After the debacle in Melbourne, the teams met and agreed that it would be best to go back to the old style 2015 qualifying. The FIA, for some reason, did not agree and instead proposed that there be another format for Q1 and Q2 and then the old style Q3. The option, they said, was to stay with the Melbourne format, presumably hoping to force unanimity for their new idea. A return to 2015 qualifying was not even on offer. That failed to achieve unanimity and so we are stuck with the same as Australia.
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joeblogsf1 
The strategy group are losing sight of what’s best for fans drivers and their sponsors. A time will come when the worm will turn and bite them back in the backside as the teams will only agree what is best for them. Sponsors want maximum exposure in the pinnacle of Motorsport especially when the top 10 go head to head in Q3…The other problem is the fans. The whole reason for the last change to Saturday was to improve the experience for fans on Saturday by having a Q1 Q2 and a Q3. With the change to the system now the Saturday experience for all has been dumbed down…I would recommend that the old format is adopted…what do you think?
How on earth is this the ‘least worst’ option.
Even drawing grid positions out of a hat is better.
No it isn’t.
Hear hear
Spoof suggestion born of frustration for goodness sake!
I’ve got an idea. Why isn’t the grid decided by the order the drivers arrive at the track. Imagine the drama of the race after the race to as drivers rush to their waiting Lear jets to get to the next circuit on the calendar.
Twists could include the drivers actually having to live on the grid spot they have bagged, foraging for food from passing fans and spectators… Judging by the results of the first F1 fan survey Rio Haryanto wouldn’t go hungry!
Like in some Top Gear shows 😉
And on that bombshell I also become unbusy next Saturday.
How about the grid slots being determined by the amount of time each driver spends intracting with the fans on the days leading up before the race.
I am having to try really hard not to let F1 get me down at the moment. It is such a huge part of my life, with my routine planned weeks in advance to watch all the practice sessions, quali and the race. Now I just feel despondent and find myself wandering why I ever bothered.
Joe, off topic.
Monaco 2015:
Verstappen crashes into the back of Grosjean: result: 5 place grid penalty for the next race and 2 points on his license.
Australia 2016:
Alonso crashes into the back of Gutierrez: result: nothing
For me difficult to understand.
May be because he is new and seen as hot headed and Alonso has a long record of mostly sensible driving.
The Haas car went into energy recovery mode the exact moment Alonso made his move. Neither driver could have known, therefore no blame can be apportioned.
/The Haas car went into energy recovery mode the exact moment Alonso made his move. /
Source, please?
Looking through the replay of the crash, from onboard Alonso’s car, it’s clear that two things happen at the same time: just as Alonso switches sides to move to the outside, Gutierrez starts drifting towards the outside too (probably to prepare for the corner ahead), and the rear light on the Haas starts blinking (indicating it is harvesting). How much that slowed Gutierrez’ down before Alonso’s right front hit his right rear is debatable, but the car definitely was in harvest mode. That, along with Gutierrez’ slight drift towards the left, was enough to turn what was always going to be a really tight move into an accident.
Watch the in-car steering wheels. That tells the story.
One of the better aspects of SKY’s coverage is the analysis done by Anthony Davidson. He showed an overlay from the FIA data source which showed the braking points for both cars.
The accident was a repetition of Weber on Kovalinen incident a few years ago.
Gutierrez had a technical issue. Something with the hybrid system. The other Haas car also had it.
Are you sure the people at the FIA are not characters from a Pink Panther movie. Totally Insane!!. I wonder if any have the surname Dreyfus.
That’s D_O_O_F_U_S 🙂
J’accuse!
A very concise article. Elegantly showing the stupidity!
The biggest problem with this qualifying format is the lack of the softest tyres as teams had to make their tyre choice before the new qualifying was introduced. It left teams like McLaren in Q2 and Ferrari in Q3 without the fastest tyre to set a time on so they elected not to go out again.
Let’s do a new selection process and give them more sets of tyres for qualifying and see what will happen then.
How would you roll back time and allow this new set of requests make its way though production and shipping? When we get to Spain things will have worked them self out. But obviously in feature the sport should try to ovoid last minute rule changes.
Since Bernie apparently believes it possible to return to the halcyon days of the 1970s, when you could knock up a tub in your Sheds, buy a Hewland, blag a DFV off the Chicken of Bicester and go racing, he must have a TARDIS tucked away at Biggin Hill. Admittedly you’d have to rent it but with the workings of compound interest that shouldn’t be a problem.
I wish Mr Larrington!! And so much better than the death by a thousand cuts, that is being endured at present.
For me, it is time to go back to the future, when 1952/53 saw of a collapse, and the rebirth that grew to become the days of great motorsport that i grew up with. The only part of that time that i don’t miss, are the deaths and severe injuries, other than that it really was way better than the mess of greed and bling of today.
If the sport carries on in this fashion, with imbecile decisions like this, the loss of free to air TV in the UK will be a moot point!
One advantage of watching it on C4 was that they could edit out the last 5 minutes of Q3!
Hi Joe,
Can we start some kind of partition?
The FIA are saying they are doing it for the fans but I think all F1 fan spoke loud and clear that the new quali format was a huge fail.
Who better than you can reach these people with what the fans really want
Keep up the great work
Paul
As Joe explained, this has nothing to do with the fans, and everything to do with money and power. Therefore, a petition from fans would be utterly meaningless to these people.
In fact, I am willing to bet that they are 100% aware that fans hate it, and will continue to hate it.
They just don’t care though.
Yes. I’ve started a partition between my lounge chair and my television which should be in place by Bahrain.
Joe,
This looks like a call for “The Mole” to come out of retirement, even if only on a consulting basis? Please check in with him. It would be great!
“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.
“You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.”
And what’s more . . .
The grin remains but
The cat has long since departed.
Hence F1’s woes.
I know it’s a different part of Charles Dodgson’s work but:
“‘It seems a shame’ The Walrus said, “To play them such a trick’
Since we have brought them out so far and made them trot so quick.”
No prizes for guessing who is playing the Mad Hatter in this charade!
I think its time for F1 to move forward and live the FIA behind. Why not create their own self-regulating body? Who gives FIA these god-like rights? Yes, I know that the FIA adds some efficiency etc but when it ceases to provide logic its time for change. This new format was too flawed and whoever pushed it down the throats of the F1 people really ought to go.
Insurance…..
F1 has had a massive influence in my family. I’been watching it since I was a very young teenager although admittedly gave up on it due to bad Belgian coverage with presenters that really should move to a gardening programme. I then discovered BBC. Amazing. Started following the sport again and even have been able to survive the boring Tilke train tracks thanks to looking forward to Spa, Monza, Brazil,… knowing that when I was a kid I found the Hungaroring boring. They kind of made sure that the falling-asleep nature of these investments were artificially compensated by DRS and push-to-pass. Which was exciting in the seventies when a press of the button made the wheels spin up thanks to 4 bars of boost… while also risking the drivers getting a piston or 12 through their skulls.
Even my 2 year old daughter crawled up next to me in the sofa to watch F1 – erasing any depression that it wasn’t LIVE as BBC switched their programming.
This year things have changed. Sky is not an option in Belgium nor for my wallet, F1 in Dutch here has also moved behind a PayWall so I’m stuck with watching it in French. I was able to halve my frustration thanks to the rediculous qualifying format which is so stpuid that even before it was on I decided to skip qualifying and just go out and learn my kids how to drive a bike. The talent I have seems to have been passed on to them so within 20 minutes they were cycling in circles and chasing each other like crazy so the exercise of learning has already worn out and they want more, going to the playground. So we decided to just go out on saturdays and sundays for a bike trip.
This means the lack of interest in the many things that made up the sport but that have now gone, has now turned into “I will just watch the race in French after I recorded it” and while I enjoyed the last race I really can’t be bothered to watch everything and to watch it live.
I DO follow this blog and many other publications because reading about stupidity excites me and will make me excited again once F1 changes for the better.
And once I will go to a live race either because it will be exciting to maybe smell petrol and hear turbo’s in 2050 when F1 is still running in relatively prehistoric time while we are blasted to other locations autonomously transported in ion-electron pods – or because I just want to have a meet and greet with some guys to smack them in the face with a titanium rod.
When I was a child, CBC’s (BBC) F1 highlights were longer than those on Radio-Canada (in French). It was the best-possible motivation fo a nine-year-old to learn English.
Rearrange the following words to form a well known phrase or saying: ARE CHARGE ASYLUM IN OF LUNATICS THE.
Hi Joe,
At the risk of stating the obvious, I’d be interested in the FIA’s reasoning for why they didn’t agree with the teams view on qualifying, and why they wouldn’t offer the 2015 style qualy as an alternative.
As a long time armchair fan of F1, the current format is so saddening, it just seems to remove the element of team and driver rushing out to have that last ditch effort on improving a lap time. For me that was the appeal of qualifying. The elimination format appears to remove variables rather than add anything.
Happy to be proven wrong by the FIA however 😉
These things often take time to bed in and if here is anything social media is good for its a huge knee jerk response and ‘OUTRAGE!!!1’
Whilst it seems, from what you wrote of teams predictions in Australia, that this does not seem to be a case of ‘oops we simply got it wrong’, like with other rule introductions do you not think that teams may adapt here and we may see the format improve as people exploit it?
Clutching at straws perhaps, the new concept is interesting though and perhaps just needs tweaking (Tyre number review, cars just need to start their flying lap before the timer goes out etc) as opposed to completely binning off.
Joe, was there any truth behind the reports that Force India were against changing qualifying back to its original format?
You really could not make it up!
and ………………. I wondered why Nico’s Champagne in Melbourne didn’t behave like proper Champagne ………………. because Bernie sold the rights to a Fizzy Wine Company.
Is nothing sacred ?????????????
Collectively, the CRH and FIA must literally be living in a champagne and foie gras bubble where the dress code is blinkers and earplugs. The move to pay-per-view and the shambolic qualifying malarky combine to show them up as the self-serving, out of touch clowns that they are. The only way that I can see any sense prevailing is if the teams put their collective feet down and refuse to race until sense prevails – there needs to be a coup d’ etat.
I haven’t seen many qualification sessions since about 2012, as they have become too predictable and before that they were as well, but my remaining level of enthusiasm for motorsport and my loyalty to it, resulted in me watching ever more tedious qualy sessions until i more or less stopped. I may have watched 2-3 last year, i didn’t see Oz, so the fact that qualy is now totally stupid won’t bother me.
Sadly the fact that F1 is going away from the end of 2018 won’t bother me either, as i expect i’ll still be able to read about it from Joe, and truncated stories in Motorsport mag.
When are the teams, owners and drivers going to wake up to the fact that this part of motorsport is now heading toward the ever diminishing white spot that the old tv sets used to have when turned off?
At the present time it is lucky for Joe that he isn’t 30 yrs younger and just starting to carry his tent to F3 events in Europe, as the younger generation of motorsport journalists look to have little future employment possibilities!
Why don’t we make it exciting? One hour all cars.
Joe, if you could have one person to replace Bernie in F1, who would it be?
The sport does not need another single person in charge. It needs to be properly organised
Properly organized with one person at the top of the new structure or a management by committee approach?
Nothing works by committee. Why? because Humans are “blessed” with a little thing called Ego
Every non-tiny enterprise that works right works by committee… when everybody on the committee has their own set of responsibilities and authority… it’s just that we usually don’t actually call them committees unless they’re powerless to do much of anything….
Joe, the first two sessions seemed to work okay (apart from the teams making a number of errors with timing). I think maybe if they need want more excitement in Q3 is to do what V8SC do and have a top ten (or whatever) shootout, whereby the slowest going through to q3 in q2 goes first and the fastest goes last, they could even make it so an add break could be easily schedueled between the first and last 5 doing their laps, great for TV! This would also incentivize doing decent laps in Q2. You could also get pirelli to give everyone a set of ultrasoft tyres for q3, so you wouldn’t be chewing into the tyre allocation.
The only way that I can see the aims of more track action & excitement that they’re looking for is to give all the cars special qualifying tyres. ‘These’ qualifiers wouldn’t be the one lap wonders of old, but tyres that could last through all three sessions without any degradation.
The next thing is that all cars would have to run mandatory amounts of fuel so that the cars could also run at (their) full speed throughout the three sessions too (and no light fuelling to improve lap times).
Then, whichever car/driver combination can be the fastest on this specification will be on pole, and the slowest will be at the back of the grid.
Of course my suggestion will still lead to false results, and teams would soon come up with special fuel burning strategy in the engine management systems to help their cars run lighter, but I do feel that it’s (slightly) more sensible that what we have at the moment.
The politics are so much more entertaining than the qualifying and racing.
Us Yanks have Trump, so yes we have entertainment at the moment.
What a mess, have none of them actually gone back and watched the qualifying hour again?
As was widely predicted ahead of time, most of the teams saw each session as a one-shot affair, with the tyres only lasting a lap or two and fast pitstops not possible because of the slow refuelling in the garages. The only way the session would be good to watch would be if the teams all fuelled up for the whole session and went out on tyres to match – but of course that only works if they all do it, as taking the one lap option with soft tyres and low fuel is faster!
And this all happened with short lap (<90s), on a dry track and with no incidents during the sessions. What will happen at a wet Silverstone, Spa or Singapore with a red flag in the middle of the session, that will be anything other than a complete lottery??
My final point would be that the whole thing confused the hell out of most of the TV commentators, how on earth is the average Joe who paid $100+ to actually go there supposed to follow what's going on?
Agreed. The FIA clearly don’t understand the magnitude of the tyre drop-off and the fuel weight on lap times. Even in past sessions where the cars stayed out on the circuit, they tended to alternate between quick and slow laps to manage tyre temperatures and harvesting energy for the hybrid system.
This qualifying system might work for touring cars which are much heavier and so have a lower fuel effect, and have far more durable tyres. It cannot work for contemporary F1.
If they really do want to do it, they’re going to have to ban refuelling and tyre changes during each part of qualifying, and bin the rule about starting the race on the fastest set of tyres on Q2, which was always a stupid rule when first introduced (for Q3) and has got more ridiculous as other changes have been made.
Madness it’s like they are using Qualifying to hide the real problem. The Sky monopoly of F1.
The best qualifying format from a pure racing perspective is the one hour free for all. It may not be best for TV but its best for racing but OK this was changed for TV.
One lap qualifying didn’t work because drivers with an edge on a single lap benefitted too much, think back to Trulli and how he qualified in comparison to how he raced.
So the Q1 – Q3 format provided a compromise between the two and provides the best of both worlds.
Why on earth change it at all?
This is what happens when you have too many Indians and no Chief. Everyone is in stirring the pot to justify their own existence in the governance of the sport.
It’s truly ridiculous.
I for one will never watch this new format, ever, if it goes on. It was f’ing stupid.
It won’t happen but F1’s overlords deserve a season of empty grandstands in response to their utter contempt for those still willing to shell out a small fortune to attend a GP.
The trouble is, it’s the circuits that will suffer not the “F1 Overlords” if this happens. The circuits have already paid their (not so) small fortune to the leeches…
One can’t get upset until one knows what the other proposal was.
And if the other proposal was awsomesauce, then people may get upset at the people who nixed it rather than the FIA.
Didnt Bernie and Todt give themselves some kind of mandate to fix the world a while ago?
Could all of this be some kind of manovering on thier parts to raise some kind of justification for them to use said mandate to be rid of the Strategy Group and wrest total control back to themselves?
The structure does not allow this. It needs the regulator to stand up and make some tough calls.
Their proposed format would probably be quite good. It wouldn’t be all that different from the 2015 style, would it?
MotoGP qualifying seems to work well and gives spectators at the practices and TV viewers (OK, pay for BT Sport in the UK, but it is relatively inexpensive compared to Sky) an opportunity to see the bikes try for a qualifying style lap in order to ensure inclusion in qualifying 2 for the top ten based on their fastest lap in the 3 practice sessions. As I’m sure most know, qualifying 1 is a time limited session for the rest of the field to sort out their grid positions and the fastest 2 go through to Q2 – also time limited, to join the fight for the top 12 grid positions. The riders get baulked by traffic, have technical problems, crash and the weather sometimes plays a part, but it usually works out that the fastest riders are at the front having earned their positions, which is as it should be.
In short, the beatings will continue until morale improves. Yay.
Joe – you say the proposal to go with Q1+Q2 new format and Q3 original format did not reach unanimity. Do you have any idea who the voices of opposition were?
I understand Force India said they would not vote no if they were the sole voice of opposition, and even then would only vote no against the entire thing.
I can’t see how anybody in the F1 Commission could possibly object to at least reverting this for the disastrous Q3 we saw in Melbourne.
Does F1 kill itself? Medicry all the way. First chenged smthing what had not needed to change and now keep it even though vast majority of fans hate it. Rip f1
Here’s a thought; how about just open the pitlane for an hour on Saturday afternoon. At the end of the hour, the fastest driver is on pole. All of the other grid positions are determined by laptimes as well. Nah, never work…
Why not encourage more running by bringing more tires. This would encourage more running which is always good for the show. They can be shipped by sea in an ecological manner and later recycled.
More product is good right?
I reckon it’s all a cunning plan from Bernie to devalue the sport (silly rules, 3 subscription viewers in the UK etc etc etc) to such an extent that even I could afford to buy the TV rights from CVC (I understand that CVC are all about returns on their investment and F1 is the same to them as a can of baked beans, no problem – they are in business)….. but I have followed F1 avidly since Gunnar Nilsson days and I could pay the annual Sky subscription if I chose to but let’s face it, nowadays the off-track stuff is often more interesting that the races, (am I the only person who sometimes falls asleep during the races? Why pay hundreds of pounds a year for that privilege? Maybe that’s why C4 have such an annoying jingle – to wake you up before the ads). I’ll still read the race reports, Joe’s blog etc, buy my Autocourse each Christmas and the blu-ray season review – but I reckon I’ll keep my money and spend more time walking the dog, mowing the lawn etc. I wonder if Ron and Frank will say that’s enough for us and concentrate on other things. Maybe they can sort it out and get back to sport that we love. Well it was nice whilst it lasted….
No I don’t see that
Hi Joe, thanks for reading this and also for taking the time to reply. I know you care deeply about this and are much, much closer to what’s really going on than us mere mortals. So that I can understand your reply, can I ask why you say “No, I don’t see that”? Are you referring to Ron and Frank saving the day? I can’t see Jean Todt jumping in at all… Kind regards, Tim.
Ron and Frank are not going to save the day.
Hi Joe
Bernie’s strange antics have been bugging me for some time.
He is no longer his own boss ,he is an employee of CVA and as such,especially after the German court fiasco is clearly doing as he is told.
BUT he is talking it the business down at every opportunity. Not to mention the TV pay wall issues etc
This guy knows which way is up he knows it’s wrong . My father and his business colleagues would , having sold a business they created ,would buy it back and re sell it numerous times each time making more money.
So I feel that he is trying to do this with the backing of Deitrich Matechitz and others or he has gone senile !
It’s the only way I can make sense of it.
John
I used to think The Bolt was running down F1 (I wont call it a sport) so he (or a friend more like) could get it cheap. But I don’t think entering into a multi year contract with Sky is one of the things to do if that is your intention.
To me it’s just a case of doing what he needs to do to stay in control.
Some people think that F1 and other things — like American politics — are resilient and can withstand years of bad decisions, but I’m not so sure anymore. I think that you can go down the wrong path so long that you eventually lose your way and can never find your way back. And, when that happens, you become repugnant and, much worse, … irrelevant.
Perhaps F1 and American politics are simply cyclical and will right their ships before they capsize. I would very much like to be optimistic about this, but it’s difficult right now.
My idea for new qualifying: 1hr countdown clock. Slowest car (based on previous race) starts first, staggered starts every 10-15 secs. No pit stops allowed in the 1hr session (no refuel, no tyre change, no radio strategy). Whoever goes the furthest in the hour gets pole. Essentially a mini race with no pit stop strategy, with faster cars forced to overtake slower cars ahead.
366 contributors have chipped in on a previous comment thread here about F1. Fans are upset and this is a fine place to talk. Thank you, Joe.
And by popular vote the new President of the FIA is……………………….
Boaty McBoatface!!!
I wanted to complain but my thoughts snowballed into a far too long potential post. So I’ll be nice and say that in spite of F1’s governing bodies, Australia was a hell of a race.
Its always the same when a dictatorship is coming to an end! History has shown that the citizens become unrestful and start probing for any weakness at the seat of power. Just thinking back to when General Franco left office, must be many other examples. If the dictator does not learn from history and goes quietly, with a succession plan in place, then there is certainly going to be a bloody revolution.
Clearly we don’t know the game plan, if indeed there is one, but its all to silly for more words.
Oh dear……..cock up by comittee.
Has anyone got some advice on how to block out all the negativity around F1 these days, whilst still being able to keep up with the news? Because it’s starting to make me angry and depressed. If I can just managed to focus on the on-track action then F1 is not really in that bad a place as people like to say IMO.
Did it ever cross your mind that this so-called negativity is because this sport you claim to love is being destroyed by a bunch of suits? If you really loved it, you would be fighting too.
He didn’t say he loved it.
F1 is my favourite thing in the world and I spend a significant amount of time and money following it, hence my sadness at the moment.
Well I’m very please to hear your sadness is only temporary and may have already passed.
I was at the GP last week, and to be honest, I really enjoyed the first two sessions – the graphics at the track could have been better (we were relying on the commentary to know who was in the drop zones.
Maybe they should look at one long knock out session until there are five cars left, Then give those cars an extra set of the softest tyre and have each do a 1 or 2 lap special with the fastest car from the first session having the choice of when they want to do their run.
I haven’t seen too much on the noise, but they sounded a heck of a lot better then when I last saw them in 2014 🙂 and the lap times looked pretty good.
Who benefits from this? Work that out and we’ll meet at their house/yacht/private hanger with pitchforks…
I find all of this BS is really tiring and depressing. In the twenty years I’ve watched F1, this has to be the lowest point overall. It seems clear to me that someone, somewhere is trying to devalue the sport for one reason or another, and they are winning big time. I just can’t think of any logical reason for all of this confusion to be happening. Anyone with the least amount of common sense and motor racing knowledge could throw together a better system — and not just qualifying, but the whole kit and caboodle — the entire package is a wreck. I feel badly for the teams involved, all of them are so far above the current F1 and deserve better (even Red Bull!). But as a fan, what can I do other than hope for positive changes, or even a breakaway series? I suppose I could stop watching and reading about F1, but I really do love the sport.
Ah! Breakaway Series! It comes up from time to time but never seems to get close to getting off the ground. I suspect it us much to do with the FIA controlling nearly all motorsport and they would not sanction any other racing at circuits that hosted breakaway races so the races would struggle to find venues. Maybe Joe can give us a history of ‘Breakaway’ and some insight into why it never happened and what would be required to make it happen! That could be a good read.
I wonder if the teams have the testes to sit out the qualifying the next weekend.
Easy answer. No.
Unfortunate, but an easy answer (and a correct one) none the less. Safe travels Joe.
What would be the consequences to the teams if they did discover their testes and sat out qualifying?
I fear nothing will change significantly in F1 until the whole financial model is substantially changed. And that is not going to happen while those in control continue to recieve mega payments from governments, TV companies sponsors. For these people they are probably largely disinterested in the sport and could not give 2 hoots about what the starting order for the race is. They keep track of the dollars. A breakaway series or new form of elite motor racing is probably a more realistic option than expecting F1 to reform itself anytime soon.
The first F1 race I ever watched was Monaco ’82, a real action packed race that grabed my attention as a 13 year old….in the following 33years I’ve been to F1 races in the USA, Australia, Italy, France, Belgium and about 20 or so British Grand Prix. But now I’m afraid my love afair with F1 is over, & it’s not just Bernie or the FIA it’s also the Teams, the drivers, the gimmicks, the money people, the Sky near monopoly et all.
I’m just bored with it.
I was talking to my next door neighbour yesterday. I said “you know that shambles that was qualifying in the first GP? Well they have decided to keep it for the next race as well”. No she says “they announced that they were scrapping it and going back to the old system”. “I know they said that” I say “but they have now decided to keep it”. No she says “you are definitely wrong and I heard them say it was scrapped”. I think some viewers may have a surprise in Bahrain.
Suggest all here also take a look at the latest post on Gary Hartstein’s blog. He doesn’t post too often anymore, but is worth reading. Search for “former f1 doc”.
Thanks for the heads-up. I thought he had stopped blogging and now he has! Sometimes guilty of calling a spade a shovel, but certainly food for thought from somebody who knows what he is talking about when he keeps to his subject.
The best way to help others love you is to love yourself and be true to yourself. F1 is doing neither at the moment and hasn’t for years. With so many forces pulling in so many different directions there is no way for the sport to know what it is or what it wants to be, never mind love itself. Things need to be simplified, pared back so everyone can understand what’s happening, then we will discover what F1 is supposed to be.
This format is nonsense. As long as Merc and Ferrari are at the top of the time sheets with Merc always being able to place 1 and 2 and Ferrari 3 and 4, there will be no cars on grid for a solid 2-4 minutes of the final qualifying session. The team heads even predicted that’d be the case and it was. And so it shall be again in Bahrain. So the most exciting part of qualifying in the old format (which was the best qualifying format we’ve witnessed in decades) is thrown out of the window for no good reason, yet they claim to have done this so fans see more cars on grid and more action.
Joe, is there drug testing for these F1 and FiA executives? If not, there should be. Test them to same standards as the drivers.
Sanatogen is probably legal!
Simply ridiculous. The situation is worse than I thought.
What on earth are the “powers that be” trying to achieve here? This is such a ludricous decision that the only way I can see it is as a deliberate attempt to make the whole of F1 a less, vanishingly less, saleable commodity. I thought CVC were looking for a way out so how does this fit in with that cynical strategy? I always knew these people were greedy but I always assumed they weren’t stupid as well. Maybe I was wrong?
So they have decided to keep the old arrangements of deckchairs on the Titanic…………
Off topic, but this free motorsport SIM software might be of interest to your readers:
MotorSport Manager is an app that is a SIM of running a racing team. You have to make all the decisions a real team manger makes.
The iPhone/iPad version is free at the moment on the Apple store (sorry Google users, not free on your store). Be quick…
http://www.motorsportmanager.net/
Do you expect you’ll find out who’s really behind all this nonsense, or is it likely to remain a matter of best guesses?
Joe is it possible that you could do two reasonably concise articles firstly how Mosley/Ecclestone contrived the purchase/sale of F1, secondly exactly who now controls what. We all think we know what did/does happen but I think we are all someway wide of the mark.
Were they trying to make the teams look like a cartel ?