F***ing hell .. first they cancel Spa this year and next they take Suzuka. Why dont they take Monza and Monaco while they are at it and put some races in Abiline, TX or Afghanistan. All this crap happens at the best driver's circuits - why can't they sacrifice Nurburgring, Hockenheim or Magny Cours instead.... I hope this Fuji crap is in addition and not instead of Suzuka. Forget Foster's Grand Prix it should Mickey Mouse Grand Prix instead... BTW look at the circuit map - it looks even more boring than Indianapolis http://www.fsw.tv/english/images/guide/rc_pic.gif
Fuji isn't a bad track. Japanese GP used to be held there, but the layout was slightly different (a bit more boring than the current). But choosing between Suzuka and Fuji, there's no doubt I'd go for Suzuka.
I don't know the layout of Fuji but it will always be Suzuka for me. And I wouldn't like to see Hockenheim go but Magny Cours I could live without...you know an intelligent solution would be to have rotating circuts, you'd have half permenant and teh other half would be selected out of a pool rather than abandoning classic circuts in favor of umm Afganistan and Calcutta. But don't tell itto the Toronto people, they'll jump on this idea.
There was an article a week or two ago that said Hockenheim might just drop F1 on it's own. It's incredibly in the red after the "upgrades" and new track layout that were forced on it by F1, and they still had to pay exorbitant rights fees. They haven't been able to recoup the cost. So, the track owner's saying they can't do it anymore. At best they might share the German GP with the Nurburgring eliminating it as the European GP. I'd thought the old track was much better than the new Hockenheim. They never should have changed it.
of all the 'real' tracks in Gran Turisom 4... Fuji is the most boaring, and least visually appealing tracks in it... IMHO. the run offs are huge, it would be hard on the brakes... it seems it would be a low downforce track. there is no real sense of speed, or distance compared to the other tracks in the game..... Suzuka is much much better in the game of course, this is only coming from a persepective of somebody who has only run it virtually
Could it have something to do with the spectators and the infrastructure? I'm not familiar with Japan, but once read that Suzuka is so remote that there is only one major road leading there and on raceday it is a logistics nightmare to get to and from the track. I remember how bad Silverstone was (and to some degree still is) and could feel the pain of the people who actually like to attend the race.
I went to Suzuka two years ago (2004) and it was a bit of a pain to get out to the track. It was a nightmare to get from the track back to the hotel! The track is about five miles from the main rail line. When you get off the train there was a cab line and buses that went to and from the track. Because everyone gets to the track at different times over the morning it isn't too bad a wait. I think we waited about 15 to 20 minutes to get our cab. But, when the race is over you normally have about 100,000 or more leaving all at once! As we were at the 04 race there was a race scheduled after the F1 race. It had been rained out because of the typhoon that had hit the day before. That's another story . We weren't able to find a cab when we left. So we started walking toward the buses. They were chartered. No cab line anywhere. Kept walking... and walking... finally found a train station. The crush of people was nuts. To say we were packed into the train like sardines is an understatement. One individual a few feet from me fainted and was slowly dropped to the floor to recover. Getting out of there took a good couple of hours. But I'd heard that Fuji is an even MORE remote track up in the mountains. So, I'm not too sure that the change is based on accessibility. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Oh, and all that red you see in the stands... it was for TOYOTA. We'd heard they'd bused in a lot of employees for the race. Toyota and Honda colors and flags were everywhere. The Ferrari support paled in comparison.
