Official Formula One and General Motorsport Thread for 2024!

[Cheeky Devlin]

Verstappen laughing at Stroll

Yeah that was good.

[Rawrgna]

Bmw having a nightmare race in both Imsa and Wec this weekend

[floydfreak]

live stream for WEC

[Robbo-92]

Not even reached the end of the race and somehow I know next to nothing else will happen other than Alonso will fall back a couple of positions, 13 laps left. F1 is in a poor state at the moment.

Edit, watched about 40 mins of the WEC from Imola and it’s been far more entertaining than all of the current F1 season bar China sprint qualifying, 5 races and we’ve had one exciting session

[floydfreak]

IMSA was also a good race and that was only 100 mins

Max is already the F1 champ this season and the rest of the season will be a borefest. Crazy that the championship is already over and the European races have not even started yet zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

[floydfreak]

F1 is also open to changing the points structure again

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/excl ... /10601483/

One item that has been given prominence on the F1 Commission agenda, which has been distributed ahead of the meeting, is a potential change to F1’s points structure.


The idea that has been proposed is for points to be distributed to the top 12 drivers, rather than the top 10, as has been the case since 2010.


To ensure minimal impact on the fight for overall championship glory, the proposal is not to shake up the points on offer at the front of the field.


Instead, if the plan gets support, then the top seven race finishing positions will remain unchanged, with only the points being offered from 8th and below being altered as can be seen in the table below.

Here is the proposed structure:

P1: 25 points (unchanged)
P2: 18 points (unchanged)
P3: 15 points (unchanged)
P4: 12 points (unchanged)
P5: 10 points (unchanged)
P6: 8 points (unchanged)
P7: 6 points (unchanged)
P8: 5 points (+1)
P9: 4 points (+2)
P10: 3 points (+2)
P11: 2 points (+2)
P12: 1 point (+1)

[Robbo-92]

I like it how thats their answer to almost a clear top 5 teams and then the rest, just extend the points positions

[floydfreak]

something Ralf says at 4.20-24 aludes to what MS is like now IMO

[Robbo-92]

Sadly we all know which bit of him is missing

Eddie saying Ralf could have been the WDC in 1999 The Jordan wasn't that good in 99 was it?

[Victor Mildew]

Sadly we all know which bit of him is missing

Eddie saying Ralf could have been the WDC in 1999 The Jordan wasn't that good in 99 was it?

IIRC Frentzen was in contention for the WDC surprisingly late in the year. I think they picked up a few wins that year.

[Robbo-92]

Sadly we all know which bit of him is missing

Eddie saying Ralf could have been the WDC in 1999 The Jordan wasn't that good in 99 was it?

IIRC Frentzen was in contention for the WDC surprisingly late in the year. I think they picked up a few wins that year.

Fair enough, long before I started watching F1, I always thought 98/99 were tight seasons between McLaren and Ferrari rather than a third team being in the mix as well.

[floydfreak]

If it wasnt for the retirement at the Nurburgring they missed out as being title contenders for the final races

[Robbo-92]

That would have been a great season if Jordon had edged the WDC, next question for folk watching F1 at that time (or gone back to watch it, which I haven't), was Ralf WDC material? Obviously his brother won the 7 WDC, but as we all know, in most seasons its the best car/driver combo that normally wins out, I always got the impression that he was a good driver, but not exactly WDC material.

[Victor Mildew]

Absolutely strawberry floating not

I remember when he won his first race, Patrick Head said that he was now as good as Michael

I've got such vivid memories of when I started watching F1. 1997 was my starting point, but 1998 was my first full season and I was obsessed with it. Used to watch rather race, then the full repeat of it in the evening

The overtaking was always crap, but the dominance of one team wasn't as absolute as it can be now. You'd usually have more chance of a heroic performance in races, especially with more technical failures and the tyre wars. It was only the late ferrari period where we got the more modern style total domination of Schumacher, which was as dull as it is today.

[Cheeky Devlin]

Absolutely strawberry floating not

I remember when he won his first race, Patrick Head said that he was now as good as Michael

I've got such vivid memories of when I started watching F1. 1997 was my starting point, but 1998 was my first full season and I was obsessed with it. Used to watch rather race, then the full repeat of it in the evening

The overtaking was always crap, but the dominance of one team wasn't as absolute as it can be now. You'd usually have more chance of a heroic performance in races, especially with more technical failures and the tyre wars. It was only the late ferrari period where we got the more modern style total domination of Schumacher, which was as dull as it is today.

98 was the first year I remember actively choosing to watch F1. I think it's cos I had my standard grade Tech Studies class that year and quite a few of the guys were into their cars and racing. Had one guy was a massive Schumacher fan, but me and my mates were Mclaren.

I do remember Ralf quite clearly actually. He was ok, but I don't remember thinking he could win the WDC at any point.
I was hoping for Coulthard to pull something out the bag in 99 after Mika got his first WDC, but alas. It was not to be.

[Robbo-92]

It's a worrying trend of F1, even in the last 5 seasons, of F1, we've only had one genuinely good season in 2021, all the rest have had one driver/car combo dominating. The 2020 season gets a bit of a pass, as after Covid, everyone was just happy to see the cars back on track racing round, but Hamilton still walked that season, not far off 5 race wins clear even in a 17 race season, thats with Hamilton only taking part in 16 races as well.

The racing is utterly woeful now, DRS is now either overpowered or not effective depending on the track/car, so moves are either relatively easy, or we're basically just teased with overtakes but nothing comes of it before tyre saving resumes. Never thought I'd say it, but I'd not even be against a slightly tweaked spec series for F1, teams can use their own power unit of course, but chassis/aero could be spec and a lot of fans probably wouldn't care that much, you'd still have better teams as they'd poach the better engineers, or have better power units, plus they'd employ the better drivers, so would be in theory a better team overall.

Kind of rambling there, sorry

[Vermilion]

It was only the late ferrari period where we got the more modern style total domination of Schumacher, which was as dull as it is today.

Yep, but then we had 05-09 which were some of the best seasons i can recall.

[False]

1 point per position, starting at 0 for 20th, 0 for dnf

multiple driver infractions, -1 point

team infractions, using extra parts etc, -1 team point

ill take my cheque

[Cheeky Devlin]

It needs something to shake things up a bit.

Is there anything to be said for bringing back refuelling? Combine that with the different tyre combinations and suddenly you get a lot more potential for variable strategies and conditions?
I wasn't watching when they stopped that actually? Do we know what the reason was? I assume they got fed up of drivers heading out with the rig still attached.

[False]

refuelling is a safety concern mostly, but also the key driver for the 2014 hybrids was for fuel efficiency, so by controlling the fuel cell and allowing teams to take a maximum of 100kg of fuel its a very easy way (in theory) to encourage economy and track usage