Teams fear burnout

Eurosport - Sat, 05 Jul 16:23:00 2008

Formula One team bosses have expressed concern about the risk of burnout to mechanics when the calendar expands to 19 races next year without an August break.

FORMULA 1 - Super Aguri mechanics - 0

"I think the absence of the August break in the calendar next year is very tough. It really is tough on the mechanics," said McLaren executive Martin Whitmarsh at the British Grand Prix.

"It worries me how hard it is going to be on the teams but I think that's a management challenge; how we're going to deal with that and make sure we don't burn people out during the course of the season," he added.

The 2009 provisional calendar, issued last week, has the Turkish Grand Prix on August 9 followed by the European Grand Prix in Valencia on August 23.

This year, with 18 races, there is a gap between Hungary on August 3 and Valencia on August 24.

Abu Dhabi will make its debut next year as the closing event in November after four other long-haul races in succession in Singapore, Japan, China and Brazil.

All of the 10 teams are based in Europe, with the majority in Britain.

"The August break was introduced as a means of genuinely giving everyone a rest in the middle of tough seasons," said Honda team principal Ross Brawn.

"Now we want to expand the number of races and not do that (have the break), so we end up having to look at reserve squads and back-up mechanics and groups of people who can take over so the other guys can get a rest," he added.

"Without doing that, to have a whole race team that can't take a holiday from what would effectively be February until November is not easy."

Williams founder and co-owner Frank Williams said the extra race would be good for sponsorship revenue but there would be added costs from having to take on more mechanics.

"Perhaps it's a little bit better for the bank balance but not as much as you might guess," he said.

"(McLaren boss) Ron Dennis once said several times to (FIA President) Max (Mosley) and (F1 supremo) Bernie (Ecclestone) in particular and eyeball to eyeball: 'The more races you put on, the more we lose.'"

Formula One has only once before had 19 races, in 2005, but there has been talk of ultimately expanding to a 20-round calendar now that testing has been reduced significantly.

South Korea and India are due to make their debuts in 2010 while there is still a strong desire to have a US Grand Prix back in the championship.

Reuters

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  1. Just a few observation points regarding that "river of tears" flowing from the eyes of people in charge of different teams cried in the main article:
    -how many days of holiday per annum are we, the fans doing "regular"jobs for living, entitled to?! anybody more than 2 months??!-if yes, congratulations, I'm not that lucky but don't complain...!!! I wish I could work for a F1 team :-)))
    -NASCAR has 36 races per season (ok, travelingwise not that complicated but still)...?!
    -if you watch Indycars, how many people attend a car during the Pitstop...?!
    -wanna gain more workforce or prevent people from burnout?-reduce testing!!!
    -"The more races you put on the more we lose" ... eehhh??? someone plz explain cos he got me completely lost on this one....!

    From v_musial, on Mon 7 Jul 5:08AM

  2. With the soaring prices of fuel in the market today, I think its time for bernie and max to think about energy saving. Reducing the number of GP's in a season would be a great contribution.

    From ronz c, on Mon 7 Jul 1:56AM

  3. Bazz31, u can keep your european attitude to urself. there are more than enough savy race fans in THOSE PLACES that you dont want F1 to expand.F1 is smart enough to understand the business aspect of the game, than your reasons. can u show me from the majority of the european population if they can name 5 drivers? i can show u millions from THOSE PLACES you are refering who are knowledgeable and smarter about racing than you. try to come up with some other reason.
    I do agree that more races in a year cheapens F1. have to come up with creative ways to keep the number down.

    From anand r, on Sun 6 Jul 7:29PM

  4. I think that it is good to have more gps but what I dont like is the fact that they are taking european gps off the calendar and adding grands prix in places like india where the majority of the population could not tell you the names of 5 drivers. The European audience is the biggest so why take it away from there? They should add more gps but add the lost european gps like san marino and the portugese gp back

    From bazz31, on Sun 6 Jul 5:17PM

  5. I wish that they would just make their minds up for once, it is getting boring the amount of times a change has been made.

    From ditsy1992, on Sun 6 Jul 11:33AM

  6. i think that bernie and max just won,t to fill there pockets even more and they don,t care about the teams or the familys.its just a matter of time before drivers/mechanics/team owners get fed up with all the politics and pomp that bernie wants and its only money why the british gp as gone to donnington park.

    From traceyowens, on Sat 5 Jul 8:50PM

  7. There is no telling how much more borring the F1 could be...

    They talking about reducing costs for theams but insted they adding more GPs, thats insane---19 !! It seems they what to improve the lack of competition and interest in the sport by throwing more money at it and eventualy lead it into oblivion...

    Besides who how can you relate to the sport if you have a tabloid-sprayed persident goverening it???

    From jsbigfan, on Sat 5 Jul 7:57PM

  8. I dont think the schedules would be as bad with 20 races if they were all geographically reasonable. Theres no reason that Brazil/Canada cant be in succession, much the same way Australia/Malaysia were. Pair the Shanghai/Fugi and Turkey/Bahrain weekends and its really not that hard.

    Besides, I hate the August break. 3 weeks without a GP causes a general loss of what little interest there is in the US by that point, because our football seasons begin at the end of August.

    From justin, on Sat 5 Jul 4:59PM

  9. I thought that Max wanted to cut the number of people employed in F1, also the amount of fuel and the amount of money spent. Does he have a solution for the teams, because believe it or not they will need all three. Do the really know what they want?

    From pauljgregory, on Sat 5 Jul 12:15PM
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