Today I saw someone refer to Lewis Hamilton as the greatest of all time. I thought to myself, "Put Sir Lewis in a late 1960s F1 car (with the cockpit flanked by fuel tanks), with no ground effect generating downforce, on a period track, with period correct tires, with the period's lack of concern for safety, and see if his pace compares to race winners back then."
Let's just conveniently forget Ascari, Fangio or Jim Clark, eh? :) Since we're comparing American sports to European, let me try and make an analogy here, where Sir Lewis The Second might sit in this whole thing. Yogi Berra was a machine gunner on Omaha Beach, Ted Williams completed 39 combat flights; Alex Rodríguez will go down as a steroid using crybaby who has his merch made in China. Same with Hamilton, you get the 'great old ones' who drank, smoke and downed burgers before (and after) racing stick-shift deathtraps, then you see HAM dressed as a runway queen rolling in on an E-scooter. He calls himself a philanthropist, and he does support Formula E, better known as the WNBA of motor sports, or as Jack would call it The Current Thing. Lewis was kneeling, wearing BLM clothing, but he doesn't outright support black or even female coming-uppers. Even the ever unlikeable Ayrton Senna was supporting kids with thinner wallets (or none at all) at the start of their carreers. One of them got a million-people procession at their funeral, the other will get a mention in the sports section.
While we're adding names to the list, don't forget Mario, Gurney, and Donohue, who all had success in a variety of racing formats. My personal choice for GOAT has to favor Andretti because of that variety. John Surtees surely belongs on the list, but do Graham Hill and Rene Dreyfuss?
I was restricting myself only to Formula 1 and pre-war Grand Prix guns.
If we are contemplating achievements outside of that discipline, perhaps it’s Graham Hill - he is the only man to win the Triple Crown, although several drivers have won two legs.
I actually wonder whether the opposite might be true. The old Formula 1 cars were more dangerous, but compared to the new ones, it was the proverbial "driving a slow car fast", which is usually more fun, but also less demanding.
Today's drivers would probably refuse to accept the high risk of death (and rightly so), but skill-wise, they are probably better. The old guys could win based on courage, today, you have to keep the car at something like 999/1000ths of the pace, if you are to have a chance.
Can you imagine that something who spent as much time drinking, partying and generally doing stuff other than focusing at being the best, like James Hunt was, could have any serious chance today?
The 1958 Ferrari Tipo 246 was about ~1200lbs and had 280hp, which in power-to-weight is closer to a modern road car than a 2022 F1 car. It of course was a spaceship back then and everything but a "slow car". Could an oldschool driver from the old days sit in a modern downforce car and drive it well? Just as well as a modern driver could sit in a 65 year old car and drive it the same way ;)
The “GOAT” argument crops up all the time in all sports these days.
It’s very hard to compare the likes of Nuvolari, Fangio, Clark, Stewart, Lauda, Senna, Schumacher, Hamilton, Vettel, Verstappen, etc. across the ages.
What is likely, however, is that Max will take the big records if he wants them. Given his young age and the 22+ races per season on the calendar, he can win 103+ races and 7+ titles provided he can find himself in the right car.
"Consistently dominant performances by a small group of elite teams do not, in my view, diminish the quality of the entertainment, especially if artificially construed 'parity' is the alternative."
I find both alternatives to be unbearably boring to watch. I honestly question the intelligence of somebody who's consistently entertained by "their" team competing for a title every year. I mean, how many times can you watch, say, the 1949-64 Yankees or Steph Curry's Golden State Warriors dominate?
"Don't try to strike everybody out. Strikeouts are boring. Besides that, they're fascist. Throw some more ground balls, it's more democratic." - Crash Davis
College football is the worst, since the rules meddling decreases rather than increases parity. Seeing a team like Ohio State never get seriously challenged with a schedule of mediocre Big 10 teams and no-name chump teams and then arbitrarily waltz into the playoff is just ridiculous. It's even more maddening if you have the misfortune of living next to the fanbase of a team like that (former Ohio resident here) and have to listen to their entitled blather every year. Conversely, the only entertaining thing in college football is watching a team like that get their teeth kicked in.
I tend to be a "hater" when it comes to lopsided competitions, rooting against the dominant player. On the other hand, I find watching an aging GOAT like Tom Brady or Tiger Woods try to overcome adversity to get one last championship one of the greatest spectacles in sports. So I guess you can chalk up a win for unexpected outcomes.
As a long-suffering Michigan fan who finally saw entropy restored last year against that team from Columbus, I echo your sentiments! During the halcyon days of the Woody/Bo era, one of the teams might win for a couple years, the underdog would spoil the season of the one cruising to the Rose Bowl (which is probably going to fade into history if UCLA and USC transition to the Big Ten—so it’ll ultimately be the Big Ten, the SEC, and everyone else?), but it was at least a contest!
If nothing else, of late, the ‘Shoe (so to speak) of the Cooper years has been firmly on the other foot (and neck)! Certainly some of the staffing choices by the athletic department in Ann Arbor have been questionable as well!
I'm surprised you mention chicago and big ten together because college football season in the area is always such a let down. Northwestern always sucks and the Illini are usually out of contention after a couple weeks. The people who went to other schools have all the fun.
I do agree that it becomes tiresome - even for fans of the victors - if one or a handful of teams wins all the time. But it can still be entertaining if there is occasional jeopardy.
I have friends who attended Alabama who no longer watch every game, because they expect Alabama to win; they are - implicitly, at least - entitled to victories.
This is where as a Schumacher (Sr.) fan, I will disagree. Never got tired of watching him beat people. Arguably seasons in which he was beaten were MORE entertaining (Like Hakkinen's championship), but watching him win on merit was never tiresome.
I used the word “dominant” in the sentence that Alan quoted above.
A dominant victory is different than a victory; Max has won the last five races, but they were not all dominant. He had to move through the field for 60% of them.
Liberty will not allow Max to steamroll through the next few years. They will erect some barriers to make it more challenging for him.
No disrespect to Michael Schumacher but was it a case of merit or was it a case of having an unfair advantage, like Mark Donohue said, in that Ferrari simply had the faster cars? If I'm not mistaken, Ferrari was outspending everybody then as well. I found F1 in that era to be a boring parade.
It's only boring if you wish to discount effort. There are good technical reasons why they were that successful and Michael's work ethic was one of the major factors.
Never mind that my comment wasn't specifically about the Ferrari years either.
The Monaco GP historically placed practice on Thursday and media commitments on Friday (the reverse of all other events).
One year MSC felt like he would have an issue at the start with the clutch packs that Ferrari was using that year. The start, of course, is critical given the processional nature of Monaco.
Schumacher helicoptered to Maranello on Friday and practiced starts all day before returning to the principality. He nailed the start on Sunday and won the race.
I am shocked the Judge allowed this. I now consider the door open on the previously suppressed topic of college football. I look forward to multi paragraph comments, linking to illustration, about play calling tendencies and counter plays. That assumes, in my mind correctly, the the average conscientious of the college football fan on this site in comparison to those on Land Grant Holy Land(no link on purpose) is parallel to the conscientiousness difference between here and the current from of TTAC on cars.
More seriously, F1 and college football are the only two sports that I don't participate in that I enjoy spectating. I had not given much thought to why that is the case but your reasons resonate with me. I will enjoy pondering that today, thank you.
The Judge and I spent the best part of a day together spectating at Road Atlanta, and this topic emerged as part of our discussion.
To summarize my thoughts succinctly: The likelihood of the expected outcomes in both Formula 1 and CFB renders any deviation meaningful, whereas it’s hard to discern any meaning in the seemingly randomized outcomes in the NFL and other top forms of racing.
The NFL wants random outcomes, but there are organizations that consistently excel anyway. The Patriots had a 20 year run while the NFL changed officiating and fabricated scandals to stop them. Conversely, the Jets are terrible regardless of how many top 5 picks they get. There are a few surprises every year, but for the most part it's the same teams in the playoffs or picking in the top 10.
I think the NFL has benefitted from the same likelihood of expected outcomes. People tune in to see if anyone can beat the top teams. NFL succeeds in spite of itself!
I like your argument, and I'll probably use it when discussing motorsport with my football friends who just don't understand and occasionally ask me why the wife and I watch F1 so religiously. (disclaimer: I'd watch waaay more motorsport if there were more hours in the week, but football I gotta keep the fuck away from cuz I watch that like a fantasy league guy, but without the fantasy league).
Small, pedantic grievance regarding comparing [insert (motor)sport here] to pro wrestling, from a pro wrestling fan that also started around grade 2, but hasn't stopped being a fan (although I don't have the time to indulge as I once did):
The criticisms I most often see levied against pro wrestling are that it's "fake" and "scripted", when in reality, it's fiction. I'm not going to get into the trigger-warning-style shame-spiral disclaimers that the modern wrestlers seem to preface any discussion of their sport (I'm appropriating the term here as a fan) outside of the arena, but pro wrestling is an amazing, authentic, and complex piece of Americana that no one with a pair of eyes has ever considered a legitimate one-on-one competition, and I don't think it's ever fooled anyone—Gotch v. Hackenschmidt was criticized in as many papers after the fact for being pro wrestling as papers before the event hyping it up as if it were going to be an actual competition. Pro wrestling is good, seriously good when you walk into an event rolling your eyes at the flippy munchkin gymnasts and munchkin brawlers (I miss the big guys) that suck you into a match for five to thirty minutes and hold you there. It's hard to do, and most of the time as an old nerd it's fun to pick apart where that hold collapses, but occasionally it doesn't and those are the matches that are fun to go back to.
People who like to be agreeable with me like to compare pro wrestling to theatre as some sort of concession, and it certainly shares some elements, but to me, it's more like improvisational jazz.
So... as fans of both, I'll let you know if I ever see motorsport that resembles pro wrestling, because I'd probably be into that.
Not sure what Liberty will eventually make out of F1, but I enjoy endlessly as they find brick-by-brick every little side deal that Ecclestone had with the venues :) The details are officially unknown but it was kind of an open secret to everyone but Liberty's execs that Monaco doesn't pay a dime to F1; this was such a blow that it was mentioned on formula1.com that the iconic circuit might be taken out from the calendar.
The thing with boring dominance of one team... when Ferrari hired Schumacher at the end of the '95 season it took them 3 years to get the team up to speed. In the retrospective interview, Eddie Irvine says that when they sat in the Ferrari F310 for the first time, both were horrified - the Italian stallions were _very_ different from their former rides. It took years to literally and figuratively stop the wheels from falling off, some might argue that even the 2000 Championship was a bit of a lucky break for them. It took determination, Jean Todt's famous "if a part fails in any way it will be redesigned, we're not using it again" credo, Schumacher's otherworldly talent, and they kept winning for the next 5 years, even if it was starting to get a bit boring towards the end.
In comparison, Mercedes simply bought an already pretty sorted Brawn GP, spent the money the Brits didn't have and won 7 straight years. I'd argue that 2022 is the first ever season where we see the "Stuttgart Équipe" (that's based in Brackley, UK) dealing with real problems. I'd say they seem to have bounced back from the start-of-the-year slump, but the season's far from over yet.
Taking the long view on F1 helps with the entertainment factor as well - a newcomer to the sport may be stunned to learn of the one-time dominance of Williams and McLaren (coinciding often with the presence of current Red Bull CTO Adrian Newey). The amazing thing about dominant F1 teams, much like dominant college football programs, is the ability to do it year-in and year-out. It's not a dominant machine or a dominant driver - it's a dominant organization that ruthlessly delivers excellence.
I am frustrated that the closed franchise model of American sports has made its way to F1 though, denying Andretti and others a shot to at least make the back of the field more interesting.
Seems like they have no problem screwing Andretti (1993 wasn’t enough apparently), but are willing to welcome new entries from Porsche or Audi with open arms.
Well, the Porsche and Red Bull tie-up ended up being a sure thing that never was, in reality. It’s over before it started. Audi is buying Sauber, so there’s no new team.
Andretti - or anyone else - can BUY a team if parties are willing to transact.
I've long thought that racing series, NASCAR in particular, should just issue every team a copy of one car design, and let the teams repair them but not modify them.
Be open about it, and be done with it.
Seriously, enough interpreting the rules and then making new ones. If the world of motorsport wants human drama, just use the same car design for each team.
From the perspective of someone who's far more interested in the technology of race cars than some bullshit human drama, it's endlessly frustrating to watch sanctioning bodies ban this brilliant car part or that inspired design feature because it gives the team an "unfair advantage."
I don't care about photo finishes, I want to see what kind of suicide machine some mad scientist will cook up in his garage to win a race.
The (potential) opportunity to claim responsibility for the engineering leading to victories is what motivates OEMs to be in F1; that, and the large audience, of course.
I see two problems with Indy Car and NASCAR being essentially spec racing series. One is that in both there is little competitive technological innovation. The other is that NASCAR is divorced from it's orgins, which were based on cars you could buy. I suppose that nowadays, a "stock" based series would have to be based on SUVs to both have RWD and appeal to today's consumers. Perhaps it would make sense for NASCAR to have a lower level series just like that.
My reaction to your piece is indifference. I am neither a big F1 fan nor a college football fan. Why am I even commenting? I like seeing connections between seemingly disparate subjects, I suppose, and I like learning how people who DO care think.
I really do like your writing style, on this and other articles, and so I mean no disrespect, but I lost the track between the stated similarities between football, F1, and the details of Verstappen's pre-race travails. There may be more than 1 article's worth of material, background, and claims here. Or it may be because I'm 3 beers into an enjoyable Saturday night PBS lineup (love those comfortable, predictable British mysteries).
Anyway, I gave it a go, and I thank you for your bold argument. I may re-read this tomorrow, and the connections will make more sense.
I always figured college football and NASCAR went hand in hand, and that's where it began and ended -- a southern thing.
1. Thank you for taking time to comment despite your indifference! Moreover, thank you for contemplating a re-visitation of the topic tomorrow!
2. There definitely IS too much content for a typical, pitchy article. I enjoy reading long(er) form content, and brevity is not my strong suit.
3. Appreciate the criticism that I perhaps failed to articulate my argument with sufficient reason or clarity. This essay would have received an F letter grade if you were my professor!
I'm still hanging on, at 9pm. Midsomer Murders is a real humdinger tonight. Bedtime be damned!
I have no complaints about the length of your article. I read the Artura piece with amazement at the detail you captured, and that was indeed a long one, as you mention in this thread.
There are times when I "don't get" something, and I think it's the creator's fault, and this happens most of the time, because I'm awesome and easily understand (ha ha). Other times, I think it's my problem, and this seems like it's the case here.
So I don't mean to come across as critical. Far from it, tho "indifference" is not a reaction an author wants. But that's my disinterest in both topics talking, I think. I appreciate your writing and look forward to your future work.
The McLaren Artura write-up was ~7,500 words as I recall. I have a few others written or drafted that are also long. Not everyone appreciates my discursive writing style!
Today I saw someone refer to Lewis Hamilton as the greatest of all time. I thought to myself, "Put Sir Lewis in a late 1960s F1 car (with the cockpit flanked by fuel tanks), with no ground effect generating downforce, on a period track, with period correct tires, with the period's lack of concern for safety, and see if his pace compares to race winners back then."
Let's just conveniently forget Ascari, Fangio or Jim Clark, eh? :) Since we're comparing American sports to European, let me try and make an analogy here, where Sir Lewis The Second might sit in this whole thing. Yogi Berra was a machine gunner on Omaha Beach, Ted Williams completed 39 combat flights; Alex Rodríguez will go down as a steroid using crybaby who has his merch made in China. Same with Hamilton, you get the 'great old ones' who drank, smoke and downed burgers before (and after) racing stick-shift deathtraps, then you see HAM dressed as a runway queen rolling in on an E-scooter. He calls himself a philanthropist, and he does support Formula E, better known as the WNBA of motor sports, or as Jack would call it The Current Thing. Lewis was kneeling, wearing BLM clothing, but he doesn't outright support black or even female coming-uppers. Even the ever unlikeable Ayrton Senna was supporting kids with thinner wallets (or none at all) at the start of their carreers. One of them got a million-people procession at their funeral, the other will get a mention in the sports section.
I love ALL of this, with the exception of the reminder that I left a few names off that list.
We both “forgot” Brabham, Piquet, and Prost, to say nothing of Rosemeyer and Caracciola and …
While we're adding names to the list, don't forget Mario, Gurney, and Donohue, who all had success in a variety of racing formats. My personal choice for GOAT has to favor Andretti because of that variety. John Surtees surely belongs on the list, but do Graham Hill and Rene Dreyfuss?
I was restricting myself only to Formula 1 and pre-war Grand Prix guns.
If we are contemplating achievements outside of that discipline, perhaps it’s Graham Hill - he is the only man to win the Triple Crown, although several drivers have won two legs.
I actually wonder whether the opposite might be true. The old Formula 1 cars were more dangerous, but compared to the new ones, it was the proverbial "driving a slow car fast", which is usually more fun, but also less demanding.
Today's drivers would probably refuse to accept the high risk of death (and rightly so), but skill-wise, they are probably better. The old guys could win based on courage, today, you have to keep the car at something like 999/1000ths of the pace, if you are to have a chance.
Can you imagine that something who spent as much time drinking, partying and generally doing stuff other than focusing at being the best, like James Hunt was, could have any serious chance today?
The 1958 Ferrari Tipo 246 was about ~1200lbs and had 280hp, which in power-to-weight is closer to a modern road car than a 2022 F1 car. It of course was a spaceship back then and everything but a "slow car". Could an oldschool driver from the old days sit in a modern downforce car and drive it well? Just as well as a modern driver could sit in a 65 year old car and drive it the same way ;)
Sorry it showed your comment as an answer to mine rather than Ronnie's :)
True.
The “GOAT” argument crops up all the time in all sports these days.
It’s very hard to compare the likes of Nuvolari, Fangio, Clark, Stewart, Lauda, Senna, Schumacher, Hamilton, Vettel, Verstappen, etc. across the ages.
What is likely, however, is that Max will take the big records if he wants them. Given his young age and the 22+ races per season on the calendar, he can win 103+ races and 7+ titles provided he can find himself in the right car.
"Consistently dominant performances by a small group of elite teams do not, in my view, diminish the quality of the entertainment, especially if artificially construed 'parity' is the alternative."
I find both alternatives to be unbearably boring to watch. I honestly question the intelligence of somebody who's consistently entertained by "their" team competing for a title every year. I mean, how many times can you watch, say, the 1949-64 Yankees or Steph Curry's Golden State Warriors dominate?
"Don't try to strike everybody out. Strikeouts are boring. Besides that, they're fascist. Throw some more ground balls, it's more democratic." - Crash Davis
College football is the worst, since the rules meddling decreases rather than increases parity. Seeing a team like Ohio State never get seriously challenged with a schedule of mediocre Big 10 teams and no-name chump teams and then arbitrarily waltz into the playoff is just ridiculous. It's even more maddening if you have the misfortune of living next to the fanbase of a team like that (former Ohio resident here) and have to listen to their entitled blather every year. Conversely, the only entertaining thing in college football is watching a team like that get their teeth kicked in.
I tend to be a "hater" when it comes to lopsided competitions, rooting against the dominant player. On the other hand, I find watching an aging GOAT like Tom Brady or Tiger Woods try to overcome adversity to get one last championship one of the greatest spectacles in sports. So I guess you can chalk up a win for unexpected outcomes.
As a long-suffering Michigan fan who finally saw entropy restored last year against that team from Columbus, I echo your sentiments! During the halcyon days of the Woody/Bo era, one of the teams might win for a couple years, the underdog would spoil the season of the one cruising to the Rose Bowl (which is probably going to fade into history if UCLA and USC transition to the Big Ten—so it’ll ultimately be the Big Ten, the SEC, and everyone else?), but it was at least a contest!
If nothing else, of late, the ‘Shoe (so to speak) of the Cooper years has been firmly on the other foot (and neck)! Certainly some of the staffing choices by the athletic department in Ann Arbor have been questionable as well!
During my time in Chicago, I found all the rah-rah for the Big Ten a little amusing given the near dominance of the SEC.
I'm surprised you mention chicago and big ten together because college football season in the area is always such a let down. Northwestern always sucks and the Illini are usually out of contention after a couple weeks. The people who went to other schools have all the fun.
That was what amused me!
The only Big Ten team that has been any good in recent memory is Ohio State. Most Big Ten teams would struggle to break .500 in the SEC.
At least we have the Bears
Watching Ohio State get their teeth kicked in will always be entertaining.
I was hoping your team would beat the “University” of Georgia…
I do agree that it becomes tiresome - even for fans of the victors - if one or a handful of teams wins all the time. But it can still be entertaining if there is occasional jeopardy.
I have friends who attended Alabama who no longer watch every game, because they expect Alabama to win; they are - implicitly, at least - entitled to victories.
This is where as a Schumacher (Sr.) fan, I will disagree. Never got tired of watching him beat people. Arguably seasons in which he was beaten were MORE entertaining (Like Hakkinen's championship), but watching him win on merit was never tiresome.
Pity we never got to see Schumacher vs. Senna.
I used the word “dominant” in the sentence that Alan quoted above.
A dominant victory is different than a victory; Max has won the last five races, but they were not all dominant. He had to move through the field for 60% of them.
Liberty will not allow Max to steamroll through the next few years. They will erect some barriers to make it more challenging for him.
No disrespect to Michael Schumacher but was it a case of merit or was it a case of having an unfair advantage, like Mark Donohue said, in that Ferrari simply had the faster cars? If I'm not mistaken, Ferrari was outspending everybody then as well. I found F1 in that era to be a boring parade.
The secret sauce during that purple patch was the key people involved:
Gianni Agnelli as patron (FIAT owned 90% of Ferrari)
Luca di Montezemolo as Ferrari CEO; he acted as shield against the Italian press
Ross Brawn as technology and strategy chief
Jean Todt as politician and sporting director
Michael as pilot
Red Bull employed a similar super team strategy in the Vettel years, and Merc did it all again to a higher level during Lewis’s period of dominance
Red Bull appears to have done it again with Verstappen
It's only boring if you wish to discount effort. There are good technical reasons why they were that successful and Michael's work ethic was one of the major factors.
Never mind that my comment wasn't specifically about the Ferrari years either.
The Monaco GP historically placed practice on Thursday and media commitments on Friday (the reverse of all other events).
One year MSC felt like he would have an issue at the start with the clutch packs that Ferrari was using that year. The start, of course, is critical given the processional nature of Monaco.
Schumacher helicoptered to Maranello on Friday and practiced starts all day before returning to the principality. He nailed the start on Sunday and won the race.
I am shocked the Judge allowed this. I now consider the door open on the previously suppressed topic of college football. I look forward to multi paragraph comments, linking to illustration, about play calling tendencies and counter plays. That assumes, in my mind correctly, the the average conscientious of the college football fan on this site in comparison to those on Land Grant Holy Land(no link on purpose) is parallel to the conscientiousness difference between here and the current from of TTAC on cars.
More seriously, F1 and college football are the only two sports that I don't participate in that I enjoy spectating. I had not given much thought to why that is the case but your reasons resonate with me. I will enjoy pondering that today, thank you.
The Judge and I spent the best part of a day together spectating at Road Atlanta, and this topic emerged as part of our discussion.
To summarize my thoughts succinctly: The likelihood of the expected outcomes in both Formula 1 and CFB renders any deviation meaningful, whereas it’s hard to discern any meaning in the seemingly randomized outcomes in the NFL and other top forms of racing.
The NFL wants random outcomes, but there are organizations that consistently excel anyway. The Patriots had a 20 year run while the NFL changed officiating and fabricated scandals to stop them. Conversely, the Jets are terrible regardless of how many top 5 picks they get. There are a few surprises every year, but for the most part it's the same teams in the playoffs or picking in the top 10.
I think the NFL has benefitted from the same likelihood of expected outcomes. People tune in to see if anyone can beat the top teams. NFL succeeds in spite of itself!
Hey Sherman,
I like your argument, and I'll probably use it when discussing motorsport with my football friends who just don't understand and occasionally ask me why the wife and I watch F1 so religiously. (disclaimer: I'd watch waaay more motorsport if there were more hours in the week, but football I gotta keep the fuck away from cuz I watch that like a fantasy league guy, but without the fantasy league).
Small, pedantic grievance regarding comparing [insert (motor)sport here] to pro wrestling, from a pro wrestling fan that also started around grade 2, but hasn't stopped being a fan (although I don't have the time to indulge as I once did):
The criticisms I most often see levied against pro wrestling are that it's "fake" and "scripted", when in reality, it's fiction. I'm not going to get into the trigger-warning-style shame-spiral disclaimers that the modern wrestlers seem to preface any discussion of their sport (I'm appropriating the term here as a fan) outside of the arena, but pro wrestling is an amazing, authentic, and complex piece of Americana that no one with a pair of eyes has ever considered a legitimate one-on-one competition, and I don't think it's ever fooled anyone—Gotch v. Hackenschmidt was criticized in as many papers after the fact for being pro wrestling as papers before the event hyping it up as if it were going to be an actual competition. Pro wrestling is good, seriously good when you walk into an event rolling your eyes at the flippy munchkin gymnasts and munchkin brawlers (I miss the big guys) that suck you into a match for five to thirty minutes and hold you there. It's hard to do, and most of the time as an old nerd it's fun to pick apart where that hold collapses, but occasionally it doesn't and those are the matches that are fun to go back to.
People who like to be agreeable with me like to compare pro wrestling to theatre as some sort of concession, and it certainly shares some elements, but to me, it's more like improvisational jazz.
So... as fans of both, I'll let you know if I ever see motorsport that resembles pro wrestling, because I'd probably be into that.
Point taken. Like many, I use wrestling as a straw man for fake, contrived outcomes.
25+ years ago I naively believed that wrestling was real, that it HAD to be so, because otherwise there would have been no point in doing it.
Not sure what Liberty will eventually make out of F1, but I enjoy endlessly as they find brick-by-brick every little side deal that Ecclestone had with the venues :) The details are officially unknown but it was kind of an open secret to everyone but Liberty's execs that Monaco doesn't pay a dime to F1; this was such a blow that it was mentioned on formula1.com that the iconic circuit might be taken out from the calendar.
The thing with boring dominance of one team... when Ferrari hired Schumacher at the end of the '95 season it took them 3 years to get the team up to speed. In the retrospective interview, Eddie Irvine says that when they sat in the Ferrari F310 for the first time, both were horrified - the Italian stallions were _very_ different from their former rides. It took years to literally and figuratively stop the wheels from falling off, some might argue that even the 2000 Championship was a bit of a lucky break for them. It took determination, Jean Todt's famous "if a part fails in any way it will be redesigned, we're not using it again" credo, Schumacher's otherworldly talent, and they kept winning for the next 5 years, even if it was starting to get a bit boring towards the end.
In comparison, Mercedes simply bought an already pretty sorted Brawn GP, spent the money the Brits didn't have and won 7 straight years. I'd argue that 2022 is the first ever season where we see the "Stuttgart Équipe" (that's based in Brackley, UK) dealing with real problems. I'd say they seem to have bounced back from the start-of-the-year slump, but the season's far from over yet.
Taking the long view on F1 helps with the entertainment factor as well - a newcomer to the sport may be stunned to learn of the one-time dominance of Williams and McLaren (coinciding often with the presence of current Red Bull CTO Adrian Newey). The amazing thing about dominant F1 teams, much like dominant college football programs, is the ability to do it year-in and year-out. It's not a dominant machine or a dominant driver - it's a dominant organization that ruthlessly delivers excellence.
I am frustrated that the closed franchise model of American sports has made its way to F1 though, denying Andretti and others a shot to at least make the back of the field more interesting.
Seems like they have no problem screwing Andretti (1993 wasn’t enough apparently), but are willing to welcome new entries from Porsche or Audi with open arms.
Well, the Porsche and Red Bull tie-up ended up being a sure thing that never was, in reality. It’s over before it started. Audi is buying Sauber, so there’s no new team.
Andretti - or anyone else - can BUY a team if parties are willing to transact.
Considering LMH/LMDh are almost as fast as F1 it would be funny, as in "wow that is dangerous!" to have sports cars sharing the track with F1.
I don’t think they’ll be anywhere near F1 speeds. LMH is already far slower than LMP1 was, and LMDh may be no faster than DPi.
Despite my previous post about there being nowhere to go but slower, i.e. restrict, I guess I fell prey to the hype(ercar) nomenclature.
I am hopeful that BoP politicking does not spoil the top class (in either series).
I can just about guarantee you that an LMDh will win Daytona - Caddy or Porsche, most likely - and that a Hypercar will win Le Mans.
I've long thought that racing series, NASCAR in particular, should just issue every team a copy of one car design, and let the teams repair them but not modify them.
Be open about it, and be done with it.
Seriously, enough interpreting the rules and then making new ones. If the world of motorsport wants human drama, just use the same car design for each team.
From the perspective of someone who's far more interested in the technology of race cars than some bullshit human drama, it's endlessly frustrating to watch sanctioning bodies ban this brilliant car part or that inspired design feature because it gives the team an "unfair advantage."
I don't care about photo finishes, I want to see what kind of suicide machine some mad scientist will cook up in his garage to win a race.
The (potential) opportunity to claim responsibility for the engineering leading to victories is what motivates OEMs to be in F1; that, and the large audience, of course.
I see two problems with Indy Car and NASCAR being essentially spec racing series. One is that in both there is little competitive technological innovation. The other is that NASCAR is divorced from it's orgins, which were based on cars you could buy. I suppose that nowadays, a "stock" based series would have to be based on SUVs to both have RWD and appeal to today's consumers. Perhaps it would make sense for NASCAR to have a lower level series just like that.
My reaction to your piece is indifference. I am neither a big F1 fan nor a college football fan. Why am I even commenting? I like seeing connections between seemingly disparate subjects, I suppose, and I like learning how people who DO care think.
I really do like your writing style, on this and other articles, and so I mean no disrespect, but I lost the track between the stated similarities between football, F1, and the details of Verstappen's pre-race travails. There may be more than 1 article's worth of material, background, and claims here. Or it may be because I'm 3 beers into an enjoyable Saturday night PBS lineup (love those comfortable, predictable British mysteries).
Anyway, I gave it a go, and I thank you for your bold argument. I may re-read this tomorrow, and the connections will make more sense.
I always figured college football and NASCAR went hand in hand, and that's where it began and ended -- a southern thing.
A few responses:
1. Thank you for taking time to comment despite your indifference! Moreover, thank you for contemplating a re-visitation of the topic tomorrow!
2. There definitely IS too much content for a typical, pitchy article. I enjoy reading long(er) form content, and brevity is not my strong suit.
3. Appreciate the criticism that I perhaps failed to articulate my argument with sufficient reason or clarity. This essay would have received an F letter grade if you were my professor!
I'm still hanging on, at 9pm. Midsomer Murders is a real humdinger tonight. Bedtime be damned!
I have no complaints about the length of your article. I read the Artura piece with amazement at the detail you captured, and that was indeed a long one, as you mention in this thread.
There are times when I "don't get" something, and I think it's the creator's fault, and this happens most of the time, because I'm awesome and easily understand (ha ha). Other times, I think it's my problem, and this seems like it's the case here.
So I don't mean to come across as critical. Far from it, tho "indifference" is not a reaction an author wants. But that's my disinterest in both topics talking, I think. I appreciate your writing and look forward to your future work.
The McLaren Artura write-up was ~7,500 words as I recall. I have a few others written or drafted that are also long. Not everyone appreciates my discursive writing style!
I genuinely didn't notice the length on the Artura review; it breezed right on by!
More than I can say for some writers for whom I must grind through as if chewing nothing but gristle.
I'm right here God damn it!
I guffawed.
I have some more stuff in the pipeline that you will enjoy, then.
It was very interesting. I spent way too long thinking about the merits of a car I can't afford to put a set of tires on.
I'm looking forward to your novella length review of the 2002 Ice Capades, Mr. Landini.