2023 Formula One Australia Grand Prix

Badwheels · Apr 2, 2023

TRASGU said:
I have seen today Formula Nascar. Liberty Media slowly but steadily are Americanizing this sport and making every single mistake that both CART and Nascar did. Liberty media is seriously making me doubt if the sport had more sport integrity 10 years ago than now. They are turning this sport in fast food racing.

Feats of Liberty Media

Stupid sprint races in where if a car is not properly setup straight out of the box that car suffers the entire weekend because after FP1 they declare park ferme rules and the cars no longer can be touched. Additionally nobody gives spectacle because the stupid budget cap, and because if someone makes a mistake in the sprint race the race is also compromised. And additionally to all of that the sprint race makes the race processional as the cars are already sorted by race pace. With no park ferme someone could find more pace in the race and overtake cars, the rules don't allow it

Races on very doubtful countries with no tradition nor following at all, going as far as racing under a missile attack so close to the track that the smoke can be seen in the TV international feed

23 races per season diluting the value of a single race. When the extraordinary happens regularly the extraordinary becomes ordinary. The same happened with the DRS introduction, it created a lot of boring overtakes in the middle of a long straight due to no driving merit whatsoever while also tying the hands of the defending driver making him almost unable to defend himself

Paywalls everywhere, free to air TV in very severe decline, now you even have to pay to watch the frikking live timing screen that was free even with someone so greedy as Bernie Ecclestone

The most overweight, longest and and understeery cars I have ever seen in this sport
Rules of the sport changing on the fly. Honestly it has to be really uninspiring to drive cars so lazy, long and unbalanced

No longer can happen a race in true rainy conditions because the tyre provider still has not been able to develop a rain tyre capable to race in the same conditions that Bridgestone, Michelin or Goodyear were capable 20+ years ago. Just, let it sink: in more than a decade Pirelli still hasn't cached up what it's predecessors did with technology from 20 years ago.

The FIA not letting a race to keep on when it starts to rain up to a point in that talent can truly overcome car deficits. And meanwhile they let tracks like Baku, Vegas, and Jeddah with inmense straights surrounded by armco barriers pretty close to the track.
Seriously, a tragedy is going to happen at some point in time in one of those tracks, in the same way that for nearly a decade we had close calls with trucks entering in the track to recover cars until Jules Bianchi died.
Just one slightly badly defended overtake in one of those inmense straights where a car clips the rear tyre of another car and the air entering under the car at 370+km/h would be send the car flying out of the track bounds 370+km/h killing a lot of spectators like in the Le Mans dissaster.
The sport created chicanes limiting long straights not to create overtaking points, but to limit the cars top speeds, and now they have become so conceited that the lessons of the past have been forgotten and cars reaching 380km/h on a straight is something OK to them from a safety stand point.

Uninspiring, over engineered and technologically obsolete and irrelevant engines. They dumbed down on it insisting in the same concept just more simplified for 2026+

Red flags associated to a standing re-start to increase drama in situations deemed just enough for a virtual safety car just for the sake of audiences and social media engagement

Liberty media bending over backwards to Netflix making a manipulative, if not openly false and over dramatized "documentary" meant to attract the kind of population that harass drivers on social media

Track limits criteria that changes half a dozen time per season, sometimes even during a single weekend

Change in rules over the season, sometimes even in middle of a single race (Bahrain 2021), it was OK for one car to get out the the track bounds about 40 times, after the very first time that another car did the same suddenly it was no longer OK

A stupid camera inside of drivers helmet that is absolutely uninformative as it is so blurry due to the lack of any stabilization at all. But they insist on show it over and over

The relations with FIA passing for the most confrontational and uncooperative state I have seen since Balestre

World class heritage tracks like Spa, Monaco, Monza or Silverstone continually under the risk of falling of the calendar, meanwhile soulless tracks like Losail, Bahrain, or Abu Dhabi go as far as to purchase from the FOM the exclusive rights to hold all the F1 pre season testing there

Complete lack of testing: just 3 days of testing that lead to unreliable cars on the first races due to lack of running, and a lack of experience to novice drivers

This sport has been turning to the worse since about 1998, and still was pallatable until pre 2009 regulations. After 2020 the sport seems like the jumped the shark in the foolish pursuit of an impossible infinite growth of the sport to appease the company shareholders. CART and Nascar made the same mistakes and they never recovered after changing the format of the sport so much.

I would like to add my less than expert comments to your submission

There are no "sports" any more. There is "sports entertainment".
Entertainment has to be manipulated to provide the audience a product that can be sold

Let's take a look at a few major "sports" and see what has changed to make them more "attractive".

Baseball now has a "shot clock" and review
Tennis now has a "shot clock" and review
Basketball has a shot clock, no defense, traveling, palm dribbling, offensive pushing off and review
American football has defensive back holding, offensive receiver pushing off, no quarterback tackling, no putting your head down tackling, no running backs and review
Not versed in rest of the world football to know changes
Hockey has passing from one end of the ice to the other(damn the lines) and review
Cycling has smaller teams, short stages and too many moto camera operators crashing into the cyclist

F1 is just following suit. If you ask any true follower of any major sport of a number of years do they like what they see now, they would probably tell you no. But entertainers know that to make money, you have to bring in the masses that are non versed in sports history. Those people want entertainment. So for those fans, they think everything is fine.

davehenrie · Apr 2, 2023

markg88 said:
I thought most motorsport had a % rule regarding a red flag? ie, once a certain % of the race has been completed when a red flag is called, then the race is completed. Do F1 not have a % rule? or do they purposely not have one so that they can make the best decision based on entertainment not racing? I think in all races I've seen or been in there was a percentage rule. I'm puzzled.

I would guess the lack of this % rule would be due to having two drivers per team, one could accidentally cause a race ending mishap to protect a leader. Also most manufacturers have customer teams. A whisper to HAAS/Aston/Alpine/Mclaren about ensuring the best parts if Mags etc pulls a crazy stunt near the end to save the factory driver.

Pete Conway · Apr 2, 2023

There are two directions in which to improve F1

1: Business = Add... more cameras, microphones, rules and platforms to view.
2: Racing = Remove radios, mirrors, DRS, reduce downforce, introduce minimum pitstop time.

Kingkoenig · Apr 2, 2023

-Next time F1 fans mention how amateurish Indycar looks, we'll just have to show them the restart after the 2nd red flag.

-How dumb do the Alpine drivers look after this race?

-And sorry Ferrari fans, but Leclerc is overrated. That's yet another mistake from him.

stbreaker · Apr 2, 2023

Badwheels said:
I would like to add my less than expert comments to your submission

There are no "sports" any more. There is "sports entertainment".

Entertainment has to be manipulated to provide the audience a product that can be sold

Less take a look at a few major "sports" and see what has changed to make them more "attractive

Baseball now has a "shot clock" and review
Tennis now has a "shot clock" and review
Basketball has a shot clock, no defense, traveling, palm dribbling, offensive pushing off and review
American football has defensive back holding, offensive receiver pushing off, no quarterback tackling, no putting your head down tackling, no running backs and review
Not versed in rest of the world football to know changes
Hockey has passing from one end of the ice to the other(damn the lines) and review
Cycling has smaller teams, short stages and too many moto camera operators crashing into the cyclist

F1 is just following suit. If you ask any true follower of any major sport of a number of years do they like what they see now, they would probably tell you no. But entertainers know that to make money, you have to bring in the masses that are non versed in sports history. Those people want entertainment. So for those fans, they think everything is fine.

Couldn’t have said it better myself. We as the audience are hypocrites in general. Let’s not kid ourselves. If none of that stuff happened and Max drove off for a 20 second win, this board would be filled with people talking about how F1 is so boring, expensive parade, etc.

It does look like 1-on-1 nobody is touching Red Bull (Max in particular) this season. Mercedes might have been able to hold Max off if they committed to working as a team, but even that feels wishful. Ferrari feels very far off. Aston Martin is really competing with Mercedes. I’m kind of expecting them to drop off once development for the season kicks into gear.

markg88 · Apr 2, 2023

davehenrie said:
I would guess the lack of this % rule would be due to having two drivers per team, one could accidentally cause a race ending mishap to protect a leader. Also most manufacturers have customer teams. A whisper to HAAS/Aston/Alpine/Mclaren about ensuring the best parts if Mags etc pulls a crazy stunt near the end to save the factory driver.

Yes, makes sense, considering the F1 paddock is full of snakes.

luizfrj · Apr 2, 2023

A race to end on yellow flag is very boring.

Solution:

Red flags (regardless if they are necessary or no) in first half of the race = standing restarts
Red flags in the second half of the race = rolling starts
Yellow in the last lap = 1 try overtime

And the most important put refueling back!

So easy to solve that mess.

Richard Wilks · Apr 3, 2023

luizfrj said:
A race to end on yellow flag is very boring.

Solution:

Red flags (regardless if they are necessary or no) in first half of the race = standing restarts
Red flags in the second half of the race = rolling starts
Yellow in the last lap = 1 try overtime

And the most important put refueling back!

So easy to solve that mess.

Refuelling won't solve anything, refuelling was the major driving force in the lack of on track action during the 2000s.

stbreaker · Apr 3, 2023

Richard Wilks said:
Refuelling won't solve anything, refuelling was the major driving force in the lack of on track action during the 2000s.

Right. I’m pretty sure all the variable fuel loads did was cause a few teams to run low in qualifying and start out of position hoping for a melee during the first corner. That rarely paid off. Then by the time they were out of the way there was just a bigger gap between the cars actually capable of battling.

Kingkoenig · Apr 3, 2023

luizfrj said:
And the most important put refueling back!

Please no! Refueling made racing even worse. Every race was about fuel strategy and "passing" in the pitlane.

Aki Korhonen · Apr 3, 2023

f1 is just entertainment not sport. but what else can you expect from Americans

Spinelli · Apr 3, 2023

MJQT said:
Not 100% related to the Grand Prix... but I very much wish F1 management (FOM) was more accommodating to the support series, especially when it comes to TV rights. It's deeply frustrating that SuperView, the paid YouTube service where all the V8 Supercars race weekends are usually broadcast – and the only way for most international fans of the series to watch – is disallowed from broadcasting the Albert Park races because F1 says "no, you must watch on OUR TV package" (and pay accordingly ). Moreover, I read yesterday that FOM even disallows the Porsche Carrera Cup drivers from keeping their own onboard videos because of wanting to aggressively enforce F1 broadcasting rights. Patently ridiculous. I don't care for modern F1, so I wouldn't want to pay for their service anyhow... but talk about a disrespectful way to treat your support series and a way to alienate fans of those series.

Check out burningwheels blogspot website. It has F3, F2 or GP2 or whatever it's called now, F1, Aussie V8s, rally, GT series, Nascar, Brazilian V8s, Formula Japan or whatever, truck racing, and more. It even has qualy sessions for F3 if you want to go that deep. Races are posted only a few hours after they occur in real life. Some times less. Consider donating a bit. He/she deserves it.

Aki Korhonen · Apr 3, 2023

we need 2 races on sunday...30laps maybe no 70 laps because normal human will fall asleep because its so so so boooooooooooooring and take the drs off. everybody can bypass on straights.for example my grandmother

Turk · Apr 3, 2023

TRASGU said:
Paywalls everywhere, free to air TV in very severe decline, now you even have to pay to watch the frikking live timing screen that was free even with someone so greedy as Bernie Ecclestone

I'm not paying for this shyte. I'm cancelling everything and going back to the high seas, they are all now taking to much piss.

Badwheels said:
F1 is just following suit. If you ask any true follower of any major sport of a number of years do they like what they see now, they would probably tell you no. But entertainers know that to make money, you have to bring in the masses that are non versed in sports history.

I don't' see anything changing until the consumer starts standing up to them. The problem is consumers will cry and moan, then line up to pay the asking price.
Modern corporations don't care if the customer is unhappy, all they care about is money coming in. As long as people pay the money the companies see that as a pat on the back, it really doesn't matter what else you say, all they see is money.
It's going to take people denying themselves for these owners to change.

BillyBobSenna · Apr 3, 2023

Aki Korhonen said:
f1 is just entertainment not sport. but what else can you expect from Americans

And don’t you forget it!

MJQT · Apr 3, 2023

Turk said:
I don't' see anything changing until the consumer starts standing up to them. The problem is consumers will cry and moan, then line up to pay the asking price.

This. 1000%.

Also goes for bad video games. People complain, but other people (and maybe some of the same people too!) line-up and pre-order... or worse, read the bad reviews then still buy the game. Remember, people, you're "voting with your wallets" – financially supporting something is, in effect, saying "I want more of this". If you don't want more... then don't buy it, and if you do buy it (or continue to subscribe) you can only complain so much.

pitkin · Apr 3, 2023

muzikant said:
in the past the teams were further apart with even a pre-qualification that could go home on Saturday. It's just closer together see the midfield now regarding your point 4. I'm sure with the top teams the drivers get equal opportunities at the start of the season it's up to the driver himself to beat your team mate,, Saintz, Russel, Peres so disagree with you. Gerard Berger was Senna's teammate but was clearly not faster

For both drivers to have an equal opportunity, the car would have to suit both drivers equally. I'm only guessing, but I'd wager they listen to Max more when it comes to car development than they do Sergio. I'd imagine it was the same for Senna and Berger too (and most driver pairings in top teams). IIRC Berger was very uncomfortable in the Mclaren, even finding shifting awkward because of his longer arms. Maybe if Senna had of instead joined a team built around Gerhard's physicality and driving style things would have been different?

We saw with Lewis and Fernando what happens when two hungry drivers are on the same team, they give the drivers title to somebody else. In fairness to them, the team and Fernando weren't expecting a rookie to be quite so competitive. In 2010 we almost saw it happen again when Red Bull came close to giving the Championship to Fernando (Massa wasn't taking points off him as Mark and Seb were with each other)

Sadly those situations don't happen very often. I think I'm right in saying 2016 was the last genuine team mate battle for the title, but there were no realistic challengers to steal it from them that time. Seems to me they've worked out it's better to have a the safe option of a "star" driver and someone who's just glad to be there picking up podiums.

Richard Wilks · Apr 3, 2023

pitkin said:
For both drivers to have an equal opportunity, the car would have to suit both drivers equally. I'm only guessing, but I'd wager they listen to Max more when it comes to car development than they do Sergio. I'd imagine it was the same for Senna and Berger too (and most driver pairings in top teams). IIRC Berger was very uncomfortable in the Mclaren, even finding shifting awkward because of his longer arms. Maybe if Senna had of instead joined a team built around Gerhard's physicality and driving style things would have been different?

We saw with Lewis and Fernando what happens when two hungry drivers are on the same team, they give the drivers title to somebody else. In fairness to them, the team and Fernando weren't expecting a rookie to be quite so competitive. In 2010 we almost saw it happen again when Red Bull came close to giving the Championship to Fernando (Massa wasn't taking points off him as Mark and Seb were with each other)

Sadly those situations don't happen very often. I think I'm right in saying 2016 was the last genuine team mate battle for the title, but there were no realistic challengers to steal it from them that time. Seems to me they've worked out it's better to have a the safe option of a "star" driver and someone who's just glad to be there picking up podiums.

That tittle would have been won by Alonso, and also the following year, if Mclaren wouldn't decide to essentially sabotage Alonso's chances that year, either by ruining his strategy, either by letting his teamate go rogue (Hungary) or by plain sabotage ( the whole tire pressure saga that at some point required FIA people to be watching Alonso's car). The exact same thing without so much drama can be said about 2010, when Vettel had full backing of Marko and the high Red Bull staff to "go rogue" against team orders and Webber on track.

The two top drivers can work, if the team is there to keep them in check, and enforce team orders if the situation warrants itself.

davehenrie · Apr 3, 2023

Even though he won some races, Juan Pablo Montoya was never really happy with his BMW. If I recall, the car was either setup or designed, as Pitkin stated, to suit Ralf Schumacher's style of driving. The super quick hands of Montoya never got the pointy car he deserved.

markg88 · Apr 3, 2023

Richard Wilks said:
That tittle would have been won by Alonso, and also the following year, if Mclaren wouldn't decide to essentially sabotage Alonso's chances that year, either by ruining his strategy, either by letting his teamate go rogue (Hungary) or by plain sabotage ( the whole tire pressure saga that at some point required FIA people to be watching Alonso's car). The exact same thing without so much drama can be said about 2010, when Vettel had full backing of Marko and the high Red Bull staff to "go rogue" against team orders and Webber on track.

The two top drivers can work, if the team is there to keep them in check, and enforce team orders if the situation warrants itself.

Fully agree. Will be interesting to see how it all pans out at Mercedes. Equal drivers pretty much although Hamilton has more experience of the tyres in races on the Merc car and maybe (seems to me) Russell more intelligent.
I'd really like them to be allowed to race but I have a horrible feeling with the car a contender now, Hamilton will be favoured by devious means but with the 'optics' that they are both free to race.

2023 Formula One Australia Grand Prix

Who will win the 2023 Formula One Australian Grand Prix?

Max Verstappen

Sergio Perez

Fernando Alonso

Lance Stroll

Charles Leclerc

Carlos Sainz

Lewis Hamilton

George Russell

Esteban Ocon

Pierre Gasly

Oscar Piastri

Lando Norris

Kevin Magnussen

Nico Hulkenberg

Zhou Guanyu

Valterri Bottas

Logan Sargeant

Alex Albon

Nyck Devries

Yuki Tsunoda

Understanding where everyone sits​

Piastri returns home​

Team management will be crucial​

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More games, period

Better graphics/visuals

Advanced physics and handling

More cars and tracks

AI improvements

AI engineering

Cross-platform play

New game Modes

Other, post your idea

Understanding where everyone sits

Piastri returns home

Team management will be crucial