Stories I want to tell and how you can help

Image courtesy of www.sportskeeda.com

Hello you, my name is Luca but you can call me Luca. So I did an article about how much I love Rush, a movie detailing the battle for the 1976 Formula One world championship between flamboyant Brit James Hunt (portrayed by Chris Hemsworth) and calculating Austrian Niki Lauda (Daniel Brühl), directed by Academy Award winning director Ron Howard.

In the article I wrote, I detailed just how significant this movie is to me, not only because it's an incredibly enjoyable movie but because of the social impact it had on me. Having lived an entire school life feeling a sense of ridicule and almost disrespect of my love for motorsport by the majority of my peers.

It is no secret whatsoever that the majority of the casual viewing public are very dismissive towards motorsport, claiming it isn't physical because you don't see the athlete moving without the help of an engine, and that it's way too reliant on numbers and that it is way too mechanical. Motorsport is just driving around in circles, it's not a sport! We all know this is bullshit, which is what made Rush so significant to me, I managed to go see the movie with some friends when I ran into them at the cinema and it felt amazing to show what I loved to them and they loved it.

Rush was my breakthrough, and it made me realise just how little the motorsport world is represented in a respectful manner in terms of media, especially in movies though I can understand why there aren't many movies since motor racing itself costs a lot of money to run so making a movie would cost a shit tonne of money. Plus with the lack of interest from a majority of movie audiences, it isn't always going to make its budget back let alone even profit, Rush cost its studio apparently $38M before marketing, and the movie made just short of $100M. It didn't lose money but it wasn't so overwhelmingly huge, a respectable achievement but not enough to cause a wave of motor racing movies.

Whilst I would love to see an Ayrton Senna biopic with Rodrigo Santoro, it probably won't happen but this doesn't mean we can't see a rise of other forms of motorsport entertainment. This has been playing on my mind for a while now, and I've decided that I want to help people like me not grow up with such shame. I want to create stories about motorsport, and I want to make it cool.

At the moment, I have three ideas in mind, all very different and tackling different corners (pardon the pun) of motorsport and showcasing this passion I have in the form of stories and various forms of media. I'd like to detail a few of them with you right now, the last one will need your input mainly as that's the one I am diverting the most of my attention to but if you can give me some pointers on the others then I won't stop you.

Image courtesy of www.carguide.ph

Here's the first one and I spoke about it in a full article, a Gran Turismo movie. With Sony having been pushing for a long time to have their own car racing franchise in order to rival the Fast and Furious franchise and also Need For Speed's attempt at a franchise which probably hasn't really materialised.

The GT film never really got going, and honestly it seems like a good thing considering they were aiming for the level of action and tone as Need For Speed and the Fast and Furious movies, and Gran Turismo really doesn't lend itself to that. Thankfully though, they weren't planning on adapting the source material of the games and were instead looking to base it around the concept of GT Academy, which incase you didn't read my dedicated article, was a programme that took gamers and put them through a selection process to determine who would be picked to become a racing driver.

There have been many graduates of the GT Academy programme but the one I always point to is the one I have pictured when it comes to proven talent and success, Jann Mardenborough. Unlike the other GT Academy graduates, Mardenborough has not only proven his worth in GT and LMP cars but also single seaters. The young Welshman began his journey by taking a gap year from education and playing way too much Gran Turismo, and then entered the competition and fought off many competitors during the selection process.

Sony's intent was to have a story about a gamer who becomes a real life racing driver, and I am definitely retaining this concept. I know for a fact though that the F&F and NFS style wouldn't work with this concept, but distancing itself from the absurdity of those two and grounding it in reality would be way more appropriate.

If you read my article, you'd also know that I am not basing it off of any of the real life stories of gamer to racer, but rather an amalgamation of a load of stories, not one exact true event but combining them all to tell a story that honours all of them. Because my main character in this story would be a British-Nigerian student named Josh Zuma, portrayed by Star Wars actor John Boyega.

He would be a very casual player who uses a controller, so that the audience are able to relate to him  a lot more even if the idea of a controller casual player being as capable as someone using a wheel and pedals is very unrealistic. We will then be introduced to the world of professional gaming racers, to show how rich the world of Esports and online and competitive racing is.

I detail all of this in my article here: https://redsone-shot.blogspot.co.uk/2018/03/an-idea-gran-turismo-movie.html

If you fancy reading up more on it then go ahead, because I know there's plenty to tell there but mostly plenty to inspire. Gaming and motorsport are both categories that people are very quick to dismiss, and not only does this story to me seem absurd in the grand scheme of things, it's very much true and I want people to see that it is possible.

In the context of my current vision of the story, Josh Zuma aims to become the first gamer to win both the 24 hours of Le Mans and the Formula One World Championship, because I heard former Nissan head of motorsport and current leader of the Esports and Cars team Darren Cox say he had no doubt in his mind that there will be a person who at one point will be racing virtual cars that will at one point win Le Mans and the F1 world championship. I hope I live to see the day, and that's what I want to get across in the GT film.

Image courtesy of www.youtube.com

Next up is an idea I had with my friend Nadine, an anime and manga focused on a motorcycle racer. Nadine and I have love and appreciation for motorcycle racing, but also Pokémon and I concede to all of you anime and manga diehards that Pokémon probably doesn't do very mature typical anime much justice, and I'm not an anime diehard myself though I am trying to get onboard with it. The anime and manga subgenres are fascinating from the outset, especially having got a glimpse of it with Pokémon.

This concept would be based on a main character who is Japanese, and is racing in the in-universe equivalent of MotoGP, which for now I will call MotoX1 incase I can't use MotoGP for licencing purposes. I have a very clever name for my main character, he would be called Motoharu since I love the idea of having 'Moto' in his name. Though Nadine tells me that you apparently have to have a name for your character that is very relevant to their personality when it comes to meaning, and Motoharu apparently means 'Origin of Spring'. Maybe I could come up with a more relevant name and have his surname contain Moto, maybe like Motozumi or an inevitably better one.

If I ever got this series to happen, I'd like to think I could hand it off to some writers who truly understood the value and importance of a story like this, and also knew how to do anime and manga way better than I ever could. My hope would be that it would have a new issue released monthly or however long it takes to release a manga, and maybe along with an anime series it would follow the main character as he races in the premier motorcycle racing category, showcasing a lot of exciting moments during the racing and meeting a lot of major characters.

I'd like to have a very flamboyant Italian character who rides for the in-universe equivalent of Ducati, and very much a Marco Simoncelli figure in terms of appearance and character. Then a lot of Spanish characters but with one certainly being the equivalent of Marc Márquez, these of course wouldn't be the main characters, just for authenticity's sake.

Of course though, this Japanese rider who just so you know who I'm referring to, I'm calling him Motoharu even if I change it later on. Motoharu is the main character, and I believe utilising a manga/anime style to tell stories in the way that this genre have been known to tell. The heavy emphasis on the racing within the story, the visuals and artwork along with the tone of anime and manga that I have seen, the energy that they undoubtedly possess, it's a recipe for perfection in my eyes!

Ideally, I'd love to see a Motoharu manga series with an issue of it released every so often, preferably as often and ideally as possible, and the anime series formatted like that of Pokémon. Following the main protagonist's progress throughout the motorcycle championship he would compete in, and the many different personalities that he will meet along the way, forging rivalries and honing his skill, I can see this becoming extremely beloved by the motorsport community.

Finally though, and this is the big one. I don't even have a name for it, that's one of the things you can help out with, along with many other things. I want to write a set of novels based on a fictional racing driver who goes from being talent-spotted in karting and going through all the hardships on his way to Formula One.

Image courtesy of www.KartSportsNews.com

In this photo from 2013, two of the drivers will be ones you may or may not know as they're both in F1 and pretty much on their way inevitably to F1. On the far right, Red Bull F1 driver Max Verstappen and on the far left, current F2 championship leader Lando Norris who is set to race for McLaren after Fernando Alonso calls it a day.

I religiously follow an incredible range of motorsport championships, especially going up the junior formulae ladder and I know fine well that a lot of you won't really follow the lower categories of racing, but it's how all drivers must go before they get to F1. For example, Verstappen was a rare case in which he only raced in the one series between karting and F1 with the FIA European Formula Three championship, finishing third behind now DTM driver Tom Blomqvist and current Force India F1 driver Esteban Ocon.

Lando Norris however is a different story, having gone from karting (becoming the youngest karting champion, beating Lewis Hamilton's long standing record) to Ginetta Juniors aged 14, finishing third with best rookie honours. Then from 2015 onwards, Norris has won single seater championships like it was just another daily function like eating or sleeping, as he won the FIA sanctioned British Formula 4 championship that year, followed by three separate championships in 2016 and last year he won the FIA European F3 championship in his rookie season with incredible ease, even more impressive considering he wasn't even with the all dominant Prema team that up until that point had won every FIA European F3 championship since the series' inception in 2012.

Norris is currently leading the FIA Formula Two after four rounds by a comfortable 27 points over five year F2 veteran and last season's vice-champion Artem Markelov, and as much as I want to relax, I know I can't because as confident as I am he's going to win, I don't want to jinx it. Anyway I've gushed enough about Lando now, all you need to know that this is how an F1 driver starts out.

Most people don't watch the lower categories even though there's always some great racing, but regardless of that, the casual F1 viewer doesn't take into account where these drivers came from. No average Joe can just make it to F1, there is a heavy selection process and I want to get across the struggles and hardships that these drivers go through in this story, the uncertainties of racing since it costs a lot of money to maintain this, coupled with growing up and going through education, the social pressures in life, all the hardships that come along the way.

My main character is going to be from my hometown, born in the early part of the year 2000 and will be talent spotted at the Teesside Autodrome karting circuit, a track which I go past when I'm on my way to Middlesbrough. Apparently the longest kart track in Europe and I went there a few days ago to speak to the owner, as I am doing research into what the process is when someone is apparently good enough for the people there to suggest that they should consider chasing a professional racing career.

I also have a very helpful and great guy helping me out here, a 15-year old British racing driver named Olli Caldwell, who is currently racing this year in the German and Italian Formula Four championships, having won a race in both series so far this year. He's been giving me his own personal experiences but I know fine well that experiences differentiate, and that I'll be doing my utmost to gather several perspectives because I want to do this story justice.

My aim with this potential series is to really encapsulate everything that a driver goes through because it seems that so many people don't see that or just don't care to know. That for every Lewis Hamilton, there's probably another kid who isn't granted the same opportunities, and I don't want to put a foot wrong.

You see, the main thing I wanted to get across with this novel and also the other two ideas I've had, it's that like the movie Rush, people who watch motorsport really don't have a lot in terms of entertainment like movies, books etc. I know there are plenty of movies out there about boxing and football, probably not a lot but that's another thing I want to get across, there's no shortage of stories out there about any and all forms of sport.

I highly encourage anyone out there who likes football or boxing, or indeed any other kind of sport that I can't think of off the top of my head, to write a book or a screenplay and try to tell this story of yours in a way that would mean that even if someone didn't traditionally like this sport, they could still pick it up and enjoy it. Like what Jeremy Jahns said about Rush, you don't need to be an F1 or motorsport fan to enjoy Rush in the same way you don't need to be a mixed martial arts fan to enjoy the 2011 movie Warrior with Tom Hardy, Joel Edgerton and Nick Nolte.

But of course to tell this story, I need people out there who are racing drivers. It doesn't matter to what degree you are into motor racing, as long as you are looking to hopefully one day make it to F1, you are around the right age, either you're still in karts or you are going to be in junior formulae, or already are, any and all advice is great.

So if you're reading this and you know you can help me out with your own personal experiences in karting and racing, feel free to contact me. Message me on Twitter @TheLucaFormat.

That's the perfect way to end this blog article. Again, if you feel you can help, do not hesitate as I hope to be making this novel and I may or may not be publishing it for free on here until a publishing company picks it up then you can go out and buy it, kind of like how Andy Weir's The Martian came to be.

Alright! Thank you so much for reading. As I've already stated, my Twitter is @TheLucaFormat, feel free to follow me on there if you haven't already if you want to know when I publish an article. Or you can put your email address in the 'Follow By Email' option on the right hand side if you want my articles sent straight to your inbox.

Hope to see you all here soon, so until we meet again.

Luca.

A traumatic day

Hello everyone, so it's a different tone today. I am using this to tell you about a very traumatising day in my life, which happened when I was in secondary school, infact most of the terrible times came from that point in my life as probably with many people's lives.

I go to an open mind therapy group every now and then, I particularly needed it recently and one of the things I talk about to my therapists is times in my adolescence that really sealed the deal in who I became, and not in a positive manner. So here I am with my heart on my sleeve, ready to tell you all about a day in my life that was just awful for me, thinking I can be open with you lot and hopefully it can help you come to terms with things in your life and maybe help you open up to the people who love you.

This event I am referring to occurred in I believe it was Year 7 or Year 8, so I was about 13 or 14 and when you are at that age, you socialise with the popular kids because you always think that's the best idea. Not relevant to the story but this group of girls I hung around with, only saw me as a butt to a joke, I wasn't to know this at the time but eventually worked it out. No matter, but the group of girls were the ones I was with at that moment before it all went to shit.

So picture this, I was leaning against a wall whilst these girls were doing what I can recall was gymnastic practice or possibly even cheerleading related, and I seem to remember I was pondering and deep in thought, can't recall for the life of me what I was thinking about. That's irrelevant though, what is very much not irrelevant was that I was off guard and not ready for an ambush, this group of girls (not the same group that I was originally with) walk up to me, led by a large girl wearing a tracksuit - who looked like she would un-ironically use 'cause' as an answer to a question beginning with why - with quite the number of minions following her.

What ends up happening is she says quite loudly to me, "What are ya doing standing there? You're freaking me out?" and I am a bit overwhelmed at this point because I am surrounded. I'm amazed that this bitch had the audacity to question me just standing there, not bothering anyone and saying she was freaked out by it.. so I stumbled with my words, trying my utmost to be intelligible but failing miserably whilst still processing what she said to me.

So after my blubbering nonsensical noises, I finally am able to say something honestly quite weak, "Is it any of your business?" because that's a great comeback isn't it? By that point, this tracksuit wearing sizeable person had taken a large swig of the drink she had, and proceeded to point to her face whilst the liquid was still in her mouth and make a noise, as if to insinuate that I was being disrespectful because I had not spoken to her whilst she had the power to speak back. A calculated move on her part, though if I had spoken whilst she still could, she probably would have spoken over me deliberately.

On top of her doing this, one of her minion girl friends begins mocking me for the way I talk, doing the high pitch "meh meh meh", you get the idea. At this point, I walk away because it's so fucking blatantly obvious to your parents or teachers that the whole "just ignore them and be the bigger person" shit works, it works so brilliantly! You sense the sarcasm in there? If you didn't, and if you haven't figured it out yet, I am being sarcastic in that sentence.

The second I turn to walk away, they begin to pour salt in the wound. Mocking me as I tried to get out of this situation, saying the typical mockery bullshit like "Awhh, you going to tell the teacher? Going to go cry?", oh and it didn't help that I had developed a reputation throughout the school for being a teacher's pet, one thing I never wanted to be but oh well. Anyway, I am about to walk out of there and without a moment to exhale, this guy I know pops around the corner.

For context, I have no idea why but this guy would very infrequently pass me on school grounds and call me a psycho, and I couldn't fight this. In this instance after just being intimidated by this group of girls, the last thing I needed was another reason to get worked up, and I was already trying to escape, and I was about to implode. My world was caving in, I was feeling so alone and powerless in these moments, I had nobody to run to, which is why what followed was what made the situation what it is.

I was trying to remove myself from all possible social interaction, doing my utmost to hold back tears when I heard someone ask me if I was okay. This being one of the girls that I was with earlier, and I couldn't tell if she was being funny with me or not but I did react badly, since I was so on edge and ready to explode, I snapped at her saying "What do you want?". That's when the straw that broke the camels back happened, and I see this girl walk up to me who I had never seen before but was with the girl who asked me if I was okay, and she says the following.

"Who do you think you're talking to with that ugly gap between your teeth?".

Yes. This was said. I have never been self conscious about my tooth gap, not now and not back then, but this moment in my life, I have been told to run and ignore whatever is hurled my way, being told that I should just not give a shit what everyone has to say. You'll be out of school in a few years, leading a very successful life whilst they are at home claiming benefits and taking drugs, come on kid it's wrong to care about what other people think of you!

In this moment of uncontrollable anger, in this moment of fear, of rage, of that feeling of powerlessness, I did something which would seal my fate as being one angry, closed off emotionally, fearful, wreck of a person. I gave this girl who said I had an ugly gap between my front teeth, one mighty swing of my foot into her leg, which apparently left one major bruise. All I can recall from this moment was I shouted something whilst trying to fight off major tears, whilst she turned to look back at who she was with and put her hand over her mouth.

A lot of what happened afterwards is a very fuzzy time, all I can muster up in memory may not have even happened but all I felt was whilst I was walking back, everyone was looking at me. I may as well have been Cersei Lannister and had someone behind me chanting 'shame', I felt the prying eyes of judgement almost firing lasers at my neck, hanging my head because I couldn't bare to look anyone in the eye.

What I do remember clear as day, I had P.E. after lunch break which was when this happened, and my class are all sat in a line and my support assistant who I am not going to name, comes up to me and gives me that same glare that I felt was happening when walking back into the school. Now just so you all know, I am well aware both now and at the time that kicking that girl was not right, but it was never a case of I just wanted to kick her. It was a butterfly effect of shit piled on top of more shit, that led to me crumbling, so it wasn't just a case of "I want to hurt someone for no reason".

The thing that really put the sourest sting to it was when my support assistant confronted me, her exact words when I told her about what this girl had said were "Well there's evidence to what you did whereas there is none of what you claim", or something along those lines. All she ever had to do was know me, that I don't just do what I did do because of an inherent desire to hurt people.

What I needed was someone to understand me, I may have been a stubborn little shit but I would have looked back on that, accepting responsibility for kicking this girl. But instead I was greeted with major backlash from the person I should have been depending on, I felt like the enemy, and that was the day I started bottling it all up.

Every day since then and to this day, it hurts. It hurts knowing I tried to get away from it all, I kept getting poked with a stick and when I reacted, I was shamed for it. I admit wrongdoing looking back but I don't blame myself, I wish it didn't happen but that's different from regret, and I don't regret it because I tried to get my voice out. I tried to shout with what I had and was so quickly losing everything I had in that moment, I was being shamed for running, I was being shamed for crying, I was being shamed for reacting, could I ever win?

I'm 21 now, and this day lives on as one of the worst days of my life. The day I broke, the day it all went to shit and I would forever remain as one angry, anxious and resenting piece of shit. I clench my fists when cars go past me or I walk past a stranger on the street because I fear for what they will end up doing, which isn't an unfounded fear as I am constantly being harassed by twats who feel it's a good idea to startle me then race off.

I play out scenarios in my head, hypothetical or past confrontations and I tense up, running these events in my mind. This has had a profound effect on me, and no amount of how well off I have it in my life will ever change what I have become, a loathing mess.

I'm writing this mostly because I want to open up, and I want to encourage everyone else to open up if something has been bothering them. I want to show this to my closest friends directly, and anyone else who sees this, the people you have in your life will accept anything that is making you hold your breath.

Hopefully I have helped someone by opening up here, because I do want to move past this and I know fine well that I have it really good in my life and so many people have it worse. But whatever you are all going through, I can't express enough that you are well within your right to react and you shouldn't be ashamed if your world is caving in and you can't hold yourself. Don't ever feel ashamed for doing some regrettable shit, you can wish things didn't happen but nobody is in their right to hold it against you.

I have lived my life closed away, I still find it difficult to be completely comfortable around so many people because of this day and so many other days. But I will continue to move forward, I am blessed to have the most supportive and loving people in my life who will help me as I will help them in return.

Don't bottle it all up, never let anyone in your life tell you that you're wrong, that you are evil for stumbling, for losing your way, it doesn't mean you are lost forever. Sometimes, all we need is a little help.

Thank you so much for reading, take care everyone.

Luca.

Luca's racing blab #1 - Formula E

Image courtesy of www.theverge.com

Hello you, my name is Luca but you can call me Luca. So I posted on my Instagram talking about the racing at the weekend, talking about the Chinese Grand Prix and Daniel Ricciardo's amazing overtaking skills which were never in question, Superbike Sunday as is known on Eurosport with the double billing of World Superbikes and British Superbikes, and the Long Beach IndyCar race in which Alexander Rossi dominated.

As you will all know, I love racing so I thought every so often I'd come here to talk about something that has me wanting to talk. In today's instalment of Luca's racing blab, I am going to talk about the Formula E championship as last weekend was the Rome ePrix. This electric racing series has been going from strength to strength and approaching its fifth year of competition, there is some big changes coming in the form of a new car and big overhaul in regulations.

Since the inception of the series, drivers would have to come into the pits and jump out of one car into another since their batteries have ran out of charge after about half way through the race. With the introduction of the new car (as you can see in the picture above), these will be a thing of the past but this of course means the old more traditional looking Formula E chassis will be retired. I have an idea that I'd like to see be used, but I'll get to that later.

Formula E's schedule is very much untraditional, it begins in the latter half of one year and the beginning half of the next, season one was 2014-15, season two was 2015-16 you get the idea. However for this season, it began in December 2017 and then the rest of the events were in 2018, and this for me is something that doesn't sit well. For the most part, all the Formula E seasons had more rounds in the following year than the proceeding but it surely needs more than just the one.

I don't want to say this was my idea because it wasn't, a Twitter user by the name of @alexstanger1993 had been working tirelessly to create an ideal Formula E calendar and has done a perfect job. So here's what Alex came up with if Formula E adopted this schedule for season five, I have put a slight spin on it but I'll get to that.

Round One - Singapore ePrix, Singapore - 29/09/2018
All the seasons of Formula E so far have started either in mainland China or a Chinese territory, Hong Kong is a Chinese territory, right? Is Singapore? Well if Hong Kong and Singapore are then this will continue that trend, with it being a week after the F1 Grand Prix as well.

I'd love to see it be a night race, as FE have never had a night race before. Singapore is one of my favourite street circuits, and I do hope that it's a mainstay on the motorsport calendar as it is one incredible event.

Round Two - Adelaide ePrix, Australia - 03/11/2018
This one is a stroke of genius actually, allow me to explain. I believe Alex wasn't picky about location whether it was Adelaide or Albert Park, but I'm picking Adelaide because not only do I think it's a better choice for Formula E, I have another event in mind for Adelaide. A lot of Formula E drivers also race in the World Endurance Championship and by 2019, the WEC will be utilising a schedule similar to that of Formula E.

I have been trying to get a hold of anybody at the WEC to put forward a suggestion for when they do have their schedule nailed down, to have a 10 hour race in Adelaide taking place on New Year's Eve, starting at 8pm and ending at 6am on New Year's Day. The Formula E going there would be a great build up event for the locals, and also for the drivers who will be heading back there for the 10 hour race as well. This obviously would apply for 2019 so providing Formula E is successful in Adelaide going into season six, then all of what I said would apply if WEC head to Adelaide.

Round Three - Macau ePrix, Macau - 01/12/2018
I absolutely love the Macau circuit which hosts the only event where both cars and bikes race, with the F3, Road Racing Motorbikes, GT and Touring Cars heading there near the end of November. This race would follow two weeks after, and I think with the new cars no longer needing as much regeneration, it would be the perfect time to add Macau.

I have nothing more to add here, I think this is a great venue that Formula E should have an event at. I do think maybe swap around Adelaide and Macau perhaps, I'm not too sure but maybe have the ePrix two weeks before the Macau Grand Prix and put the Adelaide event in December to lead up to the 10 hour event I've been thinking of, maybe two weeks before Christmas? What do you lot think would be better?

Round Four - Marrakech ePrix, Morocco - 12/01/2019
Now we jump continents to the sole African event, and I've been happy to see the inclusion of Morocco since they made modifications to the Touring Car circuit to make it a technical and interesting circuit. Formula E having been to Morocco in the last two seasons and having put on a show for the fans who attend from all around the continent.

Again, I have nothing much to add here. I think it's important to have a presence in Africa, and it's neatly placed considering the championship jumps from Asia and Oceania, to Africa, America, Europe etc.

Round Five - São Paulo ePrix, Brazil - 02/02/2019
This event has been trying to get itself off of the ground since the beginning but it has always fallen through, and it's sad as I feel São Paulo should have an ePrix. Two of the three Formula E champions have been Brazilian, and there's already a street circuit in this Brazilian city that has not been used since IndyCar last used it in 2013.

I do hope they are able to make it happen, though the Formula One event has been hampered by the robberies and people being held at gunpoint for the last few years, I don't know if the IndyCar event was also hampered by that but whether or not, I'd hope the local government can sort this out as the Brazilian fans are some of the most passionate in the world and deserve an ePrix.

Round Six - Santiago ePrix, Chile - 16/02/2019
The Chile event this season was amazing so it pains me to say it, I am not sure if it will remain on the calendar, I'd be very surprised. The race was extremely well attended but I'm hearing after one year, they're already apparently having to move location and this doesn't bode very well.

It pains me to have to admit it, I can't see Chile being a mainstay on the FE schedule or indeed on the schedule past this year, but I would be happy to be proven wrong. The Santiago ePrix was an amazing event, I just hope it isn't a logistical nightmare. The inclusion of Brazil may mean that Chile is no longer a necessary event.

Round Seven - Mexico City ePrix, Mexico - 09/03/2019
The only round with a dedicated circuit, using a shortened layout of the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez circuit. It has always been one of the most exciting races on the Formula E schedule, and the fans always come out in force so I see no need to have it removed.

Round Eight - Long Beach ePrix, USA - 30/03/2019
The heads of Formula E have been looking to have a race on the east coast of the US and the west coast as well, and the presence of this championship in the US has been extremely strong. The US has had the most venues of any country that has held Formula E, one of which is the Long Beach venue.

In the first two seasons, Formula E visited the California based street circuit two weeks before the IndyCar race would take place and as far as west coast venues go, you can pick a whole lot worse in terms of layout, racing and pedigree. The layout they use is a shortened version of the typical circuit but with the newer cars that can do a full race distance, the organisers are infact using the full length Monaco Grand Prix circuit for season five so maybe the full Long Beach circuit can be used.

Round Nine - Rome ePrix, Italy - 27/04/2019
The Rome ePrix was a huge success last weekend, the fans sold out the tickets within hours, the circuit is up there as being one of the best in the championship, and the racing was so good as it always is. Not only is this race in my opinion a must be mainstay, I feel like that this event should become a two race weekend like they have every so often in Formula E.

Round Ten - Monaco ePrix, Monaco - 11/05/2019
Two weeks before the Monaco F1 Grand Prix is the Monaco ePrix, or the Monaco Historic Grand Prix. This is such a major frustration of mine, why can't we have the Monaco ePrix every year? Basically, every other year Formula E goes to Monaco and the years inbetween is the Monaco Historic Grand Prix, please stop faffing around and let us have it all? Could it be possible to have the ePrix on the 11th, the Historics the following week which proceeds the F1? I do hope this is possible.

Round Eleven - Paris ePrix, France - 25/05/2019
Paris is another city in which we need Formula E to remain, another amazing location which holds major importance for the manufacturers and for the city as a whole in regards to electric racing. I don't know much more to say honestly, but bare in mind that along with Rome and two other locations, I'd like to expand more on the importance of these events.

Round Twelve - Berlin ePrix, Germany - 08/06/2019
I do love the location that the Berlin ePrix uses, the Berlin Tempelhof Airport which hosted the event in season one, then in season three with a completely different layout which will run into season four as well. Season two's event was relocated to the city centre after refugees were being held at the airport, and the circuit they used was okay but certainly not good enough in my opinion.

Whilst I did like season one's Berlin Tempelhof circuit layout especially the bit where they drive under the terminal roof, season three's Tempelhof layout was so much better overall with so many fast corners providing a new challenge for the drivers. I see no reason to get rid of this amazing circuit and venue, I hope we get to see more airport circuits possibly added in the future too.

Round Thirteen - Zurich ePrix, Switzerland - 22/06/2019
This one is very much hypothetical since we haven't yet visited Switzerland for the inaugural Zurich ePrix, but it's already majorly significant since Switzerland have had motorsport banned for the most part and allowed for a relaxing of this rule when Formula E came knocking. So it's obvious as to the role Formula E has played in the Swiss getting a major motorsport event.

I am very much going to tune in to this year's Zurich ePrix to see how the reaction is, and I'm actually kind of hoping season two champion Sébastien Buemi can win on home soil. If it's any good then it'll be worth keeping, but I must say that I am very much willing to boot Switzerland away in favour of another event, but I'll save that until later.

Round Fourteen - New York ePrix, USA - 20/07/2019
Last season, Formula E made the trip to North America for double headers in both New York and Montreal. I wish more than anything that Montreal could have remained on the calendar because in my opinion, it had one of the best layouts out of any Formula E circuit, however it was removed after locals complained about a shit tonne of things which I can honestly understand.

We are focusing on New York though and I think the event last season was great and is an ideal place for the season finale, racing in New York is incredibly significant and whilst I was hoping they could have utilised the Port Imperial circuit in New Jersey that F1 has been trying to make happen since 2013, but it would never have worked for Formula E since they need a lot of heavy braking zones. I do hope that Port Imperial circuit is one day utilised for F1 because it is one incredible circuit.

The circuit that the New York ePrix uses is an erected layout around the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, which was quite the location for the circuit but it seemed to logistically work very well. On that note though, I'd like to put up a picture of a few New York ePrix circuit layouts.

Both images are directly from FIA Formula E.

On the top is the layout that will be used for this season's New York ePrix, which is essentially the exact same as last season's but with that section added at the at the end of that long straight whereas beforehand it was just a simple right handed hairpin. However below that you'll see a layout that was originally showcased as being the layout that had been settled on, which I have taken the original photo and flipped it so you can see the comparison to the actual layout.

I don't know why the original layout that was decided upon was abandoned, I mean there are some things I prefer on the actual layout. I for one would keep the actual layout's bottom section from the sweeping right hander to the exit of the chicane and hairpin, but then the original layout's more technical section that you see in the top of the picture, that for me would make it by far the best overall possible layout.

Anyway the race in New York is incredibly significant, and I've said this also for Paris and Rome but you may remember that I spoke on the topic of the Zurich ePrix that I'd be wanting to see a different event if Zurich did fail, and that's what I want to talk about now.

Bonus round - London ePrix, Britain
I visited the London ePrix in 2015 for the first season finale and the witnessing of Formula E's first champion being crowned, and it was situated in Battersea Park. I was really happy to be there, but the thing that killed it for me was the inability to watch the racing unless you were allowed to go up onto the platforms, which sucked.

Overall the experience was very much a positive one, I am very much glad I could see the London ePrix but I can't honestly sit here and say that having it at Battersea Park again would be a good idea, though I really want the London ePrix back so I have a much better location that I do hope would be logistically possible. In 2012, there was a London Grand Prix proposal made by Sky Sports, Santander and McLaren along with their current driver line-up made up of Britain's two most recent F1 world champions Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button.

I'll link the video here for you all to watch the circuit presentation by Button and Hamilton.

The circuit itself is absolutely incredible and I would hope that one day, the circuit could possibly also host F1 but that itself seems to ambitious. Maybe it's too ambitious to think about this London circuit as a host for an ePrix let alone a Grand Prix, but either way it's very important that Formula E returns to London.

I had been hearing that the organisers were planning on heading to Birmingham in the UK either as a replacement round after Montreal's cancellation this year or for the upcoming season and as excited as I was at first at the prospect of racing in Birmingham, I quickly realised that London holds as much significance for Formula E as Paris, Rome and New York which is why we need all of them on the schedule.

Alex Stanger's ideal Formula E schedule is near absolute perfection. What I'd probably end up changing is, possibly removing the Santiago round, trying to shuffle everything up and trying to possible move the end of the season back so there's a gap of about three months until the next season which would begin again in late September early October. Oh and of course, I'd add London and possibly put that in place of Zurich if the Swiss event isn't successful.

Now, there was another idea that I wanted to discuss. You will have seen earlier in the article that I spoke about the current Formula E chassis being retired from usage in the FIA championship, and I also mentioned that the US has had more ePrix than all other countries that have held an ePrix. This including Miami in season one, Long Beach in seasons one and two, New York in seasons three and four and also including a non-championship virtual eRace held in Las Vegas between Formula E regulars and simulator racers.

It seems that along with these events that did happen, there is so much demand for Formula E in so many US cities, some of which include but are not limited to Austin and Detroit. I bring this up because it's quite obvious that there is a demand to see Formula E in so many cities in America, and obviously the heads of the FIA Formula E championship won't be able to satisfy all of them, since America is so vast that having more than one round in the States would still be quite excessive when so many other countries want to be on the schedule too.

I think Formula E's plan to have both an east and west coast event is very much ideal, so as far as I'm concerned that's a great idea and having Long Beach ePrix be the west coast event and New York ePrix be the east coast event, that provides a great balance. However, so many other cities have their sights set on a Formula E event and unfortunately, this isn't something that the FIA championship could ever dream of satisfying, so here's my idea.

With the chassis that FIA Formula E has used since its first season being retired after the end of this season, how about taking these soon to be disused Spark SRT01E cars and using them in a United States based championship, racing in as many of the cities that are wanting to have an ePrix. These would include Miami which would run on the weekend that the FIA championship ran in Miami on in 2015, Long Beach and New York possibly as a supporting event to the main championship, the absolutely brilliant circuit utilised in the Las Vegas eRace but brought into reality if it's possible. Then of course, literally any other US city wanting an ePrix.

The format for the US Formula E would remain very much the same in terms of how the race weekend would be set up, though unlike the FIA championship with the majority of rounds having one race and a few select others having two races across two days. For the US championship, there would always be two races per weekend, with one practice session, qualifying following with a similar format to what FIA Formula E uses with a shootout for superpole between five top drivers, then a race, this applying to both days.

I do reckon though that the US Formula E races should probably be half the length of traditional FIA Formula E races which are roughly around the 50-60 miles or 80-100 kilometres mark, this being because up until now the current Formula E cars have not been able to make a full race distance on a single charge and so therefore the drivers come into the pits mid-race and swap into another car. Shortening the races would mean no need to jump into another car mid way and basically just meaning less freight to have to haul to each round and the costs going down, whilst still putting on a show.

Been trying to get in touch with the right people to see if putting this idea into their minds would work, and so far I have had nothing but people ignoring me or not seeing the complete genius in this idea, if I do say so myself! But seriously, I thought by putting it out to you guys it would get some people thinking and hopefully there will be a racing organisation in America willing to work with the heads of Formula E to make this happen because I wouldn't be suggesting it if I didn't see the benefits for everyone involved.

Along with my US based Formula E championship and the ideal FIA Formula E schedule by Alex Stanger with my spin on it, I want to know all your thoughts on everything here today. If anybody has anything to say, feel free to let me know either in the comments or on Twitter @TheLucaFormat.

Alright! Well speaking of Twitter, go ahead and follow me on there if you haven't already and give Alex Stranger a follow @alexstanger1993. If you want my articles sent straight to your inbox then look for the Follow By Email option on the right hand side of your screen. That'll be it from me, hope you enjoyed reading and that you will be back soon for more of my mindless drivel.

So until we meet again,
Luca.

The power of joking

Image courtesy of www.youtube.com

Hello you, my name is Luca but you can call me Luca. I'm writing this on March 28th 2018, so when I say 'earlier this month' I mean March since I'm guessing I'll have this done and ready to publish in April. Anyway, earlier this month, a Scottish man known online as Count Dankula - real name Mark Meechan - was found guilty of a hate crime and with being "grossly offensive", because of what? He made his girlfriend's pug do a Nazi salute in order to prank his girlfriend, by turning her adorable pug into "The worst thing he could think of". This should scare you.

Dankula doesn't deserve this to happen to him. I personally think there is some humour that is certainly worth criticising, and I think you can be criticised for all types of humour and everyone is free to say whether something is too much, however this is way too far. Dankula simply wanted to make his girlfriend's dog as heinous to contrast his girlfriend's perception of her dog, and there are people that are saying he deserves to be locked away for it. I however, don't think he should and I'll explain why.

Now I personally think that people who have committed hate speech in the past are indeed horrible people, those who un-ironically believe that all Jewish people should be gassed or wiped out, they should be the ones in prison. Dankula doesn't hold these hateful views at all, and he is being punished for a joke, and to me not only is this worrying because people shouldn't be punished for a joke no matter how egregious it is and this may set a precedent, I do think those who are calling for his sentence are holding a very backward view. I don't claim to know everything, but I think this could be quite eye opening for a lot of you.

As you can see in my header photo, I have a picture of PewDiePie who also went through his own Nazi joke controversy back in the day, and whilst I know a few people who don't like him, I still stand by him. It all began spiralling out of control from him when he made a video using the Fiverr website, which if you don't know is a site where you pay I believe it's £5, or $5, basically five of some currency and the person you commission will do anything that they say they'll do for the money.

This can range between getting someone to do your Maths homework, playing a video game with someone, and finally making a comedic video with personal input. My personal favourite things to result from Fiverr include Big Man Tyrone's videos such as 'I sexually identify as an Attack Tyronecopter.' and 'Jamal Says "Every 60 Seconds In Africa, A Minute Passes".' which are both incredibly funny to me. Long story short, you can find a service on there for a small sum, and PewDiePie made a now deleted funny video using the Fiverr site.

For the most part, he has his requests rejected since he asks for are very inappropriate and immature, but what really got a lot of gears grinding was when he asked two Indian guys called the Fiverr Funny Guys to make a video for him. He wanted to see how far he could make certain people go, so with the Funny Guys saying they'll hold up a sign saying whatever the person paying wanted coupled with some laughing and slapstick humour before saying out loud whatever they were asked. PewDiePie decided to try and make the sign say the most horrible thing he could think of, which was "Death to all Jews" along with the guys then saying to subscribe to a YouTuber who has been known in the past to be actually racist and hateful, I won't say that YouTuber's name because he is a sack of shit.

PewDiePie was expecting his request to be rejected since he was pushing these boundaries, but much to his surprise the Funny Guys actually fulfilled his request and if you can find a reupload of it on YouTube, PewDiePie's reaction is amazing! But this did not go down well, media outlets such as Wall Street Journal deliberately took a lot of PewDiePie clips out of context to make him look like an actual Nazi. Such as a video of him watching Hitler in an SS outfit, which was to make fun of the recent YouTube Heroes programme which told people to take down videos without any sort of regulation, and another such example is when PewDiePie is pointing at a screen, it was claimed to have been a Nazi salute.

I still stand by PewDiePie, even if I did not like the guy (Which I do), all the information points in his favour and it was all really just a smear campaign on the most well known guy on YouTube, so that advertisers would jump ship from YouTube to typical media sites, which mainly did happen. I know if I was a bigger scale blogger, I'd be branded as a Nazi sympathiser and have a lot of my words taken out of context and I could not defend myself because the media holds way too much influence. That's a story for another day!

Around the time of the Charlottesville protests (Remember? The one in which Donald Trump said there were good people among actual bigots? But will call anyone who takes a knee or call for gun control 'unpatriotic' and 'sons of bitches'?), PewDiePie made a video saying he wouldn't be making any more Nazi jokes because he was horrified at the realisation of how alive Nazism still is to this day. It is unfortunately very much real and alive, and people who sincerely believe in it will continue to live hateful lives, but I do think that one of the reasons we have allowed Nazism to remain strong is that every time it is joked about, we are told we shouldn't do it as it's offensive to the victims of the Holocaust.

You can have your opinions about comments in relation to Nazis saying "Gas the Jews" or "Death to all Jews", I would personally always take context into consideration like with PewDiePie and Dankula's situations, though you can't always rely on it. However I never perceived those jokes as mocking Jewish people and the undeniable tragedy that continues to plague Europe and the world, but more mocking the Nazis.

Here's the thing with Nazi's and indeed anybody, I personally feel if you joke about something long enough then nobody takes it seriously. I of course take the holocaust extremely seriously, I hope nothing like it ever happens again but with the prominence of Nazis still to this day, the last thing I want to do is satisfy their thirst for fear, and we do that if we give them the power that we desperately don't want them to have then they have won.

Nobody wants to mock victims, at least nobody with common sense wants to do so. But like with that kid at school who threatened to burn the place down, we would laugh it off and really undermine the will of that kid, but if we had started to clearly fear this kid, we would be giving them that power and influence. That's how I see it with not only Nazis, but other groups who rely on fear mongering and dividing us as species, if we reduce their bigoted views to nothing more than something to laugh at, they are not being taken seriously.

Imagine how undermining that would be to someone who is convinced in their head that they are superior to someone because they are white, 'pure blood' all that bollocks, to be told how they feel and see is laughable is the most demoralising thing. Because they're either unrelenting in their conviction, or brainwashed to the point of no return.

Ever seen how not seriously we take Flat Earthers? "THE EARTH IS FLAT! THERE IS SO MUCH EVIDENCE!", lol kay. The same with those people who believe that 9/11 was an inside job, and as scary governments can be, that sort of sentence is thrown around by memers all the time. They reduce these mentalities to nothing more than something that can be laughed at, not taking seriously, but we for some reason actually rewards Nazis with the fear they want us to have. That's why I choose to laugh at them.

In the end, it's all a choice really. I've learned over the years that you can be freely critical and offended by people's humour, my personal feelings regarding where humour crosses a line is when it's at someone else's expense. Unless that someone else is a disgusting pile of shit, and that's what Nazis are. But you may very well have a different line than me and I'll respect that, but don't tell me I'm a bad person because I find Nazis mentalities laughable, because they are disgusting humans and don't deserve any more acknowledgment or validation.

This past year has been a defining one for humanity, America had a bigot elected as President and it really has shown how alive Nazism is in the world, and we are giving them validation! We are punishing people for mocking this mentality, throwing them in the same basket as actual Nazis and it's just sad. Hey I'll probably end up being called a Nazi because of this, but I know fine well where I stand. I just hope you lot see where I am coming from.

That's where I'll end this. I hope this has at least been somewhat eye opening to all of you. For the record if it wasn't somehow clear enough already, Nazis are disgusting, fuck Nazis and fuck Nazi sympathisers. Thank you for reading.

Luca, out.

The future of F1 - What I'd like to see

Image courtesy of www.motorsport.com

Hello you, my name is Luca but you can call me Luca. I have been watching F1 since Lewis Hamilton won his first championship, I've had a bit of a love hate relationship with the sport due to the politics and the nature of particular individuals involved within as well, but like everything in life, it can be improved so as appose to blindly hating it for one reason or another (Like the engines or the halo, though I despise the halo too) or being so in love with it that nobody dare criticise it, I am going to bring up some ideas for F1 to probably ignore but I know some of which will be quite popular.

I am making this because of the takeover of the commercial side of F1 by Liberty Media that has brought some really great things to the table - such as the F1 Live shows like the event in London that took place a week before the British Grand Prix - and overall has really modernised F1, even if the new logo isn't that nice to look at. I know what Liberty Media are trying to do so by the off chance they or the FIA for some reason are looking at some random guy's blog, here's some ideas.

Okay first of all there's car design, now this sort of thing is more the FIA's expertise but I fear that F1 is going to fall back in this particular race to really grab people's attention. Recently, Formula E revealed the car that teams would use for the upcoming 2018-19 season and well, it looks absolutely incredible!







Image courtesy of www.autosport.com

When the Generation Two Formula E car was revealed, it definitely captured that wow factor that I feel we need in F1 and have been lacking for some time. When it comes to styling, you can either make it look smooth and beautiful, or aggressive and exciting and I feel we need to see F1 cars as being out of this world incredible, that we look at in utter awe. The Formula E car looks like a Batmobile, I want those sort of comparisons to be made with Formula One.

 

Of course I haven't steered away from my feelings, the halo which looks absolutely hideous. I'm completely alright if it's a placeholder for an aeroscreen to be developed, I think the FIA's attitude towards the halo has been as hideous as it is, implementing it in all of its single seater categories as almost like a panic. The halo isn't the future, an aeroscreen is and I hope the FIA aren't patting themselves on the back just yet and are proceeding by developing an aeroscreen that all single seaters can use for the foreseeable future.

 

Next up regarding the cars is the technology, now for some reason people think the current engines are abysmal, I like the current 1.6-litre turbo V6 engines though I do think a few things can be done to make the engines sound a bit nicer, like a blown diffuser that were on the 2011 F1 cars, which I think equipped with the turbos can make for some nice deceleration noises. Raising the RPM limit I believe is also necessary, I know these smaller engines can be some real screamers and it would make for a nicer sound, I know they are planning to raise by about 3,000rpm and that can only be a good thing, I can only hope it'll work in a way that they actually do approach the limit as appose to what they do now which is start bouncing off the redline a bit earlier than the maximum RPM.

 

I'd love to see the hybrid systems utilised like how the LMP1 hybrid cars use theirs, allowing for such incredibly sharp and instant acceleration, maybe with the power coming through the front wheels possibly like I believe they did with the four wheel drive LMP1 hybrid vehicles. Also taking into account the aerodynamics that F1 have used over the years, the racing these days is really restricted due to getting dirty air from the car in front meaning cars can't get close and it sucks. I don't claim to be completely educated on aerodynamics but I have heard about Ground Effect and how it doesn't seem to be effected by dirty air, though European based racing don't seem to want to use it for safety reasons. I trust there can be a fine balance found because I'm sick of cars not being able to race because they're in "dirty air" and have to back away to save tyres and the engine.

 

I believe this next one may or may not be a nightmare to organise but with Liberty Media trying to improve the show for the fans, I had a brainwave a while back after racing a particular kind of car on Project CARS, and that was a BMW M1 Procar. Allow me to give you some backstory.

Back in 1979, a championship was put together by BMW in which F1, SportsCar and Touring Car drivers could all compete in the same cars, and they would race just before the Grand Prix took place. So F1 drivers were taking part in this series right before the Grand Prix itself, and they did this for eight of the nine European rounds that year.

This gave me an idea that would mean a little bit of fun for the attendants of the Grand Prix as well as people at home, and that is reviving the Procar name and having all the drivers race either at every GP event or a select few. There would be no practice or qualifying for the event itself, the first time a driver would be driving a Procar would be out the pits on the way to the grid. The way a grid would be decided would be a reversed order of the previous year's F1 championship results, with every new driver coming into F1 then being decided on when their official FIA entry was confirmed.

So for example if Procar was brought back for this year, the two rookies in F1 this year are Charles Leclerc and Sergey Sirotkin, if Sirotkin had officially entered F1 after Leclerc officially entered, Sirotkin would lead Leclerc on the Procar grid for the first race, with Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton lining up on the back row.

For every race afterwards, it would be a reverse grid of the previous race's results, and all races are only five lap sprints at every circuit. So there will be carnage and undoubtedly an incredible show being put on for the fans, and it would be a nice little bit of fun for the drivers in order to warm up before the race begins. In regards to if they would race at some circuits and not all, I'd pick all the European races along with Singapore, USA and Mexico.

The cars used in this series would be all powered by the same spec engine, being built to the same spec to comply to F1 engine regulations, so right now it would be 1.6-litre turbocharged V6 (though for cost reasons, I don't think they'd use the hybrid systems) developed by an engine manufacturer with no current F1 ties for example Cosworth, so no Mercedes, Ferrari, Renault or Honda power units.

The design of the cars like the BMW M1, very much a touring car or GT style but I would hope that it could drive a lot like a DTM or LMGTE car, so the drivers could throw it into corners and feel like they can push every single one of the five laps. So this would effectively be like Rallycross, short races where the drivers push albeit in equal cars which would make the racing even better.

As far as the cars used in Procar, Alfa Romeo attempted to make a Procar back in the day which used their 1988 3.5-litre V10 intended to be used by the Ligier F1 team that year, which is where I got my idea for using the current spec of F1 engines. Mercedes have made a car using their current F1 engine, the Project One, so it isn't out of the question at all, though as I've said before, I fear that having the Mercedes F1 team in F1 as well as making Procar engines would possibly mean they could exploit it.

So again, an independent engine manufacturer and chassis developer working with a racing team to run all the Procar entries and maybe for some extra fun, all the F1 drivers can customise the look of their cars out of their own or their sponsor's pockets so they can all be told apart. What do you all think of this?

Speaking of what I'd like to see at F1 race weekends, the European F1 weekend for the most part consists of two subcategories as well as Porsche SuperCup. Outside of Europe, the support schedule is little to almost non existent. By 2019, the GP3 support series will become FIA Formula 3 and will be on the F1 support schedule at the European events alongside FIA F2, and this gave me an idea to increase the support bill for many nation's Grand Prix.

In recent years, the FIA started backing a lot of national entry level single seater championships, such examples include the British Formula Ford championship, the ADAC Formel Masters and the Formula Abarth championship, which all are on the support programmes of the British Touring Cars, the ADAC GT Masters and the Italian GT championship. After the FIA started backing these championships, they became British, German and Italian Formula 4. (Note: The rebrand for the British championship began in 2015 however since the name 'British F4' had already been taken by a BRDC backed championship, this series was known as MSA Formula until early 2016 when the BRDC British F4 became BRDC British F3).

I bring this up because I think it would be a really good idea to have these national F4 championships join their parent championships at their country's Grand Prix, so for example: British F4 has all of its rounds supporting the BTCC still but then will also have an event at Silverstone supporting F3, F2 and F1 at the British Grand Prix. Same with the Italian F4 championship heading to Monza to race on the Italian Grand Prix support schedule, just like how the American F4 championship supports the United States Grand Prix at the Circuit of the Americas.

Just doing some research now, apparently the support schedule at this year's Canadian Grand Prix will be the Ferrari Challenge, the Micra Cup and Formule 1600 which is honestly a bit tragic. I'd love to see perhaps the new F3 Americas championship go there, and some more national championships even if they're on the level like that of Australian Supercars, since they have a non-championship round at Albert Park during the Australian Grand Prix weekend. Just add something to this list.

Actually after I initially finished this article, I saw a video on Twitter of what I would learn to be, the Australian Supertrucks which in the video itself were supporting the Aussie Supercars at Adelaide. What makes the series such an incredible spectacle, they have ramps put out on the track's straights and they gain some incredible air! I'd love to see a World Supertrucks championship like that supporting the F1 constantly, and now I think about it, I'd love to see some stunting at all the races like how they do between heats at the Race Of Champions. Maybe this would require structuring the weekend differently, having F2, F3, F4 etc. the days before the Grand Prix, as to give the diehard motorsport fans a reason to buy a full weekend ticket.

I honestly count my lucky stars that Europe gets the feeder series on the support schedule and I just hope that overseas Grand Prix can get some more support races from various other championships. Don't get me wrong, I am not going to say that the Micra Cup doesn't offer up some exciting racing, I've seen the Renault Clio Cup series when I have visited Croft for the BTCC and those small cars pack some punch, but we also had the Porsche Carrera Cup, British F4, Ginetta SuperCup and the Ginetta Juniors.

Now for the F1 eSports championship which I know the new F1 owners are pushing heavily and has proven to be incredibly successful, I'd love to see this concept expanded so they can do what Formula E does. Formula E have a single day structure mostly for their events and have a lot of time to kill between qualifying and the race since their cars are charging, and what the organisers do is have the drivers as well as fans compete to try and qualify for a short sprint race on a simulator. Formula E use the mobile game Real Racing 3, and I do hope to fuck that they work with the developers of RR3 to create a dedicated Formula E game.

Formula One already have a dedicated game, which is how they managed to create the F1 eSports championship and put on an incredible show. With the plans to expand the eSports championship, I can see the potential perhaps to run the eSports championship full time to host their races on the evening of the Saturday proceeding the following day's Grand Prix, but maybe as a lead up to the eSports event itself, have drivers volunteer to compete alongside attending fans who will try to qualify for the chance to race alongside real life drivers, just like what they do in Formula E. It would give plenty of attending fans reason to stay after the final day's race.

Speaking of which, I would like to genuinely know what else could be done for fans attending the Grand Prix itself. When I went to Silverstone in 2011, Jamie Archer from the X Factor was there performing next to the Wellington Straight, I don't really do much live concert stuff but that's all I can really think of. They did also invite the attendees to come on stage for a 'talent show' with some cringey play on the judges, someone acting like Simon Cowell and calling it 'Silverstone's Got Talent'.

I remember one year the YouTube channel 'P1 Pole Position' was there and I was actually meant to go on one of their shows but I couldn't make it. So with the rise of WTF1 in recent years, I can an opening for them to have an interacting factor in there among the audience. I've always liked the idea of a motorsport show with a live audience, maybe even bringing on online personalities and Grand Prix drivers perhaps in a head to head style format on a gaming rig.

Finally for the people watching at home, F1 have launched a streaming service for both current and classic races, and this would really modernise F1 if they did it right. I'd love to see onboard cameras where the viewers can rotate 360 degrees, and the ability to jump from F1 car to another, among other viewing points from the click of a button, maybe even scrolling through different commentary feeds depending on their selected language. How about looking at real time telemetry? That'd probably be a stretch considering how the teams could take advantage of each other's telemetry, but it would be just throttle, braking, G-Force, and also timing to the exact thousandth of a second in real time, among other options like temperature, tyre wear etc. I'll leave the details to the professionals.

Of course, it'd be very naïve of me to expect this to be taken into any sort of consideration but it is indeed wishful thinking. I haven't even mentioned it at length but the new logo looks horrible, I'll put up a picture along with a design I made on paper which I'll show to you all now.

Image is my own.

Top left is the previous F1 logo used between 1994 and 2017, the top right is the new logo that will unfortunately be used from 2018 and the bottom is what I made. I took inspiration from the FIA junior formulae championship logos, that being from Formula Two, Formula Three and Formula Four, and I retained the black and red colour scheme from the previous F1 logo.

The old logo was iconic and much beloved, the new one I honestly cannot think I or indeed many people will get used to. I get that Liberty wanted to put a new face to F1, to show a new period was coming led by new people, but I feel like they went too far with the logo as it just looks hideous, and I wish they had looked to the junior categories for inspiration as appose to ESPN.

Anyway that's very miniscule, F1's new logo is hideous but not the main concern, it can come across as petulant but it doesn't disguise how horrible the logo is.

So with all of that out of the way, what do you all think? Do you agree with some of my suggestions, do you not agree with some? Anything you're thinking of that I may have missed? Feel free to leave it in a comment below.

Alright! That'll be all from me, so if you enjoyed what I have had to say, I'd hugely appreciate it if you spread this around, and if you're reading my blog for the first time and you like what you see, if you want to see more of what I have to say in the future then leave your email in the 'Follow By Email' option or follow me on Twitter @TheLucaFormat.

Hope to see all of you soon, so until we meet again.
Luca.





An idea - Gran Turismo movie

Image courtesy of www.skysports.com

Hello you, my name is Luca but you can call me Luca. So I am well aware that my last blog post was also on Gran Turismo, but this isn't the exact same sort of idea because in this blog post, I'd like to talk in detail about a proposed Gran Turismo movie by Sony, and how it has the potential and the pressure to be a hell of a lot better than crappy film adaptations of video games that we have become all but used to seeing.

 

So when I say Gran Turismo movie, what springs to mind? If we are going off just the in-game content, maybe a driver who enters into some crappy sub 100 horsepower race called the 'Clubman Cup' before entering more races and eventually racing at Le Mans? Or doing a tedious driving test where you drive forward and pull up, and if the character fails then you hear a certain song by Yello? Yeah that sounds pants. A lot of non story driven video game adaptations do this, take literal elements from the source material that work as an interactive experience and expect it to work for a passive and engaged audience. This isn't the idea I have for the Gran Turismo movie.

 

This is something I know needs to be celebrated and made for the big screen, and I know a lot of you will be amazed to hear this, there are drivers who because of Gran Turismo have gone from sitting on their sofas with their PlayStation controllers to racing against all of the world's best drivers in a variety of different motor racing categories as a result of GT Academy. One such example is the man in the centre of the picture above, Jann Mardenborough.

 

Mardenborough entered into GT Academy during a hiatus from education and ended up beating up to 90,000 entrants to win in the European based competition in 2011, and has since gone on to be majorly successful in championships such as various GT and Formula Three series, winning a race in GP3 supporting the F1 German Grand Prix in 2014 and also in LMP cars at the 24 hours of Le Mans.

 

Coupled onto the other levels of success that GT Academy graduates have had, these drivers are the real deal and are here to stay, and when you also take into consideration the legitimacy that video game racers have garnered in recent years in mainstream thanks to the F1 eSports championship taking place last year, and one of the competitors being a former real life single seater from Turkey named Cem Bölükbaşı, who was signed to a team that two time F1 champion Fernando Alonso bought into, no matter what is said now about video game racers, they have proven themselves and are not going anywhere.

 

So with the rise of video game racers and competitive racing both translating over to real life and remaining within the games themselves, this is the topic and now is the time to make a movie out of this to show any old Joe sitting on his sofa that even a gamer could probably become a pro-racing driver and win Le Mans or the F1 world championship. So with this synopsis in mind, what to do?

 

According to GTPlanet, the movie might be dead which may or may not have been a good thing as of now which means someone with passion can pick it up. May not help considering Sony is looking to sell off its TV and film division, I still think something will fall into place to tell this story because whilst Sony were looking to make it a franchise competing with Universal's Fast and Furious as well as Dreamworks' Need For Speed franchises. I don't know how a GT franchise could work but let's just focus on a standalone now.

 

Okay first let's think of a main character. I'm going to be taking liberties with my idea, but have the main character take elements and characteristics from the real life GT Academy winners, mostly like Mardenborough though, mainly because of who I have in mind to portray this character. The person I'd like to see lead this film, much to the surprise of a chunk of you who believe I'm about to say Taron Egerton, I'm actually going with John Boyega.

 

Image courtesy of www.thedailybeast.com

Most of you know Boyega as Finn from the new Star Wars films, and I'm picking him because not only as we all know that he is one hell of an actor and a very charismatic guy, but also I saw an interview that he did that he apparently has a big racing rig at his home so he must be passionate about racing to some degree.

 

I'd like to see a character portrayed by Boyega as a working class college graduate a bit like Mardenborough who has maybe taken a few years away from education and casually competes in racing on PlayStation games such as Gran Turismo with his typical PlayStation controller as appose to a big simulator rig. His favourite driver could be Lewis Hamilton, since they're both Black British and this is what inspires the character's love for racing.

 

Another great thing that I'd like to see, Boyega actually told his Nigerian father about being cast in Star Wars and in a very strong Nigerian accent, his father expressed his utter delight and then asked what Star Wars was, so maybe Boyega's character could have parents who are just like that in regards to his racing. We could see some minor conflict in regards to his fixation on racing without any major aspirations in mind for his future, with the both of them hoping to see him take up a higher occupation as a result of going to university.

 

Just for the sake of not having to type out 'Boyega's character', I am going to think of a name for him which could be changed in the final version, so I'm going to call him Joshua Zuma and have him be a British-Nigerian with a mother and father who were originally from Nigeria and both moved over at a young age. So as you know these details now, you'll know I'm referring to the character when I say Josh.

 

Josh will be aged around early to mid 20's and be very much a Jack The Lad, likes his partying and hanging with his mates in the evenings, maybe have this over-confident side play into his character and development over the course of the story as it will work against him. He'll be an only child which plays into the flaw of not being able to see past himself, which he will learn when it comes to working with other people especially in the highly demanding world of motorsport.

 

Of course, Josh will have to compete with other potential candidates, and he sees when he makes it to the finals what he's up against, you could have multiple eSports and League racing champions ran by professional teams, with Josh being the only one who doesn't have any sort of major credibility or peak physical fitness. This would be an interesting point to see how Josh would react when he sees these people, making him realise he's out of his depth and begins to doubt himself since he came from a very casual racing background.

 

As far as inspirations go, the character of Josh for me would pull a lot of characteristics from both Mardenborough but also F1 eSports champion Brendon Leigh, the finger waving, impulsive and flamboyant Brit who performed an incredible last lap maneuverer for the lead in Abu Dhabi to win the inaugural championship. Leigh's very impulsive and unrefined approach to racing as well as his attitude outside the 'car' as well as his background not being in traditional simulators, makes him all the more appealing when it comes to the casual audience and that's why I have him in mind when it comes to a character like Josh.

 

Seeing the world of video games and how serious the motor racing side is through all these other characters who Josh will be competing against would be by far the best way to show off this world. I can already think of people who are already very established in competitive league racing in order to create characters for this story to appose Josh in the GT Academy training.

 

During the GT Academy events, there would be a panel of experts coming from the world of motorsport there to adjudicate the candidates, and I was thinking here we could have a fictitious British racing driver inspired loosely by 3-time F1 Grand Prix winner Johnny Herbert. Having started his career at an age that would be considered way too old and being held back by an injury from a lower category of racing, as a result not being able to be as successful as he could have been and as a result, had a relatively short career. But still very much a happy go lucky character, I was thinking probably Mark Addy for this role.

 

Addy's character that we will call, Anthony 'Tony' Kemp will - as was the case I believe in real life - be in charge of the Brits who made it to finals as the competitors who come from a certain country will be given guidance from the judge who is from their home country. Throughout the competition when the driving, fitness, media training are all piling on Josh, Kemp will be there to help him pull through but will be put under pressure to not have any conflict of interest when choosing the winner after observing the final hurdles for all the entrants.

 

As far as the end game of this movie since Josh would end up winning the scholarship, he would end up on a Nissan racing programme and he could be placed in the All-Japan F3 championship and the Japanese Super GT preparing for an assault on both the F1 championship and an attempt at winning Le Mans, a baptism of fire. I don't know how that could fit into a two hour run-time, something like that would be alluded to at the end possibly a follow-up should this movie do well at the box office then it could become a franchise like Sony were expecting. Whether or not the main elements of the gamer to racer journey doesn't carry over into a second film or not remains to be seen.

 

Former Nissan Motorsport boss Darren Cox stated on the Amazon series 'Le Mans: Racing is Everything' that he knows one day, a gamer will win both the Formula One World Championship and the 24 hours of Le Mans. The unsuccessful attempt at heading up the Nissan LMP1 effort in which Jann Mardenborough as well as another GT Academy winner Lucas Ordóñez along with a bunch of other professional drivers tackled the race in the top class, in a very untraditional front wheel drive Nissan car, the programme itself ended before it had really got going and it was such a shame.

 

The sad fact is, the reality of the situation doesn't align with what I'd hope could be told but rather than base it on one true story that hasn't quite had its moment, instead base it around so many true stories both past and present in an attempt to make a mark on the future. The reality is, we can see now that this pathway elicits pure legitimacy and I agree with Darren Cox, that we will see a gamer in our lifetime win the F1 drivers title and Le Mans, we just aren't there yet in reality. I personally would love to see this dream recognised in the form of this/these movie(s).

 

I'd love to see how the first film does if they do decide to make a franchise out of it, not that I am expecting it to be such a hit that it would warrant a sequel but it would be nice. A definite nice change of pace from the competition, I'm not into the Fast and Furious or Need For Speed films, this sounds like it would be so much more my thing. Question is though, what do you all think? Feel free to leave a comment saying something nice about this whole thing, I do genuinely want to know what you all think.

 

Oh and if you're somehow reading this Michael De Luca, Dana Brunetti, Joseph Kosinski, Jon and Erich Hoeber, all of you being in charge of this movie, I know this can be good so pen a nice script Hoeber brothers and really do try with this vision in mind. Hopefully something materialises.

 

Alright! As for the rest of you, thank you so much for reading what I have to say. If you're new here and want to see more, either follow me on Twitter @TheLucaFormat or put your email in the 'Follow By Email' option if you can see it on the right hand side of your screen.

 

Hope to have you back here soon for my next blog post. So until we meet again.
Luca.

Why I appreciate TomSka

Image courtesy of www.informationsociety.co.uk

Hello you, my name is Luca but you call me Luca. I am not ashamed to admit that I have been following online personalities for a while, some longer than others but undoubtedly the one who was the first for me, Thomas Ridgewell or better known as TomSka.

TomSka is a 27-year old writer, producer, director, actor and filmmaker as it says on his Wikipedia who gained extreme notoriety from YouTube and even before the site was created back in 2005. I first discovered him - like many people did - when my friend Matthew showed me asdfmovie, a comedy animated series that has undoubtedly garnered the majority of Ridgewell's success but alongside that, he has created sketch comedy, action videos and he has also worked on webtoons such as his own Crash Zoom and his late friend Edd Gould's series Eddsworld.

It's safe to say that I highly enjoy what he puts out into the world, but over the years I have come to realise how much as an individual he has really inspired me and taught me a lot in such a short time, and for the most part I never really realised that he had. I thought I'd put this together now, as by the end of this month (providing I do release this in February), Ridgewell will have ended his weekly video blogging series 'Last Week', which he has been doing since the back end of March 2016.

With the current landscape of YouTube personalities being all squeaky clean and disingenuous, it bothers me how we have the odd Jake Paul and Zoella who will get away with doing the most shittiest and immoral things like falsely accusing someone of assault or scam their fans as long as they suck up to YouTube and the corporate greed. Whilst not everyone is perfect, it's nice to know some people try. TomSka is the person who taught me about imperfection, about how it's okay to not force a smile for everyone.

Around 2013, Tom was still grieving the loss of his friend Edd, going through some difficult times in his life and he made a string of videos showing how he wasn't okay, and I was taken aback by this because I was still growing to realise how life was meant to live. After only watching these people who were showing themselves at their best, I aspired to be like them and would often hate myself for showing weakness, that I should always be happy and I just couldn't do it.

Ridgewell has gone through anxiety and depression as well as quite the amount of hardships, along with this he has also made some major lapses of judgement, none of which I would care to bring up in the event he may see this, but I don't think he's afraid to admit any of this. In a world where everyone tries to cover up their mistakes, and bury them and pretend it never happened, it's incredibly refreshing to see someone own up to what they've done and look forward to improve themselves. I admire that greatly. Same with his faults, he never tries to hide them and as a result, it resonates with his accepting audience who see those faults and it adds to his character, if I can quote Kristin Scott Thomas' Clementine Churchill from the new Darkest Hour movie, you are strong because you are imperfect and you are wise because you have doubts.

Another great thing Ridgewell does in comparison to his peers is treat his audience with a bit more respect and perpetuated maturity. What I mean by that is, he doesn't try to treat his audience like a collective, he hasn't called his fans the Tom Ridgewellers, I mean he did call them a collective name back in the day and realised what was happening as a result.

On one of his sketch videos, a subscriber of his wrote a perfectly harmless but critical comment and a load of the 'Turbofans' - which is what TomSka had been calling his collective fans - attacked him, and kept at him until the guy deleted his channel. Ridgewell decided at that moment to stop giving his subscriber base a collective name and just refers to them as the individual, which would stop the fans who were pouring their whole identity into this collective group and slapping that individuality onto this channel and fanbase. Considering that the groups of fans like the Phandom, the Logang, whatever they call themselves, couldn't give a shit for their respective person as anything more than just someone they fancy or want to get in a photo with no regard for their feelings, I think what Tom did was right.

There are a lot of things to really consider when looking at the landscape of YouTube but mostly when it comes to Ridgewell, it's this. He has not just shown himself at his best, he has shown himself at his worst and when I was 14 or 15 years old, I didn't realise until now how much that Tom being honest about himself really shaped a lot of my own feelings and perspective back in a time that I could not have even thought of myself as anything other than perfect 100% of the time.

Any flaw I had, I'd feel shame and whilst it's okay to carry shame for your actions because it shows you grow and regret, you should never be ashamed about who you are and for me, TomSka is the reason that I know that it's okay to not be okay all the time. In a world with pretty boys and perfect girls leading the young, impressionable and weak onto a path of falsehoods and unfulfilled fake promise, we need more TomSka's in the world to show that it's okay to be you.

Tom, in the slight chance you're reading this, I'd like to say thank you for the growing up you helped me with and the lessons I learned because of you. I am looking to meet you one day so perhaps either by then, you have read this or you are reading this as a result of me asking if you can.

Oh whilst I'm here, there has been this idea I have been wanting you to do for a comedy sketch on your main channel. Based on the Garry's Mod game mode Prop Hunt, have yourself, PewDiePie, JackSepticEye and Markiplier all as soldiers in a private hit squad, looking to take down a menace running rampant, the enemy who have disguised themselves as inanimate objects.

Maybe have the props voiced by Eddie, Elliot, Sammy etc. but keep the reveal of their ability until one of them reveals themselves as a chair or something. The big payoff though is having someone be a bottle of milk and is running away, and this quote I have taken from one of PewDiePie's videos from like 2011 or 2012 that always stuck with me. Here it is. "DIE YOU FUCKING MILK". You can have that one on me, you can credit me, I just want to see you do this.

Anyway that'll be all, thank you again Tom for being you and helping me through some difficult and confusing times by showing me just that I'm okay not being okay and not being perfect.

As for everyone else here, thank you for reading. Hope to see you all soon, and if you want to be notified of all my new blog posts, either follow me on Twitter @TheLucaFormat or put your email address in the Follow By Email option. I hope to see you all soon.

So until we meet again.
Luca.