Still at it huh? Night racing exists to maintain viewership not to increase it. Its gimickey aspect is mitigated as much as possible. Next argument please.
Artificially wet races main purpose is to maintain viewership, not to increase it. Its gimmickey aspect could be mitigated with weather simulations and limited to a ten lap phase. Bernie isn't promoting a wet racing series where every race is run under sprinklers from begin to finish. He suggested the idea to make a few races that are totally boring (e.g. Bahrain GP) as interesting as other races (e.g. Spa with its constant threat of rain). So it is not to boost viewership but to keep the viewership at an even level throughout the season.
Yer grasping at semantic straws there. The night racing is designed to mimic day racing as much as possible. No matter how you spin it sprinkly races are designed to be artificial.
A wet phase with sprinklers is designed to mimic wet racing conditions. How is that different from an illuminated track mimicking a daylight race? You just don't like the idea. Fine, no problem. But don't call one man made change in the conditions/environment artificial and not the other. And just to complete the argument: Limiting tank volumes so teams have to refuel or demanding super soft crumbling tires so teams have to do frequent pitstops are also artificial challenges thrown into the mix to keep the show interesting. And lets not even talk about the frequent use of the safety car...
If nothing else its a bad idea because it makes F1 an even bigger laughing stock than it already is. After the abuses and excesses of the Mosley years the sport has to regain its legitimacy. The idea may have traction (sic) with a small number of the cognicenti but to the rest of the fans and to the sporting world in general its a hare-brained gimmick epitomizing just how out of touch F1 has become. J.T. must be pulling his hair out at this point.
Actually I would love to see a statistically relevant survey on this topic. It could be that the majority of race fans think this is a dumb idea. Or not. We don't know. It seems from the reactions on here that the majority does not like it, but then again there are a lot of folks who haven't commented on it: Deep down many of us enjoy some wild action on the track where cars spin out and crash (assuming nobody gets hurt of course). Few would probably admit to that primitive instinct, but it is there. A wet phase certainly has the chance to mix things up (if nothing else, somebody will get passed because he is poor in the rain <cough, no names please, obrigado>). I remember going to my first GP in 1979 on a guided tour. I loved the race and was happy on the way back until the tour guide grabbed the microphone and addressed us all: "That was a pretty boring race, but did you guys see the accident on the German autobahn?" He was dead serious and most people agreed with him and went on to discuss that traffic accident. To me that was a life lesson learned right then and there. As I said, we don't really know how popular/unpopular the idea is at the moment. And maybe Bernie/Todt don't really want to find out: Some ideas catch on after they've been around the block a couple of times. So while many might hate the idea at the moment, they might change their minds once they've seen it.
BTW: I think the whole wet race discussion is unfairly held within the Austin thread: Looking at those pictures of the 40 m hill climb right after the s/f line, I don't think this track would ever be boring. *IF* they build it, this will be one hell of a great race. With the elevation changes it reminds me a bit of the Turkish GP, which is probably the best Tilke track ever. The whole sprinkler idea should really only be applied to places like Bahrain, Budapest, Barcelona and Abu Dhabi. Then again maybe those places shouldn't be on the calendar in the first place...
I get the first vote! DUMB IDEA. Easily the dumbest idea in the history of motorsport. Do yourself a favor, you're pretty intelligent, please stop with this idea. PC modeling, weather patterns etc. This is an asinine topic, I'm disgusted that I even have to comment on this. Certainly there are more interesting topics in the world of F1 (no offense) Kevin
Now yer talkin! Add some bull dogging and use strippers instead of umbrella girls and we got ourselves a real fandango! Dale
friend of mine's brother went out there Friday for a tour. he was convinced enough to put down 200+ for a suite. I told him the intardwebs were convinced that it wasn't going to happen, he didn't believe me.
Actually no: Tavio ("I can't believe it is not rain!") started it. http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showpost.php?p=140351141&postcount=478
In that case let's agree to bury it. It seems to be in bad taste to banter about floods and such this weekend.
$200? For a Suite? I sure hope so, 'cause $200,000 'invested' on March 12, 2011 is dumb money, no matter what happens. As mentioned earlier, the Tavo and crew is still about 95% short of being fully funded.
Perhaps I assumed too much when i figured someone would take his due dilligence before putting down that kind of 'stupid money' oh well, i'm still hoping it works out.
How about this idea ..... Have events at world class tracks ! And I don't mean in high class amenities , just hard tracks with many passing opportunities and true competition ! Upscale facilities do NOTHING to improve racing ! I challenge everyone that reads this to go out this year and see some "lesser" racing , ypu just might be quite suprised on how damn entertianing some "low class" racing truely is. Hit some local short tracks , maybe even some drag races or real low class Chumpcar races ! You can even search Utube for all the above and may actually be incredibly entertained.
Somehow the first paragraph is at great odds to the second. Speed TV when it was not NaSpeedTV tried to show many forms of racing. You forgot to mention, mud racing (yawn), swamp buggy racing (yawn), dragboat racing (yawn), etc., etc., ad nauseum.
The article is a fascinating read and I start to see why there is much more involved than just building a 3 mile road. Tavio hints at a race date while beying coy. The way I read it, it wouldn't be tied with the Candadian but rather the Brazilian GP. That's actually excellent news as I don't want to go to Texas in June. I was also delighted to read how liberal, progressive and art loving Austin apparently is. Sounds like a town right up my alley. PS: In all fairness, Dallas and Houston are cool places too. Great art museums and restaurants amongst other things.
Think about it in this context: There are many many "3 mile roads" (racetracks) in the USA. Dozens of them where the track itself (in terms of speed, turns) would be suitable to F1. The problem is "everything else"... the facilities - meaning the garages, stands, runoff, ingress/egress, hospitality, transportation, everything. All of that is what separates a world class track from all the rest. And all of that is what people are glossing over when they say "I don't think it can be that big of a deal to build a 3 mile road". Consider that whatever the final cost of Austin, it would be cheaper - by definition - to start with an existing track and implement the necessary facilities. Yet not one single track in the USA stepped up. Why? It's not viable. It's not that we didn't have tracks capable of supporting F1, or that such tracks couldn't be modernized. It's that the project is a gigantic turd that not everyone has (yet) acknowledged as such. Tavo being coy isn't about the date of the race, which has already been said will be in June. He is being coy because he knows there is no Austin GP, certainly not in 2012. The money isn't in place and he's clinging to his only lifeline - to make people believe they could actually have a race there, when they all know they can't.
