Have said since I first saw the McLaren that I thought they had the winner and it would maybe take them until the mid-season before they started to fully reap the benefits of it's original design, which I believe will make them almost as dominant as RBR have been. The early signs from Fridays practice are that they have caught up considerably, however we won't know for sure until tomorrow as I'm not sure if Vettel was using his KERS for his time, as he had problems with it in FP1. 'shocks' for today, Schumacher on pace, a Lotus ahead of Sutil and Kobay faster than both Renaults. looking forward to tomorrw
Seb was using Kers in FP2. I think they have pace to burn though and will be sat smugly in the garage at the end of Q3 watching the others trying and failing to beat them again.
Miggins, I hope you're right but just based on the season so far I think Glorious's prediction seems more likely. That said, McLaren have up to 12 much-vaunted updates for this weekend so they may be making a difference. It will take a lot though to catch up by the half-second needed to challenge for pole.
Seb was able to set decent times with the options over 6 laps. Didn't see that from Webber or Lewis, so Sebs sand bagging I reckon.
This should be an interesting weekend, with a multitude of improvements coming from most of the teams but all of them trying to get to grips with Pirelli's 'super-hard' harder tyre. My prediction is that the winner will be driving a car which can make extended use of the softer compound, by preserving it for as long as possible in the hope of doing one less stop. This is because there is a very significant difference in compounds (perhaps too much?). However, this must be balanced against the possibility of going much further on the hards, perhaps even saving two stops, although I do not expect many of the front runners to attempt this with so little knowledge of them. Bizarrely, the difference is such that we could see a situation with teams doing shorter runs on the hard compound than the softs! Certainly these tyres will have thrown a few spanners into normal logic. At the tail end, Kovalainen seems happy with his days work and I expect him to turn a few heads this weekend by further promoting his green 'Lotus', probably at the expense of Williams. Hispania are once again on the cusp of not getting into the race and it could be that only Liuzzi qualifies. In a sense, both of them are at the mercy of Red Bull in my opinion. Then again, it seems that they stuck to their plan of only running heavy today, so they may fair better in qualifying trim. Virgin are looking stronger than Hispania and Timo Glock is in my opinion, the most adaptable driver of the tail end of the grid, which will help, so long as they can get some reliability into his car. Amongst the leading contenders, Massa and Button have had the most difficult time today, both of whom really struggled to find a good balance. Mercedes have brought a host of upgrades and appear to be right up there with McLaren and Ferrari. It is amongst these teams where we see the biggest results of a driver contribution, with some significant differences in philosophies. My opinion is that McLaren have by far the best working relationship to improve a car; that Ferrari risk going astray through focussing too strongly upon one of their drivers who is effectively doing most of the development work; and that Mercedes have the weakest line-up with one of them consistently falling short, in spite of getting most of the input into development ideologies, and the other enigmatically out-performing him regardless of what he's given. I'm looking forward to seeing this play out tomorrow but I see no threat to Red Bull dominance, where I hope Webber can dig deep enough to rein in the ever more confident Vettel.
Based on tyre degradation levels seen in testing, and in practice, I think teams willl be doing 3-4 pit stops, and the way teams look to utilize the hard tyre will be very interesting. Based on the time difference between the compounds (2 seconds, maybe even 2.5) I think teams will be looking to run a very small stint on the hard tyre, because while hards may last longer, they are too slow to gain any benefit from running longer - I may be proved wrong on this. It's a bit premature to predict what will be the best strategy, but I think: - All drivers will use softs in Q1, even Vettel - meaning all teams who get into Q3 will have no fresh soft's - As a result, all drivers in Q3 will only do one run - if Vettel or Webber makes an error, surprise pole? - Race: Soft-Soft-Soft-Hard (with the first stint being short (undercut), and the last stint also being short) I see 4 stops being more effective with a shorter stint on the hard tyre - maybe 10 laps. Those gambling on hards at the start will probably go backwards, like Webber in China. Those choosing a 3 stop or even 2 stops will suffer if they try long stints with the harder tyre, because they may save a pit stop or two, but if the softs are 2-2.5 seconds quicker per lap, it's not going to take very long for a driver on soft tyres to get a whole pit stop length ahead of a driver on hards. This is probably more relevant to the Spanish GP Chat Thread, but it makes sense here.
Yes Forza, you're first sentence is what I was hinting at. Of course it is possible that someone finds a way around this according to traffic density and track position, which may require some quick thinking. However, unlike yourself, I do not expect the front running teams to use the soft compound in Q1, which should be of some relief to Virgin and particularly Hispania!
Judging by FP1 and 2, I think its touch and go whether Red Bull have enough in hand to get away with primes in Q1, we'll see. It'll be interesting whether anyone else tries it, maybe a Mclaren, and ends up dropping out early?
Well the normal hard tyre is 1 second slower than the softs, while the super hard is about 2 seconds (maybe even slower - and warm up would be an issue as well). If we take Vettel's Q1 times on hard tyre, and add 1 second (simulating super hard tyre): Turkey - Close to being knocked out - risky China - Eliminated Malaysia - Eliminated Australia - Eliminated That would all be on the assumption that he was the only one on the super hard tyre, while everyone else is on softs. I'm not so sure frontrunners want to take the risk. They might initially go out on hards, but I see them switching to softs later on in that session.
This could of course catch someone out in Q2, but I have a feeling people may try to do Q1 and Q2 on the same set of softs.
Well the obvious thing to do is set a really quick lap on the hards as fast as you can by the ten min mark then if in a danger place go and do 2 runs on softs.
That is a very good point BLS. Then they could save a set of softs for the race and still take pole - when I say "they", I mean Red Bull
This is true Forza. And it is one of the reasons I believe tomorrow's qualifying will be particularly interesting. I think most of the front runners will attempt to get through Q1 on Primes, although I expect Massa and Schumacher (perhaps even Button if he struggles in Practice 3) to play safe with Options. This will be one of the best indicators of whether Pirelli have too big a gap between compounds. I also agree that BLS makes a very good point.
I am excited for today! I really think this could be the day Vettel's qualifying dominance is broken by Lewis. However, I wouldn't be too surprised if I'm way out
Having just witnessed Vettel puttting in the fastest lap of Practice 3 after spending 45 minutes in the garage, I'd be inclined to disagree with you!
The gap may have widened significantly, never mind been closed. By tea time tomorrow we might all be talking about the championship being as good as over. Still, we've got plenty of random passing manoeuvres to look forward to, eh?
I guess we're about to find out, I think it'll be Vettel, but I think the McLarens will have caught up significantly. This is one of the most RB tracks, so a real reflection of how far they've improved will come after Spain. McLaren will probably be the team that have the most upgrades through the whole season because they've started from scratch.
