Numb and number 2. (I know, I know...its a sequel)

JOS RIDES AGAIN

My eternal thanks to Jos Verstappen who has hit the headlines, amongst other things, once again. Apparently, our Jos was none too chuffed to be overtaken by some Joe Schmoe while showing off for the babes at a local kart track. It seems Jos thinks he's Ayrton Senna and took a swing at the offending Mr. Schmoe. Fortunately, Mr. Schmoe was standing on the apex of a corner at the time and Jos missed him completely.

WHAT'S THE WURZ THAT COULD HAPPEN

Two fans are watching the Monaco GP and, seeing Michael Schumacher try impossible and pointless moves on Wurz and Diniz, one says to the other: "Who does he think he is? Jesus Christ?". The other says "No. Eddie Irvine."

This is much funnier if you've already heard the Arnold Palmer joke so please remember, if you don't find this funny, its entirely your fault.

JEAN ALESI POINTS THE FINGER

This weekend highlighted one of the major problems with F1 today. It's not the lack of passing, or the dominance of one team, or the small number of potential winners. It's the TV coverage. Lord knows, it's tough enough for the director to tear himself away from the endless pit-stops (Minardi has announced that they have now perfected the "endless pit-stop") but when we do finally get a break from the breaks in the action what do we get? Not just shots of a retired Jean Alesi picking his nose but slow motion instant replays of Jean Alesi picking his nose. OK, OK, it was Monaco, I know, and that was about the 3rd most interesting thing of the weekend (#2 was the abbreviated national anthems and #1 was NOT watching Coulthard pick his nose, ears, eyes and teeth while Mika Hakkinen repeats his answers from all the previous post-race press conferences this year) but that's no excuse. If I want to see nose-picking, I'll watch Prime Minister's Question Time; if I want excitement, drama and passion, I'll watch a Minardi pit-stop in slow motion..... while having sex. (Try it. Its better than Bolero - slow, not quite so slow, getting faster but still pretty slow, oops that's not supposed to happen, start again, slow, not quite so slow etc. until finally you race off to the finish and the only thing left is to wait and see who comes last).

EDITORIAL

Well, if Max Mosley actually has any power (which fortunately is not very likely), we may have seen a terrible vision of F1 in the future. Max told us that: (a) pit-stops are a wonderful thing and are actually the most exciting part of a race (which is unfortunately true but is certainly nothing to brag about) and (b) they have to be concerned over what the casual viewer thinks of the sport, not the diehard fans. This is very disturbing. Aren't the people who control various aspects of our lives supposed to lie to us about things like this? Aren't they supposed to tell us they care and claim that they want what we do but can't do anything because somebody else didn't return their phone call? They're not supposed to tell us the truth.

We know that Max and Bernie et al only care that F1 make them the most amount of money possible. We know that the casual viewers make up most of the TV audience and that TV puts practically all of Bernie's money directly into his pocket - probably giving him a little stroke at the same time to the tempo of a Minardi pit-stop. But they're not supposed to say this out loud. That's the job of dedicated, hard working, resourceful investigative journalists, such as myself. Ah, the hell with it. I quit.

NEXT WEEK

I'll be in Montreal - which is a strange coincidence because there happens to be a race there and it seems I'm going to be sitting fairly close to where it actually takes place. If anybody is in the vicinity of grandstand 24, section 5, row JJ (all the rows are named after race drivers - a little known fact), seat 15, you can come and tell me how much you love the Insider. Of course, if you don't like it, I'll be sitting in seat 16.