Why is it that teams have to run two cars?

The cost saving for a small team, to run just one car, would be substantial:

- One driver to pay (also don't have a reserve - there are always drivers in the wings if really needed)
- Half the engines to buy
- Almost half the parts to fabricate
- Almost half the race personnel
- Various other things would be less

It would mean the one driver having to do a bit more sponsorship work - or the team finds another way to do it, without the driver.

It would also mean changing how money is allocated from the FIA as well - simple situation would be for them to get half, though I would think it should be slightly modified so they get say 65% - which would barely affect any other teams budgets.

It may mean two 1-car teams share a garage at some races

It would mean that these teams wouldn't be competing for the WCC - but lets face it, they aren't anyway. And if it turns out they make a gem, and win the WCC, then they will certainly be able to run two cars the following year.

I am sure there are a bunch of other things, but there can't be any big problem there.

1-car teams would mean that we could have 14 teams next year - 12 with 2 cars and 2 with 1, for example - and the budgeting would stay the same, and garage space, so Williams and the others who objected would not need to object any more.

One of the first things that comes to mind is how would the team gauge their driver?

With two drivers driving identical cars you get a better idea as to measure the performance of each cars and each driver.

With two drivers you can get a relative performance between the two drivers. It tells you nothing much about the car.

You would of course just compare your car/driver to the others in the field. At the end of the day that is what every team does anyway. With two drivers you can also say that you have one driver who is worse than the other, but doesn't help one jot against the other cars in the field.

I think it does.

If you have one car and one driver, you can only measure the car's performance when it raced against other cars.

However, how do you know that the driver is getting the maximum out of the car?

Answer;

A) By having another driver drive the car and compare his times.

B) By having a second identical car and compare the times of both drivers.

WTH? the reason for having 2 drivers now is to measure them against each other? I thought they were teammates gunning for the same goal, to beat the competition.

The in-team battle shouldn't be much more than a psycological fight.

I would think that the marginal cost saving from running one car only would be less than the lost revenues from FOM and sponsors. Manufacturing of an additional car plus driver salary is probably low compared to the overall development cost. Sponsors pay for TV exposure and one car means almost half the exposure and therefore half the money. It would be difficult to compete in the constructors championship and the outfit would be rated as B-team and consequently reflected in the money the sponsors would be willing to pay.

The economics simply would not stack up for a one car team.

I really enjoyed seeing the Ensigns and Osellas and all the other one-car teams years ago, but times have changed. Gone are the days when a tiny team could build their own car in a little shop, plug in a Cosworth and a Hewland and take on the big boys. Now you need such a massive financial commitment that running one car doesn't make much sense. The cost savings would be a relative drop in the bucket, and you'd lose all the feedback and options that a second car offers.

Oh, and to answer the question, yes, I do think they should be allowed.

Yes I see no reason to not allow a one car team but as has already been stated the cost savings wouldn't offset the reduced exposure and therefore sponsorship income.

There is already a one car team - Renault.

I don't know.

But as a somewhat-related note, I would like to say Ferrari pushing for 3 cars per team sounds pretty crazy.

They say they would allow 14 teams. The situation is now there would be 13 teams. That would mean 26 cars. Now, what if the teams would have 3 cars. That would mean 39 cars! With 14 teams it would be 42 cars! Of course that's totally impossible with the current logistics and infrastructure F1 has.

So perhaps Ferrari means they should have 3 cars and the rest will run only 2 cars? I would just hope they shut up about it already, the more I hear them talk about it the more I think they are not being very smart. The number of teams is increasing and then they are talking of having 3 cars. It just does not make sense. Perhaps wait and see how many teams there will actually be, and if it is significantly less than the current number of teams, then propose to run a 3rd car. That would make you sound much more sensible.

Personally I don't think any team should be allowed 3 cars no matter what the situation. It wouldn't be a fair fight for the WCC, every team would have to run 3 cars to stand a chance of winning it and that's an expence most teams couldn't afford.
The best car/driver compo may end up losing the WCC because the second best has 3 cars at each race.

It is certainly part of the process to determine that the driver(s) are getting the most out of the car.

At the moment there are more than enough entries

BUT if grids were thin (12-14 cars) then certainly single car customer operations would be most welcome.

So no for now, but yes if grids are poor.

1 Car teams became obsolete in Nascar in the 1990's, so im not sure they would have success in F1 today.

Also, teams would not, in theory, be able to generate as much revenue from sponsors since they have one less car to advertise on.

It would be cool though if there were more teams in F1.

A very little part, IMHO, but it's certainly not a reason why to have 2 cars, heh

One less car to have sponsors on too and ultimatly, one car would earn less from television money as well.

With all the money put into developing a car I think it's relativly 'cheap' to produce another car.

Could always fill up second seat with a paydriver, in my eyes that's a 1 car team.

ofcourse they should allow, F1 should be more liberal, now its like Stalin is ruling it.

they should allow everything upon team's individual financial ability. Who is able to run 4 cars let them!!! Who is

My philosophy is: the more, the better. That's it.

They should liberate the number of cars for each team (and for the grid as well), only putting a cap in the number of the cars allowed to score for the constructors' championship, like it used to happen in WRC until some years ago. So, if Ferrari wants to put three cars on the track with Massa, Alonso and Schumacher, ok but they have to choose between them the most appopriated drivers to do so. And they would change their choice for the following races and so on.

Another issue that should be considerated is the possibility of having new entries throughout the championship, like in Indycar.

How does it tell you the driver is getting the best out of the car? It just tells you what your better of the two drivers can get out of the car.

If you have two bad drivers, neither will be getting the best out of the car. Worse, you could think that they are getting the best out of the car but actually they are both doing equally badly. A team needs to always be thinking about how a top driver would drive their car, and helping their driver(s) achieve that, rather than just focus on their own drivers.

No.
Are one-car teams necessary?

I thought "obsolete" was a swear word, especially where NASCAR is concerned... "run what ya brung"!



We'll see how next season pans out.

Various comments about costs have been made, and sponsors, but I really don't think they are correct.

First, costs. The actual costs would drop substantially with only 1 car and driver. I guestimate that with savings in engines, driver salary, fabrication, race personnel, you would save up to a quarter of the overall running costs of a small team.

The biggest thing that would not get cheaper is the actual car design. Yes, that is a big item, but its not that big.

I found one link which gives one breakdown of costs. It has engines at 50% so I assume that is talking about a Ferrari / Toyota team, rather than one buying engines in. Still, engines are a substantial cost even when buying them in.

Wikipedia F1 Budget Split Diagram

Second, the sponsors. They pay for exposure. The in-race TV exposure would be less, with 1 car, but it would not be half. The TV producers look for variety, and so they would show a bit of each team, which would favour the smaller teams. And if a small team did well, they would get a lot more exposure relatively - producers already tend to pick on the front runner of the two, in a two car team.

Also, it only takes 1 car / driver to make a TV advert, newspaper ad, say you sponsor a team, etc etc.

Also, sponsors want hospitality and events and so on - and for those things, having a 1 or 2 car team makes little difference, especially if the team is a bit innovative about who attends the sponsor events.

I reckon that the value of a 1 car team to a sponsor is about 3/4 that of a 2 car team. And a smart 1 car team might for example pay more for a better driver, or a more sponsor friendly driver, to increase value to a sponsor. Also things like the Brawn approach, of having local sponsors, might work well for a 1-car team.

At the moment we have a surplus of cars for next years grid, and small teams struggling to get two cars on the grid. It might be a win-win to let them only enter 1 car - room for Toyota, and save the small teams some money (or they could use it to develop one better car). Even if Toyota do leave, there are 24 cars, so having two teams only field 1 car is not exactly going to be a hardship for the championship - and the FIA could let more teams in, in 2011 to get up to 26 cars.

Why not? If a team wants to enter only one car, then they should be able to...

And let them score points. In the mid 80s, there were a couple of times where a driver actually finished in the top 6, but were denied points because that team only entered one car for the Championship.

Too many damn rules in F1 these days.

Everyone who has a compliant, fast enough and reliable car should be allowed to compete.

Or even if it's not fast enough... Let 'em try and fail (or succeed). That's the point of "competition" isn't it?

So if there were only one team drivers who would racei which team?


My list


Red Bull - Kimi
Ferrari - ALonso
McLaren - Lewis
Brawn - Vettel
Williams - Rosberg
Toyota - Massa
Renault - Kubica
Toro Rosso - Webber
Force India - Button

hey dragonfly tell me a bit more about your sig

it is intriguing