FORUMula1.com - F1 Forum

[Hammer278]

No cause to worry yet. I believe McLaren are going back to their late 90's practices of bringing out a car much later in order to get more R&D in, and then unlock its potential througout the season = less reliability, more speed down the road. Lately they've been doing the opposite, bring the car out early and make sure its fast from the outset though development potential is not as much.

With quality control more stringent than ever, what with gearbox/engines having to last many races I dont think reliability will be much of an issue, its having the best base to develop from which is what McLaren might be aiming for.

Robert...dont forget McLaren were almost a second slower in Bahrain 2010, and ended up fighting for the WDC at the last race.

[bigpat]

I don't think pumping out heaps of laps in pre season is necessarily an accurate guide to reliability. You only need to run enough laps to substantiate what you want to learn.Just going round & round is just a waste of resources.....

From the outside, its hard to know how much running is done with KERS activated, which seems to be the hardest thing to optimise at the moment. Look at Williams... plenty of laps, but no KERS onboard, just so they can get a baseline to start their program to sort the car.

It seems that Red Bull have worked through their program quicker than most others (as indicated from their press release). The numbers on the telemetry must look good......

[Hammer278]

EDITED

Nvm, figured it out.

[Robert12010]

No cause to worry yet. I believe McLaren are going back to their late 90's practices of bringing out a car much later in order to get more R&D in, and then unlock its potential througout the season = less reliability, more speed down the road. Lately they've been doing the opposite, bring the car out early and make sure its fast from the outset though development potential is not as much.

With quality control more stringent than ever, what with gearbox/engines having to last many races I dont think reliability will be much of an issue, its having the best base to develop from which is what McLaren might be aiming for.

Robert...dont forget McLaren were almost a second slower in Bahrain 2010, and ended up fighting for the WDC at the last race.

your right hamilton was a second down in quali in bahrain and still had a slim chance at the end by abu dhabi, and big pat is right that its pointless just pounding round and round, without finding out something useful , and race chick is right that this is only the car's first test, so panic is over for now!

[nish2280]

No cause to worry yet. I believe McLaren are going back to their late 90's practices of bringing out a car much later in order to get more R&D in, and then unlock its potential througout the season = less reliability, more speed down the road. Lately they've been doing the opposite, bring the car out early and make sure its fast from the outset though development potential is not as much.

With quality control more stringent than ever, what with gearbox/engines having to last many races I dont think reliability will be much of an issue, its having the best base to develop from which is what McLaren might be aiming for.

Robert...dont forget McLaren were almost a second slower in Bahrain 2010, and ended up fighting for the WDC at the last race.

your right hamilton was a second down in quali in bahrain and still had a slim chance at the end by abu dhabi, and big pat is right that its pointless just pounding round and round, without finding out something useful , and race chick is right that this is only the car's first test, so panic is over for now!

It shouldnt have started in the first place!

Just calm down for now and leave the panicking for Q3 Quali in bahrain.

[spankyham]

I'm constantly surprised by the reaction of fans, and experienced ones at that, to one lap time during testing. There are those who get all excited about a fast lap and all depressed about no fast lap.

What I believe is, the teams have their programs which they lay out long before they turn up on track. Anyone who thinks teams deliberately sandbag really don't understand the workload and the data needed to be acquired and crunched. Drivers need to learn and familiarise themselves with MRW and re-familiarise themselves with KERS.

Cars have to be driven, as per the simulation needs. They need to be pushed at times to establish limits, weaknesses and strengths.

Sandbagging and panicking about lap times I think is mostly the domain of some fans and media now.

The best example I can think of is this. At his last 3 practice sessions before Bahrain last year, Seb finished like this:-
5th, 8th and 5th. At Bahrain his RB6 was the tear-away leader and clearly the fastest car. Comfortable pole to RB and Seb was comfortably controlling the race from out front - but for a spark plug it would have been a cakewalk for him and Red Bull.

Unless you know the exact condition of all cars tyres, aero setup, fuel load, and testing purpose practice lap times mean nothing.

[Robert12010]

I'm constantly surprised by the reaction of fans, and experienced ones at that, to one lap time during testing. There are those who get all excited about a fast lap and all depressed about no fast lap.

What I believe is, the teams have their programs which they lay out long before they turn up on track. Anyone who thinks teams deliberately sandbag really don't understand the workload and the data needed to be acquired and crunched. Drivers need to learn and familiarise themselves with MRW and re-familiarise themselves with KERS.

Cars have to be driven, as per the simulation needs. They need to be pushed at times to establish limits, weaknesses and strengths.

Sandbagging and panicking about lap times I think is mostly the domain of some fans and media now.

The best example I can think of is this. At his last 3 practice sessions before Bahrain last year, Seb finished like this:-
5th, 8th and 5th. At Bahrain his RB6 was the tear-away leader and clearly the fastest car. Comfortable pole to RB and Seb was comfortably controlling the race from out front - but for a spark plug it would have been a cakewalk for him and Red Bull.

Unless you know the exact condition of all cars tyres, aero setup, fuel load, and testing purpose practice lap times mean nothing.

i am now calm!

[Hexagram]

Unless you know the exact condition of all cars tyres, aero setup, fuel load, and testing purpose practice lap times mean nothing.

The consistency over long runs is the best indicator of how good the car is not the fastest laps.

If you get a breakdown of all the laptimes over long runs you will get a pretty good idea of who is in trouble and who isn't.

[vlad]

Also, you can see that Ferraris are doing always like 115 laps or so... That could tell us that they are really working hard and focusing on some key elements... Red Bull keeps it in range of 90-05 laps, as well as McLaren... Anyway, we still have to see them in action...

[spankyham]

Unless you know the exact condition of all cars tyres, aero setup, fuel load, and testing purpose practice lap times mean nothing.

The consistency over long runs is the best indicator of how good the car is not the fastest laps.

If you get a breakdown of all the laptimes over long runs you will get a pretty good idea of who is in trouble and who isn't.

I find myself drawn to agree with your thought that consistency is good, but when I think about it, I don't think I'd be happy with being consistent but relatively slow.

[nish2280]

The teams setting the fastest laps over long runs are the ones who are going to be walking away from Jerez with a giant smile.

I'm surprised some website/magazine has not put out a table which has long run comparative timings.

ie.
Petrov: 1:20.00 - 1:24.00 (30 laps)
Kobayashi: 1:21:22 - 1:23:43 (24 laps)

Even though this wont give us direct information on who is doing well, it will still be more useful than just having quickest times.

[Hexagram]

The teams setting the fastest laps over long runs are the ones who are going to be walking away from Jerez with a giant smile.

I'm surprised some website/magazine has not put out a table which has long run comparative timings.

ie.
Petrov: 1:20.00 - 1:24.00 (30 laps)
Kobayashi: 1:21:22 - 1:23:43 (24 laps)

Even though this wont give us direct information on who is doing well, it will still be more useful than just having quickest times.

Here is a comparison of what must have been heavy fuel runs for Ferrari & Mercedes.

Here's an analysis of recent Ferrari and Mercedes stints by @TeamAnglais

Fernando Alonso and Michael Schumacher recently completed similar runs, the Ferrari 16 laps and the Mercedes 14. Once again, putting the unknown tyre compounds and any excess fuel aside, let's compare their times:

Ignoring Alonso's very slow first lap, they began with similar first laps. Then Alonso was able to stay in the 1m26s for nine laps, while Schumacher dropped into the 27s after two.

11 laps in, the Ferrari was 1.1s slower than its quickest, while 10 laps in the Mercedes was 1.3 slower than its best.

Had those times been from a race scenario (and we remove times that vary by a couple of seconds from the previous lap), Alonso would have been 8.8 seconds ahead just before Schumacher pitted after 13 laps.

Alonso
2:05.9, 26.3, 26.3, 26.4, 26.3, 26.5, 26.4, 26.9, 26.8, 26.7, 30.0, 27.1, 27.4, 27.6, 27.8, 28.9

Schumacher
26.5, 26.5, 27.2, 27.3, 27.2, 27.2, 27.4, 27.4, 27.5, 27.8, 28.2, 28.5, 28.6, 32.3

[spankyham]

The teams setting the fastest laps over long runs are the ones who are going to be walking away from Jerez with a giant smile.

I'm surprised some website/magazine has not put out a table which has long run comparative timings.

ie.
Petrov: 1:20.00 - 1:24.00 (30 laps)
Kobayashi: 1:21:22 - 1:23:43 (24 laps)

Even though this wont give us direct information on who is doing well, it will still be more useful than just having quickest times.

Here is a comparison of what must have been heavy fuel runs for Ferrari & Mercedes.

Here's an analysis of recent Ferrari and Mercedes stints by @TeamAnglais

Fernando Alonso and Michael Schumacher recently completed similar runs, the Ferrari 16 laps and the Mercedes 14. Once again, putting the unknown tyre compounds and any excess fuel aside, let's compare their times:

Ignoring Alonso's very slow first lap, they began with similar first laps. Then Alonso was able to stay in the 1m26s for nine laps, while Schumacher dropped into the 27s after two.

11 laps in, the Ferrari was 1.1s slower than its quickest, while 10 laps in the Mercedes was 1.3 slower than its best.

Had those times been from a race scenario (and we remove times that vary by a couple of seconds from the previous lap), Alonso would have been 8.8 seconds ahead just before Schumacher pitted after 13 laps.

Alonso
2:05.9, 26.3, 26.3, 26.4, 26.3, 26.5, 26.4, 26.9, 26.8, 26.7, 30.0, 27.1, 27.4, 27.6, 27.8, 28.9

Schumacher
26.5, 26.5, 27.2, 27.3, 27.2, 27.2, 27.4, 27.4, 27.5, 27.8, 28.2, 28.5, 28.6, 32.3

I still wouldn't read too much into it. Firstly, as even they pointed out, we have no idea what tyres they were on. Remember, we already know Fernando did two long runs on the same set of tyres (40 laps). Perhaps Shumi was on old tyres to start with and Nando fresh. We just don't know so you really can't read anything into it.

Secondly, and probably more importantly, if this really was the true race pace we will see, then, with MRW Shumi would be right behind Nando, not 8.8 seconds behind him on the track. To pull away from the car behind you, your car must be more than 1 second faster over less than a lap.

[What's Burning?]

One of the things they do with the data gathered is feed it back into their CFD models for raw real world data for the wind tunnel. The more they can confirm in the real wold what the wind tunnel is telling them, or more importantly add accuracy to the wind tunnel data by supplementing it with real world numbers, the better the development of future part becomes.

[bigpat]

One of the things they do with the data gathered is feed it back into their CFD models for raw real world data for the wind tunnel. The more they can confirm in the real wold what the wind tunnel is telling them, or more importantly add accuracy to the wind tunnel data by supplementing it with real world numbers, the better the development of future part becomes.

Absolutely correct......