Half the problems are because of him anyway so i have ***k all sympathy for the state of F1.
I love the sport but giving the teams power is always going to go one way and thats they get a taste of it and become control freaks over night!
The FIA needs to grow a backbone too and remember they are the authority in this sport, not the teams and be prepared to say to the teams that if they don't like it, to be sure the door doesn't hit them on the arse on the way out!
yes they might be prepared to launch a break away but it will be nothing close to the money-maker F1 is for them and if they have half the brains they strut around with, they'll know this and so too with the FIA

I'll take a mixed grid, even if it's a voluntary "wildcard" like system where you can double any points scored if you elect to start from the back of the grid.
(Quadrupled if used at Monaco)

Purism is what holds this sport back from being truly great.
Lining up the fastest car (with the best overtaker) on the front the grid is a stupid way to expect this sport to entertain us.

He's not wrong.
Disclaimer.. Daily Mail.
Jp

If they were brought in a gimmick like mixed grids I can honestly say that i'd walk away from F1 & go find something else to do with my weekend's, Just like I did when touring cars started running success ballast & reversed grids based off a random number pulled out of a tub.

If the fastest driver in the fastest car grabs pole because he's faster then he deserve's to be there & the team deserve the success for doing a better job than everyone else. If that team/driver then gets & good start & walks off into the distance then they deserve it & rather than trying to handicap them the others should simply look at doing a better job to catch up.

I agree, although personally a mixed grid isn't as bad as a fully reversed grid IMO. Sucess ballast I don't have a problem with, providing it's distributed & taken away evenly based on performance on a race-by-race basis.

Reversed grids....hahaha. You'd have Q3 with cars trundling round at 40 trying to be the slowest.

It's Bernie being Bernie just because he's Bernie.

Reverse grids from qualifying obviously won't work. I've always wanted to see a championship without qualifying. Just start the races in reverse championship standings. Championship leader always has to start last. That would make every race great, fastest cars would always start at the back and small teams are in the mix too for surprise podiums. But they would need to change the points system so it awards points for every finishing position to make it fair.

Superleague formula almost did this with the complete reverse grid for race 2. Those races were awesome.

Bernie's not saying reversed grids though, he's saying "Run qualifying as normal, then throw something in there afterwards to mix that result up", i.e. the fastest car doesn't automatically start last.

Why? What's unfair about not doing so?

I'm fairly certain that FOM are running an OnBoard camera on the Ferrari & Red Bull today.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cbz7NiGW8AAnNeh.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CbzmR-0WIAAn2a7.jpg

Looks the same as the one that FOM were testing towards the end of last year:
http://www.oxfordshireguardian.co.uk...rosjean-P1.jpg
http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/wp-conten...7499337124.jpg


There also posting some images/video's on twitter:
https://twitter.com/F1

I agree, I think that's truly the best way of mixing up the grid... however it kind of ruins qualifying. Even if they just turned it into a pole position shootout it wouldn't be nearly as interesting.

I can't help but feel F1 is never going to be thrill-a-minute in every GP, it never has been. The only thing that's really wrong at the minute is one team is too dominant, that should change next season when development on engines is freed up.

Starting last at Monaco as the championship leader, that's unfair imo. Points for every finishing position makes the fights further down the field more interesting to watch. The best fights last year were often for positions 10-14 but in the end nothing really mattered.

How about qualifying, followed by a reverse grid race on the same day? Then race on Sunday as normal, that wouldnt be so bad.

Not such a bad idea at all. Although I'm not sure where they'd find the time to fit it all in at the European races with GP2 and GP3 following qualifying.

I've thought this for a while now. Point distribution can be based on finishing position and number of places gained as in a point for each point up from the grid you started and a fixed number on the actual placing.
Qualifying would obviously be redundant on a Saturday but this could be replaced with essentially a couple of sprint races. Give the teams a super compound tyre that will last a 15 lap sprint and let them battle it out, flat out without tactics or pit stops.
The only qualifying event as such would be before the first sprint race to set it's starting positions (although this could be based on the previous seasons finishing position). Points are collected for every position, 1 for last, up to however many cars are competing for first. After that it's reverse grid order based on total points scored.
The issue of the slower cars being at the front of the grind can be removed by having staggered stating positions. P1-P3=16m, P3-P5=17m, P5-P7=18m etc, all based on the anticipated performance difference between the quick cars and the slower cars. This would mean the quickest car at the back doesn't get the obvious advantage over the car in front as soon as the light go out but should be on their tail by the first corner.

Don't think I've described this well but might try again!

Get rid of Supercup, shuffle things around on Friday with practice and qualifying for GP2/3 all done in one day, more for the fans at the track to enjoy.

The qualifying tv slot could be used for a 45min reverse race, with qualifying being shown on the various broadcasters IP platforms if they cant find room for it.

http://svgeurope.org/blog/headlines/...4-f1-coverage/

I hate to see where this is going.... (I think of you ITV with Rugby)

I fear C4 will just add a random paddock element (like ITV with their pitchside element) with a couple of pundits and get a minute of air time and that's it. If C4 is going the ITV route then they will need to use the extra pundits wisely and give them more airtime.

I.e: Maybe Lee McKenzie presenting the paddock element with the main pit reporter and the rumoured Guy Martin, the thing that would make the paddock element better though would be using Lee McKenzie to present live practice and during the race maybe get Guy Martin to do a couple of commentary inputs (Example: The commentary briefing handing over to Guy Martin mid-race to get his analyses and opinions)

I hope C4 don't do this for their highlights race (Unlikely anyway) other there would be too many voices heard on their highlights, I'm fine with them using it during the live races although as I said on my second sentence C4 would need to use them a lot more that ITV do with their rugby coverage. Perhaps use the paddock element twice during build up, once/twice during the race and once after the race. I would be happy with that.

I don't sound promised by this idea but C4 can make it work if they don't do a ITV and add elements that actually work and get enough airtime.

Was someone from Manor a big LWT fan? the new logo in black and white looked dull, in blue and orange, it's kind of good.

I wonder what colours will get used for each team on the graphics this year. Red Bull no longer have any purple on the car, leaving it dark blue, red and yellow, all colours that were used for other teams, unless they take dark blue and Toro Rosso swap to the gold that's on the nose.

Too many silver and blue cars is the real problem. Mercedes having their Petronas sidepods helps and McLaren's darker car maybe means they could use a couple of shades of grey on the graphics for different teams, or Haas could have Manor's old dark shade of red.

Manor being blue and orange is tricky unless they get dark orange and Force India swap to paler shade. Or if the Sauber happens to be not bright blue when this year's car launches.

SSN Reports:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3t...-reports_sport

Paddock Uncut:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3t...ck-uncut_sport

Ted's Notebook:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3t...notebook_sport

I don't know why there would be need for qualifying with reverse grid races. To me qualifying is the most boring part of a gp weekend these days. Unless it rains and there is a top driver out in q1. Q1 is boring because it's always the same 2 teams that get knocked out. Q2 sometimes there is a surprising driver getting to Q3, but that guy is 10th in that session anyway then. With the cars no longer able to break track records, there's just no excitement. I can't recall any memorable qualifying session from the last 2 years. Just get rid of it.

Thanks Stef.

Was there a weird editing glitch in Ted's notebook yesterday? He seemed to teleport himself into an interview with Jolyon Palmer, but perhaps it was just my recording that was glitchy


I don't think quali is the most boring part of the weekend but I do tend to agree. Despite the format still feeling like a good one, the sessions themselves have become rather uninspiring.

Q1 is only as good as your worst teams - if they're close to the back of the midfield and mean it's close enough to make it very difficult to predict who gets knocked out, it's good, but that rarely happens.

Q2 is the best session but as you say the ones who scrape through to Q3 can't do anything there and the big guns are being careful as those tyres are going to be the first stint race tyres.

Considering Q3 is meant to be the big showdown it always feels anticlimactic somehow. I don't think it needed the extra time it was given (Spa excepted) and despite the extra set of tyres drivers are given for making it to Q3 they still only do one run if they're not likely to be in the top 5 because they burned most of the others to get there in the first place.

Not really sure what the solution is but if they did refresh the format a bit I doubt I would be too upset.

I hate the idea of multiple races over a weekend, it cheapens the format IMO, and also you get this weird thing where 1 race is more important than the other usually (Feature vs Sprint, Qualifying Race vs Championship race). It's silly.

There was, and it was on the repeat too. So presumably an error from when they uploaded the package from the track.