The Explorers Club
No. CCXXIX - The Harvard Mk. I/I.B.M. Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator.







Bonus: The I.B.M. Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator & the Harvard Mks. II, III, & IV.

The Victors: Maize & Blue & Red
Minnesota-Duluth 3-2 Michigan (O.T.)
29-11-4, C.C.H.A. 20-7-1

We fell one goal short of our tenth National Championship, but the 2010-11 valiant Wolverines have much of which to be proud. Overtime time! Good on you, boys! You are a credit to the University of Michigan. I extend my congratulations to the epithetless Bulldogs of the University of Minnesota-Duluth.

The valiant Wolverines will be members of the Central Collegiate Hockey Association (C.C.H.A.) for only two more seasons, 2011-12 & 2012-13, for in 2013 the Big Ten will begin six-team conference play of ice hockey: Michigan, Michigan State, & Ohio State will leave the C.C.H.A.; Minnesota (the luckless Golden Gophers of the Twin Cities, not the Duluth Bulldogs) & Wisconsin will leave the W.C.H.A.; & Penn State will elevate its club teams to N.C.A.A. Division I status. I can't say I like the idea of the increasingly-inaccurately named Big Ten fielding such a pint-sized conference, but what does that matter since the Big Ten doesn't care a wit what I think? Fatalism is the only sensible approach here; whatever will be will be.

I once had a one-on-one meeting with the Michigan's then-Athletic Director, Bill Martin, a meeting held at his initiation. The subject was Yost Ice Arena, specifically the student seating area. It was a gloriously ridiculous circumstance, one I'll recount someday when I suspect we're all in need of a good laugh. For the nonce, Red's valiant Wolverines did a grand job representing the Maize & Blue, & I for one vow to pay much closer attention to Michigan hockey in the years ahead; a mini-Project OSPREY for collegiate hockey, if you will. It is more important to support your team after a loss than after a win; so, tomorrow I will wear my battered old 1998 N.C.A.A. Men's Ice Hockey National Championship T-shirt in solidarity with our returning victors valiant, defeated but unbowed.

Addendum—Monday morning: Please excuse my language, but I know of no other way to express precisely what I am thinking. Fuck Brian Cook of MGoBlog & his jihadist-level hatred for the Michigan men's ice hockey team. Fuck him & his relentless pessimism, fuck him & his "everything that happens is the end of the world" whining. Fuck him & the horse he rode in on. Here's hoping the miserable fuck gets crushed by a bus & rediscovers hope whilst encased in a full-body cast recovering. Fuck him & his fucking website, the hyperlink to which has just been deleted from my "bookmarks." Fuck you, Cook.

Go Blue!

This Week in Motorsport
Sweet fancy Moses, the Malaysian Grand Prix was thrilling! Reigning World Champion Sebastian Vettel started from the pole position & won the race, but the multiplicity of pit stops meant that he did not continuously lead the grand prix from green flag to checkered flag, though he was not seriously challenged, not even by the mighty McLaren duo of '08 World Champion Lewis Hamilton & '09 World Champion Jenson Button. The same three teams sat atop the podium as at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix & in the same order—Red Bull first, McLaren second, & Lotus Renault third—though two of the three teams were represented by different drivers.

Australian Grand Prix | 27 March 2011
{1} Sebastian Vettel (№ 1), Red Bull ("Infiniti" [see below])
{2} Lewis Hamilton (№ 3), McLaren (Mercedes)
{3} Vitaly Petrov (№ 10), Lotus Renault

Malaysian Grand Prix | 10 April 2011
{1} Sebastian Vettel (№ 1), Red Bull (Infiniti)
{2} Jenson Button (№ 4), McLaren (Mercedes)
{3} Nick Heidfeld (№ 9), Lotus Renault

To Infiniti… & Beyond!
Red Bull uses the same Renault-produced engine as both Lotus Renault (the former Renault factory team) & Team Lotus (the former Lotus Racing). Why do their firesuits & the RB7's livery then carry the Infiniti logo & name? There is a significant corporate alliance between Renault & Nissan, an arrangement in which Renault owns a large share of Nissan & Nissan owns a much smaller share of Renault; Infiniti is of course Nissan's luxury marque (Infiniti is to Nissan as Lexus is to Toyota or Cadillac is to General Motors). Reigning World Constructors' Champions Red Bull's engines are branded "Infiniti" purely as a marketing maneuver, not because they technically differ from those powering the four feuding Lotuses. I'm caught twixt competing impulses: on the one hand, I want to type "Red Bull (Infiniti)" because I respect marketing & capitalistic self-interest; on the other hand, I want to type "Red Bull (Renault)" because that's what kind of an engine it truly is. Henceforth, I'm pretty sure I'll type "Red Bull (Renault)," in the interests of calling a spade a spade.

Last season, Cosworth, in its return to F1, supplied a third of the grid; this year, the distribution is an even four-way split. Power by:

Renault
Red Bull
Lotus Renault
Team Lotus

Ferrari
Ferrari
Sauber
Toro Rosso

Cosworth
Williams
Virgin
Hispania

Mercedes
McLaren
Mercedes
Force India

Bolivarian Imbroglio
I no longer support Williams (Cosworth). The highlight of Williams's 2010 campaign was rookie Nico Hülkenberg's pole position in the penultimate grand prix, Brazil; at the final round of the season, in Abu Dhabi, Hülkenberg was unceremoniously let go. I was irked by this decision, but I can well understand why Williams did it. The principle obstacle, it is thought, to Williams resuming their traditional place atop the F1 world—alongside their long-time rivals Ferrari & McLaren—is the team's relatively meager funds. "The Hulk" is considered one of the most promising young drivers out there, but he does not carry nearly as much personal sponsorship as some other young drivers. Williams had little choice, one could argue, but to replace Hülkenberg—who had nothing to offer but his prodigious talent—with a so-called "pay driver"—one with deep pockets behind him. Pay drivers are nothing new in motorsport & nothing new to F1; running a top-flight racing organization isn't cheap. (A joke: How do you make a small fortune in Formula One? Start off with a large fortune.) Somebody has to pay the fare, somebody has to foot the bill. Though disappointed that Hülkenberg was to be replaced by a pay driver, that alone was not enough to cause my breach with the team.

The driver Williams selected to replace Nice Hülkenberg was 2010 GP2 (a feeder series meant to identify the F1 stars of tomorrow) champion Pastor Maldonado. Hülkenberg was the '09 GP2 champion; so, Maldonado would seem to be a worthy successor. However, that assumption doesn't hold up to much scrutiny. Hülkenberg was in GP2 for one full season, at the end of which he won the championship, thus prohibiting him from further GP2 participation. 2010 was Maldonado's third full year in GP2, giving him experience at all the tracks that his often rookie competitors could not match. In 2009, Hülkenberg & Maldonado were teammates, driving identical vehicles backed by the same pit crew: Hülkenberg outscored Maldonado by leaps & bounds, winning the title while Maldonado finished sixth. I have nothing against Pastor Maldonado personally, he's a young driver (though two years older than Nico Hülkenberg) trying to make his way in the world of open-wheeled racing, & as I always want the best man to win I wish him well if he's the best man. But any sort of objective analysis indicates that he's not the same caliber of driver as Nico Hülkenberg.

All that said, Williams are free to make their own mistakes, & it was not the replacement of the talented pauper Hülkenberg with the also talented (though less so) fat cat Maldonado that caused me to cut the bonds of affection to Williams. The breach was caused by the source of the pay driver's lucre. Pastor Maldonado is Venezuelan (no, I'm not a bigot); his principal sponsor, & now a large contributor to Williams's coffers, is P.D.V.S.A., the Venezuelan state oil monopoly. Maldonado is a propaganda tool for Venezuela's strongman-cum-dictator, Hugo Chávez. This I cannot brook. Williams is a business & Chávez's money spends like anyone else's, but I simply cannot be a party to their amoral dealings with that tyrant. I can no more root for Williams than I could buy gasoline at Citgo (& I don't). It is with some glee, of an indisputably vicious character, that I report that neither Williams had yet to finish a grand prix in 2011; neither Maldonado nor Rubens Barrichello have finished either the Australian Grand Prix or the Malaysian Grand Prix. Here's hoping their rotten luck will continue unabated.

Formula fun!

The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day: SKApril
Catch 22, "Keasbey Nights" from Keasbey Nights (T.L.A.M.)

Commentary: All the songs on Keasbey Nights, Catch 22's debut album, were written by a chap who left Catch 22 before the band recorded it's sophomore album. That chap then went on to form a ska band called Streetlight Manifesto which years later also released Keasbey Nights, calling it "as performed by Streetlight Manifesto." I've not heard the music of Streetlight Manifesto, but the latter-day ska kids in The Loose Ties speak of them as a big influence. For an old-timer like me, I reflect with sadness that ska's position in the early '00s was weak enough even without this kind of internecine feuding. Keasbey Nights is a great album as recorded by Catch 22 & I can only imagine that it's still great as recorded by Streetlight Manifesto.

Also, an irksome bit of trivia: on the exterior artwork to Keasbey Nights, Catch 22's name is written as Catch Twenty-two, yet on the interior art & the disc itself it is Catch 22. I use the numerical name Catch 22 because that is the name that survived to the later albums.