower than Liuzzi? WHAT!!

Also Glock getting on the rejects podium was a massive surprise as I didn't think he'd done anything terribly wrong, oops.

Glock didn't do anything terribly wrong, although he didn't really do anything, and was incredibly anonymous.

Liuzzi was a bit high.

I agree that Liuzzi did seem to be a bit higher than expected in the rankings given the highly critical reception he's received at times (not to mention that crash in Monza which earned him a ROTR award).

As for Hamilton being ranked lower than Liuzzi, though, there is a kind of logic to it. After his performance in 2010, when he was generally quite strong if, as ever, prone to occasional unforced errors, most observers would have expected Hamilton to have at least beaten his team mate - and had Hamilton managed to maintain the sort of form that he showed in Germany or Korea, he could have at least given Button a better run for his money than he did. Not only did he fail to do that, though, he also fell behind Alonso when Hamilton had, for the most part of the season, a better car, not to mention his overly frequent collisions with Massa (though at least Hamilton apologised for that and sorted things out with Massa in Brazil). In terms of expectations, though Hamilton did rise to them in the opening handful of races before he lost his focus, and towards the end of the season when he worked on his race preparation, he failed to do so too often in the middle part.
As for Liuzzi, I guess that the argument probably goes along the lines that the expectations for him were far lower given that a fair chunk of the paddock were expecting him to be leaving the sport altogether last year. Even so, whilst Liuzzi didn't fail to deliver what was expected of him on the whole, he didn't exactly deliver much more either, given that later on in the season he was being beaten by Ricciardo - a rookie, lest we not forget - fairly comprehensively, and had the occasional shocker (Japan comes to mind).

Great podcast guys, though I have to disagree that Jarno Trulli was the most rejectful driver when Massa was hopelessly pathetic all year, even worse than last year, I think. I also would've put Perez higher on the basis that I had no expectations for Maldonado this year and Perez couldn't beat him in GP2 so logically he would have lower expectations. But that's just my opinion. Also, during the debates, it was mentioned that 2001 had no DNQs, however, Tarso Marques failed to make the 107% cut twice that year. He was pardoned in Australia, but actually DNQ'd in Britain, so 2001 did have a DNQ, though it wasn't as rejectful as HRT's double DNQ.

For debate 1, I'll go with the flow and say 2001 won out for me. Debate 2 I'll say I think Bernie prefers the wheeler dealing, and for debate 3 I think neither driver should really get the nod, but if I had to choose between them, I'd go for Maria de Villota.

Great podcast!

Also I wish to express my eternal gratitude to the French (and Swiss) people for producing drivers with such lovely French-sounding names. I will feast on this for the next season!

Love the French accents, guys...great podcast

Don't you two dare apologise for that "audible abomination". It was hilarious!

The RotY spoilers:

3. Timo Glock
2. Jarno Trulli
1. Williams