Is Briatore off his rocker again?

[PSfan]

Just read that Briatore has suggested that a race weekend could be spiced up by following a similar flavour as A1GP in which you could have 2 races (a sprint and a feature) at each race weekend:

In an interview with German publication Auto Motor und Sport, the flamboyant Italian says he would like to see the sport reinvent itself by staging two races per Grand Prix weekend.

Briatore envisions a 45 minute sprint race in the morning following by a one hour timed event in the afternoon. The sprint race would act as a qualifier for the afternoon race with the top eight finishers starting in inverse order for the second event.

As well, Briatore says points would count for both races

http://www.tsn.ca/auto_racing/news_s...me=auto_racing

Well, I must say this can't be the first Idea for an F1 weekend I truly despise, but it did get me thinking, what if they replace qualifying with a sprint race, and gave out points for that? And the starting positions for the sprint race made up from the best times from the 3 practices, and then have the finishing results of the saturday sprint race dictate the starting positions for the Sunday race, which would be of normal distance...

OK, now I know I read way to much into that article :

[Timber]

I think it is time for him to go away and take care of his others buisnesses
Someone has to stop him from only signing the drivers that he manage to drive for Renault regarding of their talent .
He got lucky twice , now , he must go before we see Piquet inn the car !!!

[V12]

No, no, no and no!!!

And while we're at it, ditch it in GP2 and Euro F3 as well!

[Hawkmoon]

So instead of one long, boring race we get two shorter, boring races?

If the regulations governing the cars stay as they are then it doesn't matter how you rearrange the weekend, you are still going to have the same problems with processional racing.

Change the cars so they can race each other first, then worry about the format of the weekend.

[raphael123]

I think it is time for him to go away and take care of his others buisnesses
Someone has to stop him from only signing the drivers that he manage to drive for Renault regarding of their talent .
He got lucky twice , now , he must go before we see Piquet inn the car !!!

That's not very fair. Alonso, Trulli & Heikki aren't poor drivers by any means!
And he's had other good drivers like Button and Fisichella, who weren't under his management.

[ShiftingGears]

So instead of one long, boring race we get two shorter, boring races?

If the regulations governing the cars stay as they are then it doesn't matter how you rearrange the weekend, you are still going to have the same problems with processional racing.

Change the cars so they can race each other first, then worry about the format of the weekend.

Agreed 100%.

[ArrowsFA1]

Briatore has always maintained that F1 should be entertainment. He came to the sport having sold Benetton knitwear so views things very differently from the likes of Frank Williams and Ron Dennis who have climbed the motorsport ladder.

It's no bad thing to have a different perspective, but this latest idea sounds like he wants to make F1 more like GP2, which he has a stake in and which has been a success. But GP2 is not F1 and F1 should not become GP1.

[Easy Drifter]

Briatore doesn't stir the pot any more than Max and Bernie do. It gets publicity for F1 and that is their idea.
Ron Dennis does it to, just in a different way.

[Ian McC]

I don't see any reason why people can't debate the future of F1 and put forward suggestions, crazy or not.

[jens]

45-minute long sprint race? It would be about half of the current Grand Prix and in that case compulsory pitstops (or even two, like in DTM) must be included, otherwise nothing spectacular happens...