It reeks of bias? I wrote a whole book on how motorsport is compelling. I don’t think I mention Max or Lewis in it. So yes, Norris, Piastri, whoever, I don’t care.
Boring races aren’t a problem. It’s when the championship isn’t compelling is when you have a problem. The calendar absolutely needs to be balanced. People hate on Monaco but if I mention Max’s lap in 2023 or Senna in '88, everyone knows what you mean. So that’s means something.
right now because of Suzuka’s unique shape and size we have Max within a point of Norris in a slower car. This is what makes F1 interesting.
I have no objection to making the cars smaller I should add.
Total snooze fest. The modern no refuel, hybrid, Pirelli tire combination leads to fuel and tire management races all too often. When combined with wide heavy cars on tracks that have limited overtake options or are narrow, it makes for a nice snooze after lap 2.
Bring back fuel stops, reduce overall racing weight, narrower tires, narrower cars.
Max Verstappen is a beast. Unreal weekend in a car that is clearly not the fastes (at least based on the relative pace of 3 other drivers).
Norris again falls short on race craft and head games vs Max. That move out of the pits was never going to work and he should have known it.
Liam Lawson was a huge mistake in the RB. Tsunoda may be better…maybe…today didn’t look very promising for either driver.
Hadjar had a solid outing once he got the family jewels situated and comfy.
Out of all the rookies, Ollie Bearman in the HAAS continues to impress. Much like Max dragging the RB forward, he continues to drag the HAAS to higher finishes than it warrants.
The cars are rubbish but this mirrors the same issue as karting; they’re too big/heavy.
Sports that prioritise spectators always deteriorate. The competitors should always be prioritised. People will watch a compelling competition, even if “boring”. There are plenty of football (soccer) games with no action. People come back for more because the competition was real and the excitement is spontaneous.
F1’s problem, in my view, is that the drivers aren’t “racers”. Max, Lewis, Fernando clearly are, but most of the rest are, to borrow a theme from Terrence Dove’s recent substack article, “seat time” drivers. They’re also generally too young to be interesting.
McLaren is going to need to be sharper than that to beat Max and Red Bull. Even with a better car Max drove a perfect race and held them back. McLaren should’ve swapped cars with about 10 to go. To win the championship you need to be decisive and they weren’t. Oscar may have had a chance when his tires were good but running in Lando’s dirty air sort of eliminated his chance.
Lando needs to find another small level to take on Max. I don’t see the gritty and aggressive extra gear Max displayed in quali. He was wringing the neck of that car. Lando needs to be more adaptable and has to fight harder. If he doesn’t have the car advantage, he seems to get a bit complacent. Get the bit between your teeth boy.
Some of you are saying McLaren should have swapped cars, but why isn’t anyone saying that McLaren should have split their strategy?
What is the point of having two fast drivers at the front of the field if you aren’t going to leave one out to block Max and make him burn up his tires and lose time overtaking through dirty air? Suzuka would have been an ideal circuit to do this. We all saw how difficult it was to follow closely.
What’s the worst that could happen? Oscar’s tires fall off cause you left him out too long? So what??? He just goes back to where he was in 3rd. LeClerc wasn’t gonna beat him.
They didn’t put any real pressure on Max and just let him control the race from the front. Completely failed to make use of their greatest advantage (2 cars vs. 1). And why? Were they afraid of hurting Oscar’s fee fees by telling him to block for Lando?
Lando out qualified you by a smidge. Tough shit. Now get out there and hold Max up. If you don’t like it, beat your teammate in qualy next time and he’ll do the same for you.
Just cowardly strategy from McLaren today. I’m glad they lost. Sorry to be so emotional about this, but it was infuriating to watch as a fan and made the race way less interesting.
Yes and no. They come back because of some cultural meaning beyond the actual on-field action. Plenty of real competition in our sport of karting, but blimey, no one watches/cares for the most part.
I get this, but also Olivia hicks wrote a good piece on her substack suggesting the morphing of F1 towards boy band culture. Whether this change in demographics will have long term sticking power, who knows. But it is quite evident.
To me I am thinking more critical about how to offer a home elsewhere. How to relieve people of their emotional dependence on f1, and instead invest in my racing ha
No excuses needed IMO. I think HAM is doing fine so far. People’s expectations that he would compete for another championship were unrealistic IMO. He’s still very good, but past his prime.
I mean, the man is 40. This reminds me of when Tom Brady played at an MVP level at age 43 or 44 and then we all convinced ourselves that other QBs could do the same (Rodgers, Brees, etc.) and that this would become the new norm due to advances in medicine and sports medicine. It turned out that Brady was just a freak. Same with LeBron in the NBA.
I don’t think anyone has managed this in F1 in the last 20 years. 40 yo Schumi wasn’t a title contender, was he? Maybe I’m remembering this wrong. He did get pole in Monaco that one time. Alonso is probably the closest with his podiums that he got when Aston were more competitive.
Only reason you see all of this is that Hamilton is a brit and he drives for the prancing horses.
Everyone around the world is interested in, and has high expectations for, the red cars. The most devout fan base in motorsport!
Then you have the insanely biased British media all over everything George Russel or Lewis Hamilton related. Since much of F1 media is dominated by brits you get the same insane focus within F1 coverage as well.
None of that takes away from Lewis being a great all time driver, but it certainly makes me want to cheer for almost anyone else.
British media covers F1 the way American media covers politics, but I can’t bring myself to hate Lewis for that. Throughout his career, he’s often been the target of the British media, rather than its darling. I can imagine that it must be frustrating if you’re dutch or a Max superfan to read the bias against Max. Some of the stuff that Sky commentators say on broadcast about Max is absolutely punchable.
I was speaking with a coworker today and he asked if I watched F1. We spoke about different types of motorsports, and I explained that after 10 years of watching karting, most motorsports bore me.
I sent him the KC highlights from the X30 final from Texas last week and he was blown away when he watched it. He was shocked by the close driving and passing. He said it was like Daytona with left and right turns.
Karting is overrated in every way possible… 99,99% of people (Motorsport fans included) doesn’t even know how brutal a professional kart is to drive, they think is a “toy”. Let alone how exciting a race can be
When looking at it with a critical lens the racing isn’t exciting to the point of being long term compelling because not much is at stake. Close racing can be found anywhere on any given weekend, it isn’t a selling point. I notice this trend of people saying exciting a kart race is or some MX5 nonsense, and a week letter I’d bet a significant sum of money they can’t remember the name of the drivers they watched.
Karting has flirted with attracting a wider audience through points of history (superkarts, the early days with street events, and the Eurosport days), but modern karting, on short circuits, doesn’t really cut it. Drivers come and go, everything stays the same. What’s there that is truly compelling? it’s great to race karts, but not much to digest from a spectator perspective. Kart Chaser does a great job with SKUSA, I have to say what they are doing is excellent and aided by long-term competitors, but outside of that bubble?
KZ at the highest levels could have something about it, but the drivers aren’t really doing much to compel people to watch, and neither are the teams. KR did the aero stuff which was good and created a higher level of interest, for a brief moment, but beyond that the FIA pretty much have burst any bubble that one might have to invest in covering it properly. I can’t tell you how the FIA’s treatment of karting makes me want to invest almost zero coverage for it. it’s a waste of time.
Physicality doesn’t really mean much either because almost no one can understand it. People understand danger, but physicality I think really isn’t the selling point people think it is. it can add tot he spice if drivers getting tired makes a difference, but it rarely does nowadays. Supercross is harder than anything else, but I don’t really think that matters.
It unfortunately comes with how widespread karting has become. Most people when you ask them what a kart is will think of the low powered rental karts in indoor tracks. With how popular F1 has become lately it is a golden chance to promote karting more as a form of actual motorsport rather than just entertainment, but it doesn’t seem like anyone is interested in doing that.
I say the opposite. No one watches junior sport. Who here watches under-14 football? F1 has cemented the idea karting is a kids sport. It has part led to an enormous adult exodus in the UK. The F1ificaiton of karting has been devastating in the idea of trying to sell karting as a standalone sport.
