F1 Countdown:
I’m itching for next Sunday’s start to the 2003 Formula 1 racing season in Australia. It’s hard to descrive how much I miss race-weekend routines during the off-season. Suffice it to say that since I was a little tyke, I’ve spent Saturdays watching qualifying sessions, and stocking up on drinks and snacks before the racing on Sundays. Of course there are those less than spectacular weekends when you need to haul your ass out of bed before dawn if you’re a ‘purist’ and want to catch the racing action live. There’ll be a lot more of those 4am starts when I move to Calgary.
This season promises to be ‘different’ from previous years following FIA’s dramatic shakeup of rules and procedures, introduced to attempt to curb the decline in viewer numbers - a result of the lack of any real challenge to Michael Schumacher and Ferrari’s complete dominance throughout the season. Although I agree that something needs to be done to ensure the survival of the sport, I worry that a good deal of the changes are simply knee-jerk reactions that may end up turning the season into something of a circus.
I’m looking forward to racing action nevertheless. In the meantime, The Observer has an article on five-time world champion Michael Schumacher.
