MARK GALLAGHER @_markgallagher
WHEN MORE ISN’T BETTER
Formula 1’s a serious business. If it’s laughs you’re looking for I can recommend avoiding official press conferences, media briefings and interviews in the pen, where serious interviewers come up with serious questions to ask drivers who would rather be having a massage.
While the Irish comedian Conor Moore can raise a laugh with his clever impersonations of drivers and team principals, F1 isn’t a popular topic with mainstream comedians. David Mitchell, star of TV comedies including The Mitchell & Webb Look, Upstart Crow and Would I Lie to You, positively hates it. So incensed was he by the boredom caused by watching the 2008 Canadian Grand Prix that he wrote a column about it in The Guardian.
“Televised Formula 1 is the most eloquent answer to the question, ‘What sport could possibly be more of a turn-off than horse racing?’” he wrote, describing the pinnacle of world motorsport as ‘televised traffic’.
“The only F1 season I remember following was the one where Nigel Mansell became world champion purely as a result of having a better car than anyone else,” he bemoaned, comparing it to, “Monty Panesar [having] such an amazing cricket bat that, every time he tried to hit the ball, it went for six despite his limitations as a batsman.”
My response to that was the only time I’ve ever written in to The Guardian.
Fast forward to April this year and F1 finally warranted another outing on national media. This time on BBC Radio 4’s satirical news programme The Now Show presented by comedians Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis.
Their proposition is that, as sport becomes increasingly hijacked to feed media companies’ demands to provide 24/7 entertainment to customers, the main event becomes diluted.
“Twenty years ago coverage started 20 minutes before the race with a quick summary of qualifying and a look at the grid,” said Dennis.
“Now it’s ‘Join us for race weekend! It all kicks off Wednesday with a full preview and interviews, then don’t miss practice for pre-practice at 5pm, then on Thursday
