VW Enters.................

[Manoah2u]

VW as a group will have noticed what Red bull had to say about Renault.

Not just what they said, but how they said it. Public denigration of this sort does not only burn built bridges, but spreads to future ones too.

That though, is the full truth and nothing but the truth. completely agree here and failed to think about his important detail.
Nevertheless they could 'simply' take-over RedBull team completely.

RedBull has been mentioning thinking about stepping out of F1 as a constructor or team sponsor alltogether, and instead become the sport's sponsor [alike Johnnie Walker is now], or to 'buy' it from CVC and become the 'rights holder' if i read that correctly [ Read: Formula 1, sponsored by Red Bull. ].

They could still be a 'minor' sponsor of a F1 team though.

[Manoah2u]

If your target audience aren't watching then it doesn't matter how road relevant it is.

That is absolutely not true. Think about all the promotional material they use from participating - print ads, TV ads, merch/gear, VIDEO GAMES - I'm willing to bet more people drive WEC/WRC cars in video games than there are people who watch the races on TV. It's an overall branding strategy WAY more complicated than direct viewing.

Agreed. Let's face it, just pop up Gran Turismo or something like that.
Gamers would prefer to drive super sportcars, rallye cars or fantasy cars compared to F1 cars.

F1 is very complicated as a sport. Too complicated, to be honest. It's hard to understand the sport anymore.
Despite that, it's still the most Prestigeous motorsport division, with only 24h Le Mans being up there.

Therefore, success in F1 will guarantee sales and benefit/revenue.

Just think on the exposure RedBull had the past years. Now Mercedes has this benefit. Perhaps soon Ferrari will, again.
If Samsung somehow was a 'F1 constructor' [not just a sponsor], and they would have success, they'd sell crazy more.

It's about exposure though, and that's where the biggest issue lies with F1 at this moment. BUT, the sport 's about to change more so let's see where this will go.

[Jolle]

Now Piech is out of the way: Audi/VW can buy RedBull, Renault ToroRosso so in one or two years we have:
as works teams:
AMG Mercedes
Ferrari
McLaren Honda
Renault
Audi/VW

and some "privateers", and we're back like in time of BMW, Toyota and Honda. And if this will be the new playground again for the big automotive brands, Toyota and BMW can't stay behind for too long. How one person can change the sport so much... as it comes trough...

[wesley123]

So in how many countries are Diesels popular? The car costs more, the fuel costs more and the difference in mileage does not justify the additional costs in its lifetime.

What does Quattro do for you on a city roads and freeways?

So when are city folks driving their polo joining the WRC?

Very little, but customers don't need to know that!

[Cold Fussion]

Well, they can race an actual car they sell to the people in WRC.

I think even joe blogs realises you cannot buy a 300 hp AWD Polo, Fiesta, C3 or i20, so it isn't much different to F1 or WEC in that respect. Not since Subaru and Mitsubishi dropped out could you realistically believe that the road car is related to the race car.

[kudryavchik]

Guys, you are such a dreamers)))

VW, Toyota, BMW all in F1 tomorrow)))

Nobody will enter F1 now. F1 needs new rules and signs of bright future.

[toraabe]

Ok let's do it this way. If VW is entering F1, let's do it with a diesel.. Why not...
2,5 - 3.0 l v6 turbo and the same hybrid as the petrol engines.,...
With 1000 NM ++ you really need wide tyres to cope with that

[ScottB]

If your target audience aren't watching then it doesn't matter how road relevant it is.

That is absolutely not true. Think about all the promotional material they use from participating - print ads, TV ads, merch/gear, VIDEO GAMES - I'm willing to bet more people drive WEC/WRC cars in video games than there are people who watch the races on TV. It's an overall branding strategy WAY more complicated than direct viewing.

Agreed. Let's face it, just pop up Gran Turismo or something like that.
Gamers would prefer to drive super sportcars, rallye cars or fantasy cars compared to F1 cars.

F1 is very complicated as a sport. Too complicated, to be honest. It's hard to understand the sport anymore.
Despite that, it's still the most Prestigeous motorsport division, with only 24h Le Mans being up there.

Therefore, success in F1 will guarantee sales and benefit/revenue.

Just think on the exposure RedBull had the past years. Now Mercedes has this benefit. Perhaps soon Ferrari will, again.
If Samsung somehow was a 'F1 constructor' [not just a sponsor], and they would have success, they'd sell crazy more.

It's about exposure though, and that's where the biggest issue lies with F1 at this moment. BUT, the sport 's about to change more so let's see where this will go.

It's all about marketing though, and selling a message. F1 is utterly useless at that.

You bring up Gran Turismo, look at the excitement and the exposure manufacturers generate from creating 'Vision GT' concepts for the game. Red Bull kicked that off in part, but ideally it would have been a concept F1 car, get the other teams involved, get the drivers licensed into the game. This would be much more valuable and a larger audience than the straight F1 game that's trotted out every year. Having Merc / Mclaren / Ferrari 'ultimate' F1 concepts in the game would be a great approach, and real world mock ups would be more usable for gauging reaction to future reg directions than those 2 renderings Ferrari trotted out awhile back...

Marketing is a factor too; DRS, ERS and KERS mean nothing to the uninformed, but Hybrid Boost, or E-Boost or something like that might have better penetration in the wider market. Shout from the rooftops about how the cars use less fuel now, about how this tech is filtering into road cars and so on, instead we've had a couple years of Bernie and others bleating about noise and wanting V8s back, not so much shooting yourself in the foot as standing on a land mine on purpose!

[kudryavchik]

Audi will not come. Officially.

[wesley123]

Well, they can race an actual car they sell to the people in WRC.

I think even joe blogs realises you cannot buy a 300 hp AWD Polo, Fiesta, C3 or i20, so it isn't much different to F1 or WEC in that respect. Not since Subaru and Mitsubishi dropped out could you realistically believe that the road car is related to the race car.

It's a Polo either way. Of course it's not the same thing, however, they both are VW Polo's, and that is a car that has proven itself across the whole world in rallies. The body shell looks alike and that is enough the make it relatable. If they can make a performance car that won rallies all around the world then why wouldn't the Polo I buy in the showroom be able to be equally reliable?

The thing that WRC and WEC offers is some a form of relation to what you can buy in the showrooms.

[Cold Fussion]

I don't see how LMP1 relates anymore to real cars than F1. Neither of them look like road cars and the hybrid technology isn't at common in road cars. The only power train configuration we'll likely ever see in a road car is that of 919 or a 4 cy kinder version of a F1 type PU, I doubt we'll be seeing super capacitor of flywheel storage in a road car, even exhaust harvesting is debatable.

[FW17]

Somehow WEC LMP1 seems a lot more unsafe in comparison to F1, maybe a combination of poor driver talent and heavy cars makes them difficult to stay on track.

2 crashes at Spa
1 crash at Interlagos

in the space of 3 races

[Sombrero]

In theory only : think about Mario De Vilotta or Jules Bianchi : unfortunately these two crashes had both worse consequences than Davidson or Nakajima WEC crashes. We really can't say that WEC is actually more dangerous than F-1.

[FW17]

This is what we are used to seeing in WEC

[acosmichippo]

Somehow WEC LMP1 seems a lot more unsafe in comparison to F1, maybe a combination of poor driver talent and heavy cars makes them difficult to stay on track.

2 crashes at Spa
1 crash at Interlagos

in the space of 3 races

hardly an apples-apples comparison. The WEC winner at Spa 2014 did 171 laps, vs the F1 GP's 44 laps. That's almost 4 times the distance.

This is what we are used to seeing in WEC

http://cfile25.uf.tistory.com/image/157 ... 33A00A49E4

And yet he walked away from that crash. You could easily cherry pick an equally severe-looking F1 crash.

Another factor to consider is F1 does standing starts, whereas WEC does rolling starts.