The near future of F1 is looking dull..
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Customer chassis has been a suggestion for years. Williams are the most vociferous about not allowing customer cars and have been dead against it for years now. With the current rules stating changes that are not on cost or safety grounds need unanimous approval, it's a non starter. It is, after all, a CONSTRUCTORS championship, not a team one.
Only since the early 80's when they brought in the rule forcing teams to build their own cars. Before that it was a Teams Championship, and there's no reason why it couldn't be again.
Unanimous agreement is only required for in season regulation changes. The rules for each season are total up for changing until the deadline (usually 28th Feb of the year before). Those rules only need a majority from the F1 regulation committee, which is 6 votes for FOM, 6 voted for the FIA, and 1 vote each for 6 of the teams. Williams could be easily beaten if the FIA and FOM wanted customer cars.
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Soldato
But customer cars are not actually going to fix F1. All Haas have shown is a way for a new team to go straight in and fight for the midfield.
Are they beating Mercedes? No.
Are they beating Ferrari? No.
Are they even beating Red Bull? No.
Are they even beating Williams? No.
People do not watch sport to find out who comes fifth. they watch to see an exciting fight to win. Haas and customer cars are not going to fix how competitive the fight to win is.
I will give you that having more battles in the midfield keeps some interest, but it is not going to fix the sport.
Also, I can remember a few years ago when BTCC decided to split the championships into Constructors, Teams and Drivers. At one point the only constructors were Honda and one other (all other cars were purchased without car company backing), so there was a championship being fought by two companies totalling 5 cars even though there was a field of 30 cars
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Haas isn't a customer car.
Are they beating Force India? Yes
Are they beating McLaren? Yes
Are they beating Toro Rosso? Yes
Are they beating Sauber? Yes
Are they beating Manor? Yes
I don't get your point?
Haas make almost nothing on their car (they mill their own wheels, and thats about it I think). What they do instead is go to people who are industry leaders in making the component parts for cars, and get them to make them for them.
Are they beating Force India? Yes
Are they beating McLaren? Yes
Are they beating Toro Rosso? Yes
Are they beating Sauber? Yes
Are they beating Manor? Yes
I don't get your point?
Haas make almost nothing on their car (they mill their own wheels, and thats about it I think). What they do instead is go to people who are industry leaders in making the component parts for cars, and get them to make them for them.
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Soldato
Soldato
Personally I wouldn't care if it was for the lead or for 10th place, if there's great wheel to wheel racing going on, I like to watch it.
Same, I don't care if the lead car gets no air time. As long as there's a good scrap around mid field with good wheel to wheel action in happy
Soldato
I don't doubt that they're great, but you've just said yourself that it's not what people want?A huge chunk of people won't be bothered about or won't understand the technology that's in the cars - they just want them to be fast and with speed comes an expectation of noise that's been ground in to people over their entire lifetimes.
"It's just as fast but now it's a lot quieter" is a surprisingly big thing for people to get over.
This is the 21st century. People want whatever they're told they want.
The marketing and promotion of F1 is abysmal. Channel 4 just spent peanuts on pitching Guy Martin's bike against Coultard's now-technologically ancient F1 car, and it was great.
What promotion has F1 had in recent years? I mean serious promotion, outside a race weekend, that would appeal to the masses? Probably just a few Red Bull stunts 400 metres up a building in Dubai, or running round the foundations of COA or up an Alpine ski slope.
It is pathetic.
Soldato
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Except Big John has shown this weekend that a Haas can beat a Red Bull or a Williams. Maybe they aren't going to challenge Mercedes or Ferrari any time soon, but with a little work who knows? They're on the level now that Mercedes were on when they took over the Brawn team.
Its an odd stance he has taken. As if he would only consider Haas to be a success if they turned up and won their first race?
Soldato
My stance is not odd, it is actually in response to your two quotes, which IMO don't hold up to scrutiny.
The key point there, is you said "the solution" in response to "keeping F1 alive or killing it". IMO having Haas enter fighting for 4/5th place is not keeping it alive, it is just bolstering the mid field.
Let us not also forget, another reason why Haas are able to be in the position they are is because of how poor Mclaren Honda are performing and how much the Renault engine is struggling. If Haas had entered when both these things were strong (like when Marussia/Virgin/Caterham did), there is a chance they would actually be running 8th or 9th in the championship.
I would also point out using your own words Skeeter
that you say customer cars like Haas are going to solve F1, but apparently Manor are as much of a customer team now as Haas, and they aren't doing much for F1
The Haas isn't a customer car.
The Manor/Mercedes/Williams partnership started this year, and Manor have made a significant jump forward from any of their previous years. They have out qualified Renault's, Sauber's and Force India's, and beaten them under straight race conditions too.
The Manor/Mercedes/Williams partnership started this year, and Manor have made a significant jump forward from any of their previous years. They have out qualified Renault's, Sauber's and Force India's, and beaten them under straight race conditions too.
Soldato
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One of those quotes is mine, not Skeeter's, so it looks like you haven't done much scrutiny.
"The only reason Haas are doing so well is because they're better than other teams! This clearly shows how wrong you are to say they have potential!"
Soldato
Noise is an issue, it absolutely is. I remember the first time I went to a track and heard a screaming Mugen V10 at a race - it was mind blowing! And fortunately I managed to work for a sponsor of Benetton for a while and we had a hospitality area at Silverstone for test days - the thing people 'new' to F1 loved the most was the spectacular noise.
I have two kids, one is nearly 7 and one is nearly 4. When we go to places like Goodwood Festival of Speed they go absolutely crazy for the loud cars. If something quiet like a modern day F1 car comes up the hill they are more interested in running around than what is on the track. These are potential future motor racing fans with a dad who has been into it for many years, and I have problems getting them interested in current cars what chance is there for those who have parents who aren't interested in motor racing.
2016, my eldest son says the cars look 'boring' with the lack of colour. He's not interested like I was when it was Mansell, Senna and Prost. Kids have so many other things to do these days that F1 needs to be something amazing to interest them and a massive part of that is the noise. Boring old farts like us will gradually disappear/turn off, where does that leave the sport in the future.
A car up the hill at Goodwood is a million miles away from 24 NA V8s/10s reverberating around a grandstand for 2 hours.
If you took your kids to a pre 2014 race they would be screaming to go home after the formation lap. I know, because I've seen it. You hardly ever saw young kids at races with the NA engines, and the ones that were there were huddled as far away from the track as possible, cuddled up to a parent with ear defenders on looking thourghly miserable.
The V10s and V8s were gloriously loud, but that's all they were, loud. They weren't a nice noise and seeing the GP2 cars compared to the F1 starkly shows that. There are 4 distinctly different notes from the 4 different manufacturers, with all sorts of chirps and whooshes and things along with it. The GP2 cars come out with their NA V8s and its just noise. Loud, unpleasant noise.
The problem is the interesting noises from the turbos don't make it through the TV. But the reality is the more palatable sound of F1 has opened the doors to many more fans track side, and improved the experience. After 10+ years of going to GPs, I can genuinely say that on reflection, I don't miss spending 2 hours unable to talk to anyone or hear any commentary to actually understand the race one bit.
And like I said, nobody complained the old turbos were quiet. The "noise" problem has just been created by us old farts.
This weekend, do an experiment. Watch the race with you kids, and turn the volume up so loud you can't hear anyone else talk without shouting in their ear, and lock them in the living room for the whole race. See if they think that's better.
If you took your kids to a pre 2014 race they would be screaming to go home after the formation lap. I know, because I've seen it. You hardly ever saw young kids at races with the NA engines, and the ones that were there were huddled as far away from the track as possible, cuddled up to a parent with ear defenders on looking thourghly miserable.
The V10s and V8s were gloriously loud, but that's all they were, loud. They weren't a nice noise and seeing the GP2 cars compared to the F1 starkly shows that. There are 4 distinctly different notes from the 4 different manufacturers, with all sorts of chirps and whooshes and things along with it. The GP2 cars come out with their NA V8s and its just noise. Loud, unpleasant noise.
The problem is the interesting noises from the turbos don't make it through the TV. But the reality is the more palatable sound of F1 has opened the doors to many more fans track side, and improved the experience. After 10+ years of going to GPs, I can genuinely say that on reflection, I don't miss spending 2 hours unable to talk to anyone or hear any commentary to actually understand the race one bit.
And like I said, nobody complained the old turbos were quiet. The "noise" problem has just been created by us old farts.
This weekend, do an experiment. Watch the race with you kids, and turn the volume up so loud you can't hear anyone else talk without shouting in their ear, and lock them in the living room for the whole race. See if they think that's better.
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2007 or 2008 rules please:
This race still sticks in my mind as one of the best:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2en27M7Gs3o
This race still sticks in my mind as one of the best:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2en27M7Gs3o
Associate
At least Jonathan Legard isn't still commentating. I had watched every race for the previous 15 years until he started, dismissing the front wing and rear wing as pretty much the same 
Soldato
Skeeter, I'll disagree with you on the V10s - they had some character, not as much as any V12 or some of the other funkier configurations over the years, but they definitely had some soul to them. The V8s however were awful - they really were just loud and nothing else.
I very much still prefer the V6s to the V8s and just wish that FOM would just embrace them rather than suck all of the life out of the sound.
It wasn't a great race by a long way - more interesting than most at the time because of the weather, but for a wet race it wasn't exciting with big battles for the lead or anything. If that's your benchmark you must have missed a lot of the great wet weather races, like Interlagos 2003. Heck even the 2007 Nurburgring race was miles better than Silverstone 2008. But again, it was all down to the weather - 2004 or so through to 2008 was very, very poor for racing if the weather didn't come into it - we were praying for rain every race because it was so dull.
I very much still prefer the V6s to the V8s and just wish that FOM would just embrace them rather than suck all of the life out of the sound.
It wasn't a great race by a long way - more interesting than most at the time because of the weather, but for a wet race it wasn't exciting with big battles for the lead or anything. If that's your benchmark you must have missed a lot of the great wet weather races, like Interlagos 2003. Heck even the 2007 Nurburgring race was miles better than Silverstone 2008. But again, it was all down to the weather - 2004 or so through to 2008 was very, very poor for racing if the weather didn't come into it - we were praying for rain every race because it was so dull.