How is Bernie and the FIA going to help Clifford now?

A. I've heard discussion that Ferrari broke the rules but no penalty: http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showpost.php?p=141867793&postcount=175

B. Then we had the laughable situation where RedBull instructed Vettel to park his car even though there was nothing wrong. Note the smirk and amusement on Vettel's face during his post qualifying press conference.

Unfortunately for Bernie and the "Ferrari" IA, Clifford is showing his true dog like abilities and Ferrari is not able to make a big enough gain to ensure the remaining 2012 F1 season TV episodes will be interesting.

So what will be next? Will the FIA suddenly decide that the clever work that RB have done to the rear floor of their cars is illegal and their current results will stay but they cannot use this rear floor again? I guess they could work with RB to use the tactic they employ with Webber when he is getting in the way, ie. yet another gearbox needs replacing.

Personally they should let Vettel and RB win this one, they deserve it. Yes it's boring but so was MS's Ferrari domination years ... they should pin their hopes on the engine change to the v6 turbo levelling the playing field IMO. Is that next year or 2014?
Pete

 

Bernie's interest isn't in promoting Ferrari but in keeping the championship going as long as possible.
These two may coincide but its an important difference.

 

Agree, but remember which team has the biggest fan base, biggest ticket buyers and more importantly biggest TV audience. Bernie definitely does not want another 21 year drought, and the closest competitor is Alonso at the moment.

Part of the boredom issue is both team's number twos are not performing as they should and we ALL know that the teams won't allow a battle. McLaren is also all over the place with their performance.
Pete

 

There are two issues. First how to keep up interest for the rest of the season. Second how to create an ongoing paradigm of competitive parity for the future.
The first (assuming that there is manipulation) will be limited to Austin and as a one off will be ad hoc.
The second will be an attempt to tighten the rules even further. If experience is a guide it will fail. Then we're back to clumsy ad hoc solutions.
The powers that be have profit, and so ratings, as their only goal. If they continue to artificially manipulate the sport either they will succeed and make the sport a farce or fans will become disgusted and stop watching.

 

I don't think Bernie has much sway at all with the FIA - certainly not enough to force them to dish out penalties. I think RBR just made a gaffe with the fuel and tried (unsuccessfully) to get past it by stopping Vettel and pulling the "engine problem" excuse. Might have worked if they were just a hair heavier on fuel.

I do think the FIA is consistently lenient with Ferrari, though. I can't imagine any interpretation of the curfew rule that would make it legit to work on two consecutive nights. To think so means there is such a thing as breaking curfew twice on one day - which is impossible. It clearly refers to more than one race event, and Ferrari were clearly outside the rule.

It's by the grace of the F1 gods that I can't remember a time where this type of meddling has actually changed the outcome of a WDC. Vettel righteously won last year and the year prior, and luckily Hamilton won in '08 despite the heavy Massa assistance from the FIA.

There's a lot of ways to keep things interesting other than fiddling with the results.

 

On this front, I like my previous idea.

Blueprints for every car go into the public domain 2 years after they are developed. That could be the public-F1 domain (so the 2010 RBR design gets shared with the other teams), or the entire public domain - which would encourage new entrants to F1.

Things would be a lot more interesting if there were more than 2 or 3 realistic competitors each year, especially when 2 out of the 3 tend to be the same two teams (McLaren and Ferrari).

Sure, the teams would squeal like stuck pigs, but when don't they?

 

2000 I think when the Ferrari was constantly in trouble with illegal barge boards but never penalised.

Pete

 

I love conspiracy theories.

So much logic and insight.

 

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showpost.php?p=141868978&postcount=271

No rule was broken.

 

Does Bernie micro manage?
No, of course not but people with common interests act in complementing fashion. There's no need for a conspiracy.
Everyone knows what is good for business.
The teams disadvantaged no longer seem to make their gripes public. Instead they meet behind closed doors where issues are resolved in a fashion unknown to the public. Yesterday's RB fuel issue is a case in point. They got a move to the back of the field but were able to so reconfigure the car yielding a marked increase in top speed that, as it turned out, paid off better than Seb's second row position would have. Everyone's satisfied.
As far as the curfew violation goes everyone knows that it was transgressive but were any formal complaints lodged? No. A competitive red car is good for the show.
A few journos looking for a story made a minor stink that had no lasting effect. Good for their credibility and does no harm.

 

There is as much reason to read that as individual sessions within a meet as a meet itself.
Before the adjudication the assumption among the teams was that it referred to sessions not races.

 

. I'm not actually one for conspiracy theories, but I make an exception for F1 and anything Bernie touches.

Did you watch the press conference with Vettel?. He almost laughed ...

Remember F1 stopped being a sport at ALL when the teams started getting TV money. IMO Bernie and his crew should get a management fee, the FIA should get a slice to fund driver development programs and non-F1 motorsport, and the rest to either charities or the auto industry (instead of our governments having to bail them out). The teams should get none of this ...
Pete

 

Exactly.

Pete

 

Exactly.
David

 

Err... isn't that all professional sport period??

Bernie does get a management fee and the FIA does get a slice...

 

The company that pays Bernie owns F1 for the next ninety odd years.
Strictly speaking they own the TV rights but that's the only part worth owning.

 

Correct and we have seen the problem with Cricket with match fixing and so on.

The problem is they make more money the more successful the TV show is. Therefore the teams have a vested interest in fixing the races. Somehow this needs to change, and to be honest I do not know the answers.

As far as I am aware you never see a professional tennis player throwing a game so the final will be the dream game, thus increasing the TV audience ... ?

I think the problem is there is simply too many people making too much money out of F1. It is a cash cow and as there are so many people Bernie can always find somebody that will help with "tarting up" the TV show ... even if he has to go right down to the pit crew guy to muck up a tyre change. One solution to this is to get rid of pitstops, but that does not stop the mechanic doing something to the engine or whatever to reduce the likelihood the car finishes. This happened many years ago with Australia's Bathurst race.

So IMO the teams and their staff need to have their wealth separated from the TV revenue.
Pete

 

As long as the money keeps rolling in nothing will change.
Eventually the ham handed manipulation will turn off the fans.
When they tune out the money guys will leave.

 

Hahahaha

/thread

 

+1

The fix was in at Abu Dhabi qualifying. The result is that the WDC remains open for at least the USGP and possibly to the last race. That's all Bernie wants in the short term.

As for ending Vettel's (boring) string of collecting WDCs: I'm pretty sure the powers that be will squeeze the competitiveness out of the cans next year and somebody else will rise to the top. It won't be Vettel, that's for sure (and I'm taking bets on that one).

 

Why will next year be different?
The field was leveled at the beginning of this season but RB emerged dominant.

 

As all the conspiracy theories, the facts are not solid enough for me.

The issue of the barge boards you´re talking about I think it was in 1999. The barge boards were half mm bigger than standard. An involuntary manufacturing defect with no perfomance gain. The problem was that the ruler that the stewards used had only 1 mm divisions, so in theory they couldn´t measure a half mm difference. Lawyers! Ironically, they bought better rules for the next year and McLaren was disqualified in Brazil for the same reason. Nobody talked about conspiracy then, because it was the second race of the season and David Coulthard was a nobody.

The issue of the curfew is just not true, or not exact in the best of cases. The Red Bull had not enough fuel in the tanks, that´s measurable. I´d bet that they haven´t done it deliberately, because probably some relatively low key engineers and mechanics should be aware of the fix, and it makes Renault look like fools on TV. McLaren made a similar mistake a few months ago, and nobody talked about conpiracy back then.

If they wanted to fix it, there are better ways of doing it, like i.e, a bad pit call, or even better, asking the driver to just crash, Flavio Briattore style.

I don´t know if this is fixed or not, but if it is, then I´m quite sure that now they´re doing through the grey areas in the technical rules. They´re quite complex, nobody understands them or can see them live on tv, but can alter the balance of power in a bigger way that loosing or winning a few points here or theres. There were a lot of talks about the legality of the floor of the Red Bull, a few months ago. That floor was in a grey area, but they said it was OK, probably because the Red Bull sucked back then and the McLarens looked too strong so it was great to have Vettel back in the fight. Conspiracy again?

Re: the TV money: if the teams don´t get the money from TV, where do you think that they can it from? The BIG money comes from TV, not from selling tickets.

 

If it is being tampered with, it's being done in a lot more subtle way than it has been in the past.

I have no real complaints right now, apart from what appears to be the let off Ferrari had with working in curfew hours..? I think.

The main thing is constancy with penalties, either it be a back marker or front runner as long as it's the same rule for all, Mosley had teams by the balls, wondering if some ad hoc ruling would slam them, if they crossed him or spoke out against him, I hated that.

 

Maybe not so much more subtly but serepticiously.

 

I've been following the sport for nearly 50 years and maybe I'm naive, but I don't think so - At least when it comes to the machinations of F1. I even posted my hope that a consistent application of the "1 liter of gas" rule would silence the TFHB. The Viz warned me I was being overly optimistic.

I'll say it loudly;

There are no, none, zero, nada, conspiracies in F1 today.

Twas different when the Lunatic (both of 'em in fact) were running the show, but not since Mad Max was ousted IMO.

It's very, very, simple - The fact that the others obviously (according to the stewards) misinterpreted the rule is their problem, not Ferrari's..... The rule states they can violate the curfew up to 4 times over the course of the season without penalty. They did just that on both Thursday & Friday nights - 2 down, 2 left. Move on.

2014. AFAIK, no rule changes this year to next.

I honestly don't think Bernie gives a damn! TV figures continue to expand, seemingly regardless of the championship standings. Sure, he recognizes the importance of Ferrari to the sport overall - As do they all - That's why they never whine too loudly about the "Ferrari bonus".

Not true. TV contracts are negotiated in advance for multiple years - NBC just outbid Speed as we know. The amount they're paying is now fixed for the length of the contract - That doesn't change even if we have a year where the title fight is over by mid season - Makes zero difference to Bernie or the money pile.

Are you really suggesting they get together on Sunday morning and decide who's gonna do what? You cannot be serious!

I've said many times, these guys can't agree on the color of the sky - There's absolutely no way they're fixing races. Simply not possible. There really is too much at stake for such shenanigans.

Again, you can't be serious, surely? You're suggesting Bernie goes to visit the guy on the left rear at Mclaren (for example) and bribes him to **** up? Really? They all occasionally make mistakes - Nothing to see here.

I'm sorry, but what "ham handed manipulation"? It's simply not necessary these days - We're having a fantastic season - 8 different manufacturers and 10 different jockeys have won at least once. The mid field is as tight as it's ever been. Damn, even the minnows have their own little battle going on at the back [FWIW, Marussia are now ahead of Caterham - A *big* deal to them.....] The entire field is separated by the smallest of margins. Early on, the tires (that they asked for btw) gave 'em problems - But they each had their turn at struggling. Then it seemed Mclaren had it figured out. Right now it's the Cans turn to be on top.

No manipulation or race fixing required. IMO, anybody who believes that is a fool with no understanding of the sport. Sorry.

As for Seb's penalty; Completely consistent application of a well understood rule - Outside of force majeure you've gotta drive the sucker back to the pits and let Charlie syphon a liter of gas out. The stewards studied the telemetry and indeed found a case of FM (They obviously don't detail what it was). If they'd had just 150mL more gas in the sucker they'd have got away with it.

Changing the car so it works better when at the back is nothing more than smart engineering - Seems the TFHB want to believe that somehow starting from the back gave him an advantage..... I *guarantee* that given the choice they'd have rather started second than last.

Cheers,
Ian