That engine just has great driveability. The Red Bulls are fairly rapid off the line as well, look at how Vettel streaked clear in Australia. And before you mention RBR's bad starts last year, that was due to the Red Bull clutch not the Renault engine. If you look at Monaco last year as well, the Renault engines locked out the top three both in qualifying and the race, and that track is all about braking and traction. They lack power top end, but they have great traction at low speeds.
Quick out of corners but lacking top end speed suggest the engines have more torque but less BHP than their competitors, or even a wider (but lower) power band. That's a extremely simplistic generalisation however.
I think we have the answer - better torque at low revs, not so hot at top end. Whats the current limit is it 18k revs?
For me I can see Button winning this race. He seems in the zone at the moment and he was brilliant in Malaysia, Qualifying will be very interesting because if Red Bull do not run KERS then I can see Webber starting 8th or 9th. Mclaren, Mercedes and Ferrari will be running KERS and with the long straight it's the circuit where the Red Bulls will really struggle and on top of that there are not many high speed corners which is where the Red Bulls usually shine. I think Vettel has the skill and speed to take the car up to 4th or 5th and I can see Mercedes suprising everyone because of their DRS system. Going to be a very interesting Weekend
Nobody in the last 7 years has won more than 4 races in a row. I think Vettel will have a bad weekend. Qualifying badly, getting pissed off and crashing out. I had the same feeling about Webbers bad start last week. I also think Ferrari will be back on it and Massa out doing Alonso on merit - for once
I want Renault to do well, bring Mercedes back to reality and make them realise that any mistake allows the team behind to jump ahead. Get is sorted!
I'm going to go for a Hamilton/Button victory. Will be interesting to see the long straight with a Red Bull/Mclaren fight.
It will be interesting to see the tyre degradation at China.... Also will they take the same compounds to China or a different compounds???
Oh thanks for that.It means that they will take the Hard and Soft compounds to Shanghai. The Hard seems to be weak on the McLaren especially on Lewis`s car but the soft seems good.
I think Lewis's team will be looking at his setup, and normal lap telemetry with a view to learning for China. Any tweak to assist him would pay dividends. Maybe Button will learn from a slightly overdone oversteer setup? Ferrari and Renault will be putting in the hours to look for anything to bring tiny improvements. This next race has a lot of promise - again 56 laps, almost same lap distance, perhaps tighter turns, and a nice long straight.
McLaren won't necessarily have an advantage on the straights any more. In Sepang they ran a lot of wing to match the Red Bulls for downforce, and obviously increased drag in the process. I had a look at Saturday's speed trap classification to see how much they were losing on the straights as a result and here's the comparison between them and Red Bull Button 306.8 km/h Vettel 304.8 km/h Webber 304.3 km/h Hamilton 303.3 km/h Remember Button went low downforce in qualifying and increased the amount of front downforce at each stop (improving his lap times in the process). So his optimum setup would have had lower speeds, how much lower we can only guess. I think this is great for the rest of the season if both cars are similar on lap times as well as straight line speed. The similar lap times should lead to close racing, the similar top speeds should give all four drivers overtaking opportunities.
Lewis11, The tyre situation seems to be a bit unpredictable this year, I'm not totally sure quite how the compounds pan out, although I do think Lewis has adapted his driving style slightly to accomodate the tyre issues, he's just a tad smoother, not hanging out the tail, which for me is what Lews is about. I miss that. What do you think ?
Yep he has had to change his driving style but I am sure we will still see the trademark lock up at a hairpin or a extreme oversteer moment in high speed corner or even a bounce across the chicane at Montreal. Lewis is a passionate driver and that wont change.
Ferrari have some big issues they need to sort out before we see them fighting at the top: - Lack of front downforce still the biggest issue. They brought a new front wing to Malaysia, and while it looked to be a small improvement, overall the front end of the car still requires big developments. - Wind tunnel data is completely different to data on track - perhaps this is due to their recent wind tunnel upgrade? - Both Red Bull and McLaren have flexi wings, and Ferrari still don't have one. Given that it wasn't banned last year, Ferrari should have worked hard over the winter to develop this part, and should make the car a few tenths faster. - They can't get the tyres switched on in qualifying, and this ensures that the maximum for Ferrari in Q3 is 5th, and I wouldn't expect any better in China. Their slow qualifying comes from a direct result of a lack of downforce. - Aldo Costa is designing the Ferrari way too conservative. I'm not blaming Costa for the lack of pace, but the Ferrari's that he designs looks too simple relative to it's rivals. Looking ahead to China Ferrari have already confirmed that there will be new parts in China. Domenicali, Costa and Fry left for Maranello last night, in order to keep a close eye on the carââ¬â¢s development programme. Although they haven't mentioned any specific updates, you can be sure that one of the updates will be to the front wing - although probably just a small update. As China is just a few days away, we shouldn't expect any significant improvements, so I would expect Ferrari to struggle for pace again, with a much bigger update coming for Turkey.
Lewis11, I hope you are right, I like the original Lewis Hamilton, he's the guy who made me leap off the setee and smash my head into the light fitting when he took Raikonnen at Spa.
I'll sum it up after two races for you, RedBull, have not really broken away from the front runners Mclaren, Ferrari are dropping back (that scene of Alonso watching that timing screens even made ME feel sad), they know they should be fighting at the front. Mercedes have fallen into confusion and hopelessness, Renault-Sauber-Force India (DIR)- Torro Rosso have all moved up. Williams have remained unchanged, the bottom three teams have progressed well, HRT have moved away from the 107% lock out zone after hard work.
