Slowing Flowing Waters

I just put Friday's blog "Ebb and Flow" to bed and grabbed a quick shower before the first power nap on tonight's agenda...I looked at Twitter before closing my eyes and I saw all the teams at Silverstone for the British Grand Prix tweeting about the torrential rains coming down. The LIVE stream of FP1 is scheduled to begin in under two hours...just damn...

I went to WeatherUnderground and typed in Silverstone, United Kingdom. Double damn! Chance of rain today is 80% (FP1, FP2), Saturday 70% (FP3, Qualifying), and Sunday British GP) 40% I read a tweet that said pit out is below the water table...who knows if the F1 TV cameraman even knows what a water table is..or where Silverstone's is!

Silverstone Circuit is built on a former RAF Airfield where huge Wellington bombers launched their night bombing raids on Europe and Germany during WWII. Wide and fast, with long straightaways, the average speed in F1 configuration is 215kph(133.594mph). A lap is 3.660 miles, and 65% of each lap is run at full throttle...unless it's wet or raining...

Friday Evening Update:

Well, both Practice sessions were wet...the big news was 80K British race fans totally clogged the motorways leading to Silverstone and many never got to the track...including some GP2 drivers who missed their practice sessions while mired in traffic. I turns out the soggy grass parking lots were the problem...such a big problem that organizers have asked 20K fans not to come to Practice and Qualifying Saturday!

Silverstone says the record rainfall has made the parking lots impassable, hence the request of the 20K parking pass/ticket holders who will have nowhere to park Saturday.

Early tweets from the track at 8:45AM Silverstone time say it's not raining...yet. The forecast pretty much promises rain on Saturday, but less so for Sunday's Grand Prix. There's nothing like a Formula One race that starts wet and finishes on a drying track...it's the most thrilling racing possible.

Saturday 3AM Update:
Free Practice 3 is finished, all of it run in the dry. Teams were radioing their drivers on track saying "Light rain will be here in __ minutes...some rain will be here soon...the end of the session...it never came before the LIVE stream ended. The skies were definitely threatening however, so everyone expects wet qualifying...good more uncertainty for race day!