The 2017 Formula One Season: How Will It Be?

It might seem that we have only another month left of the 2016 formula one season, and still the world championship has to be decided between Lewis Hamilton and his AMG Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg. But there is a big question in the back of everyone’s mind about what will happen for the following season.

This could be an article that would have to be written at the conclusion of the year, but it is close enough to realize that the cars, and some of the management will be replaced, and whether or not this is going to change the decline of the sport, still has to be decided.

The safety of the drivers and how much protection they have is in doubt as well, simply due to the decision to initiate the debut of the Halo safety system, which to half of the drivers of the grid, have quite a lot of disapproval of how it operates. The idea was to have this in place by the start of 2017, but the disagreement of some of the drivers is making this opportunity to do this less likely.

Everyone will expect that the new takeover by the Liberty Media Group will make the sport much different, and the crazy suggestions by current head Bernie Ecclestone is beginning to get to journalists and drivers alike, where there is a good possibility that Ecclestone himself will step down completely, instead of waiting three more years to what his contract will be with his new bosses.

Not only the F.O.M has a new change, but so does the federation that runs formula one, the F.I.A. The eventual retirement of race starter Charlie Whiting and the eventual departure coming up of Herbie Blash, makes it considerable that new blood will be incoming and with Laurent Mekies, who was the former chief engineer at Toro Rosso coming to replace Blash, the changes have begun in earnest. However, now the rumor coming around is that former Mercedes director Ross Brawn has decided that he is getting tired of his retirement of fishing and might want to return not as another chance at race director of a formula one team, but to lead the new Liberty Group as possibly as a new technical lead could be very promising, and it could look very different in the way the sport heads towards as the senior men who might have decided that their time in the chair could only be for relaxing and sitting.

The real question is how are the cars going to perform?? The AMG Mercedes Team have dominated the scene since 2014, when the regulations for the newer Hybrid engine began, and while this group have been successful, the Renault, Honda and Ferrari power plants have improved, but never to the quality of the German ones. The different wheels and the wider chassis of the new cars have only been tested on the bigger rubber, but it will be really and fully be done when everything is ready to go for the first winter tests in January in either Bahrain or Barcelona, Spain.

So plenty of things to think about for next season. So when the flag drops for the last time in Abu Dhabi next month, there will be either a new champion or one that will win it for the fourth time. And following that, new ideas will be going afterwards that will make all of the factories of the racing teams have a very busy off year.

Mark Gero

Mark Gero has written formula one racing stories since 2002 on the Internet for such sites as Motorsport.com, Racing Information Service News and for a brief time at the Munich Eye newspaper in Munich, Germany along with Autoweek online. Mark also has a diploma in journalism from the London School of Journalism in London, England and in addition a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from Ashford University in Clinton, Iowa.

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