‘09 Singapore Grand Prix – Sunday Race – Hamilton wins from Pole as Button consolidates lead

McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton won the Singapore Grand Prix from pole position as he drove an impeccable race throughout having relinquished his lead only at the pit stops. Toyota scored their first podium of the season as Timo Glock finished in second place as penalties for both Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel mean they fell down the order. Renault returned to the scene of their crashgate controversy and scored a podium place as Fernando Alonso finished third.

Sebastian Vettel overcame a drive through penalty and brake problems to finish fourth ahead of the two Brawns of Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello. Button crucially finishing ahead of his teammate and consolidating his lead in the Championship race by two more points. Heikki Kovalainen finished seventh as Robert Kubica took the last point in eight place.

The race started out in a sedate fashion with Lewis Hamilton maintaining his lead and Nico Rosberg out-jumping Sebastian Vettel to slot behind Hamilton. Fernando Alonso also had a good start and passed Mark Webber but then had a scruffy exit out of a corner which allowed Webber to retake the position – but ultimately yielded it as it was deemed to be unfair. Both the Brawns had a decent start and made up few places off the start and no doubt planning to take it slow and steady throughout the race.

‘09 Singapore Grand Prix – Saturday Qualifying – Lewis Hamilton takes Pole as Brawn drivers suffer

McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton took pole position for the night-time F1 Singapore Grand Prix as he shrugged off mediocre practice sessions to post the fastest time around the Marina Bay circuit. Sebastian Vettel will start alongside him on the first row with Nico Rosberg and Mark Webber taking up the second row positions. Rubens Barrichello crashed at the fag end of Q3 while being fifth fastest but following a gearbox change, he will drop down to tenth on the grid. Fernando Alonso will start from fifth place alongside Timo Glock with Nick Heidfeld, Robert Kubica and Heikki Kovalainen complete the top nine.

Q2 threw up some surprises as Nico Rosberg topped the timesheets and championship leader Jenson Button couldn’t manage a quick enough lap and went down along with the Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen, Williams of Kazuki Nakajima, Toyota of Jarno Trulli and Toro Rosso of Sebastian Buemi. Rubens Barrichello, despite a gearbox change, is two places ahead of Button and that could be a crucial factor in the championship stakes.

Q1 saw the Force Indias of Adrian Sutil and Vitantonio Liuzzi join the Toro Rosso of Jaime Alguersuari, the Ferrari of Giancarlo Fisichella & the Renault of Sebastian Grosjean in getting relegated. The high downforce nature of the track doesn’t suit the Force India cars and after two high-flying races, they find themselves at the back of the pack again.

Happy Dussehra

Wishing Everyone a Happy Dussehra.

అందరికి విజయ దశమి శుభాకాంక్షలు.

सब्को नवरात्री की हार्दिक शुभकामनायें

Movie Review: Wanted

The biggest strength of the movie Wanted is Salman Khan. And the biggest weakness…well, is Mahesh Babu! His portrayal of the poker-faced fearless and arrogant goon-cum-undercover cop in Pokiri comes in the way of Salman asserting his authority all over the movie. Not that Salman himself can’t be poker-faced and arrogant, he usually excels in those type of characters and is no different in Wanted. Its at the lighter moments that he doesn’t even come close to Mahesh’s superb comic timing in the original. I mean, a simple upma-comment would evoke chuckles in the Telugu version but a similar comment on pasta in the Hindi one hardly makes one grin!

Apart from the comedy, Salman Khan puts in a bravura performance and carries the movie throughout. He’s never one for expressions but the arrogance and brooding machismo of the role fit him perfectly. Ayesha Takia’s portrayal is commendable and she does quite well at the emotional scenes as well as the confrontation scenes. Mahesh Manjrekar is good…he’s very hateable as the lecherous cop who makes everyone’s boot-tip itch. Prakash Raj reprises his role as the villain and I didn’t know he could speak hindi so fluently. Assemm Merchant (he from the bin tere sanam music video) plays his right hand man and could’ve been given more scope. Ditto for Vinod Khanna, who plays Salman’s father. He’s too big an actor to be relegated to bit parts such as this. Inder Kumar tags along with Salman as his friend, a cruel departure for a guy who played the friend/foe in Tumko Na Bhool Paayenge so well. Mahek Chhal plays the vamp, averagely.

‘09 Italian Grand Prix – Sunday Race – Barrichello makes it a Brawn 1-2 at Monza

Strategy, rather than raw pace dictated the race winner for the Italian Grand Prix as Brawn GP notched up a 1-2 finish – courtesy their one-pit-stop strategy – and it was Rubens Barrichello who took the chequered flag ahead of teammate and championship leader Jenson Button. Kimi Raikkonen was gifted the 3rd place as Lewis Hamilton spun out and crashed into the wall on the last lap of the race, an incident which brought out the Safety Car even as the chequered flag fell at the same time!

Adrian Sutil ensured Force India’s second biggest points haul as he finished in 4th place, with Fernando Alonso taking 5th, Heikki Kovalainen 6th, Nick Heidfeld 7th and Sebastian Vettel 8th. Giancarlo Fisichella narrowly missed scoring a point on his Ferrari debut as he finished 9th.

The start was a low key affair as none of the first-corner mayhem was encountered here but Kimi Raikkonen got the drop over Adrian Sutil and slotted into second place behind Hamilton as the cars traversed the tricky first corners. Heikki Kovalainen, who had the heaviest fuel load amongst the top four cars and was looking like an outside choice for taking the race win could not get away quite as well as the Brawns behind him and dropped as low as eight in the first lap. Championship contender Mark Webber was an early casualty as he got tapped into a spin into the gravel trap by the BMW of Robert Kubica, who himself retired a few laps later…probably because of the damage sustained in that incident.

Other notable retirements included the Force India of Vitantonio Liuzzi, who suffered a gearbox/transmission failure when he was running strongly in fourth position and the Renault of Jaime Algersuari. Despite being an incident free race, it was an exciting one to watch as there were several mini-battles up and down the field which made for edge-of-the-seat action. The best one of them all has to be the Force India Vs. Ferrari battle which was running for almost the entire race as Kimi Raikkonen had to contend with a rampaging Force India for the second race in a row, this time that of Adrian Sutil. The two Toyotas of Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock also had a close rum thing, which probably might have been catalysed by the Williams of Kazuki Nakajima. Then there was a chase building up between Hamilton in third and Button out in front and the McLaren was catching up ever so slightly each lap but ultimately Lewis’ crash meant that never materialised into a right royal battle.

‘09 Italian Grand Prix – Saturday Qualifying- Hamilton puts McLaren on Pole, Force India Second

McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton sealed Pole Position for the Italian Grand Prix at a sunny Monza track in an exhilarating Qualifying Session which saw the race for the fastest lap go down to the absolute wire. First Kimi Raikkonen and then Hamilton had held the fastest lap honours before the Force India of Adrian Sutil upended them both with a stonker of a lap to go P1 in a time which even the Ferrari of Raikkonen could not match. But behind them all, Hamilton was driving an absolute sweet lap and he nailed the Pole position with a 1 Min 24.066s lap.

Adrian Sutil will settle for P2 and coming on the back of the team’s pole position in Spa, Force India’s resurgence was continuing. Kimi Raikkonen will start from P3 in Ferrari’s home grand prix with Heikki Kovalainen in 4th. The Brawns of Rubens Barrichello and Jenson Button line up 5th and 6th on the grid with Force India’s Vitantonio Liuzzi 7th and the Renault of Fernando Alonso in 8th place. The Red Bulls of Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber complete the top ten positions on the starting grid for Sunday’s race.

Q1 saw the Ferraris set the early pace and both Brawn GP and McLaren matching them pretty evenly. Kimi Raikkonen set the fastest lap of them all as the drivers came to terms with the slightly raised kerbs around the Monza track. It might rank on many drivers’ lists as the second-best track on the calendar after Spa with its long sweeping straights but these new kerbs might just do a disservice to them if they ride them too close. Many drivers saw their car spat off the track due to these kerbs, one of whom was Ferrari debutante Giancarlo Fisichella, who damaged his front suspension in the third practice session this morning. The drivers to drop out of Q1 included both the Toro Rossos of Jaime Algersuari and Sebastian Buemi, both the Williams’ of Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima and the Toyota of Timo Glock.

Music Review – Blue

This was one album every Bollywood music buff was eagerly awaiting for (well, this and Radio). Its the OST of the upcoming movie Blue, with music by none other than the Oscar-winning maestro – A.R.Rahman. In his own words, “…is my first film after the Oscars. So expectations are scary”. Well, expectations are always high when it comes to Rahman’s music…aren’t they?

The soundtrack of Blue kicks off with the foot-tapping and soon-to-be-on-everyone’s-lips Chiggy Wiggy, marking the Bollywood debut of Kylie Minogue. The song is quite good in Kylie’s hands vocals but gets kinda mediocre with Sonu Nigam’s entrance. The Anglo-Punjabi beats and lyrics in the song don’t quite gel and the fun goes off once Kylie is relegated to the background by Sonu…and probably Akshay as well. I wish filmmakers would stop pushing his ‘khiladi’ image in every nook and cranny of the movie! Aaj dil gustaakh hai has already become a favourite. Its strummy beats and the vocals of Sukhwinder Singh and Shreya Ghosal give it an instant lift. I presume it will be picturized on Sanjay Dutt (dunno why…Sukhwinder’s vocals never seem to suit him!)

Fiqrana is a travelogue-esque song and the healthy smattering of Urdu words make one seem like its penned by Gulzar saab. Vijay Prakash does a swell job with the vocals and Shreya Ghosal ably supports him. The catchy background hook and the stop-n’-go rendition of some of the lines stand out in this one. Could’ve done done away with the electronic modulation of the voice though. Hope they won’t ruin it by picturising it on Zayed Khan! Bhoola tujhe is the lone solo track in the album and a pretty slow one at that. Dunno why but it reminded me of (shudderrr…) Yuvvraaj! Probably the orchestra/opera esque setting of the song. Rashid Ali croons it with his usual mellifluousness but won’t be a repeat track for me. Shreya and Sonu team up for the seductive-sounding Rehnuma with Sonu sounding pretty nasal at times and deep at others, and Shreya trying hard to sound like Sunidhi! The beats and slow rendition  make me think it will be played out as a background track…maybe as some dangerous shenanigans are played out underwater.

5 Years – Done n’ Dusted!