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Ecclestone wonders if F1's upcoming turbo V6s should get augmented sound [w/videos]

While every team on the Formula One grid is worried about making a good showing in this year's championship at the same time as they develop a brand-new car for next year's championship, Bernie Ecclestone and F1 circuit promoters have a different concern: how next year's cars will sound. The current cars use 2.4-liter, naturally-aspirated V8s that can reach 18,000 revolutions per minute and employ dual exhaust, next year's engine formula calls for 1.4-liter turbocharged V6s that are capped at 15,000 rpm and are constrained to a single exhaust outlet. Ecclestone and promoters like Ron Walker believe the new engines sound like lawnmowers and that the less thrilling audio will keep people from coming to races. If Walker's Australian Grand Prix really is shelling out almost $57 million to hold the race, every ticket counts. As a fix, according to a report in Autoweek, Ecclestone "suggests that the only way to guarantee [a good sound] may be to artificially adjust the tone of the V6s."
However, neither the manufacturers nor the governing body of F1, the FIA, think there will be a problem. Ecclestone fears that if the manufacturers "don't get it right" they'll simply leave the sport, but the only three carmakers and engine builders left next year, Renault (its 2014 "power unit" is pictured), Mercedes-Benz and Ferrari are so embedded that it would stretch belief to think they'd leave the table over an audio hiccup - if said hiccup even occurs. And frankly, these issues always precede changes to engine formulas, as they did when the formula switched from V10 to V8; fans, though, are probably less focused on the engines and more on the mandated standardization of the sport and the spec-series overtones that have come with it.
No one knows yet what next year's engines will sound like, but we've assembled a few videos below to help us all start guessing. The first is an engine check on an Eighties-era John Player Special Renault with a 1.5-liter V6 turbo, after that is Ayrton Senna qualifying in 1986 in the Lotus 98T that also had a 1.5-liter V6 turbo, then you'll find a short with a manufactured range of potential V6 engine notes, and then the sound of turbocharged V6 Indycars testing last year at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Any, or none of them, could be Formula One's future.

Lewis Hamilton blasts to pole position for British Grand Prix

SILVERSTONE, England - Lewis Hamilton took pole position for his home British Grand Prix for the third year in a row on Saturday with a sensational lap that left him one step away from Michael Schumacher's Formula One record. Hamilton's championship-leading Ferrari rival Sebastian Vettel, who has a 20-point advantage after nine of 20 races, qualified third. The Mercedes driver was half a second quicker than Ferrari's second placed Kimi Raikkonen and his time of one minute 26.600 seconds was so outrageously quick there were gasps before the crowd erupted. "I always try to leave the best to last," the Briton told retired champion Jenson Button in post-qualifying interviews on the grid. "I had to make sure I got that lap in. I couldn't do it last weekend (in Austria) so I made sure I could here." Hamilton still faced a nervous wait after race stewards announced they were investigating an incident involving French driver Romain Grosjean, who complained he had been blocked earlier in the session. They swiftly decided to take no further action. The Briton's mastery of a damp but drying track lit up an overcast afternoon and the pole was the 67th of his career, sixth of the season, and gave him every chance of equalling Schumacher's record 68 before the August break. The triple world champion has won the last three British Grands Prix and can equal the late Jim Clark's feat of four home wins in a row, and five in total, on Sunday. Saturday ensured he has already matched Clark's 50-year-old record of five British Grand Prix pole positions. "I feel amazing in front of a great crowd like this. I hope you liked the lap," Hamilton told the grandstands full of cheering fans. "I generally like it to be dry, but I like it when the conditions are tricky." Hamilton's Finnish team mate Valtteri Bottas, winner in Austria, was fourth fastest but has a five-place penalty following a gearbox change. That promoted Red Bull's Dutch teenager Max Verstappen, who has suffered five retirements in the last seven races, to the second row. Renault's Nico Hulkenberg and his former Force India team mate Sergio Perez filled the third row. There was good news for beleaguered McLaren, who raised a cheer when Fernando Alonso made the most of improving conditions to set the fastest time in the first phase of qualifying, with Belgian Stoffel Vandoorne qualifying ninth.

McLaren F1 boss says team will dethrone Mercedes

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