Pay-Drivers and the Consequences

[rffp]

It has been quite a while that I don't post anything here, so forgive me for the long post.

In this week’s Autosport edition, there is an interesting article about motorsport career focusing on Jaime Alguersuari’s failed attempt to re-enter F-1. Basically he complained of the current situation where he could not find a drive since he did not have the funds required by a couple of teams he was negotiating. Pay-driving is spreading fast through the F-1 teams from the backmarkers to midfielders. The Caterham and Marussia lineups are there to prove it.

Well, actually pay-drivers have always been present, even in the noughties decade when the manufacturers dominated the grid, they were always present. Motorsport is by definition an expensive activity and will require a good sum of investment. During the dominion of the manufacturers, there were several junior progragrammes in which teams farmed an excellent generation of drivers, if not the best ever. Vettel and Hamilton rose through the ranks by this manner. Their careers in F-1 were results of an investment made by the players of the F-1 community. The lack of manufacturers in F-1 have been affecting the development of young drivers. Toyota and BMW, for example, had means to finance the career of a young promise, hence the required investment was made, more often than before, by these manufacturers. More importantly, these teams did not require a driver to have funds to drive for their F-1 teams.

The scenario changed, and I don’t see Sauber or Force India, for instance, spending their money in the base categories. So drivers have been required to make these investments, resulting in the handful of pay-drivers that have reached F-1. This is symptomatic that teams are struggling financially. As the F-1 Rejects mentioned, 1994 was the year of the pay-driver, but actually the early 90’s were plagued by the pay-drivers. And it was plagued by the crushing of small teams and decadent ones too that folded due to financial trouble. Brabham hired Giovanna Amati, March had Paul Belmondo and Larrousse signed Jean-Denis Deletraz. These were drivers that were completely out of their league when they came to F-1 and the teams that signed them folded right after.

The pay-drivers that are arriving in F-1 are at least of better quality and their credentials look solid, so hopefully will fare better these years than those rejects legends. It is still troubling to see that GP2 champion is out of a seat. Nevertheless, it is good for F-1 to purge occasionally of some talented strugglers and bring some new faces. A year such as 2009, when only one rookie made to the first race, should be exceptions. Else, F-1 would find itself perpetuating the gridlock in the base categories, GP2 and GP3, which would be flooded with veterans.

But when I see Marussia lining up two rookies – I hope that the rumours that Razia’s check to Marussia bounced are false – it makes me wonder not how they will perform in 2013, but if the team will make it to 2014! Not that it will be missed if it is gone, but is this a current and future trend? Will others fold after 2014, specially after the engine changes? As for performance, Chilton and Razia will obviously have a dog year for sure. Their appraisal will be hard to make since they will be mired to the back of the grid with a car that on a good day will beat Caterham and be still 2s slower than the slowest of the midfielders.

But the worst of this change of scenario, and this was pointed out in Autosport’s article, is the consequences for the base categories. If drivers do not have the funds to go through them, the grids will shrink fast, as it is seen in the British F-3, condemning these categories to extinction. Back in the 80’s and the 90’s the structure of open wheel racing was pyramidal, there was F-1, F-3000, the local F-3 championships, and the myriads of F-Ford, F-Renault, F-GM, etc at the very base of that pyramid. Nowadays, there is still, in my opinion, a pyramidal structure, but it seems that the base size is severely reduced.

Since 1970, the only countries that have always had every season at least one point-scoring driver are the UK and Brazil. The former is facing hard times with the shrinking of their local F-3 and the extinction of the F-Renault. Although, I believe that the UK can still turn things around and there is time and strength to prevent any damage to the promotion of British drivers to the echelon of motorsport. The latter’s situation is desperate. There is only the Sudam F-3 which barely has a grid of 10 drivers, no base categories and virtually nowhere that these drivers can go except local Stock Cars, which belongs to the motor-netherworld. The prospect of no Brazilian drivers in F-1 in the next year is beyond troubling, which will crown more than 2 decades of utter incompetence of our local organisers. In 1990, there was a 20+ grid in the Sudam F-3, with the help of our neighbor from the south that is now in much worse shape, a solid F-Ford and a fledging F-Chevrolet and the country was plagued by hyperinflation.

Of course, there are many categories still standing, other countries like France are showing signs of a healthy talent raising programme, and there are plans for revamp of the base categories from the FIA, but it is my belief that motorsport is far from enjoying its heydays. I don’t want to sound too pessimistic, but it worries me that open-wheel racing is strong in Europe and it is still a high cost activity, while there is a serious economic crisis in that continent. Not a good combination. I hope I am not prophesizing the apocalypse.

[girry]

Make it possible to field a team with a shoestring budget, do everything to reduce the minimum cost to race in the series, and let the ferraris and mclarens of the world be happy to invest 100 million into a winglet. Applies to every single OW series there is; GP3 is popular and talent is flowing in, because it's like 800ke a season.

Every series which is keeping the minimum cost up is dying atm.

[Wallio]

[quote="rffp"

But when I see Marussia lining up two rookies – I hope that the rumours that Razia’s check to Marussia bounced are false – it makes me wonder not how they will perform in 2013, but if the team will make it to 2014! Not that it will be missed if it is gone, but is this a current and future trend? Will others fold after 2014, specially after the engine changes? As for performance, Chilton and Razia will obviously have a dog year for sure. Their appraisal will be hard to make since they will be mired to the back of the grid with a car that on a good day will beat Caterham and be still 2s slower than the slowest of the midfielders.




[/quote]


This is not going to be a popular thought on this site. Marussia certainly would be missed. They're giving 110% which is more than we could say about HRT. Hell, Marussia is beating The-Team-Formerly-Known-As-Lotus in testing o far!

[GwilymJJames]

No team will take pay-drivers by choice. The fact that so many teams need to indicates problems with Formula One's financial structure. No matter what Shut-Up-Eccles thinks, losing teams is bad for the sport, and I believe that unless the finances are made more fair, teams will be lost.

[fjackdaw]

"Shut-up-Eccles" - excellent reference!

[mario]

No team will take pay-drivers by choice. The fact that so many teams need to indicates problems with Formula One's financial structure. No matter what Shut-Up-Eccles thinks, losing teams is bad for the sport, and I believe that unless the finances are made more fair, teams will be lost.

It has to be said that Bernie is giving the teams a much larger cut of the TV rights revenue from 2013 onwards as a result of the latest round of negotiations, so he has conceded some ground over that issue - the teams's share of the revenue is thought to be going up to 63% (with the FIA getting a small increase in their cut of the revenues too).
Whitmarsh himself has said that the teams are, to a certain extent, the authors of their own misfortune - the collapse of FOTA hurt their negotiating position, plus the fact that Bernie could easily peel away certain parties with favourable terms (most notably Red Bull and Ferrari) suggests that the revenue split is going to remain pretty heavily weighted towards the top end of the field.

[dinizintheoven]

"Shut-up-Eccles" - excellent reference!

...so who'd be Bluebottle? Max Mosley? Ye gods, the horror. Imagine it... *whip whip whip* Ow! You've deaded me again! *whip whip whip* I don't like this game! I'm going home! Exits left to East Finchley on back of illegal Mercedes double-DRS rear wing!

(The looks of sheer confusion on the faces of all the youngsters at this point is a triumph to behold.)

[Yannick]

People who follow F1 only casually don't about half of the grid now that the number of pay-drivers has gone up.

When was the last season we had so many rookies? Can Vergne get an honorary rookie status?

[pi314159]

People who follow F1 only casually don't about half of the grid now that the number of pay-drivers has gone up.

When was the last season we had so many rookies? Can Vergne get an honorary rookie status?

5 Rookies are nothing that special. We only get the feeling that there are so many new drivers, because many old ones have retired: Heidfeld, de la Rosa, Barrichello, Schumacher, Trulli etc.

There are still very experienced drivers at the top teams (Webber, Alonso, Räikkönen, Massa, Button) but the next experienced one is Rosberg.

[mario]

People who follow F1 only casually don't about half of the grid now that the number of pay-drivers has gone up.

When was the last season we had so many rookies? Can Vergne get an honorary rookie status?

5 Rookies are nothing that special. We only get the feeling that there are so many new drivers, because many old ones have retired: Heidfeld, de la Rosa, Barrichello, Schumacher, Trulli etc.

There are still very experienced drivers at the top teams (Webber, Alonso, Räikkönen, Massa, Button) but the next experienced one is Rosberg.

Since you ask, the last time would be 2011 - d'Ambrosio, Ricciardo, Perez, Di Resta and Maldonado all raced for the first time in 2011, so it is actually a lot more recent than you think.

As pi314159 points out, the perception of a static grid is mainly because the top five teams have been hiring the veterans of the sport on long term contracts and have therefore had fairly static line ups (with the exception of Renault, although that was in part because Kubica's accident forced the change on them).

[Rusujuur]

The problem is, that a top team gets substantially more compared to a reject.

[nigellamansell]

"Shut-up-Eccles" - excellent reference!

...so who'd be Bluebottle? Max Mosley? Ye gods, the horror. Imagine it... *whip whip whip* Ow! You've deaded me again! *whip whip whip* I don't like this game! I'm going home! Exits left to East Finchley on back of illegal Mercedes double-DRS rear wing!

(The looks of sheer confusion on the faces of all the youngsters at this point is a triumph to behold.)

Surely Bernie would be Gryppe-Pipe Thynne and Jean Todt would be Moriarty?

I also nominate Nick Wirth to be Bluebottle!

"F1 you rotten swine! You deadded me a second time! I don't like this game. Exits left to East Finchley using CFD modelled electric drawstring underpants"

[dinizintheoven]

...the pants, of course, are too slow to get to East Finchley on time, can't carry enough fuel to make the trip in one go, and their major sponsor deserts them once they arrive.

The F1 Goon Show won't be complete without Major Bloodnok, though. And, given that his first name was Denis, I nominate Ron Dennis as our major. He did like to keep McLaren running with military precision, after all.

"Aeiough!* In the future, I shall refrain from partaking of chicken ovulations which have been boiled until their proteins have denatured and then marinated in a variety of herbs, spices and capsaicin-containing condiments from the Indian subcontinent.**"

* the official spelling of Bloodnok's "I'm having trouble with my piles" noise in the Goon Show Scripts that Spike Milligan wrote himself, if you were wondering.
** translation from Ronspeak into Bloodnokese: "No more curried eggs for me!"