re: 2022 Formula 1 Season Thread

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I’m disappointed no one has posted this important bit of news yet:

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April fools

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Senna

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Seems like I read his weakness was providing feedback on what the car was doing so that the crew could make improvements.

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motogp in Argentina is nuts

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That was a heck of a race.

It was posted before but it's race week so let's revisit the new Albert Park layout.

The track tweaks set to make Melbourne's Albert Park Circuit 5 seconds a lap quicker

Turns 1, 3, and 15 have small changes to make them faster. Turn 6 looks like a small change on the map but it's actually a big change that makes it much faster. Turn 13 is actually tighter now. And the biggest change of all is the elimination of the Turn 9/10 chicane, creating a curvy backstraight with a higher speed approaching the super fast Turn 11/12 chicane.

Here's a sim lap of the new Albert Park layout in Assetto Corsa: Albert Park Grand Prix Circuit 2022 Simulation (YouTube)

Old map with the new changes:



There are now four DRS zones! This is a first in F1.
www.racefans.net/2022/04/04/fourth-drs-zone-added-for-f1s-return-to-albert-park-circuit/

New map with the four DRS zones and new corner numbers:

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Seems like I read his weakness was providing feedback on what the car was doing so that the crew could make improvements.

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He had multiple weaknesses but that is one.

Senna had the innate ability to drive around a car's issues which lead him to never developing the ability to diagnose and help the engineers rectify issues. At least at the level of the better F1 drivers.

He also had near zero mechanical sympathy. He would drive a car into the ground that could have been nursed home.

He also had poor situational awareness, he never cared what other drivers were dealing with he just drove on with the highest pace he could muster until he won, wrecked or destroyed the car.

He had horribly abrupt inputs, especially the throttle. If the NSX video is the one I think it is you can see the throttle inputs could be from someone named Stabby McStabbin. His speed was from being OVER the limit 50% of the time.

There has never been an F1 driver with more raw pace than Senna but he was far from a well-rounded driver. If you could mix Senna, Prost, and Schumacher together you would have a near perfect driver. You would have to ensure you didn't create a driver with their cumulative aggression though otherwise "it" would rarely finish a race.

If you want to see a race Senna lost due to his "weaknesses" Monaco '88 is the classic example. Leading by almost a minute with 12 laps left and his engineer begging him to slow down he just couldn't and binned it in Portier. He got out of the car and walked home. This is a race he got pole by about 1.5 seconds over Prost in the same car and 3 seconds ahead of the Ferraris and dominated the entire time he was running. Prost just rolled through the checkered flag a long way in front of the Ferraris. Despite winning the WDC that year he still scored fewer points than Prost but won due to the drop races.

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There was another race in the wet that he looked like he was on rails when everyone else was sliding around.

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You are probably thinking of Donnington in '93, the first lap is considered the best wet lap ever driven in an F1 car. If you are thinking just about Monaco it would have 1984.

This brings about a thought. I would highly suggest especially for the DTS group of F1 fans sub to the basic F1 TV for a month or so (only 2.99 a month) and watch some of the old classic races. Once you get back into the 80s in the archive they don't have too many full races but they have extended highlights that are over an hour long.

Unfortunately, once it get back into the 70s they only have season highlights which is a shame. One of the best battles you will ever see in F1 was at the 79 French GP at Dijon where Rene and Gilles fount it out for the last 4 laps with Gilles holding off the turbo-powered Renault for 2nd. This is the best, though not English, video available:

YT

Gilles Villeneuve is one of the reasons I pay little attention to the record books when talking about the best drivers in F1, he only had 6 wins and 2 poles (IIRC) but he was one of the best that ever drove.

If you sub to F1 TV and pull some random lists of the greatest drives from the web and watch them I assure you that you will not feel ripped off.

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I recall seeing that race back then. One of the networks, probably ABC, televised it on tape delay if I remember correctly.

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That may have been when ABC still showed Monaco on delay every year. Back in the 70s that was about the only US coverage except maybe CBS would pick up a US GP. Delays back then were fine for the races, it isn't like the internet was going to spoil it for you.

I don’t think they will add commercials. But if they do, F1TV pro is amazing.

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but if Mercedes can somehow figure out their car/engine issues

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They can figure out their power issues (however much there actually is) but unless it is on the electric side they can't do much if anything about it until 2025.

While possible I don't see going into the last 3-4 races in a three-way fight for the WCC, mainly due to the cap. Mercedes's burn rate is almost certainly much higher than RBR and Ferrari right now. I think Mercedes's high point will be just after the summer break when I think they will be close to the other two but will wane as I bet they don't have the cap to match the other two's development in the latter part of the season. Ferrari will likely lose the most wind-tunnel and CFD time when it gets reshuffled mid-season but I think the die is cast. I just don't see the massive shifts in lap times we have seen in previous years due to the pesky cap.