Honda! You Fools!

I am quite tired of blogging but with the results of today's qualifying in Melbourne, I just had to write this one. It was fantastic to see a complete change to the look of the grid. What was amazing to see was that the top 3 was dominated by privateers not manufacturers! This is how it should be done!!

But my main focus here is on the Brawn GP cars. About a month ago I was telling folks about its speed but as is usual, many seemed to dismiss their pace as running light showboating. But there was something different about this team. Whereas show-boaters go quick once at best, these guys were consistently setting the quickest times. And not just on banzai laps. Reports showed that they were consistently fast on the long runs and signficantly, their relative pace seemed undiminished towards the end of the long runs. And when they do go for broke, there's nothing to touch them.

Well, in Melbourne, so it proved in qualifying. One thing great about this new format is that you do get to judge race pace in the final session. And if you look at their speed in final qualifying there seems to be nothing to touch these Brawns. For the good of the sport, I dearly hope they take full honours tomorrow. And if not them then at least Vettel's Red Bull.

But really the point I would like to make in this post is Honda's shortsightedness in flogging off their team just as they were on the brink on greatness. Honda's pull out put the team in all sorts of trouble. They got the cars very late to testing. This alone I believe slowed the pace of their development. But so fast was the cars they they still ended up quickest.

And late into the game, the team had to adapt to the Mercedes engine. Now this car was designed with a Honda engine in mind. Do not underestimate the significance. You can't simply bolt in any old motor to the back of these machines. The design has been optimised for engine shape, configuration and drive characteristics and delivery. The Mercedes is an incredibly strong motor of course and I bet that help. But could you believe how fast the Brawns would be running the engine they were really built to run on? I would imagine had Honda kept with it, the cars would be untouchable and I would gather would have been at least a second quicker than the next fastest runners.

When Ross Brawn took over the team I had thought him and brave man and I admired his spirit. I mean, he could easily have found employment elsewhere but he went down the route of owning the team and doing this his way. But I suppose looking at the performance of the Brawns, he knew didn't he? He knew they had created something special even before it had turned a wheel. Knew it would be competitive and quick and be able to take the fight to the likes of Ferrari and McLaren, both of which are absolutely nowhere to be seen in Melbourne.

Honda! Long have I followed this company and rooted for them on the back of their exploits in the 80s and early 90s and the fact that they powered Ayrton Senna to all three of his world titles. I have always admired their inventiveness and competitiveness and have always prayed they would do well. But there was a difference between Honda of the 80s and the Honda company now. Soichiro Honda lived and breathed racing. Making road cars was more of a side activity for him to finance his racing, much like old Enzo himself. Many many racers around the world and especially in Japan felt a betrayal with Honda's pullout of grand prix racing. With only a single win to its name, it felt like there was unfinished business. When Honda previously talked of the power of dreams, it really refers to Soichiro's dream of taking on the best of the Europeans and kicking the living shit out of them.

But today, the Honda company has perverted that dream. Transformed it to that ridiculous "My Earth Dreams." A betrayal to its roots and to its spirit. Old Soichiro Honda should be turning in his grave. Ayrton Senna too for that matter.

How long can Brawn keep this up? God knows. Without some heavyweight backing I simply don't know. Maybe for the next 3 to 4 grands prix perhaps. Maybe less. Who knows? But they should milk their current successes for all its worth.

They say the best revenge after being dumped by a lover is to simply live well. Well the best way for Brawn to extract retribution against Honda is to put the car on pole and win the race. One out of two tasks are done. Here's hoping that win comes. That'll really be sticking two fingers up the air to those narrow minded idiots in Japan.

All this provided of course that the FIA doesn't rule their diffusers illegal. Well, I think the FIA have no problems with the design after all they passed it. But as usual they just might listen to Ferrari. Even if they do though, Ferrari would still not end up quickest. That'll be the Red Bulls! Long live the revolution!

Formula 1 Reloaded Part 2

In the wake of Honda's demise Pitpass has this interesting editorial by Mike Lawrence that attacks the role of Formula 1 owners, CVC. Essentially, this is similar to the point I had made before, that CVC is an irrelevant stakeholder of the sport that serves to do nothing except serve as a rent collector. They don't even serve Bernie Ecclestone to my mind, who had cashed out his Formula 1 holdings a long time ago to Kirsch. CVC simply took out a huge loan to buy the shares from the banks after Kirsch went into liquidation. And now to service the loan, CVC of course withdraws a huge amount of money from the sport. Money, as I had argued, rightly belongs to the teams. Further amounts are taken for the benefit of CVC and through them, their own investors.

There are many side effects of these activities.

First, there is a need to take Formula 1 out of Europe and North America and bring it out East where gullible governments pay huge amounts to host these races on some of the most dreadful Tilke designed circuits. More are set to join in, South Korea and Abu Dhabi being the latest. And yet more are clamoring for a grand prix. A certain poverty stricken nation who should be spending those millions to take children out of living on the streets are ever ready to throw money at FOM instead. With these Eastern circuits, once the novelty wears off, struggle to keep the grandstands packed without giving away free tickets to school children. And sad to say, Malaysia is no different there. (Though honestly, Sepang manages to keep the hillstands packed to the brim!) And yet host a grand prix anywhere in Europe and even at Indianapolis and the fans keep pouring in year on year. Its funny but shouldn't races be run where the loyal fans are? Shouldn't races be run on classic circuits unmolested by the evil hands of Tilke?

Second, because less money is available to the teams (though that improved slightly a couple of years ago), the only ones that can afford to compete are the manufacturers. Without them, Formula 1 is left without a grid. CVC, quite smartly imposes that these manufacturers must sign up to compete for an agreed period of time, forcing their commitment.

Bernie understands this and does all he can to keep the manufacturers in. On the other hand, Max Mosley understands that these manufacturers could leave if the costs escalate to exceed the benefits of competing in grand prix racing. Hence his drive to reduce these costs up to and including the ludicrous standard engine measure recently proposed.

What benefit is it for Honda to compete in a Formula 1 where their talents cannot be allowed to shine through? Sure they have not been performing but without the freedom to allow innovation and ingenuity and produce differentiation, whats the point of the competition? There doesn't seem to be any benefit to the competition when it has to adopt a standard engine or even to have their engines forcibly equalised by regulations. Especially since their money can be put to better use elsewhere in these times of financial meltdown.

Third, you drive out teams whose heart and soul is nothing but pure racing. Teams, that by right, should be the ones to compete in the sport. These teams are driven by pure passion and its great to see these guys get it absolutely right despite facing the manufacturers. But here now, we have a sport which sidelines these pure bred racing teams in favour of makers of the horrid Toyota Prius. Furthermore, a competition billing itself as the pinnacle of motorsport has now been perverted as testlab for so-called road relevant technologies like KERS which teams are now re-considering because of the weight penalty and small gains.

There are many other consequences of this unjust and perverted ownership of the sport but I shall leave it there for now. It seems clear that whenever you see or read about some silly idea from Max and Bernie, you only have to see that they are serving no one except CVC. They have become the minions of these investors.

There seems to be a need to materialise a championship for real racing fans not the "casual fan" who knows bugger and real racing teams and not manufacturers engaged in battle in the best traditions of motorsports. A championship owned by the teams and not greedy investors with no interest in motor racing save to reap profits to serve feed their insatiable appetites. A championship run on the best drivers' circuits in the world and not on those with stupid grandstands to pamper the so-called casual fans and corporate types.

Honda Quits

A few questions pop into mind at the announcement that Honda is leaving Formula 1. But the most important ones would be:

- What will Ross Brawn do now?
- What will Jenson Button do?
- Would Honda have left if they were winning races and world championships?
- Which team will be next?