Will you watch F1 in 2016?

[steveaki13]

So with the season over I can without doubt say I have not enjoyed a season less in my time watching.

Typified by commentators trying to conjure a battle between Mercedes up all race that was never there and Mercedes turning Rosbergs engine up because Lewis didn't turn his down or something towards the end.


F1 where it proves Mercedes could just script every race.

I have never felt such apathy to a sport I once loved. Even 2014 I enjoyed a fair bit.

However I miss a sport where its more about the drivers racing cars and we have epic championship battles and races. Where the teams don't seem to run every aspect of the sport.


I found myself almost switching off an F1 race for the first time ever through boredom today. I seriously wonder whether I will watch F1 in 2016. Un imaginable to me a few years ago.

What do you guys think now the season is over?

[Stan Reid]

I won't watch much of it because I have cut the apron strings and gone OTA but I see where you're coming from. This is supposed to be a sport not a social statement. If you don't want to run real racing cars and go green then there is already a racing series for you-bicycle racing.

[N. Jones]

I thought about not watching next year but I know I will be looking at the websites to find out when the first race begins. It's a habit now and while a lot of racing was boring that is what the DVR is for.

[Rollo]

RUPERT ****ING MURDOCH :


Ten Network Holdings (which is 15% owned by Foxtel) haven't yet comfirmed that they will be showing any races at all in 2016, let alone the one hour highlights package. We were bombarded with adverts towards the end of the GP in Abu Dhabi for Foxtel.
For me to watch F1 in 2016, Foxtel will demand $761 from me; which is up from $0 in 2014.

F1 is already teetering on the brink. I hope that the troll and the mad uncle find lots of Chinese and Indian people to hold to ransom because repeatedly kicking Europe in the face and knifing America, Canada Australia, Japan and Korea in the head, isn't securing the future of the sport as far as I can tell.

Lotus weren't sure what they would do in '16, Toro Rosso and Red Bull couldn't secure engines and Marussia and Sauber were kind of close to closing the doors; all of which are likely due to the same root cause of Bernie squeezing the pennies so hard, that they're screaming.

[Grundo Farb]

A friend in Singapore normally hires a hotel room with a bunch of Finnish and Scandinavian friends as the hotel is directly on the track, looks down on 13 corners and you can watch from the balcony, TV highlights on and have the comforts of a hotel room. I went and watched it from there live 5 years ago and it was fantastic, the noise was amazing, things were happening in the race - it was a great experience.

This was their last year, he told me on the weekend they aren't doing it again as it is so boring. He said half the guys didn't turn up on the Sunday night as they found even the qualifying experience boring. The cars sound terrible, the racing is dull and he felt it has become no longer about the pinnacle of Motorsport but is now about an all encompassing entertainment - watch some cars then go to a concert.

My biggest problem with it is I don't believe the best drivers are in F1 anymore. I also find the reliance on technology terrible, when Martin Brundle is explaining that the small grains of rubber that get stuck in the gaps in the wings can have a dramatic effect on handling then the sport has lost the plot.

I now follow other motorsport much more closely as it is exciting. MotoGP, WRC two examples - spectacular to watch and things happen.

[henners88]

I only watched 4 full races this year so my commitment has already dropped lower than it has in over 25 years. I will probably watch the same next season and make do with reading about it mostly. It's a mix of the racing being dull and half of the coverage going to Sky. I do have sky coverage at home but only to watch live and that is something I can rarely do with a young family. It's generally made me lose interest.

[Storm]

I really wanted to get back into F1 after the disappointment of last year with the stupid new engines and rules but the racing this year has just been worse. Add a huge timezone jump for me and it may not be possible to watch a lot of races. Unless something drastically different happens in Melbourne there is no point being glued to the screen for 2 hours every alternate Sunday (at odd times!). Still I will most likely watch a GP in person next year though

[Mia 01]

I will Watch Everything as Always.

[Starter]

(Most of) the races are on at eight in the morning here in the eastern US. I'll watch some of them if I remember, but probably not even half. F1 doesn't get me excited any longer and the same can be said for IndyCar. Both have been dumbed down to where they don't resemble the sports I used to love. There's not a lot of real competition anymore where what car you are in determines where you will finish. The exact opposite is true of IndyCar, all the cars are the same which takes the technical aspect of the sport away. While some of the drivers are quite good, the cars in both series almost drive themselves these days. Where's the fun in that?

[zako85]

Note this pattern:

2010: good
2011: boring
2012: good
2013: boring
2014: good (barely)
2015: boring
2016: ..?

As long as Formula 1 continues alternating consistently between "good" and "boring" seasons, I am willing to watch the season that follows a "boring" one hoping that there will be a change. Granted, right now the writing on the wall is saying that the next season will be very similar to 2015.

Having said that, I gotta say that I look forward to watching MotoGP and Formula E racing too. This year, MotoGP was epic, as usual. The MotoGP races last only one hour and are true sprint races, always with good battles. The first Formula E season was also surprisingly good. IndyCar.. well that's something I watch recorded on my tablet while working out on a cardio machine, after all it's less boring than not watching anything during a workout. IndyCar is actually usually pretty fun to watch, but you have to accept relatively amateurish (Maldonadoesque) nature of most of its drivers, bizarre season schedule, and an endless succession of mediocre street races.