Quote Originally Posted by lmmjvss View Post
Where is "autosport" right now?
I've not listened to a recent Dirtfish pod on this but context might be key. If by 'manufacturers' you/they mean car brands then I think you've got it right. Dirtfish guys are just playing the promo game for the championship, which is a promo game for the brands. These have nothing to prove or develop, consumers may translate winning to quality but really can expect their cars to work all the time, every time, everywhere, else the lease/contract is void and the manufacturer gets it back. Don't think many new car sales are people buying cars outright based on reliability, durability and engineering technology, having test driven them and not just ordered online lol.

If the claims mean these championships are a great proving ground for third party manufacturers of parts used in road cars then they may have a great point, this is more in tune with what is happening in these championships - so the likes of Kreisel, Compact Dynamics, Williams, Bosch, Continental etc. etc. could be the manufacturers put to test for selling into the road car manufacturers. I'm not sure what needs developing now for road cars more than batteries and motors, and apparently "more than two-thirds of battery manufacturing is controlled by three companies—CATL, LG, and Panasonic". Probably not what these journos mean though.

I think everybody here agrees that 'win on Sunday, sell on Monday' is well out of date. Car brands now are just keen to build the best software for a dashboard display store for upselling features like trizone climate control, activating heated seats or windscreen wipers. There's no motorsport for that.