The key UI problem is that "-3.3" on the display can mean both "3.3 degree descent angle" and "3,300 feet per minute descent speed".
Good UI design is important even for trained professionals. If the computer is configured incorrectly, it may take too long to realize that there is a problem, and that's bad.
an F1 car has fewer controls than a ordinary car. different controls yes, but fewer. most people would not consider the controls on their cars "complex". because they are familiar. What sort of familiarity do you think you'd develop if this was what you did for a living?
next, most controls are sort of "modal". for instane, the clutch bite, and the two clutch paddles, are only really relevant during the start (the clutch will be used if the car spins and needs to get going again, but that is a completely different, less demanding, situation). the mix buttons and a few of the other buttons are not really worried about by the driver. the engineers tell the driver what to dial in. the reason those buttons are there is because they are not allowed to be remote controlled.
for the most part the driver will only routinely fiddle with the brake bias (not on the steering wheel), the diff and the KERS controls.
of course, if you have spent all of your teens and your adult life in race cars none of the above will be "complex" to you.
in fact, my TV and its remote is arguably much, much more complex than the user interface of a an F1 car.
No they don't. They require a powerful interface. Complexity just comes with more power, but there's nothing to suggest that an expert would perform better with a more complex interface than with a simpler one, if both offered the same functionality.
I think there probably is a principle at work to suggest that one of the properties of an expert-friendly 'powerful' interface is that it will be perceived as 'complex' by newbies.
Experts will need to have access to a large set of features (e.g. 10 different types of tire/track conditions) that newbies don't. Experts will also need ways to override interface logic which is in place to guide users automatically to the right settings (e.g. wizards, DWIMminess).
I think you're confusing "complicated" with "complex". The former is to be avoided, while the latter is sometimes unavoidable, and in some cases (as here) desired.
This also is a basic tenet of software design as well. I don't mind complexity, if it's necessary and clearly documented. Complicated code on the other hand is the hallmark of a broken development process or a lack of developer skills.
Likely, none of us would be able to simply get into an F1 car and even drive it anywhere at all.
There was a Top Gear episode where Richard Hammond tried to drive an F1 car. I figured with his experience he could make a decent go at it, but apparently the cars are so specifically tuned for going fast that it's all-out, or nothing.
In normal use, a F1 car will never be driven gently. It will be driven very, very quickly by a professional, racing against other professionals who are also driving hard. So the tires have a lot less traction when they're cold, and the brakes don't work enormously well either.
Hammond needed to be going much faster, just so the car could work properly; but alas, he's a television show host, not a driver.
