MATT G'S BAHRAIN GRAND PRIX EXPERIENCE
The only Grand Prix I'd actually been to previously was the 2004 Hungarian Grand Prix which took place while Dad and I were working in Romania. Budapest was nice, the general atmosphere was good and the fellow Brits we came across were headcases! Hotel was dodgy though and the race was slightly iffy but the one thing to remember was to bring earplugs - F1 cars can get very noisy. Still, just seeing the elite of motor racing in action was quite an experience!
This time round...well Dad 'was' meant to still be working in Saudi at this point, butting heads with the natives made him have other ideas though but we still had tickets to the Bahrain Grand Prix. So Dad just booked himself an extra plane ticket. I had never expected to wind up in the Middle East in my life, completely unchartered territory but there was F1 to watch so it was showtime.
The journey started on Tuesday with my parents and I heading to Exeter St Davids station to grab a coffee before Dad and I got a train as far as Reading. On the train I grabbed a half decent ham and cheese sandwich, then it was off at Reading, nearly left my main bag on the escalator before waiting around for the Heathrow Express. I know Heathrow well enough from my time at Stargate conventions, well enough to know that the Hoppa is generally the only game in town unless you're having to go round the houses. Either way, after having a quick look at the oh-so-legendary Terminal 5, we got a Hoppa to our crashpad for the night, a local Travelodge, watched Champions League highlights, then crashed out(me on a bed without any bedding).
So on Wednesday it's up, shower, get dressed, grab cab to T4(thank God for that!) and grab a croissant at the airport Costas, cruise around, grab new razor blades, wait for flight. An uneventful flight is a good flight. This flight included I am Legend(not one of Will Smith's better ones), St Trinians(weirdly enjoyable), our own personal map channel(of course, we 'had' to fly over Cluj-Napoca) and despite not having any chewing gum, my ears didn't explode on landing. A good flight.
Touchdown Bahrain, it's night time, 7:20pm. First thing I hear when we come into the airport proper? A prayer call! Welcome to the Middle East! Eventually we pick up our bags and grab a Kia hire car. The airport's on a smaller island of the coast of Bahrain's mainland and we were staying in a hotel called Windsor Towers. Eventually we found the place, dumped our bags off and then we headed across town to the Seef Mall, a very large Western style place where we tried to pick up tickets.
Too late for that, I grabbed a cheese croissant at a nearby Starbucks(yes the have taken over the world and yes my stomach was saying it was 7:45pm GMT and had only eaten a brownie since lunch!) then it was back to the hotel where we found what could well have been a good quality sports bar in either the UK or US circa 2006(smoking in public is still legal in Bahrain). We watched the back end of Arsenal vs Liverpool in the Champions League over a couple of Amstel and free popcorn and saw a guy smoking through some weird contraption that I think is meant to take the nicotine away! Either way, it was pretty obvious that Bahrain was not your average Middle Eastern country.
So, Thursday morning about 8am. Shower, then breakfast. Breakfast turned out to be a buffet. The Bahrain idea of a buffet? Toast, coffee, some kind of vegetable pancake, and a kid of fake sausage with BBC World on in the background. First order of business, hit the malls!
Now, while Bahrain may be one of the chilled spots in the Middle East it does have it's rules. Like, you have to cover your legs up even though it was already getting into what would be considered in the UK as shorts weather! Well first stop was the Seef Mall where we picked up our tickets. Next stop was the Mall of Bahrain which though less well known locally does have it's own indoor car park and a supermarket where you can pick up stuff like Pringles, water, apple juice and fruit. Which was pretty much what we were going to be living on for most of our time here, copying a trick from our tour of Ireland last year!
So, then it's a blast down to the opposite side of the island to see if we can blag our way into the circuit despite only having tickets for Friday onwards! To the soundtrack of Radio Bahrain, an English-language station with half the DJs flying the Bahrain flag despite sounding like they'd been poached from UK local radio! The playlist was a bit of pop, bit of R+B, bit of dance, bit of soft rock, bit of chillout, sun out, sky blue, I'm here for a Grand Prix weekend, I'm not in the mood for much else!
Well we got to the Sakhir(aka Bahrain International circuit or BIC for short)circuit...to find our designated parking bay hadn't even been set up yet, so we park elsewhere but security still won't let us in, fair enough. So, we explore the southern part of this little rock for a bit(and it is a rock, takes about an hour to get from north to south and you pass 'Saudi Arabia' signposts on the way). We find ourselves a wildlife park but the main thing we were looking to track down was this water park called Lost Paradise of Dimon. It looked a stone's throw away from the Grand Prix circuit but it was actually back on the main road then onto a windy road that was only half signposted before we finally got there. Grand Prix tickets got you 15% off but we decided to leave that till Monday.
That done, we're thinking we have nothing to lose by heading back to Manama when we hear that Friday tickets will get you in for a pit walk on Thursday. So it's a 180 and back to the information centre. Sure enough, we are go! It's back to the BIC. Security send us round the houses but we eventually get in.
And well, 
a picture says a thousand words. We have, the edge of the circuit itself, some kind of water run through thingy to cool off in(you got enough spray just walking past it), a replica old tall ship called a daal to the left and the place was buzzing enough already. First order of business was to join the autograph queue by the Daal to try and get Jenson's autograph. Slight problem, Jenson and Barrichello left before I was anywhere near the front so we hit the pits instead.
OK, so it wasn't the first time I'd set foot on a Grand Prix circuit but let's face it, an F1 pitlane is an F1 pitlane, where you get to see cars up close and personal. Or hangout at the garage of legends in the making, like so 
. And check out the garages of the other drivers I support. 
You want to know the biggest laugh though? Please, tell me, how many garages do Ferrari need? 
. Four apparently. One for Raikonen, one for Massa, two others for general stuff. Most teams only have three. McLaren, at the back of the grid due to the spy mess last year only get two.
Anyway, we then chillout in the entertainment area for a while. Highlights include a "freestyle footballer" aka a mad English guy and would be pro that doesn't have much by way of general fitness but can and has taught Cristiano Ronaldo and Steven Gerrard a few tricks for TV ads. The other guy was the mad Yank that painted to music while turning his canvas around all the time. The result was a portrait of someone - don't ask me who. Dad got himself lost in a Ferrari exhibition for a bit but then it was back to the car and back to Manama.
Except that we went via a route that took us past a load of oil fields, car dealerships and across a causeway(not "the" Causeway - then we'd have wound up in Saudi). We were headed for the British Club. It had been started up in 1935. Heck knows what the area was like back then, in 2008 it's some fairly dodgy looking back streets. Dad was able to blag membership due to his time in Saudi and must have missed his old boss by the skin of his teeth.
Anyway the Club has various facilities, the main one of which is a small pool. There's no changing room per se, just an open area outside the men's showers so we left our stuff on the sunlounger. We were in there long enough to cool off and chat to a couple of female Grand Prix scrutineers then dry off before grabbing two pints of what Dad said was "the cheapest beer in town". We wound up eating there as well. Cajun chicken burger and chips, we might as well have been back at home. However back home I wouldn't have been hearing prayer calls and it wouldn't have gotten dark so early while remaining relatively warm!
Anyway, back to the hotel and we get ourselves a 48 hour Internet connection allowing me to play catchup with email. And find NBA TV on the hotel set. Not bad. We did have to get to bed fairly early though - there was a long day of race action ahead!
So, Friday. Up at 7ish, shower, breakfast involving a fairly heavy croissant-type thingy then off to the circuit for the first practice session. We got there a few minutes late and were soon reminded how loud F1 cars can get! So it's earplugs in. This gives you a pretty good idea what the view was like from our seats. 
. Session was good though uneventful. Good to see the cars in action though. It was then two hours of cruising the entertainment area, running into an old friend of Dad's with a fit lady in tow, running into some strange silver men
, and then the second F1 practice session. Ferrari seemed to be having the better session but Lewis was running them close...untill we saw him going into the sand on the big screen! Fingers were crossed about him making it for qualifying the next day. After the F1 we decided to check out the GP2 Asia qualifying session. Well I didn't know the field so well and even the GP2 cars were loud enough so that I couldn't hear the circuit commentary over them so we bailed early.
Back to the British Club for another swim and another pint then Dad got in contact with another friend of his called John who was was also staying at Windsor Towers. So it's back to the hotel, quick email check, smarten up and head downstairs, Dad and John talked about where we might head for dinner. They were talking about the local Hard Rock Cafe as a Plan B. "OK" I thought "if that's Plan B then what the hell is Plan A?"
Plan A involved supercars in the car park, fit girls probably on a corporate payroll hanging around and an oozing of class fit for a Grand Prix weekend. The place was a Caribbean themed joint called Trader Vics and the three of us switched from beers to cocktails early on.
The chef's recommendations turned out to to be classy chicken strips of some kid followed by veal steak, jacket potato and gingersnap peas. Nice. Desert, there wasn't any really we'd filled up pretty well anyway! What I did wind up ordering up was "hot buttered rum". It tasted like a cross between toffee and some kind of alcoholic coffee/tea. Wierd stuff.
As for the company, well John turned out to be ex-RAF and had been going to Grand Prix as far back as the 80s and was able to catch me out on F1 trivia which was impressive(though how I was meant to remember David Brabbham I don't know!). Either way, it was past midnight before we got back and it was another early wake up call the next day.
Saturday, well the hangover wasn't as bad as expected, just running on empty from relative lack of sleep. Another hotel breakfast then giving John a lift back to the Trader Vics car park so he could pick up his car then down to the BIC. With shorts on as those weren't a big issue track side.
First item on the agenda - "Speedcar". Take a load of 90s(in one case 80s) F1 drivers, put them in NASCAR style racers
and watch some fun action. Like Jean Alesi and Stefan Johansson carving each other up. Like Johnny Herbert finishing ahead of Jacques Villenerve. And Uwe Alzer, a German sportscar diver I'd never heard of, winning the race. The first guy to finish who I had heard of was Gianni Morbidelli and he was in third.
Next was a third F1 practice session. The biggest unanswered question was, would Lewis take part? An early look at the McLaren garage was inconclusive. Sure enough though, GB's main man was back in business. A far smoother session but it still looked like Ferrari would have the edge.
Then, Porsche SuperCup. 
. The main Brit in this event was a guy called Danny Watts. Up against him was Uwe Alzer! Neither of them won the race though, an Irish guy called Damien Faulkner claimed the credit there.
And then, the big event of the day. F1 qualifying. Q1 and while Jenson and Lewis both went smoothly DC failed to make the cut, he'd start P17. Webber and Barrichello were the main names that were eliminated in Q2 but Jenson made Q3 for the first time this season! In Q3 though it still looked like it would be between Lewis and the Ferraris with Massa having the edge...untill Kubica came out of nowhere to grab not only the first pole of his career but become the first Polish driver to grab an F1 pole position, Massa P2, Lewis P3. Jenson started P9 which was still a great result for him.
Well there was a GP2 race upcoming but I had other fish to fry, namely trying to get DC's autograph. Big long queue, the Toyota drivers first up, then came the Red Bull and Toro Rosso drivers, queue keeps going forward, then the gets close right in front of me - DC has left the dahl! However, the compere then comes down and offers pre signed autographs, if anyone's willing to get on the dahl and do something. Well I wasn't going away empty handed! 
So, the compere asks me to do the funky chicken. So I'm finger-licking it like a loon in front of everyone and in return pick of DC, Mark Webber and Sebastian Bourdais signed cards. Nice score!
So it's then straight back to the hotel for one last email check then smarten up for the Hard Rock Cafe. It was walkable from Windsor Towers and I can now claim to have been to three HRC's on three continents! London(twice during the 90s), LA('99) and now Bahrain. Food was tasty, even more beer in the Middle East of all places(though they don't advertise it) and then returning to base for a relatively early night.
Up on Sunday before 7am, shower, breakfast then eventually get to the BIC despite Dad taking a wrong turning! Invest in a Kangaroo so we can get our own commentary along with various other tricks then it's to the dahl, waiting for Lewis. He wasn't even due for two hours and there were other people on before him. When the time comes, the compere sets up a special Lewis line.
Now I've done Stargate autograph queues enough times. This was nothing like it. I could see flags from all six continents(including a lot of Polish flags - I wonder why they'd come out of the woodwork!) but it really became a crush and the one thing you had to watch out for was tifosi of all people pushing into the Lewis line! As for the previously scheduled drivers. Well Alonso did not turn up(no one was surprised!) and the compere had to beg people to get autographs from Jacky Ickx(the term "legend" flatters him) and drivers from the MIddle East Laguna sportscar series!
Finally here come da man. By which point I've made my way back in front of the tifosi. The gates open. FRACKING INSANITY!!!! Everyone surges forward, the tifosi seems intent on crushing me and at the second time of asking I tumble onto the dahl gangway. In one piece. I walk up, and there behind a desk, is the best British F1 rookie of all time, world championship leader after two races and surely future multiple world champion. A very unreal moment. I say "good luck". He signs a poster, I get off the dahl.
We then head to the circuit for the second Porsche SuperCup race, this time with added Kangaroo TV. Using it I was able to keep an eye on Watt's position using a "favourite driver" feature...and saw him have a bad spin! He went on to finish in 7th and a German called Chris Mamerow won the race.
So it's one last timeout before the big event. And then, the drivers parade, preceded by the biggest Bahrain flag you are ever going to see! 
And then finally the cars come out on to the grid, I see Martin Brundle get a kiss from some local celebrity and see Robert Kubica on his first ever pole position with Lewis just behind him. It's the parade lap, and I get to switch to Five Live's commentary. It's five red lights, they go out, it's what we came here for, it's showtime!
Well Jenson had a bad start and soon found himself down the back of the field, round about 19th. An absolute disaster but worse was to come. Well the first I knew of it was when I saw him coming into the pits, reason unknown. It later turned out that he and DC had clashed and the Honda man got the worst of it. Very disappointing but maybe the qualifying performance is something to build on.
DC was probably the guy I saw least of. OK I roared whenever he came past us but he definitely had the quietest race of the three Brits. He didn't really have a good start and never really managed to get off the back of the field. So much for the '08 Red Bull's apparent promise. Well OK, Webber made the points but DC needs to sort things out. 18th, bummer.
Nowhere near as big a bummer as what happened with Lewis though. Watching him on Kangaroo made me aware of the four second delay - and four seconds is a long time in F1. Well I saw Lewis first have a disastrous start and wind up mid grid before renewing acquaintances with Alonso and that tangle sent him right back to 17th. He did his damnedest to try and make it back though. I saw him passing Sato. I saw him passing Fisichella. He still only finished 13th though, I was witness to probably the worst race of his career.
Up front, well Kubica got mugged by the Ferrari's at the start. Massa was the one that always had the edge and realistically, Raikonen was going to be the only one who'd catch him. OK, there were still some interesting leaderboards during the pitstops, at one point Heidfeld was leading, but I saw him come into the pits, then both Ferraris and Kubica pass him. That was the podium. Massa won his first Grand Prix of the season. Raikonen completed the first Ferrari 1-2 of the season. Kubica settled for 3rd.
The championship now looks like this. Kimi Raikonen surging into the lead with 19 points. Nick Heidfeld up to 2nd with 16. Lewis down to third on 14 points(and a win in Australia). DC's not on the scoreboard yet(best finish 9th) and neither is Jenson(best finish 10th).
One last iced coffee with John and he was off back to Jubail, leaving Dad and I to wonder round and as the sun went down, grab a pizza and take this place in once more. The end of the Grand Prix weekend and it seemed as surreal as ever but there was one last big event on the menu, a gig by R+B singer Akon. I sort of know his stuff, pity the acoustics of a Grand Prix circuit aren't exactly ideal! His hardcore fans weren't complaining though but Dad and I bailed early to avoid a traffic jam. Back to the hotel, another couple of beers in the sports bar and the moment feels more unreal that ever. Grand Prix weekend over, little more than 24 hours till I left this little rock, and I knew part of me was going to miss it.
Monday, well one last hotel breakfast then we checked out and headed to the Lost Paradise of Dimon. Setting up back by the biggest wave pool in the region(pity the waves weren't that classy) we found various flumes. One took one heck of a lot of steps to get up. One you just had to shut your eyes because you knew you were going straight down. And one got nicknamed "The White knuckler" by Dad. Two person ride, take the steep way down, get blasted up what looks like a skateboard ramp then backwards into a splash pool! And we also found time for a game of water volleyball, a slow river ride and a hot dog for lunch!
By the time that was done though, it really was a case of counting down the hours. We swung into the Seef Mall hoping to burn time with a good film but couldn't see anything worth watching. So it was dinner at a chain called Chillis, similar to TGI Fridays. Beef rib, fries and cinnamon apples washed down by a chocolate milkshake, that did me nicely as a last meal in this place. Then we just wondered around the electronics stores in the area, then the airport.
The time at the airport was just, waiting. Waiting for the hire car company to sort things out, waiting for the baggage line to open, waiting to get on the flight. We grabbed a coffee while we were waiting, Dad didn't think that was a good idea but it bought me half an hour without feeling dead tired.
The flight itself well...Insanity at 40000 feet! For starters someone had bought a whoope machine on board during a night flight. Take off 1:40am, well that's one way to make me cranky. Another way is turbulence all the way from Bahrain to Kuwait. Finally I got something resembling sleep...only to be woken up by Dad at 6am CET(5am GMT) flying over Germany. Apparently the breakfast was worth having. The guy in front didn't think so, he was still fast asleep with his seat on full recline! Well the omelette that arrived wasn't very appetizing and when I even accidentally put my seat one inch back the people behind complained! Touchdown Heathrow 6:20am with my ears exploding on the way down!
Despite the flight home from hell though and trying to talk to a would be employer with the Reading train station announcer in the background I soon had to admit, that this was probably the best holiday of all time. It wasn't just the Grand Prix, it was Bahrain. A place that makes you feel a long way from home, but you don't care. A place that's trying to be...nowhere and everywhere I guess. I just know I'll need a lot of money to get back to the coolest rock in the Middle East next year. And for someone that wouldn't have touched the region with a ten foot bargepole five years ago that's saying something!
The big race was disappointing but I wouldn't have missed the weekend for anything. May peace and happiness be with Bahrain always.
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