Schumacher logs success at Cabin.

Michael Schumacher may have asked that no-one plan a celebration for the team prior to his championship decider at Suzuka, but the Ferrari team had already booked a hut at the famous Suzuka Circuit Hotel Karaoke Log Cabins - the traditional post-Japanese Grand Prix watering hole for teams, drivers and F1 hangers-on.

Before the teams had even repaired to the log cabins, however, McLaren and Ferrari were busy reducing their paddock 'portacabins' to a less than complete state fuelled by a sense of huge relief after a very intense campaign - and much alcohol.

Before the packing-up process was even half over, Schumacher was sporting a huge cigar and was well on his way to the biggest hangover in the paddock, thanks to liberal quantities of schnapps courtesy of Karl Heinz Zimmerman, the Austrian hotelier and hospitality expert who has helped many an otherwise abstemious driver unwind in the past. His most notable victim was perhaps the late Ayrton Senna, who was a regular visitor of Zimmerman's.

Schumacher and entourage were soon crooning at the log cabins, at last giving vent in anger to the unique version of Queen's We are the Champions that they have practised for several years.