Thread: 2 Kinds of Formula One

I posted a prose-poem at this site a while back and it was about Jack Brabham. FIA Formula One World Championship is the highest class of auto racing. Let me say a few things about Formula One just to get the facts right and in perspective. The formula in the name refers to a set of rules to which all participants and cars must comply. The F1 season consists of a series of races known as Grand Prix held on purpose-built circuits and to a lesser extent former public roads and closed city streets. The results of each race are combined to determine two annual World Championships one of which is for the drivers. Formula One has become a massive television event with a global audience of 600 million people per season and financial stakes of immense proportions.


The Formula One series has its roots in the European Grand Prix Motor Racing of the 1920s and 1930s. I have taken an interest in the sport due to my interest in and membership of the Bahai Faith which also has its organizational roots in those same 1920s and 1930s. In fact the history of the two, one a sport and the other an organization with a significant future to play in the unity of humankind, havesimilar time frames.



Formula One itself was/had a new formula agreed on after WW2 in 1946, with the first non-championship races being held that year. The Baha'i Faith began its second international Seven year Plan that same year. The sport's title, Formula One, indicates that it is intended to be the most advanced and most competitive of the FIA's racing formulae. The Baha'i Faith, on the other hand, is not highly competitive but it has provided for me an excitement which is the equivalent in my personal world of Forumula One for millions of others. In some ways the Baha'i Faith is my personal Formula One. We all get turned on by different things, eh?-Ron Price, Australia

I have to disagree in some respects. What overshadows and dims F1 is the lack of real racing. Now they are making a real effort to change that, something the teams aren't very thrilled about. I give them credit for that. However, until these teams get rid of all the massive cheating that goes on, not until they forget about team orders and just let these guys race, will it ever really be racing. NASCAR is racing. F1 is riding around a track. It's all about who gets on the poll. They only have 13 slots and if you're 13th, it's like 1 in a 1000000 that you'll win. That's not the case in NASCAR when being in the back is a disadvantage but doesn't preclude you from winning.

Massive cheating?

The only team that has been publically outed is Renault. We have to remember here there is fine balance between giving the fans what they want and the cost implications, if a team didn't have some sort of team orders, there would be a massive risk of the drivers taking each other out. These cars aren't cheap to replace.

It's funny how perspectives differ.

I see F1 as a complex interplay of variables. Fuel load in Q3 vs pit strategy vs tire strategy, driver performance, chassis/engine performance from track to track. Yes, there are periods in the race where I am basically waiting for the next variable to come into play (pit widow opens, weather changes, etc) but in all, a very engaging motorsport.

I pause on NASCAR sometimes while channel scanning. To me, NASCAR looks like a caricature of the morning commute on the interstate. Droning around, bumper-to-bumper, 3 wide... whatever. I see it as the 'pro wrestling' of motorsports. I don't watch pro wrestling, either. I imagine my views are as alien to NASCAR fans as theirs are to me....

I agree F1 suffers from the cheating/controversy (yes, Renault, but also Steffi-gate, Max Mosley's little video, etc). I don't see "team rules" as that big of a problem. It's always been there.

And, of course NASCAR has its share of cheating as well. I know they have tightened up a lot in the last few years.

I guess it's a typical case of "different strokes for different folks..."

Definitely, I agree, that different people like different things. For me, there is nothing more boring than watching 13 cars race in a line. Now I think my point is valid because F1 is working hard to change that and make it more competitive. I applaud them for that and I sneer at the teams that argue and threaten to withdraw because the rules are changing. NASCAR has changed a ton. Man up and deal with the changes, F1 teams; that's what I say.

I used to love stock car racing. Sure it had personaities but it was a bunch of guys trying outdo each other to the finish line using every resource they could imagine. It was man and machine against the world. NASCAR has worked so hard to minimize the effect of the machine in the equation that it has become man against the world. A racecar has just become an instrument.