The Good ol' days

[ralf fan]

After seeing the processions of this year most f1 fans have made references to the good ol' days... ie the 80's and early 90's and even the 70's

Wrex in another thread has made the point that there were processions and boring races back then as well but no-one seems to point it out....


So what was it about these races back in the good ol' days that people keeping refering back to the them.

Was it the cars?

One explainantion i can think of is that there were greater no. of teams back then so eventough the leaders ran away with them there was always action at the back and scraps...... thats why i didnt mind watcjhing those bor-a-thons from the past

Were the drivers braver with their overtaking??

What are your recollections of why these days were apparently the best in F1?

[Kicking-back]

No.

It's simply that memory clouds judgement.

Nothing is ever as good as people think it used to be.

[ASCII Man]

Back when i first watched F1, the cars seemed almost alive in contrast to todays clinical and dull machines.
Or maybe i was a lot easier impressed when i was a kid?

Like 'Whow! A blue car!' kind of impressed, maybe.

[Phoenix1]

I think that the actual racing has not changed but two things, in the UK at least, have.

1) Like him or not Murry Walker added spice to the races

2) Most races where not shown in full and therefor alot of the boring parts where cut out

3) No personalities being allowed to shine through at the moment, it's lost is gentlemens sport image. Even Jordan is not having as much fun these days.

4) Even without Murry F1 would seem more intreasting if the commentaters did not knock it all the time. I would like to see gears etc.. back but lets not pretend they are easy to drive.

5) Ralf fan - you mention overtaking and bravery, again the perseved image is the overtaking is dumb - Sato over taking might be slightly over the top at times but hey he tries, and I bet the sponsors love it. I can't see say McLaren ever having Sato but I bet secretly alot of people in the team would like that kinda gutsy driver, Kimi has some but never gets excited about it on camara.

6) We do all look back with rose tinted glasses

7) I think a fundemental problem with this era of racing is people losing respect for Ferrari and the sports ethos of winning. I realise the racing has always been a team sport take as far back as Fangio in 1956 usng 3 other team mates cars during the season including Peter Collins car, had Collins not handed over he would of won the championship. What I think today lacks in the racing of the team mates. We all know that if Rubens is ahead of Micheal he will slow down and if behind will not over take. I have no problem with two team mates not fighting to hard but swapping positions when in commanding lead seems somewhat over the top in the position they are in.

Overall F1 needs a personality again. A James Hunt, Aryton Senna etc... someone to love or hate with several people up for the championship, I would say that last year was a class year for example, you may not see it now but in 20 years image looking back, Williams coming from nowhere, McLaren the underdog coming so close and so much drama and controversy.

Let us remember the good times and hope for some new teams to come in and liven the place up!

[Sodemo]

Im sorry but I don't buy all this talk about memory clouding judgement of past year's racing.
I have races on tape from 1993, 1995, 1996, and 1997 and by far in a way the racing was far better than in recent years.
How many overtaking manoovers did you see this year at Hungary? 1? have you seen the 1986 race? there were about 4 moves at the first corner, 2 of them around the outside...
Racing was FAR better in years gone by.

[Adam43]

Just off the top of my head I don't recall '93, '95, '96 and '97 being any better than now. I don't remember stand out races such as Hockenheim only two races ago, or Silverstone '03. Sure '93 had Donington, but Senna and Rubens aside the rest was not up to the depth of field overtaking that happened in the two race I cite. I may be wrong, I'll grab the season reviews later and have a watch.

1986, especially Hungary, now I agree with you there. That move by Piquet was excellent.

[Mackmot]

If you watch old F1 they just watching one car looks fantastic especially pre 82. It because all the cars were soft, ran lots of droop and had hardly any grip from the tyres. You see the cars move like ASCII Man says, like they are alive. You see drivers struggling to make them work. That is exciting even without the overtaking which as wrex said did not happen all the time. I love watching Motors Legend where I can watch entire seasons of the 60s and 70s and see drivers being men not businessmen

[EERO]

I've been a fan since the late sixties and watched since the early '70's. There were boring processions then too.

What made it more interesting overall was the unpredictability of the races and the fragility of the cars. Going into any given race, 6 to 10 drivers were considered to be viable winners. If a driver was running away with the season, he might still suffer a mechanical failure or have an off day. The boredom in my mind is due to the level of perfection that Ferrari and Schumacher have achieved-that and the fact that this is the FIFTH consecutive season in which the Team is dominant.
Proir to the current age, teams fortunes waxwd and waned seasonally.


Even in 1988, we at least had to wonder whether it would be Prost OR Senna.


I don't believe that we can blame Ferrari for having done such a great job; the fault lies with the other teams. But it cannot be fixed until the enormous margin in funding that Ferrari enjoys is reduced; testing is limited to race weekends after the season begins; refueling during the race is eliminated so that cars are forced to pass on the track, not in the Pits.


The current Formula has been so stable that the possibility of mechanical failure and driver error has been diminished. Allow greater variables in the races and we will see different results more often.

[ASCII Man]

Oh what the hell, i'm gonna watch my '72/'75/'77 reviews again!

[hubert]

A lot of the 'excitment' that's brought up about the years of yore has been engineered out of F1 in the name of saftey; driver saftey; corner worker saftey; and ,saftey concious track layouts.

Imola's been nutured, the cars go through tedious de-evolutions per annum meant to slow them down (which never actually happens) in the name of saftey.

The end result is a sterile procession.

I've long argued that F1 is 'just fine,' but after this Sunday's race, I finally realize that the very essence of F1 is lacking a fundamental component: common sense.

The FIA & Bernie, in all their musing and neutring of F1, are responsible for the follow the leader procession we're now witnessing - we're essentially watching a money train.

Ferrari dominate because they've got the will and budget to out spend - the remaining top dogs are also those who have the experience and money to out test, out develop and out spend the rest of the field. Bernie and the FIA attempt to inhibit this developmental pace, but their shot gun rule changes only add up to more development and more rigerous testing schedules by the teams that can afford it (Ferrari is up to 4 test drivers now?) They keep missing the point; the old adage of : "speed is money" is continually ignored - the smaller, lesser teams don't have the money to test their cars to forward their development at the pace of the top 3, nor do they have the money to attract the top engineers, etc.

Ferrari's cars experience 1400 revisions / season and their budget is touted to be somewhere north of 400 million; Minardi, on the other hand, has a sum total budget of 45 million - and Minardi are 5 seconds off Ferrari's pace - I bet an extra 150 - 300 million / annum in budget could aide in closing the gap. And the same is true for all the other teams.

If we want racing and competition to return thoroughout the field, we need to revitalize the cash flow into the mid / lower pack teams. We need to quit forcing the teams to adapt to new rulebooks every season, but rather they should be supplied with adequate funding to level the playing field.

[Son of Jor-El]

Originally posted by AdamAshmore
Just off the top of my head I don't recall '93, '95, '96 and '97 being any better than now. I don't remember stand out races such as Hockenheim only two races ago, or Silverstone '03.

Hockenheim was good but not on the same level as Siverstone '03.

'97 was a year that stands out, the Mclarens winning for the first time since '93. Hill almost winning at Hungary, Hakkinen's first win, Bergers last (and best), and the infamous Jerez incident! 6 different winners in total.

'96, for the MS fans (not I !) Spain must stand out as a classic.

[Tweed]

Magny Cours '99, was the best race of recent times, IMO.

[Adam43]

Originally posted by Son of Jor-El
6 different winners in total.

Any better racing though? Or did more different people just win without passing on the track?

Originally posted by Tweed
Magny Cours '99, was the best race of recent times, IMO.

Off topic, but Frentzen was passed by others more than he passed others. He won because of doing one less pitstop! Did he race to the win?

[Kicking-back]

My abiding memory of France 1999 is being on-board Hakkinen when he outbraked about 6 cars in one go into the Adelaide hairpin.

It was like a computer game manouvre, but it worked.

[Tweed]

Yes, and passing Panis into the fast chicane when he was barely half a car alongside.

[Fogelhund]

I believe that EERO has much of it correct when he states that the lower record of reliability in the past made things a bit more interesting. Car X might have been dominant, but could break down creating a different combination of winners.

I wonder how the % of cars finishing today compares with the 60's, 70's, 80's.. and so on.

While we've also had a few periods of dominance, they haven't been quite as sustained as this, and usually there has been more competition in any given race then this year in particular.

The Ferrari/Schumacher combination is one for legends for certain.

[ralf fan]

I quite agree.... i said above as well there were more no. of teams back then and even if the result was a foregone conclusion there was always action at the back with retirements and scraps and you seemed to have more unlikely points and podium scorers back then

full marks to the teams for their efforts but you have to say reliability has probably contributed in making f1 boring.... we rarely see a Minardi scoring points.

[Knowlesy]

I think the number of teams is irrelevant.

The number of competitive teams is relevant.

Adam......the 1997 season. I've just watched through it in its entirety and whilst it wasn't the greatest in on track action, it was certainly very good.

Strategy's, although not my favourite things, were more inventive (eg - Suzuka), overtaking was certainly present. Reliability problems were there for all, the underdogs came out to play occasionally, we had Alesi and Villeneuve in top cars, Schumacher in a dog, beautiful wide cars with slicks, no driver aids, incident and controversy.

It goes down as one of my faves for sure.

[KevinS]

I agree budgets are a big factor in differences between teams performances. But what I hear is that Toyota has a bigger budget than Ferrari and Williams and McLaren aren't far off. It is a big factor... for the other 6 teams.

I think some of the factors that make Ferrari dominant are:
- Stability (1 driver change since 1996, hardly any changes in management)
- A tyre manufacturer that gives them almost all of their attention.
- Their own testtracks, where sometimes they even test 5 days a week.
- And ofcourse Schumacher, who has a lot to do with the development of the car, etc.

As for making races more exciting... One or two sets of tyres per weekend (forcing them to use hard tyres) and maybe even lose the carbon brake disks. That should bring back some of the hard work keeping the car on the track and overtaking manouvres that require balls...

[Slippy Diff]

The boring, sterile, corporate, lobotomised drivers are half the problem. How many of them list Phil Collins as their favourite music artist???????
Just imagine 24 Innes Ireland's on the grid!!!!!!!!!!

[Wrex]

Originally posted by EERO
The boredom in my mind is due to the level of perfection that Ferrari and Schumacher have achieved-that and the fact that this is the FIFTH consecutive season in which the Team is dominant.

Total agreement here.

I never cease to be amazed at how reliable these cars are today.

[Slippy Diff]

The man

[climb]

A possible way to remix cards?
Abolish refuelling: fuel cells will have to be completely redesigned, and so will the cars.

Furthemore, F1 will have to push on anti-consumption research, which will engender subsequent results and benefits on commercial cars.

[Armco Bender]

The other man,bring back the '70s anytime

[Dani Filth]

not with those behinds