How Schumacher/Ferrari changed F1

Nothing unique about the rules changes. There may have been some changes that lead to the above mentioned domination which in turn made GP racing a boring, dull parade for the last 7 or so years.

Back in the turbo days it was pop-off valves, thinner tires, engine displacement, wing size, tire compounds, fuel chemistry, etc....... Nothing new and definately not a conspiracy against the great schumi. Face it GP racing has bit hard under this domination with the rules favoring BIG BUCKS, testing, testing and more testing. Tell me, who has had the biggest budget and the largest staff and a test rack all to themselves??????

When and if GP racing returns to the level of 86, its best year, it will be fun to watch if you are a racing fan.

BTW i used to yell at the screen for alboreto to floor it, so i am an f-car fan when they are not so dominant and i see the whole thing as fair. Just not a big schumi fan and never was.

 

Rules change in F1 all the time, has little to do with Ferrari. It has a lot to do with the safety of the sport and recently with the costs: While I agree that forcing the engines to hold 2 races won't reduce costs, that is the rationale behind it.
With a tire war going on (thankfully banned by next year) speeds will always increase and hence necessitate to slow the cars down again and/or increase the safety margin of the tracks. That leads to the boring Tilke designs like Nuerburgring and Sepang where the action is 100 yards away from the spectators. It also forces constant rule changes on aeros etc.
The last element is the racing/show element: Where do you draw the line between technical progress (electronics) and driver skill (no electronics)? Also a dominating team reduces the value of the show (which it is after all), that's when certain rule changes are targeted directly at a particular team.

The ban on tire changing last year was IMHO a direct shot at Ferrari's dominance. Pretty much all other changes were just part of the regular development F1 goes through.

BTW: Read some of the early years of F1 racing: The rule changes back then were enormous and a lot more obvious. Changing engine sizes from one year to the other to eliminate or incorporate teams. Compared to those times Mad Max is using a soft hand.

PS: The recent opening of rules to incorporate additional teams is FIA's way to drive GPMA out of business. And it worked.

 

Also, when they changed to grooved tires, it served to help Ferrari as they were still on their way up.

 

The problem with this theory is that if you change the rules aiming directly at one team, you hit ALL of the teams.

When they banned turbos, they were not aiming at Ferrari, or any one team, but there was no real change in the pecking order of F1 after that.

They can make all the changes they want, but the teams that have the best R&D (and budget), and have the best drivers, rebound the best. That's why folks like John Barnard, Patrick Head, Ross Brawn, etc. get paid the big bucks.

 

The rules are changed with possibly three goals a) make it more exciting to fans b) make it safer and b) reduce costs.

I don't think Ferrari is particularly targetted. I am sure if Renault continues to dominate, then further changes will be made to their detriment.

And like Whisky said, the changes apply to everyone, the team quickest to adapt wins.

 

if you are trying to suggest that the rules be made to run older chassis like in the 70's, and early 80's... that simply wont happen, as any sort of competitive edge is lost in terms of safety, rigidity, and mechanical grip.

every team must create a new chassis just to be close to a top team (1-2 seconds off pace) then look at super agari... they are what... 5+ seconds off pace with Sato (who is lapping so much quicker then Ide since he knows the racing lines of the track that much better)

F1 cant go back to those 'glory' days because of the nature of F1

 

Ahh, Jean-Marie Balestre' is the French guy you are thinking of.

I wasn't sure Honda was 'dominating' so much that they needed a rule change aiming directly at them, because in those years, BMW dominated for a couple of years, then TAG (nee Porsche) did, then Renault kinda did, and Honda did, they took turns.
Now, if BMW or Renault would have had anything even close to resembling reliability, things would have changed a lot sooner (and Prost would have about 6 WDC's, and Mansell would have about 3).

I'm trying to figure out if it's really REALLY worth it for the teams (sponsors, owners) to put as much $$ into it as they do, it's nearly a million dollars - A DAY. That is just nuts, to me anyway.

I wonder where the logic is with the owner of Super Aguri, or whatever it's called: how do you show up to watch your team knowing full well you have the slowest driver of all time in F1 driving one of your cars - and those cars are NOT cheap. Seems to me they could find any myriad of test drivers that would LOVE to go to a drive-off the same way Jack Roush does it, and may the best person win (the seat).

Can you even imagine the CBS announcing crew describing a 3-way battle for the lead between MS, FA and Ide ? I can't. LOL