BBC Sport Online outlines the changes made by Formula One bosses aimed at making the sport a better spectacle.

1. Qualifying

2. Points

3. Team orders

4. Testing

5. Tyres

Qualifying

For the first time in Formula One history, drivers will have only one lap to determine their grid position.

The single hour-long qualifying session on Saturday afternoon has been dumped in favour of two sessions, one on Friday and one on Saturday.

The format of these sessions has also been changed - cars will now go out one at a time for a single run rather than have a maximum of four attempts at any time during the session.

Cars will go out one at a time in qualifying

The times set on Friday will not count for the grid, but will define the order in which cars qualify on Saturday afternoons.

The drivers will go out in championship order on Friday, with the series leader first. At the first race of the season, the previous year's championship positions will be used.

The cars will then go out in reverse order on Saturday, with the fastest from Friday going out last, the second fastest second last and so on.

The change could lead to more exciting racing as a driver who makes a mistake on a qualifying lap could line up for the race behind slower cars.

However, it could also play to Michael Schumacher's advantage - the German is the best in F1 at reaching the limit of his car on his first flying lap "from cold".

Points

Winning the race will no longer be as big an advantage as it used to be because the difference between first and second place will now be two points rather than four.

The winner will still get 10 points, but the runner-up will now get eight points, rather than six as before.

The hope is that this will keep the championship alive for longer than is the case at the moment.

The points will be extended down to eighth place rather than sixth.

The points will now be 10, eight, six, five, four, three, two, one for first to eighth places.

Team orders

Team orders have been restricted by a new rule, following the controversy over Ferrari's manipulation of race results this season.

Schumacher was gifted victory in Austria

The rules now say that "team orders which interfere with the race result will be prohibited".

In theory, this will prevent a repeat of this year's Austrian Grand Prix, when Ferrari ordered Rubens Barrichello to hand the win to team-mate Michael Schumacher.

However, it remains to be seen how easy it will be to police the rule - teams are likely to be more careful about concealing any intra-team tactics in the future.

Testing

In an attempt to restrict testing and save money, teams who submit to a voluntary reduction in testing during the season will be allowed two hours of extra practice at races.

This will be introduced if at least three teams agree to it by 15 December this year.

If so, then those teams will get extra running on Friday mornings before practice starts at 1100 as long as they agree to do no more than 10 days' testing between 1 March and 1 November.

These teams will also be able to run a third car and driver in this extra session.

This could give teams extra time to familiarise themselves with the circuits - but it is unlikely to be taken up by the top teams, who will view private testing as more important.

Tyres

The rules on tyre supply have been freed up dramatically.

Tyre suppliers will now be allowed to bring two sets of tyres for each of their contracted teams.

This replaces the previous rule which restricted tyre companies to just two types of tyres for all their teams.

The new rule means that tyre companies will be able to tailor tyres to each of their best teams - which would reduce one of the advantages held by Ferrari in 2002.

Their tyre supplier Bridgestone was able to make tyres specifically for Ferrari because they were the Japanese company's only top team.

By contrast, Michelin had to satisfy both McLaren and Williams, forcing them to make compromises in tyre design.

Less technology means a better show for the fans and that has to be good, says Maurice Hamilton

Sunday January 19, 2003
The Observer

The self centered attitude of the leading grand-prix teams bit them on their expensive bottoms on Wednesday, when a failure to agree on methods of cost-cutting resulted in the FIA doing it for them. Max Mosley, president of the sport's governing body, shook the teams to the core with measures that will reduce technological input and change tactical thinking.

Whether this will make much difference to the actual racing remains to be seen but there can be no doubt that Mosley has achieved his aim of bringing down expenditure from its current over-inflated level. Had he not done so, the possibility of losing just one more team would have brought serious trouble as F1 failed to meet its contractual obligation of a minimum of 20 starters.

The largest savings will come from the elimination of driver aids such as traction control, launch control and fully automatic gearboxes. It may not be possible to implement this at such short notice - the season starts on 9 March - but the ban will definitely come into force next year. Emphasis will be returned to the driver rather than the software specialists, the downside being that many of the electronic experts will find themselves redundant, victims of a technology that had been allowed to accelerate faster than the cars it controlled.

In the short term, competitors must adapt a completely different strategy on race weekends. For the first time in any form of circuit racing, the teams will not be allowed to work on the cars between the end of qualifying on Saturday and the start of the race 24 hours later. There may be exceptions such as the rebuilding of damaged cars that might otherwise miss the race. The use of spare cars will be reduced to similarly exceptional circumstances, all of these measures designed to prevent the construction of racers with small fuel tanks, radiators and brakes specially designed for the single lap of qualifying that will establish a driver's grid position. One estimate suggested that such a car could cost £300,000.

The 30-minute warm-up on race morning is also likely to go, the teams having to make do with 15 minutes of running immediately before the grand prix. In the race itself, the driver will be very much on his own thanks to the absence of telemetry transmitting information to and from his car and, more fundamentally, a ban on radio transmissions that will call for the driver to think more for himself and rely completely on messages on his pit signalling board.

The irony is that all of the foregoing favours Michael Schumacher and Ferrari. The world champion has enough spare mental capacity, even while driving flat out, to formulate tactics as the race progresses. Similarly, the key to the first few grands prix will be adapting quickly to the new circumstances, a situation that will suit the more professional and experienced of the 10 teams.

After recovering from the initial shock, most of the teams had accepted the changes even if the various technical departments are understandably unhappy about what they see as a retrograde step. The fact remains that the spectators and casual viewers could not care less about what lies beneath the skin of a racing car so long as it actually engages in racing.

The competition may turn out to be no closer but at least there are far more variables for the teams and drivers to deal with. Mosley may have thrown F1 into reverse in terms of technology but, unlike the teams, he has done something positive about prompting F1's viewing figures to begin accelerating once more.

07 March 2003

Peter Sauber spoke for most people this afternoon when he said: "The new qualifying mode ran smoothly, gave the crowd a good show, and was good for Formula One. "

The field was released in 2002 championship-finishing order, but first-out Michael Schumacher suffered from a slippery track and was beaten by next man out Rubens Barrichello. The Brazilian’s 1 min 26.372 secs time then remained unbeaten for the rest of the session.

"It's a new experience but there are no points and it doesn't get you a good grid position," the Brazilian said.

Next was Kimi Raikkonen on 1m 26.551s, despite pushing too hard and running wide in the first corner. David Coulthard was only sixth, feeling that the new format was a bit flat. "One run, and it's over," the Scot said.

After a disastrous morning with dual engine failures (for different reasons), the new BAR Hondas starred. Jenson Button was initially fourth fastest time before being pushed down by his flying team-mate Jacques Villeneuve. BMW Williams’ drivers were less happy. Juan Pablo Montoya said his car lacked speed, while Ralf Schumacher screwed up the first sector, and said his car was "mega-nervous, with lots of understeer in slow corners."

The qualifying order will now be reversed for Saturday afternoon's grid-forming session.

09 March 2003

Though the implementation of new rules for the 2003 season have not been universally popular among the competing teams - McLaren and Williams are taking the FIA to arbitration - everyone has agreed to make the best out of the regulations for the Australian, Malaysian and Brazilian races.

"I don't think you can say we have been positive," Ferrari's Jean Todt admitted. "On behalf of Ferrari we were more in favour of no change and I think it's quite understandable: why should we ask for some changes considering the 2002 season? But saying that, we wanted to avoid any controversy and we feel that what has been finally agreed is the maximum we could accept even if with some points we don't feel very comfortable about."

"I think Jean alluded to the fact that I think we all feel that there is a necessity to look to these three races," Ron Dennis said. "I think the FIA has agreed to look at the whole thing, three races from now, and see if things have worked that we should adopt in a more structured way and things that maybe haven't worked that we should consider changing. And I think if there is that openness then perhaps the controversy that surrounds the lead up to this race can be best tempered."

The single-qualifying lap seems popular enough, but there have been calls for the regulations about qualifying with a race fuel load to be abandoned.

21 March 2003

FIA president Max Mosley, who has not travelled to the Malaysian Grand Prix, says that Formula One's new rules were successful in Australia.

"It is important not to confuse the new rules (single-lap qualifying, only one wet tyre, two dry tyres per team) with the new procedures introduced on 15 January. The new rules were voted in October by the Formula One commission. They were intended, among other things, to maker the grid less predictable and they certainly did this in Melbourne, because only the two Ferraris and Juan Pablo Montoya were where you might expect them to be on the grid.

"Human error combined with the new rules. The changes to qualifying made it more likely a driver will end up at the wrong end of the grid, and many did. On top of that, two major teams chose the wrong type of tyre. These problems, combined with a damp track and the errors during the race, did the rest."

Responding to the suggestion that the rule requiring teams to start the race with the same fuel load they ended qualifying with prevents anyone seeing ultimately fast laps, Mosley said: "True, but now we have single-lap qualifying you won't see this even if they run with minimal fuel. With single-lap qualifying the driver must avoid an 'off', he must not even get the car out of shape. This is because a few tenths can be several rows on the grid."

21 March 2003

Max Mosley also confirmed that there will be a review of the new rules after the first three races. "The team managers and technical directors will meet Charlie Whiting on 9 April to review the detailed workings of our procedures in the light of experience at the first three races," he said. "We have invited the team principals to a meeting on 11 April to consider the outcome of Charlie's meeting and discuss whether any procedural changes appear necessary."

After the Australian Grand Prix there has been general acceptance that single-lap qualifying works well and adds a new dimension to the show, but there was less enthusiasm for the rule that cars must race with a similar level of fuel to qualifying. Some team principals said that they felt that it is unnecessarily confusing for the race fans, both those trackside and those watching at home on television.

Mosley's comments did not appear to hold out much hope for actual changes in the regulations themselves, however.

"The rules (as opposed to procedures) cannot be changed during the season without unanimous agreement and I think most of the teams will feel we need more time to see the full effect of the new rules. After all, they were only voted last October."