83 replies to this topic

[NewMrMe]

Turn Friday into a Young Driver / testing day - with the race drivers only driving on the Saturday and Sunday ala Imola.

To be honest, so much of the format I’d shake up...

 

Exactly this. Gives young drivers seat time in an actual car which is currently prevented by the testing ban.

 

A1GP used to have a rookie practice session where teams could only run drivers that were under 25 and had driven in fewer than 3 A1GP races. Since I first saw it I thought it was an interesting idea.

[SenorSjon]

Don't bin it.  Yes that sounds simple, but making good decisions is part of being a success.  Part of having a successful race would be to not miss the race because you wrecked your car.  Best drivers in the world should be able to do that almost all of the time.  And if they can't, they know the risks and rewards of what they are doing.   

 

If Verstappens left rear exploded last time out, he would have went into the barrier head first, probably totalling the car. Out of the hands of the driver, but still potential weekend-ending.

[ARTGP]

Turn Friday into a Young Driver / testing day - with the race drivers only driving on the Saturday and Sunday ala Imola.

To be honest, so much of the format I’d shake up...

 

This is actually perfect   .

 

However, would not seem right if the young driver bins it on a Friday and the race driver has to take power unit or gearbox penalties. A solution to that could be that there is one power unit a season dedicated to the Fridays. But Imagine could easily cost the team an extra 1-3 power units a season considering reliability, and/or crashes on Friday.

Edited by ARTGP, 09 November 2020 - 21:49.

[Planetdune]

I never watch practice sessions so don't really care... but I guess giving them less time to prepare can only be a good thing.

[Frank Tuesday]

If Verstappens left rear exploded last time out, he would have went into the barrier head first, probably totalling the car. Out of the hands of the driver, but still potential weekend-ending.

 

So if his tyre exploded during the race, he would have been out of the race.  Which is the same thing that would happen if the race weekend was 2, 3 or 7 days long. 

 

So your concern is that a driver will have an exploding tyre during practice which will cause them to miss the race.  That would happen from one of three things.  1) overusing the tyre in practice.  If you wear through a tyre in a 1 hour practice session, that's your own fault.  2)picking up / running over debris.  The track will be clean as it is the first session of the day, or don't run off track.  Debris problem solved.  3) "Mystery explosion" which just means they don't know whether it was 1 or 2.  

 

So what about a driver that has an exploding tyre during the sighting lap?  I bet you're not overly concerned about that now, even though it would be weekend-ending.

[ARTGP]

Unless someone bins it and can't compete in the race...

 

Spare car. and some rented out Red Bull mechanics. (get your mind out of the gutters  ).

Edited by ARTGP, 09 November 2020 - 22:22.

[TomNokoe]

Three full practice sessions add intrigue, mystery and a great deal of anticipation to an F1 weekend, especially when there's a proper title fight. It often may be an illusion, but it's enjoyable nonetheless.

As noikeee said, I much prefer when the teams and drivers have been able to delve into the data overnight and come into Saturday renewed with fresh purpose, fully optimised. Many a GP weekend have been transformed by hard work back at base on Friday.

I also think there's something to be said for the drivers pushing to the absolute limits. I much prefer seeing who is fastest after 3-4 hours of practice over three days rather than just 1-2 hours over two, because essentially the challenge then becomes "who can make the most of a compromised format?", and that's not really sport, is it?

I don't agree with the predicability argument. That's modern F1 for you, for several different reasons. Unpredictability is borne out of competitiveness, which is a different argument entirely, but you could say three days helps the grid to close up.

I also enjoy the support races, which three days helps to facilitate.

Edited by TomNokoe, 09 November 2020 - 23:12.

[pdac]

I'd prefer to see a 1-day race weekend, actually.

[ThadGreen]

Which one?

 

It sucks for the fans attending the event and I would hope that once the flu virus has been taken care of we don't see it again. I can understand the majority of F1 followers not being too concerned about it (if it's Friday that is dropped) because those that are employed are at work on Friday. Me personally, I set my own schedule and while I don't always watch the Friday or Saturday free practice sessions, I think it would be severely missed by the the teams for setup and driver experience reasons.

[JacksBalls]

More time on track is always better for fans and drivers.
The key is balancing more races with time away from home for all team members. Will the extra day off actually allow team members an extra day with family or would they just be put to use at the factory for an extra day?

The reserve/young driver Friday morning session is so logical I'm surprised it's not on the schedule yet!
(Although I guess rarely does logic and F1 mix. Ha)

Could call it R.P.- Reserve Practice and start F.P. 1 in the afternoon.
Perfect for this current climate if all teams have to run their weekend reserve driver or an Academy driver. Drivers, teams, fans are always complaining that there's not enough time for a rookie to get up to speed...this would be a massive help. Imagine Tsunoda having the whole year in an Alpha Tauri or even the final 6 races to get up to speed and understand the processes. Instead of arriving at pre season testing with no idea what's going on.
Also allows for situations like Hulkenburgs parachuting into the weekend to be a lot easier since they are at the track with a seat made and systems in place if someone is out with covid.
Two practice sessions before qualifying is plenty for a full time driver. As we've seen over the Imola weekend.

Even a new drivers view on car development may end up being helpful for different directions/ideas. E.g. Alonso for Renault, Hulkenburgs pink Merc ideas etc.
I guess this would also allow some teams after money to run 'Jrs' for money too.
In terms of an accident taking out a main drivers car? Nearly every accident/issue can be repaired over night so a full Sat practice and Qual would be fine in the rare case of a rookie turning a car into a toboggan.

In would like to see more drivers having a shot!

Edited by JacksBalls, 10 November 2020 - 01:58.

[Fastcake]

I’m surprised to discover I didn’t really miss it. Not that I can catch every practice session anyway, I’ve averaged FP2 only this year, but I always thought casually watching the cars in the background was part of the race weekend. I could probably do without it as a TV viewer.

The teams don’t need it. You can do more with a half dozen laps nowadays with modern data collection and analytics than you could with a whole day of testing in the old days. They already dedicate days to each track in the simulator and know how the car should behave before even arriving. The extra time now is being used to perfect the cars and decrease the chances of anything out of the ordinary happening. Plenty of other series run without this much practice and they all do fine. And many of the less professional championships don’t have the drivers spending hundreds of hours in a simulator each month, and yet they all manage to keep it on the track about as much as those at the apparent pinnacle.

Four hours of practice just isn’t needed in Formula One anymore.

[Frank Tuesday]

I also think there's something to be said for the drivers pushing to the absolute limits. I much prefer seeing who is fastest after 3-4 hours of practice over three days rather than just 1-2 hours over two, because essentially the challenge then becomes "who can make the most of a compromised format?", and that's not really sport, is it?

How is 2 hours "compromised" but 4 hours isn't? Either is an arbitrary time limit placed on teams. 4 hours is "compromised" if the other option is 8 hours. 8 hours is compromised if the other option is dawn to dusk on Fri and Sat. The only way it isn't compromised is to allow teams to spend as much time as they want on any track they want all season.

If you want more practice time, fine, but to suggest that one arbitrary limit is inherently incorrect while some other arbitrary limit is correct is absurd. As long as every team has the same restrictions, I don't see any inherent problem with any arbitrary limit. I think that limit should be much less than it currently is.

[AustinF1]

You can do more with a half dozen laps nowadays with modern data collection and analytics than you could with a whole day of testing in the old days. They already dedicate days to each track in the simulator and know how the car should behave before even arriving. The extra time now is being used to perfect the cars and decrease the chances of anything out of the ordinary happening.

This why I say that if we want less predictability, reducing practice time isn't way to go about it. Restrict data collection, and then you limit simulation ability and effectiveness, and increase unpredictability of setup accuracy, tire wear, grip levels, fuel economy, strategy & tactics, & probably myriad other things.

[loki]

Under normal times when you eliminate a day it’s going to make it even more difficult to generate box office revenue.  That could impact team revenue.  It hasn’t appeared to change the competition aspect.

[baddog]

It was crap and shouldnt happen again

[PlatenGlass]

It's only going to be a very small number of underemployed die-hard fans that are going to sit in front of every dull FP1 and FP2 session. Even for many of them, losing these sessions would be a bonus because they get to watch all the F1 coverage without spending as much time on it so they would no longer have to engage in cognitive dissonance and pretend that they enjoy these sessions.

For 99%+ of F1 viewers it would make no difference at all. For those attending events, as has been said, more support races on the Friday would be a good thing. And there's plenty of F1 action on Saturday and Sunday anyway.

Edit - So as for whether the two-day weekend we just bad was better or worse, I'm not sure what difference I as a TV viewer was supposed to notice.

Edited by PlatenGlass, 10 November 2020 - 09:32.

[SenorSjon]

So if his tyre exploded during the race, he would have been out of the race.  Which is the same thing that would happen if the race weekend was 2, 3 or 7 days long. 

 

So your concern is that a driver will have an exploding tyre during practice which will cause them to miss the race.  That would happen from one of three things.  1) overusing the tyre in practice.  If you wear through a tyre in a 1 hour practice session, that's your own fault.  2)picking up / running over debris.  The track will be clean as it is the first session of the day, or don't run off track.  Debris problem solved.  3) "Mystery explosion" which just means they don't know whether it was 1 or 2.  

 

So what about a driver that has an exploding tyre during the sighting lap?  I bet you're not overly concerned about that now, even though it would be weekend-ending.

 

The tire was an example. We've had drain covers ripping cars apart (Williams in Baku for instance). With the current rules, they have to swap the engine to a new chassis. And with all the stuff bolted onto it these days, that is no small task. In the past, you could just jump into a T-car.

 

It's only going to be a very small number of underemployed die-hard fans that are going to sit in front of every dull FP1 and FP2 session. Even for many of them, losing these sessions would be a bonus because they get to watch all the F1 coverage without spending as much time on it so they would no longer have to engage in cognitive dissonance and pretend that they enjoy these sessions.

For 99%+ of F1 viewers it would make no difference at all. For those attending events, as has been said, more support races on the Friday would be a good thing. And there's plenty of F1 action on Saturday and Sunday anyway.

Edit - So as for whether the two-day weekend we just bad was better or worse, I'm not sure what difference I as a TV viewer was supposed to notice.

 

To me, it is build-up to the weekend and always gives a tiny shimmer of hope when a Merc is not in front. That would be dashed if it was saturday only.

[PlatenGlass]

It's the hope that kills you. (That seems to be a saying anyway.)

[Tombstone]

I have absolutely zero interest in Friday practice, nor Saturday's P3 for that matter. 

 

I'd rather have more races in a year than more days at each race, shorter race weekends would make triple-headers more viable too.

[flingsofdeon]

By turning Friday into a testing / young driver day, it creates commercial upside for the teams (selling a non-racing seat), gives up and coming talents real seat time to prep for a competitive entry into the sport, adds more intrigue to the weekend as a whole (Schumacher, Illott, Schwartzman, Tsunoda testing all year this year would only be a good thing - Russell could drop a year of racing to test every race weekend in the Mercedes).

Then, to add a little spice - on one weekend, have a young drivers race, for drivers who’ve taken part in x number of test sessions...perhaps on a Friday, then do a one race weekend for the main drivers.

[TomNokoe]

How is 2 hours "compromised" but 4 hours isn't? Either is an arbitrary time limit placed on teams. 4 hours is "compromised" if the other option is 8 hours. 8 hours is compromised if the other option is dawn to dusk on Fri and Sat. The only way it isn't compromised is to allow teams to spend as much time as they want on any track they want all season.

If you want more practice time, fine, but to suggest that one arbitrary limit is inherently incorrect while some other arbitrary limit is correct is absurd. As long as every team has the same restrictions, I don't see any inherent problem with any arbitrary limit. I think that limit should be much less than it currently is.

I shouldn't have described the two schedules using track time only, sorry.

 

4 hours of practice, over two days (Fri morning-break-afternoon-sleep-Sat morning) is definitely as close to optimal as you're going to get at any motor-racing event, save for your Indys and LeMans, etc.

 

When compared to the two-day format, and ignoring the extra time allowance, the teams have more sets of tyres, a variation in ambient conditions, and ample breaks in between to make and validate setup changes, look at test items, etc. I've probably missed some more +'s for the three-day in terms of "optimisation", but there are very clear benefits that are not afforded otherwise, and I don't think I'm overestimating their impact. That is why I used the term "compromise".

[kosmos]

I have FP1 and 2 as background noise most of the time. I don't mind if they get rid of fridays.

[Frank Tuesday]

The tire was an example. We've had drain covers ripping cars apart (Williams in Baku for instance). With the current rules, they have to swap the engine to a new chassis. And with all the stuff bolted onto it these days, that is no small task. In the past, you could just jump into a T-car.

 

 

To me, it is build-up to the weekend and always gives a tiny shimmer of hope when a Merc is not in front. That would be dashed if it was saturday only.

So if Mercedes is behind, but has 4 hours of practice to get it right you have a glimmer of hope.  But if Mercedes is behind and only has 1 hour to get it right, you don't have a glimmer of hope?  

[SenorSjon]

It's the hope that kills you. (That seems to be a saying anyway.)

Hope dies last.

[absinthedude]

Meh. It wasn't a disaster but I don't feel it added or changed anything much. I think we did lose something of the build up of tension that the three day weekend gives. But in exceptional circumstances F1 has proved it can do a two day weekend. So I hope it's something left for exceptional circumstances, and not the norm.

[Bloggsworth]

Great. It would also be a good way to seriously cut costs, reduce the sports carbon emissions, reduce the amount of money spent on race weekend flights with updated parts etc, etc. etc...

[Fastcake]

This why I say that if we want less predictability, reducing practice time isn't way to go about it. Restrict data collection, and then you limit simulation ability and effectiveness, and increase unpredictability of setup accuracy, tire wear, grip levels, fuel economy, strategy & tactics, & probably myriad other things.

I'm all for reducing the live telemetry during the race. The way most people suggest doing it is to continue allowing the teams to collect as much data as they wish, but removing the ability to send most of it back wirelessly. But if we did that for every session in practice the teams would just plug a laptop in every time the cars come back into the pits, and that's just making things more difficult while not really achieving anything. You could just vastly restrict telemetry altogether, but that's probably a no-goer.

 

I don't see how you can restrict simulation, or if that would even be desirable.

[ARTGP]

I'm all for reducing the live telemetry during the race. The way most people suggest doing it is to continue allowing the teams to collect as much data as they wish, but removing the ability to send most of it back wirelessly. But if we did that for every session in practice the teams would just plug a laptop in every time the cars come back into the pits, and that's just making things more difficult while not really achieving anything. You could just vastly restrict telemetry altogether, but that's probably a no-goer.

 

I don't see how you can restrict simulation, or if that would even be desirable.

 

Or let them collect it, but don't let them look at it until after the race on Sunday. 

 

Driver should be able to see temperature and pressure for the oil and water, and the ERS state of charge (In addition to speed and gear). But that's it.

Edited by ARTGP, 11 November 2020 - 00:33.

[SenorSjon]

Great. It would also be a good way to seriously cut costs, reduce the sports carbon emissions, reduce the amount of money spent on race weekend flights with updated parts etc, etc. etc...

 

Welcome 23-race calendar... What the cars consume during a weekend is less than what is burned off during the taxi-phase of the flyaway races.

[Clatter]

I'm all for reducing the live telemetry during the race. The way most people suggest doing it is to continue allowing the teams to collect as much data as they wish, but removing the ability to send most of it back wirelessly. But if we did that for every session in practice the teams would just plug a laptop in every time the cars come back into the pits, and that's just making things more difficult while not really achieving anything. You could just vastly restrict telemetry altogether, but that's probably a no-goer.

 

I don't see how you can restrict simulation, or if that would even be desirable.

 

I don't mind if they plug a laptop in during practise. The biggest impact will be on race day, where I would ban all telemetry. Just wish they would do it, and ignore any complaints from the teams about it being difficult.

[Frank Tuesday]

I shouldn't have described the two schedules using track time only, sorry.

 

4 hours of practice, over two days (Fri morning-break-afternoon-sleep-Sat morning) is definitely as close to optimal as you're going to get at any motor-racing event, save for your Indys and LeMans, etc.

 

When compared to the two-day format, and ignoring the extra time allowance, the teams have more sets of tyres, a variation in ambient conditions, and ample breaks in between to make and validate setup changes, look at test items, etc. I've probably missed some more +'s for the three-day in terms of "optimisation", but there are very clear benefits that are not afforded otherwise, and I don't think I'm overestimating their impact. That is why I used the term "compromise".

Why is it "optimal"?  Why is having more sets of tyres optimal?  Why are varied ambient conditions (when in the race they are usually not varied) optimal?  And if both of those are inherently good options, then why not run on Thursday as well, which will give even more possibilities for varied ambient conditions and allow them to use even more tyres.  Surely that would be even more optimal that what you are claiming is optimal.  And why is it not "optimal" for Indy and LeMans?  

 

What you are claiming is optimal is just the schedule that you are accustomed to having.  

[ThadGreen]

This why I say that if we want less predictability, reducing practice time isn't way to go about it. Restrict data collection, and then you limit simulation ability and effectiveness, and increase unpredictability of setup accuracy, tire wear, grip levels, fuel economy, strategy & tactics, & probably myriad other things.

 

I agree with what you have said here concerning data collection and perhaps we could see a separate thread (if one doesn't already exist) discussing restricting data streaming?. 

[MikeTekRacing]

not really happy to lose a day of action for people that come to the race weekends.

[PayasYouRace]

not really happy to lose a day of action for people that come to the race weekends.

 

Though most fans don't do the entire weekend. They do just the race, or Saturday and Sunday. We know this, because the crowds on Friday are usually small. It's the real hardcore fans who would watch on TV anyway.

 

And what action is there? Practice isn't exactly action. It's just the teams optimising their setups.