After seeing the great article posted by 2manylotuses, it got me thinking about Red Bull and Toro Rosso, and the customer car controversy. In my humble opinion, customer cars could really help the smaller teams, such as Virgin, get on terms with the midfield. it would improve the whole spectacle of the sport, seeing the field all closed up again. I'm only proposing it for backmarker teams, not mid field teams. Look at Super Aguri in 06, they were a laughing stock, yet a year later they were point scorers on merit, not luck, because they had the brilliant 06 Honda Chassis. Like i said, just an idea, and i'd be interested to hear your opinions on this.
In a word NO, formula one is not like other formula it is about innovation it is the pinnacle of motor sport it's about ideas and development what it's not about is standardization. And why is it every time I try to use an "s" in a word my spellchecker tells me I'm wrong and should use a "z" I'm not American!!!!!!
Like i said, it's only an idea, for the backmarkers to close the gap on the midfield. Because of the ban on customer cars, we never got to see Prodrive, who would have given Gary Paffett a serious chance, and would have been a competent team, especially with Dave Richards running the show. P.s. Don't bother with the spell checker. Spelling isn't important on this site.
I can't see it working. Repsol Honda currently do it in the moto gp, but because they weren't anticipating how expensive it is, they're going back to 2 next season. The only f1 team that could realistically pull it off are Ferrari.
3 car efforts are a costly exercise and can distract from a team's main effort. They can add colour or something inspiring to a race event though. Giles Villeneuve made his debut in a 3rd Mclaren, albeit an older M23 at Silverstone in 1977. I think the last time we had customer cars in F1 must have been the second half of the 70s. The last one to score a point was probably a year-old Lotus 78 in the 1978 German GP at Hockenheim in the hands of Hector Rebaque. I'm not opposed to their re-introduction if it allows for greater participation and opportunity given to new entrants. Getting into F1 is such a costly exercise and as suggested by Mr Cowboy, Gary Parfett may have had an opportunity to show his skills and perhaps merit a drive with a leading team. I used to enjoy the CART series in America. It was primarily customer cars in that series and you'll be surprised how well it could work. In F1 though, they would largely be second level teams. I'd vote yes and would be interested in seeing how such a scheme would work today.
I think having last years car from a top team might be worth looking at rather than an off the shelf custom car! Although I like the idea of 3 car teams, it would be a logistical nightmare for the WDCband team orders etc.
Agreed. I was referring to the use of last year's car too. However, the regs will have to change to allow this. The cars could also be an update on the original models. Presumably the teams would be able to modify them.....
"Should we bring back customer cars for struggling teams?" - No! This is Formula 1; it is Grand Prix racing. It is up to each team what they do and that's how it should remain. Customer engines are a natural product of engineering excellence; always have been and always will be; but a customer car goes against the whole ethos of Grand Prix racing. We should steer well clear of any route that even remotely heads in the direction of a one make series (which of course is the very extreme version of this).
I don't see why big teams shouldn't be able to sell an old chassis to a smaller team. They sell enough bits to them already, Sauber use Ferrari engines, gearboxes, Kers and have a near identical push rod suspension. McLaren have a technical partnership with Virgin and Force India, and Red Bull supply Team Lotus. If the two teams can come to an agreement I have no problem with it, although the Red Bull/Toro Rosso thing went a bit far as they were using pretty much the same chassis for both teams.
I see Mr Cosicave's point but I don't see there being any harm since I imagine the proportion of customer car teams will be small and they are likely to be also rans making up the show anyway. Problem for me is when the also-rans get in the way and ruin the show for everyone. Have I changed my mind? Not really. Just thinking more about it I recall Penske's first car not working well so Roger bought a March for the second half of 1975 to first race, then learn from and improvise. By the American races which were the closing events for the season they had produced their PC-3 which was largely inspired by the March. In the next year, they came up with the PC-4 which scored podiums including a well-deserved victory at Zeltweg for John Watson. please log in to view this image It's not all bad
I'd like to see a team buying bits of different teams, so you get and RB6, with red and white front and rear wing, an illegal chrome F-duct and a used set of Bridgestones.
If the rules didn't change every year this wouldn't be such a big problem. However, I don't think customer cars are a good idea- I mean what if the Hispania actually scored some points with an old Red Bull or something? That would completely mess up the results with little effort on the part of the team, and F1 is after all a team sport.
Well I suppose that if a team were to buy a customer car, the 'constructor points' they would score would be credited to them as say, Hispania. They would be free after all, to develop the chassis themselves and with no assistance from the factory team.TBH I never thought about the points scoring but hey this is all purely discussion anyway. I doubt very much if customer cars are likely to be seen on the grid for now....... unless of course Bernie has something in mind.
They're discussing it. Personally I think it would be a good thing if it helped get Virgin and HRT in the mix.
Absolutely correct Mephisto. (And get yourself a British English dictionary/spell checker). P.S. to Kyle: you asked whether customer cars should be brought back in F1 but there has never been such a thing. And as Mephisto says, that's exactly how it should remain. However, a person or body of people owning more than one team is a different matter and this has been a source of concern with Dietrich Mateschitz and his ownership of two 'Red Bull' teams, who do share information - in spite of Christian Horner's squirming when facing a similar question recently!
lol, if RBR started selling customer cars there would be a queue a mile long outside their garage, with Ferrari and McLaren fronting it.
