Plans for the fans by Maurice Hamilton
Thankfully, F1’s new owners understand who the most important people in the whole setup are
THERE is a refreshing breeze blowing through the F1 paddock these days. People are smiling more and there’s less hassle and none of the nitpicking rules apparently conceived for no other reason than to make life unnecessarily dif cult.
It’s no coincidence that the European races are now without Bernie Ecclestone’s grey bus with its darkened windows and unof cial but frosty nickname “The Kremlin”. In its place is the open door of Liberty Media’s headquarters and an acceptance that F1’s framework needs to change, not just for the participants, but also for spectators.
In Barcelona, it began work on the Fan Zone, a concept that would have been alien to the sport’s previous owners, CVC Capital Partners, to which spectators were an irritating obstacle in the quest to make money. Don’t get me wrong; F1’s new bosses at Liberty Media keep a keen eye on the bottom line, but they also understand the need to look above it and consider the interests of the people whose hard-earned cash helps oil the commercial wheels.
The rst Grand Prix in Europe provided an opportunity to try new ventures on what amounted to home soil with the convenience of shipment by road rather than air. Previously, the extensive area behind the main grandstand at Circuit de Barcelona-cataluña had seen a collection of independent stalls united only by self-interest.
This year, it had become a buzzing, well-organised focal point with live music and dancing. Innovations included pit-stop challenges, racing simulators and photo opportunities waving a chequered ag or attempting victory leaps on a podium. There were wandering minstrels and cartoonists working on the walls. The place seemed to bustle with life rather than simply being a market stall for T-shirts piled high in price and low in imagination. Up above, a zip wire ran from one end of this colourful scene to the other.
There may have been room for improvement but, as a tentative start, it was showing all the signs of F1 wanting to engage with the fans. The experience also embraced a fully functioning garage in the pit lane, showing how F1 cars are prepared and how a team works at the racetrack. For the rst time, a two-seater F1 car took the lucky winner of a golden ticket for a lap of the track. Also a rst, the fastest three in qualifying were interviewed on the grid immediately after the session had ended.
Talking is one thing, of course. But on this occasion, the Grand Prix itself provided the perfect follow-up, with an intense battle between Mercedes and Ferrari that extended beyond edgy, on-the-limit racing by Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel.
This is direct input from Ross Brawn, Liberty Media’s technical director, who saw F1 for all its faults when spending three seasons watching races from his settee after a couple of decades on the other side of the fence. When Brawn ran the technical department at Ferrari, Luca Colajanni headed the team’s media and PR operation. Colajanni subsequently moved on to manage communications for Formula E, but readily accepted an unexpected call to ful l the newly created role with Liberty Media (Ecclestone and CVC, such was their collective arrogance, having always denied there was a need for cordial relations with anyone).
Taking up his post on the Spanish Grand Prix weekend, Colajanni spotted a golden opportunity during the race when a television camera caught six-year-old Thomas Danel in tears as he saw his hero, Kimi Räikkönen, eliminated on the rst lap. Quick thinking, in association with Ferrari, had the boy located and brought to the paddock to meet Kimi. It didn’t end there, as Thomas and his parents were taken round the garage and into the throng below the podium.
A disaster for the youngster had been turned into a day he will remember for the rest of his life. In a wider context, F1 had created more goodwill in ve minutes than in the past ve decades. Chase Carey, the head of Liberty Media’s F1 operation, highlighted the different circumstances and ambience compared with 12 months before.
“We got all this press about the little boy, but I didn’t tell them to nd him,” said Carey. “They did it on their own, having a sense of freedom that they wouldn’t have had a year ago. They thought it would be a special moment, and it was. We launched no transforming events but a number of things that almost everybody said created a fresh sense of energy and excitement. It’s the rst step on a long road we’re looking forward to travelling together.”
The important point he didn’t mention was that everything was carried out using pleasing language rather than the hostile tongue that had become F1’s menacing motif.