Motorsport has few fans?

[EddyHawk]

F1 still is very popular, but GT, Le-Mans, Rally... I think that with the years the fans are less, where I live I don't find anybody who watch races, many people tells me that is boring just watch cars running, when I watch GT races in Youtube from official channels like Blancpain or IMSA, the videos have very few views and almost no comments, and in the circuits many times they have very few spectators, it will be nice that Motorsport had the same popularity as other sports like football or baseball and you could easily find people to talk about racing, sometimes I feel lonely about my love for motorsport haha, maybe is just where I live, I don't know.

 

[UnkaD]

It's the same where I live. You mention your love for motorsport to anyone at all and the only thing that comes to their mind is NASCAR, but they have no clue about that series anyway so they just nod and say cool. Sometimes someone has a little more knowledge and thinks INDY when you mention F1. This also includes everyone I meet that is a "car guy." I can never find anyone that would even know what the Indy 500 is. It's that bad. It's weird how far outside the normal scope racing is.

I feel like an outsider too because everyone can randomly start having conversations about any other sport and I have no clue what they're ever talking about. Racing is literally the only sport I follow. No time to waste on guys fighting over a ball, or just plain fighting.

 

[twitcher]

It’s the same where I live. If I mention I watch racing, everyone assumes NASCAR, and regardless of the series, thinks all of it is boring and can’t figured out why I watch it.

It’s not entirely surprising though, for multiple reasons. Cameras tend to do a rather poor job of conveying the sense of speed and skill. The scale of covering a race around a 4km race track is massive compared to covering a game played on a 100mx50m pitch or arena. It’s getting better with new cameras, on boards, drones, etc, but it’s still multiple times larger and more complex than covering a game played in a small area (eg, in a ball and stick sport, where to point the camera is easy - you point it at the ball, or at the guy with the stick. In racing, when things get spread out, where do you point the camera? Not as easy to decide.)

It gets even more complicated when you talk about endurance racing. Again you’re talking about covering an event that takes place over a large area, where the action gets spread out. Le Mans and the Nürburgring are nearly impossible to cover everything that’s happening. Then you have the length....try to get anyone you know to watch anything for 6 hours or more.

Rules in motorsport tend to be vague, poorly explained, and randomly enforced.

Add all that up, and you have a sport that’s not easy to follow, and takes genuine effort on the part of the viewer to fully understand.

Another thing to account for is most people who follow ball and stick sports played those sports at some point in their life, usually as kids. This makes it much easier for people to relate to, and to understand. If there was as many kids around the world in karting as there is in soccer or baseball, there would be a lot more general interest in racing. Because of the costs involved, this will likely never happen.


There’s also all the self inflicted wounds motorsport as suffered over the years. There’s a lot of disciplines in motorsport, and they constantly take hits at one another, with F1 having taken multiple axe swings at sports car racing over the years. If there’s any truth to the rumours, Bernie Ecclestone played a role in the Indycar split in the mid 90s. And then there was F1’s treatment of fans over the last 20-30 years, appealing to the “Rolex crowd” and trying to push out the rabble. None of these things helped motorsport grow in popularity.

 

[TenEightyOne]

F1 still is very popular, but GT, Le-Mans, Rally... I think that with the years the fans are less, where I live I don't find anybody who watch races, many people tells me that is boring just watch cars running, when I watch GT races in Youtube from official channels like Blancpain or IMSA, the videos have very few views and almost no comments, and in the circuits many times they have very few spectators, it will be nice that Motorsport had the same popularity as other sports like football or baseball and you could easily find people to talk about racing, sometimes I feel lonely about my love for motorsport haha, maybe is just where I live, I don't know.

That's quite a US-centric view. F1 has 320 million unique viewers per year worldwide. With the best will in the world it's hard to imagine that the other series you name get anywhere near that.

 

[twitcher]

That's quite a US-centric view. F1 has 320 million unique viewers per year worldwide. With the best will in the world it's hard to imagine that the other series you name get anywhere near that.

How is that a US centric view? I think what @EddyHawk said is a pretty general outlook on motorsport.

He start with F1 is still popular, which it is. 320 mil is a big number.

He then says, “GT, Le Mans, Rally, with each year I think the fans are less”. Which is true, aside from specific events like Le Mans, N24, maybe a couple of the American endurance races. But GT racing, compared to the 60s, 70s, 80s, crowds are way down. Crowds at rally are down. Crowds at NASCAR, Indycar, and other series are down as well. Watch a round of TCR Europe from Paul Ricard or Spa, look how many people are in the stands...they’re empty. Even last year for WTCC events, crowds were basically non existant (not really a Suprise given what wtcc became). Compare that to wtcc crowds at many races in the 80s (etcc) or 90s. I don’t think observing this is US-centric

I agree that there’s basically no chance to get any of those catagories of racing to be as popular as F1, for a whole list of reasons.

 

[TenEightyOne]

How is that a US centric view?

When literally the first three posts are along the lines of "whenever I speak to anyone" which implies specific locality.

I take your point that OP did use other measurements but I'd point out that they were either location specific too (number of people at races) or based on official channel views when we know (but don't support) that many people watch ripped streams instead.

 

[twitcher]

When literally the first three posts are along the lines of "whenever I speak to anyone" which implies specific locality.

I take your point that OP did use other measurements but I'd point out that they were either location specific too (number of people at races) or based on official channel views when we know (but don't support) that many people watch ripped streams instead.

I still don’t get how it’s a US centric view. If I watch a Blancpain GT race and notice that the grand stands are completely empty....how is that dependent on where I as a viewer live?

You live in England, correct? Is it common in England to find random people at a pub, or in the lunch room, who enjoy talking about the latest TCR race? Do you know people who watch the Spa 24hr as a social gathering? Do your co-workers regularly chat about the results of the latest round of ELMS?

Being that you’re in England, maybe there’s a good chance you have fiends and family who watch things like BTCC, along with F1. Even then though, I have a hard time believing that, aside from F1, BTCC, and maybe Le Mans, motorsport is much of a hot topic around the water cooler, even where you work.

In fact, I would argue that your view, that motorsport is in fact more popular than we’re making it out to be - is a very “Euro-centric” view. Outside of Europe, and maybe Japan and some places in South America....motorsport isn’t even on the radar of most people. Certainly not to the level of other sports.

It doesn’t matter where you watch racing, numbers are down. Nascar, Super GT, Aussie Supercars, sportscar racing, GT racing, Touring cars - both numbers of people at events, and eyes watching on TV (now internet) are down from previous decades.

Regarding number of viewers on YouTube. Really the only things that you need to watch on illegal streams are F1, MotoGp, Aussie Supercars, WSBK, and WEC. Nearly everything else is available on YouTube, on official channels. Look at Super GT. For all it’s popularity in video games over the last 10-15 years, they’re lucky if they get 5k views on NISMO TV. I take the point that YouTube numbers don’t tell a full story....but you’re kidding yourself if you think there’s thousands upon thousands of people watching Blancpain, Int GT Open, TCR, etc on illegal streams.

 

[shoemaker]

Many series are not advertised anywhere, they are not shown on fta tv in many places, if at all. Its no wonder nobody’s interested apart from die hard fans, no effort is made to attract new fans.

 

[longshot1314]

It's interesting because I had been under the impression that sports car racing has been gaining popularity in the U.S., given the crowds I've seen at some of the IMSA and PWC races. I live relatively close to Lime Rock Park and the past few years both the IMSA and PWC races have been drawing some large crowds to the track, though that may be slightly conflated given its a smaller track.

 

[EddyHawk]

@longshot1314 This is a PWC race where there are few crowds:


This is an IMSA race where the stands are almost empty:


And all the videos of youtube about IMSA, Blancpain, WTCC, Super GT, British GT, PWC... they have very few views

What is weirder is that there are alot of fans of games like Project Cars, Assetto Corsa, Gran Turismo, Iracing... and the majority of players like to drive GT cars or LMP cars, but when you want to talk to them about real life races they don't know anything except for formula.

 

[MatskiMonk]

There's all kinds of factors involved in the relative popularity of motorsport. It has plenty of fans, just not to the same level as popular ball sports.

The 320,000,000 viewing figure for F1 is a red herring IMHO, I know a number of people who watched the British GP, having done nothing but complain about how boring F1 is, and then complained about how boring the race was after... and probably won't watch another race this season until Hamilton's in a title decider... I don't really count these people as fans... in the same way I detest football, but am watching the world cup.

FWIW I've struck up conversations with relative strangers in both my local pubs about motorsport, though perhaps it helps living in an area known for its motorsport links.

 

[-Fred-]

@longshot1314
This is an IMSA race where the stands are almost empty:

To be fair, it was a very, very humid 46°C (115°F) last saturday with pretty much no cloud cover, so any intelligent human being would not be sitting (cooking is perhaps a better word here) in those aluminium bleachers for a 6h race. There apparently were quite a lot of people there, at least according to what the IMSA guys were saying during the broadcast, they just were hiding in the shade.


Another thing to factor in, F1/NASCAR/Indycar are broadcasted to a much bigger audience, and usually not on specialized channels or through the web.

 

[twitcher]

@longshot1314 This is a PWC race where there are few crowds:


This is an IMSA race where the stands are almost empty:


And all the videos of youtube about IMSA, Blancpain, WTCC, Super GT, British GT, PWC... they have very few views

What is weirder is that there are alot of fans of games like Project Cars, Assetto Corsa, Gran Turismo, Iracing... and the majority of players like to drive GT cars or LMP cars, but when you want to talk to them about real life races they don't know anything except for formula.

I’ve been playing pcars online for a few years now, with the last 6 months being a bit of a break from the game. I’ve been in lobbies with hundreds of different people from all corners of the earth.

In these lobbies, most people know a thing or two about car racing. They understand about a racing line, the understand racecraft, both wheel to wheel and overall strategy, they understand tuning which mimics real life behaviour, and many of them I would consider to be incredibly fast in the games.

However, if I would try to strike up a convo about real life racing, aside from F1 and occasionally Indycar (seasonal interest in Le Mans as well), majority of people would say they don’t follow any kind of GT or TC racing. If I mention names like Rast, Van der Linde, etc, people usually have no clue who they are.

After doing a hundred or so TC lobbies in PC2, I met 2 people who actually knew what TCR was....all three of us were completely blown away that we’d actually met other people who knew what TCR was.

There's all kinds of factors involved in the relative popularity of motorsport. It has plenty of fans, just not to the same level as popular ball sports.

The 320,000,000 viewing figure for F1 is a red herring IMHO, I know a number of people who watched the British GP, having done nothing but complain about how boring F1 is, and then complained about how boring the race was after... and probably won't watch another race this season until Hamilton's in a title decider... I don't really count these people as fans... in the same way I detest football, but am watching the world cup.

FWIW I've struck up conversations with relative strangers in both my local pubs about motorsport, though perhaps it helps living in an area known for its motorsport links.

I agree that region and location probably play a large role. Like I said, I live in the north west, which aside from central Africa and Mongolia, might be the driest place on earth for traditional car racing (we love our dirt biking and snowmobiles out here). However, even in North America, there are hotspots for road racing - SoCal, Florida, Atlanta, amongst a few others. My gut tells me that it wouldn’t be extremely rare to meet other petrol heads in those regions, due to their proximity to multiple circuits and more established events (Daytona, Sebring, Petite, LBC, etc).

I think the density and quantity of circuits is a large part of the reasons racing is much more popular in Europe. Look at the UK, they have more circuits there than almost all of North America combined. That said, even in the UK, I don’t think motorsport is as popular as other sports like footy, rugby, cricket, etc.

Here in Canada, during the mid day, TSN would rather show Darts or Curling on TV instead of any kind of racing.


And just to sort of back up my stance that motorsport is generally not all that populur, even if you include Europe, here’s a tweet from Kelvin van der Linde, one of the hottest up and coming GT drivers.

Edit: helps if I link the right tweet

 

[MatskiMonk]

I think the density and quantity of circuits is a large part of the reasons racing is much more popular in Europe. Look at the UK, they have more circuits there than almost all of North America combined. That said, even in the UK, I don’t think motorsport is as popular as other sports like footy, rugby, cricket, etc.

The USA has plenty more circuits than the UK, the difference is how long it might take to get to them all. I can drive to any circuit in the UK (stretching out to Mondello park in Ireland and the Isle of Man as well), also Le Mans, Spa, the Nürburgring, Zandvoort etc. etc., within 8-9 hours... Daytona to Laguna Seca is a 41 hour drive... so I take your point, but the USA is not short on venues compared to the UK at least.

Motorsport doesn't come close to the popularity of Football, or similar sports in the UK, but there are reasons and they're simply not going to change. That doesn't stop motorsport existing, and I for one, am glad that the motorsports I like are not as mainstream as Football.

 

[twitcher]

The USA has plenty more circuits than the UK, the difference is how long it might take to get to them all. I can drive to any circuit in the UK (stretching out to Mondello park in Ireland and the Isle of Man as well), also Le Mans, Spa, the Nürburgring, Zandvoort etc. etc., within 8-9 hours... Daytona to Laguna Seca is a 41 hour drive... so I take your point, but the USA is not short on venues compared to the UK at least.

Motorsport doesn't come close to the popularity of Football, or similar sports in the UK, but there are reasons and they're simply not going to change. That doesn't stop motorsport existing, and I for one, am glad that the motorsports I like are not as mainstream as Football.

Hmm, you’re actually probably right about the number of circuits in the US vs UK. I think on a per capita basis, or by population density, the UK would be higher. In the US, there’s pockets where there’s a bunch of circuits, like SoCal or Florida and Georgia, but then there’s huge areas where there is nothing other than maybe a dirt oval.

Overall I agree though, motorsport is just not as popular as other sports, for a whole host of reasons. That said, I think it could be more popular than it currently is if, over the previous 20 or so years, those in charge would have had a bit more foresight, instead of just “riding the wave” like they seemingly did.

I too am ok with motorsport being more of a niche sport. I am glad for the internet, forums, twitter, and livestreams for making the sport more accessible than it has been in the past. There’s still a lot of improvement that can be done though.

 

[TheOverdriver]

You guys are so lucky!

Here in Aus V8 Supercar races are only broadcasted on Foxtel with special races sometimes broadcasted on free to air channel 10 here which in reality is just 5 or so rounds but for you it’s mostly free to air so I mainly think that’s the problem, heck some of my friends don’t have Foxtel so I have to fill them in on every round

 

[Morgoth_666]

In the US, there's maybe six or eight NASCAR races a year on free TV(some of which aren't from the top series). Other than that you get 3 or 4 IndyCar races and perhaps 2 or 3 F1 races. Everything else is you have to pay for, sometimes multiple extra channel packages are necessary. With my local TV providers, last I checked it was somewhere around $50 a month to watch IndyCar and F1, for the entire NASCAR season and IMSA you have to pay about $100. That would also get you the IoM TT highlight shows and Le Mans(I'm not sure about the rest of WEC anymore). I could have paid even more to watch a couple other smaller series like World Challenge but I never did.

There's also some other off-road racing stuff on, but most of that is also not free and most isn't very popular outside of Supercross. I think Supercross and NHRA drag racing was in the $100 tier, although I happened to get a channel that replayed them a week or two later in a lower-cost package as well.

So there's a little on unpaid TV, but still not very much and no complete seasons. I'm not completely current on where everything is now because a couple years ago I decided it wasn't worth it anymore to pay $100 a month for 3-4 races(since I don't care about NASCAR) and another 5 or 6 hours a month of watching TV shows I could just as well do without.

 

[Blood Eagle]

FWIW on cost to watch motorsports on TV I have had Playstation Vue since it came out so roughly 4 years now and pay $39.99 a month and get every channel that most motorsports come on from FS1, FS2, NBCSN, CBS Sports, ESPN etc and can watch it not only through my PS4 but from a computer, call phone app, Firestick etc. So I have 3 TVs in my house and one is connected to a hardwired PS4 and the other 2 Firesticks. I use my phone at work. There are cheaper alternatives to expanded TV packages from big cable providers. Not really on topic but there are cheap ways out there.

 

[Morgoth_666]

Yeah, there are starting to be more and more alternatives to the traditional TV companies now. They love to force people to pay for a lot of things they don't want(because everybody wants a little bit of what's in each tier) and people have grown tired of it.

Motorsport seems to be one of the lowest sports genres in terms of fan numbers, so networks don't usually care very much and of course the cable/satellite providers don't care at all... but they tend to be pretty dedicated so will happily pay a premium for a small amount of extra value. But hard core fans of other sports also have to buy expensive premium channels dedicated just to those sports if they don't want to miss anything, partly because there are so many more MLB/NBA/NHL games to keep track of. There's lots of races, but not too many for each series. Different problems for different fans, I guess.

 

[EddyHawk]

I never pay to watch a race, I love YouTube because I can watch so many races of differents series, Blancpain, IMSA, PWC, GT Open... But I opened this topic because in all those videos even when they are free they have so low views and in the circuits the stands are almost empty, I Wonder how they get financiation to organizate all that races, in others sports, no audience and the sponsors leave.

 

[twitcher]

I never pay to watch a race, I love YouTube because I can watch so many races of differents series, Blancpain, IMSA, PWC, GT Open... But I opened this topic because in all those videos even when they are free they have so low views and in the circuits the stands are almost empty, I Wonder how they get financiation to organizate all that races, in others sports, no audience and the sponsors leave.

Blancpain, IMSA, PWC, GT Open, WTCR, and anything below that level is comprised mostly of amateur drivers who are paying to be there. It’s wealthy drivers who make those series run - and those series are nothing more than a weekend activity for some extremely wealthy people that they happen to video tape and we watch them have their fun. It’s literally like going watching your family doctor play golf at the country club.

In the GT3 catagories, most series use a Pro/Am driver lineup. They use all this Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze stuff to make it confusing, but basically Platinum and Gold are pro drivers, Silver and Bronze are pay drivers. There are some exceptions with either really young drivers, or some really old pros, who end up with a a Silver rating.

When you go to Audi and buy a GT3 and tell them you want to enter it in Blancpain, there are channels that you can go through to get an Audi factory driver (eg Rene Rast) to co-drive your car (which includes helping with setup and learning to drive the car), but you pay through the nose for it.

For instance, in Blancpain, Dries Vanthoor is a pay driver. His family pays for him to be there. His co-driver is always a top factory Audi driver. His brother Laurence was a rare exception, someone who started out as a pay driver and then got offered a job as a factory driver.


IMSA’s GTD program is the exact same. One driver pays for the car and team to be there, the other driver is the pro driver hired to set up the car and coach the pay driver. Kristina Nielsen, the defending GTD champ, is a pay driver. GTLM is all pro drivers, and DPi is a mix. Teams like Acura and Mazda use all pro drivers, but some of the P2 teams have a gentleman driver who is paying for the team to be there.

Even in WEC, that’s exactly what LMP2 and GTE-Am are...drivers pay massive amounts of money to be able to participate. Without the funding from these wealthy amateurs, most sports car series would not exist.

Without doing an exact head count, I’d say at least half the TCRi grid is made up of wealthy amateurs who are just along for the ride - who wouldn’t want to go race cars in exotic locations, given the opportunity?

GT Open, PWC, Blancpain Asia, Asian Le Mans, Australian GT - all of these series are designed to be a hobby for “wanna-be” racecar drivers. It’s all about how much money you have. The beauty of it, is if you have enough money, and you have the skill, and the motivation, you can go really far with it - all the way to Spa, or Bathurst, or Daytona, or Le Mans, and you can compete right alongside the pros. This is something that is basically impossible in other sports.

 

[jake2013guy]

Drees van Thoor

*Dries Vanthoor

 

[EddyHawk]

Waoo I really didn't know much of what you said, I thought that the mayority of drivers of those series won money, and a minority have to pay to participade, if in that series are a lot of amateurs drivers, in what series do the pro drivers participade and win money by racing apart from F1?

 

[twitcher]

Waoo I really didn't know much of what you said, I thought that the mayority of drivers of those series won money, and a minority have to pay to participade, if in that series are a lot of amateurs drivers, in what series do the pro drivers participade and win money by racing apart from F1?

As far as I know, there is not a single racing series comprised purely of “professional” drivers.

F1 has guys like Stroll, Ericsson, Maldonado, Meri, etc.

Indycar always has a few pay guys near the back.

WEC LMP1-H is all pro drivers, so is GTE. LMP2 and GTE-Am are Pro/Am lineups.

WRC has many amateur drivers, like the Arabian prince guy who drives for Citroen sometimes. Even Mats Osberg would have been a pay driver in the past before Meeke’s Mid season disaster.


I think...I think Forumla E might be the only racing series in the world comprised of all professional drivers. Yikes.



All that said, in any series where there are amateur drivers, there are also pro drivers. Blancpain GT is a good example of this. Most of the teams are made up of one amateur driver and one pro driver.

As far as winning prize money, I’m not too sure. Prize money isn’t exactly a big thing in motorsport anymore. The only race that is currently advertising a big purse for winning is the Suzuka 10hr, which iirc is offering 100k to the winner. I guess the Indy 500 is the other one with a big purse.

In motorsport, any series that uses driver pairings, the main reason the pro driver is there is to set up the car for the amateur. That’s how majority of professional drivers make money, by being coaches to the amateurs.

At the end of the day though, motorsport is basically an amateur sport, and without the amateurs competing alongside the pros, the sport would collapse under the weight of the finances involved. Taking a guess, there are probably less than 100 people in the world who are true, professional racecar drivers - people who get a paycheck purely for driving a racecar (as opposed to both driving, and setup/coaching with an Am).

Single seaters like F1 and Indycar have the highest percentage of pro drivers, but there are Ams on the grid. Any other racing series is basically a step down, and will have a higher percentage of Am drivers.

 

[SagarisGTB]

Single seaters like F1 and Indycar have the highest percentage of pro drivers, but there are Ams on the grid. Any other racing series is basically a step down, and will have a higher percentage of Am drivers.

There aren't any amateurs in F1 and there hasn't been for decades.

Don't conflate "pay drivers" with amateurs. The "pay drivers" we have in F1 are full-time professional drivers who bring contracted sponsorship to their teams and often take their salary through their sponsor. They are still paid to drive and don't usually have any supplemental income. They can be quite good too (like Schumacher and Alonso). Amateur drivers are those that make money elsewhere (usually a full time job, though it can be an inheritance) and pay to race in their spare time. Think of the likes of Simon Dolan or David Heinemeier Hansson. Nobody is paying these guys to race.

On another note, I'm surprised to hear that Dries Vanthoor is still paying to drive. He's one of the best GT3 drivers currently, so I'd have expected him to have become a factory Audi driver by now.

 

[twitcher]

There aren't any amateurs in F1 and there hasn't been for decades.

Don't conflate "pay drivers" with amateurs. The "pay drivers" we have in F1 are full-time professional drivers who bring contracted sponsorship to their teams and often take their salary through their sponsor. They are still paid to drive and don't usually have any supplemental income. They can be quite good too (like Schumacher and Alonso). Amateur drivers are those that make money elsewhere (usually a full time job, though it can be an inheritance) and pay to race in their spare time. Think of the likes of Simon Dolan or David Heinemeier Hansson. Nobody is paying these guys to race.

On another note, I'm surprised to hear that Dries Vanthoor is still paying to drive. He's one of the best GT3 drivers currently, so I'd have expected him to have become a factory Audi driver by now.

Sorry but I don’t consider Lance Stroll to be a professional race driver.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Sorry but I don’t consider Lance Stroll to be a professional race driver.

Then unfortunately your misunderstood definitions could prevent you from sensibly discussing that topic. He has a professional licence and a professional contract and drives professionally for a team in a professional series. Hope that's all cleared up for you

 

[twitcher]

Then unfortunately your misunderstood definitions could prevent you from sensibly discussing that topic. He has a professional licence and a professional contract and drives professionally for a team in a professional series. Hope that's all cleared up for you

The guy is asking what series he can watch where the drivers don’t pay to be there. Lance is paying to be there, simple enough.

If you and I sign a contract for me to mow your lawn, but I PAY YOU, to mow YOUR lawn (using your lawn mower), that doesn’t make me a professional landscaper.

Lance has a super license, not a professional license.

He has a contract, nothing about the contract stipulates it is a “professional contract”

Whether or not F1 is a “professional series” is debatable (this part is a yoke).

 

[TenEightyOne]

Lance has a super license, not a professional license.

He has a contract, nothing about the contract stipulates it is a “professional contract”

His licence is not an FIA Amateur licence, it's as simple as that. Did you look at the FIA license lists before you posted, have you ever looked at them?

If you and I sign a contract for me to mow your lawn, but I PAY YOU, to mow YOUR lawn (using your lawn mower), that doesn’t make me a professional landscaper.

So? Are we somehow supposed to extrapolate that flawed wisdom to FIA licences? You've lost me there.

The guy is asking what series he can watch where the drivers don’t pay to be there. Lance is paying to be there, simple enough.

Nonetheless he has a Platinum licence so your argument is void. You're arguing with people for whom English is a first language, please don't try to argue new definitions of words regardless of your bias against pay drivers. There have always been pro pay-drivers in F1 and there doubtless always will be.

 

[twitcher]

His licence is not an FIA Amateur licence, it's as simple as that. Did you look at the FIA license lists before you posted, have you ever looked at them?

Lance has a Platinum ranking which is for professional drivers. So you’re correct, the FIA consider him a professional driver.

Lance qualifies for platinum by two conditions - he won F3, and holds a Super License.

From Miriam-Webster

a : participating for gain or livelihood in an activity or field of endeavor often engaged in by amateurs

•a professional golfer


b : having a particular profession as a permanent career

•a professional soldier


c : engaged in by persons receiving financial return

• professional football

Lance is not payed by a manufacturer to race, and he’s not racing to gain livelyhood. I don’t know the details of his contract, but if Williams is paying him, then I suppose that would constitute “gaining livelyhood”....but Williams paying him with daddy’s money is a laughable.

No dictionary I checked had “use father’s money to buy your way to junior formula title”, or “holds shiny cirtificate from FIA for completing X amount of test miles that father payed for” listed as a definition of professional. Perhaps your beef over the use of the word is with the FIA.

So? Are we somehow supposed to extrapolate that flawed wisdom to FIA licences? You've lost me there.

Williams need to score points = you need your lawn cut.

Laurence giving money to Williams so Lance can drive their car to to score points for them = Papa twitch giving you money so I can use your lawn mower to cut your grass.

Pretty tough eh?

Nonetheless he has a Platinum licence so your argument is void. You're arguing with people for whom English is a first language, please don't try to argue new definitions of words regardless of your bias against pay drivers. There have always been pro pay-drivers in F1 and there doubtless always will be.

I was wrong to label your beloved pay drivers as “Am”, I’m so unbelievably sorry.

They’re not amateurs, but they’re not professional drivers in the sense that they are not payed by a vehicle manufacturer to race their cars.

I don’t have a bias against pay drivers, I have a bias against poor drivers. Many pay drivers happen to be poor drivers. Not all of them though, Niki Lauda was pretty good, and Stephano Comini is one of my favourite active drivers.

This was never a discussion about whether or not F1 has historically had pay drivers, or about whether it will in the future. No clue why you felt the need to add that into the discussion.

You seem a little hung up on this business about definitions of words, so allow me to bring you up to speed with where the convo started (did you even read the convo from the beginning??)

Waoo I really didn't know much of what you said, I thought that the mayority of drivers of those series won money, and a minority have to pay to participade, if in that series are a lot of amateurs drivers, in what series do the pro drivers participade and win money by racing apart from F1?

That’s the question I was offering my answer to.

So again, I didn’t use the terms Pro/Am in the same way the FIA use them (but they have a funny definition of “pro”). I will point out though, the first time I used the word professional in response to the question, it was in air quotes, a sarcastic use of the word to describe the likes of Stroll, Ericsson, etc.

The way I read the question, he was asking, “in what series are there drivers who aren’t paying to be there?” F1 has drivers who are paying to be there.

Furthermore, he was actually asking for series aside from F1, which I attempted to answer as well.

Do you have anything more to add to the discussion? Perhaps you know of some more racing series which don’t have pay drivers (to be clear, I’m not asking whether a given series should have pay drivers, I’m simply asking if you know of any series that don’t have pay drivers).

Or would you like to keep arguing about the definitions of words (notice how I was having a conversation with everyone else, and now that you’re here, we’re arguing ).