Shaken, sebastian vettel wipes his face with his hand, eyes briefly closed. "Stop when you’re mude," advises a stern female voice – and suddenly this video clip can also be understood as a snapshot of the ferrari driver’s entire dilemma.

The world governing body actually wants to use the pictures to advertise traffic safety, but vettel’s expression during his brief appearance also seems to reflect the scuderia’s renewed plight ahead of the fifth formula 1 race of the season in barcelona.

His fifth year at ferrari, which was finally supposed to be a crowning achievement, could hardly have begun much worse. Four double victories by mercedes duo valtteri bottas and lewis hamilton have pretty much demolished vettel’s world championship hopes. Once again, the 31-year-old has to prove his ability to find the strength for a counterattack. It wears on him, you can hear and see that. "If we had the choice, we weren’t going to want to rely on a comeback. But that’s the way it is," says vettel.

But simply stopping, tired of the many defeats with ferrari – that’s not an option for vettel. "Despite everything, we are optimistic that we will find our way back to our old strength," says the driver from heppenheim. The team wants to force the turnaround with a new engine expansion stage and other innovations developed in a rough hurry by ferrari. In the opening practice session on friday, however, the finn bottas is again faster than vettel.

So ferrari cannot hope for a slowdown from mercedes. "There’s no room for complacency in our position, because we know it doesn’t accurately reflect the true balance of power from the way the season has gone so far," says mercedes team boss toto wolff. The austrian describes the rough lead in the overall standings as "far too flattering for us" and derives from this the hunger for more and more victories.

At the winter tests in barcelona, mercedes seemed to be behind and vettel was the fastest, before the start of the season became a series of frustrations for him. The four-time world champion is already 35 points behind the leader bottas, while defending champion hamilton is 34 points ahead of him. "We need to start scoring points, the faster the better. The longer this goes on, the worse it looks," warns vettel.

Ferrari could also use soccer as a role model, says vettel’s team danger charles leclerc. After all, the sporting wonders of liverpool and amsterdam proved how supposedly safe leads were still being made up. "The champions league was a good example. And that’s exactly the mentality we have in the team," stresses the 21-year-old leclerc.

Vettel also uses the analogy to soccer and, looking ahead to the long season ahead, says: "we’re down 0:4, they’ve beaten us four times. But there are a total of 21 goals to be scored, so there are still plenty of goals or races to be had."But he will hardly want to emulate his frankfurter eintracht, whose unfortunate semi-final exit in the europa league the hessian watched on tv. Vettel has long since had enough of bitter failure just before the rough goal.

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The team from lichtenfels can be very satisfied with the way things have gone so far in the bavarian league. After all, the promoted team has won five of its first seven games and is in second place behind unbeaten table leader donaustauf. The penultimate game of the first round at the eighth SC memmelsdorf seems like an easy task, but the korbstadt team is warned about the strength of the sports club. As a member of the bavarian league for many years, the memmelsdorfer have an enormous game experience and know exactly how to exploit the weaknesses of the competitors. For the lichtenfelser it goes to take the play under no circumstances on the light shoulder and to set the opponent from the beginning under pressure.
It is pleasing for the team that they can fall back on the complete squad except for their two long-term injured players jonas eggert and timo kohler.

Second team challenged in kronach
In the landesliga nord-ost, the second team of the auswarts playing group meets TS kronach. We can expect an extremely exciting encounter against our direct neighbors in the standings.

Ladies of TSL in northern halben
The first women's team of TS lichtenfels, as the leader of the west district league, meets the second-placed team from nordhalben in a top match in a foreign hall. Uberdieseits contests the derby against TSV ebensfeld, even if it is played this time in nordhalben. Mhu

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A330/F 39 – what to do according to the coordinates for "sinking ships sounds, describes at the moment my very personal battlefield. It is just about 35 by 35 cm big. The opponents: flat seat versus sab muscles. And already after two hours the pain in my thighs shows me that I will lose the fight. I am sitting in seat F in row 39 of the airbus 330 to abu dhabi and yes: i hate flying. Not because I was afraid of crashing. But at 1.90 meters tall, it's not really fun to be crammed into an economy class seat for eleven hours. There's occupational therapy wrapped in aluminum in the form of noodles. But this brings neither increased nutritional value nor the desired distraction.

According to confucius, the "way is the goal". My destination is kathmandu, abu dhabi is only a short stopover. I am on my way to nepal. Sitting next to me is wolfgang grader. The bamberger grunen councillor will devote the next two weeks to his duties as national chairman of the tibet initiative and i will accompany him to document his work on the ground in nepal and india photographically.

Flight to india and nepal

Nepal and india became exile for tibetan refugees because of their geographical proximity to tibet. In 1959, the 14. Dalai lama, the spiritual leader of the tibetans, from his homeland to india, where he has since been living in dharamsala. 130.000 countrymen follow him on this way until today, 15.000 more live in nepal. But the situation for exiled tibetans in nepal is not easy: the chinese authorities are putting pressure on the nepalese government. And nepal bends. Nepal has not taken in any more refugees since 1990, and new arrivals are being sent to india. Tibetans born in nepal do not get an identification card with which they can prove their identity. Driver's license and job market remain denied with it.

The tibetinitiative, which grader has led as national chairman since 2000, sees itself as a mouthpiece for tibet in order to draw attention to the grievances that have prevailed in tibet since the chinese occupation in 1950/51. "I wanted to experience the emotional world of the tibetans in exile" so grader. Therefore, every year he travels to india and nepal. To maintain contacts and learn about the current situation of tibetans in exile.

Gay-boy reception

Kathmandu buries us with 31 degrees, 55 percent humidity and a "namaste". That's the usual greeting, spoken with the palms of your hands pressed together in front of your chest. At the airport we are picked up by tobden lama. Graders, the contact person, takes us to a guesthouse in thamel, a district of kathmandu. There tobden and wolfgang discuss the appointments for the next day. I don't know what to expect in the next few days and what people I will meet.

In the evening we meet elisabeth, a good friend of grader's. Her story shows the explosive nature of the situation in tibet: she wanted to enter tibet two days ago, but her visa was not approved. Single travelers were not allowed to enter tibet. Only groups can visit the country, and a government-appointed security guard must accompany the group around the clock.

Via potholes into the monastery

After a gay night we rumble the next morning in an old cab through the streets of kathmandu. The streets are littered with potholes, which is especially jubilant for camera technology and spinal disks. Our destination is the buddhist nunnery of kopan. The nuns were happy about grader's visit and buried us with masala tea. Wolfgang helped the tibetinitiative to organize a series of concerts in germany for the gifted nuns. Traditional tibetan chants were on the program.

"We have to use events like this to show the western world that this culture is absolutely worth preserving" so grader. But the chinese government tries to nip any emergence of tibetan identity in the bud. Only if pressure is exerted from the west on the chinese rulers, there is a chance to save this culture from extinction. At a puja, a traditional "fair" we have the pleasure of listening to the nuns for a while. A moving and spiritual moment.

When we return to thamel for dinner, we are served another surprise for dessert: we are asked to leave the restaurant because an exit ban has just been imposed. The nepalese people demanded a constitution from the government by midnight. But the parties could not reach an agreement. For fear of riots, the government has declared a state of emergency and imposed a curfew. Tomorrow a general strike and demonstrations are expected from the people. Then it is possible that nothing will happen…

To be continued.

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