Stop exaggerating: F1 is in rude health
Can Formula One survive another scandal? Forumula1.net thinks so…
Spygate, liegate, cost-cutgate and now crashgate. Scandals that have rocked the world of F1, and which have led to a media cacophony decrying the very nature of the sport. The mass media has asserted, in recent days, the following: Renault’s Crashgate is just the latest example of how deeply unfair and corrupt F1 is, in which cheating is part and parcel of being successful.
Crashgate, if proved, will be more serious than the previous examples. Never before would a team have been found guilty of conspiring to fix a race by endangering spectators’ and a driver’s life; it is quite heinous. Equally, this season the sport has been riven by division like never before; at the time of the British Grand Prix F1 was facing one of its biggest ever crises. At the start of the season, an unsavoury episode concerning McLaren and the stewards made everyone wrinkle their noses and be a bit disappointed with Lewis Hamilton in particular. We had thought the £100m fined dished out to McLaren two years before had seen off this kind of underhandedness.
But it must not be taken out of proportion. This sort of thing does not happen often; and in a sport where the highs are higher than in arguably any other field of competition, it shouldn’t really come as a surprise. Rules have been bent in every top level sport since the dawn of time, and a lot broken; but the key thing to note is if the authorities are either compliant or impotent. In none of the above cases has the FIA been impotent; rather, it has ladled out a particularly stern type of justice, the precedent that has left fans fearing for Renault’s future in the last couple of days.
Other sports are not exempt from this. Football is currently riven with the debate over diving, or simulation as some choose to call it; the gentlemanliest of gentleman’s games rugby union had its own “bloodgate” scandal recently. Allegations have been levelled at the England cricket team for time-wasting during the recent series against the Australians; and if anyone seriously believes drugs are now completely absent from athletics, they need to have their head seen to.
So why the sudden attack on F1? The truth is, there has always been a section of the media which has delighted in putting F1 down. Environmentalists are the largest element within them; ignorant of the fact that F1 has in fact been carbon neutral since 1995. Feminists also decry the inherently masculine nature of motorsport, and do have something of a point, but go for the jugular whenever they can. Bleeding hearts see the millions of dollars wasted on frivolity. Flavio Briatore is a perfect target for the aforementioned two. Then there are the sporting purists, who don’t understand F1 because it involves a machine and is a bit complicated.
So it doesn’t help when F1 journalists jump on the bandwagon and bite the hand that feeds. The sport has a bright future, with or without manufacturers; it is still mostly great entertainment, and 95% of the personnel that work in it are fair, honest and just. Including, crucially, the FIA and its affiliates, into whose hands F1 fans rather sadly place what seems like the latest example of cheating. But F1 is by no means rotten.
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Andy M | Sep 19, 2009 | Reply
Sadly it is quite fashionable to bash and criticise Formula One. Just like in the world of music it becomes fashionable to bash and criticise certain artists.
You find generally in life that many people, journalists included, are like sheep and will blinding follow a common perception without actually questioning it.
It’s the done thing to have a dig at Formula One.
Top article, by the way
Al | Sep 19, 2009 | Reply
Sorry Mr Podmore, but your argumentation is nothing but BS, driven by oversimplification! In your list of gates you forgot Max’s sexgate or whippinggate, presumably because you didn’t want to bite the hand that feeds you. I myself was a F1 fanatic … literally … when F1 was a sport. My heart would race when the lights would go out at each GP. Today F1 is driven by a bunch of money sucking egoists – each bent on sticking it to the other in a wierdly public power war, and in a variety of perverted ways. The supposed leaders (FIA) are the prime culprits … they play the sick power game professionally …. crafting wierd rules and regulations, then change their interpretation depending on the outcome they want. I wouldn’t spend a cent on the sport anymore. I even cancelled my annual membership with the team I supported for 32 years precisely because I don’t believe in the sport anymore. No Mr Podmore, F1 is intrinsically rotten. You may be right about corruption and scandals being present in almost every sport, but certainly F1 wins the honors of being the most corrupt of them all. Unlike you, F1 does not feed me, so I can express my opinion honestly and openly without the fear of Max coming to whip me!!!
Mosquito | Sep 23, 2009 | Reply
Would be interesting to hear Mr Podmore’s comments regarding Crashgate. 1 point to Al … seems like there’s a whiff of Jean Todt’s hand here … you know … Renault … Todt … French … French Automobile Association vote … lol. And, as we know, Max is doing anything to support Jean. Spygate was engineered to peanilize McLaren $100 million because there were allegations that two company employees colluded to exchange technical info. At the time Max was on record as saying that the employer is responsible for the employee’s action. Apparently no so anymore. Who says F1 ain’t corrupt. Well put Al.