Brazil sporting fever!

40

With the world's attention gripped by the 2016 Olympics in Rio, it's a good time to remember that Brazil talent has also long been at the centre of Formula One as well.

Here's an image from the drivers parade for the 2010 Brazilian Grand Prix, with local heroes Lucas di Grassi (Virgin Racing), Rubens Barrichello (Williams) and his young sons, Felipe Massa (Ferrari) and Bruno Senna (HRT) lapping up the attention from the enthusiastic crowds in the grandstand.

Unfortunately there was to be no home winner in Sao Paulo that year. Sebastian Vettel won the race ahead of his Red Bull team mate Mark Webber. Barrichello finished in 14th one place ahead of Massa, while Senna was 21st and di Grassa not classified after falling nine laps behind with worsening rear-suspension problems.

Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.