Alianora La Canta's La Canta Magnifico Blog on Ning

[  Mood: Welcome! ]
[  Currently: Reading F1 Racing (March 2006 edition) ]
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[  Mood: Happy ]
[  Currently: Reading New Internationalist (July 2008 edition) ]
Due to Button being the only retiree of the French Grand Prix, the British Grand Prix engine situation is almost a reverse of the situation at the previous race.

Fresh engines (7):

Heidfeld, Coulthard, Trulli, Bourdais, both Hondas and Kovalainen.

Not-so-fresh engines (13):

Both Ferraris (though Raikkonen may change his engine), Kubica, both Renaults, both Williamses, Webber, Glock, Vettel, both Force Indias and Hamilton.

[  Mood: Money Money Money ]
[  Currently: Reading The Ultimate FE Lecturer's Handbook by Ros Clow and Trevor D ]
Warning! Long entry alert!

The FIA has decided it would like to charge $1.1m per year to each and every team for its services in F1 races. These services include:

- a marshalling and positioning system. In the early part of the millennium, this was a fibreoptic cable system paid for by Bernie because its primary use was for the digital TV project. Ironically, the time is right to try re-introducing this service, but relations between Bernie and the FIA are too strained for the FIA to even suggest that Bernie share the costs in return for an extra revenue stream for his CVC masters.

- Digiflags. Apart from Singapore and future night races, it is unclear if these even provide a benefit to marshalling, yet the FIA seem determined to introduce them to every single race, including day ones. They were tested during the Safety Car test at the end of the French Grand Prix's second Friday practise.

- The accident data recorder. The teams used to pay the supplier, but the FIA now wants to act as the middleman. It is unclear why this is needful, and strikes me as a costly way of standardising something which FIA homologation rules mean is already standardised.

- Pit and Garage Messaging Service. This is to replace the paddock "runners" with an SMS-based service. I am put in mind of the last attempt to replace the "runners" - the Japanese Grand Prix of 2007. The e-mail-based
service was derailed when Ferrari didn't get their e-mail until over an hour after everyone else - and two laps after the race had begun. I can tell you from experience that much bigger delays than two hours are possible, and that mobile phone services can also be suspectible to unacceptably long delays. I've seem text messages reach me two days after someone half a mile away sent them - which is not exactly what the FIA are looking for in a solution.

- Weather forecasting. The teams already have their own, and frankly theirs is slightly more reliable than the FIA's service. So there's no point in the duplication, especially when there isn't even agreement on the ambient temperature when the FIA's supplier gives it (see the "cool fuel" scandal of Brazil 2007).

- Pit wall intercom system. This allows the teams to talk to race control directly. One word: Skype. That would cut the costs of the intercom system dramatically, if the FIA worries about costs (the FIA is claiming that the service costs 780000 euros, of which half is to be paid by the teams).

So we have two unnecessary services, one that could have been avoided if the FIA's relationship with CVC had been better and two that don't need to be anywhere near as expensive as the FIA claims. The other one being a move that I suspect is purely to make the FIA money.

Even if all these services were needed and could not reasonably have been made cheaper, since when has it been the team's responsibility to supply the measuring and stewarding systems? Measuring and stewarding is part of the FIA's job, shared to some extent with the circuits. Bernie tried to make the teams pay for digital TV (something that's Bernie's job) in 2003 and got told that he was being unreasonable. Logically, there is no reason why Max should not be treated identically.

The circuits have to pay to get "1T" status, which is needed to hold an F1 race. If the FIA is looking to anywhere to get external financing for its systems, it is there. Many of these things are circuit infrastructure and traditionally it's the circuits that have helped pay for this sort of thing. The tracks are the ones, if anyone, who should be helping to pay for the services the FIA are complaining about.

Most teams would be unhappy about paying over $600,000 per year more to an organisation that has made their commercial lives more difficult with recent bad publicity, and has also been keen to charge drivers a lot more for their licences. Now, it is arguable that if a driver fits the criteria of a licence then that driver should only be charged the cost of administering that licence, and I would certainly sympathise with such a point.

However, the more awkward point for the FIA is that the teams and the drivers have suddenly found each other in the same boat, thereby making each more sympathetic to the other. Joint actions become possible (albeit still of limited effect because Ferrari is almost certain to back the FIA in whatever it does, irrespective of what that is). The FIA has strengthened its opposition by this act.

If the FIA had acted before the drivers started complaining about the licence fees last week, then it would have been in a much stronger position because the teams would not have known that their drivers were so openly against what had happened to them. Now they can be frustrated together - and gathering lots of frustrated powers together is rarely a politically expedient plan.

Mind you, I would like to see details of the 2008-2012 commercial agreement between the teams, the FIA and Bernie. I'd be surprised if they allowed this sort of chicanery in the first place. Entry fees are for basic admin costs, and what the FIA is talking about is far from basic. Other formulae do not require these services and are not charged for them.

In fact, F1 could theoretically function without these services. Granted, these days we would certainly want the accident data recorder for safety reasons, but the other five things are contingent on a certain vision for future F1. A vision that sees expensive technology as a panacea for the complaints about inconsistency and ineffectiveness, and also to allow F1 to look like part of the 21st century.

The trouble with that is that technology alone will not solve these issues. Consistency and effectiveness are people traits not object traits. It will require people who understand how to apply the rules, how to inform others of what they need to know when they need to know it and who are prepared to listen when others complain before the FIA can be seen as consistent or effective. Many things are needed to make F1 appear part of the 21st century, and strictly speaking none of them are night races. Proper marketing, proper racing, sensible grown-up behaviour from the powers-that-be and an embrace of the masses that indirectly pay for F1 are what will make F1 look like part of the 21st century.

Instead, the FIA wants to charge teams for technology that is mostly unnecessary and/or over-expensive for purpose.

Typical.

[  Mood: Burn Out ]
[  Currently: Reading Formula One 2008 edited by Matthew Hancock ]
Warning! Long transcript alert!

Introduction - Friday Practise 1 - Friday Practise 2 - Force India Eye View

Listen to or download from NaBloPoMo
(Size n MB, length y:yy)

Introduction [0:00]

- Hello everyone! This is Alianora La Canta and you're listening to La Canta Magnifico Blog Pod, 20th June 2008 edition.

- Today, F1 went back to Europe amidst the bright rural sunshine of Magny-Couers. This podcast will aim to fill you in on the action.

Friday Practise 1 [0:20]

- Rain was forecast for later in the weekend, but none was seen all day. Most people did an installation lap and scurried back in because the track was so green. For the next 18 minutes, the most exciting thing that happened was a shot of a Ferrari occupied by an ear-defender-clad engineer who looked nothing like Raikkonen (who was supposed to be racing it for the weekend). Speaking of Ferrari, it was also noted that their nose hole had returned.

- Rosberg was the first driver to go out on a proper lap, and he was quickly joined by Bourdais. Nakajima was the first driver to find his car bouncing heavily due to taking too much kerb at a chicane. Piquet Jr was a pleasant surprise at this point, temporarily taking second position. However, the star was Vettel, who was in P1 until Kovalainen displaced him using the vastly superior McLaren.

- 40 minutes into the session, Sutil nearly hit a wall. Webber was complaining of low grip, but this was reflected in slow times rather than off-track excursions. Piquet Jr went wide at the same time as Webber made his complaint, underlining the fact that this was Friday morning - never a time when the track is at its grippiest.

- With half an hour to go, Massa took P1 from Kovalainen. Meanwhile, Kubica's tyres were graining - usually an indication that the car/driver combination is too hard on its tyres. It could be worse - graining is a lot easier to deal with than the flat spots Hamilton would have got from locking his brakes up at the time Kubica's radio was broadcast. Kovalainen went wide at the same corner on two successive laps, which wouldn't have done his tyres much good either.

- Coulthard tried a front wing which made the car go slower, so they changed back to the old one. Vettel went off the track. A few minutes later, Trulli did a quick spin as everyone headed onto the track. Then Hamilton locked his wheels and then clattered across the kerbs harder than optimal speed would have suggested - clearly some of the drivers still hadn't got on top of the track.

- Heidfeld continued to struggle, though not as much as Alonso. While Heidfeld had difficulties in going fast, Alonso couldn't even get all his running in because his engine exploded dramatically with three minutes to go. His mechanics were probably going to get a shortened lunch break. Kovalainen nearly hit a wall while recovering from a trip into the gravel, but continued on his merry way. Oh, and Vettel locked up again.

- Massa ended the session with the fastest time, with Hamilton, Kovalainen and Raikkonen in a tight bunch behind him. After making his mark early, Vettel finished the session 8th, between Trulli and Heidfeld. Coulthard and Webber turned in an average result for Red Bull, slotting into 12th and 13th respectively. Williams had an unusually bad session with Rosberg 14th and Nakajima 17th. Honda looked like struggling, with Barrichello 15th and Button 18th. Force India were at the foot of the table.

Friday Practise 2 [3:35]

- Unusually, Alonso rather than one of the backmarkers was first out of the pitlane.

- Seven minutes into the session, something fell off Kovalainen's car but it didn't seem to impair his performance noticeably. Trulli's performance was considerably impaired, at least temporarily, by running into a gravel trap.

- Meanwhile, Vettel was showing everyone how to go round Magny-Couers correctly by setting the fastest lap so far. This was soon beaten by Hamilton, but that wasn't really the point.

- Kubica's session was interrupted for a time because he had a misfire which needed clearing out. Sutil, keen to make up for lost time, was a bit too keen going into one corner and ended up wide. A few minutes later, Glock did the same. Coulthard complained of a lack of traction at Turns 8 and 13. Two minutes later, Alonso went off, followed by Trulli and Hamilton at the half-hour mark. Magny-Couers remained a tricky proposition at this time.

- Kovalainen took the fastest time off his team-mate while all this was going on. Said team-mate then went round the outside edge of a massive gravel trap, damaging the spoon of his front wing en route. Not the way into a team's heart or a good track position.

- Raikkonen fared considerably better, taking P1 from Kovalainen soon after Hamilton's wanderings. Then all was quiet for five minutes, a quiet broken by Fisichella taking to the gravel and Massa becoming the fastest runner. Raikkonen went wide almost immediately afterwards. Not to be defeated, Massa took the prize for the longest single stint off the tarmac at the half-way point. He went 45 degrees across a gravel trap and then scampered down a grasscrete area before rejoining the track halfway down a hairpin.

- 50 minutes into the session, Glock went aerial after launching his car off the kerbs at a chicane. The car wobbled quite a bit before landing quite squarely and continuing as if nothing had happened. Hopefully the Toyota masseuse is good, because I could imagine Glock would be feeling quite achey after that... Piquet Jr and Sutil went off-track almost immediately afterwards. Piquet Jr had a big understeer moment while Sutil missed the Imola chicane and didn't gather the car together in time for Chateau D'Eau.

- Twenty minutes before the end of the session, Alonso bounded over the chicane kerb that caught out Glock earlier, and then went wide at the final corner. Renault once again proved it had an excellent sense of humour by laughing at every single error its own drivers committed. Then Trulli and his car had a slight disagreement and Hamilton just managed to stay on the kerb. The next 10 minutes were quiet, and just as everyone's attention was drifting a little, Alonso stuck his Renault in P1 and proved impossible to remove from there. Massa nearly hit the Adelaide wall trying.

- A safety car practise was held at the end of the session. It sounded more exciting than it was, because from a spectator's point of view it looked like the normal end-of-session return, except with extra yellow flags, Safety Car boards and Digiflags. The latter will be used in night racing, and seemed to work well. Other objectives cannot be ascertained from the information available to us.

Force India Eye View [6:55]

- In keeping with the last couple of races, Friday free practise was nothing to get excited about for Force India. Fisichella was the first driver out of the pitlane for the first free practise, but finished 19th, 0.14 seconds off Button ahead. It wasn't particularly clear why this occurred, but neither Force India seemed to have much get-up-and-go. Sutil finished in last and nearly crashed at one point, though he did have an explanation. Well, two.

- The official line was that the brake calipers on Sutil's car were not working properly. However, Stuart Codling from F1 Racing reckoned it was because Sutil got stranded during some pit lane manuevering and the marshals wouldn't let the Force India crew pull Sutil back into the garage. Since reversing in the pitlane is strictly forbidden, he wouldn't have been able to continue, brake calipers or no brake calipers.

- During second practise, both Force Indias went off, but neither sustained any significant damage or lost any running as a result. Fisichella went into a gravel trap 40 minutes in, while Sutil missed the Imola chicane 52 minutes into the session and then went more or less straight on at the next corner. Still, Force India's session did not go very well, because Fisichella still only managed to get 18th and Sutil was in 20th. They were sandwiching Button.

- That's all for this episode of La Canta Magnifico Blog Pod. Thank you for listening and have a good day

[  Mood: Neutral ]
[  Currently: Reading The Legend of Huma by Richard A. Knaak ]
The French Grand Prix is the 8th race of the season, so in theory everyone should have very unfresh gearboxes. Plainly some of these drivers weren't listening...

Fresh gearbox (11):

Raikkonen, both Renaults, both Williamses, both Toro Rossos, Button, both Force Indias and Hamilton.

Not-so-fresh gearbox (3):

Massa, Coulthard and Glock.

Quite unfresh gearbox (3):

Kubica, Webber and Trulli.

Very unfresh gearbox (3):

Heidfeld, Barrichello and Kovalainen.