JENSON BUTTON has scoffed at Sir Richard Branson's claim that Formula E is poised to overtake Formula One as motor racing's elite category.
Branson, who was speaking at the Formula E season decider at Battersea Park in London last weekend, said: "I think four or five years from now you'll find Formula E overtaking Formula One . . . there's still going to be room for Formula One, but I would say there will come a time when Formula E will overtake it."
Fans of the sport have recently called for grater competition with fewer gimmicks, the Grand Prix Drivers' Association Global Survey has claimed. The majority of fans who took part in the questionnaire also called for a return to a tyre war, in-race refuelling, and, perhaps alarmingly, suggested that Grand-Prix racing has gone from "exciting" to "boring" within the last five years.
But while Button acknowledged that F1 is "too complicated" in its current format, he dismissed Branson's suggestion that Formula E, the FIA-backed electric series, will soon become the more popular of the two categories.
"No, I disagree with him completely," Button said. "Formula E is a good addition to motorsport because that series will be the electric series and the rest of us can get on with motor racing.
"I think it is good that it is in cities and it attracts people who are not motorsport fans because it is easy to walk down to Battersea Park and see a car go round. It doesn't disturb anyone either because it is not very loud.
"I've watched a couple of races - not because of the cars or the sounds it doesn't do anything for me - but the drivers do. The drivers are making that series."
Formula One has come under heavy criticism this season following a number of largely processional races. Mercedes have extended their dominance at the sharp end of the pack, while Button and McLaren team-mate Fernando Alonso were dealt a combined, and somewhat farcical, 50-place grid penalty for a raft of changes to their respective Honda power units ahead of the Austrian Grand Prix earlier this month.
"You take a five-place penalty for a new MGU-H and MGU-K and it is very complicated - an eight-year-old kid doesn't want to know what that is, and some of the people in the sport really struggle to understand what it is, too", added Button.
"I had a 25-place penalty in Austria and there is only 20 cars on the grid, so how is that possible? There are quite a few things that need to be looked at."
F1's strategy group will meet on Wednesday in a bid to solidify plans for the 2017 season to make the sport more entertaining. It has already been suggested that the cars will be quicker, wider and noisier.
"Criticism will be there forever but you just have to make sure it doesn't get out of hand," Button, speaking at the launch of Santander Cycles' Summer of Cycling, said.
"There are a lot of issues that people are talking about right now, but it seems as though the people who can make a difference are listening now and there are lots of possible changes in place for the future and a lot of them sound really exciting.
"Formula One is the pinnacle of motorsport and if a kid is not finding a Formula One car exciting then there is something wrong.
"When I grew up, F1 was just the pinnacle because of the smell, the speed, the personalities, and that always needs to be there. We need to be very careful with the way the sport goes, but the changes that I see happening are positive."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article