F1: What’s the ‘Dealio with So many loose Drain covers?

In the wake of Belle Isle’s Tar-debacle - which really doesn’t deserve any further dissection... I flashed back to the following circuit maladies of years past - skipping the embarrassing ‘Day-toner 500 shenanigans where they’ve had multiple two hour-plus Red flag incidents; one for the track’s Ash-fault tearing up and one for ‘MAC Montoya’s Jet-drier pinball wizardry!

And while I did sit thru the first hour of the Red flag track repairs at Belle Isle - wunderin’ how this skittish train wreck would end... As deservedly so; I’ve never heard thee Mayor ‘O Hinchtown, nee James Hinchcliffe go so ballistic... Almost thought I was listenin’ to Marco Andretti’s radio transmissions from this year’s Indy 500 instead; Aye Karumba!

As Hinchcliffe’s buckin’ tarball express was definitely a wee bit scary, yet it made me ponder some other driver’s bizarre accidents - most notably Sergio Perez’s Malaysian mystery, ‘Rubino’s (Rubens Barrichello) shunt at the Principality, aka Monaco. Not to mention Mark ‘Handlebarz Webber’s Red Bull selecting two gears at once whilst passing over a nearby Subway tunnel in Shanghai I believe. Or Timo Glock texting whilst hammer down at Suzuka Cirquito...

Did Rubens hit Drain cover in Monaco?

Sergio Perez (2011 malaysian GP)

"Something came off Sebastien Burma’s car, which was just in front of me, and hit the floor of my car. The fire extinguisher went off and the electrics cut out. It was a shame I couldn't finish the race as the car felt good.”

Sauber still in the dark about Perez' Sepang incident

And although I’m supposed to know everything ‘bout racing; I’m sure some reader out there can come up with the correct answer... As I seem to  recall that we’ve had track surface failures before, as wasn’t Detroit’s F1 race famous for manhole covers being hovered up from there fitting’s back during the Detroit Grand Prix days?

While I seem to think that even my hometrack Portland Int’l Raceway had a problema with its Ash-fault? Think they had some surface delaminations once during a hot summer? As I seem to recall from my track day outings that single tyre concrete patches have been laid down in some corners upon the race course...

And then there was Dallas’s epic 1984 Formula 1 race in the middle of summer when the track not only disintegrated; but! ‘Ol BLOODY NIGE gained worldwide admiration for his fine thespian skills when he collapsed after trying to push his stricken Williams across the start-finish line!

Whiles one of the freakiest incidents I can think of was Walter Brun’s Porsche 962 being obliterated in Montreal when striking a wayward manhole cover! Which I scribbled ‘bout in;

So You wanna build a Street Course?

Whilst my favourite ‘Quip of the Belle Isle weekend came from Joe Berkemeier of Trackside Online - when noting how le ‘Hamburgular, aka Sebastain Bourdais vaporized a bushy Squirrel; sardonically musing how perhaps said Squirrel was unaware that ‘SeaBasses mount had switched over from the Lotus engines to Chevy’s and thought he had MORE time to cross the track; YOUCH, good ‘Juan Joe!

As apparently Bourdais was the only driver to collect a Squirrel whilst several drivers weren’t given any bonus points for having their cars damaged by flying debris at Belle Isle...

And speakin’ of Montreal - or Mont Royale as ‘Aunty Harriet likes to pronounce it... I seem to recall scribbling ‘bout a Brit by the moniker of ‘ANT (Anthony Davidson) getting up close ‘N personal with some ‘Kuhnadiun Beaver... NO! NOT that type ‘O Beaver Boyz... This was the four legged type that ‘Ol ANT unfortunately skewered when pounding ‘round Il Notre Dam in his “Super Best Friends” (Super Aguri) chassis which I recanted in;

3yr-old Canadian Beaver

Thus, I doubt ‘Ye Mayor ‘O Hinchtown can take any solace in this, but at least he’s Ok and now his team boss Mikey can write a cheque to Dallara for those higher than expected new DW12 bits, eh?

While NO Squirrels, Marmots or Beavers were HIT during the scribbling ‘O this story and hopefully NO furry critters were pulverized over the ‘Kuhnadiun GP weekend...!