Testing - Lets make it Attractive!

Testing is normally a day when the world isn’t watching you; you can complete as many laps as you wish, on whatever amount of fuel, go through loads of sets of tyres and spin your car without losing track position. Ah, how exciting! Sadly testing hasn’t been the world’s most attractive aspect of the sport. Normally if Ferrari are coming the track is closed off to the public, all roads around the area shut off and helicopter gun ships circle the perimeter edge. Hmmm. But is all of this coming to an end? The 3-day test at Silverstone this week attracted hundreds of people to the racetrack and unlike the Grand Prix; you didn’t have to remortgage the house to pay for it because admission was free! Sadly there isn’t much else to do apart from sit and watch three Formula One cars circle the racetrack so why don’t teams invite you to come round the back and see whats actually going on? Well, Red Bull Racing with their “Pit Bulls Club” are starting to do just that, arranging excellent trips for Formula One fans to get an insight into the sport and to see how it works for real. Maybe more teams should organise similar experiences? Maybe testing should be made more attractive to the supporters who are the most important part of the infrastructure itself.

What if teams had to send the day giving something back to the fans? We know they are far to busy on race weekends and we don’t expect them to through a party at the end of every Grand Prix weekend. But say if teams had to spend a few minutes allowing people to see, ask and witness the tension of being inside a Formula One garage plus getting an autograph of their favourite driver, wouldn’t you say testing would become something different instead of three Formula One cars circling the track? It would become something attractive, not as attractive as a Grand Prix weekend, but something for the everyday Formula One supporter who just wants something back for supporting their team.