Last year the bus was quiet on the drive in from Changi Airport to downtown Singapore. After the dislocation of a long-haul flight it often is, and doubly so at a new venue without the prompting familiarity of good-times past. Out of nowhere the expressway suddenly rose up to cross the end of the main straight. Far below the pitlane and track were lit up like a… well, a highly illuminated racing circuit. It looked spectacular: a statement of intent for Singapore that instantly raised the bar for everywhere else. Suddenly everyone was in the mood. One team member, renowned for having a demeanour to make Eeyore seem enthusiastic, muttered ‘this is going to be the best race ever.’

Well, with hindsight maybe not, but Singapore is certainly the best of the new bunch. While the other modern venues lack atmosphere, Singapore At Night has it by the bucket. The drivers haven’t been too impressed with the lack of passing opportunities, but in terms of audience appreciation and organisation, this place set new standards. The organisers say they’ve tweaked the track to make it more exciting. Hopefully they haven’t changed anything else.

There is, of course the issue of working at night. The much-touted theory was that everyone should simply attempt to stay on European time. The hotels have played along, all black-out curtains and breakfast being served at 2pm, but really the importance of this has been blown out of proportion. Having a race in the dark is a novelty, but seeing teams working in the pitlane at midnight is anything but.

The original idea was for everything to simply shift forward six hours from the usual race schedule, but that all went out the window when the drivers’ union pointed out, not unreasonably, that doing so would mean holding the early practice sessions on Friday and Saturday in broad daylight which would, in the determination of sight-lines, braking zones etc., be about as much use as a chocolate teapot. And so everything’s got shuffled around and the natural order of things is much interrupted.

It’s been suggested things might be easier if Bernie simply got the sun to set sooner – but Mr E seems to be much too busy getting his pet Indian Grand Prix project sorted out to bother with such trifles.

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