F1 cancelled this year?
Discussion
Yes Derek, it's a very real risk. Just like Brexit, Corona is the latest handy excuse to bail out. The motor industry is in crisis, losses are mounting, jobs are being cut and F1 is becoming increasingly less relevant to a generation of "buyers", who buy on the basis of the best PCP deal, and a future generation that just sees a car as a "mobility solution", which they perhaps won't need to, or even want to drive.
Mercedes have achieved everything they set out to achieve from a sporting to a marketing proposition. They are making losses and redundancies in their road car division. Why spend on 2021? Renault are the opposite. They have not achieved their goals in F1 at all. Their road car business is making an enormous loss, they have not ruled out closing factories and last month said that their forecast for 2020 was bleak. Judging by what I see on the road, the type of Renaults that do sell are not to customers influenced by motorsport. They seem to sell small cars and small SUV's/Crossovers with small engines and little power. Maybe if everyone was buying a £50K Megane RS, but they are not. I don't see why Renault would stay. They have the weakest engine, they need to spend the most, and no customer income next year once McLaren move to Merc. The French government have a stake in Renault and I can see there being enormous pressure, especially if a French factory has to close, and a largely UK based F1 operation continues. I think it must be almost certain that Renault will leave at the end of 2020.
Mercedes have achieved everything they set out to achieve from a sporting to a marketing proposition. They are making losses and redundancies in their road car division. Why spend on 2021? Renault are the opposite. They have not achieved their goals in F1 at all. Their road car business is making an enormous loss, they have not ruled out closing factories and last month said that their forecast for 2020 was bleak. Judging by what I see on the road, the type of Renaults that do sell are not to customers influenced by motorsport. They seem to sell small cars and small SUV's/Crossovers with small engines and little power. Maybe if everyone was buying a £50K Megane RS, but they are not. I don't see why Renault would stay. They have the weakest engine, they need to spend the most, and no customer income next year once McLaren move to Merc. The French government have a stake in Renault and I can see there being enormous pressure, especially if a French factory has to close, and a largely UK based F1 operation continues. I think it must be almost certain that Renault will leave at the end of 2020.
LucyP said:
Yes Derek, it's a very real risk. Just like Brexit, Corona is the latest handy excuse to bail out. The motor industry is in crisis, losses are mounting, jobs are being cut and F1 is becoming increasingly less relevant to a generation of "buyers", who buy on the basis of the best PCP deal, and a future generation that just sees a car as a "mobility solution", which they perhaps won't need to, or even want to drive.
Mercedes have achieved everything they set out to achieve from a sporting to a marketing proposition. They are making losses and redundancies in their road car division. Why spend on 2021? Renault are the opposite. They have not achieved their goals in F1 at all. Their road car business is making an enormous loss, they have not ruled out closing factories and last month said that their forecast for 2020 was bleak. Judging by what I see on the road, the type of Renaults that do sell are not to customers influenced by motorsport. They seem to sell small cars and small SUV's/Crossovers with small engines and little power. Maybe if everyone was buying a £50K Megane RS, but they are not. I don't see why Renault would stay. They have the weakest engine, they need to spend the most, and no customer income next year once McLaren move to Merc. The French government have a stake in Renault and I can see there being enormous pressure, especially if a French factory has to close, and a largely UK based F1 operation continues. I think it must be almost certain that Renault will leave at the end of 2020.
I was a bit depressed by the chances of not having a cruise with my wife for our 50th, so your comments just make it worse. Not only that, I agree with what you posted. The unions, who sit on the Merc board, won't be happy with the redundancies and will want to leave negotiations with a positive, and that might well be abandoning investment in running an F1 team. No matter even if it cost the company, they'll need something to take away.Mercedes have achieved everything they set out to achieve from a sporting to a marketing proposition. They are making losses and redundancies in their road car division. Why spend on 2021? Renault are the opposite. They have not achieved their goals in F1 at all. Their road car business is making an enormous loss, they have not ruled out closing factories and last month said that their forecast for 2020 was bleak. Judging by what I see on the road, the type of Renaults that do sell are not to customers influenced by motorsport. They seem to sell small cars and small SUV's/Crossovers with small engines and little power. Maybe if everyone was buying a £50K Megane RS, but they are not. I don't see why Renault would stay. They have the weakest engine, they need to spend the most, and no customer income next year once McLaren move to Merc. The French government have a stake in Renault and I can see there being enormous pressure, especially if a French factory has to close, and a largely UK based F1 operation continues. I think it must be almost certain that Renault will leave at the end of 2020.
Renault leaving has been on the cards for a season or two and I think if they aren't challenging the top three, let alone clear in 4th, they'll jump as well. So they'll jump is another way of looking at it. Honda v Ferrari engines? Not much of a spectacle there, and not much benefit for Honda. I wonder if that's why Ferrari got an easy ride because they might be the engine supplier for all F1 next season.
I've got the feeling that the virus will not be just a handy excuse though. It will hurt industry. It might well be a hit for tourism. I made a joke about having bought half the boat when I booked my holiday, but I wonder if there will be a sell-off of boats, planes and infrastructure later this year. FlyBe going might well have helped some carriers, but for how long?
You seem to understand the medical jargon that's doing the rounds. What d'you think the risk to the races is? Will Oz be the only one?
OlonMusky said:
Yep, I agree. There's no way this s
t won't end up in tears.
]
If loads of people die then the public debt ratio will get even worse as the debt carries forward just less folks around to pay it off.t won't end up in tears.]
(Great user name!).
F1 has to stick its head in the sand for this as its revenue comes from events, and the probability is loads of these events will be cancelled due to governments putting travel restrictions in place.
Then once the virus has global reach then look at travel restrictions again.
Derek, it's hard to know at the moment whether Oz will be the only GP for the foreseeable future, because the situation is changing hour by hour. At the moment, I think that Bahrain will also go ahead. I suspect that Vietnam won't. China is already postponed, and after that it will be Holland and that is 2 months away, so it is impossible to know today. The rate at which conferences are being cancelled and large employers are sending staff home seems to be increasing day by day and F1 cannot be immune from that.
Brawn's summary of how they're dealing with the problems: https://www.autosport.com/f1/news/148567/brawn-aus...
Interesting point about the economy. In the interests of public safety no events should be taking place, no one should go to work, or any other activity not required for survival. But economically the effects of that attitude would be greater than the effects of the virus.
Interesting point about the economy. In the interests of public safety no events should be taking place, no one should go to work, or any other activity not required for survival. But economically the effects of that attitude would be greater than the effects of the virus.
HardtopManual said:
TheDeuce said:
Yet the number who reply is simply staggering.
Not as big as the number who deliberately don't, which includes me.It didn’t take long to realise he knows no more than anyone else, yet he purports to speak from some position of knowledge. Very tiresome IMO.
But it’s fine, some seem to go for it and it’s easy enough to ignore.
LucyP said:
Yes Derek, it's a very real risk. Just like Brexit, Corona is the latest handy excuse to bail out. The motor industry is in crisis, losses are mounting, jobs are being cut and F1 is becoming increasingly less relevant to a generation of "buyers", who buy on the basis of the best PCP deal, and a future generation that just sees a car as a "mobility solution", which they perhaps won't need to, or even want to drive.
Mercedes have achieved everything they set out to achieve from a sporting to a marketing proposition. They are making losses and redundancies in their road car division. Why spend on 2021? Renault are the opposite. They have not achieved their goals in F1 at all. Their road car business is making an enormous loss, they have not ruled out closing factories and last month said that their forecast for 2020 was bleak. Judging by what I see on the road, the type of Renaults that do sell are not to customers influenced by motorsport. They seem to sell small cars and small SUV's/Crossovers with small engines and little power. Maybe if everyone was buying a £50K Megane RS, but they are not. I don't see why Renault would stay. They have the weakest engine, they need to spend the most, and no customer income next year once McLaren move to Merc. The French government have a stake in Renault and I can see there being enormous pressure, especially if a French factory has to close, and a largely UK based F1 operation continues. I think it must be almost certain that Renault will leave at the end of 2020.
I am not sure that F1 has ever been that relevant to most buyers of cars, the vast majority of people cannot afford a Ferrari or McLaren and the links between mainstream manufacturers like Mercedes, Honda and Renault F1 cars and their offerings to the public are pretty remote. F1 cars are really just very fast billboards for various companies, the trouble in the UK is that the number of people able to see the billboards is limited due to the TV deals put in place.Mercedes have achieved everything they set out to achieve from a sporting to a marketing proposition. They are making losses and redundancies in their road car division. Why spend on 2021? Renault are the opposite. They have not achieved their goals in F1 at all. Their road car business is making an enormous loss, they have not ruled out closing factories and last month said that their forecast for 2020 was bleak. Judging by what I see on the road, the type of Renaults that do sell are not to customers influenced by motorsport. They seem to sell small cars and small SUV's/Crossovers with small engines and little power. Maybe if everyone was buying a £50K Megane RS, but they are not. I don't see why Renault would stay. They have the weakest engine, they need to spend the most, and no customer income next year once McLaren move to Merc. The French government have a stake in Renault and I can see there being enormous pressure, especially if a French factory has to close, and a largely UK based F1 operation continues. I think it must be almost certain that Renault will leave at the end of 2020.
janesmith1950 said:
If it wasn't relevent to buyers of cars, why would Mercedes or others enter, let alone continue? My understanding is that Mercedes quote a significant and disproportionately high marketing ROI from their F1 activities.
Well it's a lot easier to buy into the Merc brand isn't than McLaren or Ferrari.Same with Renault.
But as a counter to that it doesn't hurt BMW / Porsche etc not being in F1 either....
Then you have the whole Aston Martin Red Bull with Honda engine and fake Alfa thing...
janesmith1950 said:
If it wasn't relevent to buyers of cars, why would Mercedes or others enter, let alone continue? My understanding is that Mercedes quote a significant and disproportionately high marketing ROI from their F1 activities.
If I was the head of MB motorsport I would be making sure that my statements about ROI on the F1 programme supported its continuation. Waxing lyrical about marketing coverage, eyeballs on the product, social media engagement is largely smoke and mirrors and can't be measured exactly ( like most marketing campaigns.)It other words it probably has a value.I have absolutely no issues if current F1 implodes. For too long the same people have been making the same money at the expense of the rest of the sport, and putting it behind a paywall is a very short term solution with waning spectator interest speeding up its decline. Fundamentally, however, if the rug was pulled tomorrow, I'd guarantee we'd have another version of F1 inside 12 months. With different people making smaller amounts and maybe a focus on diversity, better wealth distribution amongst teams and the sport as a whole and with cheaper more environmentally on message, cars.
Bring it on!
Dynion Araf Uchaf said:
with cheaper more environmentally on message, cars.
What's your proposal? I think the current cars are pretty epic - they have increased thermal efficiency from 38% to 50%, which is staggering. It's just incredibly badly marketed. Unless you go electric (FE) or hydrogen (not enough energy density) I struggle to see what you would do? Ultra small small turbo engines?vaud said:
What's your proposal? I think the current cars are pretty epic - they have increased thermal efficiency from 38% to 50%, which is staggering. It's just incredibly badly marketed. Unless you go electric (FE) or hydrogen (not enough energy density) I struggle to see what you would do? Ultra small small turbo engines?
The current engines, and the F1 target to become carbon neutral are both impressive but also incredibly expensive. In the real world such targets would generally be too expensive to be to justified. Case in point, Mercedes F1 team are by the end of this year going to be carbon neutral, which is indeed a bragging right - but I suspect they're paying a lot more for their energy and logistic solutions to make that possible. So I agree, F1 is doing about as much as they possibly can right now with the current technology, and they're nipping and tucking energy usage in every way they can. They could market that fact a little better imo.
Electric must be the longer term future but with current battery capacity it's just not possible.
janesmith1950 said:
I'd love to see a free reign F1 without the need for it to be a manufacturer's marketing tool. The budgets would ultimately be self limiting. Then we would get to see what the fastest track machines in the world really look like.
They would be self limiting - to fewer and fewer manufacturers. Unlimited budgets would also increase the barriers to entry as one or two gained absolute dominance. A bit like now, only worse.Dynion Araf Uchaf said:
If I was the head of MB motorsport I would be making sure that my statements about ROI on the F1 programme supported its continuation. Waxing lyrical about marketing coverage, eyeballs on the product, social media engagement is largely smoke and mirrors and can't be measured exactly ( like most marketing campaigns.)It other words it probably has a value.
I have absolutely no issues if current F1 implodes. For too long the same people have been making the same money at the expense of the rest of the sport, and putting it behind a paywall is a very short term solution with waning spectator interest speeding up its decline. Fundamentally, however, if the rug was pulled tomorrow, I'd guarantee we'd have another version of F1 inside 12 months. With different people making smaller amounts and maybe a focus on diversity, better wealth distribution amongst teams and the sport as a whole and with cheaper more environmentally on message, cars.
Bring it on!
So much nonsense in one post.I have absolutely no issues if current F1 implodes. For too long the same people have been making the same money at the expense of the rest of the sport, and putting it behind a paywall is a very short term solution with waning spectator interest speeding up its decline. Fundamentally, however, if the rug was pulled tomorrow, I'd guarantee we'd have another version of F1 inside 12 months. With different people making smaller amounts and maybe a focus on diversity, better wealth distribution amongst teams and the sport as a whole and with cheaper more environmentally on message, cars.
Bring it on!
Marketing programs and their impact are studied in great detail, they know what works and what doesn't.
More diversity blah blah. Have you never looked at the makeup of the F1 teams? The current best driver is mixed race, there are both sexes throughout the teams and many nationalities present.
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