The big one. The engine suppliers spent 2003 trying to come up with an engine that can run for 700 kilometres (average race length: 300 kilometres) without loss of power from last year, and despite initial gripes most seem to have achieved their target. Reliability has been the catchphrase of Formula One for the last few years, and this trend will be tested to the full in 2004.

While any engine problems will be dealt a harsh penalty - at least to the front running teams - it bears mentioning that any driver who runs off the circuit in practice will also be penalized; if a collision is of such a magnitude that the engine is damaged beyond the scope of simple repair, the driver will be dropped ten places. If the damage is restricted to the chassis only, the team will have to make repairs to the chassis or replace it (while keeping the existing engine), which could have a negative effect on laptimes. Needless to say, there will be no jumping in the spare car when there's a problem this year.

Third Driver for Bottom Six Teams

During both [practice] sessions [on Friday] all teams, other than those who finished in the top four positions of the previous year's World Championship for Constructors, will be permitted to run a third car provided any driver of this car:

• is not one of the team's nominated drivers for the Event in question;
  
• is in possession of a Super Licence;
  
• has not taken place in more than six World Championship Events during the two previous World Championships.

The success of the Friday Private Testing sessions was abundantly clear, as these teams had an extra two hours per car to help set it up for each track under close to race conditions at the track - Renault in particular made brilliant use of this rule to improve the car for the actual conditions faced, rather than testing outside of the race weekend at different tracks and in conditions that would not necessarily be the same as the race weekend. McLaren's Ron Dennis was initially scathing about the session, calling the cars involved "track sweepers", before realising what an advantage it turned out to be.

Miffed at missing out in 2003, albeit realising that the session was initially set up to allow the bottom teams to save costs on non-race weekend testing, the Big Three decided to minimise the damage by insisting that any third driver would have to be either young and unproven or old and, presumably, past his prime by insisting that the third driver hadn't had a regular race seat in the previous two years.

In the short term this decision has killed off the Formula One careers of Justin Wilson and Allan McNish, although it has opened up a possible entry into the sport for up and coming drivers such as Bjorn Wirdheim and Timo Glock. The chances of a driver coming back to the sport after losing a race seat just got slimmer.

Ironically, Renault's success last year has meant that they won't be able to take advantage of running a third driver on Fridays again, as it only applies to the bottom six teams.

If one of the team's nominated drivers is deemed unable to drive at some stage after the end initial scrutineering, and the stewards agree to a change of driver, the driver of a third car may take part in the remainder of the Event. Under such circumstances a driver who started the Event as a "third" driver would have to continue with the same engine for the remainder of the Event.

One of the problems with the one engine rule is that there will be very little for the fans to see before qualifying, as the race cars will be running with the engine de-tuned to promote longevity and running very few laps. Consequently, the third driver will be very important to those teams running them, as they will be the only cars on track that can run at full power and for as many laps as they can squeeze in.

The downside of this, however, is that if for some reason the third driver is called up to race he will almost certainly incur a ten spot penalty on the grid, as his will be the only engine running on full power on Fridays and will therefore probably need changing out before the race.

The requirements of Article 60 concerning car livery will not apply to the third car being used during these two sessions but will apply should this car be used as the team's spare car during the remainder of the event.

This change was probably thrown in for Minardi and Jordan, so that they have the possibility of putting a pay driver in the third car and giving the livery away to their sponsors. The problem with this rule is that there are drivers with sponsors, and there are drivers with superlicences (third drivers require a superlicence this year), but there are few drivers with both who haven't already got a race seat.

Qualifying

Saturday 14:00 Qualifying begins and will be run as follows:

• the session will be held in two parts separated by two minutes;

• during the first part each driver will carry out a single timed lap as now starting in the order they finished in the previous race. At the first race of the year the order of the last Event of the previous year's World Championship will be used (in both cases any new drivers will be arranged in numerical order);
  
• any car stopping in the first part will not be allowed to take part in the second, if the car is brought back to the pits before the end of the session it must remain in parc ferme until the end of the session;
  
• refueling rigs will be allowed in the first part subject to everyone wearing suitable clothing and photographers being restricted as for a race;
  
• the running order for the second part will be determined by the times achieved in the first part reversed;
  
• in both sessions cars will be released as the previous one crosses the Line to start its flying lap;
  
• in both sessions the 6th, 11th and 16th cars in sequence will be released two minutes after the previous finishes its flying lap.

Qualifying will be effectively the same as last year, with the only differences being that they will go out for first qualifying in the order of the previous race rather than in championship order and that the two sessions will now be back to back, rather than on Friday and Saturday.

The drivers will still go out in first qualifying on low fuel to try and run as late as possible in second qualifying to take advantage of the extra rubber on the track, with a possible exception in the case of expected rain late in second qualifying, in which case the fast guys may sandbag the first session.

Tyre use and allocation

The number of dry-weather tyres available to each driver during the Event will remain the same at forty, twenty front and twenty rear.

Each driver will be allocated three sets of dry-weather tyres for use on Friday; these may not be used at any other time during the Event. No tyres from the remaining seven sets may be used on Friday.

The choice of dry-weather tyre for qualifying and race must be made by 09.00 on Saturday (either specification of tyre may be used for the free practice sessions on Saturday).

However, if both Friday sessions are declared wet this choice may be postponed until 13.00 on Saturday.

The number of wet-weather tyres available to each driver during the Event will remain the same at twenty-eight, fourteen front and fourteen rear.

Extreme weather tyres will continue to be permitted but, as now, may only be used when authorised.

Given that most teams will do few meaningful laps on Friday, they will be unlikely to do much damage to those three sets of tyres other than the third drivers, who will need to become tyre experts for their teams - Ricardo Zonta (Toyota) and Anthony Davidson (BAR) can be expected to give good feedback to their teams, as has been their job for a few years, but the other third drivers will need to acquire this skill quickly.

Number of Drivers During a Season

Each team will now be allowed to use four drivers during each season, not including any third driver running in the Friday sessions.

The days of multiple drivers in a team are seemingly long gone - Prost had five drivers in 2001, but before that the last team to run more than four drivers in one year was Simtek in 1994. This rule should adequately cover driver injuries and potential sackings for each team.

Pit lane speed limit

The speed limit for qualifying and race will be raised to 100km/h. In accordance with Article 100 (of the draft 2004 Sporting Regulations) the Permanent Bureau may be asked to consider a lower limit at tracks which have a particularly narrow pit lane.

It seems unlikely that this change will apply in Monaco, but otherwise it will have an effect on racing in that pitstops will take less time and may therefore be advantageous for race strategy. Williams and Renault have already stated that they will have smaller fuel tanks than last year, and it's unlikely that the other big teams haven't prepared them as well. Expect most races to be broken into more parts through increased pitting this year.

Other changes in brief

Rear wing: Only two elements will be allowed on the rear wing from 2004 - this was put into place to slow the cars (initial estimates were put at an 8% loss of downforce, although most team aerodynamicists have reported this has now been reduced to a 4% loss through various refinements). Another effect of this rule has been that sponsor logos on the rear wing are now easier for the television audience to see. The rear wing endplates have also been increased in size, to allow more room for sponsor logos.

Engine cover: Increased in size to allow more room for sponsor logos. Most of the larger teams' sponsorship departments have been fighting for these changes for some time, as noted by Williams's head of marketing Jim Wright last year.

Electronic driver aids: Automatic gear changes and launch control have been banned, albeit with traction control remaining. This will affect the start of a race, with the teams that have the best computer boffins comparatively suffering (Renault in particular have had a clear advantage in this area in recent years). It is unclear at the moment how these changes will materially affect the racing, although there is a significant cost reduction to the teams.