A Brief Thought On Scheduling

According to a report from motorsport.com, Formula 1’s new owners are considering shifting the schedule of a race weekend roughly an hour back in order to optimize television viewership and advertising. The change would only apply to races whose start time normally falls under daylight hours, leaving events such as Singapore and Bahrain in their current time slots. This is not the only broadcasting change Liberty Media has made of late; it was recently reported that free broadcasting of Grand Prix in Italy is to be restricted considerably from previous years with most of the coverage being placed behind a Sky Sports paywall. While the decision to move session start times back has not been apparently finalized, it does raise some concerns for me personally.

In recent years safety has been at the very center of Formula 1 regulation conversations which have saved sparked controversy within the fan base for altering the DNA of the sport but have indisputably saved the lives of drivers. However, the events of October 5, 2014 shook the sport to the core when Marussia driver Jules Bianchi lost control of his car and collided with a recovery vehicle that was attending to the stricken Sauber of Adrian Sutil. The crash resulted in Bianchi being placed in a coma never to awaken. Following this freak accident, the FIA immediately set out to find what the possible causes for the crash were and established a 10 man accident panel to review the incident.

Through their panel, the FIA determined a number of factor that had contributed to Bianchi’s accident at Suzuka and within their report they also included a number of regulation changes that could be made in order to ensure that such an accident would be less likely to occur in the future. One of these recommendations brought by the panel was in regards to the 4-hour rule and stated, “It is proposed that a regulation or guideline be established such that the Start time of an event shall not be less than 4 hours before either sunset or dusk, except in the case of night races. It is also recommended that the F1 Calendar is reviewed in order to avoid, where possible, races taking place during local rainy seasons.”

Looking at this in relation to the current proposal to move race start times back by an hour, it seems like an unreasonable risk to be taking with the lives of drivers for the sake of making more money off of advertisements. While the FIA panel never ruled that one single factor was the cause of Bianchi’s accident, they did make clear that time of day was one of those factors. Visibility in an open cockpit Formula car is limited at the best of times, with drivers seated extremely low in the cockpit in order to maintain weight distribution and aerodynamic efficiency as well as for safety. Throw heavy rain and fading light into the equation as well, and you have a much increased possibility of a driver making a slight lapse in judgement that could result in tragedy.

Additionally within the report it was stated that, “Consideration will be given to a review of F1 risk, in order to ascertain whether there are any significant holes in the safety defences, such that an unforeseen combination of circumstances could result in a serious accident.” Personally, I feel that pushing race start times back by an hour increases the chances of circumstances combining that do create dangerous situations for drivers. Danger has been a part of motorsport since its inception, but it doesn’t have to be. In modern times, it is unacceptable to place profit margins ahead of human lives. For thousands of young kids around the world, these drivers are heroes. Nothing hurts more than to see your hero fall. For the good of the drivers, the fans, and the sport as a whole I truly believe that these scheduling changes should not be implemented.