Michael K brings up a great point, first of all: Implementing modern F1 requirements would essentially destroy the ‘Ring as we know it today. By the time they were finished, 90% of the reason for this exercise would have been eliminated.

Ignoring the track changes, the facility requirements for F1 are truly staggering. A huge array of buildings, apartments, meeting areas, and other structures are required for each team. The broadcast support infrastructure, and accommodations for press and F1 officials all contribute many tens of millions of dollars to the cost of a facility. Granted some of these may exist at the current F1 course, but given F1′s uncompromising expectations, I question whether they’d find that acceptable.

Then there are the track changes itself, which would cost many, many tens of millions. 13 miles through challenging terrain, the now-mandatory high-grip asphalt runoffs, barriers, access improvements, the grandstand requirements… it simply isn’t realistic.

Finally, though, we get to the biggest nail in the coffin: TV. Television does not like long road races. All of the major sanctioning bodies are pushing for shorter tracks. 2.5 to 3 miles is considered optimal. If you watched Spa on Speed last week, you heard the announcers griping a bit about how the cars got spread out on a track that was only about 4 miles long. Imagine 20 cars floating around by themselves on a 13 mile track.

That’s the primary difference between racing today and racing in the 70s. In the 70s it was for the fans who went to races. Today it’s for the fans who record the race on their Tivo then watch it a few hours later when it’s convenient, never getting anywhere near the track itself.

As for there being hundreds of millions involved with F1, the fact is that those dollars are committed. There are hundreds of tracks that could be upgraded for a lot less money, all run by track owners that would dearly love to run even a single F1 race if F1 teams were footing the bill. It doesn’t work that way.

I love to dream about it just as much as anybody here, but it won’t happen.

but your all forgetting one thing, money!, how much does the Nordschleife make in a formula one weekend?

before you say sponsors! what is the cost of bringing the paddock to F1 standards?

sorry to sound pessimistic (realistic) but i’d love F1 at the real Nurburgring. with the south too, not just the north circuit.

I would recommend the driving of the Nordschleife is something else.

Bring it back, PLEASE

Changing the track itself (track surface, run-off zones) would be next-to impossible in my opinion. First, it wouldn’t be FIA paying for those modifications, but they’d rather leave it to the track owners; who in turn would have to try and get government subsidies. A couple of years ago, when both Nurburgring and Hockenheim had to be modified, it was already hard to convince the government to shell out the kind of money needed.

Now, with Schumacher gone, no other German pilot even close to a chance of getting driver’s champion, and GPs held in Germany down to just one… let’s just say chances are slim to get the necessary funding.

And then there’s the track itself. Nordschleife is being called “Green Hell” for a reason… have a look at the live streams from the 24h race, the hundreds of youtube clips, or try to do a lap in GT4 or any other game that has it. Could you imagine all this being replaced by wide runoff zones and a clean, F1-proof track surface? It would take away most of what the ‘Ring stands for, and at least I wouldn’t want to see that kind of sacrifice for a racing series which over the recent years has turned more into some kind of political drama than actual motor sport.

Besides security issues, it would also be hard to “sell” a feature race on the ‘Ring… the only grandstands are near the GP circuit, so you’d have to cover the rest of the track with helicopters and stationary TV cameras… it’s not impossible, but I wonder if it’d be worth the effort for just a 2 hours race. As for spectators, I believe that there’s somewhere around 200,000 there for the 24 hours race… at a ticket pricing of about 30-40 Euros.

So… as I’m ranting on for far too long here, maybe taking a different approach would work. Somebody already mentioned time trials, and BMW showed (was it in ’06 or ’07?) that they COULD modify their cars to tackle most of the circuit at somewhat reduced speed. So… how about something like the “Race of Champions”? Let’s maybe also get in some former F1 pilots or drivers from other series as well, and then have them compete for best times in different cars (including modified F1 cars)…

Oh… and before I forget about it. Keith, I fully agree to your last paragraph: More Nordschleife couldn’t hurt any modern track, I guess.

1. You could never pay for changing the track to confirm with the F1 regulations, and I for one would never want that to happen as it is too much fun right now.

2. So F1 would have to change their regulations, well, that’ll never happen as they are there for a reason and if you would race on the Nordschleife as it is, even with some safety changes, means there is a high likelyhood of seeing dead drivers again. Nothing is worth that cost.

3. With regards to drivers not having the cojones, at least Kimi is one of the current drivers who has said he’d be up for racing there.

4. With regards to suspension travel, Heidfeld’s lap etc..
I don’t think an F1 car would smash to pieces at Flugplatz as it probably won’t even take off. In any case, it shouldn’t so that is a place where the drivers would really have to watch how fast they are going, as death would be waiting for them if they were going too fast. That would arguably be a step back to the good old days when it comes to driver motivation. As would be many other corners for that matter as an F1 car would go round there so much faster that you wouldn’t see that many 3rd gear corners as you see with normal racing cars now. If Heidfeld would have driven one lap without slowing down for pics etc. at the safe speed that he was travelling at, it would have been a new lap record. BMW intentionally didn’t let that happen.

So yes, today’s F1 cars are able to race on the Nordschleife today, with changes to the setup, and no, they won’t break. But considering the speed they would be racing at, it’s unbelievably dangerous. Now there will be some “experts” saying that it’s up to the drivers to decide what’s safe and what’s not, well, what do think happens if you put a bunch of egomaniacs in F1 cars on the track? Yes, they will racing to the limit, and there will be deaths over the course of a few years, so it’ll sadly never happen…

When Heidfeld did his demo he couldn’t get anywhere near the line at the Karussel because BMW were worried it would literally shake their car to bits and that is only one corner.

Since 1976 we have lost suspension travel and gained massive aerodynamically. If a modern car was to take Flugplatz flat out it would smash into piece on landing.

It really shows the mess F1 is in that the ultimate racing cars are utterly incapable of running on the ultimate racing track.

It goes to show what I have been saying for years. The technical regulations need a massive overhaul.