[Rules] Future Rule Changes

[Taxi645]

When will F1 wake up ffs! Cars almost impossible to battle with in the corners (Hamilton stuck behind Verstappen, the whole midfield cue at the end). We are multiple seconds faster than last year and what do they propose for next; 5s faster again and cars which can follow each other even less.

At what point are these people going to understand what motorsport is about? What more evidence do they need what the priorities should be?

We need cars with which you can fight each other through corners damn it!

[TzeiTzei]

Originally Posted by Taxi645

When will F1 wake up ffs! Cars almost impossible to battle with in the corners (Hamilton stuck behind Verstappen, the whole midfield cue at the end). We are multiple seconds faster than last year and what do they propose for next; 5s faster again and cars which can follow each other even less.

At what point are these people going to understand what motorsport is about? What more evidence do they need what the priorities should be?

We need cars with which you can fight each other through corners damn it!

I thought we had just the right amount of overtaking.

[Taxi645]

Originally Posted by TzeiTzei

I thought we had just the right amount of overtaking.

It's not just about the amount of overtaking. It is about real fights in the corners, not just DRS-ing your way past. Just there were some good ones, but those are really the exception.

[Adam43]

It's now been 25 years since F1 was remotely like that and even then.

So back to the Q format. They're going back to the previous one, but how are they going to solve the actual problem of cars only doing a single run and saving tyres at the end. The recent experiment only changed when the car's were or weren't on the on track. Without the elimination Nico would have waited until the final minute until he went out, he had to get on with it earlier.

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by Adam43

It's now been 25 years since F1 was remotely like that and even then.

So back to the Q format. They're going back to the previous one, but how are they going to solve the actual problem of cars only doing a single run and saving tyres at the end. The recent experiment only changed when the car's were or weren't on the on track. Without the elimination Nico would have waited until the final minute until he went out, he had to get on with it earlier.

Cars that get through to Q3 were, certainly last season, given an extra set of tyres to be used only during Q3. This usually meant that all the top 10 cars participated; maybe the FIA should penalise a car - demote it 5 places? - if they stay in the garage unless it's because the car is physically unable to run, and the FIA would know that because each garage has an official observer to monitor individual cars.

[Adam43]

Same this year, but most chose to do one run and not bother with the rest of the session. Last year also had the situation were some did their run on the extra set (better than previous years in some cases), but with 14 minutes to fill, eight cars doing eight laps doesn't fill much time. I see why they tried to spread it out with the knock out, but it relies on them all having another go.

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by Adam43

Same this year, but most chose to do one run and not bother with the rest of the session. Last year also had the situation were some did their run on the extra set (better than previous years in some cases), but with 14 minutes to fill, eight cars doing eight laps doesn't fill much time. I see why they tried to spread it out with the knock out, but it relies on them all having another go.

This is one the major problems, from my point of view, that afflicts F1. Due to the tightness of the regulations, there is little scope, from the time that free practice starts at the first race until the end of the season, for teams to massively improve their car's performance. Therefore most teams will have a fairly good idea whether the times set by their drivers will be bettered or if it's worth going out again to try to improve.

But that is not something that is new. When I raced, we had far less opportunity to practice and/or qualify (maybe 15 or 20 minutes in total for both) but even then we didn't always stay out for the whole session. We also had to look after our tyres, and our engines were far more stressed than current units and needed to be protected as much as possible. And this applied right through all stratas of racing. And going back to the days of Damon Hill (especially in his title year), I well remember watching him sitting in his car in the garage with his eyes shut tight throughout a goodly portion of qualifying, only to come out almost at the end to set the pole time on his first flying lap. I don't remember anyone complaining then that he only came out to play once!

[Adam43]

So in Q3 we had the same number of laps we would have had, but it finished a few minutes earlier meaning you got four bonus minutes in your day to turn off the TV and do something less boring instead.

[S griffin]

So Bernie once again comes up with a gimmick and it finds out it's rubbish, he passes the buck! Glad though that the teams all came to agreement and realised it was a letdown for the fans. As been said before, the changes were an answer to a question no one had asked. Anyway Melbourne proved we don't need a mixed up grid to make a good race. All we need is a fast starting Vettel and seriously, less downforce and bigger tyres.

[Alan52]

I was at Albert Park.When the PA announced that qualifying was going to be returned to previous format the grandstands broke out in spontaneous applause!

[chillibowl]

for me the system failed because the teams failed to get a handle on the changes as opposed to the idea being inherently flawed.

so in additions to letting the teams off the hook, so quickly reverting sets a terrible precedence for all future changes particularity for those rule changes that do not immediately produce results.

i think if they had waited for a day or too they would have realized how successful this weekend was and would have given themselves at least one more chance to make it work. sunday certainly earned them the right to try imo.

[Richard C]

Originally Posted by chillibowl

for me the system failed because the teams failed to get a handle on the changes as opposed to the idea being inherently flawed.

IMHO yes and no. I DO think that the teams had a poor handle on the changes. I think that given time they would improve. But, I think the rules as defined for the Australian GP likely would never work well and likely would on average be worse than what preceded it. Worse being not really having a statistically significant impact on qualifying positions (we have seen just as jumbled qualification orders with the prior system) and it would not have improved the show for the fans during qualifying let alone the race itself.

Others have mentioned the likely outcomes at tracks that have long laps times. If someone cared to do the analysis using in/out and hot lap times, they would find that the options to teams would be highly limited and we may still see large amounts of time with no cars on track with eventless 90 second count downs. Additionally you have the issue of tire selection (such as everyone going out on super softs that had only a few laps to set a qualifying level time). Times were unlikely to improve without fresh tires and another in/out/hot lap sequence. The grand idea of drivers continuously circulating and trying to put in ever faster laps as those at the back were dropping out was never going to work "with those rules as written".

Maybe it could work with a series of tweaks such as allowing hot laps to count, allowing additional laps to count if they were faster than the previous lap, fixed tire compound (i.e. hardest), no allowed pit stops, and any other number of changes that likely might come via feedback from either simulations or ongoing usage at tracks (empirical evidence). My opinion is that while somewhat well meaning, it was rushed and likely poorly thought out. I would have thought that with more time being given to digest and study, teams (and frankly the FIA) would have run more hypothetical simulations to see what the likely outcome might be across many different conditions (different tracks, wet/dry, red flag scenarios, etc.) Frankly I think they came up with the idea and then quickly threw it at the wall to see if it would stick! A grand experiment with high hopes and little analysis put into it.

Richard

[Adam43]

Those things were mentioned in this thread, but drowned out by things that required less thought such as it would kill people, it is artificial and Bernie blah blah blah. In a similar way, that happened in the press and also in the meetings of the teams.

The there was nothing wrong with the qualifying assertion was false too, although made a good sound bite. There is still no reason why people should do more than one run in Q3. Which is not good for the show.

Warning, what follows is a rant and does not necessarily represent the opinions of Ten-Tenths. (To be honest, it probably doesn't even represent the opinions of the poster when they aren't ranting.) Which reminds me, in terms of sport there was nothing wrong with Australia. Everyone has the same opportunity. In terms of show is was pants, which is everyone's problem. Anyway, let's abandon qualifying completely. Give everyone, except true hardcore fans, an hour or two back on a Saturday and revert to fastest practice lap gets pole. Sport, not show. We now return you to our normal ramblings.

[chillibowl]

if this is a problem for longer tracks then would it have been a positive for shorter tracks? would Monaco quali have been better for example?

most tracks see drivers lap around or below 1.30 so if the chief concern is what happens at SPA or Yas Marina then i would argue that 2 out of 21 tracks is a minor concern at best.

but agreed there is an element here of them not spending an adequate amount of time running simulations before hand but if we are being honest Q1 and Q2 largely worked and the main issue was the 4 minutes at the end in which only 1-2 drivers set a time, neither of which the race director chose to follow.

much of the out rage is a direct result of how the session was presented to us imo.

anyways its gone and a bit of F1 trivia now but my larger point i think is still valid...if they are so quick to dismiss the ideas they do manage to agree upon then what hope can we have that they will show commitment to any of the bigger changes we want to see.

and if we do see the big changes occur, what will be our, as the fans, patience level at giving them the time necessary to make those ideas work.

[chillibowl]

Originally Posted by Adam43

Those things were mentioned in this thread, but drowned out by things that required less thought such as it would kill people, it is artificial and Bernie blah blah blah. In a similar way, that happened in the press and also in the meetings of the teams.

agree with that. i think many were praying it would fail and created a narrative that it would would fail horribly. a self fulfilling prophecy sort of thing.

it fell well short of that level of failure thankfully.

not going to say it was ideal...also like you i dont know if the previous format was ideal either because ultimately cars/drivers are still burdened with deciding between taking a chance for a moderate time increase versus using an extra set of tires and additional KMs on their engines.

[Taxi645]

Probably would be a good idea to split this thread into technical regulations and sporting regulation to avoid major shifts of unrelated topics discussed.

[wnut]

Originally Posted by Taxi645

Probably would be a good idea to split this thread into technical regulations and sporting regulation to avoid major shifts of unrelated topics discussed.

This would be a good idea!

[wolfhound]

There is to be vote on Thursday regarding the qualifying format for the rest of the year. It looks like we might end up with a hybrid of the old and the new Q 1&2 will be to the new format with with Q 3 reverting to what we had last year. However can you trust F1 to come up with a good solution to something that did not need fixing?
http://classic.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/123436

[JeremySmith]

I am speechless ......
http://www.gpupdate.net/en/f1-news/3...-needs-chance/

[bjohnsonsmith]

What is going on in F1, I thought everyone had agreed to scrap the new Qualifying format?

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by bjohnsonsmith

What is going on in F1, I thought everyone had agreed to scrap the new Qualifying format?

You seem to be overlooking the simple fact that Mr E is very, very, very annoyed with Mercedes and Ferrari because they wouldn't supply his friend Mr Horner with PUs, and so he is doing his best to try to engineer the results of F1 so that they don't win. He has the mentality that dictates that he doesn't get mad, he gets even. And he doesn't care anymore about those who support his lifestyle; it's all a big game to him.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by Mike Harte

You seem to be overlooking the simple fact that Mr E is very, very, very annoyed with Mercedes and Ferrari because they wouldn't supply his friend Mr Horner with PUs, and so he is doing his best to try to engineer the results of F1 so that they don't win. He has the mentality that dictates that he doesn't get mad, he gets even. And he doesn't care anymore about those who support his lifestyle; it's all a big game to him.

Maybe it's more the case he's worried Mr. Mastershitz, with his Red Bull billions will quit. That's potentially two teams and a very high profile sponsor gone.

[smellysocks]

F1 gives elimination qualifying system reprive for Bahrain GP

It's back 'unaltered' for Bahrain according to Autosport.


http://www.autosport.com/news/report...ay-for-bahrain

[chillibowl]

im pretty much alone on this but im glad they are going to try it again and i applaud them for taking their time to see if they can make it work or at the least take the time to give themselves a better understanding of what needs to be modified.

and as a bonus, quali for the next GP has now become 'must see tv' and im curious to see how the teams work it out for themselves.

[S griffin]

I should've known that it was too good to be true. How often does F1 make a sensible decision? Does anyone really think that it'll get any better the more times they try it. To quote Einstein 'insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result'