F1 2018 SEASON: NEWS - RUMOURS

In the future we will all be focused on Goodwood to see those old fashioned IC cars with their crazy noise wishing for the good old days.
There has to be excitement in the end, FE may have it for the driver but it doesn't quite enhance the adrenalin levels of the audience in the same way, bit like cricket really!! Great for the players like watching paint dry for the non enthusiastic.
To go electric something needs to be there to make it watchable, it is otherwise too much like a scalectrix set.
No doubt I am a dinosaur who hasn't quite comprehended the extinction event is looming. Oil, smell, noise, danger.

 

I watched a bit of Sky F1 last night. They played the 1996 Aussie GP. Far from a classic race (aside from a couple of great moments between Hill and Villeneuve for the lead), you still enjoyed the V10 sound as the car pelted down the straight or accelerated out of a corner. You also got the impression the drivers were fighting the cars a little bit too, so there was the feeling that your drivers could make a difference.

I think we miss that in the current formula.

 

It's been said many times, a lot of people look back all misty-eyed at the so called racing that used to happen. It just didn't. Most F1 races are fairly processional to a point. It didn't matter whether it was the turbo's of the 80's, the McLaren dominance, Williams dominance, Schuey dominance, RBR dominance, Mercedes dominance etc etc By and large there has been little consistently great racing, other than the off bizarre race that happens once or so a season where the form book, luck/rules go out of the window.

I do agree on the sound though. I didn't care much for the recent pre-turbo V8's, they just were noisy with no soul, but the previous V10's/V12's etc were fantastic to listen too as they all sounded different and added some atmosphere to what could be a dull race (especially at Monaco where the noise would echo around the buildings).

 

Remember when McLaren won 15 out of 16 races ?

Remember when Keke became world champion despite only wining one race ?

This sport , like all others has it's ups and downs , but I still love it , just not as much as I used to .

 

It was easier to make mistakes 'back then', and you were actually punished for them when you made them, the cars were unreliable too, which also sometimes made for some excitment.

 

Agreed .

I have always said we need to bring back Gravel traps .

 

It's all about reducing downforce to make the cars trickier to drive at the limit. It won't make the racing any better, as everyone will suffer the same, but mistakes will be punished more.

The drivers aren't stretched as much these days as they are limited by the amount of grip the tyres can handle as the downforce just pins the cars to the road. The balance needs to go back to mechanical grip rather than aero grip. Small tweeks with the rules is not enough, they need to really crack down on the intricate aero stuff that goes on. Front wings with 5 or 6 elements is ridiculous, just makes them so fragile and sensitive.

 

The issues with them are well documented, in terms of safety, so we won't be seeing them any time soon. I am surprised though that the "best" alternative that's been adopted is just tarmac. Paul Ricard has "abrasive zones", so I'm looking forward to seeing what they offer. But really it'd be good to see this researched as much as overtaking is.

Hopefully improvements on both fronts will come in soon. 2019 will see dramatically simplified front wings, and there's talk of active suspension in 2021 to improve grip.

The problem with aero regulations is that it's a war the FIA will always lose. They employ a few aerodynamicists and engineers to write the rules, but there's probably 500+, often better, aerodyamicists working for the teams, trying to defeat them. Unless the aero rules are so strict so as to almost be spec, they'll be circumvented. And Spec aero is a whole other problem.

 

Sorry .

The gravel traps add something imho .

All they need to do is make sure when they lose it , they are OK .

 

Maybe have a slippery strip at track limits, maybe half a car width, that way put a wheel on slippery bit and you have a high probability of a spin. That way you would punish mistakes but still leave enough for a decent run off.

 

I don't disagree at all! I'd much rather we could have them. But MotoGP essentially won't race anywhere with gravel now, and with cars there's the risk of rolling if an edge digs in, and skimming across the surface without being able to scrub off speed.

Whether you could have gravel with tarmac behind, to eliminate that second problem? I don't know. It increases the size of the run-off I guess. Or just hundreds of metres of Techpro?

 

Agree with you and Ched .

I think part of the skill , much as we moan , is keeping the car on the track . There should IMHO be a penalty for going off line .

 

With regard to engine noise, I find that it doesn't really bother me too much. Perhaps it's because I didn't get to attend a race before the V6 turbos came in, so didn't truly experience it. I acknowledge that there is a certain something about the brutish scream of the older engines that sets your pulse going and the hairs on your arms stand up, but it seems like something of relatively low importance in comparison to improving the show in terms of the action on track.

As far as wanting the drivers to be punished when they make a mistake, it seems to be a very thin line between ruining someone's race by beaching in a gravel trap and being let off relatively lightly by just running over some tarmac. I'm looking forward to seeing the French GP as I've long heard of the rough patches utilised at Paul Ricard and I'm interested to see what the effect is of that. In many ways, I quite like the idea of different tracks having different consequences so I don't really mind the variety between the old tracks and the new ones.

 

yeah, it's a bit of a paradox, the cars have become more reliable whilst becoming more fragile. we wont ever see a return to the racing of the past because technology has improved so much, they'll never have to drive Monaco one-handed with perfect clutch and throttle control because that's all handled by computer now. That's why no one ever has a 'bad start' off the line because, as soon as they start to spin up the rears, the computer bails them out.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/44309487

Williams aero chief leaves having got it all wrong. The reason for their issues "When the front wheels turn, they disrupt the intended airflow to the back of the car, and the critical rear floor area suffers an aerodynamic 'stall', robbing the car of downforce and grip on corner entry." just shows that aero is far too complex and important in the make up of an F1 car, or he is just crap.

 

If he didn;t consider that the wheels would turn, I'm going with the 2nd option.
Doesn't sound like an easy fix either.

 

Such a fundamental issue you have to wonder how this even arose as a problem to start with. Cars need aero to turn, surely someone somewhere did some CFD or wind tunnel work on this?

 

my bad

 

I doubt this aero issue was down to one single person, but as the head of that division he had to go, I can just imagine he was presented with twisted facts that he didn't challenge. Why though has it taken 6 races to understand this and not following the pre season testing.

As for the racing, in olden days the driver had to get it right and paid the price when he messed up with a manual gear change. Recently we had just one or two seasons when the team could not tell the driver what was wrong and the teams argued the car was too technical to allow the driver to figure it himself. Sorry, but this is where it has gone wrong, drivers are rarely heroes these days, talented , yes, heroes rarely. We want drivers who are not part of the corporate machinery.

 

Hamilton to quit before the new regs come in to persue a music career? hmm, gonna take that with a pinch of salt as there's really no need to quit racing to write music, if you're any good at music. following in Alguesuari's shoes, who hasn't really been heard of since.