Motors Bit-Tech F1 2017 thread - Season Complete

The biggest drop-off has already happened, when everyone started culling free to air coverage the viewing numbers plummeted (i'm sure I read it was something like 30% in the UK alone). Rising ticket prices in more and more obscure locations has also hurt actual attendance figures too.

I don't think Ferrari breaking away from F1 will have too much of an impact in raw numbers, but it could well tip the balance for a sport that has already pushed (priced) a large number of fans out already...

 

I don't think F1 needs Ferrari. Sure the 'everyone wants to beat the red car' has some merit, but right now everyone wants to beat the silver car [the the purple car with the bull on the side]. The red car has been routinely beatable for most of the last decade.

If anything I think Ferrari may need F1. more specifically to be seen winning in F1. IMO their engine reg hissy fit is, in part, probably them throwing a strop at pissing away their best shot at a title in years.

 

Mercedes doesn't hold the same cachet as Ferrari, they could win another 5 and it wouldn't matter, no one in the field has that brand appeal, it would have a terrible impact on the sport, who's going to be the bad guy bending the sport to their will when they leave, every good drama needs a bad guy.

 

I really want Liberty Media to deliver Ferrari an ultimatum. Take away 90% of the legacy payments to all teams, even out the prize money massively and tell Ferrari that the billions of dollars they make from merchandise sales should be reward enough.

Of course they won't, because they'll take Ferrari's threats as somewhat genuine (they're not, see billions of dollars of merch sales) and hand them piles of cash. I wouldn't mind seeing F1 without Ferrari, with the money they parasite out of F1 two or three new teams could be made financially viable.

Indeed, Liberty have indicated that once the current Pay to View contracts expire they will be lookingto get more races onto free to air, Sky's exclusive deal from 2019 being one their least favourite parting gifts from Bernie.

Neither of these are victims of Formula E, they both cyclically implode about every ten years. Usually when Mercedes and Porsche come in, outspend eveyone else, then leave having driven every other team out of the series (FE is about to fall victim to this).

DTM is very fast, very high tech and totally dependant on a few German car companies. It imploded in the mid 90s, it imploded again in the mid 2000s and it's just imploded again, they'll re-write the rules, make the cars simpler, lower downforce and a lot cheaper, get a mostly privateer grid together and the whole cycle will start again. It's the same problem JGTC/GT500 has in Japan, except replace Mercedes/Audi/BMW with Honda/Nissan/Toyota.

LMP1-H (previously LMP1, GTP, GT1, Group C, Group 6) is the same, new rules come into place, one or two manufacturers take part, win, a few more decide they want a piece of that coverage, speeds, technology and costs spiral, manufacturers pull out en-masse and we start again.

FE isn't some wolf at the door of other series, it's tiny, it's cheap and only a couple of million people watch it worldwide. It famously (infamously?) got 40million viewers for the first race, then less than 16 million for the next two combined and then audiences dropped off a cliff never to return (so far). F1 considers 25million a bad weekend and 30 million about average even with it's massive losses since 2008-9's peak viewers.

 

Massa retires... again...

 

It sounds like Di resta, Kubica or Kyvatt (maybe Wherlin) have impressed enough and it's a toss up who to go with.

 

Surely Maldonado!

 

Not yet, highlights haven't hit C4 yet.

 

Still an improvement over Suzi Perry... barely...

 

Wouldn't this be Ocon's first DNF? Ending his 100% finishing streak.

 

Also the security in Brazil has been a bit of a Catastrofuck going off twitter...

Members of the Merc team robbed at gunpoint on the Friday.
Someone else tried to rob members of the Sauber team on the Saturday
Reports of attempted robbery of Pirelli guys after the race today.

 

Seems every year something is attempted. Won't be long before they build a hotel and force everyone to stay within spitting distance of the track.

Not a bad race. Felt like a computer game tho with Riccardo and Hamilton picking off slower drivers. Few overtakes but the midfield felt static.

Few drivers of note. Stroll yet another destroyed tyre, yet another day running bear the back being completely embarrassed by his team mate.
Grosjean Penalty felt harsh since he basically done what Hamilton did in qualifying. Should he have backed out from Ocon, maybe. Still felt a racing incident than anything wrong
Magnussen, Again racing incident but felt he was more at fault than Grosjean. Didn't need to squeeze Vandorne like that and didn't see if he simply lost grip and went into him.

EDIT: New pink softer tyre to be introduced. Trying to decide prefix to describe its softness. https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/132981/pirelli-to-introduce-new-softest-tyre-in-2018
Potentially 3 new compounds next year.

 

That was a decent race, actually. But Brazil is decent quite regularly.

Hamilton fighting back was fun to see, although he WAS helped a good bit by retirements.
Riciardo doing his late-braking magic again was also fun. Someone put that man in a car that can fight.

KMag and Big John seemed like racing incidents more than anything.
Hamilton locking up while trying to have a go at Kimi shows he was driving as hard as he could, which is pleasant at a time where it seems like the guys up front cruise. Same with Vettel not really being able to break away massively from Bottas.

 

People seem to be in lala land over the tv contracts, main reason free to air won’t happen has little to do with sky and to do with the BBC / ITV not wanting to spend the cost to do a race.

Rumours are it cost bbc 5-6mil a race weekend. Even with the teams helping the likes of sky and channel 4 out there’s been rumours before of sky leaving F1.

Anyone really think another English tv provider can afford to run it? If sky said tomorrow goodbye F1 we won’t be at the races, channel 4 could not just pick all the races up as they have already said they can’t afford too.

I do not see a future at least in this country of F1 been back on normal TV and not a cable network. And at one point it might not even be that. I would not wish away sky completely as I have a feeling F1 will follow them off our screens once they quit.

 

It's not the cost of having a team at the races that is the problem though - Channel 4 still sends the whole crew to every single race, even when they are only doing highlights. BBC said it was the cost of buying the TV rights that put it off, and it's exactly that what Sky chucked the money at to nab from the FTA bidders.

 

Sending 3 people to a race is cheap the video they use is fia supplied.

People forget bbc give up there contract

 

What are you raving about? The FIA is a governing body, not a rights holder.

Sky bid £1bn for the right to broadcast races up until 2025, iirc, hardly something the BBC could afford to do.