I think that's the strategy group's thinking - they don't want to make any radical changes to the race format as they feel that's sacrosanct. Personally i'd shorten the races by 20-30mins or so, so that it's a 90mins max length. Far too often you get a good start, then it all sorta tails off towards the end.

Yes - I'm sure you are right - some people seem to be over-interpreting / over-complicating what is going to happen.

I get the impression some people may be thinking the driver has to keep setting new times throughout the qualifying session. They don't.

Take Q3. 10 cars.

After say 6 mins - first elimination. Whoever is last is 10th.

Then after another 90 secs (ie 7 mins 30 secs in) - second elimination. Whoever is last (of cars still in) is 9th.

etc.

Pole position lap could take place at any time during Q3. It could be done 90 seconds into Q3.

All it means is you have to go out and do a time within the first 6 mins - otherwise you are automatically out. But what you do in the 8th or 9th or 10th minute doesn't matter - you just have to ensure you aren't last at an elimination point.

Whether you like the idea or not, or whether you think it will work or not, surely the damning thing here is that the format isn't even confirmed to be in for 2016 and they're still evaluating it.

The Strategy Group has come up with a metric ****tonne of ideas, press releases and "rule revamps" in recent times, virtually all of which have either been amended, heavily revised or completely dropped once people actually took more than a cursory look at the idea and thought..."can't see how to make it work".

I've got nothing against rule changes, I believe the sport of F1 needs rule changes to avoid stagnation and the teams solving the optimisation problem of the day too quickly, but it's the way in which those rules come about - not initially considered, consulted, tested, applied and announced in an irrevocable this-is-definitely-happening-and-here's-how way that's key, more a scattergun approach and inevitable backtracking/watering down.

That's what really grinds my gears.

Agree with that interpretation, albeit I don't see how that fits with Bernie's idea of near-continual running like a wet session or how they sell the one-on-one pole shootout if the fastest lap was set at the beginning of Q3 when there were still 8 cars.

But who knows? We have the basis of the rules but not necessarily the complete rules themselves, so they could still be planning any old stuff in the details. My memory may be dodgy but I'm sure when they introduced single lap quali in 2003 they had the single lap basis set down well in advance but it was only a few weeks before the season started that they came up with the "oh, you need to qualify with the race fuel load on board in the main run, not fumes", which was to me what ultimately let that system down.

And you think the rock-solid timing graphics & systems are going to reliably cope with this in less than a month's time?

lol

While I think the current regulation in terms of qualifying does not need changing.

If we where to have an elimination I would think it would be better (after the initial 5 minutes or whatever), to remove 2 cars every 3 minutes, rather than 1 car every 90 seconds. This IMO would be more manageable and still have ultimately the same effect.

This season that would mean 3 eliminations to get from 22 to 16, in Q1 and then from 16 to 10 in Q2.

If it's a dry day with no SC's or red flags, most races last between roughly 75-85mins. I'd rather races last a minimum of 90mins, not a maximum of 90mins.

No they don't :/ Monza is the shortest race at just over 90...

Going by what Pat Symmonds was saying to Ted in the notebook I believe that is correct.

Pat basically said that he doesn't feel much will change in the way teams approach it, Especially the bigger teams in Q3 who are likely still going to go out & set a time & then come back into the pits with the smaller teams who are in the drop zone doing more laps just as they did until now.


Another point of confusion seems to be when its been implemented. Sky are reporting that its going to be introduced for this year; but reading the official statement its currently set for 2017 but could be brought forward for this year pending further discussion during the next WMSC meeting.

It also seems that we only ended up with this qualifying system to stop Bernie pushing through his success penalty proposal.
http://www.motorsportmagazine.com/f1...en-much-worse/

That's simply not true. Last year Monza, Spa and Suzuka were all shorter than 90, and five more were shorter than 92.
Australia 1:31:54.067
Malaysia 1:41:05.793
China 1:39:42.008
Bahrain 1:35:05.809
Spain 1:41:12.555
Monaco 1:49:18.420
Canada 1:31:53.145
Austria 1:30:16.930
GB 1:31:27.729
Hungary 1:46:09.985
Belgium 1:23:40.387
Italy 1:18:00.688
Singapore 2:01:22.118
Japan 1:28:06.508
Russia 1:37:11.024
USA 1:50:52.703
Mexico 1:42:35.038
Brazil 1:31:09.090
Abu Dhabi 1:38:30.175

Day 3:

SSN Reports:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3u...-reports_sport

Paddock Uncut:
https://vimeo.com/156638175

Ted's Notebook:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3u...notebook_sport

Worth watching the 1st 5 minutes or so of the SSN Reports just to hear Ted's rant about the qualifying change & his & Rachel's reaction to Lewis walking his dog.


Had to put Paddock uncut on Vimeo because Dailymotion seem to have introduced an upload limit of a total of 2hrs of video every 24hrs.

Monza may have been 90mins in 2008 on a very wet day with an SC start, but on a normal dry day with no SC's etc there's no way it's 90mins, not even close. Spa the same (even at an average of 2mins per lap Spa doesn't last 90mins).

Normal dry day with no SC's etc the list of races that don't last 90mins is probably along the lines of this (in no particular time order):

Italy, Belgium, Australia, Canada, Austria, Britain, Brazil, Japan. That's nearly half the races that on a normal day don't last 90mins......

I know races are set to a mileage, I've said before with modern times and cars being quicker, I've always thought for the 'shorter' races they should adjust the lap count for the shorter tracks. You get these odd 1 hour 40+ races then you get so many that are done in 85 minutes. Monza, Belgium etc - I feel should have handful more laps.

I'd rather we shortened the longer ones tbh to bring them in line with the shorter races, rather than the other way around.

Also they've announced that the fans will vote online for a "Driver of the Day" award, which will be collated after the race and presented to the driver after each race (I guess during the podium ceremonies)...

No. Definitely not. Don't want to see less racing. However expected that viewpoint from you.

I'd prefer to see 90mins of exciting racing rather than 90mins of exciting racing punctuated with 30mins of trundling around...

Shorten races, no way.

As for Driver of the Day, oh dear.
Never liked fan boost, only that it never seemed to ever work for any driver.
Might have been better to have had a vote before the race to pick a driver to climb the grid if anything, or a bypass to qualy 3. It would keep Bernie smiling, probably noone else.
I think voting for advantage is more fun than voting for no real benefit, putting someone on the podium for the wrong reason. It will just be favouritism rather than anything else.

Motors TV seems to have disappeared from the Sky EPG...

Eh.

I just noticed that too. I wouldn't be surprised if it's gone for good. Slipping down the EPG can't have helped and much of its decent racing series poached by other channels.

I'd like to see Singapore shortened as it's too long, and maybe Monaco shortened some more. I think there's a good argument for lengthening Monza and Spa but can that be done based on the current fuel restrictions/tanks?

1 hour 30 - 1 hour 40 seems about right.

It only slipped down the EPG after taking money from BT for its 413/414 numbers..
It losing NASCAR Xfinity because of cost last season was the real big sign; BT taking live V8s and Eurosport doing a carve up on the WEC hasn't helped either.

Is it gone from Freeview as well?

This driver of the day thing doesn't actually give them anything, it's just like a pat on the back from the fans. I can imagine the uproar if something like Fanboost had been put in...

So given that Sky is cutting down their F1 coverage, how much longer does everyone think the F1 channel will last? Will it make it to the end of the contract?