RUBENS BARRICHELLO DRIVING A KOMBI

Today’s Brazilian Grand Prix has got me a-thinking. Being an amateur anthropologist, one thing I like doing when abroad is attending sporting events, even if I have little or no interest in the spectacle itself. It is a splendid opportunity to observe the natives en masse and forumlate some overly simplistic generalisations that may help a little in understanding what makes them tick.

Formula One is a sport populated by multi-millionaires who take driving much too seriously. I don’t think I’ve ever managed to watch a whole race except when monstrously hungover, when lying sweating and watching the bright colours go round and round has a strangely soothing effect. I attended the Brazilian GP in 2003, around six months after touching down here, and the crowd’s social interaction was fascinating.

Firstly, the grandstand provided the perfect setting for some hierarchy-building. Those Alpha males who arrived early (we’re talking around 6am for a 2pm race) took position at the top of the inclined seating area, then proceeded to verbally abuse any interloper audacious enough to try to reach the summit uninvited. “Levanta cedo! Tomar café! Você vai ficar de pé!” came the chilling chant of the hillfort defenders (“Get up early! Have breakfast! You’re going to have to stand!”) This all involved literally hundreds of good-natured hecklers, without central organisation of any kind, and was widely respected, even by bewildered blonde Finns who, lacking local language skills, for a split second believed they were about to enter the Guinness Book of Records as victims of the largest mugging yet recorded, judging by how wide their eyes suddenly became.

The one exception to the implicit “no ascending” rule was, of course, attractive female motorsport enthusiasts. “A gostosa sobe! O viado desce!” (“The tasty one ascends! The gay goes in the opposite direction!”) was the jolly cry that greeted embarrassed couples walking along the front of the grandstand, as they desperately tried to look cool amid the hail of water-soaked screwed-up newspaper missiles that rained down on them from the battlements. Every male who passed was denounced as a “viado” (“gay”) by practically everybody in the upper echelons. Most victims of this abuse either light-heartedly returned the compliment or ignored it – something hard to imagine at a British sporting event, where, instead of inoffensive balls of wet Guardian supplements being tossed playfully from on high, the sky would be brown and amber with beer bottles. During the whole two days (practice and the race), I didn’t see one punch thrown, or one drunkard ejected, despite many beer-soaked hours spent waiting in persistent, torrential rain.

One thing that really made me laugh was the under-the-surface subversion on show. TV loves to portray Formula One as the epitome of glamour. We see close-ups of gorgeous pouting women in Fendi sunglasses trying to look interested in the team garages, the starting grid is awash with celebrities and top models and entertainment folk being photographed with Bernie Ecclestone. Down in our neck of the woods, on the back straight, the crowd was deliciously ribald and irreverant. As a vintage Kombi maintenance van trundled down the track towards us, shouts went up, “Be careful, Rubinho (Barrichello)! There’s a corner coming up!” – as it passed us we caught a glimpse of a rain-drenched pair of buttocks being majestically mooned, which raised the most rousing cheer of the whole event. TV commentator Jim Rosenthal probably claimed that we were cheering Michael Schumacher, who was following shortly behind in the back of a pick-up to inspect the flooded track. He received as lively a torrent of abuse as I’ve witnessed since prison, only topped by the foul-mouthed taunting he received when he later crashed out of the race. Apparently misinterpreting the obcene gestures, he waved to thank the crowd for their support in a state of utter, egocentric delusion.

As for the race, then Ferrari driver Rubinho Barichello started in pole position, dropped to sixth within a lap, regained the lead with some deft manoeuvres, then famously ran out of petrol just in front of us. Inexplicably, literally half the crowd at once packed it in and went home, despite the race not being even halfway through and the elevated price of the tickets. Brazilians tend to see sporting failure as just another reflection of their country’s lack of hope of a successful future.