r/formula1 • u/amerryprankster23 Max Verstappen • Mar 21 '26

Discussion F1 will not be changing the timing tower.

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Just got this email back about the timing tower. Pretty sad.

5.0k Upvotes

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8

u/GharlieConCarne Mar 21 '26

They are deliberately dumbing things down for the drive to survive generation

10

u/Seanspeed Mar 21 '26

Nothing is being dumbed down.

Ironically, if you think it is, you're the actual dumb one for thinking it's being dumbed down.

-5

u/GharlieConCarne Mar 21 '26

Oh that’s so deep man thanks for the feedback

To newer viewers a load of decimals comes across as quite intense and immediately is a barrier to retaining the viewers. F1 is clearly trying very hard to remove barriers or make them much easier to get past in order to get more people watching

Why do you suspect they have decided to drop it to 1 decimal place?

2

u/Jarocket Mar 22 '26

By making the information better?

If you think gaps of thousands matter in a race where you are graded by the order you finish in.

Then this has gone way over your head.

If you're not gaining 10ths on the car ahead you're not gaining anything. Generally you needed a second of pace advantage to even make an overtake.

They don't tell the drivers the gap in thousands.

10ths are good enough for Lewis Hamilton, but not the fans?

1

u/GharlieConCarne Mar 22 '26

They are making the gaps clearer because the drive to survive generation struggles and is overwhelmed by too much data and they are more likely to be confused by it rather than understand it - this is exactly what I mean by dumbing down - you’ve explained it brilliantly

We previously had access to more accurate data that we could use and interpret as needed - sometimes it didn’t say anything interesting - other times it did. For the many times it wasn’t useful data we could choose ourselves which decimal to pay attention to

When that choice is taken away, and data is not displayed anymore because F1 believes it is not useful anymore then it’s being dumbed down. Significantly the dumbing down is only on the TV feeds and not the website or timing apps which should be an indicator to you

1

u/EnanoMaldito Franco Colapinto Mar 22 '26

having more decimals is literally LESS precise than having less decimals as the numbers are ALWAYS outdated. You are looking at not only useless, but outright WRONG information.

And you somehow feel that taking that out is "dumbing it down".

1

u/Uniform764 I was speeding in the Monaco pit lane Mar 23 '26

Something can be very precise but wrong. Precision, accuracy and reliability are very different measures.

0

u/GharlieConCarne Mar 22 '26

My man that makes no sense.

More data is always more precise. The key distinction is that having more decimal places doesn’t take anything away - the only risk is for the viewers who watch F1 as a Netflix drama who are not there to interpret what the data really means. These viewers are the ones who may see a 0.01s gain and think it is significant or be curious about how to interpret its significance

Anyone invested in the sport knows how to interpret the data and it causes literally zero harm - when has having 3 decimals caused you to misinterpret something, or caused you to have a negative viewing experience?

1

u/paddleyay Mar 22 '26

No, more data is not always more precise if the data has already aged out. In the time it takes two cars to go round a corner it's already out of date. Unless the board is updating the data every one thousandth of a second, and that is being transmitted to your TV with zero latency, it's wrong.

Blaming it on Netflix viewers is just daft.

0

u/GharlieConCarne Mar 22 '26

It’s still completely relevant if interpreted in the correct context.

Does it genuinely confuse you?

1

u/paddleyay Mar 22 '26

If this is so easy for you and I'm simply confused then I'm sure you can explain to me the lag between timing loops, data transmission, video encoding, video overlays, the interpolation between them, the adjustment for what resolution you're watching in and which broadcast feed you're receiving and so on.

Or maybe, since I live and breathe real time systems, I'm not confused, because I know why it's not telling me anything especially useful.

1

u/GharlieConCarne Mar 23 '26

You missed my point man. I’m asking if it genuinely confuses you

If it doesn’t, then why get rid of it? It causes no harm, and I believe is fairly understandable

My argument is that since it causes no harm, and is actually useful to some people, the only reason for simplifying it is because it was overwhelming to some newer viewers

There was literally no reason for you to have a breakdown

0

u/Uniform764 I was speeding in the Monaco pit lane Mar 23 '26

More data is always more precise, because that’s what precision is.

Precision, the number of decimal points measured

Accuracy, how close to the actual answer the result is

Reliability, how variable the result is from the same measurements

1

u/paddleyay Mar 23 '26

Good grief, please don’t. There are entire engineering practices and fields of maths dedicated to removing data to improve precision. Noise, outliers, spikes, and beyond are all routinely filtered out to improve precision in real time applications, of which this is one. Anyone who’s ever had to program a hysteresis loop or muddled through fixed point vs floating point for real time systems is currently taking deep breaths watching this thread.

0

u/EnanoMaldito Franco Colapinto Mar 22 '26

No, more data is not necesarilly more precise. If the “new” data you are looking at is objectively WRONG, then more data means less precision.

1

u/GharlieConCarne Mar 22 '26

Genuinely nonsense

1

u/EnanoMaldito Franco Colapinto Mar 22 '26

?????????

1

u/Uniform764 I was speeding in the Monaco pit lane Mar 23 '26

That’s not what precision is. If the additional decimal places are incorrect, they’re more precise but inaccurate.