Motorsport Off Topic Thread

Good news. That section of the track adds absolutely nothing, apart from somewhere to crash on purpose to give your teammate a victory.

All that's left is for them to get rid of all the other valueless parts of the Singapore track... oh, wait.
 
Who remembers that at Miami last year, Mario asked Zak about the F1 drive he'd been promised?

Zak came true, Mario drove the MP4/28 around Laguna Seca. Not especially fast but he's 82 years old!

 
Feek said:
Who remembers that at Miami last year, Mario asked Zak about the F1 drive he'd been promised?

Zak came true, Mario drove the MP4/28 around Laguna Seca. Not especially fast but he's 82 years old!

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Great to see, he absolutely mullered the corkscrew must have hurt a bit that :eek:
 
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Personally I'm in Alonso's camp of thinking i.e. every single team who has won has exploited a loop hole/grey area of some form, be it engine related, aero related, steering related, braking related, suspension related and now cost cap related (many of which were against the spirit of the sport and could easily be viewed as breaches of regulations by other teams and often were). None of the previous teams who've exploited one of the aforementioned loop holes has had titles or race wins stripped from them, so it's difficult to begin doing that now. That's a precedent that the FIA set long before Red Bull were in the sport. I mention this because as we know and is very apparent in certain circles e.g. on these forums (obviously doesn’t apply to everyone), that some people choose to just "hate because it's Red Bull" or feel more strongly about subjects because it's Red Bull and/or Max. I think this is something we should consider when trying to be objective.

The above doesn't mean you can't learn from it and tighten the rules further and make punishments clearer, which leads me on to my next point. I put the blame squarely on the FIA, the fact they didn't even have predefined punishments for breaches and the fact the % of error is so large was clearly a mistake. There should be 0 ambuigity, both in the regs themselves and just as importantly, the stakes your risk if you break them.

To be clear, I'm not saying this is an ideal situation, clearly it's not.

For those interested who haven't seen the comments etc, the BBC recapped them in its Lewis Hamilton piece this morning - link
 
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But there is no precedent for breaching the cost cap because the cost cap is new. The teams all agreed to it and the punishment for even the 'minor' breach includes stripping of WDC/WCC points - again which the teams agreed to.

They wouldn't be stripping Max of a WDC as a result of the breach. They'd strip him of points, which is allowed as per the rules agreed by all teams, but due to it being a close season an effect of the points being stripped could mean he would lose his WDC. I don't believe they should take that into consideration though. Did they cheat? if yes then they should expect the penalties as described in the rules.

I said on another forum that FIA/FOM/Liberty need to decide what they want F1 to be. If they want it to be a show then this is all a storm in a tea cup and just let the show go on, but be honest about the product you're selling. If you want F1 to be a sport then sport lives and dies on it's fairness to all competitors. When 9 out of the 10 teams adhere to the budget cap (OK, 2 had procedural errors) but the team that exceeds it wins the WDC the season the breach happened, and that is ignoring the scandalous ending which also benefitted them, then goes on to dominate the following season whilst their competitors followed the rules, got their certificates and have been left for dead. Where is the fairness in that? If you think it's beneficial to your success right now, you may as well cheat and pay the fine.

In other sports they have no issue retroactively changing results in the interest of sporting integrity but for some reason F1 should be exempt from that?
 
The teams agree to follow the technical regulations every year too and yet without fail at least one team doesn’t, it’s the same thing. :p

I’m not saying it’s a good part of the sport. I flip between how I feel about it all constantly, have for years.
 
Tigget said:
Personally I'm in Alonso's camp of thinking i.e. every single team who has won has exploited a loop hole/grey area of some form, be it engine related, aero related, steering related, braking related, suspension related and now cost cap related (many of which were against the spirit of the sport and could easily be viewed as breaches of regulations by other teams and often were). None of the previous teams who've exploited one of the aforementioned loop holes has had titles or race wins stripped from them, so it's difficult to begin doing that now.
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A loophole is something like Mercedes DAS, McLaren’s F-duct or Brawn’s double diffuser. Innovative solutions and, while yes arguably against the spirit of the regulations, ultimately deemed legal by the FIA often under protestation of other teams.

With respect to the cost cap though the FIA haven’t accepted Red Bull grey area loophole explaination and have ruled they overspent.

Breaches of the technical or sporting regulations have led to disqualification and a loss of points. So why shouldn’t an overspend?
 
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Tigget said:
The teams agree to follow the technical regulations every year too and yet without fail at least one team doesn’t, it’s the same thing. :p
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Teams that break the rules are usually stopped from doing so mid-season if it's a grey area breach and have been disqualified from races in the past for bigger breaches. The difference with the cost cap is that the breach is only known about so much later.
 
Tigget said:
The teams agree to follow the technical regulations every year too and yet without fail at least one team doesn’t, it’s the same thing. :p

I’m not saying it’s a good part of the sport. I flip between how I feel about it all constantly, have for years.
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What happened to Hamilton for his rear wing being 0.2mm out of spec at the Brazilian GP? Something is either legal or it is not. They either met the budget or they did not. There is no grey area in the financial rules and I believe if they think they've spotted one they have to seek clarification from the FIA. Them thinking they're being clever and found an advantage over everyone else may come back to bite them in their rear.
 
Before replying to your comments I just want to say - Again, to be clear, this shouldn't have happened. End of. - I'm absolutely not justifying it etc, just having healthy discussions. :)

Mr Jack said:
Teams that break the rules are usually stopped from doing so mid-season if it's a grey area breach and have been disqualified from races in the past for bigger breaches. The difference with the cost cap is that the breach is only known about so much later.
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I think that's a fair point and potentially an issue with how it's currently being managed/checked. Obviously it has to be checked retrospectively to a certain extent as teams will spend all year but it definitely should have been found and resolved more quickly.

Junglist said:
What happened to Hamilton for his rear wing being 0.2mm out of spec at the Brazilian GP? Something is either legal or it is not. They either met the budget or they did not. There is no grey area in the financial rules and I believe if they think they've spotted one they have to seek clarification from the FIA. Them thinking they're being clever and found an advantage over everyone else may come back to bite them in their rear.
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That's literally one single example of an extreme. There have been dozens if not hundreds and hundreds where the opposite has been true. I agree with you, there shouldn't be any grey area whatsoever but guess what, the FIA introduced a form of that when they put in this % over rule etc. Furthermore, finance is one of the least clear industries/professions in the world. There's a reason drivers live in Monaco to dodge tax and businesses move money offshore etc, it's absolutely not black and white, unfortunately it's very much a balancing act.

Greboth said:
A loophole is something like Mercedes DAS, McLaren’s F-duct or Brawn’s double diffuser. Innovative solutions and, while yes arguably against the spirit of the regulations, ultimately deemed legal by the FIA often under protestation of other teams.

With respect to the cost cap though the FIA haven’t accepted Red Bull grey area loophole explanation and have ruled they overspent.

Breaches of the technical or sporting regulations have led to disqualification and a loss of points. So why shouldn’t an overspend?
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I think my reply to Junglist probably touches on some of this - Additionally I'll add that the reality is we don't know enough details to speculate. We don't know if the overspend is the absolute minimum or the maximum. I expect it will be settled behind closed doors as many of this things are.

I very much want to just enjoy good racing like everyone else. One thing I will maintain is that Red Bull and Max are so dominant that if the the "minor overspend" hadn't happened they would most definitely still be ahead. People can say silly things like Binotto "it's worth 0.5s" etc with no substance or proof but the reality is RBR and Max have been consistent, whereas drivers below have made continual errors along with their teams making strategical blunders constantly etc.
 
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Press conference today from RB about the cost cap situation and from what I understand the FIA have offered terms of 'accepted breach agreement' to RB..
Very much agree with you Tigget..
 
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Tigget said:
I put the blame squarely on the FIA, the fact they didn't even have predefined punishments for breaches and the fact the % of error is so large was clearly a mistake. There should be 0 ambuigity, both in the regs themselves and just as importantly, the stakes your risk if you break them.
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This is an interesting take, given the rules were published well in advance and included a very explicit list of predefined punishment for procedural, minor and major breaches of the cost cap.

They left themselves options but I don't think it's correct to say they didn't even have predefined punishments - they absolutely did and these included punishment all the way up to stripping of constructor or driver points or even complete exclusion from a championship.
 
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My issue with the whole budget cap is that it's incredibly drawn out. You can exceed the cap in 2021, the FIA review your submission in 2022 but you won't get any punishment until 2023.

Basically, you could knowingly over-spend to win a close fought battle then reap the rewards the following year and carry that knowledge / development on to a third season before anything is done.
 
Black Noir said:
My issue with the whole budget cap is that it's incredibly drawn out. You can exceed the cap in 2021, the FIA review your submission in 2022 but you won't get any punishment until 2023.

Basically, you could knowingly over-spend to win a close fought battle then reap the rewards the following year and carry that knowledge / development on to a third season before anything is done.
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Yes, this is definitely a big issue that needs improving.
 
Let’s hope Red Bull just get a fine then Ferrari or Merc turn up next year with a car 4.9% under weight using tyres 4.9% wider and wings 4.9% bigger :D
 
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