Jesus is out... So now we have 4 pay drivers in F1: Stroll, Lafiti, Mazepin, and Zhou. In 2020 Callum Illot finished second in the F2 championship fighting with Schumacher until the end. His team mate, Guanyu Zhou, finished 6th, behind Mazepin. Meanwhile, de Vries, Piastri, etc., are out of F1. Sad...
Every year this goes on longer F2 is dying a death. Especially with their new schedule that cost them a huge chunk of viewers, where rarely anyone knows when it's on. Keep it simple: F2 at all european rounds. Stop trying to make it a global championship where costs skyrocket (pointlessly). Especially with (still!) unreliable cars it's unacceptable. I think the F2 route is becoming an idiotic career move now. It's nowhere near to guarantee an F1 seat. Spend a huge amount of money only to end up racing in GT3 Pro/Am? Unless you have the ear of an F1 team already, it doesn't really make much sense anymore. Indycar however...twice as much money to compete, but twice as many races...WAY more exposure so easier to get sponsors. Piastri is leading F2 in his first year. Won everything else in his junior career so far...and he gets an alpine test drive seat? Wow 3-4 events or so a year where he can get a session in the car, if he's lucky. Even with the budget caps in place now, this is all profit to smaller teams. F1 is broken.
There are not many other alternatives to F2. Indycar is a dead end, undeservedly, but who was the last one who got into F1 from Indy?
I think that if you asked to drivers 99% would say they prefer F1 to indycar, at least for the paycheck. Another big plus is that from F1 you can get a seat at many other places, including indycar, but not the other way around.
My statement is from a fan's point of view. Racing drivers will drive anything. It's in their DNA. Ask Mario Andretti, Emerson Fittipaldi and many others.
I think both KMag and RG have commented this yr about how their new rides are driver/racer cars much more so than F1. IIRC KMag even said F1 was like piloting an airliner on autopilot. You can't deny that Indy racing on 'road' circuits, sometimes with 4-5 cars within a few seconds of the leader, is more visually engaging than F1.
I’m sick of the ‘paid driver’ insult. So was Senna, Lauda and many others in their time. Hell so were/are LCH and Madmax, it just happens that their money came from a car company and a fizzy drinks maker. There always have been ‘better’ drivers passed over for lesser ones for a million reasons. To be an F1 driver pace and skill are only one of the requirements. The ability to generate money for yourself and your team has always been there. It’s just that an extra six zeros have been added to the tab over the last few decades. Nothing changes. And while I get questions over some of the ‘pay’ drivers out there, I really think Stroll has earned his spot. He may not be a future WDC, but I’d honestly put him in the solid upper mid pack category as a K Mags, Hulk, Gasley, RoGro etc.
Oh, and as for the one way door fromF1 to Indycar, people obviously haven’t been paying attention. If Michael Andretti has managed to buy Alfa/Sauber then Colton Herta would have been on the F1 grid next year. And despite the opinions that some ‘fans’ try and promote, there is a lot of mutual respect between F1 and INDYCAR drivers. They know what it takes and how hard it is to extract that last 0.001 of a second when it matters. Anyone still dissing INDYCAR after the stupid split just hasn’t been paying attention for the last decade as to what’s happening in Indy car or they are just too rooted in their own superiority that they believe anything with a European base has to be better than something from the States.
Unfortunately, visually engaging is exactly what Indy cars are not and because of that I just cannot watch them. They look like home built submarines with that inch-thick windshield. I really liked the cars back in the days of Andretti, Zanardi, Mansell and really enjoying watching the races then. But haven’t watched an Indy race in years now.
Look at Alfa’s move in picking Zhou from a business standpoint. Zhou brings funding (25 million?) which is only pat of it. What do you think is going to happen to Alfa’s sales in China next year? It’s going to go through the roof, Zhou is going to be a National Hero (as long as he follows the CCP line) every young Chinese is going to want to drive an Alfa like Zhou. The Chinese love Bling, Alfa needs to build special editions with the F1 livery. Expect a record year for Alfa in China.
You must be kidding, right? One thing is HAVING TALENT, and still bring money. Another thing is getting into F1 just because you are buying a seat. That being said, you are right about Stroll, at least he won F4 and F3.
In terms of road car sales, Alfa need all the help they can get. Great marque, woefully under resourced FCA manufacturer.
Any news of what GIO will be doing? Is he still a Ferrari academy driver or is that all over too? Must be tough to be given the elbow, I am sure he feels he hasn't proven his potential. Elite sports are (rightly) tough.
Gio already drove 24h lm for Af corse, i believe he would be a good chance for a ferrari drive with the hypercar....an i think he will be thinking of it.
I can think of worse jobs AF Corse have a good squad. I have met some of their drivers on Clienti events They seem a happy bunch.
F1 should allow teams a third car. put all the pay guys there. let them subsidize quality drivers It hurts F1 to have guys there that are largely there because they bring cash. I'm aware that's always been the case to some degree, and other drivers have money (Lando) or connections (Mick, Max, etc) that got them there. But F1 should be "the best of the best"
Did I write INDYCar? “Indy cars” was the generic name for cars that ran the Indy 500, hence why they rebranded the series as IndyCar after the CART/IRL wars. I even liked the IRL cars after they allowed flat-plane cranks and they didn’t sound like NASCARs anymore.
