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2015 Japanese Grand Prix is a little Mercedes, a lot of zen

Just one week on from the issues in Singapore Mercedes-AMG Petronas appeared to have solved its clamp problems and everything else. Daniil Kvyat at Infiniti Red Bull Racing took the two Free Practice scalps on Friday, but when it came time for qualifying the front of the grid looked really familiar: Mercedes' Nico Rosberg took his second pole position of the season, Lewis Hamilton next to him in second. Kvyat had a hand in that, too, the Russian getting into a big accident in Q3 when he put two wheels on the grass heading into the hairpin and veered into the tire wall so hard that he flipped. That ended qualifying before a number of drivers had a chance to improve their times, Hamilton among them. That's how Valtteri Bottas got in third for Willliams ahead of Sebastian Vettel fourth for Ferrari. Felipe Massa had the second Williams in fifth, ahead of Kimi Raikkonen in the second Ferrari. Daniel Ricciardo lined up sixth for Infiniti Red Bull Racing, a team we're going to have to enjoy watching for the rest of the season since it might not exist come 2016. Romain Grosjean gave Lotus some good news by getting into eighth, the team so strapped for cash that it couldn't get into its hospitality area, so it held press conferences outside and ate at Bernie Ecclestone's Paddock Club. Sergio Perez took ninth for Sahara Force India, and Kvyat slotted into tenth after not setting a time. The Russsian's race would begin from the pit lane once his mechanics rebuilt his car. It wouldn't be a Formula One start lately without someone at the front having clutch problems. This time it was pole man Rosberg, whose power unit got too hot and put him a few horsepower down on Hamilton through Turns 1 and 2. That's half of how Hamilton took the lead from the lights going out, and the Brit kept it throughout the race. Rosberg, however, said his race was lost when Hamilton pushed him wide through Turn 2, a move Hamilton defended. Rosberg finished almost 19 seconds behind his teammate, a gap that probably isn't fully explained by that opening incident. Hamilton's race was so uneventful that we almost never saw him on camera – that is, we saw him so much less than we usually see him when he's out in front and unpressured that Nikki Lauda said he'd ask Ecclestone why the cameras avoided him. The conspiracy theory holds that FOM was punishing Mercedes for not supplying Red Bull with engines next year.

Meet the man who sold his Ferrari 250 GTO for a record $48 million

We all took notice back in August when a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO sold at RM Sotheby's in Monterey, bringing a record price for a car at auction: $48.4 million. The man who benefited — both from the proceeds and from his 18 years owning one of the rarest, most desirable cars in the world, chatted recently with Seattle Times columnist Nicole Brodeur about what it was like to say goodbye to such a beautiful machine — and how he's able to console himself with a serious collection of other fine cars. Despite the car, the third of 36, being "one of the most significant Ferraris ever built, bar none," in Sotheby's words, Brodeur says Whitten regularly toodled around in it in Redmond, Wash. — to lunch, on errands, to car shows — Redmond being a place where you do see an awful lot of incredible daily drivers streaming into the Microsoft campus. Whitten, now chairman of Numerix, a financial software company, was one of Microsoft's earliest employees, hired in 1979 by the late Paul Allen himself. He describes what it was like to be sitting on the front row at Monterey when the gavel came down. Even for a multimillionaire, multimillions being thrown around by three bidders for a single car is "very hard to fathom," he told CNBC. "But you're in a space where you have car collectors, and Ferraris are the most collectible car, and the GTO is the pinnacle Ferrari." "I miss it a little bit," Whitten says. But the world is full of wonderful cars, and an awful lot of them are tucked away in his warehouse. Plus, Whitten spent more than $2 million on the same night the GTO sold, picking up another Ferrari and three vintage Jaguars, including a 1967 E-Type as a birthday present for his wife, Michelle. In the column, he reflects on his beginnings as a driver — as an 11-year-old wheelman helping his brother deliver newspapers in their parents' station wagon. And on being a broke mathematics doctorate whose first car was a Dodge Dart. And on the beginnings of his collection when the Microsoft millions kicked in; on purchasing a 1935 ERA 1.5L Grand Prix racer from a Thai princess; and that time he hit 174 mph on an airport runway. Here's the column, if you'd like to learn more about a guy who sounds like he's had a pretty great life. And below are two videos put out by Sotheby's ahead of the auction. In the first, Whitten drives the Ferrari, talks about his love of cars — and you get a glimpse of his collection. The second video describes the car's considerable provenance.

Ferrari launches 488 GTB configurator

Though it may not be as expensive as, say, a Pagani or Bugatti, the bottom line is that most of us will never be able to afford buying a new Ferrari. And most of those who can would probably get one already consigned to a dealer rather than wait on the list. But we can certainly dream. That's where configuration utilities come in, and Ferrari has just added the new 488 GTB to its online customization tool. The system demonstrates just how deeply customers can specify every detail on their new Prancing Horse, from the exterior paint and interior upholstery down to the tiniest detail. Ferrari's lets you choose the color of the brake calipers, the amount of carbon-fiber trim inside and out, the stitching on the leather seats, the color of the carpets and the seat belts. You can even play with the height of the sun in the sky to see how your choices would stand up to the changing light of day. Play around with it first-hand and you'll see, there's really no reason any two should ever have to roll out of Maranello alike. Related Video: