Determined to spice up - or dumb down, depending on one's point of view - F1's powers-that-be were seeking to change the qualifying format at a number of events, understood to be the French, Belgian and Russian races, next season.

However, while most of the teams were in favour of the idea, two teams were against it, and with unanimity needed the proposal was rejected.

"The current governance system means we need unanimity to carry any decisions through to next year," said F1, managing director, Ross Brawn, according to the official F1 website. "The teams initially said they would agree with it and then two teams put their hand up at the last meeting and said they wouldn't agree with it.

"We wanted to try a small number of races in 2020, a different format where, on a Saturday it was a reverse-grid format based on championship order and that short-format race would determine the grid order for the final race.

"I thought it was a fascinating contest," he admitted. "The drivers were a little bit nervous, which I can understand, but we were just asking for the opportunity for three races to try the format.

"If it doesn't work, we put our hands up; if it does work, great. If it's something in between, we can work with that just to help us develop the format of racing, and it's frustrating that we've not been able to do that but I think that's, unfortunately, the classic problem with F1."

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READERS COMMENTS

1. Posted by elsiebc, 31/10/2019 5:05

"I went to a local 1/8 mile dirt track this season and witnessed one feature's grid decided this way: The driver's stood in finishing order of the heat races. The first driver pulled a number out of a hat and that number represented a starting position. He then had to decide which driver he wanted to assign it to. This was repeated until each driver pulled a number and presented it to one of their competitors.

I think a system like that would be great for F1! It could be televised on Saturday and it would make the drivers much more personable. The drama will bring on board more female fans and others who don't care for mechanical things and who would rather watch "The Bachelor". The teams would save important high stress mileage on the engines without having qualifying so that they could eventually realize their goal of one power unit per decade, and the road relevance that would bring. "

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2. Posted by C5, 28/10/2019 3:02

"So 20% of teams still have an ounce of sanity left. That's better than i thought..."

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3. Posted by USA1, 27/10/2019 15:48

"The problem with today’s F1 is like governments everything is over regulated, all these things should be up to the fans, let them decide what they wanna see personally I would like to see a budget cap and leave everything else open, may the best team win within the budget!!"

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4. Posted by DRAGON F1, 27/10/2019 15:18

"I would imagine that both Mercedes and Ferrari were against this totally daft idea of reverse grids, just for the sake of entertainment and nothing much else!

To be totally honest, I was very surprised that some 'intelligent' people within F1, such as Ross Brawn would even give this stupid idea a second thought, because as far as I'm concerned, people suggesting any kind of reverse grid in F1 does not understand that F1 is a totally competitive sport and with the top teams spending around half a billion dollars and more annually!!

Some people just don't seem to understand that it would be totally wrong and stupid for the commercial rights holder to then switch the grid around just for the sake of entertainment!! "

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5. Posted by kenji, 27/10/2019 12:57

"Why doesn't Pitpass say who the teams were? Obviously Brawn doesn't have the bottle. I would hazard a guess and say that it was either Mercedes in concert with Ferrari or else one of the majors plus a compliant satellite/B team. Either way democracy doesn't get a look in when these majors call the shots and use their weight to crush any competition on and off the track."

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6. Posted by Anthony, 27/10/2019 11:25

"Thank goodness for the two teams who rejected this proposal"

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Brawn: Two teams blocked reverse grid proposal

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