I suspect the first of many disrobings of the ‘sport’ they call F1 in the USA, as once the fame game and subsidised celebrity culture recedes, it’ll be seen for what it is, a quite boring motor racing series. F1 claims it’s the best in terms of driver talent, technology et al, but then serves up pants racing (IMHO), or lack thereof nowadays. And did anyone mention the top priority of driver safety on track?
This is where IndyCar (they go faster!) and NASCAR (far more action!) trump F1, especially NASCAR, which is why F1 has struggled to gain traction in the US – and broadcasting out of synch with US major viewing times isn’t going to help.
Totally agree. Such a shame but typical. The glitz and razmataz were perfect but forgot about the track.
Although Indy are about 20% slower over lap on a track, similar to F2.
Meanwhile watch F3 in Macau, excellent. Watch the next big name coming through. Gabrielle Mini, 18 and in first qualifying half a second quicker, genuine pace as fastest in 1st practise too, against many established drivers.
I see the F1 P2 has been delayed to make way for more celebrities.
I think it could be a slow process resolving this as it appears the concrete around the metal manhole cover failed, if this is a design fault rather than a one-off failure due to an issue with installation that could be very difficult to resolve. No doubt suck up by the ground effects of the modern F1 car. Hopefully, we will get to see some racing this weekend.
The NASCAR comparable is an interesting one, and a bit apples & pears, in that the regs try and equalise the cars and keep budgets sane, whereas F1 appears to be dominated by money, budgets and technology, trying to appeal to an international media audience. I’d argue the NASCAR races on ovals (plenty of tracks in the US) offer a better viewing experience as, let’s be honest, the viewing experience at an F1 event is like watching the world through binoculars, where you only get to see 5% of what’s going on (at best) – and with the street tracks it’s worse…and, often, there’s not much going on.
Speed isn’t everything with racing. The best motor racing I’ve seen of late is Moto3, where the words mad cap and breath-taking often apply. Similar comments apply to the junior car formulas, where the cars are far smaller, have far less aero, so overtaking (that rare thing!) is commonplace.
Carlos Sainz will take a drop of 10 places for the Las Vegas Grand Prix for exceeding power unit components after hitting the manhole cover on first practice.". BBC.
Apparently the stewards spent some time looking for a mitigating circumstances way out of the automatic grid penalty. I suspect/hope it might not be the end of it
Looking at the images, I think it’s not unreasonable to think they were checked, it’s just that noone expected the entire manhole to come loose. If you look at the images it’s the whole thing that came out, the cover itself remained attached despite the impact etc.
That the concrete holding the whole manhole in place failed is very concerning and is worse in many ways than a lid coming off. A lid coming off could be welded down fairly easily and quickly. Having to reseat the whole assembly took a lot longer.
This then resulted in kicking out all the people in the stands before practice because security staff had reached their legal maximum of working hours, which just added to what was already a monumental mess up. Too much attention was paid to the show and not enough to the sporting side and most importantly safety. Not a good look for F1 and it is the last thing it needs after the Indy debacle nearly two decades ago.
