The Official 2016 Formula One Season

The 12 lap system was the best. And why was it dropped? Because TV. Since the top teams did most of their runs in the last 10 minutes, you got 50 minutes with no relevant action (for the casual watcher, hardcore fans got the battles for the mid grid) and 10 minutes with the top 3 teams. I have around here an article from a F1 Racing mag from January 2002 with the proposed changes that ended up to be the 2003 qualy rules, and they clearly state it is because they wanted the top teams to be out during all the hour and not during 10-15 minutes.

For now I think the three-session format is OK. I'd tweak the tyre rules for the top 10 maybe, to encourage more runnings in Q3. Q2 is by far the most fun.



Stats: 139 Starts / 7 Wins / 9 Poles / 5 Fastest laps

And with more competitive teams this year the old Q1 and Q2 would have been more exciting anyway without the need for a change

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X (@ed24f1)

So Sky Sports now have exclusive deal with F1 from 2019 so people like me can't watch it after that other than the British GP which will be aired free. :/

I refuse to pay Sky money so what am I supposed to do now? Stream it illegally?

This is a stupid decision and will surely lower the viewing figures even more?!?

WEC/Le Mans & BTCC will be getting even more of my attention now.

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mika19b
So Sky Sports now have exclusive deal with F1 from 2019 so people like me can't watch it after that other than the British GP which will be aired free. :/

It might be aired free, but it will still likely need a Sky package, as there's only a very limited number of Sky channels available through FreeView (I don't know about FreeSAT).

I'll be honest, at the moment I don't really care all that much. The way things are going, but 2019 I'll probably be quite happy to source my F1 via other means if I don't have Sky, or even just cope with the highlights. Obviously the Australian GP was good, but I'm not expecting a great season (up front) and the rules for 2017 will make the cars faster, but they seem to be undoing much of the work done in 2009 and 2010 to make the racing more interesting after a largely terrible era (Championship battles were interesting, but the racing was absolutely awful in most races).

Haha, this is the kind of problem I'll sit down and hastily come up with a solution to in early March 2019, most likely on a Saturday night before the Aus GP.

So typical of FOM to respond to dwindling TV figures by making it even more expensive to watch and less attractive to even try. This proves beyond doubt that they're so far out of touch.

It's mad. If F1 was a cow it'd be slaughtered and then incinerated to prevent contamination and infection.

The drivers are right. The sports governance is obsolete. What a shame they chose to express that view via a letter. For that letter will be either shredded or else pinned to the fridge and laughed at.

What they should do is strike and hold a picket at Monaco. So when they should be preparing to race what they'll actually be doing is standing on Bernie's silly little nation anthem carpet with placards saying "This stinks, sort it out now else we're not racing".

they cant refuse to race. its in their contracts, I assume

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J i m
What they should do is strike and hold a picket at Monaco. So when they should be preparing to race what they'll actually be doing is standing on Bernie's silly little nation anthem carpet with placards saying "This stinks, sort it out now else we're not racing".

Nevvvvaaa gonna happen. It's OK hiding behind the cloak of the GPDA, but as soon as faces are shown (I'm thinking Hamilton, Button, Rosberg etc) holding placards, it's a different and very public matter and they'd squirm away under Bernies thumb* (I think Vettel and possibly Alonso would be the more vocal ones who would be quite happy to state where they stand). At the moment it's a mere statement, which will be forgotten by Shanghai and will continue to be until the next cock-up brings it up again.

Relinquishing the decisions to the current required unanimous team agreements is one of the worst things to happen to F1, as there's lots of good intent but the end result of everything is either a terrible neutered compromise or an unmitigated disaster.

It only just struck me today, but F1 is desperately missing Webber's frank opinions on matters such as this. I'd go as far as to say that the Bahrain qualifying would be back to the 2015 rules if Webber was still in F1.

* I do wonder how much of this is Bernie playing political games trying to wrestle back some of the significant authority he's lost.

Number 34, Esteban Ocon added to Manor as Rio Haryanto takes a reserve drive role for the rest of this season.

Haryanto did pretty well all things considered but will be good to see Ocon get a chance.

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X (@ed24f1)

SchueyFan Wrote:
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> Haryanto did pretty well all things considered but
> will be good to see Ocon get a chance.


I met him at Silverstone this year (I went to the mid-season test with a pit pass) and he was such a nice guy. He had time to chat to me and Alice (my almost 3 year old daughter) and signed an autograph for us. Shame to see him out to be honest.

Yeah surprising he couldn't find more corporate sponsorship from Indonesia as a relatively untapped market for F1.

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X (@ed24f1)

I read somewhere that they were even contemplating crowdfunding

madotter Wrote:
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> Number 34, Esteban Ocon added to Manor as Rio
> Haryanto takes a reserve drive role for the rest
> of this season.


Ocon is number 31.

Thanks for the memories Felipe it's going to be strange for me not following him in 2017!

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X (@ed24f1)

That's a shame.. But it's kind of neat he's chosen to go on his terms instead of petering out without a drive like Barrichello.

For a driver who was stood down after his debut season and once described as being incapable of even driving in a straight line I think he did rather well. A bracful of wins and close as you can get to a championship without actually winning it.

Farewell Felipe.

Welp, officially I have no favourite driver for 2016. Being a Schumi fan since birth, I chose Felipe as his successor. Unfortunately he wasn't lucky enough to snap up that 2008 championship. First time I cried when watching a race. It was heartbreaking stuff.

I seriously hope he keeps racing somewhere for the sake of it, but I doubt it. I think he'd rather keep racing those kart things with Felipe jr.



Stats: 139 Starts / 7 Wins / 9 Poles / 5 Fastest laps

Mclaren's 2017 race driver line-up will be Fernando Alonso & Stoffel Vandoorne

The Real Story of the Race was that the Renault's fell apart and the Ferrari's didn't.
Rosberg headed for the sliproad and retired, probably because of Nicotin starvation they have still not given him a helmet with a little hole in it.

Awesome win for Ricciardo! Lewis learns that life can be a bitch, great damage limitation from Nico.

Entertaining race for sure. I did not regret to wake up early for this

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used to be GPGSL's Nick Heidfeld