Allow me to condense..... Nearly 90% of Formula 1 fans want the sport to be more competitive, according to a survey conducted by the Grand Prix Drivers' Association (GPDA). More than 215,000 fans from 194 countries took part in the survey, which ran for two weeks following the Monaco Grand Prix. Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen was the most popular driver, while 60% wanted refuelling to return. GPDA chairman Alex Wurz said the most striking result was a lack of new fans. "We know that refuelling is probably not the answer to increase the action on track," Wurz told BBC Sport, "because we have other data from the teams. "But it is interesting that we have people who followed F1 for the first time in the 2000s, when there was refuelling, and they hark back to that era as the best - as all of us do for the times we first became interested in a sport - and there are no new fans to counter-balance their views." F1's stakeholders have been considering reintroducing refuelling, which was banned at the end of 2009, but this is likely to be overturned at a key meeting on Wednesday because data proves it reduces the amount of on-track overtaking. Other key findings of the survey were: - After Raikkonen, Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button were the next two most popular drivers - Ferrari was the most popular team, followed by McLaren and Williams - 32% of fans said the 2000s produced the best-looking cars, with the 1990s the next favoured era for aesthetics at 20% - Ayrton Senna was voted the most popular driver ever, followed by Michael Schumacher and Alain Prost - 88% said F1 needed to feature the best drivers in the world, but only 45% thought it did - 74% said the rules should be relaxed to allow greater diversity of cars and technology and 73% said the sound of the engines was important - 80% wanted more than one tyre maker - 60% said in-race refuelling should be reintroduced - 86% wanted the drivers to be more open and honest with the fans - More than half of respondents were between 25 and 44 years old, with an average age of 37 and more than 75% had been following the sport for more than 10 years. - Twitter was the number one social media outlet for F1, with Button the most followed driver among respondents, even though both Lewis Hamilton and Alonso have more followers overall Wurz said the GPDA would now spend some time analysing the detail of the data before meeting to discuss the findings and the next steps at the Hungarian Grand Prix weekend on 24-26 July. A total of 217,756 people took part across 194 countries, with the UK, France and the United States the top three respondent countries. The respondents voted F1 websites as their number one source for fan information, with 55% picking that medium and only 50% television. And more than 50% of respondents said they had stopped watching races live since the sport moved to pay television.
I find it interesting & watch. One has to pay close attention or you'll miss the action when & if it happens. If they'd have the drivers get out of the cars at pit stops & run around the cars 3 times it would improve the show. Better yet have the drivers change their own tires. Yep that's it!!! Bernie feel free to use my ideas.
I still watch, I like the current engine formula in principle and I'm not going anywhere. That said, I want fewer rules regarding the cars, and I want an exception given to Renault and Honda to allow them to develop competitive power units. Less "kicking a team while it's down" penalties for changing their defective engines. Mercedes has proven the formula works, now relax the rules so the others can figure out what they've done.
The relaxing the rules part is fine, but it all comes down to the money....the smaller teams cannot compete on that level, and the competition shows it. You relax the rules and the costs will go thru the roof. I'm not a big fan of spec series racing on this level, but how would you make it competitive money wise? I would love to see a simple formula, car has to be this size (fit into a prescribed box), weigh this much and be open wheeled, other than that - go for it! But again, the costs would start to resemble NASA - the space program, not the race series!
What we're seeing on the engine penalty side looks to me like a result of the dreaded Law of Unintended Consequences. We all know, but forget, those rules were meant to stop manufacturers building engines good for only one or a few races. The thought was that if the engines last longer, less engines would be used and this should be much less expensive, esp. for teams needing to buy them. The first obvious unintended consequence was probably predicted by some of the engine manufacturers. No one would be satisfied with an underperforming engine, and developing a reliable engine with anything near the performance levels they'd come to expect is an expensive endeavor. So, has the rule had an unintended effect opposite to that for which it was designed? The second obvious unintended consequence is what we're seeing this year with some teams suffering from ridiculous and repetitive penalties already before the halfway point in the season. Remember, it was nothing like this last year during the very first season running these complex new power systems. Two completely unexpected things happened in this second year. 1 - A previously successful engine manufacturer, Renault, redesigned their underperforming engine and now it's also unreliable. 2 - A new contender entered F1, Honda, with a surprisingly underdeveloped engine. I'm sure no one involved in development of the new engine rules expected them to have the sort of impact we're seeing now. The rules had one intent, to force the manufacturers to design in reliability. In hindsight now it can seem like those rules were destined to cause these unfair results but I'd bet most of those rules makers, if not all of them, are unpleasantly surprised by these completely unexpected and unintended consequences. They were trying to deter manufacture of unreliable engines and didn't anticipate accidentally poor designs. Personal opinion here. This is yet another example of what happens nearly every time F1 tries to develop a new rule to solve a perceived problem. They're rules happy, and they don't spend enough time war-gaming potential outcomes. No one is able to envision every possible outcome but that by itself should be sufficient reason to hold back. I think every time the Strategy Group or whoever writes a new rule the teams should be allowed (and required) to repeal one. A group consisting of one rep from each of 5 teams, selected randomly, convene to nominate 3 rules for deletion, then ALL teams get one vote and ALL votes carry equal weight. Make that 2 deletions for every addition for the first 5 years. I know, it's too simple minded and ignores the fact that most rules changes are just that, changes, rather than entirely new additions. I don't care [/rant]. They also ought to consider this year as penalty enough for Renault and Honda and allow them a window for further development.
Get rid of DRS and push to pass!! let them use either gas or diesel engines, no hybrids! And bring back flat bottom cars.
I know that they are trying to reduce coust in F1 so why not limited the budget. Just make a rule that you can only spend X amount per year for testing and the races. Make it an amount that all the teams can afford. Then unleash them to make the car they want. I want to see cars that are on the edg and drivers showing there talent. It's not fun to see one computer controlled car pass another one because the one behind gets to us DRS! Look at old footage of the 90's where they had to take there hand off the wheel to shift. The steering wheel was always moving. You could see them working hard and showcasing their talent. I know things changes but good racing is good racing. Oh and some of the drivers need to check their attitude
"Clean Air" is such an advantage for the lead car having DRS is necessary, so much so, that it should be enabled all the time (except for the lead car), not just in the DRS zones AND if you're within 1 second of the car ahead. Let the drivers decided if they should use it or not. Maybe we can get some good racing between 1st and 2nd place. With the except of one or two races a year, watching the lead cars is quite boring, the TV coverage barely even shows the lead cars for some of the races, they just cut to the leader crossing the finish line.
MCS02, how would you enforce such budgets? It's not possible IMHO. I don't believe in going backwards to go forwards, myself......
If they went back to flat bottom cars you could get closer because of the down force this would generate. You would not have to rely on the wings as much as modern cars do. Also let them have the big wings back. Not sure but I do not believe that it would be going backwards.
Going back to old technology.....manual shifters, big wings, flat bottoms etc.... No one appreciates the amount of technology it took to get F1 where it is today, where the cars are within seconds of the old unlimited formulas(relatively speaking) while using half the fuel and tires that are only good for 30 miles or so...... Has it made for a better show - probably not - after all, people just want to be entertained....lurid slides, banzai passes with the brakes almost on fire, hands sawing at the wheel..... Nope, while I'd prefer the cars to be a bit more equal, I'm perfectly OK with the new technology given the limitations imposed by this formula. I also think it's fundamentally impossible to limit the amount of money spent unless you're running a spec series, and even then..... I do like the idea of having the drivers control the DRS without limit....I'd like to see what if anything that would do for a race......
I'm worried that if I stop watching (at least recording it on my PVR), I'm going to stop watching F1 altogether. Seems the results have already been determined, probably after the first race of the year. However, by watching, lots can be learned by looking at the cornering lines, passing maneuvers, etc.... Now if I could get a DRS boost to work on my MINI, that would be great with me.
Remember when they went to active suspension? It was a bit to much, so they got rid of it. I just believe we are at the same spot agin.
Yes, but that's different than going back to the previous formula - in this case they simply eliminated a tech.....that's not the same - they didn't insist on steel or aluminum control arms as the cars had before, for example.... I do understand your point, but I think forward is the right way to go..... At some point they may eliminate the MGUK in the interests of the show for example, but I doubt they'll go back to pushrods or flathead engines. I think they should have very specific rules for overall dimensions of the car, open wheel, and maybe how much fuel it can use in a race, then leave the rest up to the teams. That's when we'd see some real innovation and forward thinking, much like we did in F1's heydays. But that would result in a spending frenzy like we've never seen before.......but maybe instead of spending billions on motor home hospitality suites and jet planes, the money would go into the cars. It might also help if they'd stop paying the drivers $50 million a season!
Yeah, we already have the "drag" part down, now if we could get the "reduction" part to work with just a push of a button! :biggrin5: