Crashes in Motorsport- Entertainment or Necessary Evil?
Are crashes in Motorsport highlights or lowlights?
Formula 1 Driver Daniel Ricciardo has heavily criticised the sport’s portrayal of crashes from the 2020 season, citing its coverage as insensitive:
“I think last year, F1 put on their social channels, like, ‘top 10 moments of the year’ or something, and eight of the 10 were crashes. I was just like, you guys are fucking idiots. Maybe 12-year-old kids want to see that kind of content, and that’s cool because they don’t know any better, but we’re not kids. Just do better, guys. Do better than that.”
Ricciardo, amongst other drivers, was also highly critical of the broadcasting coverage of Romain Grosjean’s horror crash at last year’s Bahrain GP - from which the Frenchman miraculously emerged with only second degree burns despite the car piercing a metal barrier and erupting into a fireball.
The crash footage was replayed time and time again, and was heavily dramatised by Netflix in Season 3 of ‘Drive to Survive’.
We are fortunate to live in a world where the ingenuity of humankind has led to enormous advances in motorsport safety, and serious injuries and fatalities are now rare, but motorsport remains highly dangerous.
So does Ricciardo have a point? Have we become insensitive to the danger that drivers put themselves through - and is F1 morally wrong to promote crashes as a tool for reaching out to fans?
Ricciardo’s Thoughts Dissected
The video Ricciardo refers to was released by the official F1 YouTube account, titled ‘Top 10 Dramatic Moments of the 2021 F1 Season’. It has amassed almost 3 million views - more than any videos on the channel since with the exception of qualifying and race highlights from the 2021 season opener in Bahrain.
Six of the 10 moments are in fact crashes, with Grosjean’s horror shunt ranked at number 1. So whilst Ricciardo’s comment slightly exaggerates the number of crashes, his point that F1 was promoting crashes as some of the most ‘dramatic’ moments of the season is certainly valid.
F1 also posted a separate video - ‘The 10 Most Dramatic Crashes of the 2020 F1 season’ - which has amassed 2.2 million YouTube views and well and truly proves that the sport’s ownership perceives crashes as an integral part of the entertainment factor that makes fans switch on the TV on a Sunday afternoon and buy a race ticket. And judging by the number of views on both videos, the fans do, too.
Has F1 Crossed a Moral Line?
One of the first visible changes to the sport following its acquisition by Liberty Media group was a rebrand, including a new F1 theme for the 2018 season. Written by Brian Tyler, the theme was released with an accompanying video designed to encapsulate the drama and passion of the sport.
The video uses numerous major crashes of recent history, including the thirteen car collision at Belgium in 1998, and whilst it doesn’t feature any fatal crashes it does show the impact of Mika Hakkinen’s 1995 shunt that left him in a coma with a fractured skull (which he fully recovered from). Images of Michael Schumacher in tears at a press conference, and a despondent Williams mechanic in 1994 gear also alludes to the crash that tragically killed Ayrton Senna in that same season.
F1 clearly has established boundaries in terms of crashes and broadcasting, though. Jules Bianchi’s fatal crash in 2014 - the only death in the sport since Senna - was never shown on broadcast (live nor replayed).
Similarly, there was no broadcasted footage of Grosjean’s incident until he was seen conscious and talking in the medical car, having extracted himself from the burning inferno and proven that he had not suffered a major injury. It was the replaying of the incident in the hiatus between the race stopping and restarting that Ricciardo and other drivers were so displeased by:
“I’m disgusted and disappointed with Formula One for showing or choosing the way to show it as they did, and broadcast replays after replays after replays of the fire, and his car split in half…Why do we need to see this? We’re competing again in an hour. His family has to keep watching that. All our families have to keep watching that ... It’s really unfair. It’s not entertainment.”
How Should we View Crashes?
Crashes will always be a part of motorsport, and there is certainly an ingrained culture around a collision being an integral part of its appeal. This heralds from decades gone by in which drivers were considered gladiators, putting their life on the line every time they got in the car in the pursuit of ultimate glory.
It’s hard to see this culture changing - not necessarily because it is so ingrained, but because the unexpected nature of a crash can be so shocking yet exciting.
There is certainly a base level of sensitivity that broadcasters should adhere to, especially when the driver is yet to emerge from the cockpit or let the team know that they are ok on the radio. It’s widely considered that the extensive broadcasted replays in the immediate aftermath of Grosjean’s incident were insensitive to the drivers that had to get back in their cars and restart the race on the same circuit.
But it’s hard to argue that crashes should not be utilised in some respect as part of the allure of motorsport.
They are an unavoidable narrative in history, and when they occur are more often than not an important part of a race - not only does it likely result in the retirement of the driver/s from the race, but also can trigger a safety car that has significant implications for strategy.
With Ricciardo’s comments about the YouTube video portraying crashes in a different way, it’s hard to know where a moral line should be drawn. But F1 clearly has drawn its own line which doesn’t go as far as Ricciardo would wish - and with no sign of a change of approach, it’s not a debate that shows no sign of going away.
