PUBLISHING NOTICE

As some of you know, I live in San Diego and Armageddon is underway. Thank you for your emails, fortunately, I do not live in an area likely to burn. Most of my friends have been evacuated, and the air quality is terrible while the fires burn strong, fueled by the unpredictable Santa Ana winds. I’m sure you all understand that I’m taking a few days off to help those who have lost their homes, donate food and rescue animals. The Chargers have left town, going to Arizona for practice and the gated community where some players, as well as some Padres live, was evacuated yesterday morning-although the area seems safe for now. I’ll resume posts as soon as I can…most likely later this week. Thanks for all your emails, its nice to know you care!

LEWIS HAMILTON
During the first ten laps of the season ending Formula One Grand Prix in Brazil, Lewis Hamilton started third, attempted a lame pass and quickly found himself in 7th place behind Nick Heidfeld before losing speed due to mechanical problems, (sabotage?) and falling way back to 18th. The drama continued as Hamilton attempted to inch his way back into contention, going from 14th, 12th, 11th, 10th, (still hope, with 54 laps to go)…pit stop, back into 14th, 12th, 11th, 10th, 9th, (38 laps remaining)…second pit stop…now in 9th, (35 laps left)…back up to 8th place, 26 laps to go…(just got a call that Malibu is on fire, change channels for a minute) and switch back just in time to see Hamilton finish 7th and the Finnish beast Kimi Raikkonen take home the title of World Champion. (Massa was 2nd, Alonso came in 3rd).

So, no podium for Hamilton, and a huge upset by Raikkonen, who started the race 8 points behind Hamilton. “I came close to the championship two times,” Raikkonen said. “This year it looked like it was going away, but we have a great team and believed in ourselves when nobody really thought about us.” Hopefully, I’m not the only one who spent Sunday morning watching one of the most dramatic races ever. And I mean drama gone crazy. Aside from the off-track cheating, feuding, name-calling, and drunken boat rides, the fight for the title was nothing short of spectacular. There has got to be more drama surrounding F1 drivers than you’d find in 100 episodes of All My Children. I couldn’t possibly fill you in on each detail, so if you really care, start Googling some of these guys and you’ll be entertained for hours.

THANK YOU DAVID NALBANDIAN
“When I am physically and technically good, I can beat anybody.” David Nalbandian, after beating the Swiss Mister 1-6, 6-3, 6-3.

Nalbandian beat Federer to win the Madrid Masters, and oh how good it feels to type that…“I usually play better in the finals, but it had something to do with the way he played today,” said Federer, “Today, I’m not too disappointed because I had a good tournament. I played the first four matches well.” Not well enough my oh-so-arrogant-beast…Why can’t Federer simply just say ‘He outplayed me’ instead of making comments that suggest his opponent simply got lucky.

SOCCER RECAP

Didier Drogba took off his shirt, Francisco Totti sucked his thumb, Gianluigi Buffon lived up to his name, and destroying my “All Italian Men Are Hot” theory, was (yet again) Allesandro Del Piero and his tongue.

KELLY SLATER IN ISRAEL

Kelly, Kelly, Kelly, what are we gonna do with you? Eight-time world surf champ Kelly Slater was in Israel teaching kids to surf as part of the Surf For Peace program, and while there, he hooked up with Brazilian supermodel Bar Rafaeli, Leonardo DiCaprio’s ex-squeeze. Slater and Bar were caught sneaking outta the hotel pre-dawn Saturday morning, and as usual, paparazzi were waiting for them in full force. Slater then pushed a photographer in an effort to prevent him from taking pictures, a brawl broke out and Slater was taken for questioning and later released. And this makes scuffle of the year number two for the supermodel and her booty calls. Earlier this year, Rafaeli and then boy-toy Leonardo created major media frenzy when he visited her in Israel. Rafaeli later told an Israeli newspaper she wouldn’t bring anyone famous to Israel “because there is a chutzpah here that you won’t see anywhere else.” And word to Slater- when you’re part of a campaign that has the word “Peace” in it, you might wanna avoid punching people.

As always, thanks for reading.
delinda@athlebrities.