Formula 1

[Howardh]

Radio 5 is the way forward. I agree the racing has been quite dull but Hamilton has a bit of pressure from his team mate ( and he doesn't like that!) and Ferrari surely cant keep making cack handed strategy calls!

Following a live blog (ie the Guardians) is a useful addition!

 

[DarloRich]

Following a live blog (ie the Guardians) is a useful addition!

does my head in. I would rather listen otherwise it is like watching football on teletext

 

[Pakenhamtrain]

I switched off last night 33 laps in. You see more action on the freeway then on the race track.

 

[robk23oxf]

Ferrari are a great team but they can be really amateur sometimes. Ferrari need to sort themselves out or Mercedes are going to have an easy season. I watched the Spanish GP but from 3pm I was also watching the Blancpain GT 3 Hours of Silverstone which proved to be much more entertaining and unpredictable. I highly recommend Blancpain GT (both the sprint and endurance races) and the races are streamed live on YouTube.

 

[LOL The Irony]

and Ferrari surely cant keep making cack handed strategy calls!

Are you sure about that?

 

[DarloRich]

Are you sure about that?

hence surely They seem so amateurish. "Fernando is faster than you" is the answer

 

[Strat-tastic]

I'm surprised people are happy to pay for this.

It's a race but you can't overtake very easily.

It's a race but you can't go as fast as you can because you need to look after your tyres.

It's a race but you can't go as fast as you can because you need to look after the engine et al to last for a number of races.

It's a race in name only. Make it a proper race; make it worth paying for.

Me, I still watch it on C4 partly because I am a Hamilton fan and want to enjoy his career while we have it, but paying for it? You have to be kidding.

 

[Howardh]

Dunno what can be done to make races more interesting. I enjoy them most when a top-tenner has to start from the back of the grid and wind his way through. Maybe once the top 8 or 10 places have been obtained through qualifying, their positions should be drawn at random?

 

[Howardh]

I switched off last night 33 laps in. You see more action on the freeway then on the race track.

Wigan or Deane Road in Bolton in the evening when the local chavs are driving their hired hi-perform cars to the max.

 

[LOL The Irony]

hence surely They seem so amateurish. "Fernando is faster than you" is the answer

Ferrari's strategy seems to follow someting like this

They seem to just be shafting Leclerc for Vettel despite the fact Leclerc is faster. If Gasly gets better or replaced during the summer break, I can see Red Bull coming second.

 

[Groningen]

Today in the Dutch newspapers. The Spain GP will be gone and replaced by a GP in Zandvoort, Netherlands first weekend in May next year.

Problem is how to get there 50.000 people by train. With nice weather there are 4 trains an hour each direction. That needs to be increased to 12, but even with 8 the power supply of 1.500 Volt cannot handle it. Also the platform is on 8 to 10 meters wide with a small refreshment store in the middle with only 2 tracks.

There are hotelprices going over 10.000 for 2 nights and even now no payable is available in the area.

All this is NOT official/done deal!

 

[LOL The Irony]

All this is NOT official/done deal!

Good. It'll be a crap circuit that we're only going to because of a driver being replaced by another crap circuit we're only going to because of a driver. Zandvoort isn't suitable for F1.

 

[robk23oxf]

I went to Zandvoort last year for the WTCR. There was a good turnout but probably because Max Verstappen was doing a demo run in a Red Bull F1 car. As nice a circuit as it is, it just isn't suitable for the large crowds that F1 brings. I went on the train which was very busy, I may be wrong but I think they were running extra trains between Haarlem and Zandvoort?

 

[90sWereBetter]

On Saturday night I watched a thrilling IndyCar race on Sky Sports, where the eventual winner went from 7th to 1st in the final 15 laps, a driver for a part-time team finished 3rd and another driver got his first ever top-five finish, having never finished higher than 12th since his debut in 2018.

On Sunday afternoon I'd mentally checked out after lap 5, and gave up completely after lap 25. This is by far the worst F1 season I've watched, and I remember watching 2002 and 2004. I'm so bored of the other nine teams being consistently awful. They should be ashamed of their performance.

I really can't see F1 lasting too much longer unless they seriously consider spec cars like Formula E and IndyCar. The entire thing's a money pit, and Mercedes are far too entrenched in the sport to seriously affect them with rule changes.

 

[JohnMcL7]

I really can't see F1 lasting too much longer unless they seriously consider spec cars like Formula E and IndyCar, or somehow we get a crazy awesome season like 2003 or 2012 again (the two best F1 seasons in my lifetime). The entire thing's a money pit, and Mercedes are far too entrenched in the sport to seriously affect them with rule changes.

I thought that as well years ago but a lack of racing doesn't seem to have stopped or slowed down F1 at all, before Mercedes were on their winning streak there were a lot of very dull races with Red Bull dominating instead. I think it was after the COTA race last year I read an article boasting about how the race demonstrated how great F1 was because it finished with three drivers from three different teams within a second of each other but I thought it highlighted what a farce it was since the three cars could do nothing apart from sit in formation. As ridiculous as a racing series sounds where the cars can't actually be near each other with tyres that fall apart and need careful management sounds, F1 is still regarded as the pinnacle of motor sport racing which many fans spend a huge amount of money to watch.

I've long since given up hope in it and continue to enjoy other series, the Blancpain Spa 24 is by far my favourite race of the year at the moment.

 

[Groningen]

There will be a GP in Zandvoort as long as there is Max Verstappen racing.

 

[Howardh]

There will be a GP in Zandvoort as long as there is Max Verstappen racing.

First weekend in May next year I think. They will need five tyres, soft, medium, hard, rain, snow.

 

[NoMorePacers]

Zandvoort sucks and is woefully unprepared for an F1 race at the minute, plus it requires a bunch of changes that won’t be completed by a year’s time. Assen meanwhile is much better prepared, has much less changes required (and those are minor) and is just a better circuit in general than Zandvoort.

 

[EssexGonzo]

I believed at the time that liberty media would be good for the sport but I'm disappointed. I consider myself a reasonable fan having attended about 20 European races in the last 10 years and watched most on free-to-air.

My interest, however, is waning. Not only is C4 relegated to highlights (and I will NOT become a Sky customer) but I feel that the sport is once again beginning to make itself less relevant once again. Yes, they're modernising and using social media but what about the core of the sport - access to a wider, more diverse audience and exciting racing? It seems only to be targeting those able and/or willing to pay for fee-based TV (even though adverts are plastered across the Sky coverage and C4 highlights), enthusiasts who buy into "technical/strategic" racing rather than on-track action and those who value social media coverage and "likes".

And on the rare occasions I've seen Sky coverage, wow! A load of middle-aged blokes in the same shirts standing in a huge semi-circle in the paddock engaging in self-congratulatory "Bantz". Ted's the only redeeming feature.

As a 50-something bloke who's been a lifelong fan, I feel left behind. I'm clearly no longer target market.

 

[Strat-tastic]

Are Sky still so far up themselves

 

[DarloRich]

Problem is how to get there 50.000 people by train. With nice weather there are 4 trains an hour each direction. That needs to be increased to 12, but even with 8 the power supply of 1.500 Volt cannot handle it. Also the platform is on 8 to 10 meters wide with a small refreshment store in the middle with only 2 tracks.

Does it not have its own station like Monza? Biassono-Lesmo station - i think this is part of the Milan Suburban railway but on race days units run non stop from the Central station in Milan to the circuit. I am unsure if they run back after the race as we spent so long wandering about after the track invasion we ended up going back to Milan via the main Monza station, which we used for the other 3 days of the event.

PS when we went to Spa it was quicker to drive home from Spa than to drive from Silverstone to Milton Keynes after the British GP! The speed was certainly higher!

 

[LOL The Irony]

Aaaand we're going to Zandvoort because of the Belgian.

 

[DarloRich]

Aaaand we're going to Zandvoort because of the Belgian.

an easy journey from the UK and much cheaper than Silverstone.

 

[Groningen]

Well it will be easier with the Eurostar from London to Amsterdam than otherwise around. And we all know why.

 

[JohnMcL7]

I believed at the time that liberty media would be good for the sport but I'm disappointed. I consider myself a reasonable fan having attended about 20 European races in the last 10 years and watched most on free-to-air.

My interest, however, is waning. Not only is C4 relegated to highlights (and I will NOT become a Sky customer) but I feel that the sport is once again beginning to make itself less relevant once again. Yes, they're modernising and using social media but what about the core of the sport - access to a wider, more diverse audience and exciting racing? It seems only to be targeting those able and/or willing to pay for fee-based TV (even though adverts are plastered across the Sky coverage and C4 highlights), enthusiasts who buy into "technical/strategic" racing rather than on-track action and those who value social media coverage and "likes".

And on the rare occasions I've seen Sky coverage, wow! A load of middle-aged blokes in the same shirts standing in a huge semi-circle in the paddock engaging in self-congratulatory "Bantz". Ted's the only redeeming feature.

As a 50-something bloke who's been a lifelong fan, I feel left behind. I'm clearly no longer target market.

It's not just the TV rights either that are too expensive, it's too expensive for many of the teams and it's increasingly getting too expensive for the tracks hosting the races as well.

 

[Strat-tastic]

Is this business model viable?
Did Bernie get out at the right time?

 

[LOL The Irony]

Is this business model viable?
Did Bernie get out at the right time?

He caused most of this mess!

 

[JohnMcL7]

Is this business model viable?
Did Bernie get out at the right time?

I agree with the comment that Bernie is responsible for a lot of the mess, there's been issues in F1 for a long time he hasn't addressed and also failed to move with the times.

Clearly one of the main new issues is media and distribution as the world is a very different place for watching video of any form, F1 is being largely relegated to expensive pay per view when now it's possible for people to watch videos bypassing the TV entirely. It's clearly not good for the sport when it's increasingly restricting who can view it.

The distribution of the costs amongst the teams is a big problem which Bernie is to blame for, the teams at the front get huge amounts of money (Ferrari always receive a large amount regardless of how well they do) while teams at the mid to back get very little money. In turn this means the teams at the front can stay there and the teams at the back struggle to ever progress and are often on the verge of bankruptcy. This is a problem Liberty Media are going to attempt to address in 2021 in an attempt to balance out the teams and hopefully improve the racing as particularly in the US, the fact that only a couple of teams and drivers are likely to win a race is seen as one of the main reasons F1 hasn't done as well as it should in the US which is a big market.

The rules are clearly another problem although not a new one either and will probably always be a challenge. Manufacturers complain that the current rules are very restrictive which impedes innovation and variety in the cars, in an ideal world it would have been good to see the move to hybrids being optional so that teams who could make it work could take advantage of it at the cost of reliability and complexity whereas the likes of Renault could have stayed with their simple V8 when the hybrid was problematic for them. Then again when you see the performance difference in the cars with restrictive rules it's likely the differences would be even worse.

Other series have managed with much more diverse cars but then they've always to try and balance the rules to keep the racing close which can work well at times but not at others leading to controversial wins like Ford's recent return to Le Mans.

 

[LOL The Irony]

Niki Lauda has sadly passed away at the age of 70.

 

[DarloRich]

that is very sad news.