10 cars on the Grid for Melbourne

After just gazing at some pics from Winter testing thus far, I have come to the conclusion that 10 - 15 cars will make the grid for the 2004 Australian GP. Now exactly how does the F1 expect to govern this new single engine rule this season?

Lets look at some probability here. What would fans think if a Ferrari, McLaren, Williams, or Renault blow their engine durin a practice or qualifying session. These people are coming to Gp's paying the outrageous ticket prices and buying memorbilia, all to watch their favorite racing drivers and then boom, no Michael Schumacher, or Juan Paoblo Montoya starting the GP because of an engine failure in practice.

How can the FIA do that to people who are paying. I guarentee at a place like monza if schumacher blows his engine, there would be a huge riot. Or in spain at the sight of Fernando Alonso going up in smoke, Hungrey for Kimi and so forth. Of course during the race its fine and dandy to let the engine go, but I am talking about these high caliber drivers not starting the GP because of a mistake in a practice session or so forth.

Now obviously to hold on to their reliability teams will obviously only do 3 - 10 laps at most in the practice sessions. And again I say, that would be the biggest Bullshit!!!! I went to the canadian GP in 2003, and I must say, the quality of the sport has been shot in the arm. I remember going in 2000, and the GP weekend was an event. You would go there early in the morning watch practice 1 and 2 sessions then stay in the afternoon for qualifying, watch a filler race and go back to the hotel. Then sunday morning you would be at the circuit at 8 am watch the race warmup stay obviously for the GP and then go home. It was a weekend of pure racing.

in 2003 when I went, I was there on saturday for 1 hour, left, and sunday just went for the the race obviously. JUST IMAGINE NEXT YEAR!!!! cars doing minimal number of laps to hold onto their engines,
a top driver blows his, and what did you end up paying for???? You know, has anyone ever even thought of the fact that if the championship goes down to the wire, jpm vs kimi for sake of arguement, 1 point seperates them, and bang friday practice jpm blows his engine, bang there goes the champiionship...

Nevermind trying to save cash, There are loads of other ways to save money for the sport, and so what, minardi and jordan cant compete, could they already?? I say get rid of the back marker teams, theres no point to them, and let ferrari, mclaren and so forth race their third drivers, You will see a more competative field and far more entertaining GPs. The FIA are running away with the sport and are changing it to better suit a part of the world that doesnt even care for it (America and parts of Asia) I say keep the european races, get rid of the bloody same designer for all the circuits Tilke and definantly do away with all the reformations that had been done since the start of 2003.

ciao



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i didnt read all of your post because of its length, and my weary eyes cudnt b bothered to take in all that information.

but have u not heard of if a car blows an engine, they can change it? they will then be put back 10 places on the grid.



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and i think friday is exempt isnt it? its just saturday n sundays the engines need to stay intact. not sure on that one tho.



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duh, they can change the engine, its not like they arent allowed to start the race. get to know the facts before you open your mouth.



The Legenday DFV

After just gazing at some pics from Winter testing thus far, I have come to the conclusion that 10 - 15 cars will make the grid for the 2004 Australian GP.

sorry, after that i stopped reading. You think that with the cash involved they cant make the engnes last?




Racing Is Life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting
Jesus may be able to heal the sick and bring the dead back to life, but he can't do shît for low fps

Froday counts i think but am not sure.

The rules are 1 engine per weekend but that could mean 1 engine per race meeting.



Post Edited (01-28-04 19:07)

they can change the engines and be moved back 10 places. What happens if a minardi blows its engine? would they start half a lap behind everyone to make the rule fair?

also, if a car crashes in practice, they can either use a new car and engine and be moved back 10 places from their eventual quali position, or take the engine out of the crashed car and put it into the new car (if its not damaged), and not get the penalty.

Say MS crashes and they take the engine out of RB car, RB will move back 10 places and MS will not be affected.

Thats a good way to make sure MS wins if its close with them.

they can do that. they are ferrari.




To Kimi... "You were the Chosen One! It was said that you would destroy the Sith, not join them. It was you who would bring balance to the Force, not leave it in Darkness"
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judging by what I am reading, no one is even sure about this rule.... Hence, even if they are relegated 10 places on the grid, that would affect the result, would it not? my argument still stands, even if you dont want to read it, its valid.

Heres an easy way to save money " Get RID OF WINTER TESTING." BAN IT!

I believe that travel expenses, and testing expenses during the winter months outway the building of engines.



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Thats the idea though marcol. If u need a new engine u get moved back 10 places as your car has needed a new engine. Its now a formula where u have one engine per car per weekend.

Its a challenge to make the engines last but in the long run they will spend less money on testing cause the engine will last longer and they will use about 50 engines less a year per team as currently they were going though 2 to 3 engines per car per race meeting

I believe that travel expenses, and testing expenses during the winter months outway the building of engines.

And how do you expect them to cut down travel expenses? Move the tracks closer?

Heres an easy way to save money " Get RID OF WINTER TESTING." BAN IT!

Get real. All these failures that are happening on cars now will then happen in the first race. Is that how you want it? Slow and steady wins the race?

Sorry but your reasoning makes no sense at all




Racing Is Life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting
Jesus may be able to heal the sick and bring the dead back to life, but he can't do shît for low fps

so each grid has 30 start places now? if a minardi blows up a engine it will start at grid no. 30 instead of 20? =)

They will just start at the back where they normally start so they may as well change the engine before the race, its a stupid loop hole that teams at the back may as well use.

Say a mclaren driver spins on his quali lap and has to start at the back, well they may as well say there is an engine problem and change it.

No where does it say there will be a time penalty.

What happens if there is a 1st lap pile up and drivers need the spare car, thats and engine change so will the people affected start 10 places back?

Say MS crashes and they take the engine out of RB car, RB will move back 10 places and MS will not be affected.


surely MS would get the penalty in the first place, because he is using a different engine from the one allocated to him? And surely they would have more than 2 engines with them, so Rubens can keep his own engine.

dunno how it works tbh they could swap cars and MS could use RB car.

yes they could take the engine out of RB car and put it in MS car, as thats what they will do if a driver crashes they will take the engine out and put it in the spare, that does not count as an engine change as the engine has been used that weekend.

An engine change is if a brand new engine has to be used.

This rule is good in principle but it hasn't been thought through - as can be seen by the many examples above.

I've always been against any penalties which move drivers back on the grid because it disproportiantely punishes certain teams over others.

This rule should have been introduced 2 years down the line, following a radical re-design of engines which would allow the core components to be replaced individually. That way, if an engine blew then the offending parts could be replaced without the whole unit having to be removed.

You may feel that there is no difference between replacing the whole unit and individual components, because you are effectively changing the engine anyhow, BUT this system would cut costs because undamaged parts could be salvaged.

After all, the FIA are looking for a way to cut costs, not specifically a way to slap limitations on the competitive ability of the teams.

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It is 1 engine per car per GP meeting i.e the engine the teams use on friday morning has to last to the end of the race

The easiest way to cut money problem is to stop the likes of Ferrari, Mclaren and Williams, even Sauber, Jaguar and Toyota, have a HUGE budget for a year, meaning that Jordan, Minardi and others from having to fork out a similar budget to try and match the top runners.

It's all to do with budget. It's got nothing to do, really, with the rule changes by the FIA. The FIA want to try and make front runners realise that the lesser teams are just as important to the sport as the front runners.

That's my opinion anyway.



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