We've had the Formula 1 Technical Address for a while now, but what if you have a question about the sporting side of the... err... sport? Ever wanted to know if you could pass another driver on the last lap of a GP when the safety car comes in? Or maybe you can't confirm you understood the message that your teammate is faster than you?
Any questions can be asked here, so... fire away*!
* No weaponry may be used.
:lol: Nice introduction!
No wonder you're the leader :D
Alright, I've got a question:
What happens if a driver Does Not Qualify?
Will he still be able to enter the race?
The rule changes to 107% time next year does it?
Its an interesting one, it seems to punish the smaller teams which goes against what the FIA was trying to do changing the concorde agreement last year. I still really am oposed to that the teams can spend whatever they want effectivley making it a sport of the richest of the rich and these smaller teams like Virgin, Hispania, US F1 etc are just getting problems as they can not hope to compete on such as smaller budget (like McLaren pay 38 million a year on Button and Hamiltons wages I believe? The rule that was going to be introduced would have ment they would have had 2 million to go with everything else that season I think). It just creates an imbalanced sport, this really seems to be happening more and more with sport in general mind such as Football (both American and Soccer), Cricket and others. Its a sad day as it just makes sport a game for the higher income earners and not open to all like the fundementals should be.
Indeed, the 107% rule does come in to effect next year. It only counts in Q1 though, so whomever was fastest in Q1 sets the 107% rule for the remainder of the grid. Q2 and Q3 are unaffected. If you look at so far in 2010, these would be the ones eliminated from races:
Bahrain: Bruno Senna (HRT), Karun Chandhok (HRT)
Australia: All 24 cars qualified within 107%
Malaysia: All 24 qualified, due to weather conditions
China: All 24 cars qualified within 107%
Spain: Karun Chandhok (HRT), Bruno Senna (HRT)
Monaco: All 24 cars qualified. Alonso qualified as a result of setting a representable time in Free Practice.
Turkey: All 24 cars qualified within 107%
Canada: Karun Chandhok (HRT)
Europe: All 24 cars qualified within 107%
Britain: All 24 cars qualified within 107%
Germany: All 24 cars qualified. di Grassi qualified as a result of setting a representable time in Free Practice.
Hungary: Bruno Senna (HRT), Sakon Yamamoto (HRT)
So in actuality, only Hispania would've been affected by the 107% rule if it was imposed this year - neither Lotus or Virgin have yet to fall foul of it since their debuts, so they may be really slow for the other drivers but they're still within 107% at the moment.
As for the £40 million cap you were on about, that only covered development and research in to the cars - employee salaries was not covered by the cap at all. The cap would actually level the field out a fair bit, given the smaller teams are already working to a budget much closer to that, whereas Ferrari would suffer heavily - given Toyota's pullout, the Scuderia are now the biggest spenders per season on car development.
Ah, I thought it was a cap on spending for the team in total. That would perhaps be a more reasonable approach, I dont like the vauge "we will cut spending over time" so if they spend a pound less next season then they conform to that standard?
I can see why the big spending teams like Red Bull, Ferrari, McLaren etc want to keep going as otherwise they may see it as wasted cash that they got ahead. Its complicated but to leave vauge terms in the contract the teams sign to enter the sport every year means teams wont follow the rule set. Change is needed, sure we have more competition but how long before the same cracks appear and we get Red Bull, Ferrari and Mclaren at the front with Mercedes and Renault et al bringing up the rear. Look how long it took Honda and BMW to get a win and how Toyota failed to get there, the sport needs these manufacturers to be involved and who knows, bring the budget right and you may get the Seat, Valkswagen, Toyota, Ford, General Motors etc interested in bringing teams into the sport long term.
/rant
F1 was always a bit like go-karting. It was always wallet racing. The more you have the faster you go. Well, generally anyways.
Does GP2 have a budget cap? F1 need a budget cap, that way, we'll see more overtaking.
People have suggested reducing downforce but what this will do is make the cars handle worse and get wheel spin at higher speeds. F1 will become a lower series so that won't be a very good idea.
The budget cap doesn't apply to engines, tyres, fuel etc.
Just research.
Prodrive should be coming next year too. Then in 2012, they'll change their name to Aston Martin.
The last I knew about the customer chassis issue was Frank Williams complaining about Prodrive recieving a McLaren chassis for the 2008 season (which, because they couldn't get it, they never entered). I see Frank's side of the argument really - he entered F1 and worked from the bottom up, so why should another team come in and automatically be much more successful than his? Would the Williams team have as much of a following as they do if they'd used a customer chassis to begin with? I don't think so, and I believe it's why Frank is rightly one of the most popular figures in the F1 paddock, because he took a team from scratch and made them one of the most successful teams in history.
Customer chassis would, in theory, be "artificial success" if a team like Lotus used another team's chassis - kinda why whilst I was disappointed that Stefan GP didn't get slot 13, I was glad they didn't too, because using Toyota's 2010 chassis they would've been near the top straight away.
Formula One is not only about the racing, but about the best brands. Who can develop their car the best. I think if change was needed, the fairest way to do it would be to give the teams a cap (much higher than £40m though, Jordan even ran on £120m a year) and let them develop the car with that money. However, as this year has proven with the exception of Bahrain, the sport doesn't need changing at all really.
A budget cap would fix a lot of things, first of all, we would see more effiecient upgrades as teams will have to be smarter than usual. They're not going to want to waste a single million(:P) bringing in upgrades which are useless to the cars.
And maybe RBR might fall back a little.
Second thing would be that new teams would enter and not require as much sponsorship as before.
With more cars on the grid things will get more interesting.
Anyways, I've got a question:
What is pre-qualifying?
How long was pre-qualifying?
This could be used as an advantage to test new parts.
The last I knew about the customer chassis issue was Frank Williams complaining about Prodrive recieving a McLaren chassis for the 2008 season (which, because they couldn't get it, they never entered). I see Frank's side of the argument really - he entered F1 and worked from the bottom up, so why should another team come in and automatically be much more successful than his? Would the Williams team have as much of a following as they do if they'd used a customer chassis to begin with? I don't think so, and I believe it's why Frank is rightly one of the most popular figures in the F1 paddock, because he took a team from scratch and made them one of the most successful teams in history.
Customer chassis would, in theory, be "artificial success" if a team like Lotus used another team's chassis - kinda why whilst I was disappointed that Stefan GP didn't get slot 13, I was glad they didn't too, because using Toyota's 2010 chassis they would've been near the top straight away.
Formula One is not only about the racing, but about the best brands. Who can develop their car the best. I think if change was needed, the fairest way to do it would be to give the teams a cap (much higher than £40m though, Jordan even ran on £120m a year) and let them develop the car with that money. However, as this year has proven with the exception of Bahrain, the sport doesn't need changing at all really.
Redders1989
Well BMW, Honda and Toyota have pulled out and they are not just an "average" car manufacturer. This is an issue to me still, like if another car manufacturer like Renault or Fiat or Mercedes go "enough, we spend lots in this sport and get little for it" then we loose more and more teams. I mean will Force India and Red Bull continue if in 5 seasons time they have not won anything?
Short term the sport is fine, long term there are issues. The new teams are getting mocked by Ecclestone who says the sport doesnt need them. However without compeition what exactly would the point of this sport be. Weather has helped in some races and crashes, without that can we really say these cars can overtake? What about when drivers are clearly faster than the car in front but they do not allow the driver to get past (say like when one of the Toro Roso cars held up a car for a long time as the car behind being a top 5 team just could not get enough pace to get past).
The sport is in a better condition than the past decade I would argue and interest is up, but to just stop the hard work that was put in the changes to make this sport more interesting would be a dubious move.
I agree a cap on development would be good, and I think a lower than a high one works even better as you are forced to work out what changes you really think will affect the car. This would also bring more interesting designs into play where teams start to look "outside of the box" to see how they could improve the car. Engineering is a big part of Formula 1 and the new teams get little credit when teams like Red Bull bring new parts to nearly every grand prix but the new teams are essentially keeping the gap to what it was at the start of the season. A cap may have helped them catch up more, where as if they get better with a package that took them 5 races to get together, Red Bull can just pump out another part for their next grand prix, essentially wasting the development of the cars at the back.
If the car behind is truly faster, then why can't they overtake?
It should be a simple matter of outbraking the car in front. For example, in Valencia, people said that KOV should have let WEB pass as WEB was clearly quicker. It is very true that the RBR is faster than the Lotus so WEB should have had an easy overtake.
Another example would be of GLO and ALO in Monaco. The Ferrari is much faster than the Virgin but ALO wasn't able to overtake. Sure he was angry at starting last but he can't complain about not being able to overtake. He has a very able car on his hands. So instead of whining, it would be a simple matter of out braking or out accelerating GLO.
People have suggested reducing downforce but what this will do is make the cars handle worse and get wheel spin at higher speeds. F1 will become a lower series so that won't be a very good idea. dabest2500
I would have to disagree with this statement.
Some of the worlds best rated drivers came from a time where this common to see, Senna would have his McLaren snaking at high speeds cus he just showed no fear and pure determination to win.
We need these cars to come back to the drivers more and give them more control, feel and sense of whats happening with the car instead just shifting up and down through the corners with HUGE amounts of downforce, bring back the late 80s and early 90s of F1. IMO, The Best days EVER :P
[QUOTE="dabest2500"] People have suggested reducing downforce but what this will do is make the cars handle worse and get wheel spin at higher speeds. F1 will become a lower series so that won't be a very good idea. kipi19
I would have to disagree with this statement.
Some of the worlds best rated drivers came from a time where this common to see, Senna would have his McLaren snaking at high speeds cus he just showed no fear and pure determination to win.
We need these cars to come back to the drivers more and give them more control, feel and sense of whats happening with the car instead just shifting up and down through the corners with HUGE amounts of downforce, bring back the late 80s and early 90s of F1. IMO, The Best days EVER :P
But those days, the car packages were completely different too.
They had less downforce, but not Formula 3000 downforce, and the car was suited to it.
But as the cars become more aerodynamically advanced, drivers won't be going as fast in a Mclaren from 1984 for example.
They will need to adapt to it and won't be going as fast as they can. This will reduce the spectacle which is a bad thing.
Yes the 2010 cars are much easier to handle than the 90's and the 80's cars, but everyone is aerodynamically advanced and as everyone continues to improve, the competition will continue heat up.
Downforce has already been reduced too.
Barge boards, turning vanes, etc. have already been banned.
The driving is more about the driver with the banning of drive aids.
I still am yet to disagree, Downforce has improved on the past few years due down to such tweaks as the Double Diffuser, the RW32 duct from McLaren (F-duct) Red Bulls very clever front wing, this is ingenius work from the engineers and hats off to them for it, But these cars need another i'd say 50% drop in downforce, bring it back to the drivers, cus IMO its just too easy for them nowdayskipi19
Easy?
They're are travelling much faster than before.
It was harder in the old days due to the lack of safety. But these days drivers are going at over 210 mph.
The refuelling ban simplified the sport and made it so that drivers would have to be careful and smart. One of the reasons why Lauda was so good during this time.
The extra downforce is a MUST for drivers nowadays. It even improves safety.
And how would you drop 50% of downforce?
Turn the front wing into a bumper?
If the car behind is truly faster, then why can't they overtake?
It should be a simple matter of outbraking the car in front. For example, in Valencia, people said that KOV should have let WEB pass as WEB was clearly quicker. It is very true that the RBR is faster than the Lotus so WEB should have had an easy overtake.
Another example would be of GLO and ALO in Monaco. The Ferrari is much faster than the Virgin but ALO wasn't able to overtake. Sure he was angry at starting last but he can't complain about not being able to overtake. He has a very able car on his hands. So instead of whining, it would be a simple matter of out braking or out accelerating GLO.
dabest2500
The issue is if a F1 car makes contact with another they are likely to be retired cars or into a wall, especially on street circuits like Monaco and Valencia where there are no run off areas. If a car parks itself right it can block a car behind for as long as they are not pitting in as you cant drive onto the rumble strip or wide as you can pick up dirt, run off the track potentially causing you to spin etc.
In principle a faster car should be able to overtake a car that is two seconds a lap slower but if you get behind another car you can tend to have heat issues with lack of airflow going into your car. Also drivers if held up long enough may loose concerntration and just follow the car ahead rather than attempt to race it.
Glock was going all over the place at Monaco, on the one hand he was right to race Alonso but at some points it was borderline dangerous as the Virgin car was drifting at some points and drifting on a street circuit at over a hundered miles per hour is not the most sensible thing to do.
Going to the overtaking argument, maybe kers would be the way to go again, it did aid overtaking if it was essential for all cars to have.
[QUOTE="kipi19"]I still am yet to disagree, Downforce has improved on the past few years due down to such tweaks as the Double Diffuser, the RW32 duct from McLaren (F-duct) Red Bulls very clever front wing, this is ingenius work from the engineers and hats off to them for it, But these cars need another i'd say 50% drop in downforce, bring it back to the drivers, cus IMO its just too easy for them nowdaysdabest2500
Easy?
They're are travelling much faster than before.
It was harder in the old days due to the lack of safety. But these days drivers are going at over 210 mph.
The refuelling ban simplified the sport and made it so that drivers would have to be careful and smart. One of the reasons why Lauda was so good during this time.
The extra downforce is a MUST for drivers nowadays. It even improves safety.
And how would you drop 50% of downforce?
Turn the front wing into a bumper?
Yea, but you can't wrap these drivers up in cotton wool all the time, granted its a dangerous sport, Accidents have shown this, but to also disagree with you, These cars are not as fast as they used to be, Only reason lap times are faster is because there is much more downforce, If you watch the F1 coverage, and they bring the speedo up, in a straight line at full pelt, they just tip 300Kmh, which is 180mph, only in Monza or place with VERY low downforce could you just tip the 200 mark. and all this run off area stuff I also believe is pure ****, it makes it easier for drivers to just make a mistake and get away with it.
If you make a mistake you should be punished for it by being in the kitty litter, I'm not saying make the sport really dangerous, but you need to bring a sense of reality back to these drivers that in reality they are wrapped up in cotton wool and perhaps need to realise that are sooo safe its ridiculous. By all means some safety measures are fantastic E.G Tyre teathers and the HANS device make things a lot more safer, and I tip my hat off to people who brough them in, but F1 is getting a tad too "health and safety" concious.
Rant over XD
[QUOTE="dabest2500"]If the car behind is truly faster, then why can't they overtake?
It should be a simple matter of outbraking the car in front. For example, in Valencia, people said that KOV should have let WEB pass as WEB was clearly quicker. It is very true that the RBR is faster than the Lotus so WEB should have had an easy overtake.
Another example would be of GLO and ALO in Monaco. The Ferrari is much faster than the Virgin but ALO wasn't able to overtake. Sure he was angry at starting last but he can't complain about not being able to overtake. He has a very able car on his hands. So instead of whining, it would be a simple matter of out braking or out accelerating GLO.
Garfield360UK
The issue is if a F1 car makes contact with another they are likely to be retired cars or into a wall, especially on street circuits like Monaco and Valencia where there are no run off areas. If a car parks itself right it can block a car behind for as long as they are not pitting in as you cant drive onto the rumble strip or wide as you can pick up dirt, run off the track potentially causing you to spin etc.
In principle a faster car should be able to overtake a car that is two seconds a lap slower but if you get behind another car you can tend to have heat issues with lack of airflow going into your car. Also drivers if held up long enough may loose concerntration and just follow the car ahead rather than attempt to race it.
Glock was going all over the place at Monaco, on the one hand he was right to race Alonso but at some points it was borderline dangerous as the Virgin car was drifting at some points and drifting on a street circuit at over a hundered miles per hour is not the most sensible thing to do.
Going to the overtaking argument, maybe kers would be the way to go again, it did aid overtaking if it was essential for all cars to have.
But ALO being held up by GLO? Sure ALO was ticked off, but his head was clearly not screwed on right.
There were several coreners before the tunnel that he could have overtaken. But as always, overtaking is very hard in Monaco.
Valencia is a very wide street circuit, overtaking shouldn't be a problem there.
KERS for me wasn't very good, split up the teams into the KERS side and non-KERS side.
What KERS did that was positive though was increase the weight limit by 15kg.
[QUOTE="dabest2500"][QUOTE="kipi19"]I still am yet to disagree, Downforce has improved on the past few years due down to such tweaks as the Double Diffuser, the RW32 duct from McLaren (F-duct) Red Bulls very clever front wing, this is ingenius work from the engineers and hats off to them for it, But these cars need another i'd say 50% drop in downforce, bring it back to the drivers, cus IMO its just too easy for them nowdayskipi19
Easy?
They're are travelling much faster than before.
It was harder in the old days due to the lack of safety. But these days drivers are going at over 210 mph.
The refuelling ban simplified the sport and made it so that drivers would have to be careful and smart. One of the reasons why Lauda was so good during this time.
The extra downforce is a MUST for drivers nowadays. It even improves safety.
And how would you drop 50% of downforce?
Turn the front wing into a bumper?
Yea, but you can't wrap these drivers up in cotton wool all the time, granted its a dangerous sport, Accidents have shown this, but to also disagree with you, These cars are not as fast as they used to be, Only reason lap times are faster is because there is much more downforce, If you watch the F1 coverage, and they bring the speedo up, in a straight line at full pelt, they just tip 300Kmh, which is 180mph, only in Monza or place with VERY low downforce could you just tip the 200 mark. and all this run off area stuff I also believe is pure ****, it makes it easier for drivers to just make a mistake and get away with it.
If you make a mistake you should be punished for it by being in the kitty litter, I'm not saying make the sport really dangerous, but you need to bring a sense of reality back to these drivers that in reality they are wrapped up in cotton wool and perhaps need to realise that are sooo safe its ridiculous. By all means some safety measures are fantastic E.G Tyre teathers and the HANS device make things a lot more safer, and I tip my hat off to people who brough them in, but F1 is getting a tad too "health and safety" concious.
Rant over XD
I agree with your run off point (though, I would have liked to have disagreed with you :P)
I don't agree with the kitty litter part though :D. Instead of gravel traps, it should just be grass so that they damage the car but still be able to race.
The cars no longer do 210 mph!? :shocked:
One of the things that have get SCH and others lap records up there are the fact that as F1 progresses, the slower the cars will get. 2009 was much slower than 2007 for example.
I'm happy that these drivers have very safe cars. I definitely don't want Hamilton to have an Ayrton Senna.
Without safety, we'll see drivers disappearing from F1.
If the car behind is truly faster, then why can't they overtake?
It should be a simple matter of outbraking the car in front. For example, in Valencia, people said that KOV should have let WEB pass as WEB was clearly quicker. It is very true that the RBR is faster than the Lotus so WEB should have had an easy overtake.
Another example would be of GLO and ALO in Monaco. The Ferrari is much faster than the Virgin but ALO wasn't able to overtake. Sure he was angry at starting last but he can't complain about not being able to overtake. He has a very able car on his hands. So instead of whining, it would be a simple matter of out braking or out accelerating GLO.
dabest2500
The problem is that the cars are within just a matter of a few tenths in many cases - when a faster car is behind a slower car the differences are still too small in the times when one CAN try to overtake such as out accelerating or out-braking the car in front. The engines are more or less standardised with differences being something like 2.5% MAX between Mercedes and Renault the highest and lowest powered engines and everyone runs carbon-carbon breaks from a select few manufacturers - Brembo, Carbone Industries and someone else... so the difference in braking strength is almost the same.Â
The performance differenciator is downforce and who can cut the most drag in this day and age meaning the places where the faster cars are faster are in the middle of high speed bends where there is one racing line and low grip out on the marbles.
The last I knew about the customer chassis issue was Frank Williams complaining about Prodrive recieving a McLaren chassis for the 2008 season (which, because they couldn't get it, they never entered). I see Frank's side of the argument really - he entered F1 and worked from the bottom up, so why should another team come in and automatically be much more successful than his? Would the Williams team have as much of a following as they do if they'd used a customer chassis to begin with? I don't think so, and I believe it's why Frank is rightly one of the most popular figures in the F1 paddock, because he took a team from scratch and made them one of the most successful teams in history.
Customer chassis would, in theory, be "artificial success" if a team like Lotus used another team's chassis - kinda why whilst I was disappointed that Stefan GP didn't get slot 13, I was glad they didn't too, because using Toyota's 2010 chassis they would've been near the top straight away.
Redders1989
Stefan GP would have inherited Toyota's car no more than Brawn GP inherited Honda's, Red Bull inherited Jaguar's, Force India inherited Spyker's who inherited Midland's who inherited Jordan's. It's all part of the money go round that is formula 1.
A customer car would have to come from an established team. HRT's car for example IS strictly speaking a customer car - it was designed and manufactured by Dhallara. Frank Williams' first GP season came from a customer car too IIRC so one does need to take a good hard look in the mirror before mouthing off about customer cars. That said I don't think it would be fair for a new team to pop by say "giz a chassis McLaren?" and then get a top of the line chassis built for them. ESPECIALLY when you consider that it pretty much IS the performance differenciator.
[QUOTE="dabest2500"]If the car behind is truly faster, then why can't they overtake?
It should be a simple matter of outbraking the car in front. For example, in Valencia, people said that KOV should have let WEB pass as WEB was clearly quicker. It is very true that the RBR is faster than the Lotus so WEB should have had an easy overtake.
Another example would be of GLO and ALO in Monaco. The Ferrari is much faster than the Virgin but ALO wasn't able to overtake. Sure he was angry at starting last but he can't complain about not being able to overtake. He has a very able car on his hands. So instead of whining, it would be a simple matter of out braking or out accelerating GLO.
KimisApprentice
The problem is that the cars are within just a matter of a few tenths in many cases - when a faster car is behind a slower car the differences are still too small in the times when one CAN try to overtake such as out accelerating or out-braking the car in front. The engines are more or less standardised with differences being something like 2.5% MAX between Mercedes and Renault the highest and lowest powered engines and everyone runs carbon-carbon breaks from a select few manufacturers - Brembo, Carbone Industries and someone else... so the difference in braking strength is almost the same.Â
The performance differenciator is downforce and who can cut the most drag in this day and age meaning the places where the faster cars are faster are in the middle of high speed bends where there is one racing line and low grip out on the marbles.
So how come the new teams are up to 2 or 3 seconds off the pace in qualifying with HRT over 107%?
Lotus and Virgin are new teams so why can't RBR and Ferrari overtake them easily?
It's only the experienced teams that are within tenths of each other.
So how come the new teams are up to 2 or 3 seconds off the pace in qualifying with HRT over 107%?
Lotus and Virgin are new teams so why can't RBR and Ferrari overtake them easily?
It's only the experienced teams that are within tenths of each other.
dabest2500
As I said, where the top teams gain the 2 - 3 seconds a lap is through the high speed bends where it is nigh on impossible to overtake (the only pass I have seen in a high speed bend in recent memory was in Spa 2009 when Sutil went OFF circuit and around the outside of Badoer in the Ferrari at Pouhon) - there could well be a more recent example but there aren't many is what I'm saying and this is also due to the amount of turbulent wake that comes off the back of the car in front raising the temperatures of the brakes and engine in the car trying to overtake and dramatically dropping the downforce levels so a large chunk of the advantage the faster car behind held is negated where they have it.
However is it worth writing a car off just to try and overtake somebody? Sponsors wont be happy if a driver trys to pass somebody and runs into the wall or into the other car. Also what about the deffending car, say if a HRT was in the last points place and a Ferrari ramed it off the track, fans would not be happy (well some might but I support the lower end teams and would be hugely disapointed with that).Garfield360UK
These guys are the best of the best, the only 24 people on the planet currently driving F1 cars.
They should take calculated risks, why not dummy the opponent?
[QUOTE="dabest2500"]So how come the new teams are up to 2 or 3 seconds off the pace in qualifying with HRT over 107%?
Lotus and Virgin are new teams so why can't RBR and Ferrari overtake them easily?
It's only the experienced teams that are within tenths of each other.
KimisApprentice
As I said, where the top teams gain the 2 - 3 seconds a lap is through the high speed bends where it is nigh on impossible to overtake (the only pass I have seen in a high speed bend in recent memory was in Spa 2009 when Sutil went OFF circuit and around the outside of Badoer in the Ferrari at Pouhon) - there could well be a more recent example but there aren't many is what I'm saying and this is also due to the amount of turbulent wake that comes off the back of the car in front raising the temperatures of the brakes and engine in the car trying to overtake and dramatically dropping the downforce levels so a large chunk of the advantage the faster car behind held is negated where they have it.
What? Most overtaking is done at hairpins and low speed corners.
Top end teams have more aerodynamic downforce and grip, so why not pull alongside and then out brake them?
Turbulent air is encountered by everyone so everyone shares the same problem.
Turbulent air isn't nice but as always, these guys are Championship winners and should be used to it. They should have had all the overtaking experience in the world. Turbulence should be reduced from 2008 whith the removal of aero parts and higher, narrower rear wings.
What? Most overtaking is done at hairpins and low speed corners.
Top end teams have more aerodynamic downforce and grip, so why not pull alongside and then out brake them?
Turbulent air is encountered by everyone so everyone shares the same problem.
Turbulent air isn't nice but as always, these guys are Championship winners and should be used to it. They should have had all the overtaking experience in the world. Turbulence should be reduced from 2008 whith the removal of aero parts and higher, narrower rear wings.
dabest2500
That's exactly right, that IS where most overtaking is done, but that's also where the cars are the most equal. Aerodynamic grip is at a premium as downforce increases exponentially with speed so no team has a significant grip advantage in low speed conditions when tyres are in their ideal operating temperature. So it's far harder to out accelerate them on the other end of the corner and far harder to outbrake them because they all have similar brakes it just comes down to who has the most balls or who cares less about going off. This is probably why Sato was so good and bad at overtaking, he just never seemed to know precisely when to dive down the inside successfully or dive down the inside and collide with the guy in front.
Turbulent air is not encountered by everyone, the guy in front is normally in clean air so his wings and diffuser are working as they were designed to do so - at optimum effeciency in clean air. It's not a matter of "being used to it" it dramatically drops the ultimate performance of the car driven by the guy behind. I should also point out that the double diffusers in use this year affect far more air than the simpler diffusers from 2008 drawing up for more air from the floor and therefore releasing more turbulent air behind the car. The diffuser's rake has also changed from 2008 but I cannot remember which way the changes went at present, but this will have also contributed to the difference.
As to your first paragraph, I already knew that fact about downforce increasing with speed. Just wanted to know why RBR is so good at low speed corners. Or is it a case of them just being good everywhere?
As for the turbulent air thing, I should have made my post clearer. Obviously you don't encounter turbulent air when no-one is in front of you, I would desrve a face-palm for that.
What I meant was that when someone is stuck behind another car, they will encounter turbulent air, but it's not as if they are the only person to receive it. Everyone in the same position would get turbulent air too. If you know understand what I mean.
Just compared lap times from 2008 and 2009 and it seems that the double diffuser generates a hell lot of downforce. Making cars 0.8 seconds quicker.
But between 2008 and 2009 there was also the introduction of slicks, a more draggy front wing due to increased surface area, steeper rear wing which may have caused more drag compared to the 2008 rear wing and KERS for some teams. The double diffuser didn't add 0.8 seconds it's a combo of the slicks 2-3seconds -1.5-2 seconds for the increased drag/decreased downforce (to begin with) then a boost of around 0.5-1seconds from the double diffuser.
The RBR has been able to get the tyres working better than many other teams - Renault too have been good in the low speed stuff, this would be down to a better mechanical set up or driving style.Â
But between 2008 and 2009 there was also the introduction of slicks, a more draggy front wing due to increased surface area, steeper rear wing which may have caused more drag compared to the 2008 rear wing and KERS for some teams. The double diffuser didn't add 0.8 seconds it's a combo of the slicks 2-3seconds -1.5-2 seconds for the increased drag/decreased downforce (to begin with) then a boost of around 0.5-1seconds from the double diffuser.
KimisApprentice
*major facepalm*
Why am I so stupid all of a sudden?
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