Team radio clampdown?

[Londoner]

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/115776

Discuss

[BigG80]

Its a bit stable door after the horse has bolted but I think it could help improve the show.

I'd like to see them get "Felipe you are using both pedals in turn 5" onto a pit board.

[AndreaModa]

They should do away with team radio all together. Currently pit boards are just a leftover habit - compare their size to the MotoGP ones which are actually used! Actually the lack of radio is one thing MotoGP has kept right in recent times. All the driver needs is a button on the steering wheel to inform the team he wants a pit stop, and that's it. Should put the onus right back on the driver to deliver the goods.

[Nuppiz]

I support this idea. At the moment many drivers are relying too much on the pitlane to tell what to do next. By limiting radio communication we could see more drivers making their own decisions, which could then lead to more interesting racing.

[Bobby Doorknobs]

The strategy group came up with this? This is one change that would actually make sense unlike pretty much all of their other ideas. The only problem I think is that this reliance arose really because the cars have become more and more complex. They've gone from the cars of 25 years ago where it was just a drinks button on the steering wheel to nowadays where they've got a few dozen buttons and dials for differential, ERS, brake bias etc. many of which have sub-menus. The drivers, as we've seen in races often don't know what the best setting is for a certain situation, so that has led them to rely on their engineers to tell them. Of course this has also led to increased reliance on the engineers in regards to tyre and fuel management, something we should definitely be seeing less of. I think limiting team radio should also mean limiting the functions of a steering wheel to about four or five different things.

[Klon]

Looking forward to students in need of drug money running around near the track walls with giant billboards saying "Sebastian, use KERS better out of turn 4" and "Lewis, push for the next four laps, then engine setting D". It's gonna be top kek.

[Sublime_FA11C]

I support this.

In a way team radio has grown to almost entirely replace the pit-to-car telemetry and remote control, which is banned partly or fully, though my understanding of it is not great. But what i can understand is that previously drivers had to do their practise laps, and once back in the pits they could pore over the telemetry with their engineers and figure out where they might have lost time, or where their tyre temperatures were suboptimal, or some setup changes that would improve the car on it's next run. With team radio, engineers are feeding this info back to the drivers and giving them instructions while they are still on track. It's a natural thing to do, but i would like to see it removed.

Imagine a chess player receiving radio analysis of possible moves. Not exact instruction on what moves to make, but the possibilities and explanation on how and why they are sensible moves. It's no longer a game between two players, but two players and their teams of advisors.

Radio should stay, but it's purpose should be discussing changes to pitstop strategies, warnings of slow cars or incoming leaders (for backmarkers). Pretty much any talk would be okay except analysis of data the driver themself cannot see. There would probably still be a gray area, but that's okay for now, just ban the black and white bits.

[roblo97]

I thinks it's great. Less moaning from Hamilton and less radio from Mercedes is a great thing.

[girry]

A great idea in principle but utterly impossible to enforce if they implement it like AS claims.

[F1000X]

This will benefit Kimi Raikkonen and hurt everybody else. Why not?

[Sublime_FA11C]

This will benefit Kimi Raikkonen and hurt everybody else. Why not?

No, no, no! Race engineers *must* pester Kimi with information he doesn't want to hear. Do you want to rob us of 80% of entertaining radio clips?
If the rules do ban some Team radio assistance, Driver no. 7 must be exempt from the rule. Otherwise #riot!

[Wallio]

I'm sorry but I'm going to come off as a bit elitist here. This is what happens when you have fans who have never driven a race car before. This is stupid. A driver needs to be able to tell the team what he feels, any vibrations, misses, etc. Plus the team needs to be able to tell the driver of danger on track, like the deer Montoya almost hit, or the loose manholes in China. And since when is a driver wanting to know what sector he's slower in bad? He wants to improve!

The radios are really the only entertaining thing left in a lot of racing. I went to the Indycar race at Pocono and rented a scanner. I left it on "seek" the whole race.On an oval no less, the info I picked up was increible. Set-up changes, pit strategy, spotter chatter, even Will Power's f-bomb filled tirade. I heard it all. I suppose most fans can't process the info, but my God, for those of us who can, it opens up a whole new perspective. It must be 10x better on a road course.

These rules get worse and worse. First we have v6s, now we have teams taking penalties for running out of engines (its the first year of the Formula for Christ's sake), DRS is still around, refueling is banned, now this? I guess they want drivers to silently lap in single file.......

[mario]

This will benefit Kimi Raikkonen and hurt everybody else. Why not?

Considering that, in the very next race, Kimi was demanding information from his pit wall on the gap to his competitors, it's clear that Kimi is just as keen for that information as any other driver.

From what the Autosport article suggests, it appears that the situation might not be quite so severe as Wallio suggests - I think that some of those scenarios, such as the loose manholes, would potentially be allowed as critical safety messages - but still, I would personally fall into the camp that does not see the need to remove such radio transmissions.

It seems peculiar that, whilst F1 wants to restrict such radio traffic, the ACO recently wrote a piece praising the history of two way radio communications - there are examples of drivers using two way radios since 1948 in sportscar racing, so the technology is hardly new. I like being able to listen in to those sorts of messages and work out how the strategies of the various teams unfold during a race - if anything, I would want more, rather than less, access to that sort of information.

To my mind, my attitude is along the lines of "why shouldn't a driver have access to that information?" As Wallio says, all drivers want to improve on each and every lap, to work out where they can better their team mate and beat their rivals, so inevitably they will want that sort of information. Drivers of the past may not have had access to that sort of technology, but I wager that, if it was available, that there would be many who would have used it - just look at how rapidly teams sought to acquire telemetry systems as soon as it became possible.

We saw Tyrrell jump on the opportunity in the late 1970's, in part because Ronnie Peterson was, despite his talent, a pretty poor development driver, and indeed other spheres of racing had jumped on the opportunity much earlier than that (Peter Windsor wrote a very interesting article about how Jim Clark carried out tests in 1963 at Indianapolis using an IndyCar equipped with an early onboard data logger - one of the reasons why Clark did so well in his very first Indy 500 was because he had access to telemetry data). If the sport is as much about a competition between the teams as it is between drivers, then why deny a team the tools that it has available to it in order to assist their drivers and to help beat their rivals?

[AndreaModa]

I'm sorry but I'm going to come off as a bit elitist here. This is what happens when you have fans who have never driven a race car before. This is stupid. A driver needs to be able to tell the team what he feels, any vibrations, misses, etc. Plus the team needs to be able to tell the driver of danger on track, like the deer Montoya almost hit, or the loose manholes in China. And since when is a driver wanting to know what sector he's slower in bad? He wants to improve!

Really? What a daft thing to say. Explain to me how motorcycle racing manages without team radios? And how did the drivers of years ago cope with wild unrefined cars on their own? The only information they have is the feeling of the vehicle underneath them and what they can see and hear themselves. If F1 really wanted to it could quite easily ban team radios outright but I suspect there's a safety argument to say they should be kept.

[Wallio]

I'm sorry but I'm going to come off as a bit elitist here. This is what happens when you have fans who have never driven a race car before. This is stupid. A driver needs to be able to tell the team what he feels, any vibrations, misses, etc. Plus the team needs to be able to tell the driver of danger on track, like the deer Montoya almost hit, or the loose manholes in China. And since when is a driver wanting to know what sector he's slower in bad? He wants to improve!

Really? What a daft thing to say. Explain to me how motorcycle racing manages without team radios? And how did the drivers of years ago cope with wild unrefined cars on their own? The only information they have is the feeling of the vehicle underneath them and what they can see and hear themselves. If F1 really wanted to it could quite easily ban team radios outright but I suspect there's a safety argument to say they should be kept.

Bike guys are stone cold bat-shite bathplugging crazy. They're annoyed they have to where helmets.......

As for the "how did they cope" argument, chaulk boards. And early radios. Teams experimented with Walkie-talkie type things as early as the sixties. Hell the city to city races used telegraphs to update drivers when they hit each town. Don't act like radios are new.

[AndreaModa]

I'm not acting like they're new because they aren't. No need to get petty and there's no need for a sweeping statement that says they can't cope without them, because they could. They could cope without crash helmets if they really had to, but that is absurd. Getting rid of a two-way radio isn't the end of the world when it comes to racing. In actual fact, I could even see some drivers in favour of the move - it would allow them to focus on driving instead of constantly being pestered by over-zealous race engineers.

And anyway, whilst I'd like to see them banned entirely, that's not going to be the case. Though how F1 intends to police it I do not know.

[Wallio]

I'm not acting like they're new because they aren't. No need to get petty and there's no need for a sweeping statement that says they can't cope without them, because they could. They could cope without crash helmets if they really had to, but that is absurd. Getting rid of a two-way radio isn't the end of the world when it comes to racing. In actual fact, I could even see some drivers in favour of the move - it would allow them to focus on driving instead of constantly being pestered by over-zealous race engineers.

And anyway, whilst I'd like to see them banned entirely, that's not going to be the case. Though how F1 intends to police it I do not know.

I promise you it would be not more that 2 or 3, barely 10-12%. (Kimi is a given, although as Mario said, he does want info too, sometimes). I'd actually like to see this poll be taken.

[roblo97]

I'm not acting like they're new because they aren't. No need to get petty and there's no need for a sweeping statement that says they can't cope without them, because they could. They could cope without crash helmets if they really had to, but that is absurd. Getting rid of a two-way radio isn't the end of the world when it comes to racing. In actual fact, I could even see some drivers in favour of the move - it would allow them to focus on driving instead of constantly being pestered by over-zealous race engineers.

And anyway, whilst I'd like to see them banned entirely, that's not going to be the case. Though how F1 intends to police it I do not know.

I recall that Senna had a policy of don't speak unless your spoken to and that it was thanks to a race engineer telling him to back off that caused his infamous crash at Monaco.

[mario]

I'm not acting like they're new because they aren't. No need to get petty and there's no need for a sweeping statement that says they can't cope without them, because they could. They could cope without crash helmets if they really had to, but that is absurd. Getting rid of a two-way radio isn't the end of the world when it comes to racing. In actual fact, I could even see some drivers in favour of the move - it would allow them to focus on driving instead of constantly being pestered by over-zealous race engineers.

And anyway, whilst I'd like to see them banned entirely, that's not going to be the case. Though how F1 intends to police it I do not know.

I promise you it would be not more that 2 or 3, barely 10-12%. (Kimi is a given, although as Mario said, he does want info too, sometimes). I'd actually like to see this poll be taken.

I'm not even sure that Kimi would be a given - whilst the way that he snapped at his engineer generated an endless stream of memes, that was in some ways atypical of his normal behaviour behind the wheel.

If you look at the radio traffic between Kimi and his pit wall, there is still a reasonable amount of chatter between the two sides - for example, in Hungary the team asked him for feedback on the balance of the car, to which he responded by informing them that the car was oversteering slightly, as well as asking for an increase in the front wing angle because of high front tyre wear. Similarly, later in the race he is asking the team about the pressure of the rear tyres and asking if he has a puncture after complaining about a handling imbalance.
Alternatively, in Germany you can also hear him asking on the radio about the strategies of the drivers around him, and in particular discussing Alonso's decision to switch to a three stop strategy - in fact, his main complaint there was that the team didn't tell him earlier about Alonso changing his strategy on the fly in the race.

Overall, he actually demands a lot more information from the pit wall than you might think on strategic decisions, the performance metrics of the car and so forth - it's just that, because of one moment that could be used to reinforce that public perception that is routinely peddled about him, it is assumed that he is not that communicative behind the wheel when in fact he routinely demands a lot more information than you'd think.

[LellaLombardi]

I think the radio has it's place but it's overused now. If you watch footage from the early to mid 90's the radio was there but the quality was so poor and it took so much concentration to listen to it - especially for the drivers - that it was largely used for essential communication only, and that's how it should be.

[BigG80]

...like the deer Montoya almost hit...

You know, like a horse with antlers.

Still a classic on the radio!

They would never get it past the teams but I would be in favour of reducing the telemetry the engineers receive in real time which would help to limit the amount of advice they can give the driver. By all means enable them to do data collection during the race but they would then have to download after the run and process the information then.

This would also help to reduce the amount of people being paid by teams to sit in front of a laptop monitoring a few parameter for the whole race.

[Bobby Doorknobs]

It's official: http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/115804

Team radio restrictions come into place starting in Singapore. I think it would have been better if they had waited until next year so the teams would be better prepared for the change but I suppose this is the FIA we're talking about here.

[Ferrim]

Yet another solution to yet another inexistent problem.

It's only because of the FOM broadcasting that we have become aware of this phenomenon. I don't think it's a problem, but if they feel it is - just stop broadcasting that kind of messages. If you fear fans will complain, then it means fans like to hear it, so there actually wasn't a problem to begin with (which is my position).

The fact is, no amount of team radio managed to get Webber on Vettel's lap times or Massa on Alonso's. Or Rosberg's on Hamilton's last Sunday, for that matter.

Apart from this, I cannot add much on what mario has already said. Still, unlike other stupid decisions that have been made during the last year or couple of years, this one doesn't bothers me that much, and allowing customer cars has just been refused again which is terrific news, so it's still a good week by recent F1 rule-making standards.

[GwilymJJames]

Unnecessary rule, expect 11/11 teams to breach it in Singapore without consequence. FIA ambiguous. Does this

Therefore, no radio conversation from pit to driver may include any information that is related to the performance of the car or driver.

mean messages along the lines of "Romain, if you don't slow down a bit the brakes will explode" are banned?


Still, at least the issues with half the grid being on brink of financial collapse have been sorted, and unpopular rules like double points have been axed. At least, I presume they are, since the FIA has the time to come up with shite like this.

[CoopsII]

I recall that Senna had a policy of don't speak unless your spoken to and that it was thanks to a race engineer telling him to back off that caused his infamous crash at Monaco.

Back in '92 once Mansell had got himself a lead he'd tell the team he was "going to sleep" (meaning he would churn out a succession of laps) and ask to be "woken up" 5 or so laps before the end.

I think he was still asleep at Montreal though when he turned the bloody emgine off by mistake

[Sublime_FA11C]

When a driver receives instructions to brake slightly later in turns 5 and 6, and is advised that his driving is causing excessive tyre wear through turn 9, i think it's above and beyond what the radio should be used for and that is what is being banned. Drivers getting assistance from nerds in the garage.

Team radio itself is not banned, nor is chatter banned and certainly not warnings and possible car problems, just advice on how to drive the car better while the driver is still in the car on track. The example above is from Massa's engineer in Austria i belive, and Massa did not apparently ask for advice, though plenty of drivers have done so.

I agree that removing driving assistance is a good move, mechanical devices that offer driving aid are banned, so this type of radi comms should be too.

Why is this a bad decision?

[GwilymJJames]

Team radio itself is not banned, nor is chatter banned and certainly not warnings and possible car problems,

Q: Is a warning that the driver is tight on fuel consumption a breach of the regulations?
A: Yes, we believe so.

Q: Are warnings about the condition of the brakes or tyres (slow puncture) still allowed?
A: No

[LionZoo]

So expect to see messages such as "That banana I ate for breakfast is really not sitting well" be used as codephrases for ways to drive a certain way...

[tommykl]

When a driver receives instructions to brake slightly later in turns 5 and 6, and is advised that his driving is causing excessive tyre wear through turn 9, i think it's above and beyond what the radio should be used for and that is what is being banned. Drivers getting assistance from nerds in the garage.

Team radio itself is not banned, nor is chatter banned and certainly not warnings and possible car problems, just advice on how to drive the car better while the driver is still in the car on track. The example above is from Massa's engineer in Austria i belive, and Massa did not apparently ask for advice, though plenty of drivers have done so.

I agree that removing driving assistance is a good move, mechanical devices that offer driving aid are banned, so this type of radi comms should be too.

Why is this a bad decision?

Banning those specific is, in my opinion, not a bad idea per se. The problem is the execution of this rule. How are they going to prevent such messages from happening? How will they prove what constitutes such a message? What penalty would be given for an infringement?

I don't think this will have much effect. Not because banning the messages wouldn't change how the drivers drive, but because I can't imagine any team will respect the change, although I hope to be proven wrong.

[Sublime_FA11C]

Q: Is a warning that the driver is tight on fuel consumption a breach of the regulations?
A: Yes, we believe so.

Q: Are warnings about the condition of the brakes or tyres (slow puncture) still allowed?
A: No

I'm not sure about fuel, the anwser is vague. Telling the driver how to save fuel and warning that they're about to run out of fuel are not the same thing. My personal opinion doesn't matter much, but i'm ok with drivers not being told via radio how they're doing on fuel. There is a fuel gauge of some sort in the car, and if there isn't there should be. Teams can manage this.

Toro Rosso, Force India, and to a lesser extent McLaren have received radio calls from their drivers warning of possible brake failures. The teams advised their drivers to stick with it and occasionally suggested a brake bias settings change. Not much radio time was spent worrying about the safety of brakes in poor condition. So if you're suggesting that it's unsafe to withold brake information from the drivers, i doubt it is as important or unsafe.

A slow puncture? Well they have caused full tyre punctures in the past when teams were not aware of the problem. It doesn't sound to me like banning Slow Puncture warning will make the sport less safe.

As for wheter or not punctures, brakes and fuel should be banned in the first place... i don't know. I don't mind if they ban it, but it's not the main issue, the main issue should be preventing the team from helping the driver drive and maximise car performance at the best of their ability. It is the driver that needs to be responsible for race success, at least as far as actual driving is concerned. That is what the fans cheer and respect. Being slightly helped through a corner sequence, or having the team arrange power supply for an upcoming overtake... that punctures the awe inspiring image of a driver being a heroic and slightly mad, but passionate racer.

[Wallio]

Q: Is a warning that the driver is tight on fuel consumption a breach of the regulations?
A: Yes, we believe so.

Q: Are warnings about the condition of the brakes or tyres (slow puncture) still allowed?
A: No

I'm not sure about fuel, the anwser is vague. Telling the driver how to save fuel and warning that they're about to run out of fuel are not the same thing. My personal opinion doesn't matter much, but i'm ok with drivers not being told via radio how they're doing on fuel. There is a fuel gauge of some sort in the car, and if there isn't there should be. Teams can manage this.

Toro Rosso, Force India, and to a lesser extent McLaren have received radio calls from their drivers warning of possible brake failures. The teams advised their drivers to stick with it and occasionally suggested a brake bias settings change. Not much radio time was spent worrying about the safety of brakes in poor condition. So if you're suggesting that it's unsafe to withold brake information from the drivers, i doubt it is as important or unsafe.

A slow puncture? Well they have caused full tyre punctures in the past when teams were not aware of the problem. It doesn't sound to me like banning Slow Puncture warning will make the sport less safe.

As for wheter or not punctures, brakes and fuel should be banned in the first place... i don't know. I don't mind if they ban it, but it's not the main issue, the main issue should be preventing the team from helping the driver drive and maximise car performance at the best of their ability. It is the driver that needs to be responsible for race success, at least as far as actual driving is concerned. That is what the fans cheer and respect. Being slightly helped through a corner sequence, or having the team arrange power supply for an upcoming overtake... that punctures the awe inspiring image of a driver being a heroic and slightly mad, but passionate racer.

Umm, no there isn't. In any racing series that I'm aware of. F1, Indycar, NASCAR, DTM, GP2, all rely on the engineers knowing how much fuel when into the car, and how much is being burned per second, to tell the driver his level. I'll say it again, this is a stupid rule, and honestly, I'm not going to watch F1 anymore, at least this year. Bathplugging idiots the FIA are. Let the bathplugging drivers race! Can't wait util a driver is on fire and doesn't realize it at first. Too bad you can't tell him that.....

EDIT: Le Mans cars may have fuel gauges, I don't know either way.

[watka]

I think the situation can be summarised by simply saying the FIA were damned if they did and damned if they didn't.

[mario]

When a driver receives instructions to brake slightly later in turns 5 and 6, and is advised that his driving is causing excessive tyre wear through turn 9, i think it's above and beyond what the radio should be used for and that is what is being banned. Drivers getting assistance from nerds in the garage.

Team radio itself is not banned, nor is chatter banned and certainly not warnings and possible car problems, just advice on how to drive the car better while the driver is still in the car on track. The example above is from Massa's engineer in Austria i belive, and Massa did not apparently ask for advice, though plenty of drivers have done so.

I agree that removing driving assistance is a good move, mechanical devices that offer driving aid are banned, so this type of radi comms should be too.

Why is this a bad decision?

It appears that all technical communications between the teams and the drivers are to be banned throughout the entire race weekend - in other words, it's not just the race but also the qualifying and practise sessions that are covered as well. So, if a driver might want to relay back information to the pit wall during a practise session to improve the set up of his car on the fly, the team now cannot radio back to him to advise him on his set up.

[Wallio]

How were they damned if they didn't? I'm honestly asking, not trolling. Was team radio chatter really that unpopular with fans? I know I've been working a lot of double shifts these past 5 weeks, but did I miss an outcry of hate somewhere? Honestly. I didn't see it on any sites I visit.....

If you told me (and I'm willing to bet anyone else on here) to list 200 potential improvements to F1 "getting rid of radios) wouldn't be on it. Or even thought of.

[sswishbone]

I wonder if teams will start talking like Dentists all of a sudden?

"Sebastian, A3, A4, C7, point 2"

Or something equally silly to get around it?

[ADx_Wales]

How were they damned if they didn't? I'm honestly asking, not trolling. Was team radio chatter really that unpopular with fans?

I can imagine it being a bit too overbearing at times, the battle between Alonso and Vettel at Silverstone would have looked a lot more memorable if there wasn't stuff like "Mummy he pushed me off the track waaah" being broadcast for all to hear over it, and I assume that the Mercedes inter-team dramatics are a bit over-hyped aswell, as if they're pre-recorded, as if they're making a drama while they have been (to a point) the only team at the front of the field...

[watka]

How were they damned if they didn't? I'm honestly asking, not trolling. Was team radio chatter really that unpopular with fans? I know I've been working a lot of double shifts these past 5 weeks, but did I miss an outcry of hate somewhere? Honestly. I didn't see it on any sites I visit.....

If you told me (and I'm willing to bet anyone else on here) to list 200 potential improvements to F1 "getting rid of radios) wouldn't be on it. Or even thought of.

Outcry no, grumbling yes. I think it was actually on quite a few people's lists of the things that make F1 impure and sooner rather than later it would reach the top of the list when F1 fans ran out of other things to complain about.

[Wallio]

I can imagine it being a bit too overbearing at times, the battle between Alonso and Vettel at Silverstone would have looked a lot more memorable if there wasn't stuff like "Mummy he pushed me off the track waaah", and I assume that the Mercedes inter-team dramatics are a bit over-hyped aswell, as if they're pre-recorded, as if they're making a drama while they have been (to a point) the only team at the front of the field...

If you told me (and I'm willing to bet anyone else on here) to list 200 potential improvements to F1 "getting rid of radios) wouldn't be on it. Or even thought of.

Outcry no, grumbling yes. I think it was actually on quite a few people's lists of the things that make F1 impure and sooner rather than later it would reach the top of the list when F1 fans ran out of other things to complain about.[/quote]


I missed all this. I really did. If its what people want......

Between the new engines and this, man is it going to be quieter from now on....maybe that's why Formula E is so popular on here?

[AndreaModa]

I remember one of the Autosport journos (may have been Noble or someone else) suggested a couple of months back that a ban on team radios would revolutionise the sport.

[Wallio]

I remember one of the Autosport journos (may have been Noble or someone else) suggested a couple of months back that a ban on team radios would revolutionise the sport.

Well I guess we'll find out....