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Death of Formula One

Of course I'll watch every moment of every race, but its sh#t, isn't it? Can't get worked up about 2007. Ferdy, yes. Lewis, yes. Williams, yes. Errr, what else?

A severe lack of Minardi typifies the problem. Who would have guessed just a few years ago that Williams, Minardi and Sauber would be lumped in together as the 'last true privateers'?

Max to Frank recently:
'You do realise, Frank, your business model is history? From now on its the manufacturers and the B teams'.

Frank to Autosport 'F*cking thank you! 38 years of F1 citizenship for this!'.

Its not Formula One anymore. Its a world championship for the suits.

Comments

  • somebody has to pay for those choppers... :D

    but seriously, I'm more excited about this season than about last one. Suits won't rule F1 for long if they don't know anything about F1, just look at Red Bull.
  • It will be great to be ther e when GCM moves back into the old Faenza factory with his F1 Team.
  • hope it doesn't clash with my polygamic marriage with Anna K and Adriana Lima, cause that would be something to celebrate...
  • Are STILL on about Anna K...
  • "A severe lack of Minardi typifies the problem."

    This has been the problem for a while now. Haven't been excited about F1 since the boys and girls from Faenza left. Even Webber in a Newey car and a Reggie engine isn't stirring the blood.

    "It will be great to be there when GCM moves back into the old Faenza factory with his F1 Team."

    Amen Brother..... Bring it on.
  • now to come back to topic... I think the reason that F1 seems alienating these days is that they're bit by bit getting rid of all the good tracks in favour of Tilke-designed monstrosities.
    I still don't get how someone who loves the sport could possibly get rid of Imola and Hockenheim*, just because Bernie feels the urge to race among the camels. Nobody in the middle east gives a damn about F1 apart from the Sheikh, and he'll probably realise soon that he has better cars in his garage and will get bored of it.

    Where on those new race tracks can you find spots like Acqua Minerale? It didn't get much closer between the cars and the spectators.

    *I still think that what they did to Hockenheim during the "refurbishment" was the saddest thing after the demise of Minardi, so I'm not extremely sad that they got rid of it now.

    Mark my words, Silverstone is next.
  • Will we be doing the fanta competition this year between us???? That will bring in some excitement.

    Never mind Anna K. All we want is the competition!:)
  • Normally when the suits parasitically infect a sport, it's finished. One brief flash of money fuelled excitement, then a descent into a nightmare world of predictability and fan exploitation.

    F1 may be different, in that the biggest suits of all, the manufacturers, are vulnerable to failure on track, beyond the direct impact on their racing business (and because of the astronomical cost their racing business is also vulnerable to events elsewhere). An as for what happens if the worldwide TV audience drops off significantly....F1 cannot maintain the present number of fully committed manufacturers long term.

    So it's actually Max's business plan which is built on sand. But he and Bernie'll be gone before it all collapses.
  • TV figures in the UK are awful.
  • Originally posted by forzaminardi

    I still don't get how someone who loves the sport could possibly get rid of Imola and Hockenheim*


    *I still think that what they did to Hockenheim during the "refurbishment" was the saddest thing after the demise of Minardi, so I'm not extremely sad that they got rid of it now.

    Mark my words, Silverstone is next.
    I am not a Tilke fan at all..... but the change at Imola is very nice....... one of the longest straights in F1 from Rivazzi (spelling) to the entrance to Tamburello (spelling again....'sigh) The change that should be made at Imola is to get rid of that "kink" at Villenueve leading into Tosa....one used to get guite a run on a competitor from the exit of Tamburello all the way to Tosa and Tosa became the major passing area at Imola.

    As for Hochenheim...it was a piece of #@(*&^% from the first F1 race held there in 1977 let alone what Tilke did to it. Blow the whole thing up and give Austria back its race....rebuild the Osterreichring (not to be confused with the A1 ring)...... as for Silverstone,(since this is a "wishing will make it true" segment) get rid of it as well and modernize Brands hatch which has so much more to offer than that old ex-airfield. While we are at it, get rid of Indy and since there is nothing worth a crap here in the states to hold a proper Grand Prix, give ours to Imola, or Zandvoort,............

    Viges..... so you are pro-McLaren and Williams yet you feel sad missing Minardi.....wasn't PS/Minardi screwed over big time by Uncle Ron and Frank at Montreal a couple of years ago???? very interesting......... I hope Uncle Ron and his team sucks for evermore...as for Frank, I hope he shows Toyota up big time and forces the Toyota brass to do the correct thing for themselves and just become an engine provider and establish a long term relationship with Williams Engineering....

    F1 has "re-invented" itself a number of times......and will continue to do so in the future....

    ciao
  • F1 has "re-invented" itself a number of times......and will continue to do so in the future....
    Hear, hear, we can agree on that
  • Murph, you don't really believe that Montreal bull, do you? If anyone shafted PS it was Eddie. Towards the end, Stoddie found out who his true allies were and you named them.

    Yes, F1 will reinvent itself, its just very bleak if even Williams can't make privateering work.
  • YES I do.......... thankfully, Jordan is in the past. Hopefully, Uncle Ron was slither off sooner than later.........

    As for Frank Williams..... He has survived many screw ups ( some of his own making and some not )over the years. At this moment in time he has to hope that Mad Max is wrong (which is usually the case). As others have put it earlier, it is just a matter of time before those manufacturers who aren't winning regularly look to bolt. Frank Williams is hoping that those who do leave ( Toyota, for sure) will decide to stay in F1 as an engine manufacturer only....such as Renault did when it got out after 1985. I believe that Frank's view of F1 will prevail. I am not a huge fan of Frank but I do hope he and his team are around for a very long time. But I had also hoped that Minardi, Brabham, Lotus, Shadow, Ligier, Matra, Alfa Romeo, Surtees, Tyrrell, Penske, and Toleman.

    1950, Formula One began....Ferrari is the only team that raced in 1950 still involved in F1 today...... Motor sport is all about change.....

    'Oh by the way...next time you are off to worship Uncle Ron......please tell him that he can Kiss my ...........

    ciao
  • Interesting.

    F1 has many problems at the moment, as has aleady been eloquently stated. Many of my friends are just not into F1, or any forms of motorsport. We are a very special breed. We all have our opinion on why F1 is on the wane.

    I find with my friends who only have a fleeting interest in F1 is the names that change or go missing.

    "How's Jaguar going?" Gone! Red Bull took them over!

    "Where's those yellow Jordans?" Gone! Midland took them over!
    "Who the fuck are Midland?" "Forget it, now there gone, brought out by Spyker".
    "Spyker? what do they do?".
    "Some Dutch sports car company".
    "Never heard of them".
    "It's a European thing".

    "So, are those Minardi's bringing up the rear?".
    "Actually NO!"
    "What! there not now at the front?"
    "Well err not quite, they were also taken over by Red Bull. But they call the team Torro Rosso, the italian translation of the name".
    "Jeez that Red Bull guy has some money."
    "Yeh, more than sense".

    "Sauber?"
    "Gone! Taken over by BMW."

    "Arrows?"
    "Gone also.
    "What, taken over by Red Bull?"
    "No, just gone."

    "BAR?"
    "Gone! Taken over by Honda."

    "Strewth"
    "We have a new team though, Super Aguri."
    "What's a Super Aguri?"
    "I don't know, some sort of Magical Cucumber."

    "Ferrari?"
    "Gone! Taken over by Schumacher"
    "What!!!!"
    "Just Kidding, taken over by Marlboro actually."

    It just get's confusing...

    [Edited on 13-2-07 by SuperRoo]
  • How much I would love to see tracks like Zandvoort, Brandts Hatch, Le Castellet, Dijon, Oesterreichring, Estoril, the old Kyalami again.

    I know the lack of surpasses today is mainly a matter of aerodynamics, still if you race in circuits where there actually ARE points where you can surpass, and where the driver can give that 10% more, it would definitely make no harm.....

    [Edited on 14-2-07 by manlio27]
  • I agree but the lack of run-off at Brands is truly scary. There has to be a happy medium between that and the acres of run-off we have at the new places.
  • Oh, you mean like a 'Run-Off Trading Scheme'?

    Tracks that have more run-off than required under the rules can sell their extra run-off credits to tracks that don't have the room?

    Makes as much sense as the other trading scheme that's around.
  • Tilke is now saying his new circuits won't have acres of run off.
  • Did you read his Autosport interview? More sensible than I had expected. He seems to know his racing, not just his architecture. Really, his newer tracks are far better than his old.
  • He does race sometiems.
    I saw him on TV last year in the 24hours on the old Nürburgring.
  • Originally posted by Murph'Oh by the way...next time you are off to worship Uncle Ron......please tell him that he can Kiss my ...........
    Sorry to drag up an old topic, but AMEN, brother Murph.

    I'll always be an Alonso fan but for the time being, he's dead to me. McLaren can go rot.
  • I've been reading a bit of late on the subject of "peak oil"

    According to Wikipedia:
    "The Hubbert peak theory posits that for any given geographical area, from an individual oil field to the planet as a whole, the rate of petroleum production tends to follow a bell-shaped curve. It also shows how to calculate the point of maximum production in advance based on discovery rates, production rates and cumulative production. Early in the curve (pre-peak), the production rate increases due to the discovery rate and the addition of infrastructure. Late in the curve (post-peak), production declines due to resource depletion.
    The Hubbert peak theory is based on the fundamental observation that the amount of oil under the ground is finite. The theory is named after American geophysicist Marion King Hubbert, who created a method of modeling known oil reserves and production rates. Hubbert's theory was initially greeted with skepticism by many in the oil industry, but oil companies now routinely use Hubbert's methods to predict future yields of existing oil fields"

    I recently attended a lunchean with the US President of Shell Oil. the gentleman in the seat next to me broached the supject of Hubbard's theory. The response was that there are a number of untapped energy reserves such as wind, hydro, and even heavy crude (as opposed to light sweet crude). It was interesting that the question was not really answered.

    Last evening, prior to the race, I watched a lecture on Peak Oil for the Universe of California... essentially, from the data I saw, the Saudi holes are past peak. In fact, most all of the middle east is past peak. The North Sea is past peak. The Citgo wells are past peak and most of the remaining wells will never produce the volume we have become accustomed to.

    How does this impact the topic here at hand? Well, I suspect that if the info I have been finding is true the races in the desert will not be there in 10-15 years.

    I would also say that perhaps we will start to see F1 cars move to hybrid technologies, servo motors, and cool technology for grabbin the rain from the air for fuel "injection" ....

    which means Spa will be really cool!

    :P What?!!? I haven't posted in a while! You guys needed some 'DEEP THOUGHTS"!!!!!:P

    [Edited on 19-3-07 by bernie]
  • Viges,

    BTW, I got some rather cool photos that i can offer for your book....including the garage doors shut at Spa when he was announcing the STR buy... let me know if you want the CD's
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