Monaco GP: Red Bull Thursday report

Monaco and F1: glamour, egomania and conspicuous consumption. But with the Cannes Film Festival taking place nearby, it got us thinking what it would be like... IF F1 WAS RULED BY... HOLLYWOOD 1. Scrutineering would be replaced at each race by a ...

Monaco and F1: glamour, egomania and conspicuous consumption. But with the Cannes Film Festival taking place nearby, it got us thinking what it would be like... IF F1 WAS RULED BY... HOLLYWOOD

1. Scrutineering would be replaced at each race by a script meeting. Each meeting would begin with the words: "So the race starts with an explosion. How do we ramp it up from there?"

2. Every grand prix would feature a cocky and rebellious GP2 driver, drafted into the big league at the last moment. The cocky and rebellious driver would always be Angelina Jolie. And she'd win, all the time, despite starting from pit lane. Predictable maybe, but think of the skin tight race suit.

3. The whole of the FIA would be replaced by a bald man sitting in a large chair, stroking a white cat, saying: "No, Mr Bond/Button/Barrichello, I expect you to die".

4. The FIA Court of Appeal would be replaced by Jack Nicholson endlessly shouting: "YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH!"

5. Someone would crash into the harbour at every Monaco Grand Prix. Now that's a special effect!

6. The season would always go down to the final race at which a formerly washed-up driver would miraculously come back from the brink of defeat to take a heroic victory and win the Championship - even if he started the race 42 points behind in the standings. He'd then make up with the evil villain by saying: "You can be my wing man anytime".

7. Every team would get an `engineering genius' who would tell the driver at least three times a race that it `CAN'T BE DONE!' And then he'd do it.

8. Product placement would be everywhere, with drivers regularly showing off watches, clothes, mobile phones, sunglasses. Oh wait...

9. The stars of the show would be paid insane amounts of money, would be pampered like poodles, wouldn't have to talk to anyone they didn't want to and would get their own luxury trailer. Oh wait...

10. Just go and watch Sylvester Stallone's 'Driven'. It would be like that. Seriously, it would.

Car 5 SEBASTIAN VETTEL
1st Practice P2, 2nd Practice P3

"We did a lot of laps today, which is good as that's important in Monaco. The car feels alright, but if you look at the times it's difficult to judge where we are. One thing that's clear it will be very, very tight over the weekend. The top four teams are split by a couple of tenths and fuel loads are not as important here, so it's close. It looks challenging. Qualifying has been good for us at the last races and I hope it continues on Saturday."

Car 6 MARK WEBBER
1st Practice P4, 2nd Practice P10

"It was a pretty good day today - we went a bit early with the options to beat the weather and we've got a bit of work to do with the balance, but in general it was good. We've made progress in the low-speed stuff since last year. We saw indications of it in Singapore and Abu Dhabi and what we learned with the RB5 has rolled into the RB6. It will be tighter here than it was in Spain, it's a special track - we know that. Saturday will be an exciting qualifying session for definite."