New drivers can demonstrate their potential in GP2, but Duncan Stephen wants to know where the next generation of F1 teams is going to come from.

In the coming weeks the FIA is expected to announce the identity of Formula 1′s 13th team for 2011 – if indeed there is going to be one.

This outfit should join the three new teams that joined the grid this year. But the drive to bring new teams into Formula 1 for the first time since Toyota’s entry in 2002 has revealed a problem with the motor sport hierarchy – there is no way for potential constructors to prove that they belong in F1.

There is a well-established ladder that allows drivers to showcase their talents before reaching F1. You might even say the ladder is too congested, with series such as GP2, GP3, Formula Two, World Series by Renault and multiple Formula 3 series among others. They provide a proving ground for those looking to step up to F1.

The major problem is that almost all of these are single-spec series (the exception being Formula 3, which is dominated by Dallara and a handful of other suppliers). This is a relatively cost-effective way of going racing.

It works well for drivers as reduced costs means that these series are not just open to the cash-heavy but talent-light Sakon Yamamotos of tomorrow.

But there is no real way for potential F1 constructors to demonstrate that they have what it takes to step up to F1. While the the likes of Nico Rosberg, Lewis Hamilton and Nico Hülkenberg wowed the crowds and the F1 bosses when they raced in GP2, the evidence backing potential new constructors is a great deal more opaque.

Many were left scratching their heads last year when established operations like Lola and Prodrive were rebuffed by the FIA during the selection process for this season’s new teams. Meanwhile, USF1 were granted an entry – apparently on the basis of an impressive presentation but not a lot else.

The trouble with the new teams

It’s been painful watching the new teams make their faltering first steps into F1. No new team has tried to enter F1 since Toyota eight years ago. Lotus (in their new incarnation), Virgin and Hispania have all taken on a challenge that few have even attempted.

In this context, the new teams have done a fairly impressive job. While we have become accustomed to watching increasingly professional teams and tighter grids, in the context of the bigger pictures the new teams are actually doing well.

This has not stopped the jibes from some who suggest that they do not belong in F1. We have heard David Coulthard talking about “A class” and “B class” teams. Bernie Ecclestone recently said, “there are a couple of teams who really shouldn’t be there. They are a bit out of their depth at the moment.”

The problem is not a lack of ability on the part of the new teams. It is a lack of credentials. Yet on paper, all have the hallmarks of an experienced motor racing team.

Lotus is headed up by experienced technical director Mike Gascoyne, and emerged from the (admittedly embryonic) Litespeed F3 team. Virgin is run by Manor Motorsport, a well-established team that has achieved great success in lower formulae.

HRT was originally run by Adrián Campos, who had been successful as a team owner in GP2, and is now headed up by ex-Jordan/Midland/Spyker/Force India man Colin Kolles.

But none of these teams had demonstrated their ability as a potential top-level constructor. As motor racing teams, they looked great on paper. As constructors, they lacked the hard evidence.

In the end, we must assume that the FIA had to look at what the potential teams had to say for themselves in their presentations and were left to guess which of the entries would be suitable for F1. Perhaps that is why USF1 fell by the wayside, and Campos had to be rescued at the last minute.

New teams driven by business, not sport

It would be useful if there could be some kind of feeder series for constructors, just as there are for drivers. Gone are the days when new teams could enter F1 relatively easily. F1 had effectively become a franchise system, with ten franchises. New teams did not emerge. Instead, existing teams changed hands from one rich businessman to another.

Red Bull may have first entered F1 in 2005, but its roots can be traced back to Stewart Grand Prix in 1997, via Jaguar. A team may only have been called Force India since 2008, but it has run as Jordan, Midland and Spyker since 1991.

Mercedes may have officially entered their first Formula 1 season since 1955 this year, but the team it bought can in fact be traced back to the 1960s via Brawn, Honda, BAR and Tyrrell.

So it goes for every “new” team that has entered F1 this past decade, with the exception of Toyota. The chief reason for this is cost. For anyone looking to enter F1, it is simply easier to buy an existing team than go through the pain of building one from scratch.

As such, F1 was running the risk of becoming stale. The decision for a new team to enter motorsport’s top level was always about cold business, not sporting success. While the FIA’s attempts to bring fresh blood into the sport should be applauded, the way they have gone about it has done little to improve the situation.

No matter how well this year’s new teams have done, there will always be scepticism. The question can always be asked: why USF1, but not Lola? Why HRT, but not Prodrive? Why Virgin, but not Epsilon Euskadi?

The problem: costs of course

Some kind of system where potential constructors can flex their muscles in a lower formula would help sort out the wheat from the chaff, just as GP2 does for drivers. Of course, the costs of such a series would be astronomical. In the past, Formula 2 and F3000 provided great scope for competition between chassis manufacturers. But in these cost-conscious times, GP2 is viewed as being more viable.

Moreover, this structure could be harming upcoming drivers as much it harms potential constructors. Lucas Di Grassi has complained that GP2 provided little scope for him to develop the skills needed for him to carry out development work.

Nonetheless, the current system of feeder series is rightly regarded as doing an excellent job of developing the F1 drivers of tomorrow. Unfortunately for wannabe constructors, the motorsport hierarchy has probably never been less effective at helping new teams make the step up to F1.

F1′s new teams

• New teams have cut the gap to the midfield by a third since Bahrain
• Di Montezemolo attacks new teams
• McLaren supportive of new teams

Image (C) Virgin Racing

The testing ban has robbed rookies like Grosjean of precious practice time

F1 Fanantic guest writer and Vee8 author Duncan Stephen looks at the problems the testing ban has caused this year.

This year has seen several major changes in F1, but among the biggest has been the ban on in-season testing. As is usually the case with sweeping rule changes, it has brought more than its fair share of unintended consequences.

The most obvious problem with the testing ban is the fact that substitute drivers now have little or no way of winding themselves up for a race weekend. This wouldn’t have been much of a problem last year, when all 20 drivers competed in every Grand Prix – an unprecedented situation.

This weekend Kamui Kobayashi will become the fifth rookie to make his F1 debut this year only one of which – Sebastien Buemi – did so in the season-opener at Melbourne.

At the start of this season, the grid looked more or less identical to last season. The only change was Sebastian Vettel moving to Red Bull to replace David Coulthard who had retired, and Buemi taking Vettel’s place at Toro Rosso.

It is reasonable to suggest that a lot of the reason for this stability was due to the uncertainty surrounding the ability of rookies to get up to speed. That may explain why marginal cases, such as Nelson Piquet Jnr or Sebastien Bourdais, were given second chances when perhaps they did not deserve them.

But while the testing ban may have given Piquet and Bourdais a second chance, it also hastened their exit from that second chance. In another era, Piquet or Bourdais may have been allowed to see the season out with a modicum of dignity in tact. But the only way for Renault and Toro Rosso to find out if their replacements were any good was to just throw them straight into the car. In this case, waiting until the start of the 2010 season is no good – they want to know now so that the matter is out of the way by then.

But now we run into another problem. Both Romain Grosjean and Jaime Alguersuari, lacking experience of driving these cars, have noticeably struggled to get to grips. They have been thrown in at the deep end, and you cannot blame them if they have failed to cope with the situation.

You don’t have to be a rookie to be disadvantaged by the lack of testing. Luca Badoer couldn’t get up to speed in his Ferrari, although that may have been expected since he hadn’t raced in F1 for ten years. His replacement at Ferrari, Giancarlo Fisichella, has meandered around in the bottom half of the field. Fisichella is a competent driver who finished second in Belgium with a Force India he was familiar with. But Fisichella has not had the chance to acclimatise to the F60 properly. If he was allowed to test, he might be putting in some decent performances.

Not even a seven times world champion could avoid being adversely affected by the testing ban. Michael Schumacher clearly needed an opportunity to prepare for a potential race drive. This left him scrabbling around trying to test old chassis on GP2 tyres in an attempt to get round the ban while assessing if his neck could stand the stresses of driving an F1 car again. This weekend Kobayashi is the latest driver to be thrown in at the deep end, and it is only sheer fortune that he got two sessions’ running in Suzuka last week (albeit in the wet).

Surely it is not right for inexperienced or out-of-practice drivers to be expected to go into a race completely cold. It is just plain unfair on young drivers, or drivers recovering from injury. But more than that, it has real safety implications on the racetrack. It is no surprise to see rookies make mistakes. But would, for instance, the Toro Rosso drivers have had so many major crashes at Suzuka if they had been given more time to test? Possibly not.

Why the testing ban isn’t all bad

The testing ban is not all bad though. Clearly it exists for a reason, and that major reason is cost. This remains the biggest political issue in F1 today. Placing a ban on testing is a useful way to help reach the goal of making F1 more financially sustainable.

In this respect, the testing ban appears to have been a roaring success. According to James Allen writing in August, the testing ban seems in fact set to become even more severe. Clearly, the clamour to reduce costs outweighs any issues surrounding young drivers who are struggling to get a break now.

Also in favour of the testing ban is the fact that is does not appear to have prevented teams from developing their car. Some feared that there would be little change in cars’ performance throughout the season. Instead, we have had a highly unpredictable picture, with cars varying greatly in performance as the season has progressed.

This is probably most notable in the case of McLaren. Arguably they had the slowest car at the start of the season. But come Hungary it was a proven race winner. For me, this achievement – made with almost nothing in the way of testing – is awe-inspiring. McLaren deserve plaudits for this amazing comeback in an adverse situation.

It could be the case that testing actually proved a distraction to the teams. I remember during one of his commentaries this year, the ever-opinionated Ian Phillips from Force India scoffed at the idea that the testing ban prevented development. It appeared as though he was implying that test teams liked to go testing at circuits in exotic parts of the world at their employers’ expense for a bit of a jolly, not because they wanted to make the car faster.

Despite his team’s demonstration of engineering excellence, McLaren driver Heikki Kovalainen remains a critic of the testing ban. For him, “the season has been a bit silly, up and down.”

Silly or not, the up and down nature of this season has been its saving grace in my view. It is hardly as if the racing has been scintillating this year.

Overall, my feeling is that the testing ban is a good thing. But something needs to be done to allow inexperienced drivers a better chance to build up their skills and familiarity with their car.

The issue of quite how you do this is another that is fraught with difficulty. A nice idea might be for each team to bring a third driver to each race, and they can participate in a sprint race on Friday using spare cars. But this in itself would probably be expensive. The teams may resent the distraction from the more important business of their actual race drivers. And Bernie Ecclestone probably wouldn’t like it because it could detract from GP2 and GP3.

The testing ban is good in principle and may have helped spice up this season. But the problem of how to give young drivers experience in a convenient and low-cost way is a puzzle that is proving difficult to solve.

One idea put forward on this site two months ago was to bring back testing as an event prior to Grands Prix at different (but nearby) venues. Ecclestone has proposed something similar, suggesting teams could stay at Grand Prix venues an extra day and test on Mondays.

Could either of these ideas work? Have your say in the comments.

Sebastien Bourdais made his last F1 start at the Nürburgring

F1 Fanatic guest writer Duncan Stephen, who writes Vee8, looks at how Indy Car drivers have fallen out of fashion in F1.

The departure of Sébastien Bourdais from Toro Rosso brings into focus two trends that have emerged in the driver market.

The first is the high turnover of drivers in the Red Bull teams, particularly Toro Rosso. This has been picked up elsewhere (including on F1 Fanatic and James Allen’s blog), so I will discuss it only briefly.

But another aspect has not been mentioned quite as much – the trend away from drivers who made their name in IndyCar.

Red Bull’s driver management

In its short history, Toro Rosso has built up a history of managing its drivers poorly. Since Toro Rosso’s first season in 2006, the team has gone through six different drivers. That is more than almost any other team, although McLaren has also gone through six in the past four years. The Woking-based squad has had some high profile driver management problems of its own in that period – first with Juan Pablo Montoya, then with Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton.

Back to Toro Rosso’s problems, the team’s management famously had a rift with Scott Speed in 2007 which ended in the driver accusing Toro Rosso boss Franz Tost of physically assaulting him. Needless to say, that was the end of his relationship with the team. Toro Rosso’s other driver at the time, Vitantonio Liuzzi, also ended up being disillusioned with the situation and has since cut his ties with Red Bull.

The parent Red Bull team has not had the most stable of situations with its drivers either. Its first season in 2005, also involving Liuzzi, was a disaster on this front. Although they had brought in veteran David Coulthard, who would serve as a stabilising influence and remains on the team’s books to this day, Red Bull intended to share their second seat between two drivers, Liuzzi and Christian Klien.

At first the promise was for the two Red Bull Junior Team graduates to be given roughly equal time in the race seat, with the drivers swapping places every few races. But this policy was quietly dropped after Liuzzi’s first four races, after which Klien became the permanent second driver.

Klien stayed on for the following season, but the relationship with Red Bull soon soured. Klien was not offered another year at Red Bull Racing, and was instead offered a drive at a Red Bull-backed ChampCar team. Klien baulked at this idea, and severed his ties with Red Bull, being replaced by Robert Doornbos for the remainder of the season. Following a stint at Honda, Klien is currently BMW’s reserve driver.

Red Bull heavily invests in young driver talent through its Red Bull Junior Team programme. This is the official explanation for Red Bull’s constantly changing driver line-up – it wants to give as many of its drivers a seat in F1 as possible.

This is supposed to be the raison d’être of Toro Rosso – but cynics say it is there to share costs with the main Red Bull team. For instance, why did Sébastien Bourdais – not a Red Bull Junior driver – got a race seat there? Moreover, neither of Red Bull’s longest-serving drivers, David Coulthard and Mark Webber, were nurtured by Red Bull.

Red Bull point to the success of Sebastian Vettel, saying that he is proof of the success of Red Bull’s approach towards driver development. But the fact is that BMW can have a better claim to having prepared Sebastian Vettel for F1. It was BMW who gave him his first test in a Williams-BMW, his prize for winning the German Formula BMW championship in 2004. He became BMW’s permanent test driver in 2006. It was BMW who gave him his first race drive, when he scored a point at Indianapolis in 2007.

Vettel is not the only BMW protégé either. Robert Kubica is another successful driver whose skills have been nurtured by BMW.

The tide against IndyCar drivers

Bourdais won four Champ Car titles from 2004-2007

The departure of Sébastien Bourdais also brings up the question mark surrounding the skills of American open wheel racers. Once upon a time, it was common for IndyCar drivers to make the switch to Formula 1. In fact, almost 100 Champ Car drivers have had involvement in F1, and four Champ Car champions have also become Formula 1 World Champions. Keith wrote a wonderful series about drivers hopping over the pond last year.

But today, open wheel racing in America is a shadow of its former self. Particularly over the past decade or so, the quality has decreased dramatically. But question marks over the ability of Champ Car drivers have been around for even longer.

No driver has successfully made the leap to Formula 1 from Champ Car or IRL for over a decade. The last successful Champ Car driver to compete in F1 was Jacques Villeneuve. He won the World Championship in 1997, but few would say he was among the most deserving drivers to become a World Champion. From this point onwards, the ability of Champ Car drivers to join F1 fell rapidly.

The next driver to make the jump was Alessandro Zanardi, also with Williams. Zanardi had raced in F1 before, but with a string of poor teams – Jordan, Minardi and Lotus which by then was on its last legs. But he had a more successful time in Cart, winning two titles in 1997 and 1998. This was enough to convince Frank Williams to give him a three year contract. But his first season turned out to be a disaster.

Zanardi lacked the speed and failed to get to grips with the complexity of Formula 1 cars. Towards the end of the season he even ran with heavier steel brakes, saying that he preferred them to the more modern carbon brakes used by everyone else. After a year of rumours, Zanardi’s three year deal was cut short at the end of the season, having failed to score a point while his team mate Ralf Schumacher scored 35.

Despite this experience, Williams obviously did not clock onto the fact that Champ Car drivers were no longer up to scratch because the next driver to make the leap into F1 was 1999 CART champion Juan Pablo Montoya, once again with Williams. However, this relationship was much more successful than the one with Zanardi. Montoya even came relatively close to winning the Championship in 2003.

But despite gaining seven wins in F1, doubts about the Colombian’s abilities increased as his F1 career progressed. His relationship with Williams soured before his move to McLaren in 2005. While driving for McLaren, he failed to get on top of the handling of the car.

Meanwhile, doubts about his fitness were constantly raised. While at Williams, he gained a staggering 10 kilograms (over 1½ stone) in weight during the course of one season. He did not go up in many people’s estimations when he had to sit out two of his first races for McLaren following a “tennis accident” which is said to have actually been a quad bike accident.

That was the last time Williams dared hire a Champ Car driver, but other teams failed to take notice. Toyota signed Cristiano da Matta for the 2003 and 2004 seasons after winning the CART series in 2002. His first season was a relative success, but in 2004 his performances were anonymous and disappointing. He finished in the points just once all year, before being replaced by Ricardo Zonta mid-season. Afterwards, Da Matta bitterly vowed never to race in F1 again, complaining that there was too much emphasis on cars’ technology – another sign of Champ Car drivers’ inability to handle the more sophisticated F1 machinery.

Since then, Formula 1 teams have generally given Champ Car / IndyCar drivers a wide berth – until Toro Rosso signed Sébastien Bourdais for the 2008 season. Bourdais’s record seemed impeccable though, winning an unprecedented four Champ Car championships in a row.

However, by this time US open wheel racing was a shadow of its former self. Bourdais disappointed in F1, failing to capitalise on the opportunities he was given, thoroughly outclassed by his team mate Sebastian Vettel, and even this year by rookie Sébastien Buemi. On the BBC’s coverage, Force India’s Ian Phillips recently scoffed that the problem with Bourdais was that he was used to driving “lorries”.

This year’s IndyCar series increasingly under fire for being too processional and producing poor racing. The sanctioning body has drawn up plans for a “push to pass” system to be introduced mid-season in a desperate bid to spice up the series (which, on the strength of last weekend’s race, seems to have worked). Somehow I think Bourdais will be the last IndyCar driver to make the switch to F1 for quite a while.

Read more

• Sebastien Bourdais biography
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 1
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 2
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 3
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 4
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 5
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 6
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 7
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 8
• CART drivers who raced in F1: From Andretti to Zanardi part 9

No-one can rival Jenson Button's tyre management this year

F1 Fanatic guest writer Doctorvee of F1 blog Vee8 shares an opinion on how the tyre rules are affecting the championship.

In a year of big changes to the technical regulations, one of the most controversial talking points has been the decision taken jointly by Bridgestone and the FIA to widen the gap between the prime and option tyres.

Instead of taking the two best-suited compounds to each circuit, Bridgestone now takes one good set and one sub-standard set of tyres.

This was a bid to spice up the action during the races. But has it also boosted Jenson Button’s chances of winning the championship?

Contrived tyre rules

Given the present rules where every driver has to use both sets of tyres in dry conditions, the decision to widen the gap between the compounds was right. After the mandatory tyre change was introduced in 2007, the difference between the prime and option were usually too small to make any meaningful difference to the race.

People rightly argue that deliberately putting drivers on inferior tyres is an artificial way to contrive excitement. Fernando Alonso was especially scathing, saying it would be better to put drivers on wet tyres in dry conditions.

The reasons for the rule can be traced back to the end of the tyre war. Following the exit of Michelin from Formula 1, Bridgestone were worried that no-one would talk about them as the sole tyre supplier. So to keep the focus on tyres, they concocted this rule, borrowed from America’s now-defunct Champ Car World Series. (The Indy Racing League has adopted a similar rule this year).

But to keep the focus on tyres was wrong in my view. Back in 2006, I waved good riddance to the tyre war. At the time I said:

In reality, we no longer [have] a drivers’ championship or a constructors’ championship. All we had left was a glorified tyre championship in all but name. It’s not as heroic as a driver standing up on his seat to win a race. It’s not as sexy as a constructor pushing the boundaries of technology to make their car better. Formula 1 had come down to four — literally — black boxes. Elements that are peripheral to the cars became central to the championship.

I was perturbed that tyres should come to dominate the picture in F1 so much. I have since come to the view that the primacy of the role of these “black boxes” is inevitable. But it is a matter of striking the right balance. Bridgestone’s effort to get people talking about tyres is the exact opposite of what I want to see. Ideally, they should be as irrelevant as possible. That means taking the best sets of tyres, letting the teams decide how they should run them, and leave it be.

Instead, teams are hamstrung by Bridgestone’s selfish commercial interests. Now we have this mickey mouse situation where tyres once again appear to be playing too large a role in the championship.

Playing into Button’s hands

One of the traits that emerged very early on about the Brawn car was that is treats its tyres very well indeed. Meanwhile, Brawn’s driver Jenson Button is renowned for being one of the smoothest drivers in the world with excellent tyre management skills. I don’t wish to belittle the importance of tyre management. This is an aspect of Button’s driving which should be celebrated. But I fear that this one aspect of driving is becoming the one dominant influence on the championship.

Take the Bahrain Grand Prix. Toyota managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory because their cars simply did not have the pace on the harder tyres that the team had expected. Perhaps if Toyota had the freedom to run whatever tyres they wanted, they would have won the race. We will of course never know. But it’s difficult to escape the feeling that Brawn were handed that win not because they had the best package, but because they had a package that could cope better with deficient tyres.

The potential for the tyre rule to play this sort of role was evident from the first race of the season at Melbourne. A number of drivers who were having perfectly good races found themselves falling back simply as a result of the fact that they were forced to use suboptimal tyres.

We saw exactly the same phenomenon in Monaco. Most drivers who ran the super-soft tyres in the first stint had their race ruined. Sebastian Vettel – arguably Jenson Button’s strongest rival – struggled particularly badly, at one point losing a massive 4.5s in one lap.

Interestingly, Rubens Barrichello was another driver who struggled on the super-softs in the first stint at Monaco. The Brazilian ended the first stint 12.5s behind his team mate. This helped ease Jenson Button’s path to victory, as it meant that even those drivers who had the harder tyres – which were superior at that point of the race – lost valuable time.

That puts one nail in the coffin of the idea that the tyre rule is a particular advantage to the Brawn car. Barrichello has had more than his fair share of tyre issues this season. Not only did he lose time in Monaco, he also lost the race in Spain because he was struggling on a set of tyres.

This is where Jenson Button’s silky-smooth driving comes into play. Fair enough in one respect. You can argue that if Button’s tyre management is so great that it helps him win the championship, he has earned that right. But it does seem as though he is lucky to get this leg-up.

After all, isn’t F1 supposed to be about giving the best drivers the best equipment? Jenson Button’s skill is in being a good driver with deficient equipment. If the best drivers had the best cars with the best equipment at all times, would Jenson Button have won five races out of six? I have a feeling that he wouldn’t have. Is that really what F1 should be about?

I would never wish to belittle Jenson Button’s excellent form. I have no doubt that his Championship lead is fully deserved. But I just wish he could have demonstrated it in an environment where the best drivers have the best equipment, which is what F1 should be about in my view.

Who finished where? Are we restarting? Confusion reigned at Malaysia

F1 Fanatic guest writer Duncan Stephen, who writes Vee8, reflects on the chaotic ending to Malaysian Grand Prix and how it was handled.

Before I write about the Malaysian Grand Prix, it is worth reflecting on the issues surrounding the curtailment of the race. I have no particular problem with a race being stopped if it can not safely continue. I even have no problem with half points being awarded, and in a way it’s amazing that F1 hasn’t had to resort to this since 1991.

But we have to say to Bernie, we told you so. Everyone saw the potential that we could have the sort of situation we saw in Malaysia. The race had to be stopped due to torrential rain. Then the rain had stopped, but the race could not reasonably be re-started because visibility was so poor simply because the sun was setting. Had it continued, the race would have ended in the dark, and that clearly poses an unacceptable safety risk.

Some have said that the problems would have happened even had the race started earlier in the day. Many pointed out that the GP2 race was similarly affected. But undoubtedly the situation wouldn’t have been so bad. Even a couple of hours earlier on in the day, the race could have been restarted on a drier track because it was still daytime.

Bernie Ecclestone stands by the late start time. It is true that it is more convenient for European viewers. The fact that British television ratings for the race were higher than they were last year – even when you take into account ITV’s re-run – appears to justify it in this sense. But it just didn’t feel like the Malaysian Grand Prix. And I would prefer there to be a full race with full points handed out any time. That is worth getting up a couple of hours early for.

The events surrounding the race stoppage and the restart brought into sharp focus just how complicated the regulations surrounding it are. As a viewer, I found it incredibly frustrating that no-one on the BBC’s team appeared to know the rules surrounding the two hour time limit. No doubt some of you will have seen just how annoyed I was getting if you follow the vee8 Twitter stream.

Martin Brundle quoted a specific part of the regulations which confirmed in his mind that there would not have been time to re-start the race because the two hour time limit would have passed. A more thorough reading of the rulebook reveals that article 5.3 of the Sporting Regulations (PDF) stipulates that the length of the suspension is added to the two hour time limit. In other words, even though the race clock keeps ticking, the clock for the two hour time limit is effectively stopped. Time spent while the race is suspended does not count towards the two hour time limit.

I was particularly disappointed that Martin Brundle was unaware of this, because he has commentated on a race which was affected in precisely this way just two years ago at the 2007 European Grand Prix. Fernando Alonso won the race with a time of 2 hours, 6 minutes and change, but the two hour time limit was not bothered a jot. I was surprised too that David Coulthard, a freshly retired driver, was unaware of this important part of the Sporting Regulations which directly affected a race in which he had recently taken part.

In fairness to the BBC, it is a complicated rule. I was totally unaware of it befoe the 2007 European Grand Prix, and I read up on it specifically because I was confused by the situation then. The person who does the live commentary for Formula1.com also got it wrong (no doubt he was hoping to go home early).

I was absolutely floored when a Williams engineer also revealed his ignorance of the rule of the team radio. After McLaren fouled up in Australia thanks to a leaky knowledge of the Sporting Regulations, you have to wonder what is going on with the teams. When even the teams don’t know the Sporting Regulations well enough, maybe it’s time for a root-and-branch simplification of the FIA’s regulations. That could be a good job for FOTA to do.

There was confusion, too, with the situation regarding which lap the official classification comes from when the race is stopped. This led to the farcical situation where the official classification changed before the world’s eyes with a flicker of the live timing screens. The commentators, it seems, had forgotten about the rule where the result is taken from the standings as they were on the penultimate complete lap (article 42.8 of the Sporting Regulations).

Matters were not helped by the fact that the live timing screens were showing blatantly incorrect information for the duration of the red flag period. Everyone with the exception of Jenson Button and Timo Glock were shown as having been lapped. The commentators appeared to take this at face value. But we know from experience not always to take the live timing screen at face value. All of those cars had not been lapped.

As far as I can tell, it was perhaps triggered by the cars being moved around on the grid while the race was suspended. As such, some cars’ transponders may have passed the timing beam, triggering the timing screens to show that Button and Glock had done an extra lap.

It wouldn’t be the first time a mistake of this nature has occurred. The 2003 Brazilian Grand Prix was marred by a similar incident where the FIA took the results from the wrong lap. This robbed Giancarlo Fisichella’s Jordan of his rightful win, only for it to be reinstated behind closed doors a week later.

Eddie Jordan’s people were well on top of it at the time. Seemingly, the timing system automatically counted back the correct number of laps, only for the FIA officials to do it themselves again manually, meaning that the result was taken from a lap earlier than it should have been. Jordan saw what had happened, and appealed. He was successful, so it’s no surprise that he was the member of the BBC’s team that seemed to understand the situation more than the others. But even he incorrectly stated that the result is taken from the final complete lap, when in fact it is taken from the penultimate complete lap.

The confusion once again appeared to get the better of McLaren. Lewis Hamilton began his interviews in the belief that he had finished 5th. It was left to the BBC’s Lee McKenzie to break the bad news that he was actually seventh. The McLaren representative said to Hamilton that “we are still discussing [what the result is]“. The driver gave a look as if to say, “what have they done now?”

Perhaps McLaren were worried about which lap the FIA chose to classify the race on, just as Eddie Jordan was in Brazil 2003. But given the events of the last week, it’s no surprise that no-one has kicked up a fuss. Even so, I think the FIA got it right this time. The race was stopped on lap 33, meaning that the penultimate complete lap was lap 31, which is what the classification shows.

Yet again, though, the race result has been concluded in an unsatisfactory way. Jenson Button noted that he hasn’t won a race this year in green flag conditions. Sometimes this can’t be avoided, but let us hope that we have a conventional finish in China, with a clean result decided on the racetrack.

More on the Malaysian Grand Prix

• Button wins again but rain stops play at Sepang (Malaysian Grand Prix review)
• F1 victim of own greed as Malaysian GP fails to go the distance after late start
• Malaysian Grand Prix pictures
• Malaysian Grand Prix facts and stats

But is KERS safe enough?

Doctorvee from Vee8 joins us as a guest writer and begins with a look at the controversial Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems introduced this year.

In a year of big changes to F1, perhaps the biggest is the introduction of KERS, the Kinetic Energy Recovery System. But given the way things have developed over the winter, I wonder if it’s not just a typo and it’s actually called CURSE.

KERS appears to completely fly in the face of all of Max Mosley’s hobby horses – costs, safety and green technologies. Giancarlo Fisichella summed things up when he said earlier this month: “it is still not safe after many tests, it is not reliable and it is very expensive.”

Costs

Max Mosley is forever telling the world how Formula 1 teams need to cut costs. Just last week the FIA’s World Motor Sport Council proposed a budget cap of £30 million. But right in the middle of Max Mosley’s economy drive, he has introduced KERS. He may as well have asked the teams to pour money down a drain. In February, it was reported by James Allen that the Mercedes KERS had already cost £70 million – more than double the proposed new budget cap for the entire car.

Over the winter, teams voiced their concerns over the costs of developing the new device. Ferrari chief Stefano Domenicali noted in January that KERS had already cost them double what they had expected. Flavio Briatore and Norbert Haug added their voices to the chorus.

Moreover, because the costs of KERS outweigh the benefits on many tracks, teams may resort to building two cars – one with KERS and one without. Alternatively, they could even decide to build two completely different versions of their KERS to suit the different circuits better. Ross Brawn flagged up way back in June last year that KERS might be a complete waste of time and money as it would offer no benefits to F1 cars.

To add insult to injury, it looks as though a standard KERS will be produced for 2010. That means that it will not be a performance differentiator in the long run. So all the money that the teams have already sunk into the project will ultimately come to little. As Flavio Briatore put it, “What we know is that we are spending all that money for nothing – this is sure.”

Safety

Safety issues have surrounded KERS ever since a BMW mechanic received an electric shock during an early test of a KERS-equipped car. Just days earlier, the Red Bull factory had to be evacuated when their KERS device caught fire during its development.

Over the winter, a number of people have voiced their continued concerns over the safety of KERS. Sebastian Vettel felt that the safety issue was being overlooked. Flavio Briatore described it as “not 100% under control.”

Meanwhile, Adrian Newey revealed that he feared that it would be easy for mechanics to absent-mindedly touch a car forgetting about the potential risk of an electric shock. Renault’s technical director Bob Bell said it’s “inevitable” that there will be accidents related to KERS this year.

It’s not only the mechanics who face the danger. Marshals will also be at risk of getting an electric shock from a KERS-equipped car. F1 Fanatic has received an email from motormedic, who will be one of the medical marshals working in Melbourne this weekend. It outlines the new precautions marshals must now take in a KERS-era F1:

At the present time we’re being supplied with boots and gloves which can apparently withstand 1000 volts of charge. The only downside is that these gloves are far too bulky to work in effectively, and we are expected to extricate someone from a vehicle with only our hands and no other part of our bodies should come into contact with the chassis – again… something extremely difficult to manage!

As part of the extrication team, we are very keen to know more about this system and the risks it poses to us – but unfortunately we’re being told very little…

It seems as though this will in turn put the drivers at greater risk, as the marhsals’ jobs have been made more difficult. Motormedic also left a comment:

I’m very concerned about KERS. FIA is giving no-one any information other than “wear these boots and gloves – they will protect you!” Practically – this is not a solution which is tenable!

Undertaking acute and critical medical procedures without any dexterity (compliments of the monstrous gloves) will mean that any lifesaving measure for the driver will be delayed until the car is rendered safe, or the driver is out of the car (which can’t be done until the car is earthed anyway…..)

The environment

Ferrari has confirmed it will use KERS this weekend

Last June, Mike Gascoyne pointed out a fundamental flaw in the idea that KERS is environmentally friendly: “We’ll be throwing batteries away after each race and all that sort of thing – is it particularly green? Well, no.” This has been echoed more recently by Bob Bell who said, “F1 is adding to the stock of waste batteries around the world.”

KERS was also supposed to make F1 more road relevant. But engineer after engineer has lined up to point out that F1 systems have very litle in common with their road car counterparts.

KERS – a good idea, horribly implemented

It is no secret that the introduction of KERS has been a massive technical challenge to F1′s engineers. This is a good thing. Formula 1 should be about pushing the envelope in terms of technology. Let us not forget that KERS is not mandatory. The teams chose to pursue it.

But the way the FIA have gone about introducing KERS to F1 has been a complete botch job. Of course, we have come to expect this from the FIA. But KERS marks a new nadir of Max Mosley mismanagement.

Last month Mosley bemoaned the fact that:

People like (Colin) Chapman, or (John) Cooper or (Keith) Duckworth would be lost in modern F1. So suddenly having had this culture of minimal innovation and endless refinement, we dump on them an absolutely new concept, cutting edge technology and some serious engineering, and they don’t like it – except for some. There is the odd person like Patrick Head, who is a proper engineer, who sees it as a fascinating challenge. But the team principals? It interferences with their cosy world where if you make it one thousandth of a millimetre thinner, it will be just that little bit quicker.

Mosley is right to lambast the situation that F1 has found itself in. But, as Mosley himself concedes, “in a way” (no, in every way) it is the FIA’s fault for having spent the past 15 years or sobanning every interesting new technical innovation brought in by the teams.

KERS was not introduced to F1 by Max Mosley in 2008. It was introduced by Mario Illen in 1999, almost ten years earlier. He developed an early form of KERS for McLaren-Mercedes. It was promptly banned by Max Mosley.

Had the original concept not been banned, who knows how advanced today’s KERS systems might be? The teams could have developed the systems in a comfortable, safe manner at their own pace. They could have had bullet-proof reliability and first-class safety standards by now. The technology may have trickled down to road cars within that time, and we may already be in the green revolution that Max Mosley wants to bring about.

Read more

• F1 Wolf’s overview of quotes on KERS
• KERS watch – who’s using KERS this weekend?

Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari contract runs out in 2009 - will he stay?

Doctorvee writes the F1 blog Vee8, helps moderate the F1 Fanatic Live Blogs and has written many comment for F1 Fanatic. In this guest article he asks whether Ferrari are happy with their current drivers – and who might replace them.

I just can’t get over the way this championship has unfolded.

Maybe I was mollycoddled in my formative F1-viewing years. I started watching Formula 1 in the mid-1990s. In those days, Williams were flawless and untouchable. In 1996 they won the constructors championship by a simply unreal margin of 105 points. Damon Hill and Jacques Villeneuve won drivers championships in a car which a monkey could have won in.

Then came a driving master class from Mika Häkkinen. All the while a certain Michael Schumacher was setting new standards for F1 drivers to reach. Shortly afterwards came a period of true dominance for the German who won five drivers championships in a row. Even when Schumacher was on the wane, I had the pleasure to watch a new youngster, Fernando Alonso, reach the top of his game.

Compared to that period which lasted just over a decade, this season just seems so amateurish. Each of the drivers battling for the championship (with the possible exception of Robert Kubica, who isn’t really in contention anyway) almost seems dead set on throwing it away.

Well, that is perhaps a bit harsh, but the point is that whoever wins the championship this year probably can’t look back on their season and feel that they maximised their potential. The leader currently has 70 points, which isn’t a great deal of points for this stage of the season.

Felipe Massa – a surprise contender

Felipe Massa has moved into second in the championship following his Valencia win

Lewis Hamilton is probably the one person who can feel most proud about his performance. He did have an awful moment in Canada which will in many ways overshadow this year. But apart from his normal tyre management issues, Hamilton has not disgraced himself at all. He has even thrown in a couple of really stonking performances at Silverstone and Hockenheim.

It is the Ferrari drivers that I really struggle to get a grasp on. It seems pretty clear that the Ferrari is the best car on the grid. Certainly, that has been the case for most of this season. Yet Ferrari’s drivers trail in the championship and the pair take it in turns to hold second place. If Ferrari have the best car on the grid, then it must be that their drivers are seriously letting them down.

Many people are now calling on the red team to throw their weight behind Felipe Massa in the Drivers Championship. This can’t have been what the Scuderia had in mind when they hired the partnership of Massa and Kimi Räikkönen.

I think most people imagined that Ferrari’s plan would be to focus their attention on the Finn as their replacement for Michael Schumacher. After all, Schumacher was effectively nudged out of Ferrari to make way for Räikkönen who was meant to be the next big thing in F1.

Instead, Ferrari find themselves with Felipe Massa spearheading their championship challenge. This surely wasn’t in the script. Although Felipe Massa has had a great deal of mentoring from Michael Schumacher, I doubt Massa was originally intended as a Ferrari number one. When he got the race seat at Ferrari a few years back, many suspected that it was a lot to do with nepotism. Felipe Massa’s manager is Nicolas Todt, son of Jean Todt, who at the time was the team principal at Ferrari.

However, much to the surprise of many, Felipe Massa has become a championship contender. Even though he eventually fell out of the title race in 2007, this was partly due to a bit of bad luck. In 2008 he finds himself expected by the tifosi to take on Hamilton in a two-way fight.

Whatever you think of Massa – and I have my own views – you have to hand it to him. This erratic Sauber driver has put in some truly Ferrari-grade performances since he joined the squad. His drive in Hungary was astonishing, to name just one.

However, there is no doubt about it that Massa is far from the complete package. A number of spins early in the season raised doubts as to whether he could cope without traction control. He is also known to struggle badly in the wet. He was an embarrassment at Silverstone where he had no fewer than five spins trundling round the back while Hamilton charged to victory by a margin of well over a minute.

What a strange situation for a driver who makes as many errors as this is to be Ferrari’s main title challenger.

Second thoughts about Kimi Raikkonen

Kimi Raikkonen struggled in the rain at Monte-Carlo

So how have Ferrari found themselves in the position where they have to rely on Massa? What has happened to Kimi Räikkönen? After a difficult start to the 2007 season, Räikkönen produced the goods big style by with an almost flawless second half of the year, and was the deserved winner of the drivers championship.

2008 has not been nearly as successful. The Australian Grand Prix set the scene for an erratic season for Räikkönen. The Finn had a couple of strange moments during the Grand Prix where he seemed to completely lose focus. This caused at least two major offs.

Since then we have seen a couple of solid performances from Räikkönen. But mostly we have seen more of those lapses on concentration and a great many instances where he seems to have completely lacked the motivation required to become a World Champion. The sad reality is that now the normal position for Räikkönen to be in is fifth.

There are numerous theories as to why Räikkönen has gone off the boil, but I’m not interested in going into them too deeply just now. The fact is that Räikkönen has, for whatever reason, lost his form. Just one or two years ago Räikkönen was hailed as among the very greatest. Earlier this year an F1 Racing poll ranked Räikkönen as the seventh greatest driver of all time. I suspect if the magazine was to conduct the same poll today Räikkönen would tumble a fair few places.

So who is the real Kimi Räikkönen? Did we get him wrong? Or is he actually a true great? Ferrari must be asking themselves that. They are reported to be paying Räikkönen a salary of $40 million. Massa, meanwhile, is rumoured to be getting paid no more than a quarter of that and is ahead of Räikkönen in the championship – and you have to say that he does so on merit. The Brazilian has put in some stellar performances while Räikkönen has simply looked incapable of this year.

A lot of how we should judge Räikkönen will be based upon what Ferrari’s goals were when they signed him. Given his salary and the fact that none other than Herr Schumi was given the heave-ho, you would assume that Ferrari expected Räikkönen to at least take on the team leader role, if not to quite the extent that Schumacher did.

Now, hindsight is 20/20 vision. But it is now beginning to look like Ferrari chose the wrong person to replace Schumacher. At the time I could see clearly why Ferrari chose Räikkönen. I would have chosen Räikkönen. My feeling was simply that he was certainly in the top three drivers in the world, and it was an utter crime that he had never before won the world championship. But let’s not forget some of what we already knew about Räikkönen when he signed for Ferrari.

There are some parallels between Räikkönen and Schumacher. Neither driver has easy relations with the press. And on their day, both can be stunningly fast and exhilarating to watch. But the differences between the two drivers are much greater.

We can’t expect any driver to be completely flawless, but we knew that Räikkönen could be prone to lapses in concentration which sometimes ultimately ended his race. The best example of this is the 2005 European Grand Prix where Räikkönen lost concentration while he was a long way in the lead.

He missed his braking point and locked up heavily. This created a huge flat spot on his tyre. This developed and developed and in the closing laps it was plain that Räikkönen was touch and go as to whether or not he could finish the race. Then on the final lap – bang – his suspension could take no more and off Räikkönen spun into the barrier.

In addition to his occasional lapses on concentration, Räikkönen had a reputation – whether it was justified or not – for being a car-breaker. During his years at McLaren he suffered from some major reliability problems. For some reason, these reliability problems did not haunt his team mates to quite the same extent. The theory goes that there is something in Räikkönen’s driving style damages the car.

There is also the fact that Räikkönen likes a drink. You can argue that this is Räikkönen’s private life and what he does in his own time is his own business. And I would accept that. However, Ferrari were used to the disciplined approach of Michael Schumacher who brought intense fitness regimes into fashion in F1 in the mid-1990s. Apart from the odd post-championship bender Schumacher was seldom caught drinking anything stronger than an apple juice. Räikkönen was once alleged to have been found half-naked in someone’s front garden when he was supposed to be testing for McLaren. The difference in attitude and commitment is plain to see.

Given Räikkönen’s woes, it is easy to give more prominence to the negative aspects. As I said, at the time I felt that Räikkönen was the right choice for Ferrari to make. But given that McLaren were known to be losing patience with the driver for his various antics, one wonders if Ferrari were really on the hunt for the next Schumacher or if they were just going through the motions with driver selection.

Fernando Alonso – Schumacher’s true heir?

Fernando Alonso beat Schumacher twice - should he join Ferrari next?

I am not sure why Fernando Alonso was never pursued by Ferrari in the way that Räikkönen clearly was. Alonso seems to share many more of Schumacher’s traits. He helped bring a team struggling in the midfield into regular championship contention.

Alonso was breaking records left, right and centre as he became the youngest driver to get pole position, the youngest driver to win a race, the youngest driver to become world champion and the youngest driver to become a double world champion.

Okay, these records are to do with his age rather than sheer numbers like Schumacher’s. But it demonstrates that Alonso is truly head and shoulders above his peers, just like Schumacher was. Just like Schumacher, Alonso was exciting as a youngster and in his earliest races put his car in places where it shouldn’t have been.

While Alonso’s successful spell has now dried up somewhat, though this is mainly due to circumstances largely beyond his control.

This year Alonso has often been a joy to watch, driving a car that is by all accounts pretty awful. It is no secret that last year Alonso struggled to fit in at McLaren which has a very different culture to the Renault squad. There was also the fact that he was paired up with the hottest rookie since… well, probably since Alonso himself. Only this rookie happened to have an association with McLaren that already lasted ten years. No wonder Alonso was uncomfortable.

It still amazes me that so many people write off Fernando Alonso. You don’t hear him discussed in the same kind of reverential tones as Mika Häkkinen or even Kimi Räikkönen. Yet, Fernando Alonso is the only driver who can say he beat Michael Schumacher legitimately twice (Häkkinen, remember, won his second WDC when Michael Schumacher was out for a chunk of the year with a broken leg). It seems sensible to me that, if you’re looking for the next Schumacher, you look to the guy who has been most successful against Schumacher.

Yes, this is with the benefit of hindsight. But Ferrari would have been better off signing Fernando Alonso for the 2007 season. It is strongly rumoured that Ferrari will sign or have already signed Fernando Alonso for 2010.

This is not to say that Alonso is flawless to a Schumacher-type extent. Far from it. Alonso’s main weakness is that he can get rattled if he is beaten by his team mate. This isn’t just a reference to Lewis Hamilton. Alonso lost his head once or twice when Giancarlo Fisichella got ahead of him at Renault, most memorably in Canada in 2005.

However, Alonso’s behaviour doesn’t rule him out of a Ferrari seat. In fact, this tendency is perfect for a Schumacher-style scenario, where the entire team can be built around one person and resources are fully focused on helping that person win.

Other drivers for Ferrari

Sebastian Vettel - Ferrari's next German star?

There are two other drivers that Ferrari must surely be keeping their eye on as long term prospects. One is Sebastian Vettel. He too has a couple of similarities to Michael Schumacher. First, he is German. But more importantly, Vettel has awesome pace and several times this season he has put his Toro Rosso car into positions that few other drivers would have been capable of.

The other driver is Robert Kubica. You don’t see this name linked to Ferrari very often, but I think the Italian squad would be mad not to consider him. Kubica has helped pull BMW Sauber up from the midfield and has won a race for them. He has the pace, having shown Nick Heidfeld the way a number of times over the past three years – and Heidfeld is no slouch.

There is another element that makes Kubica stand out for me. He clearly has the determination to go the extra step to make himself a race winner. This year Robert Kubica has used an extraordinary diet which helped him lose five kilos in five days. This is a significant factor in his strong form this season.

This wasn’t just a one-off for Kubica. Even at the young age of 14 he took an important step in his career that few others would have had the commitment to pull off. He moved out of Poland, where there was no motor racing structure for him to progress though, and moved to Italy in an attempt to progress through the motor racing ladder. That is the kind of commitment that we came to expect from Schumacher, but few other drivers have ever demonstrated.

So what do you think? Did Ferrari make a mistake by signing Räikkönen? Or was it a correct decision at the time that has simply transpired to be wrong? Which drivers should Ferrari be pursuing? Is it even worth trying to find the next Schumacher?

This is a guest article by Doctorvee If you want to write a guest article for F1 Fanatic you can find all the information you need here.

Recently I have begun to wonder if I should bother watching the qualifying sessions. What should be done with qualifying has been one of F1′s most contentious issues over the past few years.

This has led to a great deal of tinkering with the system. And still most people feel that the current format is far from perfect.

Before I continue, let’s take a look at the route that has been taken with the qualifying formats. Many fans now pine for the days of old – the system where each driver had 12 laps to set the fastest time in an hour-long free-for-all session.

A few years spent experimenting with variations on a format where each driver had just one lap were deemed by most to be a failure. So for 2006 the system reverted to what is essentially a modified version of the old free-for-all.

People look back on that 12 lap system with rose-tinted glasses. But let us not forget that there were very good reasons why that “12 laps in an hour” format was ditched.

Under that system, you were very lucky if anything meaningful happened in the first fifty-five minutes. And you were lucky if anything at all happened in the first half an hour. Even then, it would probably only be a Minardi with airtime-hungry sponsors.

Then, in the last couple of minutes, it would be a complete information overload. All the cars would be on track trying (and usually succeeding) so set their personal best time. It was action-packed, for sure.

But you could not see the wood for the trees. All too often, it was simply impossible to keep track of who was doing what. And unless the TV director was really on the ball, viewers would end up missing most of the important action. You would be just as well seeing a list of times scrolling across the screen rather than pretending to make sense of what is actually happening on the track.

As I said, the current format is really just a revised version of that system. The addition of knockout stages was designed to force drivers to go onto the track in the early stages of qualifying. What has happened instead is that we now suffer all of the problems of the old format in microcosm – three times every race weekend.

Nevertheless, many seem to think that the current system is at least close to perfect. Some say that simply taking out the race fuel levels to remove the tedious fuel burn-off phase would be enough to spice up qualifying.

I too would favour the removal of the fuel burn-off phase (an embarrassing anachronism given that the FIA wants F1 to become more environmentally friendly). But I could not pretend that doing so would make the qualifying sessions any more exciting.

In Q3 nothing meaningful ever happens until there are at most about two minutes of the session to go. Most people point at the fuel burn-off phase as the cause of this. But Q1 and Q2 – where cars run on fumes – also suffer from similar problems.

Increasingly, nothing at all happens for the first three minutes of each session. Then, as the end of the session nears, it is complete bedlam.

The most recent qualifying session at Magny-Cours was a typical example. More than once, the TV director was noticeably struggling to keep up due to the sheer volume of traffic coming across the start / finish line – and he seemed to give up completely during Q3.

Even using Formula1.com’s excellent live timing feature, it is just impossible to keep up with what is happening. I really would be just as well not watching qualifying and just reading the results once it’s over.

So what do I propose instead? I know this will be controversial, but I want to see a return to the one lap format. I usually felt like I was in a minority of one, but I was a big fan of the one lap system.

So what does the one lap format have going for it?

First of all, from a TV viewer’s perspective, you were guaranteed to see all of the important action. You would see the whole of the pole lap and you would see it when a driver made a mistake. You just don’t get that under the current system.

Fans of the “free for all” style say that it is exciting because it builds up to a crescendo. But the reason it built up to a crescendo was because it spent the first forty-five minutes as a whimper.

But the one lap format also built up to a crescendo – but without leaving fans with nothing to watch for most of the hour. Because the top drivers were usually out on track last, you did not know who was on pole until the last driver had crossed the line. Often, it was nail-biting stuff, particularly when the championship was nearing its climax.

As we know, many drivers crumbled under the glaring spotlight of the one-lap format. Kimi Raikkonen was a high-profile scalp in the very first one-lap session. Michael Schumacher was also caught out at Imola in 2005. Every driver was caught out at one time or another. It was nail-biting stuff.

Who could forget Montoya losing it on the very last corner at Hockenheim in 2005? You simply do not get drama like that under the current system. This is because drivers are not put under that kind of pressure to perform. Make a mistake? Under the free for all system this is no problem – just go round again (or fall back on your banker lap). By contrast, the one-lap system was uncompromising.

This led onto another of its benefits – unpredictability. It mixed up the grid without compromising the ideal of having the fastest driver on pole position. This allowed drivers like Nick Heidfeld to score a pole position on merit.

Sure, there were plenty of times where drivers used light fuel loads to get a “Mickey Mouse” pole (Jarno Trulli being the stand out example). But this problem can be solved simply by fixing the fuel rules.

The slightly mixed nature of the grid also led to more overtaking during the race, which is what everyone is screaming out for at the moment. There was the time, for instance, where Michael Schumacher had a mountain to climb just to score a point at Suzuka in 2005. That made for a tense, exciting race.

Sure, Schumacher’s grid position was down to bad luck because of the weather conditions during qualifying. This was not ideal, but you would be a fool if you did not believe that luck had a huge part to play in the free for all system as well.

How often do you hear drivers excusing woeful performances by whining about traffic? This is something else that happened in the recent Magny Cours session, when Anthony Davidson said the amount of traffic made it feel like he was on the M25 – that being his excuse for not being quick enough.

Drivers also often have their laps ruined by yellow flags. Even red flags can ruin a driver’s chance as he would lose a run under the old 12 lap system or run out of time under the current system. None of this was a problem with the one-lap system.

For all of these reasons, I was a fan of the one-lap format. Even though I was on my own, I was opposed to the move away from it. Now we are once again stuck with a system that varies from mind-numbing tedium to brain-frazzling information overload.

Related links

• Qualifying reports
• FIA tweak qualifying
• Briatore: “Fix qualifying”
• F1 qualifying for DTM
• Aggregate qualifying finally axed
• More from the soapbox

Tags: f1 / formula one / formula 1 / grand prix / motor sport