Walk the streets of Valencia's El Carmen district and, as well as the medieval Moorish architecture, you will undoubtedly notice advertisements themed around this weekend's European Grand Prix. Billboards for Formula Aqua, Formula Campus and the Formula One race itself are plastered around the city. Spain's third biggest city gives the impression of F1 fever.
Yet inside the paddock, located in the recently renovated America's Cup marina, it is a fever of a different type that is taking over: Football is dominating conversation.
The last time the F1 fraternity congregated was in Canada, where Sebastian Vettel rushed his way through a post-qualifying news conference in order to ensure he would not miss his German national team get their Euro 2012 campaign underway. He was soon watching Germany defeat Portugal 1-0 from the inner sanctum of Bernie Ecclestone's exclusive motorhome (although not before Fernando Alonso deliberately answered the final question of the news conference as slowly as possible to tease his friend and racing rival).
Alonso had also joked that as Spain were playing Italy, home of the majority of his Ferrari engineers, he might find himself on the sharp end of a trick or two were the World Champions to win. As it happened, the two nations drew and Alonso escaped unscathed.
Now, in Valencia, the European Championships have reached the knock-out phase and the different nationalities within the F1 fraternity are making their voices heard once again. Vitaly Petrov has quietened down after Russia's early exit, but Alonso was once more quizzed on whether he had sought the ear of Lotus driver Romain Grosjean, whose France the Spanish team face on Saturday night. (He had not.)
Pedro de la Rosa, Alonso's compatriot and veteran driver with HRT, said the media criticism Spain have endured after only squeezing through their group is unfair and that he does not know any fans who are unhappy. Meanwhile Mercedes's venerated seven-time champion Michael Schumacher -- who in Canada watched the Portugal match from his hospitality lounge alongside teammate Nico Rosberg and fellow countryman Nico Hulkenberg -- spoke confidently of how Germany will "naturally" be crowned winners next month.
The atmosphere is jovial, fun and very relaxed -- a sharp contrast to the tension and pressures that usually fill the paddock. Yet not everybody is engrossed by the action going on in Poland and Ukraine. Lewis Hamilton, who played football alongside Manchester United and England winger Ashley Young while growing up, said he was not sure whether he would watch his country face Italy on Sunday night.
"I don't even know when the game is, if I'm honest," he said. "Hopefully I will be able to watch it. England have been playing pretty well recently. I hope that we have a better shot this year than we have in the past, but there are other great teams out there."
For now, the majority of the predominantly English F1 media are just glad their country has avoided playing Spain this weekend. "Thank God," noted one English journalist on Twitter. "We're in Valencia and we've avoided being mullered by Spain on Saturday night."
