Liberty Media: Leveling the Playing Field?

[ChrisDanger]

Brawn is suggesting "open inspection" in an attempt to bring parity to the teams.

To paraphrase the article linked below, this could come from simply a new mindset: that of the F1 field being forced to end its climate of secrecy and to reveal more of its secrets to the competition.

Brawn told Motorsport.com “in NASCAR, at a certain stage of the season you can go and look at someone else’s car and strip it apart and see what’s in it. And that’s their way of keeping everyone loosely competitive. No one objects, no one has a problem. And it’s a philosophy that should be thought about.”

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/anal ... -f1-903516

Seems like an interesting idea. Although I imagine there's generally much less innovation in NASCAR?

[ian_s]

That's fine in stock car racing, but F1 isn't stock car. in NASCAR, the cars are supposed to be pretty much the same, so openness is good. F1 needs innovation, and this would hinder that. F1 teams would save their updates until after the open session.

[zac510]

There are a lot of clues to Brawn's thinking in the book that was co-written by Adam Parr. For example, in the book he said that so much money is spent by each team taking covert photographs of diffusers and so forth throughout the weekend that just putting the cars on show at some point (say in the pitlane after scrutineering) would save many monies and a lot of effort. It's not a stretch to say that this would help break down some of the secrecy barrier too.

[Just_a_fan]

You could, if you wished to go down this route, have FIA photos taken at scrutineering. The photos would all be taken from the same position, e.g. dead astern of the diffuser, to ensure that no one is disadvantaged. One could argue that teams would place stuff so that it wasn't visible in the official photos but choose the correct camera positions and that becomes all bar impossible.

At least that way all of the external aero is publicly visible. I doubt the teams would object to that. They would, I'm sure. object to free access under the bodywork.

[JonoNic]

In the space of a few months, Liberty Media has shoved a little old man out of the decision making in F1. Soon they will do the same to the teams. This might not be a bad thing...

Sent from my SM-A700F using Tapatalk

[ChrisDanger]

At least that way all of the external aero is publicly visible. I doubt the teams would object to that. They would, I'm sure. object to free access under the bodywork.

Well, in that article I linked Brawn was quoted as suggesting that free access should be considered.

“You know, in NASCAR, as someone told me the other day, at a certain stage of the season you can go and look at someone else’s car and strip it apart and see what’s in it. And that’s their way of keeping everyone loosely competitive. And no one objects, no one has a problem. And it’s a philosophy that should be thought about.”

[Just_a_fan]

The philosophy, yes. The exact same "strip anything apart that you like"? I can't see the teams going with it. Ultimately the teams have the final say - no teams, no race series, no money for Liberty.

[zac510]

Stripping the car down is probably going a bit far.
They could look to release more information that's interesting for fans but not necessarily revealing for the teams. For example the vehicle weight, either post-qualifying or from scrutineering. It doesn't say give away the team's advantage because we don't know how much fuel they will put in, but it gives us fans some more clues to play with!

[Big Mangalhit]

Stripping the car down is probably going a bit far.
They could look to release more information that's interesting for fans but not necessarily revealing for the teams. For example the vehicle weight, either post-qualifying or from scrutineering. It doesn't say give away the team's advantage because we don't know how much fuel they will put in, but it gives us fans some more clues to play with!

Yes this could done so easily. Just share to the open public all the informations that are already accessed by the other teams. Like radio talks, weight and technical measurements and probably more useful the GPS and telemetry data. I think the GPS is already shared with all the teams and could be very cool to do some rendering simulations like qualifying laps overlapped or crash analysis.

[adrianjordan]

I don't see how any of that would level the playing field, or make the sport any more interesting to the average fan... Not everyone is as geeky as us!!

[Ennis]

I don't see how any of that would level the playing field, or make the sport any more interesting to the average fan... Not everyone is as geeky as us!!

I know I'm one person, and one datapoint does not equal a trend, but -

Sometimes this is what drags a casual fan to being a hardcore fan. I was always a casual F1 viewer, then Sky Sports F1 was created and I started absorbing every piece of information I could which played in to my analytical brain. I know for most here it'll be like F1 for Dummies, but for me their technical analysis, deepdiving in to technical regulations and all that other jazz is what got me hooked. Now I'm signed up to an F1 Technical Forum which I visit daily despite not understanding 90% of what I read... but I try.