In article <bduvbo$m0s1 (AT) imsp212 (DOT) netvigator.com>, "J.R."
<jorosar (AT) netvigator (DOT) com> wrote:
I'd add big, fat slicks to that list - boy, did they ever go the
wrong way on that rule.
Sequential gear selction - no programmed downshifting anyway


MH
"alot is not a word"

In article <MPG.196d28889371169f989c99 (AT) news (DOT) freeserve.net>, Tony
Gartshore <tony (AT) xxevil-photographer (DOT) co.uk> writes
me out of her sight, calls me a "Babe-Magnet" <snigger>
--
Paul B The irony of the Information Age is that it has given new
respectability to uninformed opinion. - John Lawton

On Wed, 2 Jul 2003 18:36:49 +0100, Tony Gartshore
<tony (AT) xxevil-photographer (DOT) co.uk> wrote:

Well, you know I never persuade Robin to go... ;o)
--
([:]) by Kimbo!
formula one cartoon archive
Toons on hold -- see the archive at www.foca.co.uk

HooDooWitch <hoodoowitch (AT) nospam_please_baita (DOT) demon.co.uk> wrote

What made the great tracks great was size of the cars
matching the size of the track.

Try landing a 747 at a regional airport. The airport
might be enough for DC-10s, but they aren't flying
DC-10s anymore. You don't use undersized runways for
behemoth planes, you build bigger airports.

F1 today is like landing 747s at a regional airport.
The F1 cars of today are too big and too fast. There
are *no* "great tracks" of the past that would be
suitable for the F1 cars of today.

Back when cars topped out at 250km/h, the old tracks
with shorter straight provided enough length and width
to pass. Brands Hatch and the old open-wheel cars is
a good example.

Today's cars come up to the corners so fast that the
room and time to pass don't exist anymore. Aside from
those with the room and layout to permit passing (ie.
Brazil, Monza, Sepang, Spa, and perhaps a few others)
there isn't anywhere big enough. Austria may be narrow
but it makes for good racing with today's cars.

Another problem is tires. The open-wheel cars with
their narrow wheels needed the same sort of grip that
tires today need, but the big difference is marbling.
Narrower tires produced less marbles. With narrower
cars and narrower tires, the marbling is less and the
racing line is widened. Today, some tracks (ie. San
Marino) don't have enough room for one racing line,
let alone two.

Widening all tracks (except Sepang, of course) by just
two to three meters would do so much (*especially* in
Austria) to improve racing, and would certainly be a
lot cheaper than building new tracks made today's cars.

Either change the tracks or change the cars: narrower
slicks, reduced wings and downforce, and V6 engines.


Bob Dog

HooDooWitch <hoodoowitch (AT) nospam_please_baita (DOT) demon.co.uk> wrote

Possibly overcoming fear (see below).

One word comes to mind: Fear.

It takes a lot of bal*s to go flat out through Eau Rouge or run the
old Nordschlife circuit at Nurburgring in the rain.

Was it Jimmy Clark who did not like Spa and then Jackie Stewart really
got concerned about the Nurburgring even though he had his race of the
gods in the wet there?

LeMans on the Muselene (sp??) straight, corkscrew (though I am not
huge fan of Luguna Seca) and Bathurst is long with lots of elevation
changes and it looks very tricvky.

HooDooWitch <hoodoowitch (AT) nospam_please_baita (DOT) demon.co.uk> wrote:
That was still possible until a while ago, and indeed the historic boys
still used the old track. The new tarmac run-off on the outside of Stowe
means the old track can't be used any more though :-( The rumble strips
on the outside of the old Stowe are still there as a reminder of the
classic old track though :-)

There is an alternative profile corner at Club (far less tight, more of
an ess-bend) that they use for historics now though.

Again, this is still used by the historic racers, they don't use any of
the new track there. I'd prefer it if the F1 cars did too :-(

Agreed, fast sweeping corners like that are fine in my book :-)

At least they're not considering using the ridiculously tight Woodcote
chicane they used for the World Superbikes a few weeks ago for any car
racing :-)

--
David
mailto:david (AT) davidbreach (DOT) co.uk

Txl <txl@@free.fr> wrote in
news:Xns93AC9691C537Etxlatfreefr (AT) 213 (DOT) 228.0.196:

Banking, longest flat running.

Amazingly, David B <spam (AT) davidbreach (DOT) co.uk> managed to post:

That's a chicane? I thought they were doing a U-Turn in the pits

===========================
Keep it between the ditches
HooDooWitch
===========================

Raymond Luxury-Yacht II wrote:
Jimmy won three consecutive Grands Prix at the original
Spa-Francorchamps, yet voiced in public that he did not like the track.
Did not keep him from dominating there, though. Same for JYS and the old
*Ring. He said that during a whole racing lap at that track, a driver
would experience more in the ways of animosity and fear than many people
get in a whole lifetime...in the winter, he would sit by the fireplace
and reminisce fondly of his efforts to conquest the Ring, yet every time
he went there he would be conscious of wondering whether he would ever
get so see his house again.
Somehow, I doubt that these kind of emotions are well known to
contemporary F1 drivers.
Doc

Doc Knutsen <doc (AT) NOSPAMknutspeed (DOT) com> wrote:

Not wanting to single anyone out ;-) but Schumacher has been quoted as
hating the cars (and the circuits too) before his era saying they were
too dangerous. Maybe this is what breeds his arrogance and disregard
for other drivers?

How about a variation on the crumple zone and insist that cars fail
the safety tests. If Herr Schumacher had injured himself a bit more
back in 99 at Silverstone maybe on his return he might have respected
other drivers more, nahh I'm talking bollocks he won't ever change.


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