It’s almost time for the Monaco Grand Prix, the most famous, and my least favourite, Grand Prix of the year, but then, I’ve been watching F1 for a long time so maybe I’ve been spoilt.
F1 is increasingly popular these days, and whilst the Apple produced F1 movie was entertaining (if nonsense), it’s safe to say that there is a series on Netflix that has given F1 a lot more exposure.
Drive to Survive
I’ve not watched the last couple of seasons of Drive to Survive, largely because I’ve not had the time and have always had other things higher up in my ‘must watch’ list. I blame AppleTV for this entirely, as it continues to (mostly) produce amazing high quality television.
I am not anti-Drive to Survive either, I know a lot of people have become F1 fans through it and that’s fantastic. I did watch the first few seasons and whilst I learned a little from it I started tuned out as it became more about the personalities and the drama (real or enforced through editing).
F1 in ’80s
I’ve watched Formula One since I was a kid.
Watching sport was a constant in our house given my Dad was a P.E. teacher, so athletics, rugby, the Olympics, all the way to Superstars and Question of Sport(Emlyn Hughes and Bill Beaumont anyone?).
My Mum used to like watching F1 though as you don’t really need to concentrate on it which was handy because she spent a lot of her time knitting to help make ends meet (money wise, not wool wise). She watched the cricket and snooker too for similar reasons, and I still have memories of Botham’s Ashes in ’81, or Thornburn’s 147 in ‘83.
I can’t recall the exact year but I have the sense of wandering into the living room, the click-clack of knitting needles and an excitable Murray Walker commentating, then seeing these incredible looking machines going so fast.
It was exhilarating. I was hooked.
The Drivers
The 80s and 90s were stacked with racing talent. The names from the past, names that still reverberate through the sport —Fangio, Clark, G.Hill, Stewart, Lauda, Hunt— were added to in some style.
I grew up watching Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost battling without giving an inch. Nigel Mansell overtaking where it shouldn’t really be possible, Nelson Piquet serenely guiding his car round the track.
Then came a young German driver and an un-fancied team, then the move to Ferrari and the legend of Michael Schumacher was established.
Fast forward, literally, to see Fernando Alonso, Sebastian Vettel, Lewis Hamilton, and Max Verstappen, dominate the sport all without compromising, all by bending some of the rules (team or sport).
Who will the next multi-year champion be? What of the rules changes and the impact they are having?
The Local Boy
I was too young to see him drive —he retired the year I was born— but Jackie Stewart was from Milton which is the next small town to where I grew up, he was a local boy, and went to the same secondary school that I attend (by then it was a primary) and to think there he’d been, racing the fastest cars and winning the World Championship 3 times! If he could do it… maybe I could too?
Sir Jackie did a lot of driver safety after a bad crash of his own, and later in life I followed on with interest as he started his own racing team in 1997. Stewart Racing was eventually sold to Ford and became Jaguar Racing in 2000, and five years later a large energy drink company joined the fray.
Red Bull
I’m a Red Bull fan.
I was never really a particular team fan in the past, I had some British/Scottish allegiances of course McLaren, Williams, Coulthard, Hamilton but after following on from Stewart Racing to Jaguar, I was intrigued to see what Red Bull would do and given they signed up David Coulthard 🏴 then I started paying them more attention.
Christian Horner was the Team Principal and oversaw and amazing change in fortune for the team, aided by bringing in Adrian Newey and Rob Marshall. I also enjoyed their general aggressive approach, they ruffled some of the feathers of the older established teams and, in my opinion, that was no bad thing.
I still didn’t consider them ‘my team’ until 2012.
Predictions
I’ve been lucky enough to have the same close friends since I was 16. It emerged, over the early part of the new millennium, that we all enjoyed F1 to differing degrees. No doubt after a few beers we struck on the idea of having a little competition, based on predicting how the races would finish.
Every week, we would submit our predictions for the Top 10 to my mate Ian, who collated them all into a big spreadsheet, and then would update after the race, totalling the points earned (matching the system F1 use), and tracking it over the season.
I think the first year there were 6 of us, there is now 12 predicting each race, and sprint race, with an overall winner crowned at the end of the year. Ian does a great job not only collating the predictions and totalling up the results, but sending out briefing emails for each race weekend. Just don’t mess with his spreadsheet! 😉
It’s been lots of fun (I may have won the first few years) and makes the whole thing a little more interesting, especially when we can get together to watch a race, live tracking our predictions against what’s happening in the race.
Singapore
Despite having been a fan for most of my life, I’d never been to race. A couple of my friends had though, and so I finally got things sorted and in 2012 I boarded the plane to Singapore!
It was the last year of the old, noisy, V8 engines, we had seats a few feet on the home straight and the engines were so loud we had both ear plugs and large ear defenders to deaden the sound. Bits of rubber were flying up as the cars roared past, and the sound vibrations even made the bottom of my plastic pint glass shake so much I thought it was raining.
I went out again in 2015, new engines which were so much quieter, but the experience of attending the race, the surrounding stalls, the bands, the excitement and atmosphere, was just as thrilling.
Barcelona Testing
Attending an F1 race is not cheap, but attending the testing sessions is far more affordable. So in 2018 a few of us headed to Barcelona and took in the testing sessions. As it’s a lot lot quieter —think maybe a couple of hundred fans (if that) rather than many thousands that attend on race day— we could walk all around the track, watch the cars from different vantage points and even got to wander about behind the scenes.
Madrid
And in September this year I’m off to Madrid!
It’s been a long time since I saw a race live, even on TV, as I no longer have the Sky F1 subscription. I can’t really justify spending time watching qualification sessions, and 4 hour race coverage, like I used too, well not until Jack gets interested at least.
I am excited to go to another race, and a city I’ve never visited too, we have tickets for all three days, which allows you to get the lay of the land, the souvenirs bought, before race day which is always the busiest. Hopefully it’ll be a good race!
Still Growing
F1 is still growing, which is both fascinating and a little disappointing. Whilst a lot of the changes that Liberty Media brought to the sport were long needed —Bernie Ecclestone’s last few years weren’t great in terms of fan engagement— and definitely gave the sport and it’s presence a huge boost, the desire to improve the racing to make it more exciting has ended up with the odd set of changes to the engines which on one hand have meant a lot more overtaking, but on the other it’s been artificial and hasn’t really altered the usual ‘one or two cars at the front are just faster and will drive away from the rest and finish 10-30 secs ahead’.
I’m not sure what the solution is —is Formula E better in terms of racing? Does the change need to be radical? Is there anything from the past that could help?— but I’d maybe start by listening to the drivers who are all saying much the same thing, some louder than other perhaps, but they all just want a competitive race.
Still Improving
There is, of course, still issues with F1 as an idea. Thankfully they’ve moved past the grid girls, and the image of the drivers is now more focussed on being professional, rather than the 70s chain smoking, heavy drinking, lad about town. The technology looks to the future now too, with greener initiatives improving every year.
However, it’s still a massively expensive sport, shipping large containers around the world costs a lot of money, and has a lot of environmental impact. It’s still a very elite world as well, and largely dominated by white men and while this too is changing it’s not happening fast enough.
But it is changing, and the new owners are aware of the visuals and that there is still a lot to improve.
I’ve been watching F1 for around 45 years, I wonder what the next 45 will bring?
P.S. I should point out that the top image was a photo I took at my first Grand Prix in Singapore! Sebastian Vettel doing his thing.
What are your thoughts?