FIA Proposes Radical New Rules

IMO, a mix of good and bad. The good is tire changes again which gets away from the worst rule ever, so I'll basically accept anything that comes along with it. Let's have a look:

-A limit of 14 people to work on a car during a pit-stop, with only one team member allowed to work on each wheel when changing tyres.

Not sure what the point of this is, it takes away another of the things that makes F1 unique, but not a big deal either way.


-No 3rd cars are allowed anymore on Friday for the six weakest teams.

This is probably for the best.


-Tyre warmers will be banned.

This is good-- everyone uses them, so nobody is gaining an advantage anyway, but now the driver is forced to drive on cold tires which makes it a tough test for them and a place where a better driver can gain an advantage.


-No spare car.

Not good, could lead to a driver not being able to race, 20 cars is hardly enough as it is.


-A driver can use 7 sets of dry tyres over the weekend. The specification in qualy and race must be the same though. You're allowed to change tyres again.

THANK GOD!!!!!!!


-Knockout Qualifying Proposal

Stupid!!

 

thank goodness for the tyre changes...dunno bout the quali tho. so, finally, tyre change during the races...hmmmm

 

What does "knockout qualifying proposal" mean? Not familiar with that expression.

 

No Spare car- Thats falkin stupid, teams should be allowed backup cars. If you catch a slick track and 3 of the top guys wreck nobody is going to watch the flippin race.

Tire warmers- In F1 IMO thats a big safety issue. Those cars are skittish the first lap anyway, I can only imagine going out on true "cold" tires.

 

i dunno. i think it's a good move. anything that (a) makes the driver's use of his brain a more critical part of his success or failure, and (b) provides more overtaking opportunities can't hurt F1.

i was a pretty religious F1 viewer in 02 and 03. in 04 i got awfully bored. i've DVR'd a few of the races this year and skimmed through them.

imo, the good rule changes will require better performance from the individual drivers. less hardware and more wetware will make F1 a lot more interesting.

doody.

 

More fuel on the GPMA fire IMHO. Banning tire warmers is safety issue and that's just plain ridiculous. 7 sets of tires all ice cold WTF are they thinking? What's the rationale behind that ?

These are just proposals but it goes to show the FIA are are doing their best to kill F1 as we know it. The more I read of these boneheaded proposals the more I'm starting to think the GPMA is a good idea. And if it does come to be then the FIA F1 will be basically left with Ferrari and Midland and maybe Williams. But then again it may be such a watered down formula that privateers may be able to get back into it but who'll watch ? You might as well watch GP2 or A1GP for that matter as there won't be much difference.

 

You want drivers to use more of their brains then get rid of paddle shifts and put a clutch and stick back in the cockpit and throw launch and traction control out. drivers' aids are what eliminate the use of a brain.Doing the aforementioned will create plenty of overtaking.

 

Actually Steve Machett brought up a good point and i agree with him, i really don't like this whole no working on the car after it qualifies crap. They had to run in the wet with a dry setup and it's only a matter of time before someone gets hurt because of it. That rule needs to be scrapped as well as the one tyre rule. How much money could they possibly saved on that bit of stupidness. They also need to bring back the slicks. Tire warmers being banned is not that big a deal. The don't use them in Champcar so it's not unheard of to not use them. It would be up to the drivers to keep it on the island and i'm for anything that makes the drivers have to work for it more. Knockout qualifying just plain stupid. How about an inverted grid? lol

 

I just don't understand the rationale behind eliminating the warmers. It surely can't be for cost cutting. For slowing the cars...nope. 2.4ltr V8's took care of that. Can someone explain why, in the grand scheme of things, that tire warmers need to be eliminated.

I kinda like the inverted grid for qualifying as we saw that the last place on the grid and yet 2-3 secs a lap faster cars can storm to the front. The rain forced it this weekend and we saw the best race in a long long time. But it'll never happen unless perhaps qualifying fast yet starting at the back for the race gives championship points for the fastest qualifiers.

 

IMO the qualifying game is a very very bad idea. You don't want to turn qualifying into a bracket race of sorts, where people intentionally go slower to gain starting position. They would have to implement a points bonus based on fastest time. Just seems like a very bad idea that will really cripple the whole series.

For example. Say Kimi qualifies 1st, so hes at the back of the pack. JPM says screw it, pokes around, and gets pole on the starting grid. Now Kimi has to fight through traffic, risk getting taken out, and chase down JPM. The fastest qualifier bonus would have to be darn near equal in points to winning the race for it to be even remotely applicable.

 

How about points awarded based on the number of positions gained during the race to added to the 1st 8 finishers. Ex. KR would have gotten say 20pts today 10 for the win and 10 or whatever for going last to first. This would negate a McL out poking a Minardi in qualifying

 

AMEN brother!!!!!

AMEN!

i just assume such large-scale changes are NOT likely, so i'll take whatever little stuff i can get.

doody.

 

Here's a great article by Burkhard Goeschel of BMW. The last paragraph sums it quite nicely. Costs are going up not down because of the constant change in rules and specs and that the fans do not want standardized technologies for all teams. Give it a read.

 

I'm for more equal and larger fields.
As long as everyone plays by the same tire rules it doesnt matter, however no warmers does create another safety issue. I guess the idea is to penalise one for changing tires.
What is really needed is an aero package that promotes drafting, not destroys it as is the current state.
Penalties for blocking; its hard enough to pass the way it is. Stop and go in the pits.
Eliminating spare cars is just stupid , chit happens qualifying and practice days too.

 

Well I'll stick my two cents in:

Tire changes: we saw a lot of trouble at the beginning of the year with tires going off after a few laps, but the drivers and tire makes seem to have come to grips with making a tire that will last 200 miles again. It may be useful to rem that tier changes only came in to F1 in the late 80s, and that refulelling was essentially unheard of until 1994 when it was allowed again after a brief time in the mid '80s when Brabham pioneered it IIRC. Before then a GP was "off you go lads, see you at the end of the race." Maybe I'm just an old fart, but I didn't have a problem with the drivers starting with enough fuel to finish the race and not needing tire changes. Seems to me the pit stops are now just a way to shuffle things around in a more or less meaningless way and keep the ignorant masses entertained. I actually LIKE the fact that drivers have to manage their tires so as not to have them useless at the end.

Same goes for tire warmers: if they are not used, the tire manufacturers will have to compensate by making tires that can get up to temperature by being driven.

The basic argument for the above is that harder tires are good for racing: they men slower cornering speeds and longer braking distances, thus giving more opportunities for overtaking. The one thing crippling ovetaking this year is the aero rules that have made cars so skittish when following another car closely. The 90% reduction in downforce proposal is spot on IMO for exactly that reason.

There, that's enough to get a lot of you ticked off

I'll post more reactionary opinions later

 

Oh, and just one more thing while I'm ranting:

What ever happened to a waved yellow flag meaning "proceed with caution, be prepared to stop?"

These guys are supposed to be the best drivers in the world but we have to deploy a safety car to make sure they don't crash into a car that's off the track at one point on the circuit? I'm sorry, but if we poor club racers can manage to keep ourselves in line under local yellows, why can't the best drivers in the world be trusted to do it? Of course you'd have to revoke Sato's superlicence but then that needs to happen anyway....

 

Agreed. I can only imagine it's the result of the fear of shrapnel punctures. One of the byproducts of the massive safety improvements in F1 has been the fact that any minor contact seems to result in an explosion of carbon splinters. Although I never heard an explanation why the SC stayed out so long. The announcers said the lights were out but it ran at least two more laps! Maybe the Honda execs were at race control making sure Ralf's Toyota didn't get too big a lead

 

Agreed! now we get to see "out of the pits" wrecks. This decreases safety. If they want ot slow the cars down cut the horsepower but leave safety stuff in tact.