Bored

This weekend was probably the first decent weekend of racing of 2007. The Dakar Rally was finishing up, the WRC opened its season and A1GP returned from its break. But none of these events were even remotely exciting.

Seb Loeb and Citroen won again at the Monte Carlo Rally, despite having a new car (this always creates the potential for reliability issues), and to make things worse, his team-mate Dani Sordo came second. The stages were devoid of unpredictable ice and snow, like usual, making it more like watching the old San Remo Rally. The final insult was the third leg which featured one measly stage, a superspecial on the streets of Monaco. They didn't even utilize the whole F1 track, and missed out the best bits (Casino Square, Lowes hairpin and the tunnel). LAME.

The Dakar Rally reached the famed Lac Rose, with no major drama. I'll admit that the final stage around the lake is always a processional humdrum affair so I wasn't surprised. What was surprising was that this Dakar seemed rather short of its own excitement for the whole 17 days. Oh sure, there was the dramatic crash and retirement of motorcycle leader Marc Coma, two days from the end, as well as the woes of Volkswagen after the rest day, but apart from that it was a pretty tame affair, with the robotically reliable Stephane Peterhansel taking a ninth victory, and seventh in a row for Mitsubishi. To be honest, I still think the best Dakar was a few years back where they went across the top of Africa and ended in Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt.

Finally, Germany won in A1GP, again. This time they took both wins at Taupo, New Zealand.

Let's hope that the season starts to throw out some more interesting races and results soon. So, Chip Ganassi, don't you dare win the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona next weekend.