MSport Talk: Frank Motorsport Opinions & Debate

Sunday just gone I decided to forgo the F1 and watch the first round of the 2015 World Endurance Championship. And I am glad I did, the race had just about everything, action throughout the classes, not too many stoppages (full course yellow periods - which I feel worked extremely well) and drama at the front of the field - on more than one occation with the demise of the leading Porsche in the 2nd hour and the final moment steward decisions. Now, lets concentrate on that for a few moments. The number 7 Audi, which won the race finished near as makes no difference 4 seconds ahead of the 2nd placed Porsche. However in the dying moments of the race and after 6 hours of racing the Audi was penalised for leaving the track while lapping an Aston Martin and gaining an advantage by keeping the chasing Porsche behind the slower GTE mobile. The Audi was already a good lap ahead of the chasing cars before it made it's final "spalsh n dash" pit stop and, around 45 secs ahead bef...

A question that has been asked for a good many years now, many a time a website, blog or magazine (remember them) would ask the question, tens of thousands of fans - keen to have their voices heard and the magic and spectacle of the sport (apparently it is still a sport) return would answer and then... The FIA bans drivers from changing their helmet designs. So, I expect you are all excited to know just what I would do to bring the action back to the series. However, it will not be a quick fix, some suggestions may work others, maybe not, we will probably never know, I would be interested to see who does and does not agree with these proposals. We shall start with the racing itself. Here goes nothing! Racing: The cars need to be able to pass one another, cleanly and on track, and not only because one driver has better tyres, or has DRS or can use a KERS system to make his car faster than the car he is pursuing, the cars need to be able to get close to the back of the car in f...

Monday morning the 30th of March saw many people thinking Bernie Ecclestone had put his calendar forward rather than his watch when he announced the consideration of a separate F1 championship for female drivers. This of course was met with the sort reaction that double points, artificial sprinklers, the treatment of smaller teams and the loss of complete free to air TV coverage has been met. Conspiracy theorists may say that a different ludicrous F1 regulation change / announcement is imminent and this has been put out to weather the storm but lets deal with that if and when it comes. IMO a female only category is wrong, just plain wrong, does that mean we can only have female car designers, pit crew and strategists? will Claire Williams and Monisha Kaltenborn have to move to this new series? of course it wont. we have females in F1 already its simply most female racing drivers are not (yet) good enough to reach the top of the sport. Personally I want to see a championship where...

The words spoken by the great Mario Andretti on learning of the death of his team mate Ronnie Peterson following his first lap crash at the 1978 Italian Grand Prix. I was hoping not to have to write anything like this but if I am to seriously blog about motor sports then I need to write about the good times and the bad. This time it is bad. On Saturday the 28th March 2015 a fan, probably just like you or I was killed while watching a race at the Nurburgring. You have probably already read about it and seen the pictures and video. I won't include any of that here but will, send my thoughts and condolences to all involved. I hope you will too dear reader. The incident occurred at the Flugplatz section of track, at time of writing not all details are known but video shows Jann Mardenborough's Nissan GTR leaving the track at the section airborne - perpendicular to the track not too dissimilar to an F2 incident at the track involving Manfred Winklehock at the same part of the ...

Episode 1: BTCC Silverstone 1992, Finale. I am going to start a separate feature within my blog here of great races that I have seen, these will be sorted into three different categories, live trackside, live / as live / highlights TV broadcast and discovered / viewed long after the event via DVD or YouTube for example. We Start with one of the reasons the BTCC is as popular as it is today. The 1992 title showdown at Silverstone. This race falls into the second category as I watched the race on Grandstand (remember that!) on BBC TV and probably as a recorded highlights programme. The race itself is now a part of BTCC folklore and possibly the reason why many fans watch the series now. 3 drivers went to Silverstone that year looking to take the championship, defending champion, the late Will Hoy, John Cleland and Tim Harvey. However these guys would line up in the middle of the pack, Cleland 7th, Hoy 9th and Harvey 12th on the grid, whoever was going to win was going to have t...

The weekend just gone I watched - like many of you two specific motor races. The Australian Grand Prix, and the Miami EPrix. Now, as I have mentioned before I am an F1 fan of 30+ years vintage so I know my stuff but of the two, this weekend the E won over the the F. I was skeptical at first over Formula E, yes, I know green racing can only be a good thing and we have to look to the future as gas, oil etc will run out eventually but, and it is quite a big but, I feel the FIA have got something wrong. We have some big name drivers in FE, plenty ex F1, some endurence stars, up and coming youngsters and a good range of top drawer teams ranging from experienced set ups such as ABT and Andretti to former drivers (Trulli) and "manufacturer" squads (E.Dams Renault) among others however I can't help thinking something is not quite right. don't get me wrong the racing so far has been very good, (a cynic may say the Bejing final lap 1st place crash was staged to give the ser...

Well, over the last few weeks I have come to realise that open wheel racing is dead. Prototypes, GTs & Touring cars is where it is. #B12hr — Tom Taylor (@taylortom1976) February 7, 2015 I had no resposes arguing the case for the single seaters. With all the uncertainties in the world of F1 at the moment and their mentality on focusing on the big matters of the sport (one helmet design, per driver, per season!) I found myself pondering this very question.  We don't yet know, at time of writing, how many teams will make the grid at the Australian GP.  Even less certain is how many will still be around come November, and this is the sad part; I have been an F1 fan for over 30 years, I have watched more than half of the championships since its 1950 inception and I'm just not interested this year. I asked the above question of my followers one of whom you may be, thank you if you are.  During the Bathurst 12 hour race, a race that I settled ...