The Pac-Man reigns, Formula One doesn’t

Well this weekend was a weekend of armchair sports viewing for me. And seeing as this is my blog I thought I would share my thoughts!

Pacquiao Versus Clottey

Last night Manny Pacquiao, who surely must now be rated as the Pound for Pound king, fought Joshua Clottey. Potentially something of a banana skin given the huge size differential between them. And whereas when Manny fought Hatton and Cotto he didn’t look that much smaller he really did against Clottey.

In fact is was guessed by those at ringside that Clottey weighed on the night of the fight, just shy of 12 Stone the super middle weight limit. Now given that Pacquiao started out as a Flyweight it seems amazing he can get into the ring with such big guys.

As to the fight Manny dominated from the word go, he was quick, accurate and with good tactics. Having said that it really didn’t appear that Clottey had come to fight, he had a solid defence and hardly ever tried to dominate the ring. He also didn’t throw a great deal of leather, in the region of 400 compared to more than 1200 for Pacquiao.

A couple of the judges gave Clottey a round, and personally I am slightly bemused as to where that came from! Nevertheless he was game, lasted the 12 rounds and really took some punishment. And in truth I don’t think Manny looked like stopping him at any point.

Which of course nicely sets up the “super fight” with Floyd Mayweather Jr (assuming of course he beats Shane Mosely). And there certainly are some interesting imponderables surrounding the fight, though that shan’t stop me pondering them!

It is potentially a fascinating immovable object versus an irresistible force situation. The unbelievable defence and counter punching skills of Mayweather versus the speed, accuracy and workrate of Manny.

On the evidence of the Clottey fight I don’t think that Floyd will have too much trouble hitting Pacquiao, Manny’s defence is certainly not his strongest suit. But the question will really be does Mayweather have the power to stop him?

I say that because I simply cannot see Floyd winning the fight on points, even if his work is cleaner, Manny throws so many punches, so quickly that even when he isn’t hitting itlooks like he is landing well, as the slow motions in the Clottey fight often showed.

Further for my money Mayweather isnt at his best when really under pressure. I think that De La Hoya would have beaten Mayweather if he had a little more gas in the tank. There will be no question that Pacquiao will have energy to burn even at the end if he is not stopped.

On the other hand, Like Manchester United I reckon it is probably unwise to write “The Pretty Boy” off out of hand. He is a brilliant boxer, and a fierce competitor, and he is always, to date, able to find a way.

It will be interesting what weight they fight at, if it is a catch weight between welter and light welter then it will make the more interesting contest. At that weight Mayweather will probably really fear Manny’s power, and should make him up his game. At Welterweight I worry that Mayweather will bulk up and look to defend and nick rounds thinking he is safe form the punching power.

Gun to the head? Manny wins on points either way.

F1GP Is Back!

And unfortunately not better than ever. I cannot remember the last time I looked forward to an F1 season with such anticipation, 4 world champions competing, three or four teams in with a shout of winning the constructors.

An exciting prospect that is for sure. Unfortunately the new rules really seemed to spoil the race as any sort of a contest. Put bluntly it appeared that there wouldn’t be any overtaking of note, and the whole contest would be settled after the first lap barring technical difficulties.

And that is basically what happened, there was a little bit of drama around the new pit rules, and this helped Hamilton and Button both jump a place. But other than that the race was deadly dull.

Now in theory I like the idea of no re-fuelling. It means that the race results are more about driver skill than tactics. But the truth is having lots of different drivers on different fuel strategies made the races interesting, different cars on different fuel loads and paces meant “overtaking!” the holy grail of race driving.

Now as well as removing the re-fuelling the one bit of technology that might have introduced that element of uncertainty and wow, KERS, has also been mystifyingly dropped this season.

I really think they should have made KERS compulsory for this season if there were getting rid of the Re-fuelling. And my 2cents are that something needs to be done fast, otherwise this F1 season looks like it could be a processional wash out.

Though I recognise that this is judging things all on one race, we might get wheel to wheel driving with overtaking galore next time, but I cant see it. Let’s hope things improve! On the other hand congratulations to the Ferrari boys and Lewis Hamilton for their podiums. I for one was delighted to see Massa back in an F1 car and on the podium.

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