Welcome to Thursday’s edition of the RaceFans round-up.
Comment of the day
Formula 1 said their 2022 regulations had been designed to improve racing and overtaking, but three years on any gains appear to have been reversed:
When they conceived the 2022 regulations they, the FIA, said they would be tweaking them as they went to try and stop teams from finding, exploiting and successfully overcoming the loopholes each and every regulation set there has ever existed. But, as always, the FIA allowed the loopholes for the most part to exist and continue to the point where cars cannot, once again, follow each other without some considerable dirty air being produced.
The FIA simply missed the boat and these new rules for 2026 will be the same as the current ones. I fail to understand why we keep faulting the tracks when clearly in my mind it is not the tracks but the failure of the FIA to constantly monitor and tweak the rules to keep them in line with what was originally conceived.
BenjaminS (@Benihana)
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday to Chris, Hughes, Silverkeg and danny11!
On this day in motorsport
- 20 years ago today a last-lap suspension failure for Kimi Raikkonen handed victory to Fernando Alonso at the Nurburgring
- Born on this day in 1963: Ukyo Katayama, who started 94 grands prix in the nineties, peaking with a pair of fifth places for Tyrrell in 1994
- 15 years ago today Mark Webber took his third pole in a row, at Istanbul
- 65 years ago today Stirling Moss scored the first victory for a Lotus chassis, in a car entered by Rob Walker at Monaco,while John Surtees made his debut
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Jere (@jerejj)
29th May 2025, 7:01
COTD: The unfortunate reality as long as FIA won’t bother to close loopholes & prevent teams from designing their cars within stable technical regulation cycles in a way that promotes the outwash effect, which is why following has been getting harder season by season since 2022 & the same will probably happen again after next season.
On this day in motorsport: The 2005 European GP, Kimi’s famous last-lap tyre failure is simply unforgettable, which would’ve been avoidable with an extra pit stop & I’m positive FIA would’ve accepted breaching the no-tyre change rule in place for that season since McLaren had a justifiable reason for doing so, but they decided to risk a failure by staying on track, which ultimately backfired.
Keith Campbell (@keithedin)
29th May 2025, 10:00
@jerejj Honestly, in terms of the championship McLaren made the wrong decision in leaving Kimi out in that race whatever way you look at it. With the points system as it was, he would only have given up 2 points by guaranteeing a safe second rather than gambling on a first, or a 4 point swing in the championship. The risk/reward factor was not in favour of staying out. I know competitors will always want to go for the win, but that one always seemed a bit greedy to me as a failure looked like a matter of ‘when’ and not ‘if’.
Having said that, I prefer the current points system where there is a bigger reward for winning compared to other positions, which would change the risk/reward calculation more in favour of going for the win in such scenarios.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
29th May 2025, 17:40
@jerejj The FIA wasn’t prepared to accept any amendments of the tyre regulations at Indy, however sensible, without the consent of all teams. That bridge got burned in Bahrain, because Ferrari had chosen to accept significant risk to Barrichello’s car to avoid asking the teams for that unanimous permission to change the tyres (a permission it in any case knew was unlikely to come, no matter how well it proved its point, due to the very animosities that led to the regulation’s introduction).
Ideals (@ideals)
29th May 2025, 7:22
w0o0dy
29th May 2025, 7:39
The delay in enforcing the flexibility rules in a way that fits the intended ruleset was because of the weight McLaren and their sponsors/investors have with MBS&Co. And a (new) top team to score a lot of wins in the first part of the season work and the rest catching up makes for a good storyline and helps popularity if the season becomes a 3 way fight.
PeteB (@peteb)
29th May 2025, 9:24
I don’t think it’s necessarily because of investors etc but I definitely think they investigated which teams would be affected and which wouldn’t and decided based on that. They want an exciting championship and if that means giving McLaren a chance to fix their wing so Red Bull don’t run away with another title, they’ll definitely do it!
Addme (@dontme)
29th May 2025, 10:22
Stop making things up. Or provide some evidence
Tony Mansell (@tonymansell)
29th May 2025, 12:40
citation?
No thought not.
Junk post
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
29th May 2025, 17:43
@tonymansell The citation is likely to be the FIA refusing to check the regulation failing people pointed out to it after Baku, about parts of the DRS opening on the wrong axis, preferring instead to pretend everyone was asking for them to only check flexibility.
For anyone wanting to make a conspiracy theory about this, there are data points that help support the case. This is particularly frustrating since I also believe that in this case, the FIA version of events concerning timelines is the true and entire reason.
Alan Dove
29th May 2025, 10:05
“The trouble with market research is that people don’t think what they feel, they don’t say what they think and they don’t do what they say.”
― David Ogilvy
Pretty much sums up the Monaco situation. People say they hate it, but alas… people still watch
S
29th May 2025, 10:27
People are definitely saying what they think about Monaco, and there’s no reason not to be honest about it.
The real question is: how unpopular does the event need to be before meaningful ‘improvements’ (including dropping it completely) come under serious consideration?
Alan Dove
29th May 2025, 12:35
The ‘drop Monaco’ campaigners will find themselves perplexed when F1 declined alongside such a decision. This would be my predication. F1 is a result of a weird alchemy of factors, and Monaco is very much a key ingredient.
F1 very much shouldn’t listen to the noise around Monaco, it’d be their greatest error. I think they know this too.
S
29th May 2025, 13:40
F1 would still be F1 without Monaco, just like it is still F1 without the Nordschleife, and also with a reducing amount of Spa – along with a range of other ‘iconic’ F1 circuits from history.
A huge number of people watch the Monaco event because it exists as part of the championship – not because it’s a great viewing experience. Saturday is great, usually – but Sunday is not, and everyone knows it.
I expect Monaco will be dropped from the calendar – the only unknown is when. F1 seem far too addicted to rubbish racing cars, and the time will come when they are simply too big, fast and heavy to be considered ‘safe’ in that environment.
And that’s without even taking viewing figures or financial viability into account – both of which can change very quickly.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
29th May 2025, 17:49
S, for Monaco that threshold was apparently crossed last year. However, the “improvements” made things worse.
anon
29th May 2025, 18:36
@alianora-la-canta it’s was crossed the best part of half a century ago, given you’ll find complaints back to the 1970s of boring and processional races at Monaco.
BenjaminS (@benihana)
29th May 2025, 10:42
There is watching – Don’t talk to me, don’t make noise, leave my laptop\tablet alone watching. That used to be me.
Then there is watching – oh yeah hone I’ll go get the Landry, oh sure I’ll vacuum the floors watching. That is me now.
Different ways of watching and while we still watch we don’t really concentrate on it exclusively anymore, at least for me.
Adrian Hancox (@ahxshades)
29th May 2025, 13:33
Absolutely this – there are a group of us that watch F1 over a few beers at the local, and Monaco is always a case of us probably playing pool or chatting a LOT more when it is on.
Alianora La Canta (@alianora-la-canta)
29th May 2025, 17:47
Complicated in this case by people watching specifically for the farce or for other reasons that aren’t actually in F1 or Liberty’s long-term interest.
(I do know some people who followed through on not watching Monaco even though they watched other races this season. I even know one person who’s bailed on 2025 and will tune in again next year).
S
29th May 2025, 10:18
Just a small clarification to CotD – Ross Brawn’s team, under FOM, came up with these aero regs and stated they would be updated to keep the competition close.
Although the FIA adopted these regs, they never said they’d be updating them in the way Brawn spoke about. Brawn left his FOM position shortly after.
BenjaminS (@benihana)
29th May 2025, 12:04
Thanks for clarifying.
Adrian Hancox (@ahxshades)
29th May 2025, 10:53
On the subject of the COTD
Tweaking the regulations is what stifles the creativity and differentiation in the sport. If they need to have that much control then they need to introduce a standard body – wings and all – and be done with it.
I have said many times that now we have a cost cap we should be reducing regulation and giving teams freedom to innovate rather than increasing it. (Safety regulations aside of course). If a team can make a race car that is safe and competitive at say 650 kg under the cost cap, then why shouldn’t they?
I’ll get my coat.
BenjaminS (@benihana)
29th May 2025, 12:12
I am all with you on innovation and all. Heck I love listening to the snippets of Tech Talk I can still get and listen to Sam Collins talk about new “sticky uppity bits” all day long. But the news regs sort of gave us a look at what could of been, not knowing who would win week in, week out. While I like a good piece of Tech on cars I also wish we could keep what 2024 or 2025 had, good competition too.
Tony Mansell (@tonymansell)
29th May 2025, 12:42
Because they would develop it past the point of safety for driver and spectator. This is the reason the rule book started getting bigger 50 or so years ago. I’d expect someone on a motorsport website to know this tbh
Adrian Hancox (@ahxshades)
29th May 2025, 13:31
Covered safety in my post – I’d expect someone on a motorsport website to have basic comprehension TBH
S
29th May 2025, 14:00
Totally disagree. Every tweak can create a new challenge, and each team can come up with a different solution (provided the regs allow for multiple solutions, of course).
The tight rules serve multiple functions, with a key one being about containing performance and minimising field spread.
Relying on a restricted budget, a weight limit and some safety tests would totally destroy the on-track competition. We’ve been there for a very long time already, and hardly anyone likes that aspect of F1. Technical diversity, yes – but utter dominance and enormous field spread, no.
What do you suggest they should do when it turns out that the racing is terrible with those cars? More freedom, more technical restrictions, or sporting compensation such as success ballast? Or just leave it to be a mobile car show producing only parades every other week?
isthatglock21
29th May 2025, 11:56
Say what you want about Monaco, we all love to moan, but everyone from the hardcores to the casuals & beyond tunes in. The global viewing figures are always sky high vs other GP’s. Very much something few people ever talk about for some reason. This isn’t something new either, pretty sure it’s always been the case even pre DTS. If anything it shows people are hardly seeing a dull race & never tuning into F1 again, as many come back every year, often to the same race.
S
29th May 2025, 14:05
I’d like to see the official data you have to back up this assertion.
Saturday I can believe – but Sunday…?
Alan Dove
29th May 2025, 15:08
As I mentioned above Olgivy realised you take what people say at face value. Observe behaviors. That’s what dictates where value truly lies.
Robbie1
29th May 2025, 12:45
FIA explains front wing rule change delay:
“After the disastrous viewer ratings report from March 2024, showing a significant decrease in viewership and fan participation due to Max his dominance, we decided, as we have done multiple times in the past, to artificially increase tension and excitement by allowing one team in specific to run what is clearly an illegal front wing until we were sure the 2024 and 2025 seasons would be interesting to watch.”
Gerrit
29th May 2025, 13:46
If this McLaren wing is so good and totally legal, why don’t other manufacturers copy the concept? I don’t see the scrutineers rejecting a McLaren wing so it is 100% legal.
The wings are either in spec (as designated by current testing methods) or out of spec and rejected. So there are no “illegal” front wings, only variations on a design and manufacture theme. A theme no other manufacturer can match.
You suggesting the scrutineers are turning a blind eye to a wing not meeting the current testing method (a la Penske)?
No; the problem is the other manufacturers are simply unable to produce a wing like McLaren have, that passes the scrutineer judgement and current rules, and thus claim “illegality” so as to to hide their own incompetence and engineering skills.
Biggest problem for the rule makers is that a static load test for a carbon fibre part does not always correspond to a dynamic load depending upon wind speed (car speed induced pressure) over a wing section. Low speed no flex, high speed greater flex.
I suggest the real reason the new testing method has been delayed is that the cannot formulate a testing regime that replicates loading at varies speeds (wind pressure variations). The camera trick to measure flex is just not accurate enough and unable to be calibrated to give a defining go/no go measurement in regarding wing flex on the varies elements that make up the front wing. How to scrutineer a flexible part at varies wind speed induced loads across a longish and wide surface. Cant just hang a weight on the end to measure bends for it does not replicate the dynamic forces, that wind speed across the whole length of the wing, produced bending characteristics. Have a look at any (not just Mclaren) front wing elements bending at varies speed from onboard cameras (especially those little alloy end plates on each wing section). Some elements bend more than others to give multiple slot openings off different apertures across the wing. How to measure that statically is difficult unless the scrutineers instigate a dynamic test for each wing with the compounding complexity of all the wing elements behaving differently. You would need an extra free practice session just to scrutineer front (and rear wings) on all twenty cars for dynamic, wind speed induced wing bending, loading. And each wing element signed and sealed for use in a race.
Roger Ayles (@roger-ayles)
29th May 2025, 15:43
As I seem to say every year. The people who hate Monaco and want it dropped are simply not the majority, Never have been.
Every year the Monaco GP gets some of the higher TV ratings of the season and in all of the fan polls, surveys and focus groups the Monaco GP always tends to end up in the top half in terms of been a race that should remain.
I don’t mean to come across as rude or anything when I say this but those who don’t like Monaco and who would like to see it go should simply accept that it isn’t going anywhere and not watch it but there will always be plenty of people like myself who do enjoy Monaco and who will watch it.
I don’t like the sprint races so I just don’t watch any of them and yes that means i didn’t see last year’s title deciding ‘race’ but whatever.