Before discovering the world of Formula One I was a NASCAR fan, but was not nearly as enthusiastic or knowledgeable about NASCAR as I am with Formula One now. I haven’t attended a Formula One race yet, although I hope to in the future. When I was a NASCAR fan though, I visited a race with my friend who is a hardcore NASCAR enthusiast. Despite my love for NASCAR, when I discovered Formula One, it was love at first sight.
It is true that each series is unique; a fan cannot go to a Formula One race expecting to see the same racing style as NASCAR, or vise versa. So what attracted me and millions of others around the world to become fans of the sport?
First, Formula One is a global sport. Unlike NASCAR, the Formula One season takes place in various countries around the world, providing fans with large variations in climate and track conditions. This is also the reason that F1 contains drivers of all different ethnic backgrounds. Having drivers from all around the world is a really great cultural experience for anyone involved with the sport. Another great thing to see in any international sport is when all of the countries put their differences aside, cooperate and enjoy racing against each other.
From an environmental standpoint, Formula One is the ideal choice over NASCAR. As of the 2014 season, Formula One cars are using the V6 turbocharged engine which requires less gas and creates less CO
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emissions, making NASCAR a gas guzzling monster in comparison. F1 cars also use a system called the ERS system. ERS stands for Energy Recovery System and is a descendant of the KERS or Kinetic Energy Recovery System from last season. The ERS collects wasted power from tasks like braking and converts it into electric power, similar to the system used by eco-boost cars.
From an economical standpoint, F1 is superior to NASCAR. F1 is a multi-billion dollar sport that collects more money in one season than NASCAR. This can be surprising to many considering that Formula One has fewer sponsors. You can tell that the teams have more money by simply comparing the fines to the teams. In 2013, Michael Waltrip Racing was fined $300,000 for the incident at Richmond that occurred in the 2013 season. This was the largest fine in the history of the sport. This is loose change compared to McLaren’s $100 million dollar fine in 2007 for allegations that information from Ferrari was passed to McLaren. This is the largest fine in the history of Formula One exceeding the previous record of $4 million dollars.
When you compare the cars of Formula One and NASCAR, F1 pulls out on top again. For branding purposes, the cars of NASCAR are designed to resemble the model of their sponsor. For example, the previously raced Ford Taurus NASCAR was shaped similar to the car available on the market. It was even wearing a pair of round headlight stickers. The cars of F1 look more like airplanes than cars and do not look remotely close to any of the cars from the manufacturer, making it appear as if it is only made for racing. Although some of the car decals for NASCAR are visually more appealing, they are ruined by an overload of unattractive sponsorship stickers placed around the car. Formula One also has sponsors placed on their car, but they are larger. The sponsors on a car in F1 don’t ruin the appeal of the car with an excess of sponsors.
In the technology field, NASCAR is extremely outdated. They use technology that has been in Formula One in some cases ten years prior. F1 uses faster cars and strive to make the cars as light as possible to allow for better cornering. The engineers are always developing the cutting edge technology, much of which can be transferred to airplanes and street cars. In F1, the drivers are not the only people racing. The sport is a giant research and development race between engineers to get the most up-to-date cars. This is always visible during what is commonly known as the “build season”, when team engineers design the entire car (not including the engine or tires) from scratch. The car they design will be used for the entire season. Each driver may only have 1 car for each season, banning any spare cars unlike NASCAR.
Compared to the tracks of Formula One, NASCAR tracks are boring with limited action. As you can see from this split-screen comparison, the majority of NASCAR tracks are ovals or similar shapes, whereas the tracks for F1 are a variety of different shapes and sizes with more than 4 corners. Every corner of a Formula One track is a different challenge. The corners can be anything from a slight curve, tight corner, or even a hairpin turn. Limited banking for corners can also present a challenge, forcing drivers to leave the track if the corner is not handled correctly.
Another factor that can make a track difficult to drive is the changes in track conditions, the biggest being rain. Unlike NASCAR, a race cancellation or delay because of rain is a rare event. Because every team has access to wet and intermediate tires designed for wet conditions, the race can continue despite rain. Many fans enjoy a good rain race because the slippery track surface and limited visibility makes for great racing where anything can happen.
An F1 race will also see less yellow flags with a safety car (also known as a pace car in NASCAR). This isn’t because there are fewer accidents, but because Formula One has a track status known as a local caution which only requires drivers to slow down and stop overtaking in the sector of the track where the accident has occurred. It is true though that we have seen an increase in the safety car use as a result of the deaths of many FIA race marshals. Having fewer cautions shortens the amount of laps in which the cars are not racing.
The length of the races in Formula One and NASCAR are very different. The distance of an F1 race is about 310km (190.5 mi), whereas a NASCAR race will be about 430km (267 mi). A shorter race stops drivers from staying in the back of the race field and force all of the drivers to push of every possible position. Many people say: “NASCAR is a marathon and Formula One is a sprint”.
There are 22 drivers in F1 and 43 drivers in NASCAR. Having less drivers helps to ensure that only the best drivers make it into the sport. A sport with more drivers will see the talent thin out as teams search for cheap drivers to fill the seat of the car. This is why NASCAR sees many drivers that race for one or two laps and retire to the pits. This is only because the team is looking to make money and not compete. Another thing that makes Formula One a more competitive sport is that F1 racing teams can only have 2 drivers. This means that there cannot be one team hogging all of the good drivers. NASCAR however, has a higher limit and that is why teams such as Hendrick Motorsports are so dominant.
The pit stops for the F1 racing series are much faster than NASCAR pit stops. The World Record for the fastest pit stop goes to Mark Webber of Red Bull Racing after he went in for 4 tires in 1.9 seconds. The fastest 4 tire pit stop in NASCAR was 10.6 seconds and the fastest ever pit stop was 8 seconds. With a faster pit stop, not only are the drivers able to rejoin the race faster, but mistakes that are made by the pit crew can ruin a pit stop more than mistakes made by a NASCAR crew. The use of tire warmers in Formula One also allows the drivers to get a fresh set of tires that are already at optimum temperature, which allows them to push the cars to the limits earlier after a pit stop.
Many fans say that one of the boring things about Formula One racing is the lack of bumping. In reality, this is a negative thing for NASCAR. In NASCAR drivers only need to worry about getting to the driver’s bumper so that they can bump them out of the way. In Formula One, the drivers focus more on overtaking because they are unable to bump without damaging the car. This fear of damaging out of the race requires F1 drivers to drive with more precision compared to NASCAR where drivers can be bumped around without a lot of damage.
This makes Formula One a more challenging sport for the drivers compared to NASCAR. You can tell this because many drivers from Formula One have moved into NASCAR when they can no longer get a ride in F1. A good example of a driver who has done this is Juan Pablo Montoya who left F1 in 2007 to join the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. However, there are no cases in which a NASCAR driver without previous Formula One experience has made it into F1. Some drivers have attempted to do so, but none have ever made it.
Another reason that fans enjoy Formula One is because there is less conflict in Formula One in regards to the rules. In NASCAR, there have been some controversial penalties given to drivers. The rules in NASCAR can also adjusted to better assist a driver from a more popular team. This was the case in 2013 when race car driver Clint Bowyer spun out his car intentionally, bumping Jeff Gordon out of a Chase position. After penalties were given to all drivers involved, Jeff Gordon was still not in a Chase position. Fans were outraged and complained to NASCAR. Because of the public outrage, NASCAR decided to allow a 13th driver into the Chase, which was Jeff Gordon. In this case, many people believe that Jeff Gordon was let into the Chase because he is with the largest racing team in NASCAR. In Formula One, this doesn’t occur as often. The strict rules set up by the FIA are straight forward and have very limited loopholes.
The thing that many F1 fans do not enjoy is the amount of time between races. In most cases, the races are done every 2 weeks compared to NASCAR’s every week races. However, this isn’t all bad. Having a larger gap between races allows teams to test and setup the car to ensure that the car has full potential on race day.
Something that is often overlooked when comparing the two sports, are the use of substitute drivers. In NASCAR, teams may substitute the primary driver with another driver for certain tracks such as road courses and restrictor plate races. Formula One has strict rules stating that no substitute drivers may be used unless the primary driver is in need of medical attention. This means that at the end of the season every single point earned for a driver in the standings was earned by only that driver, unlike NASCAR where some points have been earned by substitute drivers.
Two more aspects of Formula One are the tyre compounds and qualifying. Currently, F1 teams have access to multiple tyre compounds, allowing teams to use specific tyres to better meet the driver’s needs. On the other hand NASCAR teams are stuck with the typical radial tires and have no other alternative tires.
For the 2014 season, NASCAR has switched to a qualifying similar to the F1 style qualifying. F1 drivers may participate in as many laps as they wish in the 60 minute qualifying period. All of the drivers qualify during the same 60 minutes meaning that the drivers can be on the track at the same time. NASCAR will not adopt this part of the qualifying, but they will be eliminating slower drivers as qualifying continues, like F1 already does. Since NASCAR is taking the F1 style, this must mean that the way that F1 runs the sport is better than the way that NASCAR has been running.
Although Formula One is my favourite sport of all-time, there will always be a special place in my heart for NASCAR and all other types of racing. I am just a racing fan and couldn’t live without it. If someone really wanted to stop all racing, they could… just leave me my Formula One.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer or company. Assumptions made in any analysis contained within this article are not reflective of the position of any entity other than the author.
