Grapevine: Paddock Life: Valencia edition

AUTOSPORT brings you its regular column of life inside the paddock. This week: Valencia

The new European Grand Prix arrived to a huge fanfare three years ago, but Formula 1 was left pretty unconvinced about the merits of the Valencia venue first time around - especially considering it slotted on to the calendar at the same time as Singapore.

But over time, the sport has come to at least enjoy the positives of the Valencia event - the fact that it is such a relatively quiet event; that the harbour front view is much better than a vast expanse of concrete paddock - and the circuit layout does at least produce some incident-filled moments even if the racing is not that good.

And although this year's event was only the third in its modern history, it was interesting to note that over the weekend Valencia was actually celebrating a centenary of action.

While the modern venue takes place around reclaimed docklands - originally renovated for the America's Cup, the 1910 event took place not so far away on Port Avenue as part of the National Automotive Exhibition.

The main element of the 1910 event was a standing kilometre test, where drivers competed to cover the distance in the shortest possible time. Nogues Sixto was the winner - crossing the line with a time of 1m22s, at a speed of 44km/h!

Formula 1 is often about moments of brilliance, and even moments of good fortune, but there was one lucky fan who could not quite believe his good fortune on Saturday when it came to getting some pictures with the drivers.

The fan had been standing outside the press conference room after qualifying and managed to grab a talking Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton prior to their appointments with the television crews.

The fan approached Hamilton and asked if he could have his photo taken with him - but rather than have his mate take it, Vettel offered to do it instead.

Realising he had the chance of killing two birds with one stone, the fan then asked Vettel if he could stop so he could have his picture taken with him.

Hamilton looked over and said to the fan with a big smile on his face: "Man, I can't let you take it yourself - here, I'll do it..."

Lotus may be gunning to win the battle of the new teams in Formula 1 this year, but that has not stopped the outfit bigging up the heritage of its name.

Team chiefs have made no secret of the fact that they view this Lotus team not as a totally clean sheet competitor, but rather as the continuation of the old Lotus outfit - which last competed back in 1994.

That decision meant Lotus marked its 500th race in Valencia - and it flew out Colin Chapman's son Clive, as well as other family members and an original Lotus Type 12 for a photo shoot in the pit lane.

Unfortunately air traffic control strikes in France on the Thursday - probably fuelled by post-World Cup blues - meant Heikki Kovalainen had to miss the historic occasion.

Jarno Trulli was there, though - and earlier in the day he spoke enthusiastically about the experience he had had of seeing some old Lotus machinery at the team's spectacular event at Snetterton in the week between the Canadian and European Grands Prix.

"It is great to be part of the heritage," said Trulli. "Lotus made history in the past and we would like to make history in the future. It is good to achieve 500 grands prix but we have responsibility and tasks ahead of us that we need to meet.

"I remember Colin Chapman throwing his cap in the air every time they won a grand prix. I remember Elio de Angelis, I remember Ayrton Senna. I remember many parts of this - even though I was a young kid."

But it is the talk about the old cars that brought a surprise response from Trulli.

"I've worked in many teams, but when I walked into the classic Lotus factory it was very special. There were old cars, and some cars that are being rebuilt. I was like a kid visiting Disneyland - even for me after 14 years of F1.

"But if I am honest I don't really enjoy driving these cars. I feel they like they are a piece of art and you should have respect and leave them where they are. They were supposed to race at that time, and now they are supposed to be like a piece of art - like a jewel. You have to look after them, watch them - and if I owned one I would never run it!"

Any fan who has spent some of the last few weeks watching the World Cup cannot help but have noticed the loud drone of the now infamous 'vuvuzela'.

The South African 'tradition' has driven spectators, commentators, managers and even players to distraction - and it will probably become a sound that will forever remind us of South Africa 2010.

So it was with much amusement that Ferrari press officer Luca Colajanni hyped up the build-up to Italy's crunch match with Slovakia on Thursday by bringing along his own vuvuzela to the paddock.

Every now and again, even standing at the far end of the paddock, you could hear the horn ringing out - and even Fernando Alonso found one of his press conferences interrupted with a quick toot when the journalists started asking him about Spain's own chances for the World Cup.

The Ferrari vuvuzela unfortunately did not bring the Italian team much good luck - and with big European nations France, Italy and England all pitched out of the World Cup over the Valencia weekend, it looked like the focus of many teams was getting back to F1 rather than football.