The real stories from inside the F1 paddock. My apologies, but the last few days have been very busy, writing 1. Brazil. Then I had to try to get the hotel in Sao Paulo to give back money to which it helped itself without my permission and without telling me. The justification for this was so obtuse that they needed an hour to work it all out, which meant that I was a bit later getting into the traffic jams and thus the check in queues. I found myself behind a group of people who could only have been a band on tour, what with the black leather, tattoos, piercings and pigtails. I discovered that yes, they were a band on tour. Yes, they were heavy metal. Yes, they had been talking some funny languages, identified as Norwegian and Hungarian, and, yes, they were rushing back to Europe to play this week with the Oslo Philharmonic,Yes, really. Not being an expert in Norwegian black metal, I asked the name of the group and was told Satyricon. I was none the wiser, but had an interesting chat comparing the lifestyles of F1 and Norwegian black metal. Where did you play in Rio I asked. Unite Wordpress Business Magazine Theme' title='Unite Wordpress Business Magazine Theme' />The guy shrugged. I dunno. When you are on tour, you get to a hotel, you get in a van, you do a concertAh yes, that I understoodIt is true that when one is on the road, things tend to blur into each other. Every street in Sao Paulo looks pretty much the same, we agreed, when lost on the way to the circuit one day. In many ways Brazil is a great country, and in others it is incredibly sad. The other day, when discussing the future of the Grand Prix, someone suggested a street race in Rio. I am still giggling about that one. If you read the newspapers, you will know that last summer the Brazilian government sent 1. A few weeks ago there were days of intense fighting between different drug gangs, trying to win control of one of the citys favelas. In comparison, Sao Paulo is a positive utopia, even if politics has become something of an Ealing Comedy Carry on Corruption with suitcases filled with money being handed over to go betweens in pizzerias, before being delivered to the top level officials. This is why the country is undergoing Lava Jato, otherwise known as Operation Car Wash, a scandal surrounding industrial scale bribery and corruption concerning Petrobras, the national oil company and a celebrated F1 sponsor. This is serious stuff when one considers that a Supreme Court Justice handling the trials died in January when a plane he was on, crashed into the sea for no apparent reason Of course, when your society is corrupt from top to bottom, it is hard to fight against criminality at all levels. And this is what F1 walked into last weekend. Brazilians are generally a pretty friendly bunch and Interlagos is a great race track, steeped in history. Just up the Avenida Senador Teotonio Vilela from the main gates of the circuit there is a purple store called Stoc Car Bar e Lanches, which was once old man Barrichellos hardware store. A few doors further up from that, next to the China Box takeaway, is the original headquarters of the Fittipaldi Formula 1 team, where they built all the cars from 1. F6. However between Interlagos and the inner suburbs of Sao Paulo, where the F1 folk stay it takes too long to get to the centre of town, there is a road that heads downhill towards the smelly Jurubatuba river. It is a dodgy area and people with guns regularly pop out and try to steal things by pointing their weapons at the unfortunate passers by. F1 people have been attacked in this neighbourhood for years and one would think that the race promoter and the city would want this to stop as the purpose of the Grand Prix is to create publicity for the city, not tell the world that it is a home of hoodlums. But no, nothing is ever done in advance, if someone is attacked more police appear, but they dont always stay very long. So, I suppose that being robbed by a hotel is a little more subtle than having someone stick a gun in your face, but it is probably not the way to win stars of excellence from worthy bodies who judge these things. By Monday F1 was pretty fed up with this and Pirelli and Mc. Laren announced that they were cancelling a planned test and going home early. Star Trek Epub Collection on this page. And heres the funny thing, Brazil is paying Formula 1 for this kind of publicityStill, the word on the street for some time has been that the relationship between the race promoter and Formula 1 is right up there with the joyous love in between Israel and Palestine. I am told the whole thing has been getting very silly with the promoter refusing to allow a Rolex clock into the paddock unless someone paid for it. It all sounds like it is building up to a right messy divorce, which probably explains why F1 seems to be very keen to get a race going in Buenos Aires, as quickly as is possible. For the record, it seems that the no one wants to promote the Brazilian race beyond 2. The word is that Tamas Rohonyi Kertesz, the man who heads the promotion company, is leaving Brazil to return to his native Hungary. Rohonyi is, of course, a major ally of one BC Ecclestone, not to mention being a neighbour as Rohonyi owns or owned a coffee plantation near Amparo, to the north of Sao Paulo. Ecclestone visited the farm some years ago, liked what he saw and duly bought a 2. Fazenda Ycatu, and he has since started marketing its products as Celebrity Coffee. The word recently has been that Rohonyi has sold his plantation to Ecclestone and is getting out of Brazil. KPIX 5 CBS San FranciscoConnect With Us At KPIX 5 PROGRAM GUIDE KPIX 5 TV Schedule WATCH A Glimpse Inside The Working KPIX 5 Newsroom Breaking News Send news tips. Hilarious Funny Facebook status updates is a great way to brighten up your Facebook profile. Install Iis Common Files Windows 7 more. Use these Funny Facebook Status Updates to get more likes. I dont know if that is true, but they are close, Rohonyi being the man who introduced Mr E to his wife to be Fabiana Flosi, who used to be on the staff of the race promotion company at Interlagos. But maybe the time has come for F1 to think again about Brazil. It is the sports biggest current TV audience by a long way but there are no guarantees for the future. The retirement of Felipe Massa at the end of this year will mean that there will be no Brazilian driver on the grid for the first time since the Dutch Grand Prix of 1. Backstreet Browser License Key. Emerson Fittipaldi was missing having been injured when a French driver on the Cote dAzur did an unexpected u turn and Emerson was smacked up in the ensuing shunt. Actually, upon reflection that is not true, because I dont believe that there were any Brazilians present at the San Marino Grand Prix of 1. FISA FOCA War, a battle over commercial control of the sport between the federation and the F1 teams. Business-WordPress-Theme-Magazine3.jpg]];var lpix_1=pix_1.length;var p1_0= [[590' alt='Unite Wordpress Business Magazine Theme' title='Unite Wordpress Business Magazine Theme' />Unite is a clean, modern and fully responsive flat design WordPress wedding theme developed using Bootstrap 3 and made for simplicity and ease of use. New U. S. home builder homebuilder publication. Covers housing, green homebuilder, new single multifamily communities home builder news nationwide. Later, of course, FOCAs leader Bernie Ecclestone separated the teams from the rights they had won and made them all his ownThe world has moved on and those who think we are going back 3. The sport is now so big that no one can consider breaking it up. It would be suicidal and would cost a fortune and the offers that will be on the table from Liberty will be sensible, if not generous. They are in the game to make money, but their idea is to do it in a logical way, working with the team and the other stakeholders. Unite Wordpress Business Magazine Theme Free Download' title='Unite Wordpress Business Magazine Theme Free Download' />The days of divide and conquer are over and, as a listed company, their ability to have special deals with the likes of Ferrari is pretty minimal. If they do that, what is to stop a Williams shareholder suing Liberty because his team does not have a fair share of the revenues Ferrari has taken a fair beating for suggesting that it might quit the sport if it doesnt get what it wants. The response inside the sport has been fairly clear. Financial, legislative, agricultural, and all the other most important news about the cannabis industry.