No More Grid Girls - replaced by Grid Kids

[Pramesi]

Formula 1 and FIA in new Grid Kids partnership

Everyone's thoughts on this?

I personally think it's a great idea since it promotes Formula 1 to younger fans while also inspiring them to work hard to become their heroes.

well, this is going to surely open a whole load of potential for child labour critisim, exploitation of kids, and i wouldn't be surprised if 'paedophelic accusations' or 'suspicions' will be coming up at some point.

this has to be the lousiest, dumbest, stupidest, retarded decisions and thought patterns ever to cross.

just no words. for real. what the.

I mean, you see this practice done in football games all the time, and I don't see people calling that either child labour or exploitation of kids

It's not exactly child labour if it doesn't interfere with their school, doesn't take away from their childhood, and is not mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous.

[proteus]

Formula 1 and FIA in new Grid Kids partnership

Everyone's thoughts on this?

I personally think it's a great idea since it promotes Formula 1 to younger fans while also inspiring them to work hard to become their heroes.

well, this is going to surely open a whole load of potential for child labour critisim, exploitation of kids, and i wouldn't be surprised if 'paedophelic accusations' or 'suspicions' will be coming up at some point.

this has to be the lousiest, dumbest, stupidest, retarded decisions and thought patterns ever to cross.

just no words. for real. what the.

I mean, you see this practice done in football games all the time, and I don't see people calling that either child labour or exploitation of kids

It's not exactly child labour if it doesn't interfere with their school, doesn't take away from their childhood, and is not mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous.

This was more a sarcasm than a real deal to me.

[Pramesi]

well, this is going to surely open a whole load of potential for child labour critisim, exploitation of kids, and i wouldn't be surprised if 'paedophelic accusations' or 'suspicions' will be coming up at some point.

this has to be the lousiest, dumbest, stupidest, retarded decisions and thought patterns ever to cross.

just no words. for real. what the.

I mean, you see this practice done in football games all the time, and I don't see people calling that either child labour or exploitation of kids

It's not exactly child labour if it doesn't interfere with their school, doesn't take away from their childhood, and is not mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous.

This was more a sarcasm than a real deal to me.

A bit difficult to read sarcasm off the internet mate

[void]

If I was a driver, I would have my exclusive grid girls or now my exclusive babysitter grid girls.

[AJI]

I really think Liberty, in conjunction with the FIA and FOM and the drivers association, should set up a working group to properly think through all of the options for this pressing issue.

[dans79]

3 words mate.....

Bring Back Bernie.

I'd rather seem him in jail where he belongs!

[Jolle]

U know how do u make F1 closer to the young? U make it interesting. I thought Liberty will finally make everything more watchable again, but instead they are making completely no sense with their decisions...

Things that we know, and should be fixed:
- ban of DRS
- shorter cars
- simpler/cheaper engines
- more engine suppliers
- more affordable aero (simplyfying few areas of cars)
- more testing
- fair money distribution
- more teams
- no fuel limitations (flow, or even amounts)
- even less penalties and more on-track aggresion and action
- gravel traps
- return of visual aesthetics of cars (no thumb noses, T-wings, fins and similar things)
- free-to-air feed
- less tracks, having only the good ones

What we are getting so far and in the future:
- HALO (ok, exceptable in terms of safety, but even without the sport would work normally)
- more and more payable channel feeds
- removal of grid girls
- massive race calendar
- change in race starts time which is now worse in terms of enjoying youre free sunday
- concerts and carnevals during the race
- more non racing related "attractions" during the weekend
- wanting to change the racing format
- new TV graphics of which the samples so far were not too good to see
- aparently space cars in the near future

I think that "we" is not in order I presume this is your personal opinion/list, not mine at least.

It is my opinion and i dare to say an opinion of many as well, since i have seen enough of posts about this things. The list might have some points which are not acceptable to all, but overall i wrote what the sport needs.

But for the sake of healthy argument i would like to see what is youre stand of what F1 needs to be interesting.

sure,

In my opinion the hybrid PU with fuel flow is good (a enforced power limiter is necessary as seen in the past)
- uncouple the different elements of the PU, especially the CE and ES to have more and different battery and electronic suppliers
- make it possible to lease a last or even older spec PU (to bring cost down for the smaller teams and to have options)
- PU penalties the same way as gear box penalties -> one PU for seven straight races, don't finish a race, you may start with a new PU, blow a PU before it's life during a weekend -> back of the grid
- DRS is necessary because of the fine tuned aero. The turbulence of the car in front gives so much disturbance that those last few % of efficiency is gone. Plus, F1 has never been this close
- F1 is financially healthy. All teams are building a car within the 107% without trouble. Lets hope now that Bernie is gone, companies like samsung and VW want to invest in F1
- I don't think the Halo is a bad thing
- although I love the cars from the early 80-s, next to the current F1 cars they look like F3 cars. I like the big long powerful cars now.
- I would like to see simulated gravel traps. sensors in the bottom of the car that detects when it goes outside the circuit and recuse power for 30% for 5 seconds or something. Real gravel traps will make drivers take less risk, which is less appealing to watch.
- change F2 so teams can easily run a team there as well, to have a broader reach (now 99% of autosport viewers only know about F1, Indy and nascar)
- grid girls: come on, it's the 21th century...
- start times: I don't mind, gives me an hour more to do some shopping, sleep late etc etc
- the stuff around the races on track? the more the people get entertained for their ticked the better, right?

[marmer]

No body would moan about drs if it was legal anytime and purely up to the drivers choice. Saves fuel makes cars faster what's not to love especially if it was free to use it would stop easy drs overtaking

[NathanOlder]

It would stop most of the overtakes, and be pointless to have if you could use it that way surely. I think it would make less overtaking than no DRS as the cars would make a smaller hole in the air so the car behind would get less benefit from a slipstream.

[63l8qrrfy6]

I really think Liberty, in conjunction with the FIA and FOM and the drivers association, should set up a working group to properly think through all of the options for this pressing issue.

Well that's kinda what they've done splashing money on setting up market research offices and whatnot.

The glorious output so far has been grid kids and the fan megastore thing.

I'm not saying bring Bernie back but for gods sake bring in someone who knows what they are doing.

[Squid]

Liberty Media is trying to kill Bernie Ecclestone.

Honestly, I'm not gonna go into the merits of grid girls vs. grid kids, but I can't help but imagine Bernie slowly dying inside with every announcement from Liberty Media. They're sistematically dismantling the image of Formula 1 that Bernie carefully built over the decades. Bernie built a sport that was exclusive, glamorous, and very much a rich man's playground. Bernie never wanted F1 to look open and approachable. The more snobbish and elitist F1 was, the better. And he made a lot of money with this image, as companies stumbled over each other to associated their brands with this sport that had the fastest cars, the hottest girls, the manliest men and the people with more money than you could even dream of having.

Props to Liberty Media for bringing a lot of aspects of F1 into the 21st century, and as was the general consensus, it was time for Bernie to step down, but we shouldn't ever forget that Formula 1 is only as famous as it is, as rich as it is and as important as it is because of this image that Bernie crafted. It was such a powerful image that simply watching F1 made people feel like they were at least a small part of this world.

Again, not going to take any stance on this. Just going to say that Formula 1 does need to go forward, but it also can't forget what made it 'the greatest show on Earth'.

[djos]

Superb - great solution to the problem. Gives kids a chance to get close to their heroes, and stops pushing the sport as being an old-boys club quite so much.

+1, I like it a lot.

Back in 80's & 90's growing up in Adelaide, we had a whole bunch of state school activities centred around GP weekends, It made me the F1 fan I am today so I'm in favour of getting the kids involved like this.

[Thunder]

The writing was on the Wall since the removal of Grid Girls. They just spaced out the Announcements to get more attention.

Personally i think it's a great solution. The young guns get to see their Idols live, Families get Paddock access. Who knows, maybe one of the Grid Kids will one Day be an F1 Driver.

[J.A.W.]

The writing was on the Wall since the removal of Grid Girls. They just spaced out the Announcements to get more attention.

Personally i think it's a great solution. The young guns get to see their Idols live, Families get Paddock access. Who knows, maybe one of the Grid Kids will one Day be an F1 Driver.

Whaaa?

Are you suggesting that rich parents will pay to have their kids on the grid, thus booking a 'paid driver' spot - for later?

[Fulcrum]

I think the concept of grid kids is somewhat antithetical with the function of the sport at present, and I suggest further changes to the grid procedure may be necessitated as a result. Let me explain.

From my perspective, the pre-amble to an F1 race and a football/rugby/cricket/etc... match are entirely different.

Firstly, the physical space, and who occupies it. The F1 grid is small. Much of the available space is occupied by the cars, additional physical hardware to support and maintain the vehicle, the staff, the strategists, the rich and connected, etc... To summarise, lots of people, not much space. In comparison, every other sport that has been mentioned has ample space for additions to the spectacle.

How is this relevant? Grid girls occupied space, the kids can occupy whatever space they took up. Yes and no in my opinion. Children require a greater level of supervision than adults of either gender, so I can foresee more than just the child being present on the grid. Whether that means the parent, caretaker, etc... someone will need to be legally responsible for them, and perhaps physically present as well. Children are also not immune to 'temptation', whether that means being somewhere you shouldn't, touching something you shouldn't, appropriating something you shouldn't, etc...

Secondly, the atmosphere on the grid. In its current guise, I'm not sure I'd consider this an appropriate place for children. The grid is a highly pressurised zone, many people are not there simply for the sake of 'form over function'. Mechanics are doing work, drivers are preparing for the race, adults are being adults (swearing, etc...), the rich and connected are mingling. As others have mentioned, conditions (climatic) are often extremely uncomfortable (hot) as well.

Quite frankly, if grid girls are simply replaced by children, I could foresee many people in the paddock grumbling about the nuisance and/or inconvenience before the year is out.

That is, unless the grid walk, pre-amble, or whatever it is called, is altered to accommodate the grid kids in a more appropriate way. I'm not sure what that would entail; perhaps a 15/30 minute event prior to formal grid assembly?