Formula 1: Irrelevant, Uninteresting and Too Expensive

Formula One is irrelevant, uninteresting and too expensive—if we are to believe the bosses at Porsche and Audi as they justify why they don’t want to be part of the world’s most-watched motor sport.

On the other hand, those of us who love F1 smugly refer to it as the pinnacle of motorsports, the ultimate expression of automotive engineering, and its vehicles as the very best that cars can be.

But is it? And does it have any relevance in the motoring world?

There is no question that a modern F1 car is a staggering machine. The sleek lines, the ear-piercing scream, the mind-boggling performance statistics and their handling on the track are the stuff that turns grown men into little boys.

Add to that the technology and engineering expertise that goes into putting one of these machines on a racetrack, and you should have the most exciting and appealing form of motorsports on the planet.

Or so you’d think.

Why then, are the major motoring marques not lining up to take part?

Throughout the history of the sport, all of the sizable exotic car manufacturers have run a car in F1 or, at the very least, supplied engines for the sport.

Names like Aston Martin, Maserati, Bugatti, Alfa Romeo, Porsche, Lamborghini, Lotus, Jaguar and Mercedes Benz have all graced the F1 grid. Add to that the perennial Ferrari and modern motoring giants Honda, Renault and Toyota and you have a veritable who’s who of the motoring world.

Despite its rich history and appeal, a quick look down the list of teams racing in F1 today reveals there are surprisingly few names recognizable from the real world of motoring.

Only Ferrari, Mercedes, Renault and, to a lesser extent, McLaren have cars that you can go out and buy—theoretically that is. Of the two Lotus teams that ridiculously compete this year, neither has any significant link to the (Malaysian-owned) British sports car manufacturer of the same name.

So what happened?

One of the major problems is the concentration of ownership of these famous names. Whereas once they were strong, individual companies, they are now merely branches on the conglomerate tree.

Fiat, as an example, owns Ferrari, Lancia, Alfa Romeo and Maserati. Porsche-controlled Volkswagen has Audi, Bugatti, Bentley and Lamborghini.

All of those great names are tied up in just two companies.

But even that doesn’t fully explain why the big names aren’t there anymore.

Where is BMW or Peugeot? Why don’t the Japanese manufacturers compete any longer? Couldn’t one of the marques from the Porsche stable represent the group?

Audi have come up with their answer. After years of teasing fans with hints at an F1 push, they have laid their cards on the table.

According to Audi, F1 is irrelevant. Harsh call, but Audi’s racing director, Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich, goes on to justify it.

"

There’s no relevance to the road. Audi has always been engaged in motorsport that’s relevant to our customers such as rallying and touring cars, which brought quattro, FSI and TFSI to our road cars.

This is why in 1999 we decided against F1. Instead we decided to take on the greatest race in the world. We went for Le Mans.

"

Them’s fightin’ words. The number of passenger car manufacturers represented alongside Audi (11 in total) for Le Mans races, however, gives a fair bit of weight to the argument.

Not that any of that stopped Audi from organizing a lavish party in Singapore to coincide with the F1 race. 

As brutal as Dr Ulrich’s assessment is, he gets the Ban Ki Moon award for diplomacy compared to the blunt assessment of F1 offered up by Porsche CEO Matthias Mueller who declared that it was “not interesting” and “too expensive."

Of course, what those two learned gentlemen don’t say is that F1 is also a ridiculously hard sport to conquer.

When you’re the big fish in Le Mans racing, as is the case with Audi, or you have multiple series dedicated solely to your brand, as does Porsche, why risk it all to be an also-ran in a world far removed from your own?

When motorsports leviathans like Mercedes and Ferrari are given a racing lesson by an energy drink company, you know you’re not in Kansas anymore.

And yet, that’s the appeal. F1 should be unpredicable and cutting-edge; it should be more than just road cars racing.

That’s not to say that F1 is a particularly innovative sport. While the perception is that F1 is responsible for many advances in the motoring field, it doesn’t hold up to close scrutiny.

Leaving out traction control and monocoque construction, F1’s strength is the development and extension of technologies rather than coming up with them in the first place. Advances in this area do feed back to the passenger market, but don’t necessarily get the recognition of high-profile advances like airbags.

However, if sport was only about real-world applications, we wouldn’t have the Olympics. Watching Usain Bolt make a mockery of world records wouldn’t appeal; we’d presumably want to see cops running down villains instead.

F1 is special and different, and while Audi would be a welcome player, the sport will survive without them. Besides, the engine changes slated for 2014 already have a host of familiar former players lining up to take part along with first-timers Volkswagen and General Motors.

The Le Mans 24-hour may arguably be the world’s greatest car race (although the folks in Monaco may have something to say about that), but F1 is still undisputedly the best series.

And it is still the pinnacle of motorsports.