Grapevine: Straw poll: Sunday at Fuji

Prior to the Japanese Grand Prix, there was a general feeling that the championship battle had been a little too... nice. Yes, there were the old enmities between McLaren and Ferrari, but by and large Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa were always pleasant to each other.

It was a stark contrast to last year, one colleague pointed out, when the reverberations of the Ferrari/McLaren spy scandal were still very much being felt and the in-house battle between Hamilton and Fernando Alonso was as tense as any in the history of the world championship.

Ironically, it was Alonso himself who took advantage of this escalation in hostilities to take his second win in a row with another inch-perfect drive that threw a stark light on the chaotic races of the two title protagonists. Neither has yet won a Formula One title - and it showed.

Perhaps it was pressure that made Hamilton ask a little too much of cold tyres into the first corner after a mediocre start - blamed by team boss Ron Dennis on a heavy fuel load - when he tried to retake the lead. Whatever the cause, and it was, after all, an understandable mistake made by a driver with a history of successfully daring first-corner moves, it had two consequences.

One, it set up the possibility of an Alonso win - and after outdoing early race leader Robert Kubica around the first pit-stops the Spaniard duly closed the deal with the class expected of a double world champion. Two, it ultimately led to Hamilton, who had dropped to seventh place by the exit in the confusion he had triggered, being hit with a penalty.

When the notification of a stewards' investigation first popped up on the screen, Massa had already outbraked himself into the chicane and then clumsily clobbered Hamilton. With the numbers 2 and 22 both under investigation, it took a few moments for everyone to realise that it wasn't that incident that was being looked at. It was the start.

A few moments later, a second notification popped up for Massa's move. Both were hit with drive-through penalties that effectively wrecked their races.

"Any experienced motor racing person sees it as a racing incident," McLaren boss Ron Dennis told us of the first corner incident. He was equally strong about Massa's suggestion that Hamilton had caused their clash at the chicane by forcing Massa off track.

"Where? Why don't you just watch the television?" he said. "You don't need to ask me or anybody, you just look at the television."

Although Massa salvaged one point, which later became two when Sebastien Bourdais was penalised for having the temerity to exit the pit-lane after a pit-stop, it was a largely fruitless afternoon for the title contenders. And there was plenty of acrimony afterwards.

Arguably the biggest chorus of 'ooohhhs' in the media centre came when the TVs picked up the Ferrari garage's celebratory reaction to Hamilton being knocked off by Massa.

It was something that BBC Radio 5 commentator David Croft picked up on in the post-race press conference with Massa.

"Was it right for your teammates in the pit garage to be celebrating when you crashed into a rival?" asked Croft.

"Are you English?" retorted Massa. "Is that your point of view?"

The honest answer was that there were plenty of people of all nationalities in the press office unimpressed by the Ferrari reaction. It was a little harsh on Massa, who while denying that the impact was deliberate did tacitly shoulder a big chunk of the blame by saying "it was a racing incident."

That was the view Bourdais had of the clash between him and Massa which occurred when the Frenchman, on his way to sixth place, emerged from the pits. But it didn't surprise the Frenchman that his good day was wrecked by a 25-second penalty.

"No, because every time I get called to the (stewards) meeting rooms, one way or the other it goes against me," he said, citing the fact that the onus is on the driver already on the track to give the car exiting the pits enough room.

"I don't know what I was supposed to do basically. I could have unrolled the red carpet and given him the corner. That is the only thing I could have done."

During his time racing - make that dominating - in the Champ Car World Series, the man the Americans liked to call 'Seabass' gained something of a reputation as a moaner. But you can't blame him. From the moment he was forced out while on course for a debut fourth place in the Australian Grand Prix, it set the tone for his first season.

The on paper results might suggest he shouldn't get one, but Bourdais deserves a second season with Scuderia Toro Rosso, even if he may have to roll the red carpet out a few times a year.

But while all this controversy was swirling around, Alonso was busy celebrating his victory. A weekend that had started with a barage of questions about where he would be driving in 2009 ended with the strongest answer. An unlikely second win in a row.