I am trying very hard not to enter the Great Debate on Honda’s silly new color scheme, honest. All the expected criticisms and plaudits are flying around anyway, so there is little point in adding to the fuss – that would be giving Honda exactly what they want: news coverage.

It is becoming quite difficult to keep silent, however, especially when a little-regarded news item about changes in the FIA regulations for the future floats across my screen. The World Motor Sport Council is delaying until 2011 introduction of some of the green rules for engines. Well, that is no surprise, in view of the fact that they sound good but are almost impossible to put into practice.

Perhaps I should explain why it is so difficult for me to bite my tongue over these ridiculous issues. My problem is that I do not accept the first premise of the global warming theory – that humanity is causing the planet to heat up and will ultimately destroy civilization through climate change and the melting of the polar ice caps. Since I am actively involved in another site, Global Warming Latest, that points out the lies and misinformation propagated by the global warming activists, I can hardly go along quietly with all the lip service paid by the FIA and Honda to a theory that depends much more on the scare-mongering of politicians than the actual findings of highly-qualified climatologists.

But I am trying to remain silent, I swear it, and, if sometimes I cannot help myself and shout “Baloney!” at some ignorant and preposterous statement from anyone in charge of the future of F1, please remember that it was not I who introduced the subject in the first place.

So, ignoring the alleged green-ness of the Honda paint job, I should point out that it is, in fact, mostly blue. The black bit at the back is obviously to indicate the curvature of the earth and is not for sponsor logos – they have made other arrangements for those, it seems. Overall, I have to say that the look of the car is not bad; it’s a bit too fussy for my tastes but a whole lot better than the other pictorial representation on the grid – Toro Rosso’s cartoon bull. But it leaves the BMW Sauber in undisputed top spot, regardless of the result of F1 Fanatic’s survey of opinion (yes, I voted – you can guess for which team).

I admit that the Williams is pretty tasteful too, almost a negative version of BMW’s scheme, but then it comes down to whether you prefer dark blue or white as the predominant color. And the thing about white is that it allows you to see the shape of the car underneath – dark colors hide interesting bits in shadow.

To return briefly to the Honda, however, I cannot resist pointing you to the best comment I have seen so far. Have a look at this.

Now that puts things much more into perspective I think!

With Nick Heidfeld going fastest on the second day of testing in Bahrain, BMW continues to look the most likely team to upset the status quo of previous years. Consistently quick and now seemingly reliable, the F1.07 is obviously very good and team manager, Mario Theissen is having to work hard to keep the hype at a reasonable level, insisting that they are not yet in a position to challenge for the championship.

It is a sensible approach to the season; far better to exceed expectations in the actual races than to underperform after having set your sights too high. If the car races as well as it has tested, the results will do the talking for the team.

The big question mark must be over BMW’s choice of drivers. Heidfeld is certainly quick on occasion but can he maintain the speed throughout a full season? I cast doubt about Nick’s motivation in an earlier post and it remains to be seen whether he can prove me wrong.

And Robert Kubica is still an unknown quantity, raising hopes with his few race performances last year but not quite as quick as his teammate in testing. He’s an ugly blighter too but that never seemed to hold back Michael Schumacher.

In fact, a part of his looks that he shares with Michael and some other supreme sportsmen is that his eyes are too close together. Don’t laugh – this trait appears again and again in top athletes and might be a very visible sign of potential sporting prowess. Think of Bjorn Borg’s near-squint and Jochen Rindt.

Well, okay, I mention this very tongue-in-cheek but it might be an interesting area for scientists to investigate – probably a more useful field of endeavor than chasing polar bears around the Arctic. And it does remind me that, in the sixties, there was a scientific study of F1 drivers to see whether they had anything in common that was different from the normal run of humanity.

They measured and tested and experimented but, in the end, could come up with only one difference: blink rate. It seems that you and I and most of humanity blink about four times a minute – but F1 drivers blink only about once every two minutes. Which may have something to do with levels of concentration but also shows that it’s all in the eyes.

With further investigation of this phenomenon, they might even be able to devise a test to see whether a driver will make it into the big time. That could put a stop to the usual ladder of karts, Formula Renault, F3, GP2 and so on, meaning that F1 could get them even younger.

Hmmm, on second thoughts, forget I ever said this…

Like everyone else, I develop preferences for teams as well as drivers. Even though I am hoping that Button wins the championship this year, my support is irresistibly drawn to the BMW team. This began last year when I was supporting Renault (mainly because it was the only team that could beat Ferrari) but increasingly I noticed BMW and was conquered in the end.

It has very little to do with the team itself; shamefacedly I admit that my support generally goes to the car I find most pleasing aesthetically. And BMW has the cleanest, prettiest car on the grid by a long way (it also appears to be the smallest, another point in its favor, although this may be an optical illusion).

They are helped by not having to please a multitude of advertisers, of course; their major sponsor, Petronas, seems happy to go with the BMW corporate colors and the others, Credit Suisse, Intel and Dell, have adjusted to fit the scheme. And the use of white with dark blue and red highlights helps to show off the pure lines of the car.

Compare this to Renault’s problems – having to keep their own yellow and blue but blend in the orange of ING. That was always going to be a thankless task and the designer has made a reasonable fist of it considering the difficulties involved. But the paint job becomes so complex that it obscures the car’s looks; all those extra colors and swooping lines effectively disguise the body underneath.

It is when we get to Toro Rosso that my artistic sense rebels. I would like to support TR as the successors to my old favorite, Minardi, but their paint scheme puts me off immediately. That silly bull plastered over the rear of the car is about on the level of the “flames” painted on the side of street racers, never mind that it makes it impossible to see what the car underneath is really like (I know, I know, it’s like a Red Bull RB3 – go here to see if you can tell the difference).

And, when you consider that Toro Rosso is not exactly overburdened with advertisers all clamoring for their own colors, you have to admit that the cause of this monstrosity is just plain, honest-to-goodness, bad taste. Since the FIA is so keen on introducing new rules to deal with every detail of the cars, surely it is time they set some minimum aesthetic standards to protect our eyesight.

Williams generally have a sensible and quiet enough color scheme but McLaren has ruined its chances with their obsession with a silver that clashes with just about any other color under the sun. And the others hover in the area of acceptability without being objectionable.

So my support remains with BMW; there is one ray of hope on the horizon, however. Word is that the Honda colors, when finally revealed, will be green. And green is the one color that could beat white – think of the gorgeous early Jordans with their 7-Up sponsorship and the short-lived Jaguars in patriotic BRG. But all hinges on the shade chosen; dark enough and the car will look great, too light and it will be vomit-inducing.

For Button’s sake, I hope that Honda have had the sense to be green in as dark a way as possible.

Ferrari grab the best times at the second session of testing at Barcelona and suddenly everyone thinks they are the team to beat again. It’s like Andy Warhol’s fifteen minutes of fame – first McLaren, then BMW and now Ferrari. Any bets on which team will be favorite next?

What it really means is that there is very little to choose between a lot of the teams. Alonso reckons there are five in with a chance of winning GPs: Ferrari, McLaren, Renault, BMW and, although still a little behind the best, Honda. To that list I would add Williams and Toyota. Red Bull has been disappointing to date and we can only presume that Toro Rosso will be more of the same since they will be running a very similar car. And Super Aguri and Spyker have their sights set a little lower than race wins this year at least.

That leaves a lot of teams in the running but of one thing we can be sure – the numbers will thin out once racing starts in earnest. Some of those who show well now will fade in the heat of competition and unexpected weaknesses will appear. The problem is in working out which of the contenders will maintain the challenge throughout the season.

The big three have an advantage in this through experience; we expect them to do well because they always do. Sooner or later the old order must change, however, and the chances of it happening this season are very high. BMW are looking like the team that could upset the apple cart. The car has been consistently good at all the circuits so far and the drivers and team members seem focused and quietly efficient. Their moment may have arrived rather earlier than Mario Theissen expected but, if they can build on early successes, they could be in with a chance of a championship.

We have seen a lot of change over this off season and big changes usually bring about re-shuffling of established orders. In 1979, the year ground effect spread to everyone, Lotus failed to capitalize on Chapman’s invention and were nowhere, while Williams emerged as top rank contenders for the first time. The fact that Ferrari managed to squeeze out a last gasp championship that year might be a good omen for them in 2007 but I doubt it. This time around, they are the team that has had more change than any other.

1979 was also the year that Ligier won the first two races with their JS11 and looked the team to beat, only to fade away as the season wore on. Could BMW be the Ligier of 2007?