F1 2012 Championship Thread

[Holdfast]

Looking forward to watching the highlights in a few minutes. Already got spoiled on the result earlier but still I love the new track's layout and want to see it in action.

In terms of result, nice to hear Lewis won and it's always great when a championship goes to the final race of a season.

[Lonemagpie]

Yeah I don't even mind so much if Vettel wins the triple next week, so long as it's gone to the final race to decide the championship

[MacLeod]

I'd still prefer Alonso to win the Drivers Championship than Vettel, but a last race title decider is always nice. Though do we want it to come down to the lasp corner of the last lap for it to be decided like in 08?

[Geckothan]

Sorting it out at the last corner would be a little too tense for me. I'd rather someone smash Vettel out at the first corner and get it over with. I have a feeling that the finger-waving prick is going to end up winning it anyway though, sadly

[MacLeod]

Well we'll find out in less than a week. Perhaps Ferrari will suprise us with an upgrade package that works.

[Geckothan]

Whatever happens, it'll probably be a decent race at least. Rain please!

[MacLeod]

Well The Brazillian GP has thrown up a few decent races.

[Holdfast]

Holdfast wrote:

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Looking forward to watching the highlights in a few minutes. Already got spoiled on the result earlier but still I love the new track's layout and want to see it in action.

That was worth watching. Austin really is a fab track; I love the massive elevation changes around turn 1.

Enjoyable first race there; here's to many more there to come. It's vital the F1 beds down well in the USA to maintain a truly worldwide presence. Hopefully New Jersey will also become a permanent fixture on the calendar alongside it.

Talking of which, the calendar really has exploded in recent years. There are just so many races, with hardly any off-season for development work. I like the long racing years but wonder if we now need more in-season testing time to compensate for these changes?

[MacLeod]

The question is how big can the calender get, we have places like Mexico, Russia, a 2nd pssoible a 3rd GP in the US. Will the teams allow it to go beyond 20 races and if not which races will get dropped?

[junxon]

i'm going to say Go Vettel! for brazil just to balance out geckothan. sure he's been lucky and his cars good, but then name a champion thats still won having a bad car and no luck.

[Lonemagpie]

I wonder if it'd occur to Seb to pull a Senna-on-Prost on Alonso... (i.e. take himself and Alonso out and so win by default)

[MacLeod]

Or even a Prost-on-Senna move.

[Lonemagpie]

MacLeod wrote:

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Or even a Prost-on-Senna move.

Indeed. (Prost did it first, in 89, but Senna did it more effectively a couple of years later!)

[Holdfast]

MacLeod wrote:

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The question is how big can the calender get, we have places like Mexico, Russia, a 2nd pssoible a 3rd GP in the US. Will the teams allow it to go beyond 20 races and if not which races will get dropped?

I think they would; in F1 money tends to do the talking. More races would mean more money (from TV deals, sponsors, winnings, etc). Obviously it would need negotiating but I think they'd eventually go for it. The problem would be finding time to adequately develop & test the cars so every weekend doesn't become just a race of attrition due to unreliability.

If they did start dropping races instead, some of the European races would be under threat. Hungary would probably be top of the list, I'm guessing.

[MacLeod]

in terms of European races, aren't we approaching he minimum whats left to cut

Monaco
Italy
Britain
Belgium
Germany
Spain
hungary

Not a lot left to cut, As those are some of the most historic races and tracks that can provide interesting races.