Clicky

Jump to content

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

JHS18

Future F1 Calendar

Recommended Posts


One of the best circuits on the calendar, if not THE best circuit on the calendar deserves a long term future.

Happy the Paul Ricard thing is dead. That is not one of the greatest tracks... :P

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
but I am sure the queen has some royal ear muffs she could put on...

Funny thing was the Queen actually wore earplugs for her own jubilee concert thing a few weeks ago. I'd like to think that was more to do with how terrible the acts were though rather than how loud they were.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Is Paul Ricard officially dead, then? It wasn't clear if that was done, or if it was getting a different date (one of its own, or sharing with someone else).

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

What result can a Grand Prix have a country?

Look at the U.S. TV ratings from 2007-2012 for the races aired on FOX.

Blue is the ratings number. Red is estimated viewers in millions. Still one more race on FOX left this year...but it looks to me like interest is up this year, back to the levels it was the last time we had a USGP...you should put races where there's interest, but you also need to consider that you can create interest if you do it correctly...

qoHZv.png

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Is Paul Ricard officially dead, then? It wasn't clear if that was done, or if it was getting a different date (one of its own, or sharing with someone else).

I believe from memory it had the support of Sarkozy and the deal WOULD have been done had he remained in power. But as it is, he isn't, so it hasn't gone ahead.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Thanks, figured the election changed it. And so the drama continues...what is Ecclestone talking about with the New Jersey race...it seems to me:

1. He found a different twentieth race, but since London is still fantasy and Paul Ricard is off, I have no idea what that would be. Argentina?

2. He wants to get Tavo Hellmund, his friend, in charge over Leo Hindery. Wouldn't put it past him. Hellmund's no longer involved with the race in Texas.

3. The New Jersey race literally has no money. Consider it was coming from all private money with no government help. It's entirely possible they couldn't make that work. And the government won't support it (whether they should or should not is a political discussion I'm not going to have) for a huge reason: how many people traveling to the race are going to be staying in, eating in, shopping in, etc. in Weehawken, New Jersey or in West New York, New Jersey? And how many are going to be staying in, eating in, shopping in, etc. in New York? This race does nothing for anyone in New Jersey, government-wise. All the money is going to end up in New York. All the prestige will go to New York, too, since it turns out the British press is just as horrible at geography as the American press is, and thinks this race in New York which it actually isn't. :P

So if they did need government help, they wouldn't get it. And since I'm pretty sure a race in Hudson County that isn't funded by the government is honestly funded by the mob...maybe Ecclestone is telling the truth that the money's not there...

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'd take Bernie's comments with a pinch of salt, typically.

In the past he has always made comments about "oh I'm not sure we're going to be racing there" etc, and 99.9% of the time they always do. I remember when there was a load of speculation about whether Korea would be ready in 2010, as it was behind schedule. Bernie made some comment in Singapore saying "it doesn't seem like it is ready so we'll have to make a call soon" and then a few weeks later, they were there. Bernie's comments are always to put a bit of a pressure on the place, to pay more money/speed up or whatever. :P

I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that he said there wouldn't be twenty races next year, but I'm not sure. But I don't think we'll really see much change in the calendar for 2013, Korea may go, Spain will probably alternate between Valencia/Barcelona...but other than New Jersey (if it does go ahead) there don't appear to be many candidates I've heard of that are ready to host a race right now. The London thing (rather predictably) seems to have dropped off the radar for now, and I doubt that'll happen in 2013 if it ever does happen. Not enough time to get everything sorted, and with the Olympics in a few weeks, I doubt much progress will be made regarding that right now.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Ecclestone has cast doubts over races before, true, but has he ever said that a race will, with 100% certainty, not be on the calendar? That's what he said about New Jersey...you wouldn't say something like that to just "speed things up" or "keep it in the news." That to me either has to be the truth, or be a tactic to get some secret demands he has met (whether that's a new promoter or otherwise).

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Mr. Ecclestone says London isn't a joke...

http://www.gpupdate....sts-ecclestone/

...so I guess since it's "not a joke" it will include shortcuts, sprinklers, and grid girls dressed in all white. And any trains taking people to the track will be on time...

We'll see how it pans out I guess. If any country can actually support two, it's the United Kingdom, and I'm sure if the calendar has to be so large, the teams would really prefer 10% of a twenty race season to be at home.

But I'm always careful to believe rumors like this, because Ecclestone's plans in big cities never work out for a lot of reasons. However, it does follow the model of the Russian Grand Prix in Sochi, using facilities that the city already invested in anyway and don't want to let go to waste, so there is some kind of argument to this one as opposed to his past plans in Las Vegas and NYC.

And while I don't like to be that guy, I will be: I know the U.K. only has one FIA Grade I track and trying to upgrade Donington was a train wreck, but seeing street circuits in countries with rich racing histories is sort of sad to me. I'm all for street circuits, and they're a good way to get countries without the racing tradition involved in the World Championship, but street races in places that have racing courses and racing heritage is...well...reality so I'll quit complaining. :P

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

And while I don't like to be that guy, I will be: I know the U.K. only has one FIA Grade I track and trying to upgrade Donington was a train wreck, but seeing street circuits in countries with rich racing histories is sort of sad to me. I'm all for street circuits, and they're a good way to get countries without the racing tradition involved in the World Championship, but street races in places that have racing courses and racing heritage is...well...reality so I'll quit complaining. tongue.png

I agree.

Most street tracks are pretty horrible. The only thing London has going for it on the basis of the Santander thing is that it goes past some famous places like Buckingham Palace, and that's about it. After that it is the same as every other street circuit in the world.

Slow corners, few passing places, tedium.

Monaco's the only real exception as it deserves its place on the calendar but...there's too many street tracks on the calendar already.

Saying that though, I can imagine that there will be more races held in big cities in the future. Done correctly, like Singapore, and it perfectly suits F1's image.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Meanwhile, Nürburgring is beginning insolvency proceedings. One wonders if they will be needing a different race for Hockenheim to alternate with, though Ecclestone says he hopes to keep the race alive. The EU is not supporting the bankrupt Nürburgring or something like that. Don't ask me. I don't even know what the EU really is or does. :P

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Surpised me. You'd think with how the European economy is at the moment (Germany being the strongest) that the last European venue to go bankrupt would be a German one. Confusing situation.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Hockenheim this year sales were 20% below expectations. For the strongest country in EU, with a passion for F1 with not one but 5 drivers including a 7 times WDC and the current champion, I'd say it's rather poor.

I blame the increase in blowhorns prices.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

About the 'Ring: didn't the owner of the track do some crazy financial scheme with it? Building a shopping mall, theme park, etc, which never even opened or something like that? Which lost them millions? I'm sure it was quite the scandal in Germany.

I may have made all that up. A quick Youtube search tells me I didn't:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Hockenheim this year sales were 20% below expectations. For the strongest country in EU, with a passion for F1 with not one but 5 drivers including a 7 times WDC and the current champion, I'd say it's rather poor.

To be honest, with the financial mess combined with how expensive Formula One tickets are, I don't find it that big a surprise. I'd be more surprised to hear of any race, European or otherwise, improving on last year's attendance.

Bahrain...well, that was pretty obvious, Barcelona was down by around 20,000 apparently, Canada's was down (that was more down to that student protest than anything else), Valencia only had 45,000 grand stand tickets - down on previous years, Silverstone had the whole parking problem on the Saturday...it goes on.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

To be honest, with the financial mess combined with how expensive Formula One tickets are, I don't find it that big a surprise. I'd be more surprised to hear of any race, European or otherwise, improving on last year's attendance.

Bahrain...well, that was pretty obvious, Barcelona was down by around 20,000 apparently, Canada's was down (that was more down to that student protest than anything else), Valencia only had 45,000 grand stand tickets - down on previous years, Silverstone had the whole parking problem on the Saturday...it goes on.

Yes, I understand the situation about other countries, but it still surprised me that Hockenheim would struggle this year with sales. I have no idea about the prices but they must be very high as it is usually packed there in Germany being as passionate as they are about their drivers in such an exceptional year for Germany's F1.

Maybe they do not want to witness another embarrasing weekend from Schumi? :eekout:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

On the contrary, I think the USGP will be better-attended this year than last year. tongue.png

Oddly enough, actually, the Circuit of the Americas completely sold out non-license tickets (as simply as possible, seats in "prime" locations require the purchase of a license to that seat for every event held at COTA in the year for some number of years; the rest of the seats are sold on an event-by-event, year-by-year basis. The latter category sold out) and are building additional grandstands for the race. I have no idea what their capacity is...

...and it will still be a huge money-loser on the sanctioning fee alone (not the cost of production) unless they sell ~150,000 tickets which even NASCAR can't do at a much lower price. To pay off construction and sanctioning fee in ten years (let's pretend it gets ten years, and let's pretend ticket sales are their only revenue when we know that's not true at all), they would need to sell 300,000 $200 tickets every single year, which is hard to do when I assume capacity is more like 100,000 or so.

And we'd still be losing money then, because there are more costs than just sanctioning fee and construction. Paying staff, for one...

Ten Grands Prix will cost well over $600,000,000 in Austin. $300,000,000 to build it, and $300,000,000 to sanction it (the local government will pay those fees). You can't tell me the investors ever see their $300,000,000 again. And you can't tell me the government sees $300,000,000 in benefits (which isn't really the right way to look at it...the money comes from taxpayers...taxpayers will see an increase of a few dollars at most per year for the Grand Prix...will each and every tax payer get a few dollars worth of benefits from the GP? Who knows, but theoretically, multiple people can benefit from the same thing the GP brings, so it wouldn't total $300,000,000 for the government but it would total the few dollars for every person in the perfect world, where it will probably total a lot for Wild Bubba that will then be taxed by the government to get something back into the fund which would then put more than the $30,000,000 sanctioning fee in theoretically if taxable income increased as a whole as a result of a Grand Prix which would then make everyone mad because now the government has more money than they need for the race and all that well anyway there'd probably be a little increase for some others and nothing for many and then they'll all realize that there might not actually be any kind of tax increase at all because the money's been sitting in a fund to attract sporting events to Austin and if you're paying the money into the fund anyway you may as well get the sporting event...it's more of an issue of people wanting to cut out the tax that they didn't realize they were paying and were therefore fine with when it was doing nothing, but are now angry about when it is doing something, rather than people resisting a new one, though I think they think it's a new one and I sort of don't know if it is or isn't).

Say what you want about Ecclestone, but anyone who can get twenty races on a calendar with more wanting a piece despite the economics of hosting a Grand Prix being pretty horrendous for any entity, public or private. Is it a short-term approach? Yeah. But it's a long short term and I don't lose much sleep over Grands Prix coming and going.

SparkNotes: I don't know how I feel about the cost to host a race but enough venues feel pretty damn good about it and that's what counts.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

The rumors about a return to Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Mexico for 2013 are heating up once more. It's a potential replacement for Valencia...even though the New Jersey race was the confirmed replacement for Valencia, which was confirmed to be alternating with Barcelona. Looks like neither of those is the case anymore, or at least for the moment.

It's a pretty good track; I liked the Champ Car and NASCAR races there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJ4DcehRBbA

As you can see, Champ Car neutered the track a bit with a horribly tight chicane. I assume that, whether for safety or out of arrogance, Tilke will make changes to the circuit if it comes back (though, to be fair, his changes will look a lot more professional than that chicane).

In my opinion, there are two types of tracks that have real merit:

1. Tracks that separate the best drivers from the other drivers. I consider tracks like Monte Carlo and Suzuka to be in this category. It takes such a precision to get around circuits like those, and because the driving is so prescribed by the constraints of difficulty and, in some cases, barriers, it's very hard to differentiate oneself in a meaningful way. Drivers who can get those extra tenths on tracks like this, to me, are showing something really, really special because there's just not much there for them to find.

2. Tracks that separate the drivers from ordinary people. In F1, that's Spa and Monza, for starters, with places like the real Nüburgring, Circuit de la Sarthe, or Indianapolis in other racing domains. These venues demand extreme bravery that none of us key board crew chiefs have. These tracks can separate the best from the others, too, in that some are more brave than others (but all are brave enough to be there)...i.e. overtaking in unthinkable places while the car is on edge. And not everyone has the car control to hold it through successive blind corners at speed while the car skates around. Still, these are tracks where you expect differentiation among drivers, so what really stands out is just the art of cars on the track and how every single driver out there is so much better than you, the fan, could have ever been.

Note how many tracks in one category, are also in the other, at least in sections or corners if not throughout the entire layout.

I think both of those types of tracks capture the essence and make up the most interesting parts in F1. Now, those aren't the only considerations in designing a track. Safety obviously has a role, perhaps nobly, or perhaps due to corporate sponsorships and insurance reasons. There are also tracks, not so much in F1 but prevalent in the U.S., that are designed with overtaking at the forefront. Personally, I don't think facilitating passing is an objective that really belongs in F1 track design, but I do see where you can argue for it, and where it fits in the motorsport world.

So, what does Tilke do? Most of the time, and not all of his tracks are terrible, just redundant, his tracks don't do much to make us witness the pure talent of some drivers over others and the pure talent of all drivers over ourselves. And to me, those two things make racing so compelling. Yeah, those elements exist on every track in every series, but they just aren't pronounced on most of Tilke's tracks, and that's why I'm not sure I like the idea of him touching tracks that existed long before his did. No track is "right" because of history, or because that's how it was designed. You have to be modern and change. I just would like to see someone else administer those changes for once.

(But that's such a cliché opinion, to be against Tilke, so I feel stupid for writing it). :P

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Interesting....

I think its hard generalising about tracks as tyres, regulations and weather all have a massive impact on the amount of perceived "fun" of a track.

Magny Cours being one of the dullest tracks to watch I remember being brought alive when it rained one year.... Hungaroring, normally dull as hell was way more interesting this year because of tyres and DRS.... Monaco is no doubt special, but the racing there is pretty dire, very little overtaking and quite processional.

Agree that some of Tilke's designs can be a bit anti-septic but then I can recall some thrilling races in Bahrain, Malaysia, etc....

Its only in the last 2 years that with fewer regulation changes, cars are a lot closer - its interesting to see how they cope on all the tracks - look how many different winners we have had....

So not sure yet if I would blame Tilke.....

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I don't blame Tilke for a lack of overtaking because 1) there isn't a lack of overtaking anymore and 2) it never was Tilke's job to create overtaking.

However, I think Tilke is one of a number of factors that made overtaking such a priority. Basically, it's my opinion that Tilke's tracks overstate the need for overtaking in F1.

A race at Monaco, or at Spa, or outside of F1 at La Sarthe, at Watkins Glen, at Mosport, at Road America, or on the oval at Indianapolis...to me, they don't need overtaking to be interesting. I watch races at those tracks and just think "wow, the best drivers are absolutely so much better than the rest of them, and all of these drivers are just so much better and braver than the ordinary person, and these cars are so damn fast and corner so well." It's so exciting to me to watch fast cars and fast drivers on a track where you either need to be really special to find an advantage, or really courageous, or both. If they cameras are someone who is really on it at one of those tracks, overtaking won't cross my mind at all because it's just beauty to see a skilled driver in an extraordinary car pushing so hard on a timeless track.

Tilke's tracks, though, have some interesting pieces to them, I won't deny that, and some are better as wholes than others. Still, I don't get that feeling of amazement watching someone drive around a Tilke track. Is part of that bias, because there's so much hype around "classic" venues? Sure, I'd say that plays into it. But it just always feels, to me, like something's missing from Tilke's designs, something that will be really impressive to watch drivers cope with, to watch the cars cope with, etc. Turn 8 at Turkey was an example of how Tilke can get it right.

To be honest, I think that, if you have a race where the cars are close, many of Tilke's tracks will facilitate overtaking better than the others. But there's also a need for overtaking/close running/tire strategy to make a Tilke race interesting, whereas I can always appreciate other races because hell, these cars are vicious and these drivers are damn good.

Tilke highlights a lack of overtaking; other tracks hide it...and then you get into personal preference, of course, about how much overtaking should there be, and how easy should it be, and what makes a good race and a good track, and there's no right answer there.

I guess my point is: it's hard to throw a bunch of romanticized, clichés about racing on a Tilke race, and it's easy to do that on a classic one. :P

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Spa was confirmed for another three years yesterday on a more favourable financial deal. There will be no alteration with another race.

Great news. The best track F1 visits and quite possibly one of the very best in the world as well.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...