Susan's Shanghai Blog - Week 35

We decided this year to take advantage of living in Shanghai to go to the Formula 1 race in person. We got middle-priced tickets, so we were not in the main grandstand at the start/finish line, but we were just after that in the first turn. From our vantage point, we could see the start, the finish, plus the first turns.

 

One of the great things about going to the race in Shanghai is the transportation.  The Shanghai Circuit is right on the subway at the (wait for it...) Shanghai Circuit station.  When you get out of the train, you can see the main grandstands from the tracks!




Inside the circuit area, there were lots of food stalls, merchandise areas, cars being shown, etc.





So this one I really had to take a picture of.  This is a custom job, where you have a DJ platform that comes out of the back of the car.



The main grandstand is absolutely HUGE!  And you can see that UBS is a big sponsor there.



 

So from here on out, I'm just going to have lots and lots of pictures.  This is the practice and qualifying day, so they did practice, stopped for lunch, and then went through qualifying.    Similar to last week when we had just lots of pictures, I won't necessarily comment on the majority of them, but only those that I have something very specific to say :-)

This is where we were sitting, so this was our view;  this is the first turn along with the big-screen TV that showed the coverage.  In the 3rd picture, when we looked right, we could see right down the forward stretch to the start-finish line and the pit area.









 

So the safety car and this other car, prior to the practice (and again before the qualifying) did the "track check" so they ran through the track following each other.



 

AND THEY'RE OFF!!!











































 

Here is lunch .. and THIS is another one of my "car that Susan would buy if money was no option!"  I absolutely love the wing-doors.

 

Now to the actual qualifying time.

So the blue flag guy is right after the exit of pit row.  The waves the blue flag to the car coming out of the pits if there is another car coming down the main stretch at full speed, so they know to keep to the inside of the track until such time as that car goes by.

































 

At the end of qualifying, we stayed for a little bit to watch the Porsche Carrera Asia race. 















 

Now, the interesting ride home.  If you've made it this far through the blog, you'll get a kick out of this (maybe).   The way that the subway lines go, you get on line 11 heading back into downtown until line 11 terminates, and then you change to line 2.  Now, there were LOTS of people taking the subway back from the race into Shanghai, and everybody on the train HAD to get off at the end station and either change to line 2, or exit the subway.  So we are on the train ready to get out when the car stops.  Now, you would ASSUME that the people getting on the train would let us all get off before they tried to get on, but no.  These 3 young people (late teens I would say, maybe early 20's) decide to barge right in as soon as the doors open before they let ANYONE get off ... so that they can be sure they get a seat.  Which I think is kinda silly, since the train was going to eventually be empty.  Tom and I both kinda just stood there and tried not to let them in ... thinking that they were being really rude .. we should make their life a bit more difficult!!

 

Okay, so now you can go on to Page 2, which is Race Day!!