This might be a banal post really, because anybody who is interested in this post will have been keeping an eye on the pre-season testing anyway, and will already have their own ideas of how things might pan out. But this is my blog, and I am stamping my feet as I type this!

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Well, that turned out to be not a bad race! Yesterday’s Schumacher incident provided an interesting talking point to frame the race in, and the race did threaten to become a procession at one point.

In a way, it still was a procession, as Alonso led the race practically from start to finish. But what happened behind him was still thrilling — and when I mean behind him, I mean right behind him.

Drivers who really deserved better were harshly treated by luck today. Mark Webber had an amazing qualifying session yesterday, and he was driving well today before his Cosworth engine expired. The Williams car appears to be capable of scoring points, but that Cosworth engine is still a massive liability. I’m not a great fan of Webber, but he was impressive over the weekend, and a podium finish would have been a fair reward.

A pity too for Kimi Räikkönen, who at last was able to challenge Alonso at the front — and he was really threatening at one point. We haven’t really seen this all year. The McLaren car doesn’t have the pace of the Renault or the Ferrari, and Räikkönen seems to have lost a little bit of his drive, but he looked good for at least second place today. He was able to take advantage of Webber’s little error at Ste Devote in a thrilling, brave move. Unfortunately, during the safety car period caused by Webber’s failure, the McLaren’s reliability glitches kicked in again — the story of Räikkönen’s life.

By this time the pack seemed to have well and truly mixed up after the safety car, and Rubens Barrichello in the Honda was in third place! It truly is a remarkable reversal of fortunes at Honda. Button really is struggling at the moment. The Honda team keep on talking up their chances, yet the performance they really need never materialises. This is a weekend that Button will want to forget — Barrichello is now much more confident in the Honda. Unfortunately for the Brazilian, speeding in the pit lane isn’t the way to go about finishing in the podium.

After Barrichello’s drive-through penalty, it was Jarno Trulli in the Toyota which Martin Brundle said looked so bad it was like a pogo stick (!) during practice who was in line for a podium finish! But towards the end of the race, his car gave up as well, on the hill after Ste Devote. Clearly, third position was not a lucky place to be in today!

So when David Coulthard in the Red Bull inherited the podium position, he might well have been worried about Barrichello and Michael Schumacher catching up with him. Luckily for Coulthard, he only had to maintain his position for a few laps, and he scored a great podium finish — Red Bull’s first. It’s good for them as they have had a moderately disappointing season so far. I absolutely loved the Superman cape stunt! It might even beat last year’s pit crew of Star Wars stormtroopers. Fantastic.

Yes, Michael Schumacher was in fifth position. After yesterday’s scanda, Schumi went some of the way towards redeeming himself with some clean, impressive overtaking manoeuvres. He left his team mate Massa behind.

Who was second you ask? Juan Pablo Montoya with yet another anonymous race, quietly collecting a helpful handful of points.

Today’s troublemaker was Christijan Albers, who unwisely squeezed his team mate Monteiro into the wall at the otherwise unusually clean start. That was unnecessary enough, but then he decided to ram into a Super Aguri later on in the race. Come on Albers, this isn’t a computer game!

I have to say though, all of the drivers were largely impressive. There was little in the way of driver error or crashes — Nico Rosberg’s was apparently caused by his throttle being stuck open.

All-in-all, it was a good race, but even this early in the season it looks as though Alonso has the championship well and truly wrapped up. Silverstone next!

• Full race result

Update: “Horner goes for a swim… But did he take a dip in the nip as advertised?”

Oh man. You know how I’ve been in ‘light blogging’ mode because of all that exam malarkey. Well I was going to break my silence today, because there was a Grand Prix today, and I usually write reviews of each Grand Prix. But it’s been a real struggle. That was an immensely boring race, and it’s difficult to think of much interesting to say about it. But I’m writing about it anyway just to prove that I’m still here. (I was also going to write about the local elections, but I couldn’t be arsed with that either.)

Firstly, I should take my hat off to Ferrari. I said at the time that I thought Imola was a fluke, but they’ve shown that it wasn’t. Ferrari are back and consistently challenging once again. Not only has Michael Schumacher won two races in a row (after a drought lasting over a season, discounting last year’s USGP), but Felipe Massa has also scored his first podium.

Everybody who was thinking that it would be a case of Alonso vs. Räikkönen was wrong. We’ll have to wait until at least next year for that. Right now Michael Schumacher is in much better shape than Kimi to challenge for the championship, particularly with that vulnerable and slow-ish McLaren.

Despite Ferrari’s resurgence, Renault are still looking good. Well, Alonso is anyway. Giancarlo Fisichella had a pretty rotten weekend. He failed to make the top ten in qualifying for the second race running, losing his rag with Jacques Villeneuve in the process. Traffic or no traffic, at the moment Fisichella is making the Renault look rather mediocre while Alonso makes it look like the best car in the world.

It was yet another worrying result for Jenson Button and Honda. They are failing to convert their winter testing form into consistent results. After all the pre-season promise, this season is beginning to look more like 2005 than 2004. At least Rubens Barrichello got a decent result. His issues with the car seem to have finally been resolved.

As for Williams, those Cosworth engines, which were bullet proof in winter, have become a liability. At least Rosberg had a good race, starting last on the grid but ending up with two points. Good work. BMW, meanwhile, are looking slightly slower but more consistent.

Maximum comedy points this weekend go to David Coulthard and Vitantonio Liuzzi, driving for the Red Bull A- and B-team respectively. They knocked each other off at the first corner. David Coulthard thinks he’s good at starts at the Nürburgring, and he’s right — he moved from 12^th to 4^th at the first corner last year. But taking that inside line isn’t a guarantee that you won’t be crashed into. In fairness, Liuzzi was tapped by Ralf Schumacher, so it was really Ralf’s fault — ITV’s commentators never noticed this.

We’re off to Barcelona next week, and that is usually quite a boring race because the drivers all know it so well because they test there all the time. And after that is Monaco, where it’s almost impossible to overtake! I’ll need to make sure we have enough coffee…

Full race result

Not a very action-packed race. For a period about two thirds of the way through it looked like it was going to be one of those rare races that actually get closer towards the end, but it was not to be. I didn’t fall asleep though, so I’m becoming expert at surviving these races that are on at funny times.

I think the biggest thing to point out is how confusing qualifying is these days. Qualifying in Bahrain may have been a success, but yesterday’s session was a bit of a shambles. We had Steve Rider and Mark Blundell standing there on ITV’s coverage going on about how Michael Schumacher had been knocked out when he actually hadn’t. You could actually see the moment when Mark Blundell was told through his earpiece that Schumacher was actually still in; his face fell!

But the confusion wasn’t to end there, because there were several engine penalties. I really think this is the most idiotic rule in Formula 1 at the moment. They say that if a car breaks down 50 yards after the finish line then the car has done its job perfectly. Well, not any more. David Coulthard was given an engine penalty after his engine expired after the race. But if it blew before the chequered flag he wouldn’t have got a penalty.

Massa’s engine problems were confusing as well. We were told that he wasn’t even going to take part in qualifying because of his engine penalties. Then he did, but only in stage one — he qualified for stage two but didn’t take part in it. Why? And then there was the issue of Michael Schumacher. ITV and BBCi were both reporting that he would start 10^th because of his engine penalty. I didn’t understand that. Today Martin Brundle said he asked three different Ferrari people and got three different answers — none of which ended up being correct!

Bernie and chums go on about how important it is to entertain fans during qualifying. But what is the point when nobody knows what the grid is actually going to be like until just before the race? Formula1.com has this to say:

The official provisional grid, as released by the FIA on Sunday morning, follows below. Further changes are still possible prior to the race

Ridiculous! They almost may as well determine the grid order by plucking names out of a hat. And the FIA want to have engines lasting for six races! This engine rule is meant to be a cost-cutting exercise, but at this rate everybody will be starting at the “back” of the grid, and just making as many engine changes as they want anyway. And the grid will probably end up be determined by the fastest times.

So here’s a bright idea. Why not just forget the whole engines business — and the race fuel loads while you’re at it — and let’s have the fastest drivers at the front of the grid. What a novel idea!

I can’t help wondering if some teams are actually taking advantage of the engine rules. If you’re starting from the back of the grid you can fuel heavily and have fewer pit stops. This is how the somewhat average Felipe Massa beat his seven-times World Champion team-mate from further back on the grid today. Unusually, Ferrari opted not to swap the drivers around — but it’s only a point, eh? That could come back to bite them!

It doesn’t help that with the new V8s, engines are most teams’ achille’s heel at the moment. The Ferraris seem particularly bad. I know nothing about engines, but that Ferrari engine sounds seriously rough. It cackles away. Sometimes it sounds like Michael Schumacher’s dragging along a tub that’s scraping along the ground. Both Cosworths also blew, which was a particular shame for Nico Rosberg. Nick Heidfeld was also looking good when his BMW went.

Apparently Juan Pablo Montoya’s engine wasn’t in too great nick either. That’s just as well recently, because he was looking seriously mediocre. 4^th might be a respectable result, but we’ve seen what Kimi Räikkönen can do with a McLaren and he ends up making the “fiery” Montoya look quite mundane. Sometimes I wonder if Montoya has enough drive. He often seems to settle for finishing fourth or fifth rather than making that effort for a podium finish.

Rubens Barrichello was once again a disappointment. He is used to driving a car that does all the work for him, and he’s finding his new Honda hard work. Meanwhile Button is racking up the points. For the second race in a row Button has said that he could not get anything more out of the car. Clearly the Honda is not quite up there with the very best cars. And looking at the huge gap between Button and Barrichello, maybe Button is better than we thought all along? Apparently no driver who has yet to win has started so many races. That surprises me, but it just goes to show that a win from Button is overdue.

Fisichella was brilliant today though. Alonso’s qualifying fuel mishap may have gifted him the clear winning opportunity, but you don’t win a race from pole by accident. As for Alonso, my favourite moment was his move at the very start of the race. It’s one of those overtaking manoeuvres that looks like it simply should not be possible — an effortless move from nowhere around the outside of the two Williams cars. Brilliant.

Alonso’s already opened up quite a wide gap at the top of the championship standings though. I hope we don’t end up having a Renault-dominated season. The next race is another tough one for the body clock. It’s properly in the middle of the night, not merely early in the morning like today’s race was. Hopefully it will be worth getting up for.

Woohoo, the new Formula 1 season starts this weekend. Already! Yet again the winter has gone by quickly, and it only seems like yesterday when a drain cover became the most important player in the race. And so once again it is time for me to write some totally un-expert non-analysis in preparation for the first race.

Despite the short period of time, the Formula 1 that will start tomorrow is going to be very different to the one that we saw in China in October. Engines are wee, tyre-changing is back, and everybody will get in each other’s way in qualifying once again, just like in the good old days.

I know I am in a minority of one here, but I was a fan of the one-lap qualifying system that F1 (just about) settled on in the second half of 2005. I think on Saturday everybody will remember all of a sudden that the free-for-all wasn’t always a barrel of laughs. Great laps would be ruined by slow cars or yellow flags. We would miss the pole-setting lap because the director was too busy looking at Michael Schumacher scratching his arse. And, most annoyingly of all, Giancarlo Fisichella would benefit from dodgy weather conditions to get a freak and completely unwarranted pole position.

The new qualifying format is just like that old system that everybody now apparently loves, except with some added complicated bits that will force teams to actually, like, go out on the track within the first fifteen minutes (the worst aspect of the old 12-lap qualifying system). It could turn out to be okay, but we’ll just have to wait an see. Fisi will probably have a few more pole positions than he ought to though.

I’ve not been following the winter testing so well, so I can only go on the little bits that I’ve read here and there and pure guesswork. I think this year is going to be quite unpredictable. Maybe half a dozen teams have the potential to win a race. Renault and Honda are both said to be very strong this year — aparently they are both reliable and quick. I wouldn’t expect Renault to find 2006 as easy as 2005 turned out to be, although they ought still to be at the very top.

As for Honda, they have had the potential to be winning races for a while now, but it’s never quite worked out for them. They came back down to earth with a bump last year, but surely they will be in shape to win races this year. But will they lose out with Honda supplying resources to the hastily-assembled Super Aguri team as well? It will be very interesting to compare Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello. I think it is a well-matched pairing, and neither of the drivers will like to see themselves getting beaten by the other. We all have quite a good idea of what Rubens is capable of, so this year we will find out if Button is really worth all the hype.

McLaren are apparently having more reliability problems. It has to be sorted out. McLaren have had major reliability problems since at least 2003, and most of them seem to be Mercedes’ fault. Kimi apparently reckons McLaren aren’t yet where they should be, so it sounds as though McLaren aren’t convinced they’ll finish many races at the start of the season though. By mid-season though, with reliability problems ironed out, they ought to be consistently challenging at the top. If Renault end up having a good year though, Alonso will kick himself for switching to McLaren for 2007.

I think I read that Ferrari had some reliability issues, although nothing as serious as McLaren. Ferrari may not be as fast as Renault or Honda or even McLaren. But the new tyre rules will surely work to their advantage. Ferrari should get at least a few wins — surely they aren’t prepared to settle into a mid-grid position.

Toyota and Williams will also benefit from the new tyre rules. I think Toyota are serious about winning now, and they could do it this year. They showed real promise at the start of last year, but worryingly tailed off towards the end of the season. I am not a great fan of either Jarno Trulli or Ralf Schumacher either. Trulli seems overrated in my view.

As for Williams, I really think they’re turning a corner now. They’ve had a torrid few years. But with the BMW and Buttongate sagas behind them now, Williams will be able to concentrate on getting back to the top. Are wins on the cards? Possibly for the first time in decades, people are not talking about Williams as potential race-winners. While they’ve had a success drought since 1998, they’ve still always been seen as potential front-runners.

Yet 2005 was so bad for Williams that the question this year is whether or not they can pull themselves back towards the front, rather than challenging for wins. But I think Williams could catch a few people off guard. Cosworth are meant to be V8 specialists, and there is a lot of hype about their engine. Add to this the Bridgestone tyres and I think you’re looking at a seriously strong team. In fact, the only thing that I think Williams are lacking this year is a Grade-A driver — and who knows, Nico Rosberg could be one.

Red Bull are another team who have been having reliability problems, but apparently they’re being ironed out more quickly than McLaren’s. Red Bull is starting to look very serious as an F1 team. Employing Adrian Newey sends out a serious signal, as does securing a Ferrari engine deal. But does all this really mean that Red Bull is a future race winner? If Ferrari start getting beaten by Red Bull too much then Ferrari will simply pull the plug on the deal. Besides, Ferrari engines never seemed to do Sauber all that much good.

Which brings us neatly on to BMW-Sauber. Mario Theissen is clearly very ambitious, and I think that he and BMW have taken a big risk. Being outside of the UK is always a disadvantage and there is no guarantee that the BMW–Sauber relationship won’t have the same troubles as the BMW–Williams relationship. Wins will be a long way off. The odd podium is a possibility, and I’m a real big fan of Nick Heidfeld. Villeneuve can sometimes be a liability though.

Red Bull and other mid-grid teams will be looking over their shoulder finding Toro Rosso (that’s Italian for Red Bull, see?!) snapping at their heels. For the first time, like, ever, Minardi won’t be at the back of the grid, even if it’s due to lots of Red Bull money. They will be the only team using an under-powered V10 which, if you believe the doom mongers, will actually be faster than the V8s — and because they’re under-powered they’ll be more reliable to boot.

Toro Rosso had better make sure they aren’t too successful, or the equivalency formula will be changed. It’s not a very pleasent situation — if Toro Rosso end up being 7^th or 8^th out of the teams, people will just be suspicious, even though they might have the genuine ability to be the 7^th best team on the grid this year, V10 or no V10. Unfortunately, Toro Rosso won’t get the opportunity to prove it.

Midland — nothing much to say. They’ll probably be at the back of the grid alongside Super Aguri. Midland isn’t the sort of team you can get excited about. They’ll be lucky to score points.

And last and very definitely least, Super Aguri. It sounds like a cheesy 1980s video game, but it’s actually the new state-of-the-art Formula 1 team direct from Japan. Er, except they’re using four-year-old Arrows chassis which didn’t even do Arrows much good four years ago, never mind anybody this year with the car altered out of recognition to meet today’s regulations. The Honda backing is tasty though. The whole thing stinks of a badly thought out PR exercise so save Honda from a Japanese backlash for sacking Takuma Sato from BAR. Sato will be available for all your crashing needs in Super Aguri this year, and his team mate is Yuji Ide, direct from Formula Nippon. All I can say is, for Super Aguri’s sake, thank goodness the 107% rule doesn’t exist any more.

So there you have it — my personal poorly-informed preview of the F1 season. Can’t wait for the first Grand Prix in Bahrain — I’ll be up bright and early.