doctorvee

The BBC’s coverage of Formula 1 is great, but we have become highly accustomed to seeing the same people being interviewed time and time again. Multiple interviews with Martin Whitmarsh and Christian Horner are guaranteed.

And the BBC appears to have a curious obsession with Lotus. It feels like they have been given ten times as much coverage as Virgin and Hispania, the other new teams.

During today’s qualifying pre-show, I decided to play a spot of BBC F1 bingo on my F1-based Twitter account @vee8. Following an interview with Lotus driver Jarno Trulli and Mercedes boss Ross Brawn, I began to twitch:

BBC F1 bingo: Lotus – tick, Ross Brawn – tick. Now just waiting for Christian Horner and Martin Whitmarsh. Then Whitmarsh again.

I got a lot of response, particularly as the interviews with Christian Horner and Martin Whitmarsh duly appeared very soon afterwards! Double Whitmarsh was completed when the McLaren boss was among the first to be interviewed after qualifying had finished.

So I’ve decided to play for real, this time choosing my five bingo boxes in advance. Here are my chosen five:

• Ross Brawn
• Stefano Domenicali
• Stefano Domenicali
• Christian Horner
• Martin Whitmarsh

As you can see, I have decided to take a risk by gambling on a Double Domenicali.

I will face strong competition from lookingspiffy:

Right, my BBC #F1 bingo card – Whitmarsh, Domenicali, Horner (possibly double Horner?) and Sam Michael as a wild card.

That is a good-looking bingo card. Sam Michael could easily get a look-in on the back of the very strong performance Williams had in qualifying today. Double Horner could be difficult to achieve though.

Who would you put on your bingo card? Don’t make it too easy. Throw in a wildcard or a double appearance. It doesn’t have to be an interview either. For instance, you might like to include gratuitous mentions of Eddie Jordan’s shirt, an appearance by Tanja Bauer from Sky Deutschland, or Martin Brundle pushing his way in front of another journalist during the gridwalk.

And no Legardisms please. The Legard-bashing is tiresome. Besides, we are ideally looking for all of the boxes to be filled pre-race, before the FOM five minute sting.

Finally, this is nothing against the BBC’s coverage! I am a big fan of the BBC’s coverage, which is a quantum leap ahead of what ITV were doing. I would just like a bit more variety in their pre- and post-race coverage.