Its a shame, this year has been shaping up as the best year of F1 in a long time.

Should have cancelled the race.

trouble is FIA do what ferrari say

Only if they have the right tyres

Three quarters of the audience will stand there for the opening credits then run out to the car park

On the one hand, i can see the michelin argument........but it's complete insanity to, in effect, take your bat and ball in.......

The FIA "could" have said yues to the chicane request......

Why should the othet teams "reduce their speed", although that would have been better than the farce going on right now (or not,, I stopped watching ten mins ago..........lol)

The only team that, on present form it woudl disadvantage is Ferrari........

Makes you wonder really if it's become a case of the tail wagging the dog......

Bizarre..........Can't wait to see the bloodbath that will occur in the press the next fewdays........lol

I just hope they hurry up and do the breakaway thing they've been planning for ages. Maybe they would make it interesting, its no secret really that F1 has gone downhill in the past few years. In fact, I haven't actually seen a race this year, I did see some highlights of one as I just assumed it was going to be a procession like normal, Ferrari then McLaren etc leading the pack, though apparently its different this year. Switched it on briefly and what do we have? A procession.

Progress my a***

I just hope they hurry up and do the breakaway thing they've been planning for ages. Maybe they would make it interesting' date=' its no secret really that F1 has gone downhill in the past few years. In fact, I haven't actually seen a race this year, I did see some highlights of one as I just assumed it was going to be a procession like normal, Ferrari then McLaren etc leading the pack, though apparently its different this year. Switched it on briefly and what do we have? A procession.

Progress my a***[/quote']

Ahh but it's a six car procession

Ahh but it's a six car procession

True, a 24 car procession would be a lot more boring I guess

True, a 24 car procession would be a lot more boring I guess

takes longer to go by

Cant see Michelin being involved in F1 for much longer.

Just looks as boring as any other F1 race.

To be fair the last few Grand prix have been very good, Monaco and Canada were exciting and gave some great racing.

Cant see Michelin being involved in F1 for much longer.

No. This will cost them Millions in the long run...

Here today gone tomorrow....what is a shame is how there is talk of one of the oldest tyre manf's being removed from F1, yet they are the most used of all teams.

Bridgestone can't do single lap quali's...

As Ross said, good races up untill today, today we saw just how much power the

Here today gone tomorrow....

As Ross said, good races up untill today, today we saw just how much power the

who's going to pay for this though, i know i'd want my refund if i was there and i'm quite sure the sponsors of the race wont want to cough up.

Michelin, doubt it

FIA, fat chance

In all i think next year it could be a bit empty at the indianapolis grand prix!

who's going to pay for this though' date=' i know i'd want my refund if i was there and i'm quite sure the sponsors of the race wont want to cough up.

Michelin, doubt it

FIA, fat chance

In all i think next year it could be a bit empty at the indianapolis grand prix![/quote']

I was just about to say don't bank on their being one. Then I remembered the sheer stupidity and bloody-mindedness of the powers-that-be as demonstrated today.

Been a great season so far, here's to hoping we'd get an entire season of Ferrari having their face rubbed in it...

Why couldnt michelin fly in the other tyres overnight? Sure they would of had no testing and the Bridgestone runners would of had the upper hand - schumacher/barrachello would have won. The Jordan's and the Minardi's however lap about 4 seconds slower than the front runners so that would compensate for tyres which hadnt been tested before, atleast everyone could of seen a fair and good race and it would of only damaged Michelin and the F1 sport slightly, but show that they knew what they were doing. Doing the above would of also made it much more interesting as no one would have a clue who would win.

Too much bureaucracy in F1 im afraid, at the end of the day it's a sport for spectators to watch and drivers to compete, and not some commercial enterprise which it seems to of become. That's why the Moto GP is much more fun to watch, 2 wheels, 2mm from each other, 200 mph, 20 riders, some big accidents and ar$e nipping moments and the best bit is they get on with it instead of whining.

Why couldnt michelin fly in the other tyres overnight?

Changing the tyres after they've been nominated is a breach of number of regulations and there was no guarantee without testing that the replacement Barca spec tyres would solve the problem.

The proposed chicane didn't happen, the existing tyres weren't safe (witness both Ralf accidents from this year and last for the effects) and the Michelin teams were prevented from using replacement tyres through threat of disqualification for breaching the regulations. What option did they have apart from going through the motions then withdrawing?

There have been problems with tyres before but no regulations to prevent the manufacturers sorting the problem. I can't remember the specifics but Goodyear flew out 400 odd replacement tyres at 12hrs notice to Japan or Australia after a manufacturing flaw was found in the early 90s.

As an aside - Wasn't it nice to see Bernie in a flap for once?

I don't blaim the drivers that did go out for doing so - not a good way to win a race, but still, they are supposed to go round (and round, and round) on the Indy track in order to do their contractual stuff.

For some reason ITV decided it was necessary to have crud sound with a loud 'click, click' sound every second or so, probably sat uplink or something, but it was driving us insane so we turned it off and a beer was grabbed for the garden instead

Let's think about the other possibility - letting them drive regardless. Had anything gone wrong, it would have been very bad. They just couldn't risk that.

As for chicane - dunno what happened at what time, so hard to be sure. Either way, it didnt do the sport much good, just as things were starting to get back on track again.

I bet the Indy race will be off the calendar in the near future

The sooner the A1gp gets going the better:

http://www.a1gp.com/home.html

Could someone explain what happened, for those that didn't know it was on?

I'm guessing a load of cars had to be retired because of illegal tyres?

It's nice to see that international governing body is as up it's own backside as much as things are at club level.

FIA is in my opinion, too influenced by Ferrari. Add that to the fact that it's French based and it clear why they suffer from **** and elbow syndrome.

Michelin discovered a problem with thier tyres, and in the interests of safety told the teams not to race on them

Now, this is America we are talking about here, imagine the compensation claims if they did allow them to race on those tyres and something went wrong

They wanted a chicane building? its not quite that simple, all tracks are assessed for insurace purpose, if they put a chicane in and someone crashed or got injured, again think of the liability

In my opinion, Michelin did the right thing, the FIA did the right thing also in a wierd sort of way, after all, why should teams who chose another tyre manufacturer be penalised?

What I think SHOULD have happened in my opinion is Bridgestone should have stepped in and said their tyres are available to ALL teams, in the interest of safety, and delayed the start for an hour or so for practice, yes it may have breached a couple of rules, but at least there would have been a race

OR

The race should have been cancelled

As it was, the race was a complete farce, and I think F1 is now finished in the USA, dont forget also, the yanks have cars running round that same track at higher speeds than the F1 cars get to, and regadless of what you think of the yanks, they do have a good understanding of racing

F1 has been a farce for a number of years now, and it will continue the same way

As for Michelin, I think they also are going to have problems now, both in the USA and also in the rest of the world, I can out with a comment while the race was running, and I wonder how many other people around the world said or thought the same thing, I have just had 2 new tyres fitted on my car, and the comment I made was "Im glad I had Continentals fitted on my car and not Michelin, if they can screw up GP tyres, what chance have the rest of us got"

I'm not convinced that A1 GP will be a patch on F1.

It certainly won't have the big name drivers or tracks , and F1 has been excellent this year. Now if the F1 teams can regain some control from bernie baggins things can continue to improve

I'm quite sure someone will point out its not quite that easy but why couldnt the other drivers race on Bridgestones and score no points, paying some sort of premium to Bridgestone.