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Archive: Melbourne

Singasnore — What makes a good F1 race?

28 September 2010 23:19

Categories: *, Formula 1, Newspapers, Television

What do viewers at home love about F1? It is great wheel-to-wheel racing? Lots of overtaking? Strategy calls? Or the venues? Looking at the polarised reactions to this past weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix got me wondering.

A few of the journalists were pretty effusive about the race. Will Buxton was particularly euphoric:

Epic race. One of the best of the season. Wow.

I saw that this drew a few hoots of derision, including from me! Because from the comments made by other fans watching at home was that… well… it was a bit dull really.

It wasn’t a stinker by any means. There was some good action and a fair few talking points. But large stretches of the race were rather processional. Hardly epic.

The epic race without the racing

Will Buxton justified his comments:

No sarcasm. Epic race. ALO VET lap trading, WEB early stop and brill drive, HAM / WEB moment, GLO driving arse off. KUB amazing.

There is some truth in what he says. While Webber and Kubica provided some entertainment, this was only because they were out of phase with the surrounding cars strategy-wise, so were not on an equal footing with the drivers they were battling with.

As for the battle at the front, the problem was that Alonso’s victory was never truly in doubt. He commanded the track all weekend, and always even looked like he might have a bit extra left in the tank too.

During the first phase of the race, Vettel drifted back to 3.5s behind Alonso. After the pitstops, the gap eventually grew to over 2s before slowly decreasing again. Vettel did get mighty close to the end of the race, but this was typical Alonso driving conservatively.

Renault engineers always talked about how conservative Alonso was as a driver. They never had to tell him to turn the engine down; he had already done it.

So it was in Singapore. Alonso had done just enough to establish himself as the certain winner of the Singapore Grand Prix and had the whole situation under control.

It may have looked good on the timing screens. I did indeed get excited when purple sectors were being set and Vettel started to decrease the gap. But the “lap battle” was partly down to the street circuit becoming cleaner and faster towards the end of the race.

I’m sure they were playing with each other, but neither looked to be pushing particularly hard. Alonso was always in control, and Vettel never looked interested in truly pressurising.

At the start of the race, Vettel had ceded the first corner, setting the tone for his race. It did not look like he was particularly interested in winning — a suspicion confirmed by Vettel’s comments that passing Alonso would have been too risky. And why bother? Alonso is the ultimate defensive driver, as his amazing battle with Michael Schumacher at the 2005 San Marino Grand Prix demonstrated.

The bottom line is that if you hold a race on a street circuit with one overtaking spot — two at a push — then the racing isn’t epic. There might be stuff surrounding the racing — strategy, crashes, pretty buildings… But not much overtaking.

Interesting, yes. Epic, no. The ingredients simply weren’t there.

Epic racing or epic facilities?

There is a trend for certain venues to be talked up a lot by the F1 circus, no matter how good the racing is. I particularly remember Valencia Street Circuit — which has served up three of the most turgid grands prix seen in the last decade — was universally praised by the teams as being a great venue for grand prix racing.

Scratch the surface of the headlines, though, and you see that they are not so interested in the racing itself. Ron Dennis said that the 2008 European Grand Prix at Valencia was so great that it made him “ashamed to be English”. But it left most others ashamed to be F1 fans, it was so bereft of racing.

Of course, Ron Dennis was thinking about the facilities. Facilities are apparently the only thing that matter in F1 these days. Never mind what the viewers at home make of the track. As long as the venue is equipped with a shiny silver throne for the McLaren chief to do his golden business in, who cares about the people at home?

Similarly, the journalists have clear favourite places to visit and places they can’t stand. China? Don’t talk to them about it. And spare a thought for poor, poor Magny-Cours. It was so awful — not because of the circuit, of course, but because it was in the middle of nowhere, as the journalists never missed the chance to remind us!

Meanwhile, Melbourne is always the “great place for a race” — is that code for a booze-up? And Singapore is now “epic”.

Never mind the fact that the Marina Bay Street Circuit is not great for overtaking. Never mind that the 2008 race needed a manufactured crash to pep it up, and that the 2009 race was voted the fourth worst of the season by F1 Fanatic readers.

TV coverage demonstrates skewed priorities

The scenario was not helped by some rather lacklustre television coverage from FOM this weekend. It looked to me like the director was more used to directing pop music videos than motorsport.

Coverage at night races is always dominated by shots of the lit-up buildings and the scenery surrounding the circuit. It feels more like the Singapore Grand Prix is more like an advert for Singapore than a motor race. Who was going to bed last weekend without seeing that flashing “Your Singapore” banner in their sleep?

When it comes to races like this, Bernie Ecclestone’s priorities are clear. Why else would the bland coverage of last year’s Abu Dhabi Grand Prix have won an FIA award for best coverage of the season? Much of the race action was missed. Anyone not paying full attention would have thought that the race was won by a hotel that looks like a giant flashing lady-toy, so fixated were the cameras on anything but the cars.

Those in the inner circle in F1 should remember that the fans at home are looking for epic racing — not epic Holywood movies, epic nightlife or epic superloos.

8 comments

Williams protest questionable aero

28 March 2009 15:25

Categories: News, Opinion

One news story that began to develop late on Saturday night in Melbourne was that Williams had lodged a protest against Ferrari and Red Bull. Nothing appears to have happened on that front yet, so I assume that everyone has gone to bed and it will be sorted in the morning.

There isn’t a lot of information out there about the protest. Grandprix.com suggests that the protests surround aerodynamics around the sidepods. By this, I assume we are talking about the strange structures that have sprouted up just in front of the sidepods. Ferrari use them as an elaborate mirror stand, but it’s clear they serve an aerodynamic purpose.

These strange structures were noted at the time. But it was pointed out that they were perfectly within the rules, even if they went against the “spirit” of the rules, which was to get rid of such weird and wonderful aerodynamic devices. This leads me to wonder if Williams are simply being a bit mischievous in their protest against Ferrari and Red Bull.

The recent fuss kicked up by Ferrari and Red Bull (and Renault and BMW) about the “diffuser three” is similarly contrived. I don’t understand the technical regulations all that well, but everything I have read suggests that the controversial diffusers are perfectly within the letter of the law. What is at question is whether they are within the “spirit” of the law.

Are Williams simply sending out a message to the complaining teams — giving them a taste of their own medicine? “We can play this game as well. Your cars aren’t within the spirit of the law either.”

Update: I had missed that Williams had withdrawn their protest just before midnight. There is still no explanation, but the fact that they have withdrawn the protest make it all the more likely that Williams were just being a bit cheeky.

Update 2: Interesting quote:

Williams recognises the possibility that in this area there could be more than one interpretation of the rules and therefore does not feel it appropriate to continue with the protests.

1 comment

Could Melbourne be a dusk race?

19 March 2009 20:37

Categories: Opinion

We have just about become comfortable with the concept of night races, after the success of last year’s Singapore Grand Prix. But in Bernie Ecclestone’s quest to have all races starting at a sociable hour in Europe, could he have inadvertently invented the dusk race?

There were a couple of close calls last season. The season finale at Interlagos last year was strange enough. The fact that the entire circuit was plunged into complete darkness immediately after the chequered flag only added to it. The podium was lit, and the sky behind looked pitch black even with all of the techniques they can use on television to mitigate it.

The sun wasn’t even setting. Sunset was approximately 90 minutes after the end of the race. But heavy clouds ensured that if the race hadn’t finished, they may well have had to bring out the red flag anyway, so dark the place seemed.

It was a similar scenario during Friday Practice for the Italian Grand Prix last year. Even in the late morning, when the sun is high in the sky, a fierce storm gave teams a dry (okay, a very, very wet) run for the dark conditions they were to expect at the following race in Singapore.

In the past two yeras the start time of the Australian Grand Prix has been shifted from 1400 local time to 1530 last year to 1700 this year. The idea behind this is to have the race starting at 0700 British time (0800 CET), which is a smidgen more sociable than 0300.

I don’t know about you, but being a nightowl I much preferred the middle-of-the-night start. It felt like a special occasion, and for me it was all part of the romance and the excitement of the build-up to the start of the season.

Sometimes ITV put on a special night of programming building up to it. No such thing from the BBC this year of course. A “grand prix night” is a bit redundant when the grand prix is on in the morning. This is a missed marketing opportunity, showing once again that Bernie is not quite as smart as he thinks he is.

But does the later start also have implications for safety? The evening start is a messy compromise. Bernie wanted a night race, but the Australian GP organisers refused. So they met in the middle.

That’s all very well in normal circumstances. The race starts at 1700. So the sun will be pretty low, but it will still be daylight.

But what if something unforeseen happens? The start of last year’s Brazilian Grand Prix was delayed by fifteen minutes. If the race has to be stopped, that will add more time as well. On top of all this, the race may be anything up to two hours long (and that excludes any stoppages for red flags).

On 29 March 2009 the sun sets in Melbourne at 1918. Let’s say the formation lap takes three minutes. If the two hour time limit is reached, cars could still conceivably be running at racing speeds at 1905 (for the time it takes for the leader to reach the finish line, then the cars on the lead lap to complete that lap). Then there is the in-lap. If, for some reason, the red flag has to come out, they would only be able to take ten or fifteen minutes maximum to be sure that the race will be completed with the sun still in the sky.

It is an unlikely scenario. The two hour time limit is seldom reached, and a lengthy race stoppage is thankfully also rare. But the possibility exists. I’m surprised not to have seen anyone else mention this. Can the drivers, marshals and spectators be sure that all of the appropriate precautions have been taken?

Could the Australian Grand Prix be the first ever dusk race?

16 comments

The disappointment of Valencia shows that fans have been forgotten

2 September 2008 10:47

Categories: Opinion

I’ve been thinking a bit about the recent European Grand Prix. Almost universally, Formula 1 fans have expressed their disappointment in what was — even by F1′s standards — an incredibly boring race. However, equally universally, those who are lucky enough to live in the Formula 1 bubble were effusive in their praise of the venue in Valencia.

McLaren boss Ron Dennis even went as far as to say that the European Grand Prix was so slick and cosy for the likes of him that it made him “ashamed to be English” because Silverstone was so poor in comparison. Moreover, he called for the government to get involved in the effort to create a British Grand Prix venue as good as the Valencia Street Circuit.

Quite why Ron Dennis expects that the government should subsidise a hugely rich sport which thrives better in Britain than it does in any other country in the world is unclear. The notion that it might ever be politically acceptable demonstrates that Ron Dennis is somewhat out of touch with reality. And the fact that he used the most boring race of the season to justify his idea suggests that he is well and truly off his rocker.

Alianora La Canta has hit on the problem that F1 currently faces in one in a post that ponders on the discrepancy between the views of those in F1′s ivory tower and the views of the fans on the ground.

I have a fairly simple theory on this; the discrepancy is evidence that F1′s business model is too heavily skewed towards the rich rather than the majority of people.

The fact is that despite the millions that have been spent by governments to ensure that the European Grand Prix in Valencia went without a hitch, fans were left disappointed on all manner of fronts.

Alarm bells began ringing pretty quickly during coverage of Friday Practice 1 when many television viewers noted that the circuit had very few landmarks with the exception of the bridge. Most sections of the circuit looked the same, lined with concrete walls all around. It looked grey and drab. Valencia Grand Prix? It might as well have been the Cumbernauld Grand Prix as far as viewers could see. (Is this the pit buliding?)

The people at FOM obviously noticed because as the weekend progressed, more and more aerial shots were used during the coverage. It was the only way viewers could see the harbour. Albert Park would have a similar problem, but they cleverly painted their walls green so that it did not look grey and dull. Hopefully this is on the list of improvements to be made for next year.

But the list of improvements must surely be a long one. There have been complaints from people who shelled out for tickets for the European Grand Prix that they couldn’t even see any of the action from the grandstands. Incredibly, this is a repeat of the problem from last year’s Japanese Grand Prix! How difficult can it be to build a grandstand facing the right direction?

Most importantly, though, the circuit was scandalously difficult to overtake on. In fact, I counted just one overtaking move all race, made by David Coulthard very early on in the race. He later tried to overtake someone else, but pathetically crashed instead.

The circuit was well hyped-up. It was meant to be great for a street circuit — wide and with run-off areas that would encourage overtaking. We were told there were at least three overtaking spots in the circuit.

This later transpired to be an out-and-out lie. Ferrari revealed that they knew that it would be very difficult to overtake. They were so certain of this that they actually based decision on Kimi Räikkönen’s engine on the basis that it was impossible to overtake. During last week’s Renault podcast, the Enstone-based team echoed Ferrari’s sentiments, revealing that their simulations too told them that it would be impossible to overtake in Valencia.

I can understand why it would be impossible to overtake on an ancient circuit like Monaco which was not built with today’s cars in mind. But the Valencia Street Circuit is practically purpose-built for modern F1 cars — at least it ought to be. And it was a complete failure.

Hermann Tilke gets a lot of stick for his circuit designs. However, we know that Tilke can design a great circuit. Just look at Istanbul Park. Shanghai International Circuit isn’t too bad either. But Valencia Street Circuit is a proper turkey. I think Hermann Tilke needs to save up some cash to buy himself a simulator of his own so that he can tell in advance, just like the teams, which designs will facilitate overtaking more than others.

What bugs me, though, is the prospect that the priority of the European Grand Prix wasn’t even the fans. We know that street circuits do not always lend themselves to the best racing. Yet, Bernie Ecclestone only seems to be interested in street circuits at the moment. The other new circuit on this year’s calendar is the Singapore Street Circuit. If you ask me, the Singapore Grand Prix has disaster written all over it, and the European Grand Prix was an ominous sign of things to come as far as I’m concerned.

All of this leads me to suspect that Bernie Ecclestone’s current priority is not to provide paying fans with some decent entertainment. But it is to provide the rich inhabitants of F1′s inner circle with some nice holiday destinations.

A couple of years ago there was a whisper that the Paul Ricard Circuit could play host to a grand prix where fans were kept out — a grand prix especially for F1′s VIPs and no-one else. The idea was widely ridiculed at the time. But you can believe that Bernie Ecclestone would actually go ahead with it.

It seems that the problem with F1 at the moment is that it doesn’t matter how bad the racing is. As long as the circuit comes equipped with superloos, that’s all the likes of Ron Dennis care about.

13 comments

Thoughts on Australia and Malaysia

23 March 2008 17:32

Categories: Report

Well I didn’t get a chance to post my thoughts on the Australian Grand Prix. The Malaysian Grand Prix came around so quickly. It’s a bit much to have back-to-back races straight after the off season — like being thrown in at the deep end. Anyway, it’s a good opportunity now for me to get my thoughts together about the first two rounds of the season.

The first thing to point out is the apparent unpredictability of the season. Even though both races turned out to be relatively easy for the winners, each of them struggled in the other Grand Prix. Both podiums were occupied by three different teams, and no driver has been on the podium for both races.

It is probably fair to say that most people expected Ferrari to dominate at Melbourne — myself included. Ferrari looked to have the upper hand during winter testing and stand to benefit from McLaren’s turmoil over the winter. How wrong the predictions turned out to be though.

Both Ferrari drivers looked embarrassingly out of their depth without driver aids — Massa in particular. With Räikkönen it is probably fair to say that rather than being caught out by the new rules, the Finn simply had one of his occasional off days laden with uncharacteristic mistakes.

But the icing on the cake was Ferrari’s slew of reliability problems. Räikkönen slowed to a halt during qualifying with a fuel pressure problem and his race was cut short by an engine problem. Other problems cropped up during practice in Malaysia. Moreover, Ferrari-equipped Toro Rosso and Force India cars have had some engine-related problems in both races as well. All-in-all, it was Ferrari’s worst start to the season for around a decade and a half. So much for the pre-season predictions!

It hasn’t been plain sailing for McLaren though. I have covered the qualifying incident before, so I won’t repeat it. Australia was quite a breeze for them — the perfect way to return after the torrid events of 2007. But they didn’t have the luck or the speed in Malaysia.

Hamilton in particular was scruffy during qualifying and he carried some strange tyre wear issues into the race. A disastrous pit stop cost time in itself and probably caused aerodynamic problems for the rest of the race as the front rim shield was moving with the wheel instead of staying stationery as intended. This begs the question though — was Hamilton running with a moving aerodynamic device, therefore driving illegally?

Kovalainen has had a solid start to the season, cementing his reputation as a reliable and fast driver. He can probably be happier with his first two races than most drivers.

So, McLaren were strong in Australia and Ferrari had the upper hand in Malaysia. This is pointing towards a repeat of last season where the championship was close but few of the actual races were. The fortunes of the two teams may yo-yo according to how the cars suit the circuit.

It also looks as though the pre-race predictions that there was going to be a tight midfield were on the mark. It is difficult to see a clear ranking of the teams from 3rd downwards.

My first impression is that BMW are very strong. Those pre-season balance issues are clearly a thing of the past, which is wonderful to see. I love to see BMW doing well, and I have to say that going by the first two races it even looks as though, with a bit of luck, they could get their first win this season.

Both drivers have impressed. Robert Kubica has been particularly strong in qualifying. A poor strategy certainly cost him in Australia, and according to Piotr in the comments here it was reported that Kubica had a throttle problem. That went largely unnoticed in the British media from what I saw. He certainly made amends in Malaysia with a near flawless drive to second.

Heidfeld was stunning in Australia but bad luck hampered him in Malaysia. Who knows where he could have qualified if he didn’t have to pick his way past so many slow moving cars. Luck didn’t improve for him during the race and I feel we really didn’t see his full potential at all during the weekend. And he still finished 6th! Not bad going.

A tale of two races for Williams. Nico Rosberg did a fantastic job to finish 3rd in Australia, and Nakajima collected points as well. It looked as though Williams were back near the top where they belong.

But Malaysia was little short of a disaster from start to finish for Williams. Rosberg’s race was compromised by a needless incident with Glock on lap 1. Meanwhile, Nakajima’s race was obviously awful. Despite a relatively promising period towards the middle of the race, a puncture put paid to his race in the end.

We can’t forget Nakajima’s coming-together with Kubica in Australia. It is the kind of mistake you expect rookies to make. But if he is still doing that sort of thing by the end of the season, it will become unacceptable. We shall wait and see. Pre-season I cited Nakajima as my dark horse of the season, but he has done little to demonstrate that I was right.

Red Bull probably come next, and they look like they have the speed to regularly contend for decent points hauls. But the big question mark surrounding them is, as it was last year, reliability. You would have thought that sorting out their reliability problems would be their top priority, but if anything the problems have become much, much worse.

So the gearbox doesn’t — so far — appear to be causing too much grief. Instead, the Red Bull cars are afflicted with a plethora of silly little niggles. In particular, the Red Bull appears to be frighteningly fragile — to the extent that the stewards have been requiring explanations for the way that the car simply disintegrates if someone coughs on it.

Craig made a really good point that it seems to be a trait of Adrian Newey’s. A few years ago the McLarens were similarly fragile (and, incidentally, unreliable). Now Red Bull have the same affliction.

Besides plain old mechanical failures, the Red Bull has fallen to pieces in quite frightening ways. Firstly, there was the moment in FP2 in Malaysia where a simple trip over the kerbs absolutely wrecked David Coulthard’s suspension and sent him into a violent crash that eventually sent one of his wheels flying off. To have wheels flying about is a big no-no in safety terms, and it’s no wonder that the stewards were worried.

Then during the race, Mark Webber made a slightly aggressive entrance into the pitlane. That was enough to knock off his rear light. This is potentially another major problem were it to rain, which isn’t exactly out of the question in Sepang.

Then there was Coulthard’s coming-together with Felipe Massa in Australia. Normally you would expect Massa’s car to have the most damage, but Coulthard’s damage was major. The way the suspension fell apart then was really quite odd to my eyes.

Incidentally, on that incident, I take Coulthard’s side there. I am not DC’s biggest fan, but I really think Massa was far too ambitious to try that kind of move from that far back. It is true that Coulthard shut the door abruptly, but Massa shouldn’t have been there in the first place in my view.

Toro Rosso have the worst of all worlds when it comes to reliability. They have had their fair share of problems with last year’s car which they are still running. When they get their new car (essentially the same as Red Bull’s chassis), it will only pile on the problems. And they have that apparently unreliable Ferrari engine in the back.

Toro Rosso have had a good start to the season though. Starting the season with last year’s car has probably been an advantage to them. The trick is choosing the right time to switch to the new one.

Sébastien Bourdais impressed greatly in Australia before having that engine failure. He could buck the trend when it comes to drivers who have arrived in F1 from IRL / ChampCar who have tended to be out of their depth in F1. A needless spin in Malaysia has put a dampener on that prospect however.

Meanwhile, Vettel is further improving his reputation as F1′s new hot property. He’s looked great during some sessions, but it hasn’t come together for him during the races yet. No doubt he will soon be scoring points again for Toro Rosso.

The jury is still out on Toyota. We haven’t seen what Glock is capable of yet. But Trulli did really well in Malaysia. He set the fastest time in Q2, started 3rd on the grid and finished 4th. Not bad by Toyota standards. I wonder if he was on to something when he said that Toyota would be the surprise of the season.

Renault are disappointing. Alonso was lucky to get 4th in Australia. He won’t be able to get many points very easily this season. The Renault car just isn’t there. It’s possibly the 7th fastest car on the grid now — what a fast decline. Piquet had a bad Australian weekend, and a completely inconspicuous Malaysian weekend. He will have to up his game, but he has time to do that.

Honda are making some good progress. Not much else to point out except that they should, morally, have scored some points by now. They will do eventually, and they are looking much better than they did last year.

Just shows you what having a guy like Ross Brawn in charge can do. I have to say though, I found it deeply ironic that pitstop strategy genius Brawn’s first race in charge saw perhaps the most disastrous pitstop I have ever seen. Barrichello had to enter the pits while the pitlane was closed. Then his lollipop man lifted the lollipop too early, meaning that some mechanics were toppled over as Barrichello sped away. Then Barrichello ran through the red light at the end of the pitlane. Okay, so none of that was really Ross Brawn’s fault, but it was still quite funny.

Force India need to improve a bit more to fulfil their pre-season promise. At least they will not be permanent fixtures at the back of the grid.

That status goes to Super Aguri. But I suppose really they will feel luck simply to be there.

All-in-all, there are still plenty of unanswered questions. But the mixed-up nature of the results so far is very promising for a close Championship. I’m looking forward to Bahrain already!

2 comments

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