6 ms·

I don't understand why it would kill the sport, could you explain?

pangoraw 6y ago
I think this is mostly to give teams with smaller budgets a fighting chance against teams like say Mercedes who have an astronomical budget and could finance R&D all year long.
nindalf 6y ago
They mentioned astronomical expense. I’m guessing if one deep pocketed team did it and gained an advantage, the others would be forced to do the same. These teams would risk bankruptcy if they didn’t win. And not everyone can win.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
Gene_Parmesan 6y ago
Expenses. Currently the top spenders are Ferrari and Mercedes. Both spend somewhere around $330 million (US) per year (and Mercedes has spent a total of $1.4 billion over the course of these current engine regs developing their car -- that's just development, not race expenses.). This is a beyond insane figure, but it's worth it to them for the marketing. Meanwhile smaller teams -- the teams you need to actually fill out a grid so there's actual racing to watch -- are probably around the $100 million/year mark. F1 is almost purely play-to-win, to use a modern coinage. The aerodynamics involved have been so insanely optimized that teams spend millions per year to employ some of the best aerodynamicists in the world to eke out another 0.005 secs/lap over the competition. The performance gap between the top and the rest is fairly proportional to the spending gaps. In recent years it's been Mercedes winning every championship, with Ferrari winning a share of races and Red Bull stealing one or two. Those top 6 cars are often a full minute ahead of the pack after just a dozen laps or so. The rest of the cars have no chance at all. This year it's even worse as Ferrari got caught doing something illegal so their engine has been nerfed. Mercedes just drive away at the start and are almost never remotely challenged. Now in this environment, how many sponsors/car companies want to spend hundreds of millions per year just to tool around multiple minutes behind the Mercedes cars? It's just not a good investment. And many good ideas to counteract this (reverse-grid sprint races on Saturday to decide starting order on Sunday, as opposed to traditional qualy, at select tracks) are lampooned by the fanbase for being untraditional. Unfortunately if the sport continues like this there won't be any traditions left to uphold at all; I understand their complaints but it's a delicate balance. The latest attempt to restore some modicum of balance is spending caps. The only chance F1 has to survive long term is to encourage new teams to the sport and discourage current ones from leaving, and that means (a) limiting spending across the grid, and (b) not allowing the top engine manufacturers free reign over the formula. Unrestricted research/testing would hasten its demise because it's just another opportunity for the rich teams to spend more. And point (b) above is what killed the LMP1 class; engine manufacturers exercise political sway to make it harder for other manufacturers to enter/win/compete, but then the grid starts dying and those manufacturers pull out, leaving a set of ossified regulations that make it almost impossible for new engine manufacturers to enter.
- notnap 6y ago
  Please go and check this Ferrari season. You are in for a s🅱️in
  - friendlybus 6y ago
    A spinotto, a sbinnata even. This is romain grosjean to gunther steiner. I think I've lost control.
  - tobr 6y ago
    Huh, this is the first time I’ve seen an emoji on HN. I thought they were filtered out.
  - toyg 6y ago
    Reddit is leaking hard. We have to do something. Pronto, Binotto?
- travisjungroth 6y ago
  Seems harder to regulate spending in racing than other sports. In baseball, it’s pretty much all in athlete salaries. I bet most (if not all) teams have a single player that makes more than the whole coaching, analytics and scouting staff put together. And all these salaries are public. But in racing, so much spending is “off the field”. Seems tough to audit and easy to cheat.
  - ajsnigrutin 6y ago
    The problem here is also the research costs. Things, that were only in racing cars years ago, appear now in production cars. Basically, Mercedes can afford to try new things in racing, because it will bring them money in the long run, by selling those new features in their "normal" (road) sports cars. Even if we limit the research costs, some other Mercedes team will work with (eg.) engine optimizations for their production sports cars, and those findings will also find their way to racing. Even with mainstream car makers (which most of the companies there are), it's easier to develop racing stuff, if you then sell a bunch of very expensive, very fast street-legal cars, than if you sell mostly "normal, working people cars".
michaelt 6y ago
F1 teams have severely unbalanced finances. There's a small number of teams that keep winning and have most of the fans. Having the fastest car this year gives you a leg up next year, having the fastest car attracts the fastest drivers, and having the most fans gives you negotiating leverage over the governing body. For example, Ferrari have so many fans and so much negotiating leverage they get given $100 million every year - a "heritage bonus" Uncapped spending would mean all the other teams would either go bankrupt, or be completely uncompetitive.
- bosie 6y ago
  Isn't F1's unbalanced finances nothing compared to other sports though? i.e. tennis. federer has completely different opportunities compared to a top 75 player. did it kill the tennis sport and/or is it killing the sport? you could argue that way given that it is always the same folks winning the big tournaments
  - rogy 6y ago
    But Tennis isn't dictated on who has the most billions to invest in new technologies, its pretty limited to the amount of money you can spend on coaching.
    - bosie 6y ago
      kind of. coaching is probably peanuts compared to the rest. physios (and all other folks) that fly with you. first class and private flights (hilarious that the top players are flown on the tournament dime to the tournaments), perfect nutrition (potentially with personal chefs), nutritionists, drugs or drug therapies, surgeries, preventative medicine etc. staying in a topnotch hotel for two or three weeks prior to a grandslam tournament to get accustomed to the location and time zone.... the list goes on and on. federer can spend 5 million on it per year without notiicing it. the world number 100? probably 20k.
      - smcl 6y ago
        Cool, now take ALL of those things you listed and now include the fact that in F1 they have to develop and build an entire car as well
elorant 6y ago
Because smaller teams could not afford it. Thus you'd end-up with a handful of teams competing which would probably translate to half the cars you see on track now. Diversity in any sport is what brings in fans and sponsors. Three to four big names competing with each other with no one else on sight could kill F1, or any sport for that matter.
- romanoderoma 6y ago
  on the other side, if there were only 5 top teams with 4 car each, competition would be much closer than it is now... Look at how it is now: Mercedes has one official team, one unofficial (racing point) and a third "hidden" team, the former Williams. Where is Toto Wolff going after the announcement that he will leave Mercedes? and why you say Williams? (Wolff has bought shares of both Aston Martin - former Racing Point - and Williams) That's 6 Mercedes cars, but only 2 allowed to go fast and win. Ferrari-Alfa Romeo are in a similar situation. I say let them race and see what happens. Put the human factor back by having less cars, but with similar performances.

I think this is mostly to give teams with smaller budgets a fighting chance against teams like say Mercedes who have an astronomical budget and could finance R&D all year long.

nindalf 6y ago

They mentioned astronomical expense. I’m guessing if one deep pocketed team did it and gained an advantage, the others would be forced to do the same. These teams would risk bankruptcy if they didn’t win. And not everyone can win.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

Gene_Parmesan 6y ago

Expenses. Currently the top spenders are Ferrari and Mercedes. Both spend somewhere around $330 million (US) per year (and Mercedes has spent a total of $1.4 billion over the course of these current engine regs developing their car -- that's just development, not race expenses.). This is a beyond insane figure, but it's worth it to them for the marketing. Meanwhile smaller teams -- the teams you need to actually fill out a grid so there's actual racing to watch -- are probably around the $100 million/year mark. F1 is almost purely play-to-win, to use a modern coinage. The aerodynamics involved have been so insanely optimized that teams spend millions per year to employ some of the best aerodynamicists in the world to eke out another 0.005 secs/lap over the competition. The performance gap between the top and the rest is fairly proportional to the spending gaps. In recent years it's been Mercedes winning every championship, with Ferrari winning a share of races and Red Bull stealing one or two. Those top 6 cars are often a full minute ahead of the pack after just a dozen laps or so. The rest of the cars have no chance at all. This year it's even worse as Ferrari got caught doing something illegal so their engine has been nerfed. Mercedes just drive away at the start and are almost never remotely challenged. Now in this environment, how many sponsors/car companies want to spend hundreds of millions per year just to tool around multiple minutes behind the Mercedes cars? It's just not a good investment. And many good ideas to counteract this (reverse-grid sprint races on Saturday to decide starting order on Sunday, as opposed to traditional qualy, at select tracks) are lampooned by the fanbase for being untraditional. Unfortunately if the sport continues like this there won't be any traditions left to uphold at all; I understand their complaints but it's a delicate balance. The latest attempt to restore some modicum of balance is spending caps. The only chance F1 has to survive long term is to encourage new teams to the sport and discourage current ones from leaving, and that means (a) limiting spending across the grid, and (b) not allowing the top engine manufacturers free reign over the formula. Unrestricted research/testing would hasten its demise because it's just another opportunity for the rich teams to spend more. And point (b) above is what killed the LMP1 class; engine manufacturers exercise political sway to make it harder for other manufacturers to enter/win/compete, but then the grid starts dying and those manufacturers pull out, leaving a set of ossified regulations that make it almost impossible for new engine manufacturers to enter.

notnap 6y ago
Please go and check this Ferrari season. You are in for a s🅱️in
- friendlybus 6y ago
  A spinotto, a sbinnata even. This is romain grosjean to gunther steiner. I think I've lost control.
- tobr 6y ago
  Huh, this is the first time I’ve seen an emoji on HN. I thought they were filtered out.
- toyg 6y ago
  Reddit is leaking hard. We have to do something. Pronto, Binotto?
travisjungroth 6y ago
Seems harder to regulate spending in racing than other sports. In baseball, it’s pretty much all in athlete salaries. I bet most (if not all) teams have a single player that makes more than the whole coaching, analytics and scouting staff put together. And all these salaries are public. But in racing, so much spending is “off the field”. Seems tough to audit and easy to cheat.
- ajsnigrutin 6y ago
  The problem here is also the research costs. Things, that were only in racing cars years ago, appear now in production cars. Basically, Mercedes can afford to try new things in racing, because it will bring them money in the long run, by selling those new features in their "normal" (road) sports cars. Even if we limit the research costs, some other Mercedes team will work with (eg.) engine optimizations for their production sports cars, and those findings will also find their way to racing. Even with mainstream car makers (which most of the companies there are), it's easier to develop racing stuff, if you then sell a bunch of very expensive, very fast street-legal cars, than if you sell mostly "normal, working people cars".

michaelt 6y ago

F1 teams have severely unbalanced finances. There's a small number of teams that keep winning and have most of the fans. Having the fastest car this year gives you a leg up next year, having the fastest car attracts the fastest drivers, and having the most fans gives you negotiating leverage over the governing body. For example, Ferrari have so many fans and so much negotiating leverage they get given $100 million every year - a "heritage bonus" Uncapped spending would mean all the other teams would either go bankrupt, or be completely uncompetitive.

bosie 6y ago
Isn't F1's unbalanced finances nothing compared to other sports though? i.e. tennis. federer has completely different opportunities compared to a top 75 player. did it kill the tennis sport and/or is it killing the sport? you could argue that way given that it is always the same folks winning the big tournaments
- rogy 6y ago
  But Tennis isn't dictated on who has the most billions to invest in new technologies, its pretty limited to the amount of money you can spend on coaching.
  - bosie 6y ago
    kind of. coaching is probably peanuts compared to the rest. physios (and all other folks) that fly with you. first class and private flights (hilarious that the top players are flown on the tournament dime to the tournaments), perfect nutrition (potentially with personal chefs), nutritionists, drugs or drug therapies, surgeries, preventative medicine etc. staying in a topnotch hotel for two or three weeks prior to a grandslam tournament to get accustomed to the location and time zone.... the list goes on and on. federer can spend 5 million on it per year without notiicing it. the world number 100? probably 20k.
    - smcl 6y ago
      Cool, now take ALL of those things you listed and now include the fact that in F1 they have to develop and build an entire car as well

elorant 6y ago

Because smaller teams could not afford it. Thus you'd end-up with a handful of teams competing which would probably translate to half the cars you see on track now. Diversity in any sport is what brings in fans and sponsors. Three to four big names competing with each other with no one else on sight could kill F1, or any sport for that matter.

romanoderoma 6y ago
on the other side, if there were only 5 top teams with 4 car each, competition would be much closer than it is now... Look at how it is now: Mercedes has one official team, one unofficial (racing point) and a third "hidden" team, the former Williams. Where is Toto Wolff going after the announcement that he will leave Mercedes? and why you say Williams? (Wolff has bought shares of both Aston Martin - former Racing Point - and Williams) That's 6 Mercedes cars, but only 2 allowed to go fast and win. Ferrari-Alfa Romeo are in a similar situation. I say let them race and see what happens. Put the human factor back by having less cars, but with similar performances.