How nice it was – compensation for a fundamentally boring opening race of this year’s Formula 1 World Championship – to see the beaming 41-yearold Fernando Alonso back on the finish podium in Bahrain. Third place in a Red Bull seem-alike Aston Martin was a great revelation. It was in some measure amends for the demeaning manner in which the metallic green Aston Martin course car of last year somehow looked more in place than the sister-liveried F1 team cars following it, buried some way back down the starting grid.
So the grand old marqueBrooklands special fame – in 1920 to its first Grand Prix car project of 1922 it spluttered as much as it ever roared, yet simply – somehow – kept going.
