If this is your first time to walk across the pond, you can read the guidelines HERE. If you prefer you can wait in the Q with Sabzi Wala. It's totally up to you.
The Bahrain International Circuit hosts Formula 1 every year. I am not a Nascar or racing fan, but I LOVED going to the track and watching the races. It didn't matter what or who was racing. I loved the atmosphere. Loud noises, fast cars. It was amazing. People fly from all over the world to watch the Bahrain leg of the Formula 1.
Here are a few fast facts. You can read more over on the BIC website:
- This year’s FIA Formula 1 world championship will take place over a grand total of 1129 laps. That’s a distance of 5795km and an average of 59.6 laps and 305km per grand prix
- At 6.3km, Bahrain is the second longest track on the 2010 F1 calendar. The longest is the 7km Spa-Francorchamps circuit, home to the Belgian Grand Prix. The shortest is the 3.3km street circuit in Monte Carlo, used for the Monaco Grand Prix
Racing whether on or off the track is a huge past time in Bahrain. There is not a weekend that goes by that a race doesn't occur.
(SUZUKI GSXR 1000 aka GIXXER)
(HAYABUSA aka "Busa)
Right up from my flat was a empty stretch of highway. It was the "unofficial" track. Every weekend I would go up on my roof and watch the bikes vs cars. Guys popping wheelies or stoppies. Doing burn outs that rip their tires to shreds.
(Saudi/Bahrain Causeway)
Being a tiny island, there wasn't far you could go so racing cars and bikes was one way the locals entertained themselves. Guys from neighboring Saudi Arabia often drove over the causeway every Thursday and Friday to show off their latest ride and challenge the "locals" they deemed inferior. Although the Bahrainis usually beat the crap out of the Saudis and sent them back across the causeway licking their wounds.
This racing fetish leads to another fetish. The number plate. Having a number plate with 4 numbers or less showed a very high status. They were not easy or cheap to get. Royals had number plates with 2 or less numbers. The higher up the monarchy the fewer numbers in the plate.
If anyone ever got a good number plate, then they would starve or sell their first born child before they would sell that plate. Think I am joking ask any Arab who was raised overseas. Not just the number plates but mobile numbers are highly sought after as well. Another thing I never quite understood. I had a friend who was offered 4000 dinars ($10,700) for his mobile number. I almost pissed myself when he said "No, thanks".
I guess it's a guy thing. All the testosterone coarsing through their veins and more money than they know what to do with. You might go your whole life in USA and never see a car like this one, but they are commonplace in the Middle East. That was something I never could get over. I always thought having a BMW or Mercedes was "high class". There that is what the maid drives.
