Poll: Austrian Grand Prix 2020, Spielberg - Race 1/?

[JRS]

I was talking recent seasons

Well, you'll have to forgive me for thinking you meant "never" when you typed "never" rather than "recently"

 

[Alibaba99]

Be interesting to see Hamiltons onboard to see if he lifted at all when Bottas went off. Might have been the difference.

Hamilton only went yellow in the first sector so certainly was significantly slower than his previous lap.

 

[englishpremier]

Watching on F1TV there's about a 40 second delay between Live Timing and the "live" stream. It's a little annoying.

They also seemed to have increased the sound from the mics on the cars and the radios. Now they drowned out the commentary. The whole stage sounds muddled to me.

Ferrari never had good aero they relied on straight line speed which has now strangely disappeared, it's no wonder they're now mid-field.

It's obviously not just the engine. It's not like they were dead slow in 2018. It's probably more likely some crappy aero package they've changed to. They did 103.6 in 2018 without the special 2019 engine.

 

[CaptainRAVE]

He’s been cleared!

https://www.racefans.net/2020/07/04/hamilton-cleared-over-yellow-flag-speeding/

Brilliant. I want to see a straight fight between him and bottas.

Looking forward to see their race pace, DAS in action and Hamilton’s reported straight line setup.

 

[mmj_uk]

Well, you'll have to forgive me for thinking you meant "never" when you typed "never" rather than "recently"

Yeah I accept I worded it lazily.

According to this Ferrari now slowest in straight line speed, Alfa Romeo with Ferrari engine was top:
https://forums.autosport.com/topic/...grand-prix-build-up-thread-finally/?p=9112577

So either they got their setups wrong or their usual high downforce setups are now bogging down the car on the straights, the latter of which is probably compounded by bad aero.

 

[MissChief]

Yeah I accept I worded it lazily.

According to this Ferrari now slowest in straight line speed, Alfa Romeo with Ferrari engine was top:
https://forums.autosport.com/topic/...grand-prix-build-up-thread-finally/?p=9112577

So either they got their setups wrong or their usual high downforce setups are now bogging down the car on the straights, the latter of which is probably compounded by bad aero.

If they’re running a high downforce package here then they’re stupid or incompetent. Possibly both. This track has the lowest number of corners on the calendar, two of the corners are anything but for an F1 car.

 

[Steampunk]

It's obviously not just the engine. It's not like they were dead slow in 2018. It's probably more likely some crappy aero package they've changed to. They did 103.6 in 2018 without the special 2019 engine.

I think they already said that the aero is "fragile" and aero parts are not behaving as expected when on the car. It looks like there's a significant discrepancy between the computer and wind tunnel models, and the real world performance. It's not the first time a team has made a big mis-step because the models do not correlate to performance on the car.

Unfortunately for Ferrari, with a shortened season they have little time to fix anything so fundamental, especially when Mercedes seem to have again got it right from the start.

 

[Danthus]

There was clearly a moment last year when the performance of the Ferrari suddenly dropped off. That just happened to coincide with them being quizzed about bending the rules with regards to fuel flow.

We know they have come to a secret agreement with the FIA about whatever it was they did or didn't do.

Sky seem to be pretty happy to link the performance today to the engine performance.

Do we really think they have built a car a second per lap aerodynamically slower?

 

[godinman]

Anyone able to get the highlights on 4od? The website says they should be there but I can't see anything :/

 

[JRS]

Do we really think they have built a car a second per lap aerodynamically slower?

Do you really think that it's impossible for Ferrari to screw up in this manner?

 

[Deleted member 651465]

It’s Carlos Sainz I feel sorry for. Unless Ferrari can pull something out of the bag by the end of the season he’s potentially looking at a full season of mid tier driving where McLaren are looking to be the better car!

 

[CSMonkeh]

Not running an illegal engine this year

Aha!
Suppose it would be more acute at this style of circuit

 

[this_is_gav]

It’s Carlos Sainz I feel sorry for. Unless Ferrari can pull something out of the bag by the end of the season he’s potentially looking at a full season of mid tier driving where McLaren are looking to be the better car!

To be honest, while Ferrari are looking down and out and frankly hopeless at the moment, they will probably beat both McLarens tomorrow (they had better race pace yesterday) and in the world championship. Next year and in 2022 I imagine they'll still be ahead of McLaren, even with McLaren having Mercedes engines.

Norris in particular had an amazing Q3, but both Ferraris will almost certainly finish well ahead of both McLarens come the end of the season... unless they manage to go even further backwards with their Hungary upgrade, which would be some achievement, but one you would never put past Ferrari.

 

[MissChief]

To be honest, while Ferrari are looking down and out and frankly hopeless at the moment, they will probably beat both McLarens tomorrow (they had better race pace yesterday) and in the world championship. Next year and in 2022 I imagine they'll still be ahead of McLaren, even with McLaren having Mercedes engines.

Norris in particular had an amazing Q3, but both Ferraris will almost certainly finish well ahead of both McLarens come the end of the season... unless they manage to go even further backwards with their Hungary upgrade, which would be some achievement, but one you would never put past Ferrari.

Unless Ferrari are seriously, majorly, hilariously sand bagging, and I don't think they are, Ferrari will be lucky to get a car in the top 6. I expect McLaren are expecting to.

 

[CaptainRAVE]

Hamilton is going to get a brilliant tow if he gets even a vaguely decent start. Especially if he is setup for straight line speed.

Watching quali lap was mesmerising. It was the best on the grid. He was absolutely on it.

 

[englishpremier]

I think they already said that the aero is "fragile" and aero parts are not behaving as expected when on the car. It looks like there's a significant discrepancy between the computer and wind tunnel models, and the real world performance. It's not the first time a team has made a big mis-step because the models do not correlate to performance on the car.

Unfortunately for Ferrari, with a shortened season they have little time to fix anything so fundamental, especially when Mercedes seem to have again got it right from the start.

It seems there is always a discrepancy between wind-tunnels and the real world. Any team that has poor performance has been saying this for the last 10 years. You'd think they'd sort it out by now. We can only guess. Perhaps they were happy to add lots of draggy aero when they thought they'd be using a super power plant, and the revised car will be more efficient aero-wise.

People keep saying "short season" but it's not that short. 15-18 races. That is basically a normal season. It's only the very modern times has the championship been extended to 19, 20, 21 races.

 

[MissChief]

It seems there is always a discrepancy between wind-tunnels and the real world. Any team that has poor performance has been saying this for the last 10 years. You'd think they'd sort it out by now. We can only guess. Perhaps they were happy to add lots of draggy aero when they thought they'd be using a super power plant, and the revised car will be more efficient aero-wise.

People keep saying "short season" but it's not that short. 15-18 races. That is basically a normal season. It's only the very modern times has the championship been extended to 19, 20, 21 races.

Most commercial wind tunnels top out at a much lower speed than F1 cars can run at and they only work from front to back and without turning the steering wheel by the regulations. As soon as the cars start turning or experience wind from different directions it plays merry chaos with finely tuned Aerodynamics. McLaren had this issue with their 2018 car. Conventional wisdom stated moving the bargeboards closer to the front wing and wheels would improve the flow along the 'coke bottle' and on top of the floor and under the sidepods. And it did. In a straight line. As soon as they turned the front wheels the wash coming off the wheels was too chaotic to be finely controlled and they lost downforce across the whole of the car which was why they were so slow.

Compare this picture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McLar...nd_Prix_FP3_Fernando_Alonso_(40970600574).jpg To their 2019 car, here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McLaren_MCL34#/media/File:Lando_Norris,_Chinese_GP_2019.jpg and you can see the front barge boards are much further back and nowhere near as tall and the sidepods are much further back.

 

[413x]

I'm Dissapointed in ocons performance. I know it's only the first session , but still. Not great for Renault, who are again , not great anyway.

 

[deuse]

I'm Dissapointed in ocons performance. I know it's only the first session , but still. Not great for Renault, who are again , not great anyway.

Ocon lost 3-4 th by not having a tow.

Well done to Bottas
Wonder if Hamilton said "white privilege" to him after

Hoping Norris and Russell have a great race.

 

[mjt]

Ocon lost 3-4 th by not having a tow.

Well done to Bottas
Wonder if Hamilton said "white privilege" to him after

Hoping Norris and Russell have a great race.

Can’t you leave your racist views out of this thread?