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Month: May 2010

Pedro de la Rosa Q&A: BMW Sauber may surprise in Monaco

Everybody has been talking about the difficulties involved in Michael Schumacher’s comeback, forgetting that Pedro de la Rosa had been away for the same period of time. Added to that, De la Rosa is at a team busy adjusting to life as an independent again, with a car that’s had more than its fair share of reliability woes. Now, though, the Spaniard is convinced the bad times are over. With the input of new technical director James Key, performance is on an upward curve and BMW Sauber might even surprise in Monte Carlo this weekend, as De la Rosa explained exclusively to Formula1.com…

Q: Pedro, the road to success seems to be a very rocky one. Did you expect it to be that difficult?
Pedro de la Rosa: Yes, more or less. I never expected that my return would be easy. It has been a difficult start because we’ve finished only one race out of five so far and the reason for that is hard to swallow. But Formula One is never easy and I would be happy to do this interview five more races into the season because I am sure that the results will be much better then.

Q: From the outside, there seems to be two elements to the difficulties. The car is not as technically mature as one might have expected from a BMW-developed machine, but then there’s the human factor. Adjust to racing again seems a bit tricky – even for Michael Schumacher. When do you expect to come to terms with these two factors?
PdlR: Well, I think that on a performance level we made a big step forward in Barcelona, so that is a reason to be optimistic about the next few races. On the reliability I must say that we’ve been extremely unlucky for one reason or the other. When I say that, I have in mind that we did 5000 kilometres in pre-season testing without any issues whatsoever. So that brings us to the fact that all problems have materialized during the races – and that really smells like bad fortune. I don’t like to talk about misfortune in motor racing because this sounds like an excuse. But we have to see it as a way of understanding that we can do a lot better by finishing races.

Q: Peter Sauber said some time ago that he underestimated the time that it would take you to get back into ‘racing mode’. Where would you say you face the biggest problems?
PdlR: I must say from my point of view it has not taken more time then I expected. My last race was also the last race of Michael Schumacher – in Brazil 2006 – and when people talk about how difficult it is for Michael they are forgetting that it is the same for me – and I am not a seven time world champion. For me it has somehow been very quick that I’ve readapted. I have to admit that the first few tests were difficult, but since then I have been performing at a good level. All we need now is reliability to show the true race pace that we have.

Q: When looking at your performance you always get close to Q3, but then things go awry in the race. How frustrating is that?
PdlR: Last week in Barcelona it was difficult, because in Q1 and Q2 I was in the top ten, and then I missed out. You have to understand that the car was capable of Q3, and that made me happy because had I had a perfect lap I would have made it to Q3. That showed that we have the car, and that lets you concentrate on your own driving.

Q: You bring so much experience with you from McLaren, a world championship-winning team. Do you feel you BMW Sauber are making the most of your input?
PdlR: I think that we have a very good team and we are very strong, very united. Now with James Key as our new technical director I feel that we will be making big steps. I don’t want to say that this will happen due to my experience. I am only a small part of this big team. We have to give credit to all the engineers and mechanics and all the people working in the wind tunnel. And James Key is our leader now. I would say that my experience is important, but not critical. It is a little part of a big structure. That is what people have to understand. My biggest asset for sure is that I have been involved with world championship-winning cars and that is one of the main reasons I am at Sauber. I am thankful to McLaren for having taught me so much – and now I have to use all that. Speaking about all that is all very nice, but now I am here, we have a good technical team behind us, and we have good resources. I have a lot of experience – so now let’s make it work! There is no excuse of not having the budget, or stuff like that. We do have a good package.

Q: James Key was one of the creators of Force India’s VJM03, a car that’s been doing well. Do you already feel a difference since he joined the team in April?
PdlR: I think that James is bringing a lot of common sense, a lot of understanding and a lot of experience and he has impressed me very much in a very few weeks. But we have to give him time and I don’t want to overload him with expectations. We have to let him do his work. He is now in the process of analyzing what are our strengths and what are our weaknesses and I feel very good about all that. He is the right guy for the team.

Q: When you analyze the situation where do you see the most room for improvement? Car and team alike?
PdlR: I think the car is very different from what I used to drive. Extremely different in its characteristics, mechanically and aerodynamically and that is something that I didn’t need to mention because James spotted it straight away. The team is working now in these two areas, but our main target is to improve the aerodynamics – a lot! I see that now they are targeting the right weaknesses of the car – and that is very important. The good thing about us now is that we know exactly what our weaknesses are. I have been in many teams where they never knew what their weaknesses were – they’d be shooting in every direction. Now with James we are shooting exactly at the right spot – and this is why I feel confident.

Q: You must have had expectations of where this season should take you. Have you already lowered those expectations?
PdlR: Oh yes. I have a perfect plan about the next few races. I am confident. I was not happy in Barcelona – in fact I was extremely disappointed, also because it was my home Grand Prix – and I must say that I had a very bad night on Sunday when I could hardly sleep. But then I woke up thinking: ‘Well, you are in a good team – and that is what you have been pushing for – and we still can do it’. It’s not the end of the world. Okay, we had a bad race but the car is good now and I am sure that there will be good races.

Q: There’s nothing like the Monaco Grand Prix. What do you hope to achieve on Sunday?
PdlR: The most important thing for me is to do as many kilometres as possible on Thursday. I haven’t raced here since 2002, so for me it is about re-acclimatising to the track – a difficult track! I know that if we do a good job on Thursday and in qualifying we will be in the points on Sunday. We could be better than people would expect from us here.
Copyright Formula One.com 2010. All Rights Reserved.
Jersey Chore, Getting it Right. Gratuitous Stereotypes and the Jersey Shore, Season Two

Looking forward to a very happy and healthy summer. I eagerly anticipate spending some time on the Eastern Seaboard,all with family and close friends. An invitation of a guest shot with Jersey Shore Season 2 has become a matter of serious consideration. I know I could lend some legitimacy to that oft maligned HBO reality series. Those kids have captured the imagination of a large viewing audience. They are filming the second installment because HBO is gonna” Bank it Like Hank.”

Myself and almost everyone I grew up with in Jersey City, Hoboken, Hudson, Essex, and Passaic Counties, and even a few guys from Bergen County, intuitively understand what “The Situation” and the rest of his “crew” is experiencing during a summer in Seaside Heights. Unexpected and uncalled for, is what we would use to describe some of the more complex events as they unfolded.

Jersey Shore Season Two, just needs to step it up a notch, past the gratuitous stereotyping and blow away the whole host of critics by reaching back to the day when there was no HBO, but there damn sure was a Seaside Heights, and a Belmar, and Matawan, and Asbury Park, Lavalette, Avon, Bradley Beach, and well, the list is well known.

One or two episodes, we bring those kids up to speed, bada bing bada boom. It’s all good. You wanna’ see Jersey Shore, we will be happy to show it to you. Our invitation is extended with respect, as we only ask that while we are your Hosts, you extend us the same courtesy.

To the current cast, my utmost respect and congratulations. You have the one dog down, and Season Two is where it all happens. You have an audience, they are your fans, they are watching YOU GUYS. You have an established platform, the reality of that platform is your reality. YOU OWN IT!.ALLOW NO ONE TO BOX YOU IN. . Use it well, make me proud. And hey, don’t sweat it, Frankie and I will be down to see ya.

.All The Best,

Mike.

vegasmike433.

Las Vegas, May 11, 2010
Tell-All Generation Learns to Keep Things Offline

Christopher Capozziello for The New York Times
“I am much more self-censoring,” said Sam Jackson, a student.

Min Liu, thinking about her career, has begun removing personal information from the Web

.

May 8, 2010
Tell-All Generation Learns to Keep Things Offline
By LAURA M. HOLSON
Min Liu, a 21-year-old liberal arts student at the New School in New York City, got a Facebook account at 17 and chronicled her college life in detail, from rooftop drinks with friends to dancing at a downtown club. Recently, though, she has had second thoughts.
Concerned about her career prospects, she asked a friend to take down a photograph of her drinking and wearing a tight dress. When the woman overseeing her internship asked to join her Facebook circle, Ms. Liu agreed, but limited access to her Facebook page. “I want people to take me seriously,” she said.
The conventional wisdom suggests that everyone under 30 is comfortable revealing every facet of their lives online, from their favorite pizza to most frequent sexual partners. But many members of the tell-all generation are rethinking what it means to live out loud.
While participation in social networks is still strong, a survey released last month by the University of California, Berkeley, found that more than half the young adults questioned had become more concerned about privacy than they were five years ago — mirroring the number of people their parent’s age or older with that worry.
They are more diligent than older adults, however, in trying to protect themselves. In a new study to be released this month, the Pew Internet Project has found that people in their 20s exert more control over their digital reputations than older adults, more vigorously deleting unwanted posts and limiting information about themselves. “Social networking requires vigilance, not only in what you post, but what your friends post about you,” said Mary Madden, a senior research specialist who oversaw the study by Pew, which examines online behavior. “Now you are responsible for everything.”
The erosion of privacy has become a pressing issue among active users of social networks. Last week, Facebook scrambled to fix a security breach that allowed users to see their friends’ supposedly private information, including personal chats.
Sam Jackson, a junior at Yale who started a blog when he was 15 and who has been an intern at Google, said he had learned not to trust any social network to keep his information private. “If I go back and look, there are things four years ago I would not say today,” he said. “I am much more self-censoring. I’ll try to be honest and forthright, but I am conscious now who I am talking to.”
He has learned to live out loud mostly by trial and error and has come up with his own theory: concentric layers of sharing.
His Facebook account, which he has had since 2005, is strictly personal. “I don’t want people to know what my movie rentals are,” he said. “If I am sharing something, I want to know what’s being shared with others.”
Mistrust of the intentions of social sites appears to be pervasive. In its telephone survey of 1,000 people, the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology at the University of California found that 88 percent of the 18- to 24-year-olds it surveyed last July said there should be a law that requires Web sites to delete stored information. And 62 percent said they wanted a law that gave people the right to know everything a Web site knows about them.
That mistrust is translating into action. In the Pew study, to be released shortly, researchers interviewed 2,253 adults late last summer and found that people ages 18 to 29 were more apt to monitor privacy settings than older adults are, and they more often delete comments or remove their names from photos so they cannot be identified. Younger teenagers were not included in these studies, and they may not have the same privacy concerns. But anecdotal evidence suggests that many of them have not had enough experience to understand the downside to oversharing.
Elliot Schrage, who oversees Facebook’s global communications and public policy strategy, said it was a good thing that young people are thinking about what they put online. “We are not forcing anyone to use it,” he said of Facebook. But at the same time, companies like Facebook have a financial incentive to get friends to share as much as possible. That’s because the more personal the information that Facebook collects, the more valuable the site is to advertisers, who can mine it to serve up more targeted ads.
Two weeks ago, Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, petitioned the Federal Trade Commission to review the privacy policies of social networks to make sure consumers are not being deliberately confused or misled. The action was sparked by a recent change to Facebook’s settings that forced its more than 400 million users to choose to “opt out” of sharing private information with third-party Web sites instead of “opt in,” a move which confounded many of them.
Mr. Schrage of Facebook said, “We try diligently to get people to understand the changes.”
But in many cases, young adults are teaching one another about privacy.
Ms. Liu is not just policing her own behavior, but her sister’s, too. Ms. Liu sent a text message to her 17-year-old sibling warning her to take down a photo of a guy sitting on her sister’s lap. Why? Her sister wants to audition for “Glee” and Ms. Liu didn’t want the show’s producers to see it. Besides, what if her sister became a celebrity? “It conjures up an image where if you became famous anyone could pull up a picture and send it to TMZ,” Ms. Liu said.
Andrew Klemperer, a 20-year-old at Georgetown University, said it was a classmate who warned him about the implications of the recent Facebook change — through a status update on (where else?) Facebook. Now he is more diligent in monitoring privacy settings and apt to warn others, too.
Helen Nissenbaum, a professor of culture, media and communication at New York University and author of “Privacy in Context,” a book about information sharing in the digital age, said teenagers were naturally protective of their privacy as they navigate the path to adulthood, and the frequency with which companies change privacy rules has taught them to be wary.
That was the experience of Kanupriya Tewari, a 19-year-old pre-med student at Tufts University. Recently she sought to limit the information a friend could see on Facebook but found the process cumbersome. “I spent like an hour trying to figure out how to limit my profile, and I couldn’t,” she said. She gave up because she had chemistry homework to do, but vowed to figure it out after finals.
“I don’t think they would look out for me,” she said. “I have to look out for me.”
A few questions with former mob lieutenant Frank Cullotta
E.C. Gladstone
Wed, May 5, 2010 (4:20 p.m.)

Frank Cullotta, Tony Spilotro’s right-hand man
“It’s all about the dough, the water, how you get that stuff to rise.” Frank Cullotta is talking pizza. While Grimaldi’s, Settebello and Anthony’s might debate who has the best East Coast-style pie in the Valley today, Cullotta is here to remind everyone that his Upper Crust restaurant was the pioneer of Chicago-style stuffed-crust pizza in Vegas. “We had great pizza, where the crust didn’t droop over when you pulled out a slice.”
But don’t expect much about pizza-making when Cullotta, 72, appears at the Winchester Cultural Center as part of a May 8 panel talk featuring former detectives and crime writer Dennis Griffin. Most will want to hear more about how he funded the restaurant (“We put the restaurant up with the money from the robberies”) as well as his other past professions: larceny, thuggery and — when duty called — homicide.
As Tony Spilotro’s right-hand man, Cullotta walked tall in Las Vegas during the swan-song era of the mob days. Then, famously, he went into witness protection and provided testimony that helped end the “Outfit’s” reign. Since appearing in Martin Scorsese’s Casino (1995) and publishing his memoir in 2007, he’s been more public, though appearances here are infrequent.
Calendar
The Mob Chronicles
May 8, 2 p.m., $15.
Winchester Cultural Center, 3130 S. McLeod Drive; 455-7340.
Reading about the dozens if not hundreds of incidents you’ve been involved in, Frank, what struck me is: How do you even remember doing them all?
You know, every robbery you go on, 90 percent of them are exciting, they’re a challenge, so they stay with you. I still couldn’t put half of them things in the book, it would be totally impossible, I’d be talking for a year! Some of them were exciting and there were some duds. But the majority were exciting.
Is that part of the appeal of that life?
No, the glamour. People sort of look up to you. You got money, you got friends, you got no money, you got no friends. It’s power. You get off on it. Everybody does.
What do people ask you about the most?
Well, the strangest thing people ask me is how it felt to kill somebody. I think that’s sort of a weird question. ‘What would you do if you had it to do over again?’ What I tell people, I am what I am today because of yesterday, so I have nothing to change about it.
Some people claim Harry Reid was on the mob’s payroll — he claims there was a contract on his life. What’s your take?
Nah, he wasn’t involved with us [laughs]. I know he wasn’t involved with us. As far as us trying to plant a bomb on his car, because he said he fought the syndicate, that’s bullshit. It wouldn’t have been on the car his family drove, it would have been his personal car. We’re not out to kill wives and kids. We do our homework.
A lot of people say Vegas was better back when the organization was running things. How do you feel?
I think it was a warmer place back then, more social. Every day over there was a nice day. Even the days I got followed by the cops. It’s a nice place now, I wouldn’t talk anyone out of going there. But I don’t think it’s ever going back to the way it used to be, and I think the way it used to be was nicer.
A stone is most likely to blame for Hamilton’s accident
ESPNF1 Staff
May 10, 2010

Hamilton remains positive
Race:
Spanish Grand Prix
Championship:
FIA Formula One World Championship
Profiles:
Lewis Hamilton
Teams:
McLaren
A stone stuck between the wheel rim and the tyre is the most likely cause for Lewis Hamilton’s accident on the penultimate lap of the Spanish Grand Prix.
The shattered remains of the front-left corner of Hamilton’s car is being rushed back to Woking for analysis. Almost within sight of the chequered flag, his McLaren speared into the turn three barriers after a sudden tyre failure cost him second place both in the race and in the world championship standings. Team boss Martin Whitmarsh immediately speculated that “debris” probably caused the problem, while Bridgestone said its initial impression was that “this was not caused by a tyre issue”.
“We are working closely with McLaren to understand what happened,” said Bridgestone’s Hirohide Hamashima.
After qualifying, Rubens Barrichello took photos with his mobile phone camera of his FW32 and his helmet, so amazed was he about the damage caused by flying stones. He told Germany’s Auto Motor und Sport that he had to nurse his vibrating Williams to the chequered flag after feeling a “strong shock” on the left front.
“We had to slow him down to ensure we didn’t have a problem with the tyres,” confirmed technical director Sam Michael. “We’ll be looking into that for the next race.”
Barrichello suspects a stone got stuck in the wheel rim, and a similar cause was also not being ruled out to explain Sebastian Vettel’s brake problem. After the Red Bull was inspected, Christian Horner revealed that the brake disc “was a bit damaged”.
“We will only know for sure in the factory,” he added.
© ESPN EMEA Ltd.
Sex, Drugs, and the Spill

Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times
Paul Krugman

May 10, 2010
Op-Ed Columnist
Sex & Drugs & the Spill
By Paul Krugman
“Obama’s Katrina”: that was the line from some pundits and news sources, as they tried to blame the current administration for the gulf oil spill. It was nonsense, of course. An Associated Press review of the Obama administration’s actions and statements as the disaster unfolded found “little resemblance” to the shambolic response to Katrina — and there has been nothing like those awful days when everyone in the world except the Bush inner circle seemed aware of the human catastrophe in New Orleans.
Yet there is a common thread running through Katrina and the gulf spill — namely, the collapse in government competence and effectiveness that took place during the Bush years.
The full story of the Deepwater Horizon blowout is still emerging. But it’s already obvious both that BP failed to take adequate precautions, and that federal regulators made no effort to ensure that such precautions were taken.
For years, the Minerals Management Service, the arm of the Interior Department that oversees drilling in the gulf, minimized the environmental risks of drilling. It failed to require a backup shutdown system that is standard in much of the rest of the world, even though its own staff declared such a system necessary. It exempted many offshore drillers from the requirement that they file plans to deal with major oil spills. And it specifically allowed BP to drill Deepwater Horizon without a detailed environmental analysis.
Surely, however, none of this — except, possibly, that last exemption, granted early in the Obama administration — surprises anyone who followed the history of the Interior Department during the Bush years.
For the Bush administration was, to a large degree, run by and for the extractive industries — and I’m not just talking about Dick Cheney’s energy task force. Crucially, management of Interior was turned over to lobbyists, most notably J. Steven Griles, a coal-industry lobbyist who became deputy secretary and effectively ran the department. (In 2007 Mr. Griles pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about his ties to Jack Abramoff.)
Given this history, it’s not surprising that the Minerals Management Service became subservient to the oil industry — although what actually happened is almost too lurid to believe. According to reports by Interior’s inspector general, abuses at the agency went beyond undue influence: there was “a culture of substance abuse and promiscuity” — cocaine, sexual relationships with industry representatives, and more. Protecting the environment was presumably the last thing on these government employees’ minds.
Now, President Obama isn’t completely innocent of blame in the current spill. As I said, BP received an environmental waiver for Deepwater Horizon after Mr. Obama took office. It’s true that he’d only been in the White House for two and half months, and the Senate wouldn’t confirm the new head of the Minerals Management Service until four months later. But the fact that the administration hadn’t yet had time to put its stamp on the agency should have led to extra caution about giving the go-ahead to projects with possible environmental risks.
And it’s worth noting that environmentalists were bitterly disappointed when Mr. Obama chose Ken Salazar as secretary of the interior. They feared that he would be too friendly to mineral and agricultural interests, that his appointment meant that there wouldn’t be a sharp break with Bush-era policies — and in this one instance at least, they seem to have been right.
In any case, now is the time to make that break — and I don’t just mean by cleaning house at the Minerals Management Service. What really needs to change is our whole attitude toward government. For the troubles at Interior weren’t unique: they were part of a broader pattern that includes the failure of banking regulation and the transformation of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, a much-admired organization during the Clinton years, into a cruel joke. And the common theme in all these stories is the degradation of effective government by antigovernment ideology.
Mr. Obama understands this: he gave an especially eloquent defense of government at the University of Michigan’s commencement, declaring among other things that “government is what ensures that mines adhere to safety standards and that oil spills are cleaned up by the companies that caused them.”
Yet antigovernment ideology remains all too prevalent, despite the havoc it has wrought. In fact, it has been making a comeback with the rise of the Tea Party movement. If there’s any silver lining to the disaster in the gulf, it is that it may serve as a wake-up call, a reminder that we need politicians who believe in good government, because there are some jobs only the government can do.

Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company
Hamilton Big Looser at Circuit de Catalunya

F1 – 2010 – Gran Premio de Espana Telefónica – Catalunya
Hamilton slips down standings in Spain tyre blow
GMMf1NET — May 9th – 3:49pm
May 9 (GMM) Lewis Hamilton was the big loser as Barcelona’s Circuit de Catalunya hosted the Spanish grand prix on Sunday.
The McLaren driver was running second behind dominant winner Mark Webber when a tyre failure pitched him into the barrier on the penultimate lap.

It means he is now just seventh in the drivers’ championship, 21 points behind his teammate and title leader Jenson Button, who had a bad race in Spain stuck behind Michael Schumacher.

If Hamilton’s tyre had held on for another two laps, the Briton would now be just three points off the lead.

“It could have been (caused by) debris caught in the rim,” McLaren team boss Martin Whitmarsh speculated.

Webber aside, the big winner on Sunday was the local hero Fernando Alonso, who not only benefitted from Hamilton’s failure but also Sebastian Vettel’s brake problem.

Alonso is just 3 points behind championship leader Button, with Vettel and Webber driving a dominant car but just third and fourth respectively in the standings.

“Overall the weekend has been so-so for us but in terms of results it’s fantastic,” said Ferrari’s Alonso.
Copyright. F 1 Reports. 2010. All Rights Reserved
Spanish GP preview: Hitting the reset button for Barcelona

By LJ Hutchins
Thursday, May 6th, 2010
Formula One? What’s that again?
It’s been nearly three weeks since the 12 teams and 24 drivers competing in the F1 World Championship have lined up on the grid for a race – and, as far as their fans are concerned, things can’t get going soon enough.
But they probably aren’t quite as we left them. After four flyaway races in Bahrain, Australia, Malaysia and China, the series starts its European rounds with teams having taken a long, hard look at their performance – and that of their competitors.
The Spanish Grand Prix, the first European race, is the one where teams start running major upgrades in a bid to steal a march on other teams. Rules are checked and re-checked, innovations are copied and adapted.
Ferrari and McLaren are both bringing new packages to Barcelona and both are publicly confident that they will be able to top the all-important qualifying standings as a result. Of course, that’s a slightly larger claim by McLaren than by Ferrari at the moment.
Back at base in Milton Keynes Red Bull will doubtless have been scratching its collective head over the knotty issue of reliability. If Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel had been driving cars with less of a propensity to break down at the side of the track then they would undoubtedly be higher than eighth and fifth in the drivers standings.
The team would also be doing better than its current fifth place in the constructors’ championship – and it’s not as if this problem has come out of the blue, reliability has been taking points off this squad for literally years. If they ever seriously mean to be champions this leak has to be sealed once and for all.
One team that can be guaranteed to have thought up a few neat workarounds to early-season problems is Mercedes GP under the canny leadership of Ross Brawn. For this Brackley-based squad the flyaway part of the season has been like the proverbial curate’s egg – good in parts.
Nico Rosberg is driving a blinder and has got himself to second in the drivers’ standings with a consistently competitive performance. Michael Schumacher, by contrast, is having unexpected difficulty with the car.
It will be particularly interesting to see whether any refinements dreamed up by Brawn will favour one driver or the other, and also how Schumi will cope now he’s back on European soil.
In the midfield Force India has to make good on team principal Vijay Mallya’s lavish prediction that it should be able to finish fifth in the constructors’ championship – but a resurgent Renault led by Robert Kubica is likely to be a sizeable obstacle in its way.
Williams is having a dog of a season so far, to the disappointment of its many fans, who will be hoping it has spent the breathing space provided by the last three weeks wisely. Similarly, BMW Sauber and Toro Rosso have both been knocked off course by the circumstances they find themselves in.
One faced a late race to the grid following the withdrawal of its previous owner and the other is struggling to stand alone after being forced to cut its close ties with its parent team. Both will probably be lucky to salvage much from 2010 over and above keeping themselves ahead of the backmarkers.
Among the new teams Virgin has a fast car but is still struggling to get its ducks in a line regarding fundamental issues like the size of its fuel tank.
Hispania has succumbed to the temptation to fiddle about with its driver lineup, but probably in a good way – introducing the experienced Christian Klien in a reserve role to try to come to a better understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of its car and drivers.
Lotus excited with its early form but then suffered a series of setbacks. Its veteran driver Jarno Trulli says he regards the start of the European season as a new beginning.
Button honoured with Champions’ Avenue membership
Jenson Button has been inducted into the Circuit de Catalunya’s Champions’ Avenue display in the run-in to the Spanish Grand Prix with his championship-winning achievement now recorded on a bronze plaque in the central spectator area.
He joins drivers including fellow Formula 1 world champions Nigel Mansell, Lewis Hamilton and Ayrton Senna as well as Australian motorcycling legend Mick Doohan.
He said of the honour: “Barcelona’s Circuit de Catalunya feels very much like a second home to me: during my career, I’ve spent a huge amount of time both racing and testing here. And last year’s victory in the Spanish Grand Prix was one of the highlights of my championship battle.
“To be recognised as world champion is always very special. It’s something that you tend to overlook when you’re working so hard to prepare for the next race or the year ahead. So it always feels worthwhile to stop and take stock for a moment: and that’s what today’s all about. This means a lot to me.”
Copyright britsonpole. 2010 All Rights Reserved
Schumacher Quicker in Spanish Grand Prix Practice

F1 – 2010 – Gran Premio de Espana Telefónica – Catalunya
Schu looks ‘a whole lot better’ in Spain – brother
GMMf1NET — May 7th – 2:37pm
May 7 (GMM) On the opening day of the fifth grand prix weekend of 2010, Michael Schumacher’s brother thinks the seven time world champion may have turned the corner.
6-time GP winner Ralf Schumacher, six years younger than the Mercedes driver, is in the Barcelona paddock this weekend as sporting boss of the GP3 team RSC Mucke.

Mercedes has heavily updated its 2010 car for the Spanish grand prix, including a longer wheelbase that is touted to suit 41-year-old Schumacher’s famous affection for strong front-end handling.

In morning practice, he was ahead of Nico Rosberg by more than three tenths, having been outpaced by the younger German in nearly every previous track session.

Schumacher looked comfortable and competitive once again in the afternoon.

“Here in free practice we have seen that everything for Michael looks a whole lot better,” Ralf told Sky television.
Expert Blogging Tips
17 Easy Steps to Brilliant Blog Posts
by Jill Chivers
You know what I’ve discovered? Most of the people writing about blogging are experts. Funny thing, that.
These expert bloggers have been doing it for a while and they have thousands (if not tens or hundreds of thousands) of subscribers. The best give lots of free stuff away that’s actually worth reading, and we know we’re standing on the shoulders of giants when we follow their advice.
And all that’s good. Don’t get me wrong.
But when I first started blogging about six months ago, I struggled to find a succinct summary all in one place. I spent a full day online giving myself an MBA -– Masters in Blogging (Advanced). I subscribed to this, downloaded that, printed out something else, read everything I could without my eyes becoming permanently crossed.
Because I couldn’t find what I needed — a straightforward checklist-style guideline to getting started as a newbie — I put my own together.
Does a newbie have anything to teach you?
I know what you’re thinking:
What does this Jill person know about brilliant blog posts? She’s just getting started herself.
I’ll readily confess my own lack of experience. My knowledge is growing (subscribing to copyblogger is helping), but my confidence still lags behind what I’m learning.
Does this sound familiar to anyone? I reckon there might be a few others who are in this same boat. And it’s to these newbies (and maybe some more experienced bloggers who are overwhelmed by the sheer volume of info about How To Blog So your Bank Balance Explodes) that I write today.
I broke it down into 17 (relatively) easy steps, so you can find everything in one place. Use this post checklist-style, to start writing the kind of content that attracts links and readers:
Four factors to remember before you start to write
Write a draft headline. You’ll come back to it at the end, and it may very well change and evolve. But a basic proposition and a compelling hook will help guide your content.
Make sure you have one idea per post. My first draft post had about 47 ideas in it. This turned out to be a good thing. Once I got it through my camera battery-sized brain that my post was too complex, I then had 47 possible posts, which should keep me going for about six months. But I did have to trim that first post (and every subsequent one) down to One Idea. When in doubt, leave it out.
Make sure you know your purpose. What are you trying to accomplish with this post? Are you hoping to sell a product? Get referrals? Attract links? Be bookmarked on Delicious? Get lots of attention on Twitter and Facebook? Disclose some irrelevant personal information to a bevy of strangers? (The first five are recommended, the last one should be undertaken with extreme caution.)
Who are you writing to? Come up with an ideal reader, with a full set of personality characteristics. This is a person who loves what you do, buys everything you sell, and tells everyone they ever meet about you and your site. Write to that person, whether fictional or real. My ideal reader is Carolyn, who happens to be a real person who lives in Boston. When I write, I imagine it’s a (semi) personal note from me to Carolyn.
I’ll give you an example for that last point. After the enormous success of her memoir eat pray love, Elizabeth Gilbert was harassed and harangued to write another best seller that millions of readers around the world would want to read. (And as a platform for a movie that Julia Roberts would want to star in.)
No pressure there.
Gilbert says that she tried for months to write that book, and failed. She threw her first attempt at Committed away because she was trying to write to the millions and it just wasn’t working.
She ended up writing the book for a small circle of women who know, love, and support her. The millions who ended up buying and reading the published book came later.
So, to sum it up: come up with a solid headline, for a post based on one idea, with a clear purpose, and for a single ideal reader. Now you’re ready to start writing this sucker!
Eight idea sparks for more compelling content
Here are some tried-and-true techniques that can help you write stronger posts. Try igniting one or more of these idea sparks when your fingers are on the keyboard but your brain is drawing a blank.
Make it eye-friendly. If you use them wisely, a nice bunch of fascinating bullets is a great way to break up your copy and make it easy to read.
Embrace the list post. Building a post around a numbered list is still one of the strongest ways you can organize content. If you’re skeptical, take a look at those “popular posts” to the right. See a few numbers in those headlines?
Examples and stories. What has your own journey been? What light bulb moments have you had? Where do the themes you write about show up in the everyday? (Seth Godin is the master of this; study how he does it.) And how does this relate to what you do and to the products/services you are selling?
What are you reading and watching? Articles, news stories, research papers –- all good stuff to refer to and comment on, drawing a connection back to what you do.
NEWS FLASH! Is something in your world new? Have a project launch in the works? What about a speaking gig or workshop you are running? Perhaps someone well-known in your field is coming to town? You can use your own news flashes or “borrow” other people’s, they both work.
Interviews. Who’s fascinating to your readers and willing to give you some time? Ask them some good questions, write their responses down, then wrap it all up with a jazzy conclusion.
Challenges and bugbears. What’s bothering you or your (potential) customers? Offer input to help them with their real or imagined problems, or talk about how you overcame something on the dark side.
Who do you admire? Pick a famous person and write about the link between something about them (their work, their interests, their charity appearances, their drug rehab story of pain) and how it relates to your own work.
Five last things to check before you post
You’re nearly done! You’ve created some killer content (well, it just about killed you, anyway), so now it’s time to wrap up.
Let’s finish off with some style! Five quick things to remember here:
Hyperlinks. Linking out is an important part of developing relationships with other bloggers, and it’s also helpful for SEO. Try to include a hyperlink about every 120 – 200 words.
Make your last paragraph sing. Give us a call to action (tell us what to do), make us an offer we can’t refuse (and put a ticking clock on it), or reach a surprising conclusion.
Come full circle back to your title. Does it need any tweaking to reflect your content (your one idea, your clear purpose, and to speak to your ideal reader)? Is it compelling? Is it something your readers will want to bookmark, link to, and share?
Do a final check for structure. How does the post look on the page? Have you broken all that text up so it’s easy for us to read?
Say something about yourself. You know, it could start with “About the Author:”
How about you — what’s on your own personal “checklist” for creating brilliant posts? Let us know in the comments.
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About the Author: Jill Chivers is a quick study. Since starting her blogging career six months ago, she has made many fine mistakes. She intends to use this terrific checklist to improve her own blog posts. From her home base of the Sunshine Coast, Australia, Jill presides over her new online business, which helps her customers resolve tricky problems of all kinds.