It has been one hell of a week (and a bit) in the world of Formula One motor racing. The most dramatic and spine-chilling event was the crash that Felipe Massa had during the last seconds of the second qualifying session (Q2) on Saturday, 25^th July, in Hungary. The world has been watching, and I am glad to say it has subsequently turned out to be a "Good News" story.

By now almost everybody is familiar with the tale, but I thought I would add a little postscript. During my searches of the Official F1 Website I was glad to see that an effort had been made to explain the accident, and to graphically show what the 'experts' thought had happened.

It is much the way I described it in my previous post. They have published a detailed description about where the damper spring impacted the car and driver, information they must have collected on further inspection of the remains of the car, and they surmise that the spring, collected by the front left wheel shot up and struck the car initially at 'arrow-1', then struck the cockpit at 'arrow-2', and then shattered Massa's visor above the left eye.

Good. I thank them profusely for the explanation. But where the hell are 'arrows 1 & 2' in the tiny graphic that these guys posted? I found them, but not before lifting the picture and blowing it up in my own graphic software!

So I went looking for a 'zooming' script that could enlarge areas of a small web graphic when a 'magnifying-window' is moved over areas of the original by passing the mouse cursor over it. I was successful, indeed I had several scripts to choose from. I've earmarked one for use on my fully-fledged website as it takes a series of complicated JQuery/JavaScript coding to make it work. However, here is one that is simple to implement, and which will do the job just fine as far as a blogger template and page is concerned. Did I mention it is FREE?

Move your cursor over any part of the small image and you will see a small translucent square with crosshairs. Moving that square around the small image will enlarge the area covered by the square in a (hidden) window to the right of it.

I think that is pretty cool, and will write it up as a TIP on the Playpen in a day or two. If you are interested, that is where you will find the information. And a link to the author's page. Let's be fair about this; he did all the work, I'm only using it. Must remember to make a small donation via PayPal for his efforts! (done!)

Here are some of the other 'goings-ons' in the Formula One world, most of which is of little or no interest to the average person. But I shall list them anyway ...

• The FIA promises to investigate 'debris-related' accidents.


• BMW announce that they will be withdrawing from Formula One at the end of the season.


• Ferrari plan to substitute Schumacher for Massa for the rest of the season.


• Australia Post is to issue special 55-cent stamps featuring three different images of Webber to commemorate his maiden Formula One win in Germany.


• 2009 Concorde Agreement signed. The Concorde Agreement - a contract between the FIA, Formula One racing's commercial rights-holder and the participating teams - sets out the basis on which the teams participate in the championship and share in its commercial success.


• Michael Schumacher begins training, but cannot use the Ferrari F60 (the 2009 car) due to the current rules that do not allow testing of the cars during the summer break.


• Ferrari write to the FIA and the other teams asking that this rule be relaxed due to the circumstances. 17 teams agree; Williams DO NOT. Schumacher must continue practicing in the 2007 car.


• Nelson Piquet Jnr is sacked by Renault.


• Felipe Massa flies home to Brazil to recuperate.

That's a brief round-up. I hope there isn't going to be any more of this sort of behind-the-scenes activity for the rest of the month of August.

I need the rest ...