I've been a racing fan for most of my life. I remember the open roadsters on the 1 mile dirt ovals and watching the likes of Mario Andretti, Parnelli Jones, Troy Ruttman, AJ and others when, as you point out, it was more about the man in the car and less about the car.

I've been a Formula One fan too for more than 50 years! I had the pleasure of being invited by Rob Walker to be a member of his crew at a time when the Formula One was still a sport and the American venue for our Grand Prix was Watkins Glen, NY.

And, I've watched as the advancements in technology and massive amounts of money have altered the course of what I once loved, to its detriment. Fomula One has become a commercial instrument for promoting the car companies in developing nations.

Indy and America's open wheel racing were dealt a death blow by Tony George's ego when he formed the IRL. In Formula One we have the interference of Bernie Ecklestone and the Max and Girly Show.

I design and build devices for aircraft and have been in the boundary layer enhancement business for almost 25 years. I am also a licensed pilot. I can say with certainty that the greatest risks to any aircraft occur when it's taking off or landing.

What sits between the four tires these days is no longer a racing car but an emasculated airplane that can't seem to make up it's mind, what domain it wishes to be in.

And, so, it hunts back and forth tentatively in the riskiest transitional domains possible. And the risks are not just to the driver.

A few years ago I watched a Mercedes Benz coup perform two backwards somersaults, 50 feet in the air at almost 200 mph at Le Mans. It did not land on the track. It landed instead on on the other side of the ARMCO barrier, on it's wheels, right side up.

Pure unadulterated luck!

Had that same maneuver occurred elsewhere on the track where there were stands populated by spectators, Daimler-Benz would have the dubious distinction of repeating the same horrible accident it was involved in, at the exactly the same track, back in 1955 where over 80 people were killed and countless more seriously injured. It wasn't Mercedes fault, not even remotely, but the carnage occured nevertheless.

We need to rein in technology. We need to eliminate the use of aerodynamic devices on racing cars completely. We also need to place a limit on the costs. Not just in Formula One, but in Formula Two, open wheel racing here in the states and in the full envelope prototype catagories as well.

There are plenty of Cheap and low cost divisions of motor racing to enjoy if that is what you crave. Let the F1 boys and Indy boys continue to push the envelope, that is how progress occurs.

GA vote from me - I stopped being a NASCAR fan this summer - it's just too much like "rasslin'" nowadays. Sometimes the "good old days" really were better, I think.

I'm, a fan TOO, have been since I was about 6 yrs old. Saw indy cars race at Darlington, saw motor cycles race there too, didn't work out very well for those types. Raced some cars myself, and once saw "Iron Mike Migill" fly a 55 or 56 ford over the wall at Darlington between turn 1&2, and a few minutes later walk back into the grandstand and waved to the crowd. No fins or wings to help there, did it the hard way, end over end. Mike was what one would call "tuff" I think he must have lug nutts instead of gonads.

TMF

This problem isn't unique to formula racing, in ANY competitive activity one always tries to determine how to increase the probability of winning.

For an organisation to institute new rules is simply to reset the process. Can't have 5 Litre engines, must be 1500 cc's OK, off we go again! There are classes of racing that require the engines to be bought from one shop, sealed and go into tightly limited cars. For a wonderfull example, look at formula Ford and research the times for a course over time.That's the characteristic of competition.

My peve is so called VINTAGE racing: cars are nothing like they were so it's turned into just a potentially less expensive way to race that is totally unrepresentative of what racing was.

As always in this country, the question is: how fast can you afford to go?

cheers;