Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Formula One/Archive 6

Simple English
I want to create a similar wikiproject on the Simple English wikipedia because I find the number of articles on Formula One insufficient for that wiki. Is there anyone interested joining my mission??? Frizzle 19:00, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

UK drivers and nationality
The story so far.....

It has been agreed for a long time that the nationality used for F1 drivers in Wikipedia articles should match the flag that they raced under. See previous discussion. In most categories that is the nationality of the driver's racing license. However, Article 112 of the FIA International Sporting Regulations states that the nationality of drivers in a world championship (so including F1) is the nationality of their passport.

This is not normally contentious, except in the case of the UK, where it's not uncommon for editors to amend UK/British to Welsh, English, Scottish or Irish. As you can only have a British passport, not a Welsh, Scottish etc one, this does not then match the official results. See previous discussion on this topic. Note, by the way, that where a driver lives is not relevant.

The various UK drivers articles have slightly different ways of approaching this at the moment, although in almost all cases the Union Flag is used in the info box. There are (fairly mild) edit 'conflicts' going on at Tom Pryce and Eddie Irvine at the moment over the use of the Union Flag. It would be useful to have a completely standard approach agreed.

Can I suggest that we standardise on the following approach for UK drivers, which is almost exactly what we already have.
 * Drivers identified by the FIA as British will have the Union Flag used in their infobox and in all race and championship results. This will include English, Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh drivers, but not drivers from the Republic of Ireland.
 * The opening line of the lead for all UK drivers should read: "X is a British (former) Formula One racing driver from (England/Northern Ireland/Scotland/Wales)."

That seems to cover all bases fairly.

Please indicate your support or otherwise below. If we're happy I think I'll add this to the WP:F1 page under something like 'style guide'. Cheers. 4u1e 22:37, 30 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Sounds great to me. Bretonbanquet 22:52, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
 * I second that. -- S kully Collins Edits 09:11, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Thirded. Readro 10:47, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Support--Diniz 13:11, 1 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Supported, but with one condition: that we amend the opening line to "X is a British (former) racing driver from (England/Northern Ireland/Scotland/Wales). He/she drove in Formula One from/during...". Not all that glisters is F1, and most drivers have a considerable career away from the top formula. Pyrope 13:58, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
 * OK - presumably with similar wording added to represent other notable series for someone like Juan Pablo Montoya, who has competed in several notable series? (I've just realised that I should have posted this at WikiProject British Motorsport as well!)
 * Done. 4u1e 17:15, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Support - Obviously discretion should be used whether to use Formula One in the opening sentence. It makes sense for some like Michael Schumacher, but less sense for someone like Allan McNish who's been far more successful at sportscar racing. Alexj2002 01:24, 2 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I didn't take part in any of the earlier discussion, but I don't see the problem here. A British driver is British. Whether he self-identifies as British, English, Cornish or Independent Truronian is irrelevant: Wikipedia records facts, not opinions, and whether a particular driver likes it or not his nationality is British. In any case, why not simply reword to something like this: "Joe Bloggs is a British former racing driver, born in Llandudno, north Wales"? That sticks to facts and avoids the necessity to "sub-divide" Britain. Loganberry (Talk) 03:26, 2 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Good points, I'd go with that argument. However, there are always some nationalists who seem only too keen to add the cross or saltire of their choice to a driver, just take a look at the mess that the BTCC reports are in, a complete shambles. I would also say that EVERY driver should start simply with the occupation of racing driver, and then have this qualified in a second sentence. Ok, so Ayrton Senna was best known as an F1 driver, but he also broke records in pretty much every other class he contested. Too many of the driver bios are already hopelessly skewed towards F1 career information, even where their F1 expoits were far more limited than in other series. Pyrope 08:59, 2 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Like Pyrope, I think the problem is that 'drive by' editors change the nationality to Welsh, Northern Irish etc with middling frequency. To be fair, most of these editors never return, and I've not yet encountered a truly stubborn individual. I'm trying to find a form of words that makes it clear that we're not calling drivers British because we don't know that they're Welsh (etc), and also trying to get a really solid concensus on wording, to reduce the 'drift' in the wording of these articles.
 * Re British - yes you are completely correct, that is why we have standardised on this. My only objection to your suggested wording (using birth place instead of nationality) would be that it clashes with the standard format for birth (and death) details given just after the name i.e Joe Bloggs (born 1 January 1066, Hastings. Died 31 December 1999, The Red Lion, Cambridge).
 * I think Pyrope has a good point regarding 'F1 driver'. I think we can use common sense to decide what goes first, so Ayrton Senna would be 'a Brazilian former racing driver. He drove in Formula One from 1985 to 1994, winning 41 races and three world championships. He also competed in karting and British Formula Three'. F1 goes at the front, because it's the best known. 4u1e 09:08, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Fair point about the format, but that's a fairly minor problem, I think. You could get around it by stretching a point slightly with the standardised format, though. For example: "Joe Bloggs (1 January 1066 - 31 December 1999) was a British racing driver. He was born in Llandudno, north Wales, and died in Wick, Scotland aged 933." Personally I think it's (marginally) preferable on grounds of easy reading to keep the dates and places separate anyway, so long as they're all easy to find, and that's what I do all the time with cricket biographies. Loganberry (Talk) 00:25, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm happy with Loganberry's suggestion, and as no-one else raised an objection, we'll take this as the agreed position. I'll leave it until the 7 December (so the discussion will have been open a week) before adding the following words on the project page:


 * "Drivers from the United Kingdom are listed as British in all driver articles and race and championship results. This reflects the FIA's own rules, which state that competitors in world championships must compete under their passport nationality, while competitors in all other forms of international competition compete under the nationality of the country which issued their racing license. This keeps Wikipedia consistent with official results and avoids the project having to make possibly subjective decisions about whether a driver is English, Northern Irish, Scottish or Welsh.


 * The lead for all British drivers should begin:
 * (Name) ((date of birth) - (date of death) was a British racing driver. He was born in (town, England/Scotland/Wales/Northern Ireland) and died in (location). He competed in Formula One from (year) to (year) and (detail achievements).
 * Details of other racing series entered should also be included, and should be given precedence over achievements in Formula One if appropriate for a given driver."

Thanks to all for your views. 4u1e 17:24, 3 December 2006 (UTC)


 * A result of this is that we still have categories for English/Scottish/Welsh Formula One Drivers etc, which is somewhat at odds with what we've decided here. Any thoughts? Bretonbanquet 22:53, 4 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I've got no personal objection in terms of the article (probably because I don't pay much attention to categories!). You've still got the problem of verifiability, although compared to some of the categories people come up with, they're fairly sensible. 4u1e 00:50, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi all. Can I just disagree with the practice of stating birth and death locations in the text, rather than in brackets next to dates. Dates and places are inextricably linked, and the format (b. 45 Junember 2009, Somewhere) is a far more elegant and succinct form than the rather clumsily discursive "...was born in Somwhere and died in Somewherelse, Somecountry." Personal preference I know, but my pov for what its worth. Pyrope 10:46, 12 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I had a bust-up a while back with User:Attilios over this, when he started going through various random driver articles and creating separate paragraphs for places of birth, creating stylistic howlers and generally making a huge hash of many articles. No-one else seemed to care and I lost my temper with him  :o(  He was adamant that his way was best and I had to take a month-long Wikibreak while I cooled off.


 * I wanted things as you just outlined, even though some of the longer places names can get a bit clumsy, and the simple dates, e.g. (May 2, 1917 - February 23, 1996) looks quite neat, with the places listed afterwards. Personally I don't mind, but as I am currently going through all the driver articles making sure infoboxes / flags / dates / places are more or less complete and standardised, it would be good if we could agree absolutely on how to do it :o) Bretonbanquet 21:06, 12 December 2006 (UTC)


 * The Wikipedia Manual of Style suggests "* Locations should be included in the biography portion of the body article. For example, "(12 February 1809 in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England–19 April 1882 in Downe, Kent, England)" should be separated to "(12 February 1809–19 April 1882) … He was born in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England … He died in Downe, Kent, England":

MOS Dates of birth and death Alexj2002 21:36, 12 December 2006 (UTC)


 * The problem with that is that the vast majority of the driver articles don't have biography sections. Attilios' answer was to shove birthplace details in the career section, which looked absolutely chronic.  Are you saying that birth / death place details should be in the initial paragraph or in some other entirely disconnected section? Bretonbanquet 21:46, 12 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Good comments all. I fully agree that (12 February 1809 in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England–19 April 1882 in Downe, Kent, England) is clumsy, and you lose the pertinent information amidst the repetitive stuff. I would prefer to see "(b. 12 February 1809, Shrewsbury — d. 19 April 1882, Downe) was ... from England." The indication that both Shrewsbury and Downe are in England is implicit in the text and does not need repeating twice in the brackets. So long as the wikilinks are pointing to the correct places then I don't think we need full (Date, Place, County, Country, Nation) format. The exception to this would be where the person concerned had died outside of the country of their birth, e.g. "Carel Godin de Beaufort (b. 10 April 1934, Maarsbergen – d. 2 August 1964, Cologne, Germany) was a motor racing driver from the Netherlands", which is quite common amongst F1 drivers, who had a tendancy to fall off the perch in dramatic fashion. In de Beaufort's case we similarly do not need the Lander and region details, we just need basic information, not an address to send condolence cards to. Just a couple of personal format preference explanations as well: 1) I like using the b. and d. as the black letters help to give structure against the blue wikilinks. 2) Similarly, day-month-year sequencing helps to separate the numeral portions. If you then want to expand on the details of birth and death locations in the text then great: for instance, how come de Beaufort died in Cologne? I also disagree with the manual of style here as well: surely dates and places of birth and death are reference information and should be easily accessible, not buried in the text? Pyrope 08:55, 13 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Good point about the lack of biography sections. Remember with regard to the MOS "different Wikipedia articles are written with different audiences in mind, and editors are free to adapt their style accordingly." Alexj2002 09:41, 13 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Fully agree with most of that. One thing I'm less keen on are the 'b' and 'd' in the dates - I just think they're superfluous, and the day-month-year thing - no problem as such, but I think the number of articles set out like that number about 3, so what about the 800-odd articles set out as month-day-year?  :oO  Can't we just pick a system and stick to it, then we can concentrate on stuff that's more important? Bretonbanquet 18:58, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Time for a new face to Wikiproject: Formula One?
I was thinking that our current WP:F1 page looks a bit cluttered so I'm going to propose changing it. I've come up with a draft design which I think is an improvement - this can be viewed on my sandbox. Main changes are that the layout has been columnised for easier reading, contributors/participants list and featured content list have been moved to subpages (not yet created) and summaries with links to them take their place and more prominence is given to the Article Improvement Drive. I'd like to know what you guys think of it. Alexj2002 22:06, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Good idea Alex and great design! (ever considered it as a profession? :-P). If you want, I'll make a members list page with a proper table.-- S kully Collins Edits 22:17, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Well the design has been pinched from the Rugby Union Wikiproject, so I can't take any credit for that. If the design gets approved then yeah, a members list page with table would be handy. I'd think the Featured content style used in WikiProject Football (WP:WPF) could used be used for the featured content subpage. The subpage could then be linked to from the Improvement drive page as well so it's all in one place (less chance of it getting out of date). Alexj2002 22:56, 7 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Should we have a separate page for the style guide as well? (Sort of like this). We've more or less established a standard for how an F1 page should look through the Featured and Good articles, which are fairly consistent. We could also put the recently agreed words on UK stuff there as well. 4u1e 22:59, 7 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I think it looks nice - great effort, even if it was "borrowed" :o) I'd also agree on the style guide page, it would be nice to be able to refer people to it when they get irate over their edits being reverted :oD Bretonbanquet 23:04, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I'd agree with putting it on a subpage 4u1e, the less clutter on the main page and the easier it is to find stuff the better in my opinion. Perhaps we could standarise some subpages names for tidyness - e.g. at the moment we have Portal:Formula_One/Did_you_know_(management) & Portal talk:Formula One/Management of selected articles - should they both go to Portal:Formula One/page or Portal talk:Formula One/page? I prefer the former but it could be argued that the article improvement drive should come under WP:F1 and not the portal. Alexj2002 19:10, 8 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Yeah - I was kind of making things up as I went along when I did those (like I've stopped now....). Umm, let's think - Article improvement should be a WP:F1 thing, I only made it as sub-page of the portal because that's where I was editing from, I think.


 * Did you know is a portal thing, and yes it should probably remain a subpage of the portal.


 * (The article improvement drive could do with a bit of a re-think, by the way, I'm not really paying it enough attention to keep it running properly (Not that it's my 'baby' - it's for anyone who's interested to use). We should probably review the wording and our intentions for it. While we've had some good results (Damon Hill, Gilles Villeneuve and Monaco Grand Prix) progress is patchy. I also sense a lack of coincidence between what gets voted for there and what people are really interested in working on! Including me!) 4u1e 11:32, 13 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Part of the problem with the improvement drive is people's lack of awareness. The other is I think people vote for what they think should be improved rather than what they want to improve. The first would be addressed by the new WP:F1 page (it's right at the top!). The second, well I suppose it could be explained slightly better what it's about and people voting for stuff they want to work on!. Right, we need to decide if the style guide stuff is going on it's own subpage or not then I think we can start creating the subpages (Skully said he'd be willing to do the members, and I've started on the FA page) before implementing the new design. Alexj2002 16:54, 13 December 2006 (UTC)


 * The majority of the WikiProject Formula One/Featured material page has been finished. I think I got all the FA and GA's - Please add anything that's had a PR, Failed GA/FA or current GA/GA. Alexj2002 09:18, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Carlo Mario Abate
The article on Carlo Mario Abate states that he failed to qualify for 2 or 3 Grands Prix in 1962-63, and as far as I can find out, he never even made it as far as the Qualifying sessions in any of them, withdrawing before the meeting started. He has a F1 infobox as well. Are we going to include drivers who entered World Championship races but didn't actually turn a wheel in any of them? There are quite a few, and I could easily add them to the various lists etc, but we might be struggling for notability in some cases.

Abate raced and finished well in a few F1 races, but none of them of World Championship status, so these details can go in the article, but does he merit an infobox and inclusion on the list of F1 drivers? Bretonbanquet 17:27, 9 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Good point. He doesn't really warrant that status. Adrian M. H. 17:29, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
 * In the list of Formula One drivers I intentionally included anyone and everyone who put themselves on the entry list for a GP. This was just for completeness and simplicity since almost every website uses different criteria for identifying F1 drivers (started a race, qualified, attempted to qualify, pre-qualified, drove in Friday practice...). All the drivers who never started a race have a note [2] in the races column of their table, if you think they should be removed I'd prefer they weren't but if you do, please just use a specific criterion for it (as this is one of the requirements to keep it as a featured list). – AlbinoMonkey (Talk) 23:25, 9 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm happy to have him on the list along with all the other guys who entered a World Championship GP but didn't turn up or actually get out on to the track, it's just that there are many others who did that and aren't listed, like Piero Monteverdi, Menato Boffa, Rob Slotemaker, Gary Hocking, Syd van der Vyver, Ernie de Vos, Giancarlo Gagliardi etc etc. Either we include them all, and there are around 30, I think - or leave them off the list.  I'm happy to add them, but other people may not be. What do you think? Bretonbanquet 00:33, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Any comments on this - it's a bit unresolved, this one. Bretonbanquet 18:22, 16 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I must've missed your reply when I checked this. I didn't realise there are so many not listed - I tried to use as many different sources as I could when making the list but evidently they were not complete. Could you give me some kind of idea how many drivers fit the description and are not listed? Again I'd prefer to add them rather than removing others, as it seems to me to be the most clear-cut method of classifying someone into or out of the list. – AlbinoMonkey (Talk) 23:39, 19 December 2006 (UTC)


 * OK, I have a list of names plus the races they entered. Most were either withdrawn before the meeting started, or turned up and did not practice for whatever reason.  But they were all on entry lists.  I guess they don't feature in many sources simply because their involvement was so minimal.  They vary from guys like Geoff Duke who were very successful in other fields, to people like Ray Reed, who is incredibly difficult to find out information about.  I have 36 guys on the list, most with dates of birth / death etc as well as their entry details / car details etc.  I'm not sure all will merit an article of their own, but maybe they could still be listed?  If you want the full list, I could post it here, or on my user page, on the main list talk page, or wherever you think is best. Bretonbanquet 23:03, 21 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Sounds like a list page with redirect pages for each driver to me. Pyrope 12:50, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Need for a WikiProject: Motorsport?
Do we need a WikiProject Motorsport for collaboration on topics that affect all motorsport articles? I came across WikiProject_Rugby - the purpose of which is to "maintain its children Wikiprojects: Rugby league and Rugby union as well as recognising, organising and improving the common areas between the codes." Now we have a lot more Motorsport WikiProjects covered than two and I sometimes think stuff such as the UK country discussion on the F1 Wikiproject applies across several others. I'm posting this on the F1, WRC, NASCAR American Open Wheel Racing, A1GP and IROC to get people's opinions. Your comments are welcome! Alexj2002 21:06, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I'd vote a yes. I think we need to have a global style for motorsport articles. Currently they all have different ways of doing things. There's also a question of notability. We need to discuss what is notable involving motorsport, as we can't list every Formula Ford driver in the world. Also, should motorcycle racing be included in the project? Readro 22:54, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm in too. I'm already a member of several relevant WikiProjects - F1, A1GP, British Motorsport and MotoGP (which I think should be included due to common interest in circuit articles for example) and I agree that there is a lot of overlap between all of these and an umbrella project would be helpful in co-ordinating style and approach, especially where drivers are in more than one series in their careers.  Justin Wilson is a good current example - he gets infoboxes for both Champ Car and F1 and they don't really sit well on top of each other.--Jsydave 11:04, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
 * WikiProject Sports Car Racing was just launched yesterday, so it too would be another branch under the umbrella of WikiProject Motorsport. I'll post the information on WP:SCR too. The359 23:00, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

WIP now viewable at WP:MOTOR - please help develop it. Alexj2002 13:44, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Definitely needed. 4u1e 20:18, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

List of Formula One fatal accidents
I've managed to get a respectable (and believable) amount of drivers for this list. Can you guys show your support for this list of Fallen Heroes?-- S kully Collins Edits 12:36, 18 December 2006 (UTC)


 * It's a necessary article, I think. That's all the drivers though, isn't it? I can't think of any others. Thumbs up. Bretonbanquet 22:35, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Nationality Vandal
I've got a nationality vandal at Brian Naylor among other places, who is deleting the word "British" that we all agreed on in the style guide we recently tried to sort out. I'm running up against the 3 revert rule, so is there anyone who wants to help? Bretonbanquet 21:01, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

You are adding British to the first sentence of English drivers, but not Scottish - WHY? If you had edited Scottish article accordingly, I wouldn't have reverted your needless edits (you are just duplicating the information in the infobox)

172.141.31.107 21:06, 18 December 2006 (UTC)


 * You missed David Coulthard then... I haven't been through all the drivers yet anyway, so some may not yet be edited according to the style guide wording that people on here set out. That was the concensus here, so we will stick to it.  Any further discussion must be here or on talk pages, or people will take you for a vandal. Will you be going through all the Italian / French / German driver articles removing "needless" information?  Didn't think so.  Bretonbanquet 21:09, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

I missed what exactly? You changed the information in the infobox, but didn't add "is a British" to the first sentence and you left the Scottish description in place - 4u1e changed the description to British. All the articles for German/French drivers just say "is a driver from Germany/France" and there isn't the English/Scottish/Welsh/N Irish VS British debate going on with those anyway - so I don't get your point on that.

172.141.31.107 21:19, 18 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Show me one I missed between A and N and I'll change it now. The only Scottish driver I missed on purpose was Jim Clark because there are dedicated editors on there and I don't touch that article as a rule.  Should still say British though, and it probably will when someone gets round to it. Bretonbanquet 21:11, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't have time at the minute, but I will look through the entries tomorrow and will post them. I seem to remember seeing a couple that hadn't been changed.

172.141.31.107 21:21, 18 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I remember the Coulthard article now - I noticed the flag had been changed so I changed it back. I didn't notice that it didn't say "British" till 4u1e came and edited straight after me.  You'll have to take my word for that. I just looked and spotted a couple of Scottish drivers which I missed to be fair, point taken.  Rest assured there was nothing anti-English about it. There are certainly some English ones I've missed too.  Articles which don't have that style of opening paragraph I have left alone since I am concentrating on articles with little or no information at the moment, mainly 50s and 60s drivers.
 * The England/Scotland/Wales/NI debate is a pain, and shouldn't be a part of these articles at all. We should only be dealing with nationality. The inclusion of "from England", "from Wales" etc is a concession to people who keep harping on about it. When we put "from the UK" and took off England/Scotland etc people went nuts, so we agreed on the wording together, to include both "British" and England / Scotland etc.  It is a bit clumsy, but it's the agreed wording. Bretonbanquet 21:27, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Bretonbanquet is quite right: if your opinion differs from the status quo that has been established among WP:F1 members, then please outline your reasoning on this talk page so that we can all discuss it, rather than editing articles without even an explanation. Remaining anonymous is doing your cause no favours either. Consistency among specific types of article - drivers, teams, and so on - is an important consideration and is integral to any Wikiproject, so it is important to settle on a method that makes sense and works, which is what we did. Adrian M. H. 21:32, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Formula One a Featured Topic?
After looking through this Featured Topic thing, I can see that we have a rather decent amount of Featured stuff on Formula One. Of course the most important article is an FA, that is the main article along with 2 bios at FA status, 2 famous GPs at FA status and a noteworthy team at FA status.

These articles are also backed up with GAs, with two very famous drivers reaching GA status...oh and Mark Webber as well :-P, a noteworthy car; a Famous Grand Prix and contructor are also at GA status

Of course, it makes even more statisfying reading when we go through the lists, 3 FLs, including a list of all participants in this sport, I believe no other project has done so, and a list of all previous champions for both drivers and teams and a list of fatal accidents could be the fourth FL for the project. Oh and we also have a FP...

But I don't really think that's enough for F1 to be considered a FT on Wikipedia. Because I still have a few things I want to improve:
 * The core articles, History; Regulations, car, Racing and Future.
 * Important bios, namely Michael Schumacher, Ayrton Senna and Juan Manuel Fangio, I chose these three because I think they'll be the most viewed bios on F1.
 * Seasons, no F1 season has yet reached an FA...let's do something about this ;-).
 * Grand Prix, just a few other important ones I guess, namely Adelaide '94, Jerez '97, Spa '98, Austria '02, Siverstone '03
 * Lists, finially. I wouldn't mind having the list of teams at FL as well as the list of records and circuits.

Anyway, those are my suggestions... -- S kully Collins Edits 07:52, 20 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Formula One sure has potential to reach FT. We just have to direct our efforts to the same articles, everybody working together is easier.--Serte [ Talk · Contrib ] 11:32, 20 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I would certainly like to see the Technical Regs article overhauled and expanded considerably - four brief paragraphs on chassis regs is barely scratching the surface. If I get the time over the next few days, I might start improving it. If anyone else has strong knowledge in this area, you're welcome to add a comment here or on my talk page and maybe we can collaborate on it. Adrian M. H. 14:07, 20 December 2006 (UTC)


 * The full text can be found here if anyone would like some light reading! --Jsydave 14:14, 20 December 2006 (UTC)


 * That'll be my primary reference source then! Adrian M. H. 14:17, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Updating Race Reports
Is anybody going to update race results from the 1990's as all it features is the race results itself. I have put in reports for the first few races of 1994 using my own info. You can get info of Formula One related websites to be used for Qualifying results, practice results etc... You can also edit race reports of other websites, so the page just doesn't have the results and that's it. Can you please try and update these as soon as possible.

Here are a few web-links that have have very detailed, specific information:
 * Stats F1:- Provides detailed race results, profiles, lap charts, qualifying results, engine details, pictures etc...
 * Grand Prix:- Very good website to get results, profiles and reports.

I suggest you use these as many driver profiles and races need to be updated (e.g. Taki Inoue, 1995 Pacific Grand Prix are prime examples- they are very spacious and need lots more information.

If you come accross a profile that should have info, go onto these websites and try and get a bit of information. Although it is mainly old races, they are still useful.

Look at the 1994 Brazilian Grand Prix, 1994 Pacific Grand Prix and 1994 Monaco Grand Prix at how to set it out.

It would be helpful. If you have updated any files add the file name underneath. Many thanks. Davnel03 16:15, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, there is of course 1994 San Marino Grand Prix, a featured article. 82.152.209.189 00:18, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Formula One driver criteria
Following on from the discussion above, I'd like to discuss an 'eligibility' requirement for classifying someone as a "Formula One driver" (and as a result whether they appear on List of Formula One drivers or not. At the moment the page was designed to list anyone on a GP entry list, although as Bretonbanquet pointed out to me, there are many missing. However, the page also excludes modern drivers such as Sebastian Vettel who have done the "Friday testing" role (which means they are on the entry list), because they have no intention of entering the race. I'm not that well-versed in F1 history, but I assume this may also be the case of a few part-timers back in the old days - entering a GP just to get some practice miles up with no hope or intention of actually racing... So, I'd like to suggest a new criteria for the list - any driver who has attempted to qualify (or pre-qualify) for an F1 World Championship Grand Prix. This means we keep minor drivers who were definitely intending to at least attempt to race, whilst getting rid of people like Karl Oppitzhauser - who attempted to enter the 76 Austrian GP but was refused. I'd also suggest that we include these names on the page somewhere, but not on the main list. Thoughts? – AlbinoMonkey (Talk) 11:11, 26 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I would like to see a list (at least) of everyone who was on an entry list, even those who were just mucking about - like Bernie Ecclestone for instance... But while I think that a list would suffice for some of these guys as opposed to individual articles, we would have to use some kind of POV in some cases when deciding who was serious and who wasn't. Difficult one, that, but as you say, Oppitzhauser for example was at best incredibly optimistic and probably ranks among the most marginal "F1 drivers". I think some kind of list of Friday testers is in order too. Enyclopediacally, they all need to be at least mentioned.  Bretonbanquet 11:32, 26 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree that they should all be mentioned and that the list somewhat compensates for not having an individual article (I believe Juan Jover's page was deleted a couple of times for non-notability even though he actually qualified)... I was just wondering if bona-fide F1 drivers 'deserved' to be on a separate list on that page - having Neel Jani (19 GPs) and Luigi Fagioli (7) in the same list with the same number of GPs to their names gives the wrong impression in my opinion. I'm fine with either way though. – AlbinoMonkey (Talk) 11:57, 26 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree with that last point - the Friday testers shouldn't be on the same list as any other F1 drivers, since they never even threatened to start F1 Grand prix - people like Matteo Bobbi, Ryan Briscoe, Bas Leinders etc. A separate list somewhere, perhaps.  We have the proper main list article, which could be for all qualifiers and genuine attempts to qualify (which it basically is already), then maybe we could have another list for entrants who failed to turn up / non-serious attempts / withdrawals etc, i.e. the Carlo Mario Abates of this world, plus another for Friday testers. Any other thoughts? Bretonbanquet 00:40, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

How about something like this - names all in the same table, but made a bit more obvious that they never started? (ps I don't know if the numbers I put in for starts are correct, just some I quickly sourced to demonstrate)

Maybe something for the Indy-only drivers as well? – AlbinoMonkey (Talk) 11:59, 6 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I quite like that :o) If we use pink for the guys who DNQ'd, maybe the likes of Abate could be a different colour?  Any other comments?  Bretonbanquet 15:08, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, I like that. Logical, clear and readable, neatly arranged. Out of interest, why would Carlo Mario Abate need a different colour? Adrian M. H. 18:46, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, because he never even turned up for the races he was entered in. I just think it might be worth differentiating between drivers like him (most of whom aren't listed yet) and the guys who actually attempted to qualify. Bretonbanquet 19:16, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Ha ha, I see! I gave his article the briefest of skims, but didn't pick up on that fact. I don't know if that warrants a different colour... Maybe an asterisk with a note would be better, given the relative rarity of that particular scenario. It would explain it neatly. Adrian M. H. 19:26, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure that point is in his article, which explains why you didn't spot it :D This is a discussion we were having above here somewhere, as to whether he and his ilk need inclusion on the main list or not. There are over 30 entrants who didn't turn up for whatever reason, and we were wondering if they count as "F1 drivers" or not.  I think they should be included, but with a clear note, like you say, or something to set them aside in some way as fringe characters. Bretonbanquet 19:49, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's an interesting point. I'm not sure whether they should be included, given that they didn't attempt to qualify. Certainly, they'd need a caveat to mark them out. I would prefer not to include them, as presences are much more important than merely intending - or expressing an intention - to enter. I think that to include them would require a separate table, using the same or a similar layout, that describes something like "drivers who entered, but did not participate, in Grands Prix" Adrian M. H. 20:27, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Constructors who only participated in the Indy 500 races 1950-1960
I disagree with constructors who only participated in the Indy 500 races between 1950 and 1960 (e.g. Christensen, Wetteroth, etc) being included in the "Formula One constructors" category. These cars which contested these races were not Formula One cars. I propose that such constructors should be removed from the "Formula One constructors" category, and the List of Formula One constructors article. If concensus is that these constructors need to be included in some category, then I propose they be included in a (new) "Indycar constructors" category (although I acknowledge that's a somewhat nebulous term). DH85868993 16:56, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I know they weren't built as F1 cars, but did they meet the criteria, which weren't very detailed at that point? I've never been quite clear whether Indy was just a round of the world championship (the rest of which was run to F1 regulations) or whether the F1 regulations of the time were vague enough that an Indycar (wrong term, I know) counted anyway? Didn't an American driver run a sprint car at one of the early USGP for example? 4u1e 18:22, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
 * On that topic (but off F1) shouldn't there be an 'Indy' (USAC? US Open wheel?) constructors category? Some of the organisations we're interested in here would also appear in it. 4u1e 08:15, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I think there should. The tricky part (as you have hinted) is what to call it. I'd like to get it "right first time". DH85868993 09:06, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * The relevant Wikiproject is called American Open Wheel Racing. 'American Open Wheel Racing constructors'? The major problem with that is that since the early 1980s (ish) the vast majority of the constructors have not been American, which will be slightly counter-intuitive! 'Constructors for American Open Wheel Racing series'? Bit cumbersome, but more accurate. Anyway, probably one to take to that Project, I'll post over there. 4u1e 12:19, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * From 1954 onwards, I'm pretty confident that the cars running at Indy didn't meet F1 criteria (F1 specified a maximum engine size of 2.5 litres; the Indy cars were using 4.2 litre Offys). From 1950-1953 though, I'm not 100% sure. In terms of engine capacity, the Indy cars were OK (i.e. 4.2 litres < max F1 engine capacity of 4.5 litres) but I'm not sure if they satisfied all the F1 tech regs. I'll pose the question to my friends at AtlasF1's Nostalgia Forum, to see if we can get a definitive answer. For what it's worth, my understanding/belief is that when the CSI first created the World Championship for Drivers (note: no mention of "Formula One" in the title), they intended it to be a series of Formula One races, but to justify its description as a World Championship, they thought they had better include a race in America, and since there was no Formula One race in America, they picked the race in America that was closest to an F1 race, which was the Indy 500.

Distinction between Formula One constructors and teams
Although today the terms "team" and constructor" are synonymous within the context of Formula One, it wasn't always the case. There are several Formula One teams which never constructed a Formula One car, but which are included in the "Formula One constructors" category, e.g. Scuderia Centro Sud (which is correctly identified within the List of Formula One constructors article as a team rather a constructor). I propose the creation of a new Category: "Formula One teams" and that (a) teams which are/were not constructors (e.g. Scuderia Centro Sud) should be removed from the Constructors category and included in the Teams category instead; (b) teams which are/were also constructors (e.g. McLaren) should be included in both categories; and (c) constructors which never ran a works team (e.g. Veritas?) should only be included in the Constructors category. Thoughts? DH85868993 16:57, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
 * The point against this is that it adds complexity (more than many reference works on F1 include). It is also irrelevant for the period 1983 - 2007. However, I would tend to support it on the grounds of accuracy and that it's about to become relevant again, if as I assume, the rules for 2008 onwards differentiate again between a team and a constructor. 4u1e 18:25, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Following discussions with Pyrope and 4u1e, here's what I propose: DH85868993 03:20, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
 * creation of a new category: [Category:Formula One entrants]
 * all F1 entrants (including constructors who were also entrants, e.g. McLaren) to be included in [Category:Formula One entrants]
 * entrants who were not constructors (e.g. Scuderia Italia) to be removed from [Category:Formula One constructors]
 * columns in results/championship tables currently labelled "Team" to be changed to either "Entrant" or "Constructor" as appropriate
 * As you'll gather, I agree with this approach, having raised it before. Not important for the the current stuff, although I withdraw my comment that it's irrelevant for 1983 - 2007, as the difference is relevant for Scuderia Italia/Dallara and Larrousse/Lola in the late 80s and early 90s. Larrousse had their points from 1990 deleted because of a mixup over the difference between constructor and entrant. The topic gets more relevant the further back into the historical stuff you go, and will presumably become relevant again from '08 when teams will be able to buy chassis again.
 * Regarding the labelling of results, this can only be 'constructor', not 'entrant', as it is the constructors championship, not the team's championship. A further complication is that the constructor actually consists (or used to at any rate) of the chassis manufacturer and the engine manufacturer. See 1964 Formula One season for example - there are seperate entries (correctly!) for Brabham-Climax, Brabham-BRM and Brabham-Ford. This difference is still made for 2008 (see 2008 Sporting regulations articles 18-23), although it also now says that "points scored with an engine of different make to that which was first entered in the Championship (...) will not count towards (nor be aggregated for) the FIA Formula One Constructors Championship." (article 43). 4u1e 08:10, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Yeah, sorry, I wasn't especially clear on that last point. What I meant was if you have a table column containing entries such as "McLaren-Mercedes", "Jordan-Yamaha", "Brabham-Ford", etc (e.g. such as you would find in a Constructors Championship table) then the column should be labelled "Constructor". If, on the other hand, the column contains entries such as "TAG Williams Team", "Gold Leaf Team Lotus" and "Scuderia Italia", then the column should be labelled "Entrant". - DH85868993 10:22, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

1950-1960 Indy 500
For the 1950-1960 seasons, I propose the addition of a note to the "19xx Formula One season" page indicating that although it counted towards the championship, the Indy 500 was not a Formula One race/run to Formula One regulations. Any objections? DH85868993 17:17, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Subject to my point above - did 'Indy' cars of the period meet F1 regs? (which may have been as simple as a weight limit and a engine capacity limit) 4u1e 18:27, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Jean-Denis Délétraz
Article number two in the series of "F1 minnows who would not likely otherwise get their page updated" is Jean-Denis Délétraz. I'm working on the content but it looks lacking without an image. Does anyone have anything on him we could use? Readro 22:27, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia Day Awards
Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 19:28, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Category:Formula One cars
Most of the articles about individual Formula One cars are tagged with "Category:Formula One Cars". But the Arrows, Benetton, Ferrari, Jaguar and Minardi F1 car articles are tagged with an appropriate subcategory (e.g. "Category:Ferrari Formula One Cars") instead. It seems sensible to me to either do it one way or the other, but not a mixture of both. My initial thought was that all the F1 car articles should be classified into subcategories of "Category:Formula One Cars" rather than into "Category:Formula One Cars" itself. But then I wondered if we really want lots of little subcategories containing maybe one or two articles. The existing 5 subcategories are just collections of articles about individual cars; there aren't any "common" or "related" articles. So perhaps it would be better to just do away with the subcategories and just tag all the F1 car articles with "Category:Formula One Cars". [Note also that the existence of the subcategories also raises questions like "Should the Arrows subcategory include articles on Footwork cars?", etc.] Or maybe we should have subcategories for constructors with many articles (Ferrari, McLaren, Lotus, etc) and not have subcategories for those constructors with only one or two articles. Thoughts? (Noting that the WP:F1 page doesn't provide guidance on the use of "Category:Formula One Cars"). DH85868993 17:51, 30 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm inclined to agree with you. This problem is quite common among parent and sibling categories and in this case, it would be fixed quite easily by keeping all but the most significant and numerous cars in one parent category. Sub-categories should be restricted to, say, McLaren, Ferrari, Lotus, Williams, probably Tyrrell, and maybe Benetton (though that might open the door to Renaults and Tolemans?) Something along those lines anyway, based on significant participation and significant success. Adrian M. H. 22:30, 30 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I find it hard to get too excited about categories, but Adrian's probably got the right solution for now. I'm not sure I agree with the reasoning, though - I believe that the criteria for needing a sub-category is really only how much stuff goes in it, not how important it is. If someone wants to create separate articles for all 20-odd Arrows/Footwork models then they probably do need a category of their own just to make the overall category summary page manageable. I would also suggest that for lesser teams with shorter histories it might be more suitable to create a summary page covering multiple models (see Ferrari 312 for example). It's hard to think of much to say about some models, and in this way you can create a single article with some interest, rather than a series of short and perhaps rather repetitive ones. I'll probably take this approach for the Fittipaldi Automotive cars when I get round to it. 4u1e 18:36, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

template:F1
I think a more intuitive/descriptive name for this template would be "template:F1 season". I realise the template has already been used about 100 times, but if people think it's a worthwhile change I think it shouldn't be too hard for someone to create a bot to convert the existing uses. DH85868993 11:23, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I disagree, having a very short title is much more helpful. This template is often used many times per article, so there's a lot to be said for keeping its name short, to save on typing effort. I say this as a Repetitive strain injury sufferer. Spute 20:17, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Car numbers pre 1974
As many people will know, prior to 1974, car numbers varied from race to race, so the contents of the "Number" column in the "Drivers Championship final standings" table in the "19xx Formula One season" article are essentially meaningless. (Except for the drivers who drove at Indy - since they only drove in one race for the whole season, it's valid to list a single race number against their name). Two questions: DH85868993 01:24, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Is this worth worrying about, or should we just wait until the tables are updated to the "new format" (as in 1950 Formula One season) which doesn't include a "Number" column?
 * If we think this issue is worth addressing now, should we leave the numbers for the Indy drivers, or just remove the column altogether?
 * I missed this question (presumably due to a more recent change by the time I read my watchlist). I'm not sure what stage we're at with updating the table styles, but I would suggest waiting for that process to take its course. Kills two birds with one stone, as the saying goes. Adrian M. H. 14:39, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Formula One vs. Formula 1
Well, it really gets on my nerves when someone uses the "1" instead of writing it out, because I think the latter looks a whole lot neater. Anyway, which should be used? The number (1)? Or the word (One)? -- S kully Collins Edits 08:23, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
 * We went over this one sometime early last year (See here). I've gained a little more knowledge on the topic since, so I'll recap:
 * 'Formula One' was orginally written as 'Formula 1'. Sometime in the 1970s it started to be written as 'Formula One' (I've have heard, but don't know if it is true, that the change was led by FOCA, formerly known as F1CA, which looked like fica (warning - vulgar!), which is not terribly polite in Italian).
 * The two are now used interchangeably, but the FIA seems to currently have a strong preference for 'Formula One', judging by what they use on their website and in the regulations, although they are not totally consistent. The official F1 website is www.formula1.com, however, although I suppose that may have been down to availability of domain names as much as anything.
 * I imagine that the two have always been interchangeable, but the 'dominant' form has shifted from 'Formula 1' to 'Formula One'.
 * I don't think we can really say one form is wrong, I strongly prefer 'Formula One' as current usage, but I think it's just one of those things where we will have to agree that usage will differ, although we should be consistent in any one article. 4u1e 10:13, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
 * P.S. Yet another thing we need to put in the 'style guide'! 4u1e 10:13, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Articles on testing
Some other users have started a page on 2007 Formula One season Testing. The page is in need of some rethinking and clean-up. I have made some suggestions on the talk page. But my reason for raising it here, is to ask articles on testing sessions are encyclopaedic? Should there be discrete articles on testing for each season or perhaps just a paragraph on the pre-season testing in the main season article? Cheers. --Journeyman 00:32, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I would suggest it's not needed as a separate article, as it is not a world championship event. If all it's going to be is a list of results then there are already places to find that information out on the internet. I think it should be deleted and a summary of testing, (a couple of sentences) added to the 2007 Formula One Season article. Alexj2002 11:28, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree with Alex's comment. It does not warrant its own article, the data itself has fairly limited worth anyway (we all know how misleading test results can be - Honda RA106 anyone?) and the useful/interesting/valuable parts can readily be incorporated into the season articles, as Alex suggested. Adrian M. H. 15:01, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Pyrope 15:34, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I have proposed it for deletion. --Journeyman 00:45, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Article ratings
It was suggested a long time ago that we should get in line with other Wikiprojects and include article ratings for F1 articles. We've never gotten round to it, but WP:MOTOR's implementation of the system (see here) reminded me. Does anyone agree that this would be useful when we start the article improvement drive up again - we could choose to focus on articles rated as high importance and low quality, for example. I think the change just consists of adding the appropriate code to the project banner and some effort in rating the articles and it seems to be possible (in some way, see WP:NASCAR) to auto-generate a list of articles at each level, which would possibly make some of the stuff Alex has put in his proposed new WP:F1 front page a bit easier to manage.

If we agree that this should be done, I will (hopefully!) cut and paste the relevant bits from the WP:MOTOR template. We can discuss how to rank levels of importance later. 4u1e 18:38, 10 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Agreed - great idea --Jsydave 15:38, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
 * OK - I've started by modifying the project box, somwhat tentatively. I'll need to look into how the NASCAR project collate the results and decide where to duplicate that - another modification for Alex's proposed revamp for the main page above? 4u1e 12:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Template:F1 car
Hi all. New template knocked together for car articles. Very much along the lines of the pre-existing cut-and-paste jobs that have been used for some articles, but tidied a touch. Pro-forma on the project page and the template talk page. Please keep an eye out for unboxed articles and articles not using the correct format (e.g. most Lotus cars seem to have gained the "Team" template). Comments would be great... Pyrope 19:15, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
 * That's good. I've got a few that I need to change. Adrian M. H. 19:23, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
 * We've also got template:Racing car though. Maybe I should be better at publicising these?! :D On this occasion I would argue for using the racing car version, because it should also be relevant to sports cars etc. The info should really be the same for any racing chassis. 4u1e 08:02, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, didn't see the previous template and it never appeared in searches. I'll combine elements of the two under the template:Racing car (with some comments from the talk page) and then adjust the project page. Hold off using either for now... Pyrope 09:11, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

As you can see from the red link above, Template:F1 car is now dead. Long live Template:Racing car... Pyrope 11:14, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Dumb question time. When populating template:Racing car, if two examples of a particular car are entered in each race of a 16-race season, do we set Races=16 or Races = 32? DH85868993 13:29, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Not a dumb question, just hard to answer. I've been using the number of races in which a car of that type was entered (your former example), not the total number of chassis which entered races (your second example). Either is quite logical, anyone got a view on what's 'normal' in high quality sources? 4u1e 14:09, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
 * "Grand Prix Racing - the whole story" (www.gpracing.net192.com) lists both - see sample for McLaren. If we're only going to have one number though, I think number of distinct races (i.e. Races=16) would be better (a) for consistency with Driver and Constructor/Team infoboxes and (b) intuitively. Consider the McLaren MP4/4: "Races=16, Wins=15, Poles=15" gives a more accurate impression of what happened in 1988 than "Races=32, Wins=15, Poles=15". DH85868993 15:19, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I would only use the double figure when it is distinctly advantageous and clear to understand. Such as when referring to starts, as opposed to races, in the context of analysing results. ie: "from 34 starts, it had 4 engine failures, 3 suspension failures and 2 collisions." The single figure makes more sense in infoboxes and avoids confusion when dealing with single car entries in the days before two-car teams were made mandatory. -  Adrian M. H. 17:19, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Time for another archive?
I think this page needs to be archived again. I don't mind doing it, but is there any special technique? Or do you create a new page, move all the non-active content from this page there and then remove it from here? DH85868993 06:17, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * There's still a lot of room on the page 5 that I made recently. I was holding off moving more topics, as many of the older ones were still active to some degree. Adrian M. H. 12:25, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Damn, I just did it. Feel free to revert this page and blank Archive_6 if you like. DH85868993 12:43, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Or move stuff from Archive_6 to Archive_5. DH85868993 12:49, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I'll just move it over, since page 6 will be needed soon anyway! Adrian M. H. 17:07, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * All done. Page 5 is now pretty much full. Someone may like to re-arrange the content in date order if that is advantageous. Adrian M. H. 17:11, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Chassis links from tables
There are several kinds of tables which link to chassis:

Entry lists (here's an extract from the entry list for the 1950 British Grand Prix):

Note: In the "Chassis" column:
 * "Alfa Romeo 158" is linked to Alfa Romeo (presumably because there's no specific article for the 158)
 * "Maserati 4CLT-48" is linked to Maserati (presumably because there's no specific article for the 4CLT-48)''

Driver career summary tables (here's an extract from the wonderful John Surtees table):

''Note:
 * "Lola Mk4" is linked to Lola Mk4
 * "Cooper T53" is linked to Cooper Car Company (presumably because there's no specific article for "Cooper T53" and/or because the Cooper Car Company article is the one which best covers the T53 (it contains a photo of a T53))''

and Constructor career summary tables (here's an extract the Jordan Grand Prix table):

''Note:
 * There is an article for the Jordan 196, so that link is blue
 * There is no article for the Jordan 195, so that link is red''

I'd like to propose a slightly modified solution for discussion. My idea is to leave the Constructor career summary tables as they are, but in the Entry Lists and Driver career summary tables, to link the "constructor" part of the "Chassis" to the relevant constructor article, and link the "chassis designation" part to an article covering that particular chassis type (note that the article may or may not be dedicated to that individual type). So, the tables above would become:

''Note: In the "Chassis" column:
 * "Alfa Romeo" links to Alfa Romeo; "158" links to Alfa Romeo 158
 * "Maserati" links to Maserati; "4CLT-48" links to Maserati 4CLT-48

''Note:
 * "Cooper" is linked to Cooper Car Company and "T53" is linked to Cooper T53
 * "Lola" is linked to Lola Racing Cars and "Mk4" is linked to Lola Mk4''

The advantages (as I see it) are that: Note that, at the current time, there are only a handful of Entry Lists and Driver career summary tables containing Chassis details. So if people like my idea, it wouldn't require much rework. Thoughts? DH85868993 05:58, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * the "Chassis" column now provides links to both the constructor and the type.
 * we can possibly remove the "Constructor" column from the Entry List tables.
 * Yes, I like it. One vote in favour. Adrian M. H. 12:29, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I like it too - nice work. Bretonbanquet 17:18, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * And I was just going to create the Jordan 195 article! ;-) Support.--Diniz 17:19, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Yep, why not. Gets round the problem I had constructing the Surtees-type table in not having too much red on screen at one time. Pyrope 01:13, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Constructor career summary tables
In the career summary tables for constructors, should the values in the "Chassis" column include the constructor name? Or is it redundant? Currently, the constructor articles are inconsistent on this point, for example Jordan Grand Prix and Toyota F1 include the constructor name, whereas Sauber and McLaren do not.

BTW, this question really belongs as part of the Race and Career Result Charts discussion, but that's been archived, which I presume means we can't update it any more(?) Should we "unarchive" that discussion, or (radical idea) should we create a "Sample Tables" project page, and relocate that discussion to the new page's Talk page? DH85868993 06:29, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Another thought: When we get around to doing the career summary table for Frank Williams Racing Cars, we'll probably want to distinguish between "Iso-Marlboro IR", "Politoys FX3" and "Williams FW04" in the Chassis column, so maybe we do need the constructor name after all. DH85868993 07:46, 14 January 2007 (UTC)


 * The constructor's name is redundant except in a tiny minority of articles, so I would leave it out unless needed. The casual reader would think that it was clumsy duplication. I'm not 100% familiar with archive policy beyond how to do it. Undoing it is another matter. Not really necessary, particularly if you provide an anchor link (ie, to a section heading) to the relevant archived topic. Adrian M. H. 13:56, 14 January 2007 (UTC)


 * And don't forget about Arrows' Footwork period. Apart from these obvious circumstances I would keep the full chassis name as it avoids confusion. To take a well aired example from this page, MRD made Brabham chassis for quite a while, and the Lotus 72, 76, 78 and 79 were named John Player Specials Mk.I to IV at the time they were competing. It also helps when considering outfits that have much longer names than their chassis were given (e.g. Honda R&D, Honda Racing and Honda Racing F1 all produce/d chassis called simply Honda xxx). I don't think that full names are clumsy repetition, in fact I have a hunch that casual readers will appreciate some proper nouns rather than the alphanumeric strings that most F1 chassis designations tend to produce. Just as an aside, in the FWRC example, Williams referred to the pre-FW04 chassis as FW01-03, so this information should perhaps be worked in somewhere? Pyrope 14:11, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Error: Damn, I meant of course that the Loti 76, 77, 78 and 79 were JPS cars... Doh! Pyrope 15:12, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Links to Honda
I think it's appropriate to change all the F1-related links to Honda to Honda Racing F1 instead, on the basis that the Honda Racing F1 article covers Honda's entire F1 involvement (including the 1960s and Honda's time as an engine supplier as well as the current team). Does anyone disagree? DH85868993 11:28, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Fine by me. Pyrope 13:55, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
 * No, that makes sense. Adrian M. H. 13:57, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
 * OK, (I think) they're all done. DH85868993 10:58, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Well please let me be the first to say a big WELL DONE to DH for having put in a lot of fairly dull, repetitive, thankless work on that. I just wish we had an F1/motorsport barnstar we could award. Now there's a thought... ;-) Pyrope 11:15, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Pyrope. But really, it was a lot of fun (he lies, unconvincingly). Next on my list of "global link updates" are (as discussed elsewhere on this page):
 * Alfa Romeo --> Alfa Corse
 * BMW --> BMW Motorsport
 * Lotus Cars --> Team Lotus
 * If anyone has any objections to these - speak now or forever hold your peace! DH85868993 03:10, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Intro to Formula One car articles
Could there be a standardized introduction to articles on Formula one cars? As opposed to the many different intros out there, I would prefer a single NPOV line, such as ''The X was a Formula One car designed by X and X as X's entry for the X season. It was driven by X and X''. Gareth E Kegg 22:56, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I think that we should avoid standardising text content to that extent. It is neither necessary nor desirable. I don't know how many different introductory paragraphs you have seen, however, so I can only volunteer my own work: Sauber C20 or C12, for example. I don't see anything wrong with that style, since it reflects the key points of that particular article. Adrian M. H. 23:11, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd agree with Adrian on this. After all, what makes each car notable varies from one to another. Some stand out for technical reasons (e.g. Lotus 78), while others are interesting for the sheer number of wins they accrued (e.g. McLaren MP4/4), and so on. I personally think that the first two lines should encapsulate why you should want to read the rest of the article, and these reasons will vary between cars. Hence, a standardised intro would actually obscure pertinent information. Pyrope 09:37, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
 * You've hit the button there, Pyrope. I believe that every F1 car has something noteworthy about it (even if it won't be of interest to everyone). And look at Wiki's articles from the viewpoint of someone who is just browsing for interesting topics: they will be turned off if every article reads almost identically. Adrian M. H. 15:15, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Antonio Pizzonia Photos
Hello, I have photos of Antonio from the 2006 Long Beach Grand Prix and a couple related PR events, that I could upload to Wikipedia, but I have to retain the copyright. Can I do that? You can see them here http://dechusa.tk I have a lot more too. CCWSF1 09:12, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
 * You can't retain absolute copyright when uploading to Wikipedia or (preferrably) Commons. The best that you can do is either to release it on an "Attribution" licence (meaning that others can use it fo any reason provided that the attribute the work to you) or a "Noncomercial" licence (meaning that anyone can use the item for educational or personal reasons). If you want to retain full comercial copyright then you would be best advised not to upload to Wikipedia. Take a look here. Pyrope 09:32, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Just to correct the above - 'non-commercial usage' licences are NOT permitted on Wikipedia. The licence must be either Attribution or Attribution Share-Alike. Alexj2002 14:08, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Tom Pryce
Just to save a possible Peer Review until I've got it to Good Article standards, can some of you guys have a look at my work on the Tom Pryce article please? Thanks :D.-- S kully Collins Edits 10:19, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Hey, nice looking article. Well on its way to GA. I gave it a gentle edit and refreshed the results table, but there are still some points that you could focus on if your really want to polish this thing up. The first is a fairly minor point about numeration. You have to decide if you want to use text or numerals for things like 1st/first, lap 52/lap fifty-two etc., and try to keep to one or the other. Secondly, statements need to be attributed. There are quite a few places where there are comments along the lines of "so and so thought..." or "...was an admirer" which aren't attributed and need to be. My final comment is a bit more abstract. This concerns the prose style and breaks down to three main pointers: formal; pithy; and elegant. Try to maintain a formal and neutral tone, avoid superfluous superlatives and comments within the text that are subjective. Stick to facts. Try to be as concise as possible, and leave out information that doesn't really relate to the subject of the article. For this reason I took out the part about Alan Jones and Ricardo Patrese; both interesting points but more to do with the Shadow team rather than Tom Pryce. Finally, try to be more elegant in your turn of phrase. Not easy without practice (and I know that I am certainly still not there myself) but general pointers would be to try and avoid starting sentence after sentence with "He...", "The...", "It..." and so on. Also, try to avoid too much repetition within sentences and paragraphs. There were quite a few instances where single sentences contained "Pryce" or "Shadow" a number of times for instance. Also, try to reduce the length of each sentence. Only make one, or at most two points in each. If you start going over 30 words in a sentence see if you can split it. Otherwise, good job! Pyrope 14:13, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
 * See, there I go using "also" too much. That will teach me to proof read my own comments! Pyrope 14:16, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I've read the first half and skimmed the rest, so here are my initial thoughts. Firstly, there are quite a few minor changes that I would make to phrasing. I agree with Pyrope's assessment. Secondly, I think that there are too many small facts in what is a longer-than-ideal introduction; facts that would sit better as part of the F1 career section. I noticed, for example, a slightly odd phrase in an image caption; "...is where Pryce and Jansen Van Vuuren hit each other..." Surely when a car and a human being collide, it's the car that has done all the hitting. Here is an example of the need for minor but important changes: "Pryce's death was met with grief from all those who knew him during his career, none more so then his wife Nella; his parents Jack and Gwyneth and the Shadow team" should really read "Pryce's death was met with grief from all those who knew him during his career; none more so then his wife Nella, his parents, Jack and Gwyneth, and the Shadow team." That puts the semi-colon in the correct place. There is an article somewhere on Wiki about the Oxford comma, and it applies here. Anyway, I don't want to leave only negative comments; your work so far is a good effort, and the article is well researched. Adrian M. H. 15:38, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Good article Skully. I agree with the others in general terms, I've got some specific questions about some of the material, but I'll post those on the article talk page, rather than take up more space here. Cheers. 4u1e 07:53, 16 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I do apologise for striking part of your messege, it just helps me "tick off" what I've done and what still needs to be done. Anyway, thanks for the reviews and I'll get back to you on those points 4u1e.-- S kully Collins Edits 12:39, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Jansen Van Vuuren
I don't want to hijack the Tom Pryce topic, but seeing as it is related - Jansen Van Vuuren; is he notable? The accident is obviously notable but I'm not sure he himself is, as his only claim is through being the guy that Pryce collided with. I think the content should be in 1977 South African Grand Prix instead. What opinions do you all have? Readro 01:00, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Good question. Initially, I was going to agree with you, as I was expecting to see a brief stub. As there is actually some decent content there, it will require some assessment of what is worth keeping and what can be merged. If there is a lot that is worth keeping, but little that can be merged, then it would be better to keep it. In short, I'm not sure either way. Adrian M. H. 12:47, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd say put the bulk of it in the race article - it wouldn't be dissimilar to 2005 United States Grand Prix or 1994 San Marino Grand Prix. 4u1e 23:21, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Improvement Drive - Clay Regazzoni
Just a heads up to let you all know that Clay Regazzoni has been selected as the improvement drive article for this month. Readro 01:02, 16 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Good. Top driver, sad loss. I'll certainly pitch in with what little I can. Just one question... what is with the Sporting positions box header? Sounds like athletic karma sutra moves to me; wouldn't Sporting achievements or Career titles, or somesuch, be a better phrasing? Pyrope 08:35, 16 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Fixed! Readro 11:01, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Links to BMW
I propose changing all F1-related links to BMW (e.g. constructor and engine supplier in the 1960s, engine supplier to Brabham and others in the 1980s, engine supplier to Williams in the 2000s) to link to BMW Motorsport instead. I realise that BMW Motorsport is just a redirect to BMW Sauber, but I think that BMW Motorsport is the more logically correct entity to link to. Plus I'm not sure about the longevity of "BMW Sauber" as a name for that article - what happens when BMW decide to drop the "Sauber" name (in 2008?) DH85868993 02:28, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I would much prefer to have a page about BMW Motorsport. I was thinking about this very issue yesterday while working on Formula BMW. There is so much history that would be better described in a dedicated article, like you suggested in the Mercedes discussion: huge touring car history, M1 Procar series (does that have its own article? Haven't seen one yet), and so on. If anyone else agrees and wants to collaborate on it, I might be able to find some time for it. Adrian M. H. 13:00, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree it needs doing. I want to get Mercedes-Benz Motorsport sorted first, but i can see that a similar article should be done for several manufacturers, particularly those with a long and wide-ranging history in Motorsport like BMW. Brabham, Benetton, Williams, WTCC, Super Touring, Formula BMW... A lot to write about.... The [official BMW motorsport website] would be a good place to start.Spute 19:24, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd agree - get all the relevant material on the BMW Motorsport page, leaving BMW Sauber as a separate article. I don't have the time to work on it though. I do have several books on Brabham covering the BMW period (surprise, surprise!) and the Autocourse 'history of the F1 car 1966 - 1985', so if anyone wants facts referencing or answers to specific questions, I may be able to help if you drop a note at my talk page. I tend to need nagging, too. Sorry! 4u1e 18:24, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * How does BMW M fit into the equation? After reading the article, I believe this (as "BMW Motorsport GmbH") is the entity which produced the 1980s F1 engine. So perhaps we should move all the racing history stuff (currently on the BMW Sauber page) to BMW M and have BMW Motorsport as a redirect to BMW M? (My brain hurts) DH85868993 04:46, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Possibly... but all the FBMW series websites describe BMW Motorsport. Also see bmw-motorsport.com. As I understand it, BMW describes M as specifically the road car tuning department, destinct from the motorsport division. So if that is the case, we should keep the two subjects separate and have a BMW Motorsport article. Adrian M. H. 12:57, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
 * OK, I've reinstated BMW Motorsport as an article rather than a redirect, and moved the "racing history" stuff from BMW Sauber there. DH85868993 14:37, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Here's a photo of Antonio
I don't know how to put it in the article. You can crop it if you want. I have photos of Justin Wilson, Timo Glock and Cristiano da Matta too. I'll see if those articles need photos. - CCWSF1 05:08, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the photo - just need to check something out though. You say it's Attribution + Noncommercial + NoDerivs in one place and Attribution 2.5 below. Which is it? If it's the former then it isn't suitable for use on Wikipedia I'm afraid. Alexj2002 16:17, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm confused. I visited the page someone suggested and it says that 'Attribution + Noncommercial + NoDerivs (by-nc-nd)' is allowed. Where does it say it's not? That is the version I wanted to use. CCWSF1 23:06, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Try following the procedure used for this photo of John Watson. Might work out how you need. Pyrope 14:48, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
 * From WP:IMAGES: "Licenses which restrict the use of the media to non-profit or educational purposes only (i.e. noncommercial use only), or are given permission to only appear on Wikipedia, are not free enough for Wikipedia's usages or goals and will be deleted." Alexj2002 10:38, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Well if that's official policy then that's official policy. Begs the question why the tag exists though? Pyrope 11:06, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * The withpermission tag is to be used in conjunction with fair use. If an image is fair use, and we have permission from the copyright holder then it's used. However pictures of living people can rarely ever be claimed as fair use. Alexj2002 11:43, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Veritas
I think the two Veritas articles (Veritas (constructor) and Veritas (Automobile)) should be merged. Assuming people agree with this idea, does anyone have a preference for which one becomes the merged article and which one becomes the redirect? DH85868993 01:48, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Of the two, Veritas (Automobile) should be the page name. The company was almost exactly the same set up as Alta, in that it was a road car manufacturer who produced racing cars to order for privateer entrants. Therefore it is the more general page name which would be appropriate. Now go to bed and leave some work for the rest of us... ;-) Pyrope 07:51, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * If you're looking for work, there's still a few of those Honda links to update... :-) DH85868993 13:09, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * The two Veritas articles are now merged. DH85868993 13:23, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Number of doubles
The list of highest number of "doubles" (pole and win in the same race) on the List of Formula One records has undergone a few edits recently. For a long time, the first 2 entries in the list were "1. Schumacher 37, 2. Senna 29". Then it was changed to "1. Schumacher 28, 2. Senna 29" (I think this was vandalism). Then it was changed to "1. Senna 29, 2. Schumacher 28" (I think this was probably a good faith edit). But I've seen quite a few websites which credit Schumacher with 40 such achievements. Can someone who knows the right answer please update the list? Thanks. DH85868993 13:08, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Updated... but for how long. The most reliable stats site that I know of all credit him with indeed 40 doubles (e.g. chicaneF1.com). I suspect we have some anti-Schumi trolling. Pyrope 13:46, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Don't look at me :-P. Anyway, F1db seems to agree with you on that one (Schumacher stats (40 doubles) & Senna stats (29 doubles)).-- S kully Collins Edits 13:54, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Article Ratings (Q & A)
I've gone and rated a few articles on F1 at the moment and I've hit trouble (already!). So I would like some suggestions for the following scenarios (sp?):
 * F1 race report: Several race reports I've come accross have only the race results, should those articles be considered "stubs"?
 * F1 driver priority: Ah, yes...My favourite part of the Bio template. Anyway, I came across the Jenson Button article and found it to be "mid" importance on the bio wiki-project template. I demoted it down to "low" because Button has only on one race. Sure, he's notable in a Formula One scope but this template considers every notable person that ever lived...so I think that drivers who have won a World Championship (or record) can be considered "mid" priority on those templates, while those who have won 3 (or more) titles can be considered for a higher priority.
 * Another headache I've encountered is that of lists. We have four FLs now on WP:F1 and should there be a class for these., or should they be under the FA banner?

Anyway, any suggestions for improvement would be very welcome (and appreciated ;-)).-- S kully Collins Edits 15:45, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Hey Skully. Good questions as ever. Re. the race reports, I would say yes to stubbing all those with results only, or even those with only very brief race summary sections (say <5 lines or so). Of course, some races are fairly dull (shock, horror...) and these may not need more, so it might be a matter of judgment. As for the priority, bear in mind that we are overlapping with the biographical community on this one. While, from our motorsport-centric viewpoint, JB might be only moderately interesting alongside the true greats, he is a probably one of the better known sportsmen in the UK, so may well deserve his "mid" rating. Pyrope 08:10, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Adding F1 Open Tasks lists to one's own userpage?
Hello,

I would like to know how I can add the Open Tasks list to my userpage. I used to have it, but the WikiProject F1 box no longer has the tasks list in it. I am interested in adding the task list at WikiProject_Formula_One/To-do to my userpage. What is the right box for that? Thanks Guroadrunner 21:15, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Addendum: I figured it out. I needed to have the following code to get the right box:

 [edit] WPF1 open tasks:




 * Guroadrunner 21:28, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Alain joins Damon and F1 as TFA!
Well, today I found out that Alain Prost, the second FA bio I've worked on (With the invaluble (sp?) help of many others ;-)), is now going to appear on the Wiki Main Page. Meaning that it'll join Damon Hill and Formula One in that respect.

The only thing is that it appears on a Saturday and I'm not online on weekends. So can I ask you lot to "look after" it for me from those vandals. I'm sure (Well, I know 4u1e knows what I'm talking about) what happened with Damon Hill when it reached the mainpage last year.-- S kully Collins Edits 10:09, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Seems to be unavoidable - a combination of those who can't resist vandalising any article and those who have particular axes to grind. The former aren't really too much of a problem as lots of editors watch the main article and will revert the addition of pictures of genitals or replacing the whole page with "Danny is ACE!!!!!!!! Yay! :-)" or similar nonsense. We need to keep an eye on editors introducing particular agendas, though, which may not be evident to most readers. I should be around for part of the day. It would probably be useful to give the article a final polish before it appears as well, I know there's been a certain amount of editing since it went FA. Cheers. 4u1e 16:49, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

Template:WikiProject Formula One
Am I alone in thinking that the Jordan image is not the best that could be used to summarise this project? Mark83 19:36, 27 January 2007 (UTC)


 * No - it's out-of-date, and would be better replaced with an image of a successful driver/car/team. Perhaps Alonso in the R26 would be more appropriate?--Diniz 19:45, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Well that's what I thought of. Whatever get's picked might annoy some people. However if the policy is to picture the world champion's car (constructor or driver), that seems fair. I mean I know this project deals with the history of F1 as much as the present and future. However on a template to summarise the project I think an up to date image would be better. Mark83 19:54, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I tried to make a new one (Image:WPF1logo.png) with one of the Alonso images:


 * It's virtually the exact same size as the old one, but looks smaller due to the angle so I made it a bit bigger in the infobox. – AlbinoMonkey (Talk) 15:00, 28 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I like it, nice one! Pyrope 15:06, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Great work! Mark83 15:09, 28 January 2007 (UTC)