Formula One - 2018

[BOF]

30 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

Thought the Spanish GP at the weekend was the first dull race since the opener. Nothing happened.

Yeah Barcelona does have a tendency to be a procession. Usually the level of interest is mainly in all the upgrades that are brought for the start of the European season, and how the teams make gains or losses against their rivals.

[Genie]

Apart from the early smash the race was pretty dull.

DRS seems to be a waste of time, even cars with DRS enabled can't clear the traffic.

[BOF]

Fingers crossed Monaco will be better than normal.  The Red Bulls look strong in the twisty bits and severely lacking on the straights so I'm hoping they can go and take the win here.  Probably Ricciardo though, cuz if Verstappen keeps up his record of hitting something in every race then he won't be getting to the finish line.

[AVFCDAN]

40 minutes ago, BOF said:

Fingers crossed Monaco will be better than normal.  The Red Bulls look strong in the twisty bits and severely lacking on the straights so I'm hoping they can go and take the win here.  Probably Ricciardo though, cuz if Verstappen keeps up his record of hitting something in every race then he won't be getting to the finish line.

Early prediction is for Kimi to take pole with Vettel a few hundredths behind him. Kimi to end up with a slightly longer pit time, completely by chance, whereby Seb turns up the wick and clears him after the first round of stops.

[BOF]

Red Bull have taken the maximum amount of hypersoft tyres to Monaco.

 

[Genie]

49 minutes ago, BOF said:

Fingers crossed Monaco will be better than normal.  The Red Bulls look strong in the twisty bits and severely lacking on the straights so I'm hoping they can go and take the win here.  Probably Ricciardo though, cuz if Verstappen keeps up his record of hitting something in every race then he won't be getting to the finish line.

It does make me laugh when drivers pick up these damaged wings and then report that its fine or even better than it was before. Someone in their aerodynamics team awkwardly looks on...

[BOF]

Just now, Genie said:

It does make me laugh when drivers pick up these damaged wings and then report that its fine or even better than it was before. Someone in their aerodynamics team awkwardly looks on...

True.  Although if there's one track you don't need compromised aero on ...

[Stevo985]

I don't really understand the tyres available in F1 these days.

Anybody got a dummies' guide?

[villakram]

12 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

I don't really understand the tyres available in F1 these days.

Anybody got a dummies' guide?

Toffee from the freezer.

Toffee from the fridge.

Toffee from the cupboard during a normal day.

Toffee from the cupboard during summer.

I wish they'd make a toffee left out in the sun, but practicalities take priority for some reason.

[BOF]

48 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

I don't really understand the tyres available in F1 these days.

Anybody got a dummies' guide?

Basically the term 'soft' has somewhat lost its meaning now that it's applied to 4 of the 7 dry weather compounds.

[VillaJ100]

2 hours ago, BOF said:

Basically the term 'soft' has somewhat lost its meaning now that it's applied to 4 of the 7 dry weather compounds.

Looks bloody stupid. Should be like 'Grade 1' to 'grade 8' or something. 

Agree about barca. Always been a bad race, its a bike track. Could be worse though, could be Valencia. They should sack off that crap chicane on the penultimate corner. 

[Stevo985]

3 hours ago, BOF said:

Basically the term 'soft' has somewhat lost its meaning now that it's applied to 4 of the 7 dry weather compounds.

This is basically what I assumed. But it seems like sometimes the durability isn't ranked the same way? Like sometimes the soft tyres seem to last way longer? Or am I getting that wrong?

 

Also, I assume only certain tyres are allowed at certain races?

[Genie]

5 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

This is basically what I assumed. But it seems like sometimes the durability isn't ranked the same way? Like sometimes the soft tyres seem to last way longer? Or am I getting that wrong?

 

Also, I assume only certain tyres are allowed at certain races?

The durability of the tyres have a number of influences such as how they are treated by the driver, air temperature, fuel load being carried etc. Drivers can manage the tyres so that theoretically less durable tyres last longer if it suits the strategy.

Bit like fuel, you generally get more mpg out of Diesel than petrol but you could nurse a tank of petrol to make it last longer than driving hard with diesel if it suited.

Pirelli will pick 2 or 3 compounds for each race then the teams pick how many sets they want from Pirelli’s selection.

It must be very hard for tyre manufacturers, people often think that because a tyre is wrecked after 20 laps it’s the limit of their capability. Fact is they have to engineer the parts to only last these short durations and also a period of “fade” which is exciting.  If not then teams wouldn’t change tyres mid race which would make it very boring. Pirelli could easily make tyres that stand up to 2 hours of abuse by an F1 car.

I just thought of something to make F1 more exciting, Brakes changes mid race, 2 compounds of brake pads and both need to be used! I might drop an email to Mr Brawn. 

[BOF]

Different tracks also have vastly different surfaces. Temporary tracks like Monaco will be rougher again. But even amongst permanent race tracks there's a huge disparity in terms of grip/smoothness and tyre degradation. Pirelli pick what they think will be the best compounds for that track, and the teams decide how many of each they want. 

[Stevo985]

16 minutes ago, Genie said:

The durability of the tyres have a number of influences such as how they are treated by the driver, air temperature, fuel load being carried etc. Drivers can manage the tyres so that theoretically less durable tyres last longer if it suits the strategy.

Yeah I get that, of course. I just mean sometimes it seems that they end up going longer on soft than they do on Medium, but on the same track. But I might have got that wrong as I'm not usually paying that much attention to the tyres.

[BOF]

Mercedes are “bloody worried” about their Monaco performance

Quote

Mercedes are “bloody worried” about their Monaco performance

2018 Monaco Grand Prix

F1 world championship leader Lewis Hamilton says the Monaco Grand Prix is likely to be a “difficult weekend” for Mercedes.

Neither of the team’s cars finished on the podium in last year’s race on the Monte-Carlo street circuit. Hamilton failed to make the cut for Q3 and finished seventh.

Mercedes executive director Toto Wolff said the aftermath of last year’s Monaco Grand Prix was not pleasant for the team and he is “bloody worried” about how they will perform this weekend.

“In the last years there was always tracks that suited us well and some that we weren’t perfect for whatever reason,” he said. “It’s very difficult to undo the DNA of the car. Monaco, Budapest, Singapore were all tracks where we underperformed a lot last year.”

Wolff admitted the team doesn’t fully understand why its car performs less well at slower circuits.

“Why our car doesn’t like to be quick around the corners in Monaco we haven’t found out yet,” he said. “[But] we know what went wrong last year.”

Hamilton said the team may have to resign itself to banking points on a weekend where it might not be contenders for victory.

“We know it’s probably going to be a difficult weekend. We know the others could be quicker than us, potentially. But we might be surprised, we might not be [uncompetitive].

“We’ll just prepare ourselves in the best way we can. Whatever we’re faced with, we’ll take it. As you can see this year you can still get great points in races even though you don’t win. It’s a long way to go still. We’ll be focused on getting the maximum from the weekend regardless of whether we’re fastest or not.”

 

Fingers crossed eh?

 

[BOF]

Max Verstappen starting the weekend off with a trip to the stewards' office.

Here he is reversing into oncoming traffic after going off at Saint Devote.

 

In better news for the Red Bulls, only Lewis Hamilton was able to get to within 9 tenths of a second of them in first practice.  Lewis eventually coming 3rd, 0.354 behind Ricciardo.

[Genie]

Grid girls are back (tries not to be offended :D )

[BOF]

2 minutes ago, Genie said:

Grid girls are back (tries not to be offended )

Yeah I read that they're not actually banned.  That was a misinterpretation of what happened.  Liberty are just not employing them as a matter of course (no pun intended).  It's kind of at the behest/discretion of the individual event, and Monaco have gone with a combination of grid girls and guys, which they've also done in the past before all the kerfuffle..

[BOF]

Seems Pirelli have taken our comments into consideration

No more “hyper-soft”? Pirelli asked to change tyre names for 2019

Quote

Pirelli could change the naming system for its tyres for the 2019 F1 season following a request from the FIA and Formula One Management.

The change would see the three available tyre choices at each event referred to as ‘hard’, ‘medium’ and ‘soft’.

Different tyre compounds would continue to be nominated for each race to suit the track, but the current names would be replaced by letters.

Pirelli sporting director Mario Isola said a change is “possible” for 2019.

“We had a request from FOM and FIA to just call them hard, medium and soft, with three colours, the same colours and same names for all the races,” he said. “But obviously different compounds, because you cannot use the same compounds we use in Silverstone in Monaco or Suzuka.

“On a second level we will have compound A, B, C, D, E, F or whatever, and we will tell you that for this race, the hard is B, the medium is D and whatever.”

Isola said the aim of the change was to simplify the sport for fans.

“For spectators it’s probably more understandable,” he said, “but you also have the possibility to go deeper in detail for technical information that we will continue to provide.”

Pirelli has begun assessing the idea, said Isola. “It’s an on ongoing discussion but we said we are available to evaluate this change.

“I made a check with production and logistics, obviously we need to understand all the implications. It is feasible because we produce a specific batch for each race to be sure that they all come from the same batch of production. So honestly to put a purple label or a yellow label or any other colour is not a big issue. It’s a possibility.”

Some revisions to the rules might be needed to accommodate the change, Isola added.

Pirelli also intends to reduce the number of available compounds next year. “[There are] seven this year is because we wanted to have a back-up,” said Isola.

“Six is a good number to have the right flexibility in tyre choices. Maybe if they are better spaced we can have five instead of six. But the number will be five or six.”