Tuesday, March 22, 2005

Here we go!

An otherwise dozy afternoon gets good, thanks to (free) tools like these. This is my first post done through W.Bloggar . All major blogging engines like Blogger, .Text etc are supported.

Njoi Maadi !

Wednesday, March 09, 2005

Success Explicated

Two fantastic quotes on 'Success' I thought were worth quoting here:

The sign on the door to success says, 'PUSH'.

Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm.


Source: Unknown

Monday, March 07, 2005

F1: New regulations on full 'Throttle'


Let me go back in time and regurgitate what I had to say about F1 about a year ago:

"99% of the people who are asked this question - What is Formula 1 all about?, would typically answer this way: A sport where cars go round and round the same track without any meaning or purpose. This, at the glance, may seem to be the way it is, but real F1 purists agree that sport is just a small part of F1. The real essence of F1 is all about the research, engineering and technology involved in getting those mean machines to the circuit. F1 is like a test bed for putting the components of a car through the most gruesome tests. F1 is the path through which the latest and the greatest components or features make it into normal road cars that you and me drive everyday."

Therefore, anybody who blindly asserted that F1 is just a mere sport would be subject to extreme flak from me for sure. But of late, strange things seem to be happening in the F1 scene, which has caught me wrong-footed. The recent domination by Ferrari perhaps has left FIA thinking about the seemingly ludicrous ways of equalizing competition. You can get all the gory details here.

Essentially, cars this year would be slower, a lot slower, thanks to the new aerodynamic regulations. Moreover, the new qualifying and race rules will leave the teams taking a conservative strategy. Of course, teams would find their own ways to claw back those last ounces of performance from the cars, but why have such constraining rules in the first place ? If cars get faster every year, so will there be advancements in safety features. In fact, F1 technicians would probate that an F1 car, in its all glory, would still be lot safer than a normal road car. So why not let raw performance drive the spirit of F1?

I think its high time for FIA to revisit what I think is the real philosophy of F1 (which is pushing all limits), rather than thinking of making this a fair sport. If you love F1 and are at unrest due to the new regulations of FIA, please do drop in your comments!