Half an hour before the Bahrain Grand Prix started, something happened at the back door of the Mercedes garage. Five tall handsome hunks were performing some kind of a combination of a rugby scrum and the haka dance of the All-Blacks. They were chanting some strange lyrics and singing at the top of their lungs. One of the men was wearing the Mercedes racing outfit and a racing helmet. Wondering what it was?

Four of Nico Rosberg’s friends from his school days had come all the way to perform a little good luck dance for the driver right before the race. Considering that Nico finished the race in fifth position and that was actually one spot higher than his seven-time world champion teammate Michael Schumacher, looks like the ritual really worked. Here’s something more.

If the dancing and chanting took place in the paddock of the Bahrain Grand Prix, what was everyone in the paddock outside Istanbul as Formula One prepared for the Turkish Grand Prix gossiping about? Remember Karun Chandhok’s crash in the last laps of the Monaco Grand Prix a couple of weeks ago. Chandhok was Formula One’s only Indian driver.

Jarno Trulli in a Lotus had tried to pass Chandhok who was with the Hispania team. Jarno Trulli not just failed to get by, but actually managed to land his car on top of Chandhok’s head. The bottom of the Lotus had actually touched his helmet. Now, that was quite scary and a narrow escape. Karun Chandhok needs something like Nico Rosberg, doesn’t he? A lucky charm may indeed work!

There was this small press scrum on Thursday in the paddock outside Istanbul when Formula One was getting ready for the Turkish Grand Prix. At the meeting, Chandhok took out an egg from his pocket. Was he going to do some kind of magic? Certainly no. The racer said that a bunch of his friends in England came over to meet him and then offered him the egg for good luck. The idea, he said, came from the lucky egg of the 1988 Olympic Jamaican bobsled team, famously portrayed in the film “Cool Runnings.”

Now that he has an egg for a good luck charm, will the Formula One racer carry it in his car during the race? Karun says, “No way. My engineers would probably complain that it was another 50 grams of weight….” That’s right. This is not bobsledding. But, it was very nice of his friends to think of him and wish him luck.