Is F3000 any good?

[429CJ]

Q: What is the biggest mistake for a young race driver?

A: To win a F3000 championship.

Eighteen seasons of International F3000. Eighteen champions.
Only three of them have won a Formula 1 Grand prix. Those three (Alesi, Panis and Montoya) have all won only one GP.
So, is F3000 any good? Should there be some other Junior Class?
Recent F1 champions have had only minor, or not at all experience from F3000 class. Schumacher's "mentor" was a Group C Sauber-Mercedes, Häkkinen came straight from the British F3, Villeneuve was a CART champion. Only Damon Hill had significant F3000 experience in underfunded teams, but even he wasn´t any real player in that class.

[mac]

I have a theory on this.

In the last few seasons we've seen Webber, Alonso , Bernoldi, Pizzonia and Massa join Formula One from F3000. Not an international F3000 title amongst them. Massa won the Euro title, but he's still young enough to fit into my theory.

Theory:
F3000 is a difficult formula to come straight into and be successful straight away. Rookies find it very difficult to win the championship in the first year or so. Look at the facts:

- Wilson won F3000 in his 4th year in the series.
- Bourdais won it in his 3rd?
- Enge kinda won it in his 3rd or 4th year?

From my point of view, Wilson's problem wasn't that he won the F3000 title, it was the years he spent in F3000 getting mediocre results. This is where he kind of became forgotten.

Nowadays, team bosses want young, naturally fast guys, who have great potential and adapt quickly. Guys like Raikkonen, Massa, Alonso and Pizzonia.

Consequently, they don't want someone who can spend 4 years getting to a point where he challenges, they want someone who gets in the series and makes an impression, comes to grips quickly, and is immediately on the pace. Anyone who spends more than 2 years in F3000 is going to struggle to make F1.

You look at how long it took for Wilson to make an impact in F3000, and compare that with Webber winning in his 2nd or 3rd race, in the wet. Alonso in his 1st few races, at Spa. Massa winning the title straight up.

Rookies are getting younger and younger, and bosses are going to look for them to impress straight away in a formula, not take a few years to do it.

[DanFlag]

In my opinion Mac as a pretty good theory.

The main facts; young and fast!

[Spiddy-Spid]

Alonso actually got pretty poor results for most of his first season. He won the final race of his first year with the help of Astromega's legendary Spa set-up.

[sceptic]

It was Enge's fifth year.

[429CJ]

Actually, this same "curse" was working earlier almost as strong, in the days of F2. No F2 champion ever won a World Championship in F1. Jacques Laffite and Rene Arnoux came close, but not close enough.

[unofficialf3000]

Originally posted by Spiddy-Spid
Alonso actually got pretty poor results for most of his first season. He won the final race of his first year with the help of Astromega's legendary Spa set-up.

But Alonso did impress with his pace throughout the year, in a season when the grids were huge, although he didn't ultimately score many points.

[unofficialf3000]

Originally posted by sceptic
It was Enge's fifth year.

It was his fourth full season though. Sorry to be pedantic

[Jay]

mac summed it up well.. the problem seems tobe the F1 people want young guys who will come into F1 and challenge for wins immediately? Thus the caroselle of drivers from lower formulae to teams at the rear of the F1 grid. Then they're disapointed when their young guy isn't ready for the pressure...

[BootsOntheSide]

F3000 cars in the past have not handled enough like F1 cars, they have had too much of a different style, and not been enough of a proving ground. Its also too difficult for rookies to challenge due to the lack of tessting. In short, F3000 is utter rubbish, freankly winning the 125cc bike championship wopuld be better preperation. It seems to be a good feeder for CART though, with Montoya, Junquiera and Brack having won or nearly won both.

[enemy-ace]

With the new Lola chassis for 2002 I think F3000 tried to position itself as more of a feeder series for F1 (not that it isn't already, but just more so now). I think however that modern F1 cars are rather easy for a naturally quick driver to adapt to and that experience in a similiar type car is uneccessary. Also with all the engineers analyzing telemetry data in an F1 team that driver feedback is becoming less neccessary. So unless the FIA brings the F1 cars back into the driver's hands a little more, I think any kind of prolonged experience in any type of feeeder series will become less essential.

[Kimi]

Yeah mac's right and i guess that's the reason why toyota pulled Briscoe out earlier this season...

[Sid The Manager]

simply f3 cars are more like f1 cars to drive than f3000 cars are, the f3000 car also has less adjustments a driver can make. a good f3 driver could even "unlearn" some of his setup skills pounding around in the relatively bus like f3000 car for too long.

[racer69]

As mentioned above Formula 3000 cars just don't have any relevance to a current F1 car. The only real help is that the drivers can learn some of the tracks.

As also mentioned team are going for young drivers straight out of F3 now, it seems that after you do enough practice to do any well in F3000, you are considered almost too old.

How long can it go on for? With the teams looking to F3, maybe with the return of the European F3 Championship next year, maybe the emphasis and focus should go onto that?

[littleman]

The answer to your question is NO.It's now a very expensive cul-de-sac where you tread water waiting for something better to come along.It costs you $1.2 million dollars a year while you wait in line!