Okay folks, it is the off season time for useless debates.
If you could change one thing about F1 (and just one thing you anoraks) what would it be and why?
Replace the sprints (and Monaco) with some kind of drivers exhibition.
Have them all race in the same car, a car that can be rented at that track. B that way fans can go to the track on track days rent they same car and see how they stack up.
This is a win in so many ways.
We get to see who the best drivers really are. It gets rid of stupid sprints. The track gets off season attention and money. Fan interaction, and so on.
Make the cars lighter and smaller.
Make them do the first lap on foot.
The running of a sport like a business. I don’t want authoritarian regimes sportswashing their crimes by paying for a big race. I don’t want rights-holders playing with formats and locations in order to promote their brand for a new target audience. I don’t want to have to pay through the nose to watch my favourite sport because a rich corp bought up the broadcasting rights.
I despise the very concept of sponsors and advertising, but I can at least acknowledge that it pays the bills for my best boys to race their colourful cars. All the rest can fuck right off!
I think the success of features based on calculated track position - like DRS and the Virtual Safety Car - proves that the time has come for Mario Kart style power-up cubes. Project them onto AR displays in the drivers’ helmets, and show them on the TV feeds.
- Mushroom allows the driver to cut corners and speed over track limits.
- Squid ink appears in the field of view of all other drivers’ visors.
- Verstappen gets blue-shelled and all his power cuts out until he’s stationary!
- etc.
Call me crazy, but I think in 10 years time you’ll be looking back on this post as prescient.
Make them switch directions every year.
Like to clockwise around Monaco one year, but counter clockwise on the same track the next.
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Reverse-DRS. Every driver who is more than 1 second behind another driver gets DRS to catch up but then they have to work hard for the overtake.
It’s probably nonsense but I’d love to try it out in a handful of races.
Run one race a year for the unwashed masses. Tickets are cheap and by lottery. Infield camping. No generators. No luxury booths. No RVs. Tents only. No re-entry. First year at Watkins Glen.
I just want it to be competitive between teams. I’m sick of a single driver or team winning every single race all year. It happened with Lewis and now max, and since I don’t care about drivers racing for 10th, it ruins the racing for me.
There’s lots of little things about current F1 to improve, but sprint races are the most egregious offender. Get rid of sprint races entirely. They were bad when they set the grid for Sunday, they are even worse now that Saturday is essentially its own, separate event.
Might not be a popular change but I would like to see less races. Feels like there are way too many and some of the newer street courses aren’t that great. One of the reasons I follow IMSA more than F1 is that there were only 11 races last year. For me that made each race weekend something to look forward to.
Get rid of track limits. I never want to hear those words again. Put a tire barrier in the corner you don’t want people to cut. automatically sanction people who cut the corner and do it immediately. Add an extra bit of asfalt that drivers have to drive on as soon as the have cut a corner, so they loose 5 seconds per lap when they do that. Be creative.
Sprinklers!
Set to turn on at a random lap number for a random amount of time.
Make the Sprint Race start in reverse driver standing order. Would fix the awkward Friday qualifying. New schedule would be Friday practice 1&2, Saturday qualifying and sprint race. Friday race.
Would also make the Sprint race actually interesting because everyone has a reason to care and fight
The sprint should be before qualifying. That way people who work on Saturdays would be able to catch quali live without major changes to their schedule
How would the order for the sprint be determined?
I thought OP had meant reverse championship order when he said reverse driver standing order.
No changing tires during a red flag.
I was tempted to say no working on the car AT ALL during a red but I’ll settle for just the tires.
Edit: for clarification, a red flag for an accident. Obviously a red for weather is a different situation.