Formula 1 - 2016 Season

From the consumer side I can with for:
* NO telemetry during Saturday and Sunday (maybe only black box recording, but no live access to them) -> yes, let the cars break down again
No, that's just pointless. We want more overtaking and on-track action, not cars blowing up just as things are getting good. If you want that, you may as well just have a random chance once a lap for each car to be told to retire from the race.
 
I meant it more in a sense that through the telemetry the engineers are basically steering the races/racing. I want much more weight on the drivers again (race strategy, managing the cars resources) without the box basically telling them every button to press when and where. Even the car setup should be much more an effort than having the engineers optimize every minute thing. Without much telemetry on the important days on the weekend this will be much reduced (or it just shifts to the simulators). And as a result yes, the cars will be overdriven and broken by the drivers... as it should be, if they cannot manage the resources the cars should again break.

The racing currently is not good, as you suggest. It is basically broken due to DRS. Some of the best overtaking manoeuvres of the past would be so pointlessly unspectacular with DRS. Push button and drive by.

The technology just has gotten too perfect in the recent past. So perfect that any interesting racing cannot even happen. The best car is always in front, even from the last place this car will get to the podium. In the past a good driver could make a difference. Today: Nope. So I would hope for the sake of the sport that they reduce the technology again. Let them have these nice hybrid engines, but take away a lot of the other stuff - like telemetry which allows them to optimize too far. There is so little that a driver can do wrong today just because there are multiple hundred men permanently watching every sensor on the cars.

Edit: One more thing. What in hell do the teams have to have fixed gear ratios for the entire season. Again an area where a clever setup could make for an interesting race. But today all tracks are run through a simulator to give the most optimal transmission setting for the season. And as all are doing the same there is no variance.... A new team cannot enter F1 without all these resources. So no new minor team surprising us.
 
It does not help the sport if some media consortium is taking over. I agree with Bernie when he says that there needs to be a single person pulling all the strings.
Well, it hasn't been a single person pulling all the strings for a long time now. FIA sold out and can't regulate, the teams can't regulate (the strategy group is an idiotic concept) and FOM is being super-greedy. With CVC out, there will maybe be a focus on the sport as a content cash cow and not as a financial ingredient, to be squeezed and sucked dry by taking out loans against future profits.

Make the profits now by making it more popular, better, less stupid. Hey Jean Todt, why not quit and work full time at the UN for that road safety stuff you're so interested in, it is a worthy cause. Just not something the FIA president should do.
 
Even the car setup should be much more an effort than having the engineers optimize every minute thing. Without much telemetry on the important days on the weekend this will be much reduced (or it just shifts to the simulators)

It is more than that. There isn't just one way to set up a car, each driver has a different style and feels different things from the car. That's why they have free practice sessions, where the driver gives feedback about what is working well for them and what isn't, and making suggestions about what needs to change. F1 is about engineering as well as driving. You can't expect a driver to know the minute details of how their engine and aerodynamics work in conjunction. They probably understand a lot more than drivers used to. For F1 cars to be a spectacle, they need to be driving technology forwards, not sticking with old technology, and new technology is going to trend to being more complicated rather than one person being able to set up and maintain a car all on their own.
 
It is more than that. There isn't just one way to set up a car, each driver has a different style and feels different things from the car. That's why they have free practice sessions, where the driver gives feedback about what is working well for them and what isn't, and making suggestions about what needs to change. F1 is about engineering as well as driving. You can't expect a driver to know the minute details of how their engine and aerodynamics work in conjunction. They probably understand a lot more than drivers used to. For F1 cars to be a spectacle, they need to be driving technology forwards, not sticking with old technology, and new technology is going to trend to being more complicated rather than one person being able to set up and maintain a car all on their own.
The problem with technology taking over we can see now. There will be a single team which gets it right and then nobody can catch up. Ok, this is a problem with the rules preventing developing what you have, but as I said the technology is just too perfect nowadays to allow for interesting wheel to wheel racing. The cars need to be simpler and in some areas much harder to control than they are today for some drivers so show their skills.
 
The problem with technology taking over we can see now. There will be a single team which gets it right and then nobody can catch up. Ok, this is a problem with the rules preventing developing what you have, but as I said the technology is just too perfect nowadays to allow for interesting wheel to wheel racing. The cars need to be simpler and in some areas much harder to control than they are today for some drivers so show their skills.
If there weren't limitations on development everyone could catch up, but sadly realistically it's only the big works teams and red bull that could, and it would kill all the rest
 
One change they could make is test drives. Allow the teams every two races to stay longer at the track and test. Without testing no one is catching up, as we could see in the Red Bull dominance. Some teams had the means to do development but could only do it with limited wind tunnel and simulation tests not on the track. Even today I believe no one has caught on to Red Bull in terms on aerodynamics.
 
The problem with technology taking over we can see now. There will be a single team which gets it right and then nobody can catch up. Ok, this is a problem with the rules preventing developing what you have, but as I said the technology is just too perfect nowadays to allow for interesting wheel to wheel racing. The cars need to be simpler and in some areas much harder to control than they are today for some drivers so show their skills.

Teams getting it right and other unable to catch up is something that goes back as far as the Auto Union days. We've had Williams, McLaren, Ferrari and Red Bull all dominant for a long time. To some extent that is simple the result of an open formula.

That said I do agree there might be too much tech involved. But F1 being what it is, it is hard to get around that.
 
It was exciting seeing Daniel Ricciardo hunting down Nico Rosberg. If there hadn't been traffic, it would have been really close at the end and Daniel could even had won the race.

It is good for the championship that Rosberg has managed to beat Hamilton in the last few races and I have no doubt Hamilton will fight back.

Nice to see that Verstappen also can make mistakes.
 
Shame Ferrari tactics cost Kimi his podium place, only pass in the top crowd on track
 
Shame Ferrari tactics cost Kimi his podium place, only pass in the top crowd on track
Wasn't Kimi on ultrasoft when Lewis pitted? I think Kimi's tyres wouldn't last the distance and Kimi would be in the same situation as he was in China 2012.
 
Wasn't Kimi on ultrasoft when Lewis pitted? I think Kimi's tyres wouldn't last the distance and Kimi would be in the same situation as he was in China 2012.
No, Kimi was on Soft aka the hardest available tyre. Ferrari switched him to (used?) ultra softs when he pitted last time.
It's possible that the tyres would have ran out of life, but at least Rosberg did 28 laps on them, which is exactly the amount of laps Kimi would have been running had he not pitted again (while Ricciardo did catch Rosberg towards the end, it wasn't enough to pass, and I think their difference was smaller to begin with than the difference between Kimi & Hamilton after Hamilton had pitted)
Just in general, Vettel proved you could do the race on Soft-Ultra Soft-Ultra Soft without falling off the cliff starting from last spot and passing literally everyone but 5 drivers from top teams, so Kimi shouldn't have had any issues with Ultra Soft-Super Soft-Soft
 
No, Kimi was on Soft aka the hardest available tyre. Ferrari switched him to (used?) ultra softs when he pitted last time.
It's possible that the tyres would have ran out of life, but at least Rosberg did 28 laps on them, which is exactly the amount of laps Kimi would have been running had he not pitted again (while Ricciardo did catch Rosberg towards the end, it wasn't enough to pass, and I think their difference was smaller to begin with than the difference between Kimi & Hamilton after Hamilton had pitted)
Just in general, Vettel proved you could do the race on Soft-Ultra Soft-Ultra Soft without falling off the cliff starting from last spot and passing literally everyone but 5 drivers from top teams, so Kimi shouldn't have had any issues with Ultra Soft-Super Soft-Soft
You're right, I had forgot when the ultrasofts were put on. It would have been great to see Kimi and Lewis fighting to the end if Kimi had stayed out
 
I missed the first 5 laps and the safety car, but enjoyed most of what I saw.
Really enjoyed the race changing once lewis pitted towards the end of the race, If Ricciardo had gotten past the traffic sooner he could of won, such a shame.
Some dude on reddit made a championship table with the Petronas Mercedes Team removed(can't find source);
2eRxVyD.png


Looks like it would be a more interesting championship.
 
Looks like it would be a more interesting championship.

Not really. The first place driver in the championship would be further ahead of 2nd than we have at the moment.
The distance between 1-4 on that table is roughly the same as 1-3 in the current championship.
In that table, the gap between 1st and 5th is 143 points. 144 points covers the first 6 drivers in the current championship.

Take into account that the 3rd place driver in that table is Kimi, and Ferrari aren't really ones for letting drivers race for championship wins (when they have a chance of winning) and you end up with a more strung-out top 6, with (effectively) the same number of drivers fighting for the title.
 
What do you mean, "Take into account that the 3rd place driver in that table is Kimi, and Ferrari aren't really ones for letting drivers race for championship wins"... Of course they will let Raikonnen his fair shot at the drivers championship if Vettel is not the top man points wise.
 
Race was pretty fun and it was nice to see at least one of the Mercedes not run off into the distance. I don't think rosberg was really under pressure at any point, I think they could have gone faster if they really had to.

Anyway I didn't go to Monza in the end. Besides not really having the time and not being too enthusiastic about travelling from and to Rome to Monza on the same day I decided to wait until next time I'm in Europe. Skipped Spa as well for similar reasons.

I'll probably be going to Suzuka though, if my mate and me can agree on tickers. He probably wants cheap but I really want a screen close by this year as last year I pretty much missed the whole race.

Thanks to Softbanks craptastic network even internet radio didn't work at the track.
 
Mercedes was lucky that was the last lap ... had there been one more lap I don't think rosberg could have maintained the pace with Ricciardo.

Sign of good things to come next year :)
I do believe 2017 will see more equal racing at the front with McLaren making comeback and RedBull potentially being top again. Hope for Ferrari to do well, but with their internal changes triggered by James Alison decision to leave I'm not sure how they will fare. Obviously Mercedes will still be favourite in my opinion ...
 
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