Recent comments

What methods can we pay with?

Thanks.

So proud of Palmer getting the spalsh!

No worries, I found it just in time and submitted it (hopefully in time for the deadline!).

Thanks Richard

The paragraph ending with "such as electrical devices" should say "such as electrical devices, are not always visible on metal detecting equipment. 

Unfortunately, there was an error when the text was copied into the field.

Sorry for any inconvenience.

The principal of freedom of speech gives people the right to dissent to immigration policy, but it also allows other people to react to that by believing that makes them racist.

It's also very dangerous to say that the days of superiority and inferiority have passed. Some people would disagree with you that racial harmony has been achieved, and surely even those who agree understand it's still an inchoate development. 

Fair points, but me and a few other people I know at uni got C's in Maths. I don't think its too easy to be honest.

Is this 8th May or the 7th? Because the 7 May is a Tuesday.

I think the issue is mainly with the co-commentator. They are more often than not absolutely dreadful. Alright have the main one for some stats, figures and something to help you keep in tune with a 0-0, but please get rid of people like Townsend and awful commentatory like: "Chelsea are really dominating here (other team scores), well it's been coming Clive, last few minutes Chelsea have been on the back foot".

It's a well paid job, surely other people can do it well! As Dec says Sports journalists may well be the answer, at least they are trained!

I'm struggling to see the comparison between horse racing and F1. Just because women jockeys ride in the Grand National (although overwhelmingly it's a male thing), you say ask why this can't be the same? 

You cite Katie Walsh, quite rightly. I hope she is an inspiration to young female riders just like Nina Carberry and Carrie Ford (both have enjoyed minor success in the National). 

But the difference that those jockeys have is that they are an instrumental part of the stables they hail from. None of them are professionals, they are amateurs by trade. They prepare the horses just like stable lads and grow up with them. The horses will know them better than any professional because they're a part of the team. They muck them out. They cheer when the stable wins and they cry when, touch wood, an accident occurs. They hone the emotion that some horses need. 

Just because they're racing competitions that take skill and strength, it doesn't mean they are similar. Horses respond to certain people better than others. Sometimes they happen to prefer a female touch. I don't think you could say that a Mercedes would suddenly kick into gear if you changed the gender of pilot. 

The issue of women in top-level motorsport, never mind F1, is less about the sport being sexist and more about how many women are involved throughout. In nine years of national-level kart racing, I raced against three different girls - more than a hundred guys. There's no more frustration in being beaten by a female competitor than there is a male competitor - it's equally a killer when someone finishes in front of you or mugs you off. So, in terms of what the racing world views women drivers as - rivals, nothing more or less.

What motorsport could do better is lose the false "aw, isn't she doing well?" I'd like to state that Susie Wolff is not the right person for aspiring drivers to look up. She has a rather pathetic record in junior formulae and score points in just one of her seven seasons in the DTM - the German Touring Car championship. Her position at Williams comes largely, if not entirely, because her husband Toto Wolff was previous among the top brass. However, my understanding is the team seriously rate her intelligence and feedback - she has developed into a valuable engineering commodity, but a good racing driver she is not. Certainly not one worthy of a Formula 1 seat. 

Similarly, Danica Patrick is a perfectly good driver - you don't win IndyCar races and compete at the front in American single-seater and stock car series without being a good driver. But lauding 12th-place finishes as anything more than an average drive is incredibly patronising because it implies that "she did good - for a girl".

But Visser could be the real deal. ADAC Formel Masters is a series held in high regard and the fact she won two races in her rookie year is impressive.  

I think saying it would take a special woman to make it in F1 is to paint a rather negative picture of motorsport. Ultimately it *should* be special drivers occupying the 22 seats on the grid but that's naive in the current climate. Using Visser as the example. She's well-backed, she'll have less trouble finding external financial support should Red Bull not fund her entirely because - sadly - in mainstream media/commercial avenues she will generate added hype, being a woman.

But the important thing is she's talented. Possibly no more talented than the best male drivers in the series but certainly no less talented - especially just because she's a girl.

Definitely. Ann Barnes has to consider her position. She has said that because it was a flagship idea in her manifesto, she will do it again. Well surely this incident proves it was a poor policy.

Heartless PR stunt or genuine hope to get the youth involved; either way it didn't work and she put a 17-year-old in an extremely stressful position.