I was reading Martin Brundle's interesting Q&A at http://www.itv-f1.com/Feature.aspx?Type=Ask_The_Team&PO_ID=32837 He was asked how he would fix qualifying. I quite like his ideas:
He brings up some good points. But these rule changes are getting a little out of control. The 12 lap - 1 hour format is best. There is no point in declaring the tires used or the fuel level being used. It just complicates things further for the viewers at home. The teams that do not get enough TV time ("Minardi") can either improve performance or quit! This is a competition and not make everyone happy event.
This seems to be the closest we have to a thread about the revised format. Let me say I'm glad they are doing away with Q2 on Sunday, that was a disaster. I just wish they could have kept the light tank format instead of the race fuel format, it was more natural. The race is for strategy, qual should be all about pure speed.
That is not true. F1 will always attract privateer teams. There is only room for about two or three small teams. Unfortunately we have two stupid small teams at the present moment. Both Jordan and Minardi have outgrown their usefulness and need to evolve! We need new privateer / small teams that can actually be somewhat competitive and reliable. One more thing, F1 would collapse without Ferrari. No other team holds that power.
You would not be able to watch it unless you went to the track every race weekend. That is if the track owners still wanted to run F1 races. Without Ferrari there would be no F1 TV coverage. Without Ferrari there would probably be no interest for track organizers to want to run F1 races. Without Ferrari, F1 would probably end up becomnig a spec series with everyone running on the same tires, engines and chassis. The F in F1 stands for Ferrari. F1 wold not have survived so long had it not been for Ferrari and its fans.
So wait, why is their coverage of CART & INDYCAR, they both don't have Ferrari. This argument is retarded.
Martin's ideas are interesting, but they also continue to over-complicate something that was always at its best and most exciting when it was simplest. I think all the qualifying-with-race-fuel-loads nonsense is for ****. I also question how significant the airtime issue is. Just about the only people dumb enough to watch Formula One qualifying, well, US I guess could probably recite nearly all the sponsors on the cars. And another 1:19 of TV time for Jordan isn't going to make a lick of difference when the team goes to sell itself to potential sponsors. It was smart to ditch Sunday Q2--I stopped watching Saturday's round completely. They should have unlimited laps, with whatever fuel loads they choose. This way we get to see the drivers in top form, light on fuel, really pushing it.
CART and INDYCAR are US based race series! They do not have world wide coverage like F1. This conversation is not retarded. Your ability to comprehend is!
What would be wrong with doing 12 trimmed-out 'flyers' Saturday morning (at like 11). The top time guarantees a front row spot (ala CART), and the order at the end of Q1 determine reverse running order for a race-spec Q2 on Saturday afternoon(2 or 3pm). Aggregate times would determine the grid and obviously parc-ferme and race fuel enforcement would be able to persist. As a fan, I think I would really like that.
Ok, take GP2 then. A *2nd tier* series which gets coverage in virtually ever European country. My theory is that whatever is seen as the highest level of motor racing will get coverage *everywhere*.
And my point is that without Ferrari, F1 would no longer be the highest level of motor racing. Therefore, F1 would no longer get coverage *everywhere*.
And neither will be whatever series, even the radio controlled car series, that Ferrari joins. For every Ferrari owner out there, there are two Porsche owners to 10 Audi owners to 100 Toyota owners. In case you're math skills are up to snuff, the elite powerful Ferrari following are beyond miniscule by way of comparison. Sunny
It does not take a Ferrari owner to be a Ferrari fan. Many of us here were first Ferrari fans and then later became owners. Edit: Also, the overwehlming majority of F1 fans the actually visit the races today are Ferrari fans. Somewhere in the region of 50% to 60%. An even bigger majority of F1 TV audiences are Ferrari fans (60% to 70%).
I think history proves you wrong. F1 has probably had some of its best periods when Ferrari were "one of the lesser teams". IMHO F1 was more popular in the days of Senna, Prost, Mansel (and I was too young to drive let alone own a car). When Williams and Mclaren were fighting it out. If the likes of MB, BMW, Toyota, Honda, Renault, etc leave F1, who exactly has the budget to replace them? Will 9 x Jordan and the like and 1 x Ferrari make a series? I think not.
I suppose we need to decide what we want from qualifying. Do we want it to be a pure test of who can get round the circuit the quickest? To do this they need fresh tyres and light fuel. Or do we want it to be a way of determining the grid that involves some compromise in grid position for a better race strategy? This is where the qualifying on race fuel comes in. With the old 12 lap qualifying the Saturday afternoon was often more exciting than the Sunday. I am happy for the race to become more exciting than qualifying, which is what we have now. However the modern qualifying is so dull and complicated that I never watch it! Single lap qualifying will never show who is the fastest as all the drivers will be staying within their limits. If they know they have a decent time already they will be willing to risk all to get a quicker lap and we will see some real driving.
I'm suprised nobody has kicked up a fuss about the safety implications of the single set of tyres policy.
After Australia there was some talk about that, but I think because the tires have shown to be pretty robust the issue has died away. I'm as surprised as I am glad that there hasn't been an issue with tire failure.
I don't know why there would be an issue with a single set of tires anyway, what prevented the old tires from now blowing up after 20 laps? Same exact situation, why would moving the tire life up to 75 laps somehow be any different? They just design the tire life to be 75 laps, just like they designed the previous tire life to be 20 laps.
Because its not as simple as just adding some more layers of rubber. At race conditions there are alot of factors that affect the lifetime of a tre. And the longer you expect it to run, the less certain you can be it will survive. Looking at the condition of the tires its clear at the very least handling is compromised. I'm suprised nobody has complained. For example would it be acceptable to add a bit of ice on the track to make the race more exciting? There will definately be a catastrophic tire failure due to wear. I just hope it doesn't result in serious injury.
