F1 From Indianapolis...

[RocketmanX]

Hey guys!

Been a while.

Had to come back and see what you're opinions were here of the "incident" at Indy.
Being an Indiana native, F1 fan and a faithful attendee of the US Grand Prix, I have to say I'm very happy I did NOT have time to go this year

I saw many people making stops on the road back to their homes that were not pleased in the least. I was quite suprised to see anyone stay at all. I would have left.
I have to say, I was not pleased to see the classless people that were throwing debris on the track. Of course you'll get those kind anywhere, I just hope they were not the nice folk from Indiana.

Too bad the whole thing played out this way.
Tony George and the Speedway were prepared to do whatever was necessary to make the race happen as mentined often by the Announcers.(not sure about your broadcast but we have Bob Varsha, David Hobbs, Steve Matchet, Peter Windsor, and Derek Daly)

The FIA I don't really blame either. Although like most of you I think they should take the Stuffy, Arrogant, Stick out of their Arses! Especially Mr. Eccelstone. A bit of fexibility would be a welcome addition to the sport.
But, to get back to my point. The need for rigid rules and inflexibilty is due to the microscopic probing ofthe rules done by all the teams. Any deviation in the rules as written would open a whole other can of worms. I actually feel, in this first instance in recent years, that they made the right call. Why should they bend the rules because Michelin messed up. The Michelins teams are the ones who are paying, unfortunately in this instance the fans did too.
However I feel they should look at this and learn from it so it doesn;t happen again. NASCAR does this weekly and the fans love th consideration they are given as well as the teams.

So to put it simply Michelin is to blame here- as well as the teams. Seems like a major lack of preperation on their part. The track wasn't ground yesterday and the bank has always been there. The real issue as to why the tires came apart was the added grip given by the grinding. The Indy cars and Nascar guys all had the problem figured out very quickly.
In my opinion as a Racer I would have, as a team, made sure that Michelin was well prepared for these new conditions. Obviously they were relying on the same old, same old and changed nothing.

The Indy track BTW, is one of the smoothest tracks out there. It was the recent re-asphalt job that casued the initial problem as it was NOT laid smoothly. Grinding removes the bumps and increases grip. If the grinding were too "rough" then the you would have seen tread flying apart in bits.
The Tire problem with the banked corner was due to the side wall seperating from the tread where they re "laminated" together. A failure due only to the Michelins inability to withstand the high side load on the left side tires.

Too bad this will probably have a very negative effect on F1in the US as it WAS gaining momuntum over here (mostly due I think to the Jeff Gordon/JPM car swap). It will never be popular with the Dyed in the Wool NASCAR fans as they are more in favor of a more physical race than F1 affords. Too musch arrogance and Elitism in F1 for the Down-Home Good 'Ol Boys here in the US.
This will not help in the least, A NASCAR event would never happen that way and like it or not F1 will always judged by NASCAR as NASCAR has always had the Fans firsta as well as Safety and Great competition.

The only good thing I can see from this is, I may now have a great opportunity for some cheap reserved seating
That is if the race still happens. Tony George will likely be VERY demanding for next if it happens.

[midzt]

http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.a...33204&PO=33204

Further devopements in the case.

If the FIA punish the Michelin teams it would mean that all the talk about making F1 safer would be a loada BS. I mean, they can't punish a team for not running their cars if they think that it is unsafe for their drivers and their competitors around them. Michelin gave clear intructions to the teams that their tyre wasn't safe.

The FIA are taking things too far, they have no common sense and Ferrari are continuing to kiss their booty.

[TomWilko]

Marshalls are not paid. They are racing enthusiasts who volunteer and risk life and limb for their love of the sport.

The blame firmly lies in the hands of Michelin.

Why should Bridgestone be penalised with a chicane, or allow Michelin to bring new tyres in from Spain which were suitable (due to the long right hand corner which puts a lot of load on the left tyres).

At the end of the day, the right decision was made by Michelin, they wouldn't accept responsibility for any incidents caused from tyre failure. The FIA made the right decision in keeping the race in the same format and configuration as on Friday.

The only possible answer was to cancel the race, and re-run it later in the calendar, in the interest of safety. If this is not possible, then the race should of gone ahead.

Here's an interesting point though.... If the Michelin cars didn't go out on the grid, the race would of had to of been cancelled. The start of a F1 GP has to have at least 20 (could be 18) cars on the grid to start the race. As all drivers started the race (the parade lap counts as one lap of the race), the race continued as normal.

Spot on Nick, and I havn't even talked to you about it to try and convince you of my opinion

Think of the tyre as any other product being built onto a car, if it goes wrong or is proved unstable it cannot race. Sauber, about 4 years ago withdrew their cars from the race weekend because they could not prove that the car was structually safe at high speed loads on a circuit (the exact year and circuit I cannot remember.) No-one was adjusting the rules for them and it cannot be expected that rules should be changed just because a manufacturer or team does not provide the right piece of equipment for the job. Michelin failed to provide a backup tyre, and it should have been on the FIA or teams shoulders to make sure one was developed.

The way the race ended was the only way it could have, changing the circuit would have caused unfair penalties on Ferrari, Jordan and Minardi; while asking teams to slow through the final turn would not only prove impractical but it would also be dangerous in the event of faster cars over-taking slower cars.

I am more eager to see the new series being started up because of this and will be following the next few days with interest as to what sort of penalties getting laid down.

...I really wish I had £10 on Monteiro to come top 3 though on Friday afternoon, would be sat here with a couple of thousand pounds now

[TiG]

Hey guys!

Bringing us up to date with US view

RocketManX, thanks for that insight it was great to hear what you thought of it all. I certainly appreciate it and sure others do too.

The only thing i disagree with is the herirachy of the sport.
Fans > FIA > Teams > Tyres

F1 would not happen without fans, doing something that will annoy/disappoint/frustrate/anger the fans is not acceptable imo.

Therefore anything and everything should be done to make the fans happy.

But FIA now see it like this with all Michelin Teams being charged with the following breaches.

The FIA informed each team individually that they had committed the following transgressions:

“Failed to ensure that you had a supply of suitable tyres for the race.

“Wrongfully refused to allow your cars to start the race.

“Wrongfully refused to allow your cars to race subject to a speed restriction at one corner, which was safe for such tyres as you had available.

“Combined with other teams to make a demonstration damaging to the image of Formula 1 by pulling into the pits immediately before the start of the race.

“That you failed to notify the stewards of your intention not to race.”

The seven teams must defend themselves against these charges at next week’s meeting.

At present, all of the FIA’s condemnation has been focused directly on the seven teams rather than Michelin itself.

I view these as laughable items.

We are talking lawsuits if they raced and tyres failed, Ralf Schumachers tyre failed on his first flying lap?, and most other teams had tyres close to the limit after 11 laps max.

If the michelin cars slowed in turn 13, and had a car doing 100mph more fly into the back of them?.

Its a completely untenable situation for all the michelin teams. Its clearly got to the point of no return in my opinion.

I'd guess the other manufactuers could make life very difficult for the FIA if they had the will over this.

Interesting politics to come i'm sure

TiG

[Stoo]

goodbye Formula1 tbh..

[jon bda]

Good article by James Allen...


http://www.itv-f1.com/Feature.aspx?T...en&PO_ID=33214















P.S. F1 sucks anyway, watch MotoGP instead.

[Rave]

Good article by James Allen...

You're surely joking? That's a contradiction in terms. For example:

If you’d had a dozen middle aged women in there, the problem would have been sorted in 20 minutes.

Total cock TBH.

[jon bda]

Come on then Rave, whats your official verdict?.

[Butuz]

I'll tell you what the root problem is. Formula one is not a sport any more, it is a business. It is not run for the fans, the fans are just considered customers. The fans are not at the top of the heirarchy, they are at the bottom. This structure can not succeed because sooner or later fans are going to realise that if they stop watching, Formula 1 will collapse.

The race was a discrace.

Butuz

[Rave]

Come on then Rave, whats your official verdict?.

It's:

F1 sucks anyway

[jon bda]

[dkmech]

So to put it simply Michelin is to blame here- as well as the teams. Seems like a major lack of preperation on their part. The track wasn't ground yesterday and the bank has always been there. The real issue as to why the tires came apart was the added grip given by the grinding. The Indy cars and Nascar guys all had the problem figured out very quickly.
In my opinion as a Racer I would have, as a team, made sure that Michelin was well prepared for these new conditions. Obviously they were relying on the same old, same old and changed nothing.

The Indy track BTW, is one of the smoothest tracks out there. It was the recent re-asphalt job that casued the initial problem as it was NOT laid smoothly. Grinding removes the bumps and increases grip. If the grinding were too "rough" then the you would have seen tread flying apart in bits.
The Tire problem with the banked corner was due to the side wall seperating from the tread where they re "laminated" together. A failure due only to the Michelins inability to withstand the high side load on the left side tires.

The reason the tyres failed wasn't because Michelin relied on "the same old". Last year the tyres were changed during the race. So it is obvious that there is no question that "same old" had anything to do with this. While the banking was always present new grooves mean that it can be taken at greater speed. This means higher loads on the tyre. I don't know how michelin can be expected to accurately predict what exactly these changes to the track would require from tyres. They can't test at indy. Bridgestone hoewever would have had quite an accurate picture through firestone. And I bet they didn't volunteer to share this info with Michelin.

Something I heard which I thought would have been fair was that Michelin teams volunteered not to score any points (with Bridgestone teams scoring points) if the chicane was installed. Maybe they haven't said this specifically to FIA, but I heard this mentioned a number of times. Seeing as 9 teams have agreed to racing with the chicane why not offer ferrari to share out the 18 points as they see fit between their drivers and not race if they think that racing with a chicane and a guaranteed 1st and 2nd places would be in any way unfair to them.

FIA made some valid points about cars not being set up for an extra breaking zone and the danger of any accidents arising from that or in some other way related to the chicane, but I am sure if they wanted to get things done they would've been able to set up a chicane which would keep things safe.

Unfortunately politics got in the way.

I just hope Kimi or Alonso will still show ferrari their rear ends in the championship despite the free points.

[jon bda]

And the FIA let Ferrari get away with dodgy tyre warmers...

[Stoo]

btw, the chicane = zero points for michelin teams was put on the table, but rejected by the FIA (Fecking Idiot Administration..), as apparently it have been unfair to compromise Ferrari, Jordan & Sauber's race strategies, despite the fact that Sauber didn't care either way as long as a full race took place.

At the end of the day Michelin made an honest mistake, one which bridgestone could easily have made had they not been fore-warned by firestone (and they were still keeping a very close eye on the tyres anyway), but the blame for the fiasco can only lay the the feet of the FIA and Ferrari. FIA because they rejected every possible solution given to them (other than the equally unsafe "just slow down on that corner" - resulting in a closing speed of ~100mph+ in a dangerous breaking zone), and Ferrari, because had they agreed to the chicane, the full race could have been run.

F1 has completely lost it's appeal now, and the stupidity of the last race has just sealed it's fate for me. I really hope the manufacturers do start their own series without the FIA & Ferrari in 2008, it certainly couldn't be any worse than the current shower.

[iranu]

Yep I see this debacle as the beginning of the end for F1 as it stands.

Can't wait to see Ferrari crush "Joe and Fred Bloggs Garage" F1 cars sponsored by "Kate's Bacon Butty Emporium" in 2008's F1 season while all the other teams go racing proper.

[DeludedGuy]

I still love F1, that fiasco just made it a little more exciting actually. Its all closer at the top now.