Lewis, Christian & the top 4 F1 drivers.
#21

moroni Wrote:simply not enough teams on the grid.

Nope, 10 teams in the modern era is as small as the grid has ever been, and it’s not great. TBH for a few years (after the Hamilton / Vettel / Kubica crop) there’s actually been a real dearth in quality young drivers coming through, so the lack of seats wasn’t really an issue for the sport. Now though? Off of the top of my head I can list in the junior Formula at least 5 potential WDCs all with Lewis / Vettel / Max like records... and luckily for Brits 3 of them are British. Throw in Wehrlein, Giovinazzi and even Kvyat (he was seriously rapid in junior Formula) and you could potentially have 10 drivers knocking on the F1 door soon who deserve a drive. There is some dead wood in F1 at the moment, but not much. Think Grosjean, Ericsson, Magnussen and potentially Stroll could be considered dead wood. Possibly the two Toro Rosso drivers too, but after knocking him, Gasly quietly impressed me. Kimi and Alonso might be nearing retirement, but is anyone else? Hamilton and Vettel each have 5 more years in them easy, Hülkenberg might find himself pressured too, given he’s now north of 30.

Antilochos Wrote:I think there are enough teams, but other interests prevent teams from getting the best drivers. Interests like a need of funds, dependency towards sponsers, etc. But then again, that is how the world works and we are not willing to pay thousands of [fill in the currency of choice] for tickets, pay per view, etc.

There is in no way enough teams in the sport. Period. It is historically low in the modern era. We used to have grids of up to 30 cars. Not saying that’s desirable, as the tracks got congested, BUT, a grid of 24 or 26 cars is. The “there’s not enough money” argument doesn’t quite hold either. F1 commercially generates more income than at any other time. That income is just distributed badly. I accept teams have found it harder to get sponsors / higher sponsorship fees since tobacco advertising was banned, but, the money is there. Plus for the big manufacturers it remains great (invaluable according to Renault and ?Mercedes) PR. Porsche could do it, as could Toyota. No problem. But they’d need an initial helping hand / incentive to do so.
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#22

(16-12-2017, 08:02 AM)Jody Barton Wrote:  
moroni Wrote:simply not enough teams on the grid.

Nope, 10 teams in the modern era is as small as the grid has ever been, and it’s not great. TBH for a few years (after the Hamilton / Vettel / Kubica crop) there’s actually been a real dearth in quality young drivers coming through, so the lack of seats wasn’t really an issue for the sport. Now though? Off of the top of my head I can list in the junior Formula at least 5 potential WDCs all with Lewis / Vettel / Max like records... and luckily for Brits 3 of them are British. Throw in Wehrlein, Giovinazzi and even Kvyat (he was seriously rapid in junior Formula) and you could potentially have 10 drivers knocking on the F1 door soon who deserve a drive. There is some dead wood in F1 at the moment, but not much. Think Grosjean, Ericsson, Magnussen and potentially Stroll could be considered dead wood. Possibly the two Toro Rosso drivers too, but after knocking him, Gasly quietly impressed me. Kimi and Alonso might be nearing retirement, but is anyone else? Hamilton and Vettel each have 5 more years in them easy, Hülkenberg might find himself pressured too, given he’s now north of 30.

Antilochos Wrote:I think there are enough teams, but other interests prevent teams from getting the best drivers. Interests like a need of funds, dependency towards sponsers, etc. But then again, that is how the world works and we are not willing to pay thousands of [fill in the currency of choice] for tickets, pay per view, etc.

There is in no way enough teams in the sport. Period. It is historically low in the modern era. We used to have grids of up to 30 cars. Not saying that’s desirable, as the tracks got congested, BUT, a grid of 24 or 26 cars is. The “there’s not enough money” argument doesn’t quite hold either. F1 commercially generates more income than at any other time. That income is just distributed badly. I accept teams have found it harder to get sponsors / higher sponsorship fees since tobacco advertising was banned, but, the money is there. Plus for the big manufacturers it remains great (invaluable according to Renault and ?Mercedes) PR. Porsche could do it, as could Toyota. No problem. But they’d need an initial helping hand / incentive to do so.
Jody, I don't mind more teams, but are also fine with the amount we have (don't care much for what it used to be; everything changes).
Agree that the income is distributed badly in F1, but still there just seems to be not enough money. Again, I care less if the income today is ultimate high. It is all about the income and cost ratio. The costs are at a ultimate high also and the ratio between the two is gone (forget about index, inflation and all that!). It is just so expensive now to be a F1 team, let alone a team that can fight for the title.
My point is: make it easier for teams to step in and you get more teams on the grid as a result. The extra bonus you get, is that it probably will be more compatative between teams and teams have more reason to choose the better driver in stead of the driver with most funds.
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#23

Antilochos... I refute the costs being at an ‘all time’ high. RBR, STR McLaren and Williams all publish their financial results... Mercedes do, but don’t separate out there various sporting endeavours, ditto Renault, and actually the peak of spend was between 2005 to 2009. Since then costs have actually come down... but so too has income. The switch from regs between 2016 to 2017 will have seen a bump no doubt, but to hit McLaren / Ferrari / Red Bull levels from 2005 to 2009 would need a spending increase of 35% or thereabouts to happen. Costs have been coming down.

So I don’t know whether making it easier / cheaper is the real issue here. Or whether it’s poor distribution of money, and some teams no longer being able to raise sponsorship money. However, F1 as it currently stands isn’t healthy, and something needs to change, engine costs are tumbling, and if Horner is to be believed next year they’ll spend less on engine supplies than than did during the V8 era, so that’s not the issue either. In fact the biggest ticket items seem to be transportation costs and the hospitality homes the teams need.
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#24

Jody, not sure if published results are that reliable (looking at companies and institutes that I know - like the one I work for- , they are not, focus is on shareholders...).

Enfin. I was not talking about cost of car, but total costs of team. Like you already mention in last post, the costs of transportation and hospitality. But I was thinking about the whole aspect of costs. Just look how much people are working for the big teams compared to the small teams. A lot of those people are working in expensive countries (looking at cost of labour) and receive good salaries I'm sure. Then you get the taxes, security, laws that force companies to take extra measueres (safety regulations, way of financial registration etc).

It is just a big step if you want to get into F1 nowadays (at least I think...).
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#25

Antilochos I was talking about overall costs coming down, the headline figure has come down drastically. Inside that hospitality has gone up, but other costs have plummeted. The issue is revenue has dropped significantly for all teams from 2009 onwards. The sport just isn’t attracting the big ticket sponsors.
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#26

(16-12-2017, 05:45 PM)Jody Barton Wrote:   The sport just isn’t attracting the big ticket sponsors.

To be fair if my company was in the position to sponsor within sport would I go down the route of f1? The answer could only be NO, Viewers are less and less each year, a sport which rarely makes the news and if it does is for all the wrong reasons....in fact sponsorship wise the only positive (uk) is Lewis Hamilton

"You live more for 5 minutes going fast on a bike than other people do in all of their life"....Marco Simoncelli
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#27

(16-12-2017, 05:56 PM)forzaferrari Wrote:  To be fair if my company was in the position to sponsor within sport would I go down the route of f1? The answer could only be NO, Viewers are less and less each year, a sport which rarely makes the news and if it does is for all the wrong reasons....in fact sponsorship wise the only positive (uk) is Lewis Hamilton

But on the plus side it really is a word wide sport with great exposure. Viewing figures may have dropped recently(ish), but it is nothing that can't be fixed by bringing back free to air TV coverage. I pay my Sky sub because I want the UHD feed and want to watch every race. If C4 had every race I'd have a serious rethink. Sky's coverage should be a lot better than it is, I consider it poor myself. BBC did a better job back in the day.
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#28

(16-12-2017, 06:23 PM)morini Wrote:  Sky's coverage should be a lot better than it is, I consider it poor myself. BBC did a better job back in the day.

BBC / ITV / C4 all did a better coverage in my opinion, I really can't understand why Sky with a dedicated channel can't do better, but maybe I'm just a little biased against Sky, I think ITV had adverts during the race if I remember right, which was very poor form, quite liked Jim Rosenthal though, so maybe a lot is down to presenters

Also I think this is the main goal of Liberty Media in the end, I think Chase Carey has stated he wants every race to be like a Superbowl event in every country they go to and wants the race to be the culmination of a week long festival type atmosphere at each venue - this sort of approach along with whatever streaming service I heard them mention if they get that sorted should bring the big sponsors back in

"I Say, I say . . . . The satisfaction you have in a few minutes when you become champion. It's enough to live forever 
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#29

(16-12-2017, 06:23 PM)morini Wrote:  But on the plus side it really is a word wide sport with great exposure. Viewing figures may have dropped recently(ish), but it is nothing that can't be fixed by bringing back free to air TV coverage. I pay my Sky sub because I want the UHD feed and want to watch every race. If C4 had every race I'd have a serious rethink. Sky's coverage should be a lot better than it is, I consider it poor myself. BBC did a better job back in the day.

I am not knocking Sky as I think they they do a good job but like my school report many moons ago... "could do better" Wink I just hope LM can make the Spectacle and racing so much better, there is so much scope to make F1 great again

"You live more for 5 minutes going fast on a bike than other people do in all of their life"....Marco Simoncelli
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#30

I think LM we’re saying taking into consideration illegal streaming sites the sport is probably watched by more people now. The issue is that when it went to fee pay services around the world viewing figure plummeted. The organisers may have got more money, TV companies may have made more money, but the teams got screwed. The advertising real estate was worth less on their cars and they only got a piffling boost in TV income.
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