F1 2023 - Pre Season Testing

[Mr Jack]

I don't think Aston are close to Ferrari, and I think they'll start the season behind Merc and get further behind as things go on. Still, they've clearly made a huge leap forward and are likely to be best-of-the-rest I think. All those new hires and all that Stroll money is starting to pay off.

My guess at the ranking of the teams for race 1 goes something like this:

Red Bull
Ferrari
Mercedes
Aston Martin
Alpine - Williams - Alfa
McLaren - AlphaTauri - Haas

I don't think Red Bull are far enough ahead of Ferrari for Pérez to outperform the two Ferraris. Merc may well be closer at other circuits.

 

[Locky]

Will be a record points haul for max this season. The other cars won't even be close and Perez just isn't good enough.

 

[Johnno2]

McLaren's performance seems underwhelming.
Right now the person paid by McLaren who would be most happy is Danny Ric.

 

[Mr Jack]

The Race have an interesting piece giving their take on each car.

 

[utajoker]

Saw this on reddit. No idea how they got them numbers but gives an idea.

 

[GravyMonster]

I don't think Aston are close to Ferrari, and I think they'll start the season behind Merc and get further behind as things go on.

Completely agree. I don't believe for a second Aston are third fastest team. Their 1-lap pace is grabbing headlines but that is meaningless. Their longer runs were still mired in the midfield teams. Whether they're trying to get some new sponsors, or keep Daddy Stroll happy to build the teams value before he exits, I don't know. Whatever the opposite of sandbagging is, they're at it. I suspect the same for Williams.

My reckoning for this year:

Red Bull
Ferrari
(gap)
Mercedes
(sizable gap)
Aston Martin
Alfa
Alpine
McLaren
Williams
Alpha Tauri
Haas

 

[Mr Jack]

Saw this on reddit. No idea how they got them numbers but gives an idea.

Looks like those are just the time differences between the best times in each year.

 

[utajoker]

Looks like those are just the time differences between the best times in each year.

If that's the case you would expect some indication because they will have done a similar running pace in last year's testing too.

 

[Greboth]

I’d generally agree with that pecking order. Though I am struggling to place Merc. A few things they’ve done, like running higher downforce wings the whole test, could be because they’re struggling with this years car or because they’re back to their sandbagging ways.

The former is more likely but they might surprise us. Roll on Q3 when we’ll finally know.

 

[utajoker]

I would love them to stick it on pole by half a second next weekend

 

[413x]

All I can say is I truly hope alpine are not fibbing and they didn't try any low fuel runs.

I still think front will be same as last year. Unfortunately with verstappen out on his own

 

[Mr Jack]

My guess at the ranking of the teams for race 1 goes something like this:

You know, apart from being overly cautious about Aston, that was pretty much bang on. For all the caution over reading things into testing, it turns out to have been a damn good guide.