Blue Flag Rule - Race Day

I know this is a rather ancient Chestnut but don't you agree that if the above rule was abolished on Race Day we would get some very interesting results? It would really sort the men from the boys in my humble opinion and definitely throw a wild card into the proceedings. No longer would you see a "faster" car be able to zoom past the field from the back as if they're the only guy in the outside lane of a Motorway. They would have to work much, much harder to get back in the fight at the front.
 
I'm not sure what you mean - are you talking about when a driver in a top car somehow ends up in the back field or when the leaders come upon the backmarkers?

Because in the first case they have to overtake and there aren't any blue flags shown and in the second case I disagree with you.
 
I do however think it's unfair if the backmarkers are engaged in a battle at the point the leaders come up to them. I think blue flags should only be applied outside of this scenario.
 
Maybe they should just go a little bit faster Hamberg :snigger:

Back to the OP. For me its the lesser of two evils, do you spoil a fight for positions 16 to 20 or spoil the fight for positions 1 to 5? There is definitely a skill to being lapped without losing time.
 
In an ideal world this rule would be abolished. However as tooncheese correctly points out, I'm sure teams that have connections (such as Toro Rosso and Red Bull) would abuse this.

Although surely they would get bollocked for it, bringing the sport into disrepute I'd imagine. Still it would be hard to prove...
 
Several valid points raised BUT...

I can't think of any other RACE where competitors are expected to make way for another to improve the "overtakers" chance of winning!
 
Maybe they should just go a little bit faster Hamberg :snigger:

Back to the OP. For me its the lesser of two evils, do you spoil a fight for positions 16 to 20 or spoil the fight for positions 1 to 5? There is definitely a skill to being lapped without losing time.

The entire field should be in a straight fight. No favouritism.
 
If we are being that idealistic, then why not go the whole hog and have a 200 mile long track ;)

Otherwise, its not a straight fight for someone to get held up by another driver that is 3+ miles behind them in the race. :)
 
In some racing series the blue flag is not mandatory it only shown to a driver for information that a faster car is approaching and can move over as a matter of courtesy if he wants to.

Maybe F1 should adopt that principle.....
 
In Monte Carlo this year, a Caterham led a McLaren for the majority.

Do you want to see that race decided by the leader having to make risky overtaking moves on backmarkers. And Caterham and Marussia don't need the unpopularity.

Those problems are in addition to Jean-Eric's Little Block of Horrors.
 
I'm not really a fan of junior teams, but anyway a back marker should have the nous to know when to get out of the way or he wouldn't make many friends with the big teams.

I remember Suzuka 1996 Damon was on poll but Gerhard got off to a better start and lead for a few laps Damon went for an overtake into the chicane and it was mighty close to Damon losing his front wing but Gerhard made room for him, when asked after the race Gerhard said "I did not want to interfere with the championship battle." In other words he had enough sense and courtesy to get out of the way when challenged.

This is called sportsmanship, and it should not have to be imposed onto drivers via blue flags it should just be part of their make up as a sportsman....
 
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