Formula 1 2009 - The Great Soap Opera

[The Stig]

I know I'm probably the only F1 fan here, but what happened this morning is too good to pass up.

Formula 1 is a pretty crazy sport. In fact, it's not really much of a sport at all, it's a massive real life soap opera that happens to hold races every two weeks. The drama makes Hollywood look dull and the politics make Machiavelli look like a wimp.

For example, in 2007 McLaren, one of the top teams, was thrown out of the teams' championship and fined $100 million (not a typo) for stealing data from Ferrari. That's pretty incredible on its own, but what's more incredible is that the whistleblower was one of their own drivers, who was upset because he thought the team liked his teammate more!

Then in 2008 you had the World Championship change hands on the last corner of the last lap of the last race of the season when a rainshower ruined on team's strategy gamble.

But what happened yesterday is even more incredible. In 2007 and 2008, the Honda team had dismal results. They were so bad that nobody would sponsor them. So after the final race of 2008 they announced that they were quitting the sport and selling their team. Of course, in this financial environment selling a team in an ultra-expensive sport like F1 is no easy task, and a lot of people just assumed the team would fold, leaving their 500 employees on the street.

By the start of last month they still didn't have a buyer. The rest of the teams had been testing their 2009 cars for over a month already. Finally, Honda's team manager, a guy named Ross Brawn, managed to buy the team and re-name it Brawn GP. He managed to convince Mercedes to let him use their engines, but that required a big re-design of the car. The team showed up for the first race of the season in Australia without much testing time, without any sponsors, and probably without enough money to complete the season.

With that in mind, everybody was a bit stunned when the Brawn cars were in the top 5 in Friday practice. Richard Branson was so impressed that he flew down to Australia overnight to sign a sponsorship deal for Virgin with the team. With hastily applied Virgin logos (no time to re-paint the cars), the Brawn cars went out and qualified 1-2 for the race. They're the clear favorites for the win tomorrow.

So a team that looked like it wouldn't exist a month ago scored the first debut pole position since 1970, with second place to boot, and a big sponsorship deal. Even Hollywood couldn't think up something like this!

[hifigator]

I'm not an F1 fan, but thanks for the story.

Now what about Helio and his back taxes?

[The Stig]

Mar 28, 2009 10:22:13 GMT -5 hifigator said:

I'm not an F1 fan, but thanks for the story.

Now what about Helio and his back taxes?

Helio's an Indycar driver. Their first race is next week, I think in St. Petersburg, FL. Helio's trial is ongoing, so he'll probably miss it. Depending on the outcome of the trial, he could miss a lot more races in the future.

[The Stig]

Well, two races down and already plenty of chaos, craziness, and controversy.

In the opening race in Australia, the first Brawn car was leading in the closing laps with a Red Bull in second, followed by a BMW and the other Brawn car. The BMW was on the best tires of the lot. He closed rapidly on the Red Bull, whose tires were badly worn, and in turn the Red Bull was closing on the leading Brawn. But when the BMW tried to pass the Red Bull, the Red Bull driver lost control and slid into the BMW and took them both out of the race. As a result, the Brawn dream was complete with a 1-2 finish in their first ever race.

Behind them, controversy raged. McLaren's #1 driver is Lewis Hamilton, a hugely popular British media darling and the defending World Champion. After the Red Bull/BMW crash, the pace car came out, which meant no passing is allowed. Hamilton was in 4th, behind a Toyota. Behind the pace car, the Toyota slid off the track and came back on behind Hamilton, who was down in 3rd. Hamilton radioed his team and told him what had happened, and they told him to let the Toyota back past so Hamilton wouldn't get a penalty for passing behind the pace car. Hamilton pulled over to the side of the track, let the Toyota past, and finished 4th.

All seemed fine, but after the race, the officials called Hamilton and one of his team managers to hear what had happened with the Toyota. Hamilton and the team manager realized that the Toyota might get a penalty for passing behind the pace car, so Hamilton told the officials that he hadn't let the Toyota past. The Toyota was duly penalized, and Hamilton was elevated to third.

There was just one problem. Immediately after the race, Hamilton had given an interview to the American F1 broadcaster Speed Channel. Not knowing that the Toyota was under investigation, Hamilton told them that he had pulled over and let the Toyota past. The next day, the officials got wind of this interview. Before the next race, they listened to the tapes of the McLaren radio conversations, which proved that Hamilton had been lying. They duly overturned the Toyota's penalty and disqualified Hamilton from the race. In a desperate bid to protect their media darling driver, McLaren scapegoated the team manager who had been with Hamilton, saying the whole thing had been his idea. The team manager was sent back to England on the next plane.

In the second race in Malaysia, the race was wild from the start. Ferrari had made a massive strategic error in qualifying, leaving one of their drivers starting from near the back, while a Red Bull and a Brawn were both starting behind where they should have been due to penalties. When the race started, the leading Brawn made an awful start, while a Williams shot into the lead. Behind him the penalized cars passed their way through the field, but everybody's eyes were on a massive dark cloud near the track. F1 keeps racing in the rain, and it was monsoon season in Malaysia.

F1 cars have three types of tires - Slicks (no grooves) for dry conditions, intermediates (shallow grooves) for light rain, and full wets (deeper grooves) for heavy rain. Ferrari's forecast showed that a cloudburst was about to hit the circuit, so they put their driver on full wets at their first pitstop even though the track was completely dry. Unfortunately for them, the rain held off for a while, and the driver dropped out of contention. Meanwhile, the lead Brawn car had fought his way back into the lead after his first pitstop.

A few laps later, the first raindrops hit. The last time it rained on an F1 race in Malaysia was in 2001, when a monsoon hit the track and flooded parts of it in minutes. With this in mind, and seeing the huge dark cloud by the track, pretty much every team called their driver in for full wets. But the rain turned out to be only a drizzle. A Toyota driver had been the only driver to take intermediates, and he started passing everybody. He made it up to second place before everybody realized what was up and called their drivers back in for intermediate tires.

It was at this point, when everybody was getting rid of their full wet tires, that the monsoon hit. All the drivers were back in on the next lap for full wets. In most F1 races, the leaders make 2 pitstops. It was about halfway through the race, and the leading Brawn had already made 4 stops, with most other drivers on 3 stops. A lone BMW had taken on intermediates at his first pitstop and stubbornly stayed on them as the rain picked up. Even though he was on the wrong tires, he was in second place because he'd made 3 fewer stops than the leader, although he quickly fell back to third behind the wise Toyota driver.

By this point, the track was basically flooded, so the officials had no choice but to stop it to wait out the rain. Unfortunately, dusk was quickly approaching, and by the time the rain stopped it was too dark to continue, so the race was abandoned. It was the first time in almost 20 years that a race was stopped early due to weather. Due to a strange rule about some laps not counting, the BMW found himself elevated to a second place finish due his strategy error, ahead of the Toyota who had passed him. Meanwhile, Brawn had their second win in two races. The only downside for them was that the race only awarded half points because it was stopped early.

The next race is in China in 2 weeks. Before that race there will be a hearing about the legality of the Brawn, Toyota, and Williams cars, which could change the results of the first two races weeks after they were run!

[Boz]

So, wait.....who is Gina Gershon dating?

;D

[SirSaxa]

TheStig

Thanks for the detailed recap of events.
I only follow F1 a little these days and I was shocked to hear that Brawn went out and won the first race's top two spots! I had never heard of Brawn and had no idea what happened. Then I read a little bit about the Hamilton fiasco. But I did not have the time to check out what the heck was going on until I read your posts today.

Ross Brawn! What a ballsy guy. I guess he knew what he had in that team. Now I want to get back into following F1 this year. Sounds like it will be very competitive all season long. And, as you well know, the F1 cars are the best in the world. Great stuff! Thanks.

[The Stig]

F1 can be a bit hard to follow here in the States, since the races come on at odd hours and are on an obscure channel. Speed Channel is the US broadcaster, and the next race will be shown at 3am Eastern time.

The good news is that the Speed Channel commentating crew is actually very good - in my opinion they might be the best in the world. Once the series gets back to Europe in April the races will be on at 8am Eastern time, which is still early but not as absurd as 3am.

The best website for following F1 news is Autosport: www.autosport.com/news/. The official F1 website is formula1.com, but it sucks balls.

Some good F1 books are the three books by Steve Matchett, a former mechanic on the Benetton team. He does a great job of explaining the sport in a way that's accessible to outsiders. Life in the Fast Lane is his recounting of the 1994 season at Benetton, which was one of the most controversial in the sport's history. The Mechanic's Tale is an autobiographical account of his time in F1. The Chariot Makers explains the technical side of the sport.

My favorite F1 book is Flat Out, Flat Broke: www.amazon.com/Flat-Out-Broke-Formula-Hard/dp/1844250180/ref=pd_sim_b_2 . It's the autobiography of Perry McCarthy, a driver who tried to get into F1. It's great because McCarhty should have been a stand-up comedian instead of a race car driver.

Here's the video of last year's championship ending. Felipe Massa of Ferrari is leading the race. Lewis Hamilton needs to finish in at least 5th place to win the championship - if he finishes outside the top 5, Massa is champion. Massa is Brazilian, and the race is in Brazil. Hamilton ran 4th early, but a light rain has hit the track, and he made a pitstop for intermediate tires. However, Timo Glock of Toyota has decided to try and finish the race on dry tires, and as a result he is now ahead of Hamilton. Right behind Hamilton is Sebastian Vettel, the best wet weather driver in the field. Vettel's car is dark blue, Hamilton's is silver and red, and Glock's car is white and red. Unfortunately, the title of the video gives away the ending:

Apologies for the low quality, but the F1 officials are ruthless about taking F1 videos off of Youtube, and this is all I could find.

[The Stig]

McLaren have now been summoned to appear before the World Motorsports Council over the lies they told at the Australian GP stewards' meeting. This could result in further punishments.

[hoyainspirit]

Appreciate the post, Stig. I have followed F1 in the past, but it admittedly has been a few years. Think I'll tape a few races and watch at my leisure.

[The Stig]

Tomorrow's a big day in the F1 world, as the International Court of Appeals could change the course of the season or even disqualify the winners of the first two races.

The issue is the diffuser - a part at the rear of the car that alters the airflow at the rear of the car. The rules for the diffuser were dramatically changed during the off season. Three teams (Brawn, Williams, and Toyota) used a loophole in the rules to effectively build a bigger diffuser that is still within the letter of the rules. They have been dubbed the "Diffuser Gang." The other teams (led by Ferrari, BMW, and Red Bull) say that while the Diffuser Gang's cars are within the letter of the rules, they go against the spirit of the rules. The consensus seems to be that the trick diffuser gives the car an advantage of 0.5 seconds per lap - a huge advantage in F1 terms.

On the Thursday before the opening race in Australia, the other teams lodged an official protest against the Diffuser Gang's cars. The Australian GP stewards ruled that the cars were legal. The other teams immediately appealed the decision, which requires a hearing at the International Court of Appeals, which will take place tomorrow.

Since then, we've had the first two races of the season, both of which were dominated by Diffuser Gang cars. Diffuser Gang cars currently hold the first four places in the championship.

Tomorrow could see three possible results:

1. Trick diffusers are deemed legal. If this happens, the other teams will immediately set to work designing their own trick diffusers, although it remains to be seen if they can get them to work as well as the Diffuser Gang's.

2. Trick diffusers are banned, and the Diffuser Gang are disqualified from the first two races. This would be a huge blow to the Diffuser Gang, since they would lose their points and they would have to design and build a new legal diffuser in a matter of days. The result would probably be a huge loss in performance. Such a ruling would be pretty unfair, since the Diffuser Gang were officially told that their cars were legal in Australia.

3. Trick diffusers are banned, but the results from the first two races are unchanged. This is more likely than option 2, since the Diffuser Gang's cars were passed as legal in Australia and Malaysia.

Either way, we'll have a more level playing field for next weekend's race in China.

Here's an AP article on the issue: sports.espn.go.com/rpm/racing/f1/news/story?id=4064501

[The Stig]

The diffusers have been confirmed as legal. Renault say they have a new diffuser ready for China, it's not clear when the others will have theirs ready.

[The Stig]

F1 drivers can be a bit dull at times. Sponsor commitments and an overbearing media have turned them into PR robots. Fortunately, there are some other people around the paddock who are really entertaining characters. They add a lot to the soap opera side of F1.

One of those people is Flavio Briatore, the Italian boss of the Renault team. He's old, fat, ugly, outspoken, and a real a**hole. But when a recent poll asked Italian men who they'd most like to be, Flavio came out as the winner.

Flavio is one of those people who succeeds at everything, for no apparent reason. Everything he touches just turns to gold. He never had any real interest in cars. He worked for the Benetton clothing company, running their American division in the 1980's. Around the same time, Benetton owned an F1 team that wasn't performing very well. The Benetton family asked Flavio to run the team, despite having zero experience in racing. Within about 5 years he had the team at the front of the grid and winning championships. He then left the sport for a while, and the team fell back into disarray.

In 2000, Renault bought the Benetton team and brought Flavio back to run it. Once again, he had the team winning championships within 5 years. The most remarkable thing is that he does this on a tiny budget compared to teams like Ferrari, McLaren, and Toyota. Nobody really knows how he does it. He has no technical expertise, but he's the best F1 team boss out there.

He also succeeds elsewhere in life. Like I said earlier, he is fat, ugly, and not at all charming. Yet he constantly has a supermodel by his side. He fathered Heidi Klum's first child, then promptly dumped her for a better looking girl. I'm not sure how you can improve on Heidi Klum, but Flavio managed it.

Now, Flavio was very upset about the FIA confirming that the trick diffusers were legal last week. He reacted in usual fashion - by shooting off his mouth in hilarious fashion.

In his first comments, he said that the decision could get a driver killed, then went on to insult both of BrawnGP's drivers, before wrapping up by saying that the decision would cost him 10 million euros, since it would cost that much to design a new diffuser. formula-one.speedtv.com/article/f1-briatore-furious-with-diffuser-decision/

The comments were funny for a few reasons. First, Renault tried to design a trick diffuser in the offseason, but it was rejected as illegal. Now they're suddenly too unsafe and expensive for Flavio? Second, Jenson Button (one of Brawn's drivers) responded to Flavio's insults by pointing out that Flavio had tried to sign him for this season....

Today, Flavio took it a step further: www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/74562

Now he's asking for Honda's prize money from last year to be given to the other teams, instead of giving it to Brawn. He's also asking the organizers to stop paying Brawn's transportation costs!

[The Stig]

And after all that hubbub over the trick diffusers, Red Bull qualify 1-3 for the Chinese GP without the trick diffusers! Renault qualify 2nd with a trick diffuser that was flown out from the factory at the last second on Flavio Briatore's private jet.

[The Stig]

Holy sh*t!

At the start of this thread, I said, "Formula 1 is a pretty crazy sport. In fact, it's not really much of a sport at all, it's a massive real life soap opera that happens to hold races every two weeks. The drama makes Hollywood look dull and the politics make Machiavelli look like a wimp."

That was based on what happened over the last two years, but what happened tonight absolutely blows everything else out of the water.

Eight of the ten Formula 1 teams, including all the top teams, announced tonight that they will not participate in Formula 1 next year. Instead, they will form their own series and race in that. This announcement was the culmination of a long process, and it basically became inevitable two days ago, but it's still absolutely stunning.

The issues behind this are incredibly complex, but I'll try to sum it up briefly:

Formula 1 is run by the FIA, which is the world's motorsports governing body. The FIA is run by a fellow named Max Mosley. Mosley is a VERY controversial figure. He's a lawyer at heart, and he's incredibly stubborn. He's a stickler for rules and procedures when it comes to other people, but be believes that he's above all rules. He was already not very popular among the teams or F1 fans. However, the FIA Senate (the body that elects the FIA President) absolutely worships him. Last year he got caught on camera in an S&M orgy with 5 hookers that might have had Nazi overtones (Mosley's father was Oswald Mosley, head of the British Nazis during WWII). The Senate's response was to give him a vote of confidence.

Earlier this year, Mosley introduced a huge raft of rules changes, which included a $40 million budget cap for next year (top F1 teams spend about $500 million per year). Instead of consulting the teams as he is supposed to do in the F1 rules, he imposed these changes unilaterally using a rules loophole. The teams, united for once in the Formula One Teams Association (FOTA) were furious, but Mosley refused to back down.

Over the past couple months there have been endless negotiations over the budget cap, the various technical rules for next year, and general stuff about the way F1 is run. FOTA insisted that they wanted to reach a compromise, but it quickly became apparent that Mosley would not accept anything resembling a fair compromise.

Earlier this month was the deadline to submit entries for next year's F1 season. A bunch of new teams submitted entries, since the budget cap meant they could now afford F1. Two smaller FOTA teams (Williams and Force India) submitted entries as well, which got them kicked out of FOTA. Right before the deadline, the other 8 FOTA teams submitted entries, but with conditions attached. The conditions basically said that their entry was only valid if Mosley abandoned his rules changes.

The FIA initially accepted their entries, but only if they dropped their conditions and accept Mosley's rules within a week (tomorrow was the deadline). In response, the 8 FOTA teams have announced that they will leave F1 for next year and form their own series.

The big controversy now will be over Ferrari (and to a lesser degree the two Red Bull owned teams). These teams submitted conditional entries, but the FIA ignored that and accepted them as full entrants because they had signed deals several years ago that committed them to F1 until 2012. Ferrari argues that these deals are invalid because the FIA haven't held up their end of the bargain, but this will probably end up in court. Ferrari are crucial to both series. They are by far the most popular F1 team (think Red Sox + Yankees rolled into one), and their participation in the breakaway series would instantly make that series viable. Mosley and company will do everything they can to keep Ferrari in F1, and thus out of the FOTA series.

We haven't seen the end of this yet, but today will probably go down as one of the most crucial days in F1's 60 year history.

Article: news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsport/formula_one/8108488.stm (listen to the audio bit - it's very good).

[SirSaxa]

Thanks for the Update.
Sounds like the CART/Indy break up of years back... that opened the door for NASCAR to become predominant in US auto racing. Indy has yet to recover despite kissing and making up in recent years.

[The Stig]

That's the nightmare scenario for F1. But there have been other successful splits. In 1979 CART split from USAC, and USAC's Indycar series simply died out after two years and CART thrived.

[The Stig]

Here's a very quick summary of the situation for people who don't know F1: sports.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=4271052&name=hinton_ed

The only thing he gets wrong is that Ron Dennis isn't in charge of McLaren's F1 team anymore - the affable and businesslike Martin Whitmarsh succeeded him.

[SirSaxa]

Uh oh... now Bernie Ecclestone spouts off.

A FEW SAMPLES
Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone faced criticism from politicians and Jewish groups Saturday after being quoted as saying that Adolf Hitler "got things done."

He was quoted as saying that democracy "hasn't done a lot of good for many countries -- including this one."

Ecclestone also said the West had been wrong to depose Iraq's Sadam Hussein, saying: "He was the only one who could control that country."

Ecclestone, who owns F1's commercial rights, is no stranger to controversial remarks. He once said women should dress in white "like all other domestic appliances."

sports.espn.go.com/rpm/racing/f1/news/story?id=4305770

[The Stig]

Bernie is a real character - a very odd fellow. He has a real disdain for the press and the masses, and he doesn't care at all what those people think about him. In fact, he seems to like the idea that the masses loathe him. A few years ago F1's doctor Sid Watkins (one of Bernie's good friends) wrote a book that included a section about Bernie. Bernie threatened to sue him if he wrote anything nice about him. His interviews are so rude that they're actually funny - they're full of one-word answers and very blunt, arrogant statements.

He's probably does more harm than good for F1 right now, since his draconian copyright rules and his strategy of seeking profit over the sport's health have been problematic. But he's also an integral part of the soap opera. F1 simply wouldn't be the same without Bernie.

Does he actually think Hitler as a good guy? Probably not. He enjoys riling people up. I do know that he doesn't like democracy - he thinks everything should be a dictatorship, with him as the dictator.

[theexorcist]

Jul 4, 2009 22:43:39 GMT -5 The Stig said:

Bernie is a real character - a very odd fellow. He has a real disdain for the press and the masses, and he doesn't care at all what those people think about him. In fact, he seems to like the idea that the masses loathe him. A few years ago F1's doctor Sid Watkins (one of Bernie's good friends) wrote a book that included a section about Bernie. Bernie threatened to sue him if he wrote anything nice about him. His interviews are so rude that they're actually funny - they're full of one-word answers and very blunt, arrogant statements.

He's probably does more harm than good for F1 right now, since his draconian copyright rules and his strategy of seeking profit over the sport's health have been problematic. But he's also an integral part of the soap opera. F1 simply wouldn't be the same without Bernie.

Does he actually think Hitler as a good guy? Probably not. He enjoys riling people up. I do know that he doesn't like democracy - he thinks everything should be a dictatorship, with him as the dictator.

You don't really believe that someone being quoted as saying "Hitler had the right idea" should just get off as "Bernie being Bernie", do you?

This came up in Deadspin yesterday, but it bears repeating - you get nothing but trouble if you bring up Nazi analogies. Always a bad decision.