auyongtc’s blog

It’s been quite sometime since I last wrote much about Formula 1. What better time to resume than now, at the start of the 2005 season!

Woke up and saw the Qualifying 1 of Australian F1 Grand Prix in Albert Park, Melbourne. My thoughts? Stupid! Stupid, stupid, stupid - the changes made to Formula 1 qualifying makes it boring and dull. Like for instance, today’s qualifying session was ruined by rain. The only driver smiling around the paddock now must be Giancarlo Fisichella of the Renault F1 team. His gamble to use dry tyres on the drying track paid off, and it started to rain heavily right after he finishes his hot lap. I think the saddest driver there now must be Takuma Sato, and not Kimi Raikkonen, JP Montoya, or even Schumi. He crashed out badly on his out lap, he must be furious now that his insurance premium is definitely gonna increase, again

If you thought last season’s qualifying was bad, this season’s worse. I really have no idea what that stupid Max Mosley was thinking. Then again, what could you expect from someone who sleeps with Ferrari? I bet if Schumi and Rubens can’t make it to Top 10 on qualifying in the remaining runaway races (Malaysian and Bahrain), Max would alter the rules again when F1 goes back to Europe, just to favour his lover Gosh, really wish someone would contest for the FIA top seat that Max’s been hogging. Paul Stoddart might not be the best candidate, but sure as hell he’s different. Heck, even Eddie Irvine would be preferred instead of Max for the seat!

Why did I think it was worse? Well, this season’s qualifying format aggregates both the Qualifying 1 (Saturday) and Qualifying 2 (Sunday morning) sessions to determine the grid position for the drivers. And today’s rainy session gave a very good example how weather can dictate the outcome of the grid position. Should there be no weather changes in tomorrow’s qualifying session, the grid is pretty much decided by today’s session. I really feel that this is just crap. It’s an uneven playing field now, with grid slots easily decided if weather intervened. What about driver talent and car performance, does it not matter? Furthermore, if it rains tomorrow during race time, it’s gonna be really dangerous having slower cars up in front of the faster cars on the grid. It’s just accidents waiting to happen if it rains tomorrow at the start of the race. Mark my words…

At least in the last season, if the first qualifying session was ruined by bad weather, teams can still salvage something during the second qualifying session - having only penalized with an earlier lap queue. Even then, it’s not a fair session. Cars that go out later typically have tremendous advantage over the cars that go out first. It’s not even interesting. They should just bring back the old qualifying format, with some changes of course.

During the low-time of F1 viewership, the new qualifying format was adopted in order to improve TV ratings and attract more audience. However, the old qualifying format is still the best for the race. 1 whole hour of maximum 12 laps per driver. Fastest time decides the grid. It was criticised only because the top teams would normally drag on until the last 20 mins before starting out when the track is at its best condition. Heck, if that’s the case, split the session to 2 x 30 mins in succession. Require each driver to record at least a lap at each session, exempted only if there are technical problems. Still the best time gets the best grid position. More excitement, more fun, lesser crap - Are you listening, Max??!

And then there’s this change to tyre use. Now the cars must have tyres that survive the Qualifying 2 session and whole race distance (up to 200km) in only 1 set of tyres. So now we don’t get to see much tyre change during pitstops, unless of a puncture or change of weather. Makes it even more boring. And if another pitfire happen like what happened to Jos Verstappen in 1994 at Hockenheim, Germany (see here for the video clip), definitely we can kiss pitstops goodbye for a long time! And if Schumi dominates this season like he did previously, F1 is definitely gonna be boring… that time I’ll rather just watch World Rally Championship (WRC) instead.

Let’s just hope that Kimi and Montoya gives Schumi a run for his money this season. Watch out, McLaren’s on the bounce back!