If I Ran F1: David Brabham

Brabham is one of the most successful and recognisable names in the history of motorsport and now David Brabham is continuing his father’s legacy by bringing the team name back through an innovative new model. Check it out if you haven’t yet, and in the meantime we approach David to give us a taster of how would the Formula 1 world look if he ran it.

Running Formula 1 is not something that I would say I have on my radar right now, but… I am not sure you would see much change if most of the current people who have been running Formula 1 for so long didn’t get their marching orders, so I would have to bring in new people who have a different mindset. The old thinking of “well this is Formula 1 and this is how we do it” would be out to bring fresh thinking in.

I would then look at where money was coming in from, how much and where it was going. I’d meet all the partners involved in Formula 1 to ask what their views are on the state of Formula 1 and what changes they would like to see introduced to help them and the sport in general.

I would work with race circuits on a revenue share with circuit advertising, which would establish a healthier track environment where ticket prices could come down for the fans, but ensuring that money was spent on transforming the tracks to enhance the fan experience.

Fans would be asked a whole range of questions to see what they are happy with and what they aren’t, and what other types of access and involvement would make it more interesting for them. I would look at how we could interact with the fans around the world and give them more access behind the scenes of what makes racing exciting.

I would look to bring in a price cap of $150-200m per team to contain the escalating costs in Formula 1, as the teams are spending much more than the amount of revenue and sponsorship that can be generated in today’s world. The teams aren’t capable of making these kinds of decisions because of their vested interest.

The funds would be distributed in a way that would ensure all teams were well funded, so they can have a chance of developing their cars to make the racing much closer and interesting.

I would work with race circuits on a revenue share with circuit advertising, which would establish a healthier track environment where ticket prices could come down for the fans, but ensuring that money was spent on transforming the tracks to enhance the fan experience. So bringing in the latest digital/virtual equipment to bring the tracks to the 21st century. This way we could save and make the traditional historic racetracks more sustainable, as these historic tracks add real value to the show. It should bring the magic back to Grand Prix racing.

I would invest money into the junior categories so that the talented drivers coming through to Formula 1 add credibility to the show, while the F1 teams would have to do the same.

I would bring in wider tyres, like the old days, and make the cars slide around a bit more so we can see the skill of the drivers come through.

I would increase the minimum weight of the cars by 100kg so money was spent elsewhere instead of spending millions on saving those last few grams.

Well that is a start, but we know it isn’t going to happen soon!