December 30th, 2009 at 10:55pm Under Motorbikes
MCN’s tests have proved that Triumph’s new 1600cc Thunderbird is one of the best cruisers out there – its mixture of lazy parallel twin power and surprisingly sharp handling more than matches rivals such as the Harley-Davidson Super Glide and…
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December 30th, 2009 at 10:55pm Under Racing
Like it or not, this is why a lot of people watch F1
There’s a lot of discussion about how to ‘improve the show’ and make it more accessible to the ‘average fan’. But what do typical sports fans actually think of F1?
I’ve had it in my mind for some time to find out and the festive season has offered lots of opportunities to meet new people.
So – while avoiding the opportunity to bore people to death about my favourite subject – I’ve snuck the phrase “what do you think of F1?” into conversations a few times recently and turned up some surprising results.
Two responses were particularly common:
The kind of dedicated F1 fans who read F1 Fanatic are more likely to appreciate an impressive overtaking move or a great qualifying lap.
But the average fan tunes in waiting to see it all go wrong. And although safety is much improved today compared to 20 or even ten years ago, that’s still a slightly worrying thought.
There’s no denying that crashes are spectacular and, when you know a driver escaped injury, entertaining. But are there many other sports where people tune in mainly to see it go wrong?
I don’t watch much sport that doesn’t feature four wheels and an engine, so you might have to put me right on this. But I suspect football fans watch for the goals or to see their team win, rather than in anticipation of a leg-breaking tackle.
Perhaps it’s just part of human nature that we find something irresistible in seeing multi-million pound racing cars reduced to heaps of rubble by a mis-judged move. Or is it the case that the good things about F1 – the passes, the hot laps and so on – are a bit too intangible to be universally appreciated?
The other comment which came up most often was the complaint that a driver’s success is entirely down to whether he’s got a good car or not.
The zero-to-hero story of Jenson Button over the past two seasons was seen as a case in point.
To an extent F1 is little different to other sports. Ferrari and McLaren can spend more money to build a better car just as Chelsea and Manchester United can dip into their vast reserves to hire the best players.
I think the difference between an average fan and an F1 fanatic here is mainly down to perception. The average fan sees F1 as a contest between drivers. Dedicated F1 fans see it as a contest between drivers and teams.
The driver’s role in developing and setting up a car tends to get get overlooked by the average fan. Not to mention the skill involved in driving it (I have long suspect on-board cameras make driving an F1 car look stupidly easy) and the ever-tighter margins of competition.
So if F1 wants to attract more casual fans it needs to change the rules to make all the cars the same and create more crashes.
In other words, it needs to become NASCAR.
I’m sure you all have plenty of interesting opinions about whether that’s a good idea – and whether it’s already happening. So, whether you’re a ‘casual’ fan or an F1 fanatic, post your thoughts below.
By Mikel Add comment
December 30th, 2009 at 10:55pm Under Racing
Ralf Schumacher wants to emulate brother Michael’s F1 return, telling a German news agency:
I would seriously consider an interesting and attractive offer to drive in a competitive Formula One team.
Ralf Schumacher
Sibling rivalry, eh? Whatever one of them gets, the other has to have one too. But there doesn’t seem to be much chance of a double-Schumacher comeback happening.
All of last year’s race-winning teams have filled their berths for 2010. And his definition of ‘competitive’ probably won’t include Renault, who finished eighth in last year’s world championship, or the born-again Sauber outfit.
Since quietly leaving F1 at the end of 2007 the younger Schumacher has had a distinctly disappointing two seasons in the DTM, finishing 14th and 11th.
Is Ralf Schumacher an under-appreciated talent who left F1 too soon with much yet to accomplish? I doubt it.
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December 30th, 2009 at 10:31pm Under Cars
Filed under: Aftermarket, Subaru, Specialty, Design/Style
In the real world of asphalt and hydrocarbons (yes, that’s possibly redundant), the Subaru WRX STI is a common target for zealous mods. While much tuning can go on under the stock skin, which isn’t exactly subtle on a Rex, it’s de rigeur to go at the exterior with pieces of thermoplastic and visions of reshaping dancing in your head.
If you’re not deft enough to translate inspiration to metal, or you don’t have a WRX, or you just want to avoid getting gunk under your fingernails and cutting your hands all up while trimming out big pieces of sheetmetal, you can do it with bits and bytes instead. Of course, a digital mockup is a good way to test out ideas before taking the nipper to the roof, too.
Pete from Digimods has decided that the WRX could really use a rear-mounted engine, plenty more scoops, and a giant roof duct to supply air to the engine, and drown it if it gets taken out in the rainy season. It’s a very nicely done rendering. Some will love, some will hate, all will likely have something to say. Have at it, kids!
[Source: Digimods via CarScoop]
Rear-Engine Rendering: Student-styled Subie is the hot hatch of dreams, nightmares originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 30 Dec 2009 14:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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December 30th, 2009 at 08:51pm Under Racing
The awards and accolades continue to pile up for Jenson Button.
Now the world champion has been awarded a Gold Badge by BBC childrens’ programme Blue Peter.
New team mate Lewis Hamilton already has a Gold Badge which he won last year – in addition to his three regular badges.
Button is also expected to get a mention in the New Year Honours List along with former boss Ross Brawn. Button will again match Hamilton by receiving an MBE.
Among the other prizes Button has won since claiming the world championship are four BRDC Awards including their Gold Star and Autosport’s International Racing Driver of the Year and British Competition Driver of the Year.
How many more gongs will Button collect before the 2010 F1 season begins? Are there any others that I’ve missed? Leave a comment below.
Read more: Button leads F1 drivers in BRDC awards
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December 30th, 2009 at 11:55am Under Computers
OCWorkbench has recently unveiled the benchmarks showing the graphics performance of Intel Pentium G6950. The H55 chipset was compared with three other platforms: G41, G45 and GF9300 with GMA X4500 (800MHz), GMA X4500HD (800MHz), and GF9300 (450MHz) respectively.
According to the test, the Pentium G6950 outperformed the G4x products by a good margin, but still lagged behind NVIDIA’s [...]
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December 30th, 2009 at 11:55am Under Computers
Special thanks to Clunk.org.uk
Our friends at Clunk.org.uk has just reviewed the Danamics LMX liquid metal cooler, and let’s check out if it’s worth every penny of it.
Danamics LMX measures 158.2×170.5×90mm (just the heatsink itself), weighing 1180g, and supports AMD Socket AM2/AM2+/AM3 and Intel LGA775/1156/1366 processors.
simple package
LGA775 fitting kit
AMD fitting kit
LGA1366 fitting kit
a small tube of [...]
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December 30th, 2009 at 11:55am Under Computers
DFI has just announced a new mini-ITX motherboard based on the latest dual-core Atom N450 processor – LR100-N16M, targeting gaming, industrial control automation, and medial equipment embedded applications.
Embedded with the Intel 82801HM I/O controller (also referred as ICH8M), the fresh board features GMA 3150 graphics, up to 2GB of DDR2-667MHz SODIMM memory, three SATA 3.0Gbps [...]
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December 30th, 2009 at 11:55am Under Computers
According to what Digitimes has learned from graphics card makers, NVIDIA’s Fermi-GF100 GPU is not coming out until March, 2010.
NVIDIA originally planned to launch Fermi in November 2009, but was delayed until CES in January 2010 due to some reason. However, the company recently told graphics card makers that the official launch will be delayed [...]
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December 30th, 2009 at 11:55am Under Computers
Less than one week after releasing GPU Caps Viewer 1.8.1, Geek3d has been quick enough to deliver the 1.8.2 version which is essentially a bugfix release.
Changelog:
- Bufix: OpenGL 3 context creation with old OpenGL 3.0 drivers like forceware 186.18. The bug led to an infinite loop.
- Bugfix: number of shader processors of Radeon HD 4830 [...]
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