23 replies to this topic

[Gwynston]

Will F1 ever be a traditional sport ever again?

I know it has always been full of politicking, but this year has gone further. I don't want to rehash all the various incedents, but it seems like everything just gets taken to the nth degree just for the sake of it, e.g.:

- Teams appealing: The customer car row, Brazilian GP result, Safety car in Japan
- FIA/Stewards interfering: Hungary qualifying, mass dampers, Monza qualifying last year etc.
- Spygate: Stepney/Coughlan, Ferrari/Toyota, McLaren/Renault

While examples like the 1st two bullet points are becoming an increasingly irritating blot on the sport, the spying scandals risk changing the sport forever I feel. The thing is, we all know information follows technical people who change teams, and always has done, but I can't see how anyone will get away with it ever again.

Here's a quote from Ask Nigel this week:

Even drivers are not immune. I remember one team principal telling me that when his new driver arrived, his first task was to sit down with his new engineers, and tell them every single thing he could remember about his former team. It was extremely illuminating, the team principal told me - not least in terms of how that team had been cheating. "We learned," he said, "an awful lot..."

I can't see how anything will be allowed to pass in F1 ever again without endless scrutiny, arguing, poilitcs etc. A precedent has been set and I don't think the FIA are capable of policing every tiny detail consistently.

[kar]

In a sport that spends billions of dollars every year to go racing it was inevitable this sort of politicking would begin to take place, particularly in the most closely fought season in 20 years.

So to answer your question, no, F1 will never be a 'traditional sport' again, just the same as any modern, popular, sports aren't.

And if the FIA doesn't regulate spying, espionage and otherwise 'foul play' between teams, the civil courts will and that could well lead to uglier, far more damaging verdicts than what the FIA ever could.

[geGR]

I fear, where this amount of money is involved, one can not speak about "traditional sport".
Me though, I would prefer extreme policing (by the FIA) to having to put up with these endless screams of "everybody is cheating". That said, sure, it is inevitable that people who change teams bring technical information with them (in their minds, that is), but during this year we have not seen just that, haven't we?....

[F1Champion]

Mo money, mo problems.

Back when the sport had little money it was seen as the golden age of motorsport, simple honest and exciting racing, now that billions are poured into the sport, politics and a cut-throat nature have emerged.

[Gwynston]

OK, but I guess what I'm thinking is that the way intellectual property is handled will be very difficult to police in the future. And the clowns in the FIA don't give a lot of confidence in being able to handle it consistently.

The McLaren case has set a precedent that opens the door for endless investigations and recriminations in the future.

[jonpollak]

What's that Sir Frank quote...?
It's a sport for 2 hours every other week...

There ya go

Jp

[geGR]

Originally posted by Gwynston
OK, but I guess what I'm thinking is that the way intellectual property is handled will be very difficult to police in the future. And the clowns in the FIA don't give a lot of confidence in being able to handle it consistently.

The McLaren case has set a precedent that opens the door for endless investigations and recriminations in the future.

If you consider as a given that F1's governing body are clowns, then I guess there is not much room for argument(s)...

[lukywill]

it´s a sport as long as it is a english play time.

[lukywill]

Originally posted by jonpollak
What's that Sir Frank quote...?
It's a sport for 2 hours every other week...

There ya go



Jp

not at all sir frank. it was sir dennis who quoted it. you know the english mafia.

[Gwynston]

Originally posted by lukywill
it´s a sport as long as it is a english play time.

[lukywill]

Originally posted by Gwynston

[angst]

Originally posted by Gwynston

Clearly he means that only the English understand the concept of sport....;)

[lukywill]

bingo.

germans are after art more than a way and france has the sarkosy way of divorce under and after the vote.

and we don´t like nascar. and never went to the usa for reference.

lucky us.

[Enzoluis]

Originally posted by Gwynston
.

Here's a quote from Ask Nigel this week:

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Even drivers are not immune. I remember one team principal telling me that when his new driver arrived, his first task was to sit down with his new engineers, and tell them every single thing he could remember about his former team. It was extremely illuminating, the team principal told me - not least in terms of how that team had been cheating. "We learned," he said, "an awful lot..."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is not an infrigement of the sport rules, you can say and explain what you have learned in the former team. That is different to pick up draws, documents or files that do not belongs to you but to your employer,

[rhm]

Originally posted by Enzoluis



This is not an infrigement of the sport rules, you can say and explain what you have learned in the former team. That is different to pick up draws, documents or files that do not belongs to you but to your employer,

I think his point isn't the CIA-style debriefing of the new driver, it's that they disclosed not just normal detail, but also all the ways their previous team were cheating. Cheating goes on - even if you're not breaking the rules, you're trying to bend them as far as possible and as such you are breaking the spirit of the rules. But at some point the principle of 'not taking the piss' comes into play. Nobody thought drivers swapping places in the race to help each other's championship hopes was too controversial until Ferrari decided to take the piss at the Austrian GP; teams play games to get weight down to the minimum limit all the time and the drivers pick up rubber on their tyres at the ends of the races to try and be sure, but BAR's fuel system allowed them to run underweight and was really taking the piss.

Teams spy on other teams all the time and will use anything they discover from other team's employees or new hires as well as from straightforward espionage as long as they think they can get away with it. But the relationship between certain McLaren employees and Nigel Stepney was deemed to be taking the piss.

Ferrari's floor at the Australian GP this year - a small development on rule pushing that had been going on for years - not taking the piss apparently.

What was staggering about the whole Stepneygate story was how holier-than-thou Ferrari managed to be about it, as if nobody ever tried to obtain information about other teams, as if nobody would ever look at documents that landed in their lap. Do me a favour.

We see the same thing from Williams and BMW at the appeal hearing this week - they say how outraged they are that McLaren would seek to have them excluded from the Brazilian GP, Ferrari accuse McLaren directly of "naked opportunism" and indirectly of hypocrisy for trying to get the results of the race changed but claiming they don't want to win the championship in a court. *AS IF* those three teams, or any other team for that matter, wouldn't be doing EXACTLY the same thing if the situations were reversed. They'll say they wouldn't now, or rather their fans on this board will claim they wouldn't. But the fact is they would and if they are at all honest with themselves, they know it. The fact they claim otherwise with a straight face, that is hypocrisy.

As for F1 as a sport. Forget it. Even the written rules they do have the stewards refuse to enforce when it doesn't suit them. It's a joke.

[Sakae]

Is espionage also a sporty game sort off? I would like to hand over my list with questions for LH to Egyptians that should ask him, so we get into bottom of this...

[pingu666]

Originally posted by MiPe
Is espionage also a sporty game sort off? I would like to hand over my list with questions for LH to Egyptians that should ask him, so we get into bottom of this...

i remmber mark thomas saying the egyption police would handcuff people with there hands behind there backs, which is standard practise. hanging them up from said cuffs isnt, and thats mark said they did/do

[Sakae]

Oh, Hammy wouldn't like it then. Let's move on.

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally posted by F1Champion
Mo money, mo problems.

Back when the sport had little money it was seen as the golden age of motorsport, simple honest and exciting racing, now that billions are poured into the sport, politics and a cut-throat nature have emerged.

But back then the winning was still done by the teams with the best set-ups, which were sometimes Brabham but also sometimes unfortunately big resource works teams. All the others had nice paint work, trucks and tidy garages but didn't do much of the winning.... no real difference to Toyotas of today really.

[giacomo]

Even drivers are not immune. I remember one team principal telling me that when his new driver arrived, his first task was to sit down with his new engineers, and tell them every single thing he could remember about his former team. It was extremely illuminating, the team principal told me - not least in terms of how that team had been cheating. "We learned," he said, "an awful lot...".

As if this would be something new.

I remember when Rene Arnoux left Renault for Ferrari in late 1982 he even brought some stolen parts of the Renault electronic with him.


Still those things are not comparable with having a mole in another team who is sending updated SMSes about the current testing ongoings.

[Tigershark]

Originally posted by giacomo
As if this would be something new.

Exactly, it isn't and the teams now this. Which is why you'll see drivers who are switching teams complain they are not testing the latest developments during the latter part of the season and are generally not able to test anything at all until january.

[RSNS]

Very often, I find myself thinking that all fans are victims. In the same way that there are people who gloat on having a Mac instead of a Pc (good for them if they can afford it) not because the Mac is, in fact better, but because they were victims of all the publicity and hype (I am not against Macs: I use one myself) it sometimes occurs to me that all the Alonso or Hamilton (or, worse still, Ferrari or McLaren) fans are really only consumers.

[Lazarus II]

F1 is a "sport" for 2 hours on Sunday, otherwise it is part of the entertainment business.

[wrighty]

Originally posted by jonpollak
What's that Sir Frank quote...?
It's a sport for 2 hours every other week...

There ya go

Jp

Whoever said it, I think that's basically (and with respect, JP) 'history'. If any business was run the way F1 is run, it'd not last 5 minutes before it was dragged through the courts and sunk on the basis of its bizarre management style and lack of financial disclosure .
I'm not convinced it's even 2 hours of sport every other week now