F1’s new sporting director, Ross Brawn has suggested the creation of a research group dedicated to better understanding overtaking and depart from the use of artificial aids.
Brawn is returning to F1 in a role that will help shape the sport’s future through a comprehensive review of its regulations and what can be done to enhance wheel-to-wheel racing.
“One of the things I want to do within FOM is to create the capacity to study those things,” he told veteran journalist Maurice Hamilton in an exclusive ESPN interview.
“FOM’s never had that capacity and has always had to take the opinions given to it by other parties.
“The FIA do a little bit of that, but what I would like to do is create a small group of people within FOM that have the experience and the knowledge to look at those problems and those challenges so that we have our own opinion on what could be the solution.
“We would work with the teams and the FIA of course, but we would also have some knowledge ourselves. I don’t know how deep that will go because there are limitations on how much you can do.”
Brawn admitted he has never been a fan of DRS or of any sort of gimmick destined to increase overtaking.
“I’m not a great fan of DRS if I’m honest. It artificially solved a problem that we didn’t want to tackle head on.
” It doesn’t have the quality or merit of a full-on overtaking manoeuvre, the fact that you can press a button and get past almost means we never see those full-on [overtaking manoeuvres].
With the advent of new regulations this season, many of which were devised with the aim of increasing overtaking opportunities, Brawn is eager to assess F1’s new state of affairs on the racing front.
“I think 2017 is going to be very interesting, because from what I perceive we have moved in that direction again — to higher levels of aerodynamics — and I think we will get a perfect example of whether that is going to improve or worsen the situation. So we’ve got a field test going on next year in the racing season to see.
“It may well shake the order up a bit, and that’s one thing that’s important, but if we end up with cars that are going to become even more difficult to race with each other then I think we have got to take that as a clear indication that there is a rethink needed in the long-term.”
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