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So, Britain has it’s first Formula One World Drivers Champion since Damon Hill in 1996. In a thrilling, unpredictable race Lewis Hamilton drove conservatively, seemingly content in the fact that he only needed to finish 5th.

Ultimately, that conservatism almost cost him the title as two laps from the end he was passed by the very impressive Sebastian Vettel in a Toro Rosso and it all seemed over.

As Ferrari and Brazil were celebrating their first World Drivers Champion since Ayrton Senna, no-one was watching the pace of the two Toyota cars who had elected not to switch to the intermediate wet tyres. Both Toyotas had gone through the second, twisty section of the racetrack 10 seconds slower than the rest of the field. At the start of the previous lap, Timo Glock, running in 4th position was only 12-14 seconds ahead of Hamilton and Vettel.

As Felipe Massa crossed the line, the Toyota, Toro Rosso and McLaren had only just passed through the second split timing beam, and Massa was effectively World Drivers Champion 2008.

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You’ve got to hand it to the Daily Star. While their Big-brother-Z-List-celebrity-hyped paper is not always the most newsworthy, it certainly throws up some of the more amusing stories.

Today, they claim that Bruce Willis is set to play commentating legend Murray Walker in a film about the life of Michael Schumacher - inventively titled “The Michael Schumacher Story”.

I don’t know what is more laughable - the thought of Bruce Willis donning spectacles and getting overexcited everytime a puff of smoke appears at the rear of a car (even if it is tyre smoke)… or the prospect of a film about the life of Michael Schumacher.

While Schumacher is without doubt one of the greatest drivers F1 has known, his career wasn’t always the most exciting - and given the fact that Schumacher is purported to be involved, it is unlikely that the more controversial aspects of his career will be highlighted.

Schumacher drove in a period in F1 where his superiority was rarely challenged. If you were to make a true life film about “modern” F1, you’d probably make it during the 1980’s, where you had Senna, Prost, Mansell, Rosberg (Sr), and Piquet (Sr) all fighting for wins, and some of the real characters such as Gerhard Berger.

None of this will come to fruition, except possibly as a made for TV film, and while Murray did comment for the whole of Schumacher’s career, he was not always the greatest supporter of the German.

The main reason Willis has been linked to the role, is simply that he is probably the most famous aging bald actor in Hollywood. Apparently “an insider” claims that in glasses, Willis looks very much like a young Murray Walker. This is forgetting the fact that Walker was not a young man during the Schumacher period.

Formula One will be returning to the BBC from 2009 onwards. This has already sparked a huge debate on Radio Five Live, the most popular question being - will they use ‘The Chain’ as the theme tune again?

The ITV theme tunes have been mixed to say the least. The theme for the first couple of seasons was written by Jay Kay, better known as ‘Jamiroquai’. As a huge motorsport fan, I’m sure he jumped at the chance - however his theme tunes did not have the excitement of the bass riff from ‘The Chain’. The tune they’ve been using in more recent years, a kind of tribal chanting theme was an improvement, but still doesn’t have the build-up that ‘The Chain’ has - from the opening Bass Riff to the guitars.

Another strong debate is why F1 should even be shown on the BBC, when they have lost the majority of football, and the cricket. Given Bernie Ecclestone’s notorious business strategies, Formula One would not come cheap.

F1 is not as popular in the UK as football, cricket, and at the moment, possibly even rugby, but I do wonder if the fact that we now have a British driver who is a consistent winner, and probable future champion has influenced the BBC’s decision to get back into the F1 game…

My only hopes are that:

1. They do actually use ‘The Chain’ as the theme tune
2. They keep Steve Ryder as the anchor (Jim ‘The Football’s on in a minute’ Rosenthal really showed how much better Steve Ryder actually was!)
3. They manage to keep Martin Brundle (The best pundit in F1)
4. THEY LEAVE JAMES ALLEN AT ITV!

Formula One’s politician has now threatened that the future of the Australian Grand Prix is in doubt unless the organisers agree to run the race at night in the future.

Bernie Ecclestone often makes threats like this - the British Grand Prix at Silverstone is regularly under the axe, but FOM have only once actually carried out one of its threats, dropping the Belgian Grand Prix from the 2003 calendar. However, this was more to do with commercial rights for tobacco advertisers than any indication that the circuit (one of the best in the world) was not up to par.

Night races are an unknown commodity in F1 - this year sees the first one in history, held at Singapore. The biggest concern is of course, safety. In an enclosed arena where it can be easily floodlight, safety is not so much of a problem - for example, NASCAR often have been holding night races since 1978, despite the fact that like F1 cars, NASCAR don’t have headlights. However - it would simply not be practical at a circuit like the old Hockenheim to place floodlights, as 80% of that circuit was out in the woods.

The old Hockenheim is a prime example of why you shouldn’t do night races - in 2000, it saw a protester marching down the side of the track after scaling the surrounding fences - a job that would no doubt be easier in the dark.

The idea of holding night races is so that they can be screened during prime-time television in Europe. My interest in F1 has waned over the last few years so I no longer wake up at 4am to watch the ‘flyaway’ races in Australia, Japan and now China (and Singapore this year).

This year’s Australian Grand Prix start was also delayed by 90 minutes so that it started at a better time for the Asian market. However, I doubt that an hour and a half would make a noticeable difference to the Formula One fan - only to the TV schedules - delaying the start means that the race falls into a more lucrative TV slot, meaning FOM can charge the advertisers more.

Despite being a global sport, the focus of F1 is still in Europe. The majority of the teams are based in England (even ‘Team Force India’), the majority of the drivers are European and the majority of the races are also held in Europe.

FOM have tried to address that balance, by introducing more ‘flyaway’ races, but I don’t think we’re in any danger of seeing a switch to holding night races in Europe any time soon to provide more convenient TV scheduling for the Asian market. The problem with any global sport, is that it’s always 5 o’clock somewhere, so F1 races will always be held when there is maximum revenue to be made.