And so, from one of the prettiest sporting venues in the world to, er, Silverstone. I have promised faithfully some of the chaps at the British Racing Drivers' Club, who own Silverstone, that I will never again refer to the venerable circuit as "the former airfield" because it sends out all the wrong messages about it being a bit rickety and windswept.

Which, of course, it is. But it is all we have got and the BRDC have big spending plans to transform the place, so fingers crossed that the mercurial Bernie Ecclestone keeps the faith and keeps the British Grand Prix running at the old place.

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Of course, Bernie has a slight distraction from his day job running Formula One these days, since he joined forces with Flavio Briatore to buy Queen's Park Rangers. Bernie says he doesn't play much part in the running of the Coca-Cola Championship club, leaving that to Briatore, who doubles as team principal at Renault and will be in his usual place on the Silverstone pit wall this weekend.

But Bernie tells me he did once give the QPR players a team talk before a game of, what seemed to me, such admirable common sense that the Football Association should hire him immediately as a consultant. "I just went in and told them I had no idea how to kick a ball so I wouldn't bother trying to tell them how to do it," he says. "But I told them that if the referee got his yellow card out to book them, they should say, 'Thank you, referee' and get out of the way immediately and get on with the game. If you start arguing with a referee, he will remember you and he will look to get you into trouble next time. There is no point in arguing, he will always win." See? Perfect common sense.

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There was a funny story relating to the sale of QPR to the dynamic duo in SportPro magazine this month. I have no idea whether it is true or not and haven't checked with either Bernie or Briatore, but I like it so you are getting it.

The pair had been looking to buy a club for some time - Ecclestone was in the frame at Chelsea before Roman Abramovich turned up on the scene - so the word was out that they were in the market. But Briatore was also on the lookout to buy a restaurant in London to add to his burgeoning empire. So he gets a call from somebody offering him QPR. He thinks, "Mmmmm, sounds good" and rings Bernie to ask him if he knows a restaurant called QPR. At which point the diminutive genius was forced to put his old friend right. Probably rubbish, but I like it.

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So farewell, then, DC, which is what those on the inside of Formula One call David Coulthard. Coulthard was one of the first people I met and interviewed when I joined the sports department at The Times as Motor Racing Correspondent in 1998 and, in the intervening years, I have found him in turn amenable, funny, kind and just a little chippy when things went the wrong way.

He wears his heart on his sleeve, which is both a virtue and a vice and many inside McLaren still say to this day that he would have been a world champion had he not been prone to agonising over his deficiencies, while team-mates such as Kimi Raikkonen and Mika Hakkinen didn't bother with the hard work of thinking and just got on with it. You can't doubt the fella's talent, that's for certain.

So what next for the great man? Well, he is out of the hotel business. The Columbus, which he opened to a great fanfare in Fontvieille, the next port up from Monte Carlo, was a magnet for the Monaco gliteratti - and John Button, Jenson's dad, who lives in Cap D'Ail, a couple of minutes down the road. But DC and Ken McCullough, his Scottish business partner, have sold the business, making a few quid on the way.

No matter, for DC seems stitched on to be part of the BBC commentary team when the Corporation takes over Formula One coverage next year. Talks have already taken place, I understand, and details just have to be confirmed. He has all the skills: a former top driver, he is articulate, bright, funny and likeable. Just one thing the Beeb might have to take care of: they might want to lock him up in a dark room ten minutes before live transmission to wash all the rude thoughts and words out of his mind before he goes on. DC has, what we called up North, a "potty mouth", which, sooner or later, will mean that, at some point, something very risque will spill out without him realising it. Then again, a bit of risque might brighten up Formula One on one of its many dull days.

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Another thought. Have you noticed how many foreign sportsmen and women use the phrase "For sure" when they speak English? You listen this weekend. Looking at transcripts from Wimbledon press conferences in the past fortnight demonstrates their speech is riddled with the phrase. Why?

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