Making F1 More Interesting

Utterly absurd.
But no crazier than things already incorporated into the "sport".

Will the mods please delete this thread before it gives Bernie &Co ideas.

 

I think the engineered tire destruction is a great thing. Adds to both the strategic and the tactical parts of the sport.

 

+1 nothing absurd in this at all...

 

Other than the fact that the drivers have to race well below their and their car's capabilities just to preserve the rubber?

 

Correct. It makes strategy and driver technique more important than pure sprint pace in order to extract the best overall performance in each race. In my view that's great.

 

Great show but not what F1 is all about.

 

After watching this morning's qualifying can anyone say that tires haven't eclipsed every other aspect of strategy?
The tail is wagging the dog.

 

I think you'll see them give everyone in q3 a set of softs that they have to then give up. Then everyone will take at least one all out shot at pole and takes the tire factor out of qualifying (to a degree).

 

The Matchett rule

 

+1

While I like them having to "struggle" with set up etc this does seem to have gone too far.

Hembery continues to say they're doing what the teams asked for and that they can change if asked - But that needs unanimous approval and I can't see, eg, Fauxtus & Sauber being in favor - Seems they've got on top of it, at least in qualy.

Should be an interesting race one way or another - Someone will run long on the softs and make a mockery of the "they only last 2-3 laps" scenario........

Cheers,
Ian

 

Knew you'd see the light sooner or later
I'm happier than ever that Michael is back. Only he, among everyone in F1, is in the position to speak truth to power.

 

I dunno about "seeing the light"...... I thoroughly enjoy seeing them struggle with setup. Some get it right, some don't. It's always been that way and long may it continue.

I don't think we'll see a two-step gap again this year though - That does seem a little too much.

+1 I am however a little surprised *none* of the others have spoken up agreeing with him - If all (or the majority) said "we agree with Michael, the tires have become too important and we can't drive properly" Pirelli would have to listen.

Cheers,
Ian

 

I think you're mistaken - This is one area where the FIA (and even the Pygmy) are effectively out of the loop. The teams (via the TWG) asked Pirelli to supply this range of tires, and they were all expressing their happiness with them in testing.

Now they've lost all that rear end D/F most of 'em are struggling big time - Damn, JB & Mcham are in the same car and can't agree on which is best!...... This is either good or bad depending on your POV of course.

As the Viz says, "good for the show, bad for the sport."

Cheers,
Ian

 

If you mean the hard soft mix for this race yes.
If you mean employing tires as wild cards that honor goes to the Pygmy and his FIA trolls.
Why Pirelli would put itself in such a lose lose situation is beyond me.

 

Is it really bad for the sport though?

Drivers now know that even if they are not on pole they still have a very good chance of winning the race unlike in previous seasons.

If they drive the car well, they make up for a poor grid position, whereas is previous seasons they were pretty much stuck for the race in the position they qualified in - where's the joy in that?

What was one of the biggest things to put drivers off going into F1? (apart from the cost) - a lack of wheel to wheel racing, a lack of overtaking.


Look at it this way:

Over the last couple of seasons this is how the race weekends have gone:

Qualifying: Vettel gets pole.
Race: Vettel leads from the front, goes off like a scorched cat and is never seen again bar the pit-stops and goes on to win the race without breaking a sweat.

There was very little interest in who would win the race as that was pretty much a foregone conclusion - Vettel. The main interest was in who would come second, third, fourth etc., etc.

F1 was at risk of heading into another era similar to Schumacher's Ferrari era Where, unless you were a fan of Schumacher or Ferrari, F1 fans started to ask: "What's the point!?", and interest was at risk of draining away again.

Lets be honest here - Vettel winning every weekend was getting a bit boring quite frankly! (of course, if he was doing it in a Ferrari then I would have loved every race! ).


This season however: Four races gone - four different winners!

No one has a guaranteed advantage over the rest of the field as we have seen in past seasons.

Red Bull are not running away with the Championship as they had done over the last two seasons.

Vettel is not automatically on Pole at just about every race and then just waltzing off into the distance for the race win, he's having to race wheel to wheel and battle for every position - which is surely what everyone on here has been hoping to see in order for him to prove that he is one of the all time greats.

Race outcomes are no longer totally predictable or guaranteed, just because someone is leading the race doesn't automatically mean they are going to win the race any more.

Different cars are suiting different tracks and that is mixing things up greatly.
Different weather conditions are affecting different cars in different ways (luckily for Alonso in Malaysia!).

Because of the tyres there's more overtaking going on than ever before.

So how can this be bad for the sport?
How can the processional races that we used to get be better for the sport?
Do we really want to return to a situation where you know that, bar a mechanical failure, the driver on pole is going to win again at just about every race?

Schumacher can't drive on these new tyres? - that's strange, because Perez seems to be able to make them work, just look at the long stints he manages on them, and he's not fannying about at half the speed of the rest to make them last longer.

As it stands, F1 is far less predictable this season and for the average fan who has no allegiance to any driver or team, that has got to make the sport more exciting surely?

Still, if you'd all rather go back to the old days of no overtaking, processional races, predictable race results, single team domination (fine if it's Ferrari ) and drivers who start a race knowing that they might make up a place or two via the pit-stops but that's about it, then I'm sure Pirelli could easily give that back to F1.

 

You mean the good old days when no one went out to qualify until the last second?
Not to worry. We're heading back there fast.

Increasing random chance is not the same as improving the sport.

 

It's easy enough to prevent that by putting in rules that state that X-amount of laps must be run within the first 10 minutes, then X-amount more within 20 minutes, then 30 minutes etc., etc.

As it stands with the situation today (drivers not running at all in Q3), I'd have a rule stating that any driver who fails to participate in a qualifying session that they are eligible for will have all their times deleted and will have to start from the back of the grid.

"Ah!", you say, "but then they will simply do a lap at a very slow speed to get round this rule!".

But I would have another rule that states that any lap time completed in a later session must fall within 101% of the drivers fastest lap in a previous session. If a drivers lap time falls outside the 101% then the slower time will dictate the drivers grid position overall (With the exception of conditions beyond the drivers control - a change of weather for example).

Something to that effect (I've not gone into all the pro's and cons but the rule would be made so that a driver has to push to do a fast lap in every session that he is eligible for).

It all depends on who you are improving the sport for though.

Schumacher is talking about improving things from a drivers point of view, but that is not necessarily going to improve the sport for the fans.

From the fans point of view, unpredictable tyres brings with it unpredictable racing and therefore increases the excitement as the outcome of the race is not a foregone conclusion.

History has shown that when races are forgone conclusions (Schumacher's Ferrari era), the fans interest starts to disappear because there is no excitement any more.

Now lets say Schumacher gets his way and Pirelli make the tyres so there is no degradation.
So now every driver knows he can push the tyre as hard as he likes and they wont go off. So overtaking becomes much harder as the difference between the cars at any point of the race is minimal. Where's the excitement there for the fans or the drivers? How is that improving the sport for anyone?

Look at it this way - Predictable is boring! That's just a fact of life! If you know exactly what's going to happen then it's not that interesting.

Unpredictable is exciting! It's another fact of life! If you don't know what might happen next then it's far more exciting and interesting!

 

Adding more complications and gimmicks haven't improved things so add more?

I'm saying improve the sport. You're right that it differs from improving the show.
There is enough dumbed down entertainment in our world today. I just want the Boobocracy to keep its mitts of my F1.

Rant over.

 

Okay, I'll ask you the hardest question of them all:

How would you improve the sport (not the show), whilst at the same time not returning to the processions that we had to put up with in recent years?

(Personally I'd start with banning those damned ugly stepped noses! - Mclaren have shown today that you do not need to have an ugly step and no, I will never get used to them!)





BTW, I'm sure you never rant! (I'm pretty sure that that would be far beneath you!).
I've always found that you come up with good, well thought out arguments that you defend with an intelligence that is lacking in all too many these days!

 

If I want to call them rants who are you to deny me the pleasure?!


First I'd make the finances of the sport transparent. As long as Bernie and Co. can operate in secret he can play teams against organizers against drivers against sponsors etc.

Then I'd redraw the tracks. Since F1 is wholey dependant on TV revenue now most tracks are designed to look good on TV and not to promote passing.
I'd be sure that, while maintaining safety, there would be a cost to going off track.
And I'd let the drivers race. No more crying to teacher when a driver feels put upon by an aggressive move. No harm, no foul.
Those are enough to begin with.

 

The fans would rebel.
Besides it isn't necessary.
You've got the Hamilton "Ooops I hit the off button accidentally while leading the WDC as a rookie" system already in place.
Never before, never after.
Just a co+incidence to be sure.

 

It's hardly random.

 

It's more and more of a crapshoot each year.