Thread by @IWTKQuiz

F1 fans rejoice! The season might be over, but @_SlackOverflow here to take you all on an exhilarating ride with many fun facts about this wonderful sport.

Strap in for a fun ride! Get ready for when the five lights go out.....

Hello! I’m @_Slackoverflow or Merin as per my Aadhar Card.

Growing up an only child impossibly desperate for an elder sibling, I clung on to Schumacher for life.

Themes of projects I picked while in school, colour of my clothes, choice of fake helmets from Shivajinagar, debates that settled/ destroyed friendship, my dog’s name, my email ID – everything was centred around Schumacher and F1.

Many Years and bucketloads of luck later, I managed to land a social media job for @pumamotorsport that I swear I did for reasons besides photos like this one.

PS - That's @danielricciardo :-)

PPS - That’s my F1-atheist, yet 100% fantastic boss cringing in the background.

The beginning:

Formula 1 traces its roots back to the early days of motor racing in the 1900s.

After World War II, the first world championship race was held at Silverstone on 13th May 1950.

While Giuseppe Farina won the inaugural championship, the star driver in the 1950s was Juan Manuel Fangio.

Fangio won the drivers' championship five times in 1951, 1954, 1955, 1956 and 1957, a record that stood 46 years with five manufacturers (no one’s replicated this!)

Fangio is considered the most gifted racer of all time.

He started as a mechanic in Argentina, built his own car and raced with it. A smart businessman,he purchased trucks for cheap,hoarded on tires that were in short supply and sold them for big gains when the economy revived.

Fangio made his way from South America to Europe in the late 40s and to F1 in 1950 for the inaugural season at the age of 39. (today, most drivers debut ~20).

After dominating the 1950s Fangio arrived in Cuba with great confidence in 1958 having won that race the previous year.

The night before the race two gunmen burst into Hotel Lincoln in Havana and kidnapped Fangio. At the time, Cuba was going through monumental changes as Castro’s forces attempted to take control of the country and implement a communist state.

To highlight their cause, kidnappers attempted to take Fangio and rising star Stirling Moss hostage.

The kidnappers let Moss go after Fangio lied that Moss was ‘on his honeymoon’.

The kidnapping was carried out as a statement to the Cuban Government under Batista.

The incident caused a stir worldwide, with the Batista Government’s forces left red-faced as they frantically tried to find Fangio. The kidnappers released him the next day. Fangio told the media that he was treated with great care while in captivity and that he held no ill-will.

In fact, he was told that when the revolution would be successful, he would be invited to Cuba as a special guest.

Fangio did not return to Cuba till 1981, when, in a strange twist of fate, he brokered a deal to supply Mercedes trucks to Castro’s government.

The tradition of spraying champagne to celebrate victory celebrations wasn’t a thing until 1967.

Dan Gurney began Champagne spraying on the victory podium at Le Mans by placing his thumb over the open bottle, shaking and intentionally spraying the onlookers.

In 1986 Ayrton Senna, Jacques Laffite, and Nelson Piquet were stumped to find bottles with the cork tightly intact on the podium at the Brazilian Grand Prix.

Watch as they fiddle around before they managed to finally get to the festivities.

A few variations exist for the champagne tradition.

At the Bahrain GP, drivers spray carbonated rose water.

Missed opportunity was when @LandoNorris got his first podium, he didn't do an Indy500 tradition and drink milk!

Ayrton Senna - Without debate one of the best drivers in the history of the sport, he’d been racing F1 for over 6 years, collecting 2 championships, but without a win at his home GP.

His eventual win at the 1991 Brazilian GP didn’t come easy.

Senna drove the last leg of that race with a faulty gearbox. He was gradually losing gear after gear, and by the last dozen laps, he was down to only having sixth gear. Having to drive this way was like trying to drive a tank at Grand Prix speeds.

Senna, although a marvelously conditioned athlete, was at his physical limits. He later said he would have retired from the race if it had been anywhere but in his home country—he felt he had to win the race for Brazil.

Through sheer willpower, Senna managed to get the car around the course so no one caught him. After he won, he was so exhausted he had to be helped from the car.

The whole of Brazil nominated him for Sainthood for his stunning victory.

Watch -

Flying Finns – or Finns known for their speed have been celebrated across sports.

My favorite is the infamously-hilariously monotonous Kimi Raikkonen, known for his curt “Leave me Alone” remarks on the radio or his BWOAHs in nearly every interview because he couldn’t care less.

On the rare occasions when Kimi does speak, his voice sounds low, deep and slightly gravelly. This is because when he was five he fell off his bike and hit his throat on the handlebar, damaging his vocal chords irreparably.

Even as a child Raikkonen spoke so less that his parents brought him anxiously to the therapist. And he sent him back home after half a day. With a letter in his pocket: “Your son is above average intelligence. That could be the reason why he chooses to remain silent…”

F1’s original Flying Finn was a chap named Keke Rosberg, champion in 1982 He sported facial hair that current drivers could only dream of growing.

Decades later, a Finnish company called Rovio decided to pay tribute to Rosberg. Looks familiar? :-)

And now for something totally different - the world of F1 advertising.

The first team to have advertising were the British Racing Green Lotus. Now logos and ads are commonplace in this glitzy, glamorous world.

Some brands next levelled things.

For instance, to create a buzz ahead of the launch of Ocean’s 12, the promoters chose the flamboyant Monaco GP and decided with the Jaguar team (now Red Bull Racing) to run the two Jaguar F1 cars encrusted with....wait for it...

...a literal diamond set worth $300K into the front nose of each car.

The car crashed on the first lap.

Christian Klien crashed his diamond-encrusted F1 car before he ever finished a lap around the circuit, creating a frenzy as excited spectators went looking for the diamond.

And here’s the really crazy part:

Track safety regulations prohibited Team Jaguar from searching for the diamond until after the race ended two hours later.

Looks like someone didn't think things through fully.

Jaguar team spokesman Nav Sidhu was honest in saying: “At that point, I probably should’ve been worried about the car or the driver. But, I must admit, my immediate thought was for the diamond.”

No thread on F1 can ever be complete without showing my love for Schumi.

Did you know?

Schumacher made his debut because his manager Willi Weber made statements that draw parallels to "Ashwatthama is dead".

When Jordan racing needed a replacement driver mid-season for the Belgian Grand Prix, 22-year-old Michael Schumacher was drafted overnight because Willi Weber claimed that Schumacher had raced in Belgium several times before.

The truth of course, was that Schumacher had never seen that track and only tested an F1 car a few days before.

Schumacher qualified 7th on his debut, having studied the track on a bicycle, and the rest is truly history.

Racing drivers are expected to be fit.

Along came Schumacher.

He simply did not get tired and his rivals had no choice but to adapt.

The current drivers attribute the fitness revolution to the almost impossible fitness standards set by the champion.

F1 drivers have only their necks to hold their ten-pound heads upright and in an 8-G corner their heads can have effective weights of 88 pounds.

That is the average weight of a 12-year-old. In 2007, Lewis Hamilton had a 14-inch collar size, today he’s got an 18-inch collar.

And that's typical of all drivers these days, their necks go straight down from their jawlines.

Fernando Alonso exemplifies this neck strength with a party trick that is a fan favorite - he can crush a walnut between the side of his head and shoulder.

Still not as gangsta as the Vicco Vajradanti ad grandpa breaking walnuts with his teeth. #BMKJ

Here's how insainz Carlos Sainz is training to improve his neck muscles. Looking at this gives me a headache.

Drivers sweat out almost 4kg in body fluids thanks to dangerously high cockpit temperatures, often north of 55C (even higher in Bahrain and Singapore).

This results in a 40 percent decrease in brain function, which is critical when you're driving at speeds over 350kmph.

This also means that when it's time to wave the chequered flag, drivers are so weak that F1 has rules about how heavy trophies can be!

There are all the fun stories I had. Here's three recos from me for F1 fans (or aspiring ones - come join us, we're fun!)

The chain by Fleetwood Mac. My ringtone forever!

The instrumental section is the theme tune for BBC and Channel 4's coverage of F1

Read: I just Made the tea – Tales from 30 years in F1

Di Spires spent three decades serving up tea, sympathy and a lot more to some of F1’s legends. Her memoirs are packed with amusing stories about drivers like Schumacher and Senna.

Watch:

- Rush
- Senna
- Drive to Survive
- Fangio: Life of Speed

That's it from me, Merin -
@_SlackOverflow

Hope you've enjoyed the ride!