Now that sounds like a good series, if we get everyone who doesn't like F1 as it becoming to put in some money, I am sure there would be enough to launch the series.
I have to agree with 5haz too. There should be some limits but nothing that forces standardisation.
Yeah absolutely I understand everyone has to make a living, but cost cutting shouldn't be taken so far that it begins to undermine the very spirit of the competition itself.
There are quite a few figures within F1 making indecent amounts of money, money that could be used for the good of the sport rather than going into people's wallets. For example, how can the FIA justify the ridiculous price of a superlicense while forcing teams to drastically cut spending at the same time?
Lets hope so.
But it would have to be a single focussed, well organised breakaway effort with widespread support, if the international racing community divides off in many directions then it will weaken.
I wouldn't blame the FIA for charging a lot of the super licence as drivers are willing to pay for it. That's just business. But it's also why the conditions are being set for a possible rival to the FIA. If someone else can offer teams a better product to showcase themselves then we have a goer
Indeed, I don't think the drivers are particularly willing to pay as much as they do (there has been various grumblings), they don't have much of a choice and thats why they do.
Money shouldn't be the only incentive to make the move to a rival motorsport organisation though; if a new organisation is set up I think it would be a good idea to aim to attract those who are more motivated by a love for the sport than for profit and greed, less Flavio Briatore and more Bruce Mclaren.
I think current regulations are too 'forced' and artificial, they have too much of an influence over the car design, the designers are having the car designed for them by the regulations.
A lot of great racing has been produced almost by accident by regulations, not deliberately, an example being the 3 litre F1 regulations of 1966, 1.5l forced induction was included so that entrants could supercharge their current engines and stay competetive as a stopgap, but it unintentionally lead to spectacular cars over 10 years later that the rule makers never would've imagined when the rules were laid down.
We need to distinguish profit from greed. The most generous and racer type people I have ever known have been extremely profitable business types while the most selfish/greedy person I've ever known happened to be homeless! I digress but saying you have Racers Vs Greedy Businessman isn't the reality of the situation
The fact is that motorsport as it is isn't really profitable. Teams aren't allowed the technical freedom to actually manage their finances effectively and have to end up spending millions interpreting insane rules.
You can't deny that there are some very greedy people involved, of course not everyone who makes money out of motorsport is greedy but there are some.
What I really mean is that some of the money raised by the FIA could be put to better use than simply going into wallets, especially when the FIA is supposed to be a nonprofit organisation.
It is if your name is Bernie and you hold all the commercial rights to the biggest international championship of them all.
And yeah, the rules are so narrow that teams have to make the most tiny adjustments and changes to gain any kind of advantage, which requires precision technology which is expensive. This is because they are all forced to follow pretty much the same basic design philosophy.
The biggest problem I have with Bernie is he's convinced Governments to subsidise Grand Prix. Literally burdening the public to pay for motorsport and line his pockets.
That IS definitely greed on his part, I'd agree on that. That way of working screws everyone over. It nearly lost Britain a Grand Prix because of the inflated price Bernie can now charge (Government and efficient spending practises aren't what you see together) and in the end it's probably going to force tax payers to bail out the British Motorsport Industry which is a giant waste of people's hard earned cash, and in the end screws you and everyone else over coz Bernie is getting money from your pocket!
From what I've read Bernie's other business exploits have left him in quite a bit of debt, hence him feeling the need to turn F1 into a cash cow.
But the FIA are mostly to blame for the push towards international spec racing series.
And yeah having to subsidise a Formula 1 race should be avoided as much as possible because unlike healthcare etc, not everybody wants and needs F1.
That dosen't mean to say that the government should not promote the motorsport (and engineering in general) industry in the country, right now I'm reading a news article about how MP's are calling for greater support of Britain's motorsport industry. (Lets face it, its one of the last remaining things we are world leaders in)
I don't mind funding Bernie (for now), because I'm a motorpsort fan and I like watching F1 on the TV, I can see where non-fans might have a problem.
But you could also say that I'm adding to Roman Abramovich's purse because the BBC covers football matches sometimes, but I don't mind, I understand the BBC has to put on programes for everyone and so sometimes I'll have to pay for things I don't want, but thats life.
However, subsidising and getting tax payers to pay for a Grand Prix (especially at the cost it takes to run one these days), is a far bigger deal IMO than getting taxpayers to pay for F1 TV coverage, at least then TV coverage is available to everyone with a TV set, rather than just the relatively few people who can get their hands on expensive tickets in the case of a subsidised GP.
Making a GP cheaper would be better than having to find public money to make the ends meet.
Ticket prices to be set with limits. E.g. cheapest ticket at £45 (for whole weekend), best grandstand ticket (£100 per day), paddock passes £100 per weekend.
Driver breifings to be held 'outside' (i.e. within the public access areas), so that everyone can see/hear what they're saying. Autograph sessions will be held as well.
Ticket prices will rise, in time, but only inline with the rest of the economy (and not necessarily just inflation!)
May consider the idea of driver pay caps... But then again...
However, the argument you use to support paying for F1 coverage is the exact same argument Bernie will use when attracting government funding for GPs aka "It's in the good of the country". 17 countries have already fallen for it. Silverstone is one of only 2 GP not publicly funded. British Ministers are already putting things in place to 'protect' British motorsport. This, I believe is a direct consequence of that model.
The reason the tickets are SO expensive is because governments around the world have allowed Bernie increase the price of running a Grand Prix. Governments are much more willing to spend vast amounts securing a Grand Prix coz essentially it isn't their money. So Bernie can go to Silverstone and say "X Y Z GP is giving me this much. Match it or I go somewhere else."
As you know I am wholly against the licence fee because the damage it causes to businesses just like Bernie's greed and deals with governments has done to Silverstone ticket prices.
Hey hey, I did say (for now). The way things are won't change overnight, perhaps we'll have to wait until he kicks the bucket or the men in white coats finally arrive to take him away.
And like I said, TV coverage and an actual GP are two very different things.
Price fixing without proper market analysis will cause you more problems than good. You'd have to assess supply an demand and costs involved. For all you know tickets could fall in price.
Bernie is a certain type of person. The type that doesn't care if the sport is effectively Formula Ford, as long as he is making more and more money, he doesn't care what the championship is really like.
Well I don't know about that, in some poses Herr Schumacher looks like he has a ridiculously long neck, perhaps that goes somewhat towards explaining his success?
I know, I never understood why MS likes to extend his neck diagonally-upward like an EMU or something. Especially during interviews. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZNF2lVjzuI
Hmmm. I thought it was because the current aero package produces massive grip loss when you're following a fellow racer. Sometimes I stumble on some Mazda Miata spec or other everyone-has-same-material kind of series on tv and the racing is quite something.
Same characteristics with decent mechanical/aero grip ratio = amazing racing no?
One thing I miss seeing is how the old cars were a handful to drive. I want massive power. I wanna see a driver modulate the throttle through 3 gears out of a slow corner. I want massive brakes & tires. Over-body aerodynamics severly regulated. Everything else as loose as it can be. Let the engineers be engineers. When they get to the human body limit, slow the cars down in the particular situation it reaches that limit. Not anywhere else.
Thats probrably true, F1 cars/DTM cars have a lot of downforce and are very closely matched, resulting in dull racing, BTCC cars also have a lot of grip for the amount of power they have and that is why drivers have to drive like Jason Plato to get ahead of the car infront.
Spec series are supposedly meant to showcase driver talent, but this only really happens if the cars have a small enough amount of grip that the skills of the better drivers really get to show through, in a spec high grip series such as what F1 is becoming this wont happen.
Actually, judging by the recent diffuser hole issue and the F-vent issue, I think it's really the engineers who are trying to be clever with rules rather than lawyers. Lawyers actually know the established principles of statutory interpretation (literary rule, purposive rule, golden rule, ejusdem generis, "plain meaning", etc.), whereas engineers don't. But I digress...
I used to think that mechanical grip should be increased in F1, but my thinking has changed somewhat recently. I still think that the focus of aero should be shifted from wings or over-body aero, to under-body aero. But for tyres, I think grip should be reduced, not enhanced. Wet weather races result in a lot of action because of low levels of grip, so perhaps F1 should adopt very hard tyres with low traction.
I guess you ultimately reach the same goal in either case. Grip of tyres x downforce 'multiplier' = eventual grip
Case 1. Sticky, wide tyres, wide track, very little downforce (and, to make it consistent even when following another car, generated via the floor of the car rather than winglets and vanes and growths). High grip x low downforce = x performance.
Case 2. Harder tyres (and narrower track, tyres etc), but masses of downforce. Low grip x massive 'multipler' = x performance
In the wet, with the current regs, we approach the power:grip ratio that makes it more interesting. So, without a change in aero regs, we need to give the cars 2000hp or more in engines that are more highly strung (narrower powerband, much less tractable). Or we leave them with 700hp and take away 75% of the downforce [though current F1 engines, with silly single make ECUs, rev limits and very specific regulations are so tractable that your granny would be quite happy to use on to get to the shops. Given she was told to use earplugs! So just cutting downforce wouldn't help all that much...]
Or we go silly and artificially soak the track. But artificial is no fun - I cite boobies as an example - much less fun when you know they're fake.
Edit: F3 was much more entertaining a) before the cars followed F1 down the stupid aero addons route and b) when the engines were really peaky.
And, of course, the skilled engine developer wants to make maximum power with the least amount of peakiness, to the point of asking for less power and more driveability (see Renault in F1 these days). Thus F1 should have a maximum engine displacement (2.4l, 3.0l, 3.5l... it doesn't actually matter), and a MINIMUM power output of about double todays figure. They can have lots and lots of torque and much lower revs (longer strokes), or small amounts of torque and massive revs. One will be peaky (and the better drivers will be able to do great things with them), and the other won't be (great for beginners, but ultimately slower given equally brilliant drivers). so peaky wins. Which means cars getting sideways. Which means mistakes. Which is fun to watch. Hurrah.
Downforce has to be reduced and the only way to do that without slowing the cars as much is how tristan said with much wider track and also ground effect, power has to be improved too, so it gives the car a more knife edge handling effect.
