The F1 suicide - Page 2

Why Michelin? When it was the FIA that just wouldn't budge on the matter. Michelin brought along working tyres and the FIA should've let them run the new tyres but have no points for those guys...

Michelin made a mistake, but the FIA couldn't bring it to themselves to create a workaround. Michelin were right to tell it's team's drivers not to race for safety. The FIA were right that it is braking the rules, but there should have been a workaround.

No, Michelin brought tires that would be well suited to driving around town but not for driving around the speedway. The new tires that Michelin shipped in prior to the race were also unsafe.


Why penalize the teams who were ready to race?

Well there were other options open to the FIA. Giving a race to the punters should have been their number one priority.

Who said anything about penalizing the Bridgestone runners? Give them the points, but not Michelin runners.

The Michelin runners would jump to give the punters a race, because then they would get their sponsorship money.

What other options? Create a chicane that could have affected the Bridgestone tires? Slow the Michelin teams in turn 13 which would have created a hazard for the faster Bridgestone cars? Make the Michelin teams drive through the pits every lap which would have been a complete waste of time for both the teams and the fans? Make the Michelin teams pit every 10 laps to change their tires, against the rules, and suffer enough penalties to make the race an exercise in futility?

Since the FIA rules only permit a team to change an engine after every two races, the Michelin teams were best to sit this one out and save their engines.


Again, why should the Bridgestone teams be penalized because Michelin couldn't supply the correct tires? The Bridgestone teams were set up to run on the course as is, not with an added chicane. They certainly shouldn't have to dodge Michelin cars dawdling and crashing around the track.

There was a race. Unfortunately the Michelin teams were screwed by Michelin, not the FIA, and they didn't participate.

Go to the FIA website (www.fia.com) and read the regulations.

I have no empirical evidence to prove Nascar's number one spectator status but do a simple Google search for "Nascar America's number one spectator sport" and see what you get. It seems that more folks than I agree with this idea.

It doesn't take much "empirical evidence" to expose the claim as bogus. Even if you assume 4-12 million people per year, it hardly competes for any season long attendance records for sports. Baseball draws about 70 million people, NBA and the NHL about 20 million. Sure, packing in 100,000 people at once is an accomplishment that deserves some kind of claim-- "largest spectator sport" just isn't it.

No kidding. NECKCAR is for rejects from demolition derbies.

Notice how this is being made into a "With US or Against US" thing.

I'm American. NECKCAR is retarded and boring.

The suggestions made to 'come up with a solution to make sure the show goes on' misses one vital point: F1 (and Nascar, Indy etc) is not a show, it is a sport. Sports have rules to stick to.

Imagine if 5 teams turned up with 5 litre turbo engines one race weekend because they packed the wrong engines - should they be allowed to race 'to make sure there is a show'?

The concept of letting the Michelin runners race but without gettibng any points is equally bizarre. Imagine Schumacher leading, Alonso second and coming up fast. Michael would gently pull over, let Alonso go, in the knowledge that he's still on the 10 points, and Alonso didn't have the chance to perform a risky overtaking manouver that might have put Micheal out.

In any case, why would Alonso push his car for no points? He's on suspect tires (would you like to be in a car when you're told 'if you drive at 200mph it's likely to burst, but stick to 170 and you should be OK'?), with the requirement that his engine has to last for the next race too.

The bottom line is that FIA were spot on. Michelin failed to bring tires to the race that could be used. As such, Michelin should have the book thrown at them.

Finally, Ferrari. Quite why Ferrari should be lambasted is again beyond me. Ferrari have gone on record as saying that they were never asked about a chicane, but if they had of been, they would have rejected it. Two things - firstly that makes it clear that it was the FIA that said no to the chicane (quite correctly), and secondly, Ferrari want to race by the rules, and not be penalised for no fault of their own.

Build a chicane! What, put a few tires down and say - try not to hit them boys! Paint some lines - stick to being inside them! Do me a favour.

What happened on Sunday was a farce, and probably damaged F1 in N America for years to come. But put the blame where it lies - Michelin. Not the FIA, who are there to uphold the sporting rules. Not Ferrari, who turned up with the proper equipment to race.

David

Funny, I know Lowes Motor speedway hold 50,000 folks but thats just the infield the otherside of the track holds more then 150,000 more Just for your info

Sounds like fun, but it's still wrong.

Official figures put the total attendance for Nascar at just 6.7 million, which doesn't even approach the number of people who attend MLB (70 mil), NCAA Div-I Football (33 mil), NCAA Div-I Basketball (25 mil), NBA (20 mil), NHL (20 mil), or NFL (20 mil) games. It's probably not even the 8th largest spectator sport in terms of...spectators. Maybe the sport claims an outrageous number of "fans" but I would wager that the total television audience for Nascar ranks among the middle of the pack too.

Everybody is missing the point of what happened this weekend.

This is pure F1 politics. Bernie Ecclestone "owns" Formula One. The various race teams are not happy with the arrangement anymore and want more control, or they are talking about starting a competing series (kinda like the whole "Indy Car" "Champ Car" thing). Ferrari at first was aligned with the other teams, but this summer became the only team to sign a new "deal" with Bernie Ecclestone and F1 (probably some back room money).

So you have 2 camps, Bernie Ecclestone and Ferrari, versus everybody else. This weekends "show" was the race teams way of showing they are unified in their desire for real change in the series, or they will leave. This became a perfect place to pull a power play, because the Indianapolis race is probably the least important on the F1 circuit.

Almostwise,

so what did the weekend prove in terms of a power struggle? Did the teams force through an illegal chicane at the last minute? No.

You're right about the fact that ther is a power struggle, but you are wrong that this weekend was about that.

This weekend was purely about a supplier, Michelin, getting it wrong, and the FIA refusing to break their rules to accomodate that.

Ferrari, Minardi and Jordan arrived with the proper equipment to race, and did so. The other teams failed to do so.

David

iMac David,

Call me a "conspiracy theorist" if you want but I think the teams took advantage of the tire situation to prove that they have unprecedented "solidarity" between them. As valuable as championship points are in the series, not one Michelin team even attempted to race. Instead they used this situation to try and make the current F1 management look bad. They could have raced, maybe not for first or second, but at least for some points. All they would have had to do was not charge hard through that one corner. That's what a "chicane" would have done, slowed down their entry speed to the banked corner.

My questions are:

Why are the teams painting Ferrari as the bad guy, for not agreeing to a chicane? The teams have really been gunning for Ferrari all year since the Ecclestone deal, critisizing them and how they are "ruining" the series. Just see the "testing contoversies" for this one.

Why are they blaming FIA as the bad guy for not relaxing the rules? They know this is self defeating, and just makes the whole series look bad.

Not a single team blamed Michelin. This, to me, was all about making a very big, expensive, statement.

almostwise,

i disagree with you when you say that no team blamed Michelin. In fact, I think all teams did blame them, but are deflecting that blame to FIA (and Ferrari to lesser extent) because they 'wanted to put on a show'.

The blame they are now seeking to place relates to solving the problem that Michelin caused.

I also disagree when you mention that it was a show of unity. Firstly, both Jordan and Minardi stated that they wouldn't race unless all Michelin runners were there too. 10 minutes before the start, Jordan informed Minardi they were going to race after all, so Minardi had to follow suit (as they are battling at the tail end). So solidarity failed.

What I think you fail to appreciate is that in a lot of people's opinion, mine included, that no solution was available (with the possible exception of all the Michelin runners voluntarily slowing down in turn 13).

Every other solution is a farce - you cannot have cars that cannot gain points 'racing' with cars that can. Should there be a collision the ramifications are enormous.

You cannot build a chicane in a few hours, and expect the various insurance companies to be happy. Race course need homogulisation (sp?), and a slapped together set of tires (or whatever) won't wash. As for painting a chicane - yeah, right, like race car drivers are going to follow the lines!

to comment on your tire testing comment: I have sympathy for Ferrari. Michelin supply 7 teams (5 competitive - Maclaren, Williams, Renault, Toyota and BAR), Bridgestone 3, only 1 of which is competitive. If each team has exactly the same mileage allowance, Michelin has in effect 5 times the data to work on than Bridgestone does. How is that fair?

Ferrari's compromise was to limit the mileage per tyre company. Still not perfect, as Ferrari would end up with far more time testing tires than, say, Williams.

Somewhere between the two is the answer.

Finally, I keep in mind that F1 is about a sport with rules, and these rules can't be changed just because a competitor turns up with poor equipment. That way lies a sport more akin to professional wrestling, where the show is far more important than the sport (if indeed there is a sport beneath the show).

Cheers,

David

PS I was reading recently that the idea of a single tire for qualifying and the race came not from the FIA, but from Michelin! Ironic, really, seeing how some people are blaming the FIA single tire for the race rule for this fiasco.

Hey iMac David!

Good points. Never really thought about the Ferrari testing reasons that way before. However, what the teams are trying to do with new testing rules is level the playing field a little bit, to make the sport a little more economical. Ferrari has, I believe, the largest F1 budget by far. They won't agree to "testing" limits, and spend far more time testing than any other team, testing a lot more than just tires. (Wind tunnel tests, etc.)

I also just can't shake the feeling that this is about the threat of a "breakaway series" There was a Monday meeting between FIA and the 7 teams that boycotted the race, where they were chastised for their actions. Curiously, Michelin was not chastised. There is a great article about this at Planet-F1.com about this, that can be found here:
www.planet-f1.com

Minardi boss Paul Stoddart also gives a detailed minute by minute account here:

Minardi's Statement

I did make one important mistake though, apparently FIA president Max Mosley is the one behind this fiasco, and not Bernie Ecclestone. Bernie was apparently on the side of finding a solution.

With regards,
Raimo

Hi Raimo,

I haven't got time to read the Planet f1 article right now, but I will do later this evening. I did read Minardi's statement earlier today.

One question for you, though. If you were Max on Sunday morning, what would you have done?

Cheers,

David

PS Agree with Ferrari having the biggest budget - they even own two racetracks.

PPS Since you now agree that Bernie was on the side of the teams, how does that square with your theory that the teams flexed their muscles to get a bigger slice of the pie, when the FIA is NOT the commercial arm of the sport, Bernie is?

PPS I guess the FIA spoke to the teams, and not Michelin, because it was the teams that didn't race, the teams that didn't retire as per the rules. As far as the FIA are concerned, Michelin is a parts supplier, like Brembo or Shell. Nothing to do with the FIA.

PPPS sorry about the PSs!

Hey iMac David,
Love the PS'S!

The only point I'm trying to make is that this co-ordinated action between the teams, just re-fueled the fire to change how Formula One is run. They made their point that they can work togther when pushed. They could have raced, albeit at a disadvantage, but chose not to.

Sure Bernie as "Commercial Arm" wanted to make this race go, he's not an idiot, he knows that what happened this weekend makes it even harder to "break into" the USA market. But even 2 of the 3 "Bridgestone" teams were going to boycott the race, but decided against it at the last minute, due to worries about sanctions. The only team that wouldn't budge at all was Ferrari (who knows how the conversations between Ferrari and Bernie Ecclestone went...).

I know, meaningless, because the FIA and Mr. Mosley had final say anyways, but the whole situation just spotlighted why the teams are frustrated. They aren't happy with the FIA, and they aren't happy with Bernie Ecclestone "owning" all the commercial rights, and his back room dealings with the likes of Ferrari. Both the FIA and Bernie Ecclestone thought that any talk of a competing series was "dead" after Ferrari was signed on through 2012, however this punch in the nose shows that the other teams can take dramatic action when pushed.

Yeah, Michelin screwed up. But a lot of politics definitley came into play as well.

Excellent Q & A with FIA President, Max Mosley, is here.

2005 Fox Sports Nascar ratings numbers.

I hate to burst your bubble here, but having a 6.1% share of the daytime audience, is not so good. I mean what is their competition at that time frame? In my market they are up against old movies, infomercials, and golf, and they are only getting a 6.1 share.

Also realize that this is an average number. look at the numbers, events like Daytona get a much higher number, which means that the rest of the races are actually much lower.

The best ratings for the Daytona 500 are somewhere around 11.0. Comparatively speaking, that's basically a low World Series television audience. The UNC-Illinois basketball title game was 16.0. I won't even get into the Super Bowl, which admittedly has a large non-fan viewship, but definitely much more fans watching. And since there are so few Nascar races, the total number of people watching over the course of the season for the 10 or so sports with larger total attendance definitely exceeds the total Nascar viewership over the course of the Nextel Cup.

Whether it's total attendance or total viewership, Nascar doesn't approach the popularity of so many other sports. What remains is just a bunch of dedicated fans and growing popularity of the sport. The murky claim of "largest spectator sport" only now rests on its supposedly large number of "fans." I don't believe it for a second, since you'd think all those other people who can't attend the event would watch it on television in *very* large numbers.

Michelin declared that they will pay back the spectator of the Indianapolis Grand prix.
That was the least they can do.