Grand Prix Rejects

..in having a sh*t-ton of races on the calendar?

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/82900

F1 already copied NASCAR's testing ban, and this appears to be the next to follow. Seems our favorite ancient moneynut wants 25 races on the Formula 1 calendar...

But where would those extra five races come from? The streets of Rome are supposedly already there, so that's 21...

Bernie is obsessed with a New York street race, which is a hilarious joke since Americans don't like spending that much money on their motorsport.

Somebody shoot Bernie. Please.

He's also mooted a Parisian GP, chasing round EuroDisney or some such.

Cynon wrote:Bernie is obsessed with a New York street race, which is a hilarious joke since Americans don't like spending that much money on their motorsport.

NYC roads are also more suited to WRC cars than F1 cars. If F1 ran there all the Newey based suspensions would snap in an instant.

Cynon wrote:..in having a sh*t-ton of races on the calendar?

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/82900

F1 already copied NASCAR's testing ban, and this appears to be the next to follow. Seems our favorite ancient moneynut wants 25 races on the Formula 1 calendar...

But where would those extra five races come from? The streets of Rome are supposedly already there, so that's 21...

Bernie is obsessed with a New York street race, which is a hilarious joke since Americans don't like spending that much money on their motorsport.

Knowing Bernie, he'll be on the lookout for some suckers - sorry, investors - that he can persuade to hand over vast piles of cash over to him.
So, if we allow for the Rome GP, and the possibility of a US GP (for now, we will leave the location to be specified), then we have three potential places left. One likely candidate would be Losail, in Qatar (which already hosts a Moto GP round), which would fulfil the prerequisite of having lots of cash and a flashy circuit. The circuit was designed to F1 standards, and the owners are interested in F1 - Bernie is probably already on the phone to them.
There would probably be another race in Asia, since Bernie is after their money, and it'll probably be yet another semi-street circuit (so more like Singapore or Valencia then Monaco). Where is difficult to say - we already have Malaysia, Singapore, China, and Japan, with India and South Korea already on the list. Perhaps Bernie will try something like a Hong Kong street circuit? It'd have the high tech infrastructure he would crave, along with the aesthetics (and cash).
As for that final option, I would put a strong bet on Russia - Bernie has been eyeing up the possibility of (yet another) street race, this time in Sochi (which is being renovated for the next Winter Olympics), and with Petrov as a driver and Lada as a sponsor, Bernie is probably aiming to build on that and build up the sport in Russia.

Sadly, as I type this, I can predict that all of these places will have one thing in common; they will be dull, repetitive Tilke dromes which will add nothing but unnecessary padding to the season. Whilst the idea of extra races is good, I would prefer quality over quantity; moreover, if the races are anything like as processional as Bahrein or Valencia, the press are going to tear the sport to shreds for being dull.

LionZoo wrote:

Cynon wrote:Bernie is obsessed with a New York street race, which is a hilarious joke since Americans don't like spending that much money on their motorsport.

NYC roads are also more suited to WRC cars than F1 cars. If F1 ran there all the Newey based suspensions would snap in an instant.

Exactly. Chicago's streets are just as terrible. But the main problem F1 would have in the USA is that American motorsport will survive -- and grow -- without F1 being present. If anything, F1 has been pulling ideas from American motorsport rather than the other way around in the past 10 years (safety car rules, testing regulations, the idea of a "push-to-pass"...).

So if Bernie is serious about getting a race in the United States, he will have to bow to the wishes of American motorsport, and get a possibly lower-budget race at either the Brickyard or some other track in the middle of nowhere (Road America please? *salivate*), because I don't see even Las Vegas bowing to F1's wishes unless F1 mans up and runs the Las Vegas oval track.

Didn't the techies/truckies etc. threaten strikes and major disruption about 7 or 8 years ago when a 20-race season was mooted?

Quality over quantity, Bern.

The scary thing is, if we think Bernie's obsessed with money, just wait until he goes and F1 is run by banks...

Ovals and superspeedways are, once again, the solution.

coops wrote:Ovals and superspeedways are, once again, the solution.

Of course they are - Crashes by the dozen, safety cars aplenty, bunched up grids with no runaway leads...
Isn't that what F1 fans keep braying about after every boring race?

PWNSNBM wrote:

coops wrote:Ovals and superspeedways are, once again, the solution.

Of course they are - Crashes by the dozen, safety cars aplenty, bunched up grids with no runaway leads...
Isn't that what F1 fans keep braying about after every boring race?

That and an overtaking maneuver

coops wrote:He's also mooted a Parisian GP, chasing round EuroDisney or some such.

Of course, a race at Disneyland, either in Paris or Florida, would be a Mickey Mouse track... (see avatar )

America - Martinsville?

And the Isle of Man TT track PLEASE!!!

Honestly they should run one oval-track too, then they actually do cover all kinds of asphalt tracks...

I want them to go to the old Chimay, and make the pit near the chimay brewery
(yess yess, if i'm going to the belgian gp all of you people who come can get a chimay from me and a bottle of spa-water, too!)
the new (well, nineties...) chimay on the other hand is even worse than tilke could ever come up with: straights, square double chicanes, 90° corners, and that's it...


i support the idea of an oval. At least they have to try it, it might work.
We also need a GP run in snow! (a Greenland GP would be great, the circuit infrastructure completely made in iglo-style, not including captain iglo off course, as i don't support sea captains who kidnap children to an island with the promise of finding a treasure)

ye, we can't run it on Iceland...

Laguna Seca

Watkins Glen

Mosport

uhh....how about Bathurst?

Jordan wrote:uhh....how about Bathurst?

A Modern Formula 1 Car wouldn't survive a lap around here considering how much air a V8 Supercar can get over the top of the Mountain.

Watkins Glen (the long course) is a great layout but the facilities aren't good enough for an F1 race nor would ISC/NASCAR pay that much to attract F1 there...

F1 will not race in the US again until after Bernie is gone. I don't see them ever adding an oval. There were apparently rumors about it when CART was so successful before the split and starting to make inroads on the F1 audience, where F1 might have added some ovals to retaliate. But I don't think they feel threatened from any other series.

The testing ban is kind of a ripoff from NASCAR. I didn't think it was a good move for NASCAR either as the initial testing ban in the early '90s is what led to NASCAR's powerhouse multi-car teams and all the privateers going out of business. In F1, the privateers were already gone (well, until this year when we have some new ones) and teams have been fixed at two cars since the '70s so there would be less impact in that regard. Safety cars are probably a ripoff from CART more than NASCAR because I can't imagine F1 taking NASCAR remotely seriously when they were introduced (they probably only took them seriously when Montoya defected, ironically many years after NASCAR stopped being actually good), while they sure as hell took CART seriously.

Road America would be the ideal choice in the US, but they don't have that kind of money. Nor does Indy anymore now that Tony George is gone and they're trying to be a lot more conservative with their finances. Sebring might also be good, and they might have more money than either at this point. But let's face it, how many new natural road courses are likely to be added? Maybe if the IRL goes out of business eventually, they can get Long Beach back.

A EuroDisney street race? That's kind of ripping off the IRL and their Walt Disney World Speedway in the early years.

I'm sure they could arrange 20-25 races at good tracks in theory but not for the fees they want, so they will be generic. Ditto for NASCAR. They could certainly have good races at 36 tracks, but the tracks they've added since Indy have been Tilkedromes. I don't get why the Nationwide Series gets all the good road courses besides Watkins Glen: Montreal, Mexico City, Road America. Let NASCAR's real drivers onto those tracks... (Of course I also don't get why IndyCar still has yet to add Road America, ESPECIALLY now that Milwaukee is gone.)

With a few grandstands, I don't see why Oliver's Mount couldn't be added as an English GP

Please, for the love of god, use the Portland International Raceway.

Follow it in one more way: Add an oval. Seriously, is there any possible road course on the Indianapolis grounds that would provide a better race then the oval? The GP would need to be longer than 305 km, though...

Sean wrote:F1 will not race in the US again until after Bernie is gone.

That's funny, because Bernie has his sights on a Manhattan Grand Prix, and what Bernie wants, Bernie gets.

Sean wrote:A EuroDisney street race? That's kind of ripping off the IRL and their Walt Disney World Speedway in the early years.

It was not a street race in EuroDisney. It was a circuit to be built nearby.

Sean wrote:They could certainly have good races at 36 tracks, but the tracks they've added since Indy have been Tilkedromes.

That's also funny, because Indy was the ultimate Tilkedrome. I would rather have twenty races in Valencia than one at Indianapolis, which is a shame, because a circuit so famous didn't deserve an infield as crappy as the one it got.

watka wrote:With a few grandstands, I don't see why Oliver's Mount couldn't be added as an English GP

Road racing has the distinct advantage of being raced by motorcycles, which are considerably narrower and therefore have a lot more room for overtaking. Make that into a Formula One track, and you'll have one hell of a procession.

Captain Hammer wrote:

Sean wrote:F1 will not race in the US again until after Bernie is gone.

That's funny, because Bernie has his sights on a Manhattan Grand Prix, and what Bernie wants, Bernie gets.

That's also funny, because Bernie has no idea about what kinds of money Americans want to spend on motorsport events. Especially in large cities like New York. If he does get a New York street race, and the race actually happens, I will photograph myself with a potato chip bag on my head for all to see.

RAK wrote:

watka wrote:With a few grandstands, I don't see why Oliver's Mount couldn't be added as an English GP

Road racing has the distinct advantage of being raced by motorcycles, which are considerably narrower and therefore have a lot more room for overtaking. Make that into a Formula One track, and you'll have one hell of a procession.

Note to self... there is no sure-fire way to make sarcasm work on the Internet.

watka wrote:

RAK wrote:

watka wrote:With a few grandstands, I don't see why Oliver's Mount couldn't be added as an English GP

Road racing has the distinct advantage of being raced by motorcycles, which are considerably narrower and therefore have a lot more room for overtaking. Make that into a Formula One track, and you'll have one hell of a procession.

Note to self... there is no sure-fire way to make sarcasm work on the Internet.

That's why I use puns.

Hey Sean, are you attending Cornell University by any chance?