Season starts this weekend in Australia. Should be interesting to say the least.
--- Alan
Heh, and there's already a big controversy over the diffusers, KERS isn't rolling out as smoothly as hoped, and the big teams were kinda sucking in practice this morning. We'll see what qualifying brings out shortly, though...
Edit: And boo to losing Montreal, of course. I'm glad I managed to see it there a couple years ago first.
Last edited by Fugitive; 03-27-2009 at 07:53 PM.
I hate what the rule changes have done to the looks of the cars. They're uglier than they were in '96, following the safety revamp, or in '98, when F1 went for a narrow track and grooved tires.
I know, I know... "The racing will be better." Well, we'll see. Right now, I'm just hoping the smaller teams make the most out of the chaos, before the big teams get their act together. A Barrichello win for Brawn would be nice.
That's all I want. F1 has gotten so boring, I changed from being a religious follower to someone who sometimes doesn't view a single race in months. After Schumacher's departure it has gotten a bit better, but still; far too little overtaking, cars that break when they slightly touch each other.Originally Posted by Enduro_Man
For all you Americans laugh about how Nascar is for rednecks, and Europeans say it doesn't need skill because "they only drive in circles", I find its gritty action a lot more interesting. But for me, the best racing series (of the last decades) has been DTM an its offsprings (funny how, whenever I have to do a DTM race in Grid or Race Driver, I'm all "ah fuck no way I'm gonna win!" because DTM is so damn fast). I also used to watch the Australian Supercars.
I LOVE those Holden cars, which of course for me are nothing but glorified Opel Omegas. Seriously, how could GM make the damn Opel Omega B such an awesome V8 monster in Australia and the USA (Pontiac GTO), and here the best we got is the Omega MV6 3.0 211 hp, that can be bought for little more than thousand Euros here in Germany now? Grrr!
Great to see Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello on the front row, I like both of those guys and I hope they do well this year.
I've been a Ferrari fan since I started following F1 in 1995, but it's nice to see a new team step up and challenge the big teams, even if it's only this race.
Is there any reason why Brawndo won't be able to compete over the course of the season?
None that I know of, except past F1 history. I am sadly out of touch with F1 this year, I didn't even know Ross had started/bought his team until today.
I haven't seen the new cars, can't name the drivers on every team like I used to, etc.
But I can't wait to catch up.
Forza!
Well, Brawn, Williams, and Toyota are all running this trick diffuser, that's sort of against the spirit of the rules but not against the letter. Because F1 loves bureaucratic nonsense, the diffusers have been deemed legal for the race, but that has been appealed by the other teams. That appeal won't be heard until after the 2nd race of the season.
After that, it will either be definitely illegal, in which case they can't use it anymore, or definitely legal, in which case everyone will build one (no doubt they have already started, just in case). Either way it will probably result in Brawn not having the advantage they have now. Of course they are the fastest of the "diffuser cars" now, so that doesn't mean they will be slow or even that they will cease being the fastest. But that's how it could happen.
As far as I know, Brawn are not even bothering with KERS this year, either, so conceivably one of the teams running KERS could get that figured out to where they are faster than Brawn.
From what little I've read today, the "big" teams are using KERS, which is why they find themselves lower on the grid. The politics of F1 are sooooooo staggeringly silly. Which is part of the fun of it.
OH. MY. GOD.
Just saw the new cars in practice footage. They are not pretty. Is it 1983??
I like the way the Brawn car looks, at least. And I like Jenson Button too, so I guess I'll switch allegiances this year. Someone has to.
It sucks not being able to watch this race, sounds pretty crazy so far!
If anyone was wondering whether they should bother watching this race, the answer is a resounding "YES YOU SHOULD".
That is all - anything else would rapidly approach spoiler territory.
Can't agree with anyone who argues that F1 is boring. It's like a lot of other sports: if you don't understand all the nuances of what's happening, it's monumentally dull. If you do understand, it's interesting. I understand why people might dislike F1, just as I get why people say oval racing is boring, but there's great stuff there once you know where to look.
Sadly, I barely saw any of this race. BBC shut down the stream I was watching with 12 laps remaining, and apparently all hell broke loose shortly thereafter.
SPOILER
I really hope the stewards don't do anything to Kubica and Vettel. I've watched that incident about four times now and can't really find fault with either of them. They were fighting for position and neither had a clear line into that corner. With a gun to my head, I'd say Vettel should have backed off once Kubica got ahead on the outside line, but stuff like this happens in good, competitive racing. I'm worred the FIA is going to once again slap a penalty on one of these guys, just like they did Hamilton last year for cutting the track during that duel with Raikkonen.
If the FIA wants good racing, it can't have drivers backing away from a fight because they're afraid of coming under fire from the stewards.
Update - Vettel penalized 10 grid positions for Malaysian GP. Frak.
Last edited by RobZacny; 03-29-2009 at 03:35 AM. Reason: New info
*SPOILERS*
I'm still to be convinced that the drastic rule changes have led to closer racing. (In fact, I wonder if the Kubica/Vettel incident would have ended up the way it did if both cars had narrower front wings.) Nevertheless, if monkeying with the regulations can yield a 1-2 from an underdog team, then the ends might justify the means. Again, we'll see.
The Vettel penalty is ridiculous. Ideally it should have been filed as a 'racing incident', but based on what I saw, the only way Kubica could have passed cleanly was if Vettel braked hard or driven onto the grass. What's the lesson here? If you're in an accident, never apologize.
I don't think rule changes ever have nor ever will yield a guarantee of closer racing, short of forcing everyone to run identical engines and chassis (at which point it wouldn't be F1). If anything, I suspect they've helped perpetuate the dominance of the same handful of teams, because drastic rules changes are always going to be to the advantage of teams like Ferrari, McLaren, and Williams. They have the financial and human resources to handle any new hoops the FIA asks them to jump through, while mid-field teams struggle.
The fact is that you can't guarantee close racing in a sport like this. Sometimes a team will simply run away with the championship, as we saw McLaren and then Ferrari do in the earlier part of this decade. That's inevitable. But you also get seasons like the last one, where it seemed like every other race there was a memorable duel. But Ecclestone and Mosley think they can engineer a competitive season. They've never been right yet, but there's nobody that can stop them (although I have my fingers crossed for the new Formula One Teams Association).
Can someone explain to me the point of the green-striped super soft compound? Why are teams forced to use these despite the tires' apparent lack of redeeming qualities?
I don't think Kubica had a clean pass available to him, but Vettel probably should have backed off once it was clear that Kubica was ahead of him going in and had the line. But I'm still not certain what each driver should have done in those 2 or 3 seconds, and I've had a couple hours to think about it. All the stewards did here was further ensure that there will be fewer passing attempts.
Agreed, which is why it's so galling whenever the FIA trots out 'overtaking' and 'cost-savings' as justifications for their latest round of rule-jiggering. Max Mosley once compared an F1 race to a chess game, in which the excitement is derived from the anticipation of the move, rather than from the move itself. Max was pilloried (only figuratively back then) for saying so, but there was a lot of truth in that awkward soundbite. I love close racing, but only up to the point that it starts to feel contrived e.g. the Hanford Device or those trackside sprinklers pundits keep suggesting after every great wet race. If I want overtaking, I'll watch NASCAR or MotoGP. If I want spectacular driving, I'll watch the WRC (at least until they ban turbos in 2011... Thanks again, FIA!).
You're also right about rule changes generally favoring teams with deep pockets. As clever as Ross Brawn and the ex-Honda development team are, I'd say we lucked out. Would people be so excited about the sport if it had been Ferrari who'd interpreted the diffuser regulations so creatively? Undoubtedly, the British press would be groaning about the red cheaters and their enablers Max and Bernie.
Doesn't the Brawn team have any sponsors?
I don't recall seeing a single sticker on the cars, and the overalls seemed just white & black...
What. The. Fuck?until they ban turbos in 2011
Today every damn 1.4 liter car has a turbo- and/or -supercharger, and fucking Rally cars don't? Hello reason? Where are you? We've come from the Ford RS 200, Lancia Stratos, Audi Quattro and MG Metro to THIS? Sad.
Virgin declared their sponsership for them on Friday I believe - they've certainly had virgin sponsorship on their car for the weekend and Richard Branson was in the pits during qualifying watching Button take Pole.
Well, that was well worth staying up for, ended 3:40 am here and worth every second of sleepiness today. The cars are ugly IMO, but the racing was fantastic. I also think the Vettel/Kubica dustup was a racing incident, I don't think a penalty was warranted. Fantastic drive by Jenson, if Ferrari don't get themselves together I have a clear and viable second choice this year.
I hate it. Cars are ugly as sin. KERS is a lame gimmick that prevents passing which defeats the point of the ugly shittier aero. I didn't see good racing. I saw Button lazily hold a lead while Barrichello used a much faster car to make up for his mistakes. And I saw a mutual screw up turn into a bullshit one-sided penalty. There's nothing better about this season, in fact it's worse.
Schumacher in a Ferrari might have been predictable but it was an event to watch. If I wanted to watch overly restricted, unstable, ugly cars smash into each other I'd watch NASCAR. F1 is losing it's regal appeal.
That KERS stuff is indeed a strange gimmick. It's like if some cars had Nitrous shots, and others didn't. Doesn't seem fair. Or skillful, for that matter; "Oh shit, he's going to overtake me because he's a better driver and has a better car! Oh right, I press this button right *here*, and he can kiss my ass!"
The plan for KERS is sort of interesting (especially as a way to make the cars more "green") - they're looking to have substantially increased the size of the power boost (and the storage) by 2011 / 2012. So you're looking at about a 300 hp increase (rather than the 80 hp for ~7 seconds per lap).
The system is currently pretty heavy at 25 - 30 kgs, a few drivers couldn't have it installed as they couldn't fit in in with their weight and the ballast required for good weight distribution. Brawn wasn't running KERS at all, but did have the funky (and under investigation) diffuser - I'm sort of intrigued to find out the result of that investigation really, as it will either mean all the teams will swap to that style design or Brawn will have to come up with another way to find the competitive edge.
Rebuens mentioned in the press conference that his diffuser was damaged or lost completely during his opening demolition derby antics, for what that's worth to the discussion.
Trulli has been reinstated to third, Hamilton has been disqualified - http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2009/4/9113.html
Hamilton can still bang Nicole Scherzinger, the bastard!
Not anymore. She is upset with Hamilton for making "misleading" statements about his love during a recent hearing she held.
I'm trying not to let the usual post-race nonsense penalties annoy me (and they haven't even resolved the diffuser thing yet). I had such a good time watching the race without cheering for anyone in particular.
Are thost post-race penalties and investigations par for the course in American series like Nascar and Indy (or however it's named these days)?
I have no idea.
The FIA is really into punishment and role reversals.
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