The Queue
With Leviathan having now become a joy to read (though with still much more ahead than lays behind), I find myself fancying ever more ambitious future projects. To the following list, I shall have to add greater explorations of poetry, especially Alfred Tennyson & Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince
Dante Alighieri, Comedy (A.K.A. the Divine Comedy)
John Milton, Paradise Lost
John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress

And, of course, Edmund Burke. The problem is there appears not to be a "definitive" work by Burke; so, I shall have to pick amongst the various surveys of his writing to find that by which I will first be introduced to his ideas.

Years ago, my sister warned me off reading Dante, but I fear I did myself a disservice by so readily accepting her advice. After all, our tastes in literature diverge just as widely as do our tastes in music, movies, & art; so, why should I be so certain of her predicted verdict of my taste on a given work? I am, if nothing else, an eclectic fellow (or, less charitably, mercurial). She might well be right about the Divine Comedy, but I will have no confidence of that 'til I take the plunge myself.

This Week in Motorsport
Formula Fun!
Formula One World Championship
Round 20
Grande Prêmio do Brasil
Sunday, 25 November 2012

Triple World Champion Sebastian Vettel ('10, '11, & '12)! If one of the most exciting, crazy races I've ever seen, Vettel became only the third man to win three consecutive World Drivers' Championships, joining the illustrious company of five-time champion Juan Manuel Fangio ('51, '54, '55, '56, & '57) & seven-time champion Michael Schumacher ('94, '95, '00, '01, '02, '03, & '04). At the age of twenty-five, in only his fifth full F1 season, Vettel became the ninth driver to win at least three titles over the course of a career, joining the aforementioned Fangio & Schumacher, & such illustrious names as Alain Prost ('85, '86, '89, & '93), Sir Jack Brabham ('59, '60, & '66), Sir Jackie Stewart ('69, '71, & '73), Niki Lauda ('75, '77, & '84), Nelson Piquet ('81, '83, & '87), & Ayrton Senna ('88, '90, & '91). Red Bull Racing (Renault), for whom Vettel drives & who also won their third consecutive Constructors' Championship, produced T-shirts emblazoned with "V3TTEL" across the chest. I want one.

The race, as mentioned, was completely bughouse. The race began on a drying track, having earlier been subjected to rain. Vettel was spun on the first lap & after the spin his Red Bull was clipped & damaged by the Williams (Renault) of Bruno Senna. After spinning 180° the RB8 came to rest in the middle of the track, Vettel's nose pointed at the noses of the swiftly oncoming cars. The pack parted like the Red Sea, an amazing sight given the proclivity for multiple-car shunts on Lap 1 of any grand prix. Absolute disaster having been inexplicable avoided, Vettel reoriented his car & dashed off in last place. Meanwhile, up at the front, the McLarens (Mercedes) of '08 World Champion Lewis Hamilton & '09 World Champion Jenson Button & the Force India (Mercedes) of Nico Hülkenberg were quickly pulling away from the rest of the field. A light rain began to fall & in the slippery conditions more & more cars dove into the pit lane for "intermediate" rain tires ((or "inters," as opposed to "full" or "wet" rain tires)—except Button & Hülkenberg. Those two stayed out, way out in front, through the rain, & when the rained ceased & those behind them had to pit again to shed their inters, the pair found themselves forty seconds ahead of the third-place runner. (A lap around Interlagos only takes eighty seconds.) Alas, in such slick, mixed conditions shunts are inevitable & there was deemed to be enough debris on the racetrack to warrant a safety car intervention, wiping out Hülkenberg's & Button's massive gap. By this point the young German ace was leading, the first time he'd ever lead a grand prix. Vettel continued his charge through the field, & was soon back into the points (only the first ten finishing places pay championship points). The race wore on & the rain fell intermittently & everyone stopped for tires, & eventually Hamilton, on fresher rubber, retook the lead from Hülkenberg. The Force India tried to pass the McLaren in the first turn, with a slower Caterham (Renault) slightly balking them both at that awkward spot, but there wasn't enough traction & Hülkenberg slid into Hamilton, deranging the front suspension of Hamilton's car, shunting the former World Champion out of his final race for the only F1 team he's ever known. (Next year, Hamilton is to drive for the hapless Mercedes A.M.G. factory squad, a deeply puzzling move on Hamilton's part.) Hülkenberg was given a drive-through penalty for causing the collision, & Button assumed the lead, with the Ferrari duo of double World Champion Fernando Alonso ('05 & '06) & Felipe Massa behind. Vettel worked his way through the traffic up into seventh place, & then one more up into sixth. With Alonso finishing second & Vettel sixth, Vettel would win his third consecutive Drivers' crown. The rainfall became a downpour & if there has been more than a handful of laps left everyone would have pitted for full wet tires, but as it was everyone stayed out on inters & Paul di Resta of Force India crashed on the second-to-last lap, meaning the race finished behind the safety car, freezing all the runners in their positions. By a three-point margin over a twenty-race season, with twenty-five points paid for each race win, Sebastian Vettel became the 2012 Formula One World Drivers' Champion. On the podium, Alonso's eyes had a thousand-yard stare.

'Twas a thrilling conclusion to a madcap season, widely heralded as one of the best in F1's sixty-plus-year history. A title chase that went all the way to the final round, eight different race victors, a triumphant return of F1 to the United States—for what more can one ask? Formula One is an incredible sport, dear readers, one that I would urge sincerely each of you to give an honest chance to win you over.

By Endurance We Conquer
The first Le Mans-affiliated race of 2013, the 12 Hours of Sebring, is yet over three months away, but season entries for the World Endurance Championship (W.E.C.), the American Le Mans Series (A.L.M.S.), & the European Le Mans Series (E.L.M.S.) are beginning to take shape. This will be the fifteenth & final year for the A.L.M.S. in its current guise, after the Series's purchase by the N.A.S.C.A.R.-owned Grand-Am Road Racing Association & ahead of the '14 debut of the as yet unnamed "unified" series. There is little news, as everyone in North America seems to be holding their breath 'til the rules under which the unified series are to be run are announced early next year. What news there is: Aston Martin are making a big push in G.T. (modified production cars, as opposed to prototypes), with Vantages to run in both the A.L.M.S. & Grand-Am. Porsche have ceased factory support for customer teams while they concentrate on developing the racing version of the new 911, the Type 991, with two factory-backed 991s to run in the W.E.C. Flying Lizard, the once-&-future Porsche factory-backed squad in the A.L.M.S., have thus announced that in '13 they will campaign in the lower G.T. Challenge category, instead of the ruthlessly competitive G.T. class. In A.L.M.S. G.T. the factory-backed B.M.W. squad (co-owned by Bobby Rahal & David Letterman) are switching from M3s to Z4s, a car that has been enjoying great success in Europe & seems more directly equivalent to class competitors the Chevrolet Corvette, the Ferrari 458 Italia, & the S.R.T. Viper.

Prototype counts continue to be lower-the-ideal in the A.L.M.S.; the Anglo-Swiss team Rebellion Racing, who earned the overall victory at October's Petit Le Mans, have announced a full-season campaign, a most welcome addition to the P.1 class. I don't expect much change in the P.2 count, again as the '14 rules & regulations are yet unknown. The W.E.C. & the E.L.M.S. have the opposite problem of the A.L.M.S., with healthy fleets of prototypes & a dearth of G.T.s. The W.E.C. especially looks set to have an embarrassment of riches in P.2, with multiple squads joining the globetrotting series from both North America & Europe. Here's hoping those moonshiners at N.A.S.C.A.R. are paying attention to the popularity of P.2; it would be a relatively easy for the Grand-Am teams currently running Daytona Prototypes (D.P.) to switch to Le Mans Prototype 2 (L.M. P.2) machinery in a few years' time, when their D.P.s have reached the natural end of their mechanical lives.

Semi-Pro
S.R.T. (Dodge) Viper Cup
Round 4
Road America, Race 2
Sunday, 12 May 2012

Round 5
Virginia International Raceway, Race 1
Saturday, 7 July 2012

Round 7
Monticello Motor Club, Race 1
Saturday, 25 August 2012

There is a chap, Ben Keating, who oft-times appears to be invincible. He often stands head & shoulders above the rest of the field, sometimes so much so that I think he might deserve a drive in a higher category, maybe even the A.L.M.S. The Viper Cup is high-level club racing, not a real pro series, but that is not a criticism; I'm the last man ever to have a bone to pick with amateurism. I enjoy professional sports as much as the next fellow, but that's simple acceptance of the ways things are. Had I my druthers, the gentlemen versus players debates of the late 19th & early 20th centuries might well have turned out differently.

Mazda MX-5 Cup
Round 5
Mid-Ohio
Sunday, 10 June 2012

Round 6
Road America
Saturday, 23 June 2012

Round 7
Mosport (technically renamed Canadian Tire Motorsports Park)
Friday, 20 July 2012

The "Miata Cup," too, is high-level club racing, as the commentators like to remark, "The cheapest way to get yourself into a nationally-televised racing series." What is most interesting in this latest series of races was seeing Mid-Ohio on television. I am now so familiar with both the track & the entire complex, having spent the best part of three days there, that it lends a unique perspective to the television images. (I am dreadfully late in my report on seeing the A.L.M.S., the IndyCar Series, the World Challenge series in person at Mid-Ohio, & for that I am sorry.) I will agree with a point often made during Speed's F1 coverage, that television does not adequately convey the topography of racing circuits, especially the vertical element. Hills upon which circuits climb on valleys into which circuits plunge looks much steeper in person, rather, they look artificially gradual on television. Sweet mercy, how steep must Spa's Eau Rouge or Laguna Seca's Corkscrew really be, given how vertigo-inducing they already look through the camera?

The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day
The London Symphony Orchestra & Alberto Lizzio, "Pomp and Circumstance, Five Marches for Orchestra, Opus 39, № 1 in D Major, 'Land of Hope and Glory'" from London Symphony Orchestra Plays Classical Favorites (T.L.A.M.)