United States Grand Prix 2014, Austin - Race 17/19

Duke said:
Driving to a delta on the virtual safety car seems to work on the testing.
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I've not been following this new system, is it to slow them all while they catch up to the safety car? replace safety cars? or is this just enforcing double waved yellows?
 
Interesting idea and seemed to work ok.

Begs the question if it does work reliably in a race proper that the actual safety car kind of becomes redundant apart from in heavy rain maybe.

But how exactly is this all going to tie in with the whole standing starts after a safety car rubbish that was supposedly coming in next year? No point them all driving to a delta to keep a set gap then all stopping on the grid for a start!
 
Calling it a Virtual Safety Car is a bit missleasing. It doesn't follow the format of a SC (bunch the field up, let cars pass, and standing starts next year). It's more an enforced double waved yellow. Maintains everyone's gaps while controlling their speed through dangerous areas.

The instant deployment and instant withdrawal is a good thing. SCs waste loads of laps faffing about. With this your controlling the race for only the amount of time you need for the danger to he cleared.
 
Skeeter said:
Calling it a Virtual Safety Car is a bit missleasing. It doesn't follow the format of a SC (bunch the field up, let cars pass, and standing starts next year). It's more an enforced double waved yellow. Maintains everyone's gaps while controlling their speed through dangerous areas.

The instant deployment and instant withdrawal is a good thing. SCs waste loads of laps faffing about. With this your controlling the race for only the amount of time you need for the danger to he cleared.
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I didn't catch the end of FP2, but in FP1 (and I had to hurry off after the flag so correct me if I'm wrong) it seems they just used a lap time delta rather than a zone delta. If that's the case then it's a waste if there's nothing wrong with 90% of the track.
 
Yeah I do have issue with them nullifying the whole track in order to control speed through one area. That applies with existing SC rules too.

It does avoid the pushing into a slow down area concern. Everyone does the same speed from the same time and that's that.

Its an improvement on the current retarded (in so many ways) SC rules, but it's not perfect. It's effectively a copy of the Code 60 rules used in some endurance series (Dubai 24h for example).

Edit: interesting point reading up on Code 60, I wonder if they would have to close the pitlane during a VSC, as a stop while the whole field are going slower loses you less time.
 
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Skeeter said:
It does avoid the pushing into a slow down area concern. Everyone does the same speed from the same time and that's that.
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It leaves a grey area if, for instance, you're held up behind a backmarker for a few corners, and you estimate you lost a second, does that mean you can make up for a second throughout the rest of the lap? Or if you lock up into a corner? Or this, or that?

I had the same problem with the sector times improvement in the existing yellow flag rules - just because you set a fastest sector doesn't mean you didn't back off through the yellow zone.

Take away the interpretation. The technology is there so just take it out of their hands. Force them to go slower through the corner(s) where there are yellows out and let them blast around the rest of the track as they normally would. They have everything they need to implement it around the track and in the cars.
 
The speed is so slow they wouldn't be locking up or able to make time up. They just drive round at the delta time keeping their time at 0.000 difference or above.

Its done on timing loops of which there are loads. Something like 1 every 100m.
 
this_is_gav said:
Well we have 18 cars with Sauber expected to leave and Force India seemingly doubtful and Lotus have been are far from secure for a year now. You need the team's agreement to get them to up their quota by 50% and not all teams will be able to fulfil it anyway. Teams like Williams can't just crank out another car and associated set of engineers and mechanics.

It's a delicate issue because there is no obvious fix to a very real problem. Add a third car and you've got podium lockouts, massive points differences or cars which float around without any real purpose (and potentially cause problems for teams which are racing for points) or cars which aren't on parity with the others (a year old) and thus a tiered championship. None of the fixes suits everyone, so you're relying on teams all agreeing to something which might be detrimental to their interests or you've got a small grid. In the end, we all lose out.

And you can't change the engine spec this late. Exhaust or something might be possible, but the very nature of the regs is what stops the volume of the noise. And any change would drive up costs further.

F1 has found itself in a horrible position entirely of its own making and with no obvious fix.
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What a circus. It's embarrassing.


Monisha Kaltenborn on the cash situation in F1 :

"I think it's a real shame that we have turnovers of billions of dollars and as a sport, as a community we are not capable of making sure that 11 teams survive. You try to explain that to somebody"

http://www.planetf1.com/driver/18227/9542618/Kaltenborn-beyond-stage-of-frustration-
 
Her maths isn't so good. F1 made $1.4bn last year, of which the teams shared $700m between them.

Even if they shared the whole lot that would only be an extra ~$65m each. F1 is not turning over billions of dollars and bypassing the teams. F1 just costs too much to compete in. That's the problem that needs solving.

It's the whole "teach a man to fish" thing.
 
Not if Bernie is creaming it. How do we know what he does? He can buy off courts after all.
 
Skeeter said:
The speed is so slow they wouldn't be locking up or able to make time up.
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Of what we saw on the feed Hamilton still had to correct the car in FP1 going through the esses while they were sticking to the delta, so I'd argue enough still hasn't been done. I don't know if that's a fundamental aspect of the car at lower speed, or it was him trying to examine the grip levels while taking a chunk of kerb, but it shows the potential is still there to lose a car while going a little slower.

The ACO made cars go at 50mph I think it was through a yellow zone. Just do that. Extend the zone to the zone beforehand to give them time to react if you need to. Just don't leave it to them to decide where in the lap to back off. Take it out of their hands.
 
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V F said:
Not if Bernie is creaming it. How do we know what he does? He can buy off courts after all.
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Well CVCs accounts are public, so go have a look if you want.

this_is_gav said:
Of what we saw on the feed Hamilton still had to correct the car in FP1 going through the esses while they were sticking to the delta, so I'd argue enough still hasn't been done. I don't know if that's a fundamental aspect of the car at lower speed, or it was him trying to examine the grip levels while taking a chunk of kerb, but it shows the potential is still there to lose a car while going a little slower.
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Clearly we saw different footage. The speed at the end of FP2 was the around the same it would be behind a SC. If you can crash behind that your a fool (or Ericsson).
 
this_is_gav said:
The ACO made cars go at 50mph I think it was through a yellow zone. Just do that. Extend the zone to the zone beforehand to give them time to react if you need to. Just don't leave it to them to decide where in the lap to back off. Take it out of their hands.
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I think your miss understanding how the VSC works.

But I'm with you, I'd prefer for them to just nullify the affected area.
 
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