November 19, 2006

F1 Tech: Wussy? HELL, NO!

Pete, in a comment yesterday, mentioned the "wussification of F1 with green technologies."

Now, see, I don't happen to agree with the view that 'going green' is going all wussy-treehuggy. In fact, considering the history of F1 as the technological leader in motorsports, it's exactly the right thing to do.

Hell, if they could make an electric-motor-powered F1 car that could go (say) 200mph for 250 miles (or signifigant fractions thereof with pitstops) without burning gasoline, I think that'd be amazingly cool. If they could do those numbers running on any number of green technologies, that'd be fantastic.

If it kills the speeds, however, or makes the cars only go 5 laps between pitstops, then forget it. But technological advances are not to be shunned in F1; remember that F1 has ALWAYS been the leader in motorsports technology... and F1 tech flows down to our cars. Disc brakes, turbochargers, tire makeup, antilock braking systems (and traction control)... all worked out in F1 before they made it to our humble Toyotas and Chryslers. Why NOT 'green' tech?

Besides, who knows? Maybe they'll have something like garbage-powered Ferraris.

And there will always be people like Steven DenBeste, who think that F1 is vaguely pansyish anyway. Amazing that someone so smart can be so dumb, but what can you do, huh?

Posted by: Wonderduck at 04:56 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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1 I'm also somewhat concerned about F1 going wussy, but it seems to me that misguided cost-cutting and safety measures are the main problem. Note to Bernie and Max: this is Formula One, it's supposed to be expensive and (just a little) risky. (While you're at it, you might want to tell the race stewards to lay off the Keystone Kops routine and get their act together. But I digress...)

As for eco-friendly technology, it should be easy to incorporate that into F1; for example, change the fuel rules to allow teams to use ethanol (like in CART) or diesel fuel (like the Audi R10 in ALMS--perhaps biodiesel would work here). They'd have to work out some equivalence formulas to make sure that teams that go that route don't have an undue advantage or disadvantage over teams that stick with gasoline, though.

Posted by: Peter the Not-so-Great at November 20, 2006 11:57 AM (coFiU)

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