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Annotated Bibliography

How has safety and technology impacted the sport of Formula 1 throughout history and what is
to come in the future?

Veronica Shoemaker
Professor Malcolm Campbell
English 1103
October 16, 2016

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Annotated Bibliography
21st Century. Formula 1. N.p., n.d. Web. 7 Oct. 2016.
This website is the official Formula 1 website. It has up to date race recaps and current
events, along with interesting articles about the history of the sport. This site is equipped
with driver interviews and video clips of different races and practice sessions. One of the
articles I found on this site lists every safety advance, rule change, and penalty that has
been implemented in Formula 1 since the 1950s. It has the year that each advance was
suggested or put into play and a detailed explanation about it. The advances vary from the
introduction of roll over bars to the height of the safer barrier walls surrounding the track.
Other features of this website include a full list of every race ever run, and the driver who
won it. Along with phenomenal photographs and articles, it has the full set of F1 rules
and regulations so the fans and press can better understand what is going on at the track
and in the garage area. Since this is the official Formula 1 website, it is extremely
reliable. It is run by people who work directly for the sport itself, so I know all of the
information I am getting from it is up to date and accurate. This website is a news source
for fans, the media, and even the teams and drivers themselves. It is extremely helpful
because it lists the rules and regulations, so people like me, who know very little about
how the sport is run can better understand what is going on. I plan on using this site
frequently because it gives the list of all of the new technology implemented in the sport
over the years and the exact year that it was put into practice. It is going to be a website I
plan on visiting often throughout the course of my research this semester.

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Lippi, Giuseppe, G. L. Salvagno, Massimo Franchini, and Gian Cesare Guidi. " Changes in
technical regulations and drivers' safety in top-class motor sports." British Journal of
Sports Medicine. 9 Oct. 2007. Web. 15 Oct. 2016.
This academic journal compares the dangers and fatalities between two types of
motorsports: motorcycling and Formula 1. It talks about a few significant wrecks and
deaths in Formula 1 that made safety a new priority. The authors express throughout
much of this piece that one of the major dangers of the sport is the speed, and they
suggest how to reduce it and better protect drivers in the future. They suggest that A
potentially effective measure would be to further increase the weight and reduce engine
power, which may encourage manufacturers to build more robust cockpits and slower
competition vehicles. As a way to slow speeds. They also briefly cover some of the
recent advances like the minimum size of the impact-absorbing structure and the
mandatory HANS device, used to protect the drivers necks and heads. However, they
believe that the restrictions introduced over the past 10 years (prior to 2007) have been
overall ineffective. The authors of this journal used many reliable references like the
official Formula One website and other Medical journals. The main author, Giuseppe
Lippi, was a science major at the University of Verona, Italy. Unfortunately, I could not
find much about the other authors on this article, except for the fact that they have
published many articles in this Medical Journal. This piece was written for the fans and
people in the racing industry to prove that all of the new rules and the safety advances
have not been as effective as many think. This source may be used as an opposition to my
other sources that all state that the safety advances have done wonders for the drivers and
teams. It has some specific crashes that I can use to talk about why change needed to

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happen in the early years of the sport. I only plan to reference this work briefly because it
does not fully support my argument, but it can help me ultimately argue my point.
PRESS, THE CANADIAN. "Close call for Villeneuve: Walks away from crash practising for
same race that killed his father." Standard, The (St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada). 29
Aug. 1998, Final, Sports: A10. NewsBank. Web. 13 Oct. 2016.
This article is a brief summary of Jacques Villeneuves weekend at the Belgium Grand
Prix. It is explained that Villeneuve had a bad crash during practice for the Belgium
Grand Prix, the same race his father had a fatal crash in, 16 years earlier. The driver was
interviewed after the accident and explained what happened and that he is okay. Driver
Mika Hakkinen had a similar crash during practice for that race as well. It is explained
that he hit a wet section and slid. Both of these drivers were able to walk away from
these wrecks with just a few scratches and bruises. Standard, The is a news source that
sheds light on many stories including those in the motorsports industry. The authors
audience is the papers loyal readers, and any other motorsports fan looking for a recap of
the previous weekend. I could not find an exact author on the piece so I am not sure how
accurate or reliable they may be. Although there is not a ton of information about the
wreck itself, I plan on using this to show that a driver walked away unharmed from a
wreck at a track that killed his father years earlier. It helps to prove that some of the
advances at the tracks and in the cars have actually made a difference. I really like the
quote from Veteran driver Michael Schumacher in this article where he states:
"Villeneuve's accident was a big one and it proved that safety standards have improved a
great deal,". Schumacher is a driver who has been around the sport a long time, and he
has been given the reputation as one of the most influential men in F1. If he says the

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safety has improved, it means the safety really has improved substantially. I plan to use
this quote to prove that the older drivers who have seen the sport change completely will
argue that it has become safer than it was before.
Varma, Vineet. "A matter of life and death: Five infamous crashes in Formula One history."
Daily News & Analysis (India). 8 Oct. 2014, SPORTS. NewsBank. Web. 10 Oct.
2016.
This article From an Indian news stations lists the 5 most substantial crashes in Formula
One history (up to 2014 when it was published). The crashes described are some of the
most unfortunate in the sport, and in many of them, more than one driver lost his life on
at the track. Varma dissects each wreck, why it happened, and what the result was. This
article was written shortly after the crash of Jules Bianchi in 2014, which gave him
injuries resulting in his death. He lists them in order of significance instead of by date,
which shows that some of the worst wrecks happened more recently. Along with the
article itself, he included videos of the horrific events. One of the recaps includes the
death of a crew member who was hit by a driver while trying to attend to an injured
driver. The author closes this article by stating very clearly how dangerous of a sport F1
is. Varma is an established journalist writing for Daily News & Analysis in India. I have
heard about of many of these wrecks in other articles that I have researched, so I know
that what he is writing is true. Although I cannot find much information on the author, the
sources and information all appear to line up with my previous research. This article was
written to inform people that this sport is in fact dangerous, it always has been, and
Varma suggests, that to some degree, it always will be. He voices concern about the
safety of the drivers and crew members, hoping to draw attention to the dangers and

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spark change. This article is very helpful because it lists five well known crashes in the
F1 world and why they ended in the loss of lives. Since most of the incidents he describes
are prior to the 2000s, I plan on using this article to show that modern day crashes do
happen, but are not as significant or deadly as the ones he described. I will use his
explanations of each death and will try to link them to a new safety advance implemented
in the preceding years.