Thursday 1 April 2010

F1 Overtaking Solution Found

I guess the fundamental problem with overtaking and F1 is that a lot of effort is put into ensuring that the best cars start at the front of the grid through qualifying. Why should we then expect slower cars to even stand a chance of overtaking? Overtaking should therefore only be possible if the car in front makes a mistake or the car behind has some kind of advantage. Drivers make few mistakes these days - and it's almost impossible for a car to run well in the hot dirty air of the car in front. Given that we're unlikely to return to the days of fully manual gear changes with a foot clutch it's unlikely that driver mistakes are going to increase.

Perhaps then we should concentrate on giving chasing cars some kind of temporary advantage. How about rev limiting all cars most of the time but allowing drivers the ability to use full revs on a limited number of occasions during a race. It would then be up to the drivers to decide when to use their full rev allowance - either for overtaking or holding off a challenge. It should be possible to keep a record of how many times an allowance has been used so that those watching the race can still see who has the ability to use full revs - unless it would be better to keep that fact a secret from the drivers!

Monday 15 March 2010

Hail Alonso - Ferrari have a new hero

So the first race of 2010 is over, what did we learn? Well, already it looks like being a three division series. with the newcomers - Lotus, Virgin and Hispania occupying the bottom division. The Mid Division looks like comprising Sauber, Williams, Renault, Torro Rosso and Force India. Division 1 holds no surprises and is made up of Red Bull, Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes. Alsonso was a little lucky to bring the race home for Ferrari as Vettel had looked the man from pole to lap 33 when a duff spark plug screwed his race. We can expect to see Red Bull and Ferrari slugging it out over the next few races whilst McLaren and Mercedes pull out all the stops to close the gap. It was also an interesting race for team head-to-head challenges. Alonso seems to have put Massa in his place, whilst Hamilton did a good job over Button. Rosberg may think he's got on top of Schumi but he should be aware that Schumi had the faster laps yesterday. Schumi may be a little rusty but he is getting back on pace - and he did hold off the reigning World Champion! It will be interesting to see what happens in the next race or two. Oh - and people don't seem to like the lack of refuelling!

Thursday 11 March 2010

F1 Testing Tease

So how much can we tell from pre-season testing? Last year the final two test sessions in Barcelona and Jerez gave a fair clue to the first race. Generally speaking, those at the top of the testing performed best in the race. Brawn, Toyota, Renault and Williams all performed well in testing and on race day in Melbourne. On the other hand, Ferrari and Sauber disappointed. If 2010 follows test form then we should be looking at Ferrari, McLaren, Mercedes and Red Bull - but don't rule out Williams or Sauber. So take your pick! The true test will be Sunday's race in Bahrain. The ban on refuelling will mean that qualifying will show us which cars run quick on a low fuel load but only the race will tell us how good a car is over the full fuel range. Bring it on. I hate the off-season.

Wednesday 10 February 2010

Atomic Jihad - the Repeat

Once upon a time I wrote a film script called Atomic Jihad. I have been trying to find a buyer ever since. Once upon a time it was listed by Scriptshark. Yesterday I went online to check if Scriptshark were still listing it, they're not, but and lo and behold I discovered that Joel Gilbert has just released a film called Atomic Jihad. All I can say is that Joel's is a political documentary whilst my script is for a thriller. See if you can guess which would be most fun to watch! Anyway, I reckon I'll have to come up with a new name for my work now - even if it is held in the U.S library of Congress under that name. Such is life - and it's okay Joel, I don't have a problem. Who knows - maybe you saw the title of my work and liked it. If that's true I wouldn't mind a little acknowledgment.