1. Log in now to remove adverts - no adverts at all to registered members!

The Official Not606 Chinese GP Chat & Predictions

Discussion in 'Formula 1' started by El_Bando, Apr 2, 2013.

?

With Friends like these?

Poll closed Apr 11, 2013.
  1. Vettel

    16.2%
  2. Raikkonen

    2.7%
  3. Webber

    2.7%
  4. Hamilton

    40.5%
  5. Massa

    2.7%
  6. Alonso

    16.2%
  7. Rosberg

    5.4%
  8. Grosjean

    5.4%
  9. Button

    8.1%
  10. Perez

    0 vote(s)
    0.0%
  11. Other

    0 vote(s)
    0.0%
Multiple votes are allowed.
  1. JonnyBaws

    JonnyBaws Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 14, 2011
    Messages:
    5,345
    Likes Received:
    717
  2. Big Ern

    Big Ern Lord, Master, Guru & Emperor

    Joined:
    Jan 28, 2011
    Messages:
    23,534
    Likes Received:
    17,781
    Part of me hates the tyres, and part of me likes them, motor racing isn't all about driving flat-out, all drivers have to manage their cars, the harder you drive a car the more liable it is to breaking, the faster you drive your car the more fuel you burn, ergo, the more weight you have to start with, which also adds to the stresses of the cars. But I do think that some tyres are just ridiculous, to have tyres that last 5 laps is an absolute joke, how can that be 'cost cutting'? I don't like the idea of enforced pit-stops, I'd like to see a return to open tyre choices.
    On the plus side, I do like to see the lead change so much, and to have drivers in teams like Sauber & Force India leading races is a refreshing change, and it was nice to see Vettel hunting down Lewis in the final laps, gave the last few laps a bit of excitement.
     
    #342
  3. BrightLampShade

    BrightLampShade Well-Known Member
    Forum Moderator

    Joined:
    Feb 14, 2011
    Messages:
    13,495
    Likes Received:
    2,568
    China report: racing but not as we used to know it - Autosport:

    It was lap four, DRS had been enabled for only a lap, and Fernando Alonso's Ferrari was tracking Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes like a shadow down that long, long Shanghai back straight – a silver bullet chased by scarlet, tiny specks emerging from the smog, but growing bigger fast, and loud; Fernando bobbing this side and that, Lewis checking his mirrors as he stood on the brakes for the Turn 14 hairpin, 200mph down to 60mph in just 3s at a peak of 6.4g, Brembo discs glowing orange. And he was still ahead.

    But his problems were far from over, because this year there is a second DRS zone down the pit straight. Accelerating out of the hairpin, up towards that pit entry where Hamilton lost the 2007 world title as a rookie, they crossed the DRS-detection point, with Fernando still just a breath away and team-mate Felipe Massa just a further breath away, therefore getting his DRS armed too, ready for deployment as the three of them screamed past the pits in a blur.

    By the time they'd approached the seventh-gear entry to Turn 1 the Mercedes was travelling at around 195mph, the Ferraris at around 212 thanks to their open rear flaps. Alonso darted by the defenceless Mercedes one side, Massa the other.

    It was racing, sort of – but not as we used to know it. Just as only Hamilton's defencelessness against a wing-stalling device made this double overtake feasible and conjured up a scene that looked like fantastic racing, so it was with the tyres. 'Let him go, you're not racing him,' said the race engineers' voices to drivers who were on varying tyre strategies, desperately trying to eke out competitive stint lengths. And so that driver would allow the other one to pass – and that too would technically be an overtake and would therefore look to the untrained eye like racing. But it wasn't; it was simply two different strategic wave frequencies interfering.

    The real race was a cerebral one, being contested on the pit counter, the drivers just speed monkeys expressing the performance of their package, being instructed on the most efficient way to run their race.

    The DRS zones at Shanghai were overdone; the feature is supposed to make passing possible, not inevitable. Here drivers were virtually stumbling into passing moves, so big were the speed differences closed-flap to open, so long the straights.

    But equally there was no doubt that the Ferrari was a faster race car than the Mercedes, even though Lewis had outqualified Fernando by over 0.3s the day before. The key to that was how relatively easy it was on the front left – the defining tyre around Shanghai and its two long, long loops, Turns 1-3 and 11-13. Combine that with an aggressive Pirelli compound choice of the soft for the option tyre and we had an even more extreme situation than Melbourne.

    None of those who had qualified on the soft in Q3, and who had therefore already put three laps on the tyres they were obliged to start on, were reckoning on getting much past lap six before they would need to pit. The fronts would grain almost instantly and continue to grain, shedding skin like a snake until they were worn out after just a handful of laps.

    It was this extreme tyre and track combination that had split the field into two strategies, according to where they had expected to qualify – and hence the interfering waves as one strategy fell into its dip as another was in its ascendancy; drivers sometimes passing each other like ships in the night.

    Jenson Button, in addition to starting on the mediums, was trying to get by on just two stops rather than the more common three, recognising that getting a result from the McLaren as it is required stealth.

    "You don't want to look like you're not fighting," he sighed, "but the best thing to do was to have clean air and not destroy the tyres. If we couldn't run to target it would destroy our race. We had to cruise a lot of times when normally you'd fight with people."


    ...and then some more, but I may have lost some of you already.

    Interestingly my Autosport online membership ran out 3 months ago now but yet I can still get their features and forix data :)
     
    #343
  4. GUEST

    GUEST Member

    Joined:
    Mar 26, 2011
    Messages:
    347
    Likes Received:
    0
    but the tyres create fakery.you dont have on track battles,instead you have drivers driving at 80% trying to be as close to delta time as possible.so essentially drivers are not racing each other,theyre just doing their individual thing.also it seems like it doesnt matter what you do.if your car isnt good with the tyres,you cant make any difference as a driver to make them last longer,unless you drive at 50 or 60%,but thats just ridiculous.also all you have is easy overtakes because of weak tyres and drs and the fact drivers dont fight to keep their place or get their place back,which makes overtaking extremely easy,it shouldnt be.also tyres that barely last for 5 0r 6 laps is wrong for f1.
    so is it the driver making the difference,or is it all about how your car works with the tyres.
     
    #344
  5. Big Ern

    Big Ern Lord, Master, Guru & Emperor

    Joined:
    Jan 28, 2011
    Messages:
    23,534
    Likes Received:
    17,781
    It's better than the bridgestone era IMO, but if you read I've agreed that having them wear out so quickly is ridiculous, the trouble is Pirelli have gone too far and the ridiculous rigidity of the rules have combined to cause the current situation, but back in the day conserving tyres was also a part of F1, who could forget the last 10% of Adelaide 1986 when 2 drivers lost the WDC because of poor tyre management? there were always races where someone was conserving tyre wear, sadly the rules on tyre choice are too rigid, I'd like to see someone using super hards whilst some others are on mediums and others on soft, and the final laps are similar to yesterdays Vettel V Hamilton. The other problem is the pits, they are now so slow through the lane that a pitstop costs about 1/3rd of a lap, a redesign of the pit entries to shorten the time lost would be of great benefit to the spectacle, as there would be more reason to stop and give the drivers more reason to push their tyres, sadly it'll never happen.
     
    #345
  6. JonnyBaws

    JonnyBaws Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 14, 2011
    Messages:
    5,345
    Likes Received:
    717
    #346
  7. El_Bando

    El_Bando Can't remember, where was I?
    Forum Moderator

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2011
    Messages:
    14,374
    Likes Received:
    1,830
    Is Mutley Seb or Vergne?
     
    #347
  8. JonnyBaws

    JonnyBaws Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 14, 2011
    Messages:
    5,345
    Likes Received:
    717
    Picture didn't come out quite as clear as I liked, Mutley's got the #1 on his helmet.
     
    #348
  9. BrightLampShade

    BrightLampShade Well-Known Member
    Forum Moderator

    Joined:
    Feb 14, 2011
    Messages:
    13,495
    Likes Received:
    2,568
    please log in to view this image


    <whistle>
     
    #349
  10. di Fredsta!

    di Fredsta! Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 25, 2011
    Messages:
    3,366
    Likes Received:
    89
    #350

  11. Forza Bianchi

    Forza Bianchi Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 25, 2011
    Messages:
    5,132
    Likes Received:
    26
    [video=youtube;hV_TTdQ_Jv4]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hV_TTdQ_Jv4[/video]
     
    #351
  12. Joey Zyla

    Joey Zyla New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 6, 2013
    Messages:
    176
    Likes Received:
    5
    Holly Nonck, what a great race from Esteban Gutierrez!

    Congrats to Fernando Alonso on the win, though!
     
    #352
  13. RoadRunner

    RoadRunner Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Aug 6, 2011
    Messages:
    4,258
    Likes Received:
    28
    I, like ASC, am preparing a nice big helping of humble pie for ya Kyle :D
     
    #353
  14. Joey Zyla

    Joey Zyla New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 6, 2013
    Messages:
    176
    Likes Received:
    5
    MaxWhiplash, why did you give me negative reputation for my post? :(
     
    #354
  15. Max Whiplash

    Max Whiplash Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    May 19, 2011
    Messages:
    4,094
    Likes Received:
    156
    I could ask you the same question. In fact, you know perfectly well why: now stop trolling, playing games and acting like a child. I was pretty patient with you but now I've had enough.
     
    #355
  16. Joey Zyla

    Joey Zyla New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 6, 2013
    Messages:
    176
    Likes Received:
    5
  17. El_Bando

    El_Bando Can't remember, where was I?
    Forum Moderator

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2011
    Messages:
    14,374
    Likes Received:
    1,830
  18. EternalMSC

    EternalMSC Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2011
    Messages:
    10,624
    Likes Received:
    747

    My thoughts exactly the mods should have sorted it for good. They didn't.
     
    #358
  19. di Fredsta!

    di Fredsta! Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 25, 2011
    Messages:
    3,366
    Likes Received:
    89
    Look again, he's gone :)
     
    #359
  20. EternalMSC

    EternalMSC Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 26, 2011
    Messages:
    10,624
    Likes Received:
    747
    My apologies thanks for the heads up.
    Thanks to the mod that sorted it also.
     
    #360

Share This Page