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[Hammer278]

And he said when he does it, it would have been an 'extraordinary lap'. So now people think Massa is on top form but Alonso who is the Lord himself has just pulled another one out of the bag in China.

[spankyham]

IMO the F138's performance in China was, perhaps a little better than we might initially think. Nando's win was reasonably comfortable - he could have pushed harder if needed. However hard he was pushing, he achieved this with a damaged F138 - which, like Kimi's Lotus, would have somewhat compromised his cars potential on the day.

Below are two points of damage on Nando's car (both pics taken in parc ferme immediately after the race). These would most definitely have upset the aeros of the car - how much we can't tell, but they would have had a negative performance effect.

[Hammer278]

Are you kidding me bro...he probably suffered a cumulative total loss of 0.945 second with that damage.

[Jabberwocky]

Like hammer says I can not imagine that damage amounting to much. However I do agree that Alonso was not pushed in anyway to get that win.

[1Lemon]

Compared to Kimi that damage is nothing at all. That probably lost him less than half a second throughout the entire race if it occurred at the start.

[LRW]

I cant even work out what the damage is to the second photo? Looks like a sticker hanging off...?

Id have to agree with the common consensus, that I cant see it would caused that much loss of performance.

[What's Burning?]

Are you sure that wasn't Massa's car?

[1Lemon]

That "damage" on the wing is so neat, perhaps it was a quick Red Bull hacksaw repair job before quali.

[spankyham]

Interesting to read that I'm pretty much Robinson Crusoe with my thoughts that it would have had a negative effect on the cars performance.

Why I thought it would have had an impact:-
1) China is a front wing dependent course (ie df at the front of the car is more important here than just about any other circuit - I had mentioned elsewhere that I felt this had a little to do with why RB weren't their usual dominant selves there)
2) there is the obvious damage to the top element but, the element also looks damaged beyond the gap/hole
3) any damage to airflow at the front wing effects airflow under the car, at the pods and at the rear
4) very small changes in this area have been known to have significant effects. Best example I can think of the slit opening under the nose of the RB - there for boundary layer effect and others (a whole lot smarter than me over at the F1 Tech forum) were estimating the effect of that at a tenth a lap

Having said all that, perhaps the consensus is right and it didn't have any appreciable effect.

[Hammer278]

I'm sure if there was a significant loss, Alonso and his boss would've pointed it out repeatedly during the post race interviews.

[What's Burning?]

Kimi basically lost an entire end plate along with the nose cone damage and Renault didn't even bother to change it.

[1Lemon]

If anything, looking at the picture again, it looks like a piece of rubber that's hanging off the tyre and overlapping the front wing. Difficult to see though.

EDIT: Renault?

[spankyham]

If anything, looking at the picture again, it looks like a piece of rubber that's hanging off the tyre and overlapping the front wing. Difficult to see though.

EDIT: Renault?

It was definitely a hole, that's been pretty well established.

Whatever, the F138 worked really well all weekend in China. Be interesting to see how well it holds up against the RB's in Bahrain as I fully expect them to come right back as this circuit definitely suits their car.

[bud]

I think any performance loss would have been extremely minimal.

[andrew]

The front wing picture looks like a photoshop edit and the other looks like a piece of red tape hanging off. The sticker looks like a movable aero device to me.