Tipped Over The Edge

I'm not enjoying being dead last and third-last in my footy tipping competitions. Probablistically, selecting tips by flipping a coin would do better than me (so far). (I've been considering pitting myself against a magic 8-ball for the rest of the season for some blog material, but I think being beaten by an inanimate object would result in general craziness and/or a fragmented 8-ball.) But Science help you if I'm going to sit here and be e-slagged for my Cricket World Cup tips when I get 2 outta 2. Here, read!

Hi Patrick,

Welcome to the tipping results for Round 10 of the Cricket World Cup 2007 season brought to you by footytips.com.au.

YOUR TIPPING:
Poor tipping, you scored 2 points.

RESULTS:

Winning Team Score Losing Team Score
Sri Lanka 289 (5) def. New Zealand 208 (10)
Australia 153 (3) def. South Africa 149 (10)


Regards,

The team from footytips.com.au

G'day footytips.com.au,

Go fuck yourself!

Love,
Pat

Had Scotland defeated the Netherlands, I dare say I would have won the cricket tipping. Shame that clash of the titans was the match that foiled me!

Bored? Want more out of the Internet?

The astutest/most bored of my readers may have noticed that I've included my Google Reader Shared Items in the linkbar to your right. Why is that awesome, you ask? Well, as you may or may not know, posting a blog is at the bottom of my boredom chain while surfing the Internet. Reading items from RSS feeds is way higher - and something I do often. So I'm using my shared items as a way of approving the post or saying it's amusing - and it takes me just one click.

So basically, if you're bored or ever wished that I updated my blog often, try reading my shared items, as I update them regularly through the working week. I tried to incorporate shared item snippets into my blog's sidebar, but despite Blogger claiming their new features are pure unadulterated sex, most of them don't work if you don't host your blog on Blogger (which I don't - courtesy of Brad's generosity). Even more encouragingly, the Blogger team say that their "Layouts" features are "unlikely to be supported soon if ever". Honesty is great, but it's not so nice to alienate the more technical users after you've forced them to upgrade.

Back to the shared posts thing: you can subscribe to the RSS feed of my shared items if you'd prefer to be notified when I've shared new stuff. So essentially you can "feed" off my feeds, and only what I consider the best of what I've read. It's not sloppy seconds, it's just recycling.

I'm going to stop typing before all these degrees of abstraction start to get to me.

Patrick Presents The Champ Car World Series Rogered By Seven

Since the late 90s/early 00s when Formula One^(TM) started to turn into pole-to-finish processions - and it became clear that not all races in America are on ovals - I've had an interest in the CART/ChampCar/Bridgestone Presents The Champ Car World Series Powered By Ford series. Gradually the series lost prominence as Americans stopped driving in it, replaced by Formula One^(TM) hopefuls and rejects, and more oval tracks were replaced with road circuits. Eventually Toyota and Honda stopped supplying engines to CART teams and defected to IRL, leaving Ford as the lone engine supplier. But it was better racing than ever and Channel 10 kept showing it, so I kept giving the VCR a workout and watching the race on Tuesdays.

The owners of ChampCar reinvented the series to be a lower cost, more competitive alternative to all other premier racing series. They introduced a turbo boost button (now used in A1 GP) to encourage overtaking and markings for different tyre compounds (now used in Formula One^(TM)) in the past few years. The rules prohibit blocking and there's a good serving of overtaking and wall-to-wall stoushes. I'd say it's the motorsport fan's series.

Heck, the IRL series which successfully usurped CART as North America's best open wheel series is even considering a merger with CART - after years of poaching the best drivers, tracks, engines and sponsors. There are even ties Down Under beyond hosting a race: there's a Team Australia and Australian Will Power (yes, Will Power) won Rookie of the Year in 2006. Aussie and former Minardi owner Paul Stoddart has started up the Minardi Team USA operation for 2007 and Kevin Kalhoven not only co-owns a team, but was one of the three main contributors to help keep ChampCar afloat during tough times. Things are at their most interesting and competitive levels for the past decade from both a racing and an Australian standpoint.

So I was in a state of disbelief as to why the first race in Las Vegas wasn't broadcast...especially considering Power won it, the first win for an Aussie in the 20+ year history of the series. A bit of Googling later and I found my answer...

...Channel Seven. No wait, Channel Fucking Seven. Their purchase of V8 Supercars rights from Channel 10 was reported heavily due to the cash involved, but I hadn't heard a whisper about them buying the ChampCar rights off Channel 10. Not a replay, nothing (except for the Surfers Paradise race, hopefully). Must be tough fitting it into those 2am timeslots. Who knows what kind of tyrannical wrath the late-night fanatics of Guthy-Renker Australia or Passions repeats could muster?!?

At least Formula One^(TM) is interesting again!