Given that it is an off week and I've been reading some of the Baku reaction, I thought now might be an interesting time to give my 2 cents on "how to fix F1", which seems to be a popular topic of conversation in the last little while. I saw it more so in the offseason but it still comes up all the time.
There are only a few of us that actually post here but I'd be curious if anyone else has thoughts on the topic.
I'll try and be somewhat brief in each point but that'll mean I won't fully flesh out all of my thoughts. Let's just assume that most ideas would need some working out and some may not be viable at all except in a dream world.
EDIT: Ended up being kind of long so I put it under spoiler tags.
Spoiler!
Problem: Management of the sport is all messed up.
Solution: Get rid of Bernie, first off. Man is a total cancer. Then find a way to get new ownership. CVC and their ilk are milking F1 for all it is worth. They have more in common with FIFA and the IOC than they do with the Premiere League, NFL, NBA, NHL. That is to say CVC doesn't give a crap about the sustainability, they just want to take out every last penny of profit and then sell it down the road. They aren't interested in the health and viability of the sport or the teams over the long term.
Then get some real management that will work with the FIA and the team/drivers associations to ensure that the money is reinvested back into the sport. Make it profitable to host races and stop leaving the smaller teams to go bankrupt to compete. Make watching and following the sport easier. Give better access to teams and drivers. Stop holding tracks and cities hostage (thanks Bernie) and forcing them to spend hundreds of millions in blood money just to host a race.
Hopefully this would kill a number of problems. Folding teams, pay drivers, lack of performance convergence, major auto manufacturers staying away from the sport.
Problem: Cars are boring.
Solution: This one I legit think is easy. Unfortunately they seem to be going the other direction.
Reduce aero packages to make the cars more difficult to drive and reduce dirty air. Allow cars to follow more closely without ruining their grip levels or tire wear. Nascar recently did this and the drivers love it.
Find a better solution than the hideous looking halo for head protection.
Have Pirelli develop tires that have clear steps between performance and have the faster tires have a clearly quicker drop off rate.
Problem: Tracks are boring and in the wrong countries.
Solution: Twofold. First, along the lines of the first point I made, have ownership and FOM actually care about growing their audience and not just accepting huge payments and bribes from authoritarian regimes with awful human rights records.
Second, develop the tracks to be safe but less forgiving. I think a track like Montreal is safe, it just also doesn't have 100 foot concrete runoff areas at every turn. If gravel isn't safe enough and a wall isn't desirable for safety reasons then find something else that is punishing to runoff into.
Obviously growing it in NA would be great for us. More exposure, better times (for us and for europe; canada always gets great ratings because it is on in primetime), easier to attend races, easier to buy merch lol.
I don't have an issue expanding into new territory, just don't do it into such horrible places. Korea, India, a non-oppressive middle eastern country (those exist right?) are all ok with me. I'm even sort of ok with Russia. Just get rid of places like Azerbaijan, Abu Dhabi and Bahrain.
The devastating split of Indycar in the mid 90s proves that people will go elsewhere. Indy used to be big. Now it is all about Nascar and Indy is failing despite having entertaining races (their hideous cars don't help but I digress). The sporting landscape is crazy competitive. F1 needs to quickly adapt and modernize their business model. The teams, especially Ferrari, Mercedes and Red Bull need to stop trying to fix the sport in their favor and actively screw the smaller teams into financial ruin or in 10 years they will be the only 3 teams competing anymore. Winning is great but, to use Game of Thrones terminology, sometimes I wonder if they are like Littlefinger and would be happy to burn the kingdom to the ground, just to be king of the ashes. They need to realize that increased competition and marketability will improve their financial situation. By withholding competition and development they are helping themselves maintain a monopoly on the front of the grid but are jeopardizing the sport as a whole.