Lame GP Merch

Yesterday afternoon the package containing our tickets for Australian Grand Prix arrived with an unexpected surprise, free stuff. The Grand Prix Corporation is certainly not known for its generosity to patrons, so I was eager to see what had been sent. I needn’t have bothered.While we have mocked some previous years’ promo gear, the 2009 stuff is even less worthwhile. That’s right, it’s less useful than the sunglasses cleaner and micro-fibre cloth we got a few years back, it’s not as high quality as the little hardcover book that had photos of F1 cars and fewer words than Meg and Mog.

This year, lucky GP Advantage ticket holders have received a cap and a commemorative pin.

It seems that lime green is in at the GP this year.

The photo really can’t give you a full understanding of how cheap and nasty this stuff is. I described it earlier as a cap a ball boy at the tennis would be ashamed of and a pin that an exchange student would reject, I don’t have much to add.

However, after years of seeing people at the track wearing the dodgy caps given to them as part of their Qantas Holidays GP package, I have no doubt that we’ll see plenty of these caps at Albert Park this March. With that in mind I’ve devised a game.

You get one point for spotting a pair of people walking or sitting together wearing the cap, you get to double your points for every extra person in a row with the cap on. eg. Three people with the dodgy cap, two points. Four people with the dodgy cap, four points.

If you can spot the pin anywhere you get five points and if you see the Holy Grail,  the pin attached to the cap, you get a whopping 25 points. The multiplier rule also applies to pins, so if you can spot four pins on hats in a row you may as well take the trophy home right there.

The best thing about this game is you can play it anywhere in Melbourne on GP weekend, you don’t even need to be at the GP. With that in mind I’m going to make up half a dozen score sheets for the Save Albert Park protesters so each of them has something to do all weekend.