2016 F1 Season - Your thoughts
2016 featured the longest f1 season on record. With 21 races this season, there promised to be much for the F1 fans to enjoy and ponder. The American racing team Haas had their first year with a car that was mostly Ferrari engine and parts. And delighted us the fans with their remarkable accomplishments. New tracks were introduced, Baku which had quite a question mark on it exceeded everyones expectation and turned out to be a brilliant addition to the calendar.
Much to our delight, Max Verstapenn was one of the main highlight of the season. With controversial defending tactics combined with great speed and car control, with a sturbborn predetorial attacking driving remincent of Senna, Schumacher, young Hamilton [2007/8] and young Vettel [2009/10].
While most are quick to criticize Mr Ecclestones when he gets it wrong, rarely is he praised for those things that he gets right. Baku and Haas are legacies that we should be grateful to Mr Ecclestone for. The brief change to the qualifying format was one of those ideas that did not meet with approval. But the initiative to drive down the cost of engines and ensuring a better level of engine parity between supplier and customer teams is certainly other great contribution by the maverick wizard negotiator of F1.
The most defining component of the 2016 season was the recurring dominance of the Mercedes team. The sheer power of the dominance was to ensure that only a Mercedes-Petronas driver was going to win the 2016 driver title. Which unfortunately sets the scene for a fierce two man battle between the Mercedes drivers; 3 times world champion Lewis Hamilton and newly crowned world champion Nico Rosberg. A rivalry that seemed set to put at risk the Mercedes bid for the 2016 constructors title began to unfold. Placing the aspiration of the team in a position at odds with the result of the assertions of the personal aspirations of their drivers. The crash in Spain where both Mercedes cars wiped each other out of the race highlighted the extent of the problems facing Mercedes. It was also a defining moment which saw the introduction of the so called rules of engagement.
A set of rules that was not shared with the public but executed internally in a number of unclear ways. Asked about what these ways were, Paddy Lowe can be quoted at saying we have our ways, which included depriving a wanton driver of new parts among other ways suggested. All suggestions were Mercedes did not appear to know how to control the raw competitiveness of their drivers. From a fans perspective, they seemed to have the effect of sanitizing the racing with the so called "rules of engagement".
Most noticeable was that after Spain, we rarely had two competitive Mercedes cars race each other from the lights to the end of the first lap. One car would either have clutch issues at the start while the other was ok. Or something else happened that somehow ensured that we do not have a competitive tussle between the two Mercedes cars. For a car that completed a race season worth of laps during the pre-season test, it leave many with disbelief that they would have so many mechanical issues during the season. I suppose this is what they mean by "we have our ways" maybe.
2016 has been for me an unsatisfactory year. I feel robbed of something but l cannot put my finger decisively on what it is. But l can say it was unsatisfactory because there was no proper fight for the driver's title in the sense of a wheel to wheel action. Hamilton and Rosberg each scored their wins in circumstances where their immediate competitor [their teammate] was having some sort of issue and is unable to compete directly in a wheel to wheel duel. With obvious exception to some truly exceptional wins by Hamilton where he won from a disadvantaged position against better opposition, like Monaco and the race after that.
Dominance which preclude competition it seems, has not made for a great season. Particularly, we do not get to experience the raw competitive actions between the two drivers with a real chance of winning the drivers title. If these drivers were in two separate teams; [Schumacher vs Hill], [Vettel vs Alonso], [Hamilton vs Massa], the influence of the team on the outcome of the season is less and limited to their driver and car combination. When both driver are in the same team, it is hard to exclude the possibility that the teams has not favoured one driver over the other and in so doing wittingly or unwittingly influences the outcome of the season; [Prost vs Senna], [Button vs Barrichello], [Vettel vs Webber], [Hamilton vs Rosberg].
I suppose we are all very disappointed that the promise of Ferrari getting even closer to the Mercedes and mounting a serious threat did not materialize. While Redbull excelled, they were only good enough to snatch low hanging fruits, like the Spain wipeout etc. Disappointingly Ferrari and Williams faded as the season wore on, while Redbull and Force India emancipated from their 2015 positions.
Most of the exciting entertainments this season were in the midfield and we have Kimi, Perez, Verstapenn, Sainz and Ricciado to thank for that. Unfortunately Vettel was lacklustre, Hulkenburg was accident prone [mostly as a result of other drivers], Kyvat was ambushed and both Williams driver were a shadow of their true potential.
How do you rate this season and why?
