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Sorry I'm so late on this. We had technical problems yesterday. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Speaking of technical problems, if you missed it, you missed a great Formula 1 race Sunday.

I know, I know. These F1 guys speak with funny accents, wear tailored suits and eat pate foi gras. But think of it this way --who has a funnier accent than Bill Elliott? Jeff Gordon can dress pretty sharply. And heck, pate isn't much different than liver puddin'.

Besides that, just like good ole NASCAR, the F1 guys make up the rules as they go along.

This week's race in Australia was notable for several reasons: A relative lightweight, Giancarlo Fisichella, won the race and proved he's no mere flash. A true heavyweight, Michael Schumacher, retired early from the race, a rare and surprising sight. A lot of other cars that should have been at the front were shuffled all over the place.

Rules and random chance were all to blame for the mixed-up weekend.

Here are the rules changes and their impact on the race:

QUALIFYING: This year, under a new qualifying rule, drivers must make two runs at qualifying. That's two individual hot laps at two separate sessions. Those two times will be added together and a driver's total time fixes his starting spot.

For this first try, the Weather Gods shook up the order. Fisichella was one of the early qualifiers, a position normally that does not help drivers. Drivers like to qualify as late in a session as they can because the track is cleaner and quicker. After Fizzy qualified, the skies opened up. From that point on, the rain had stalwarts like Schumacher sliding all over the place.

In the later second session, the track was dry. But the damage was done. Schumacher, who has won seven world championships, had to settle for a low position because there was no way to make up for the rain's impact. It was that way up and down the grid. It looked like a Saturday night "madhouse scramble" at Bowman Gray raceway in Winston-Salem.

TIRES: This rule baffles me. But here it is: Drivers cannot change tires during a race like they could in years past. Usually, a driver in an F1 race will use two or three sets of tires. Now, in an effort to slow things down, the F1 governing body has limited drivers to only one set of tires. Yes, they can switch to rain tires if it's wet. Otherwise, the set you start with is the set you finish with.

Normally, under the circumstances, Schumacher would fight like mad to get up to the front after a bad qualifying run. Tires can get shreaded with that kind of driving. But under the new rule, he has an incentive to go easy and save the tires. That's what he did Sunday. He had to stay back, pretty much in a bad position, for most of the race, waiting for a chance to really open up and see if he could make up time and get toward the front.

ENGINES: A new engine rule, however, played into Fisichella's favor and gave Schumacher a way to win by losing. Under the old rules, you could run a qualifying engine and then shift it out for a race engine less likely to wear out over a long stretch of driving. Heck, for all I know you could have a "sitting in the truck" engine in the good ole days where you threw as much money at a team as you could find.

Now F1 teams must keep the same engine through qualifying and the race not for one, but for TWO weekends of racing. So an engine has to go twice as long and be twice as durable. With teams emphasizing durability over raw speed, the spoils go to the drivers who can stay in the race. (It was notable that McLaren Mercedes actually finished its first race of the year. Normally, a new McLaren engine just blows up.)

So Fisichella benefited by having a durable engine. More importantly, after Michael Schumacher was speared in a curve by another driver, he simply retired the car, even though he could have kept going. The reason? If you end a race early without seeing the checkered flag, you get to put in a new engine. Schumacher will have a new engine at the next race in two weeks while his top competitors will have this weekend's engine still in the car.

So there you have it. If you have the SPEED channel you're all ready to catch the next race in about two weeks.

If not, stay tuned. If John will have me back, I'll keep you posted.

We'll be glad to have you back, Dick. If anyone wants more, be sure to check out the official F1 site. And please show Dr. Barron some love in the comments.

Thursday night update: Post edited to catch formatting mistakes I should have noticed this morning.