Several tech facts will change for the upcoming F1 season, beginning with the introduction of the Kinetic Energy Recovery System (KERS), continuing with the adjustable rear wing and ending with the more degradable tires provided by Pirelli. All these features are said to make the sport more fun to watch, but certainly not easier to tackle, as argued by the drivers.
“F1 is becoming more radical, with more and more attention being put into the show. I wonder if this is necessary,” said Vettel in a recent interview with German magazine Der Spiegel.
“If a critical point is reached we would sit down together and discuss it. It's about our safety,” he added, pointing to the fact that the demands from F1 drivers have increased dramatically in the last couple of years.
With the addition of all these new features, the steering wheel resembles very much to a Christmas tree, with several more switches added for the 2011 campaign (KERS deployment, rear wing activation and so on). Fernando Alonso echoed Vettel's thoughts, insisting that F1 has moved from being a sport to an entire business.
“It is too much a business to be a sport, and too much a sport to be a business,” said Alonso in an interview with AS newspaper, piggybacking on a few comments he made on F1 a few years back, according to which “Formula 1 is not a sport.”
“But it is not just a sport purely and simply, because there are too many interests and too much at stake,” he added.
According to a recent report from Autosport, F1 veteran Jarno Trulli has already complained about the good functioning of the adjustable rear wing, pointing to the fact that there is an obvious delay between the moment in which the button is pressed by the driver and the time it takes for the adjustable rear wing to click back into place before braking.
“There is a sort of 'no man's land' of at least 5 metres when the load on the wing is not felt yet,” said Trulli.
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