19th Jun 2005
Indy F1 Fiasco
If you’re an F1 fan, you know where to find the info about the sad state of politics in the sport.
I used to follow Formula 1 Racing quite closely, and have attended Nurburging ‘99, Australia ‘00, and Monaco ‘00. I can’t imagine any of the fans making the trek to Indy ‘05 feeling anything but utter disappointment at the complete debacle of today’s “race” (only 6 cars starting out of 14). Of course, this doesn’t excuse the handful of idiots that started throwing debris on the track.
For Michelin to come to Indy for the 6th time in as many years, and not be able to produce a safe tire is incomprehensible. For the FIA to not allow a chicane in Turn 13, when it seemed to be the only sensible compromise, proves them to be an incarnation of bureacratic inflexibility. It was absolutely amazing to see 14 cars return to the garage at the end of the formation lap. Sad, but understandable from their point of view (your tire supplier tells you the tires are not safe, what do you do?)
This incident will only speed the split between the teams and the FIA. It’s glaringly obvious that the FIA does not have the interests of the fans in mind. I look forward to the creation of a series that is not run Eccelstone and Mosley.
Lay the blame where it belongs; on Michelin. They screwed up the tire choice. You can’t change the rules for a race in the middle of the race. It’s 100% unfair to the other (Bridgestone) teams. FIA was just upholding the rules, and they gave the Michelin teams plenty of options. (Changing the layout of the track 1 hour before race time and after days of practice and qualifying is beyond laughable.)