Happy Wednesday. Interesting thoughts here about how GP's are held or should be(organized, funding etc) Enjoy Turkish Grand Prix Preview Tuesday 2nd June 2009 - PlanetF1.com The Turkish Grand Prix is one of those races like Sepang and Bahrain where the enthusiasm of the organisers to organise it isn't matched by the spectators who want to spectate. It's one of a series of races away from F1's traditional core which by now should have established a healthy audience - given that the circuit is built for excitement and overtaking. A grandstand seat at the final chicane before the start/finish straight at Istanbul would be a brilliant place to watch a grand prix. But it hasn't. And the person who profits most is the commercial rights holder who pockets the fee for providing a race. golf the organisers of the top competitions know that they have to attract big names to give credibility to their events. So they pay appearance money. They don't pay it to the European PGA, they pay it to the golfers themselves. In F1 none of the teams get extra appearance money for going to the Ulan Bator GP. They are obliged to turn up at races that aren't particularly good for their sponsors. If Max Mosley is so worried about the vital new teams then the FIA should step in to administer the awarding of new races. What they should do is create a fund for new teams from the new nations who want to host a race. If they want to become part of the exclusive club of F1 venues they need to show a long-term commitment to the sport (like Bahrain has done in investing in a team). The FIA has to sanction any new event and therefore should take its cut, leaving the likes of Ferrari, McLaren and Toyota to mind their own businesses. And speaking of Ferrari, this weekend will be the race where they show that all the late nights and long hours have been worth it by taking a serious shot at winning their first GP of 2009. Felipe Massa loves the Istanbul circuit which has a preponderance of fast corners and the four apex corner of Turn 8, the greatest challenge in F1. Last year Massa had the advantage of a car that suited his driving style and not Raikkonen's. Armed with slick tyres, Kimi has regained a lot of his exuberance (that's behind the wheel, not behind the microphone). Both he and Felipe have won at the Otodromo Istanbul and it should be a lot closer this year than last. We should also get an overtaking fest as the cars will be able to follow much closer than before. Brawn have been developing a new front wing for the race and Red Bull will be able to dial in their new double decker diffuser, Monaco hardly being the track to show what it can do. Toyota, too, will be keen to get out of the confines of the barriers and prove that they haven't gone in to terminal decline. One thing we can be fairly certain about is that discounting a miracle, McLaren and BMW will be firmly planted in the middle of the grid, unable to generate any grip in the high speed corners. It seems almost inevitable that following the grand prix at Silverstone, Mclaren will start designing for 2010. Providing the rules are going to be locked down there doesn't seem much point in assailing a championship that Norbert Haug already admits is beyond them. Likewise BMW, another team who invested massively in KERS technology only to find others could go faster without it. In fact the season has been a curse of KERS. The three teems that have run without it are leading the constructors' championship - Brawn, Red Bull and Toyota. Meanwhile Renault, Ferrari, BMW and McLaren who all invested significant amounts of their development budget and time on KERS are languishing in unfamiliar positions in the table. That Max, he really knows how to help teams save money. What is not great for those who want to throw in the towel early in 2009 is the position of KERS next year. How do they design a car when the technology might be dumped or might have a single spec adopted by all teams? Should we get more Brawn and Red Bull success in Turkey it might be a case of the majority of the grid giving 2009 up as a bad job. The consequences of not being able to test improvements on a car with the in-season testing ban looks to be that if a team can open up a big advantage, then they can keep it much more easily if the only testing is on Friday afternoon. For season-long interest sake we need Ferrari, McLaren and Toyota success and some Brawn and Red Bull failure. The chances are that on Sunday we'll probably only get one out of five. I wonder of it ever rains this time of year in Turkey... Andrew Davies
Max step in on the awarding of venues? I don't think Bernie would like that much and in that Max needs all the friends he can get right now I don't see it happening.
