Formula 2 is known as the stepping-up class to Formula 1, but that is not always the case. Richard Verschoor tells Ziggo Sport Race Café what he thinks of the fact that Formula 2 champions do not always get a chance in Formula 1.
It has been repeatedly shown that good performances in Formula 2 do not guarantee a chance at the pinnacle of motorsport. Nyck de Vries became champion in 2019 but only got the chance for a permanent seat this year. Oscar Piastri, who became champion in F2 in 2021, also could not board an F1 team immediately. Felipe Drugovich now faces the same fate. The 2022 F2 champion is now a reserve driver at Aston Martin, and for now, it is far from certain that there will be room for him to join an F1 team next year.
'F2 champion should get chance in F1'
Therefore, Richard Verschoor thinks there should be special rules to promote the flow to Formula 1: "Actually, there should just be a rule that whoever becomes champion in Formula 2, whoever that may be, should just go to Formula 1, whether that is in a general team or in a team that joins."
Just no. What is a problem however is the lack of testing and how far removed from an F2 car an F1 car is now. Both make it extremely hard for new drivers to adapt. Maybe the solution is allowing rookie drivers to have much more time in F1 cars between seasons.
The FIA has no power over driver choices outside of the Super License rules. Each team is independent and chooses drivers based on their own criteria.
How should that work out?
Force teams to give a F2 champion a seat?
And which team? Who is going to pay? Which driver will have to leave F1?
I don't see this happening, it's way too complicated unless, the FIA decides to build up their own team with their own cars.
It's not going to happen anytime soon.
I asked myself a lot of the same questions, which, obviously, Verschoor did not.
Yeah indeed, it seems like a logical idea at first, just like how football leagues do it, but yeah, football leagues don't do individual players, it's a whole team that relegates or advances.
So, maybe they could instead do that, the bottom team racing against the F2 winning team and the loser goes/stays in F2 and the other goes/stays in F1.
But i'm sure many teams will not be happy about that either, because a team like Haas might get stuck in F2 for consecutive years, even though they've spent way more money on their team than F2 teams would (i assume) and had to do a lot more to enter and stay in F1 in the first place.
An F2 team is not a constructor and has a much smaller number of people. they are not built to race in F1.
The best F2 will be destroyed by the last F1 team anyway ?
At least, if I understood well you suggestion.
Also not sure that a F2 team would like to enter F1. It's an whole other budget and will need to build/buy way bigger facilities including, staff and machines.
In order to be able to do what Verschoor suggests, it will be necessary that drivers sign with the FIA instead of the teams themselves.
IMHO, I don't see this happen. I also don't think teams will agree with that.
But the idea of such a system like in football (soccer) would be nice indeed ?
Ah yeah, the worst F1 team will probably still be quicker than the best F2 team.
I forgot that F2 had a totally different structure.
But yeah, i wasn't really serious with my suggestion, and i see that it's a lot less straight forward to begin with.
I guess from Verschoor's POV, the relegation system might make sense to him, as the cars are pretty much the same, but F1 is a lot different on many aspects.
I do like the idea as well, maybe teams can put their reserve drivers on the line with some side-championship.
Although i have no idea how they're "put on the line", but i like the concept of reserve drivers adding something.
Since there's only 10 constructors, and likely also 10 reserve drivers, they could add the top 10 of F2 to complete the grid.
And if F2 drivers finish ahead of F1 drivers in the final standings, they can be signed for F1, or traded with the F1 driver.
But yeah... that only really works with drivers that come directly out of F2, as a Max would not have qualified for that as he skipped F2 altogether.
So, there's plenty issues everywhere.
I forgot where, but i suggested something like Formula 1.5, like reserve drivers doing the sprint races instead of adding them to the regular championship.
But i did not consider that there might only be 10 reserve drivers, so they could still add the top 10 of F2 in there, but i'm not sure for what purpose, other than having a full grid and some pointless challenge.
Or as I like to say:
"Everyone said it was impossible, until someone did it" ?
Yeah it would imply too many changes unfortunately.
That's right, more problems! Haha
Yeah, it's probably impossible to bring small changes if the current system is still active.
Who knows what they might do in the future, but yeah, considering it's about a lot of money, things might not change very quickly, if at all, unless there's more profit to be had by changing it.
There's even another complexity.
Most drivers in F1 got support from F1 teams since karting, through F4, F3, F2 and others.
Let's say, even if a driver supported by an F1 team finishes 2nd in F2, and the winner of that very same championship didn't have the support of a F1 team, the 2nd driver will most likely get the priority for a F1 seat. Reason being the important amount of investment that the F1 team already made since karting. The Team wants to make profit, or at least a return of investment with the driver.
Either by employing him themselves, or by selling him to a bigger team.
Sauber has been a team who took profit with Heidfeld, RAI and MAS, by selling them to bigger teams.
This system has been in place since decades. It is not going to be easy to break that chain.
But it would be great to see such a system based on merit instead of current "capitalistic" one.
Yeah...
But in an attempt to answer your question anyway:
Replace the driver that finishes last in the standings (while holding a contract), whatever team he may be driving for. Unless the F2 champion in question already managed to secure a better contract with a better team, then the runner up gets his place. This comes with a $1m salary, paid by the FIA. This also becomes the minimum required salary for any F1 driver.
Now, this might come with a bunch of unwanted consequences and team tactics.. but it would also make it more interesting to pay attention to what happens in the back of the field and at the top tier of F2, which is a win for the FIA.
It'd be messy in practice and it's probably not going to happen.. but I think it would be interesting?
Problem with this is that each team is independent and pays for their own costs. If someone pays their own way, they absolutely will not have someone else tell them how to run their team/company (except for obeying the sporting rules of course).
The teams would have to agree to this rule, of course. And of course this could force an unwanted driver on a team. But it could also give a losing team a top driver for a year, for free. Might be hard to say no to that.
Like I said, it would potentially be messy. But also quite entertaining perhaps.
It just goes any established business practices. If one owns a restaurant, for example, then for sure one would be expected and required to follow rules and laws regarding hygiene, employment, building codes, etc. These would be like the sporting rules that F1 and the international sporting code currently have.
But other than that, it's a case of: "I own the business, and I'll do what I want!" Mandating a driver onto a F1 team, is like the government mandating that you must hire a specific person as your chef.
Maybe fun to speculate on, but it just goes so far into incredible that I don't see it even being proposed.
Apart from what Mike tt pointed out, I see another potential issue.
Let's say that the worst driver in F1 gets a better car/team (by luck) than the 2nd worst driver and hence, scores more points.
This means that 2nd worse driver will need to join F2 while the worse on stays in F1.
It is still going to be a question of luck.
Also we should consider that a F1 car is way more complicated to drive than a F2 one.
A new driver will need one year to acclimate.
I think we're asking a little two much to the FIAsco ?
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