Australian Grand Prix: Ferrari revival may bring back excitement

The era of the legendary Bernard Ecclestone has come to an end. He is now Chairman Emeritus of F1 and we know what that really means — you are welcome to hang around the office but please don’t touch anything!

It’s a pity that he went on a low with the 2016 season offering dismal fare. Although F1 teams now whisper their dissent, none had it in them to challenge the physically diminutive yet towering supremo when it mattered. Fans deserted F1 in droves unable to accept the neutered sound of the normally banshee scream of an F1 engine in full cry. Fuel restrictions didn’t help the cause either.

You don’t have to be a genius to figure that the likes of Ferrari, Mercedes and Red Bull have the money power to work around any restrictions thrown at them and any attempt to level the playing field is an exercise in futility. Further, one would imagine that the powers that be understand aerodynamics and the attendant downsides.

Yet 2017 is going to prove to be another difficult year for F1 with overtaking moves few and far between due to the fact that when one attacks or even come close to the tail of the target he loses traction!

The body work of the new F1 car has so many protrusions that may work well when the car is being tested independently in a wind tunnel but when the pursuing car gets too close, it disturbs its aerodynamics completely and makes handling a nightmare. The cars being wider by way over five inches doesn’t help either as it makes it even more difficult to overtake as most circuits don’t offer the luxury of so much real estate.

Add to this wider tires and grip and soon passing a car in front will only be easy only when it pulls in for a pit stop! All though the cars are quicker by five seconds now I don’t see the advantage in this alone aspect making it any more exciting. For a spectator it’s almost impossible to palpably notice the difference between a car hurtling down at 240 km or at 260 km.

At least now I know why the attractive Nicole Kidman was present at the circuit on Saturday. F1 will now gain some knowledge on attraction control if not traction control! Aussie champ Daniel Ricciardo went down under in front of his adoring partisan fans when he lost it on a corner for no apparent reason. So there actually has to be a good reason!

Lewis Hamilton showed his mettle by grabbing pole at the death. His teammate Valtteri Bottas threatened momentarily to be his new found nemesis but succumbed to the wily Sebastian Vettel and the resurgence of Ferrari who may bring some excitement back to a struggling F1. Hopefully. And Force India still have it to play a strong midfield team. Sergio Perez fought bravely and fell painfully short of making it to a well deserved Q3.

So what has changed in the new season? Same suspects at the helm. With budgets ranging from $400 million available to a top marquee team down to $100 million at the lower end one has to get the thrills purely as a fan of this high speed game of chess and not expect some daredevil moves or maybe better still we could wait for miracles.

Same question — show me the ‘cheque mate’?