Oh come on, get real, testing times are not irrelevant when the best team of last year by a country mile is already 1.5 seconds ahead of everyone else first test out. Thinking everyone else is sand bagging, testing, high fuel or whatever and red bull are not is just naive especially this close to the first race.
F1 Season 2024 - Pre-Season Thread
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1.5 sec is worrisome as mainly all teams hide performance at testing, so either RB are an aggressive strategy, which is highly unlikely or they conservative as the rest, then its going the be a RB procession in 24. hope im wrong
Caporegime
They're neither irrelevant nor reflective of real performance in quali and races. Rather they sit between the two. It is very rare for the order shown in testing to be the order shown in the season that follows (look at Alfa's performance last year, for example) but it's unheard of for times in testing to be totally unrelated. Dominant cars always impress in testing.
It is obviously too early to conclude that Max will deliver another record breaking season, but to dismiss the idea that Red Bull's pace today is ominous is equally wrong headed.
I'd be the first to be moaning at a potentially dull 2024 season if Red Bull looked dominant, but you just have to wait imo.
It's such a balancing act to provide a competitive sport, that is also an entertainment product, whilst being based around technological design and development. Throw in to the mix being more "green" and to cost less year on year, whilst making more money year on year, across the globe with so many races and it's even more complex.
I think the reg changes are both good and bad for so many reasons.
But you are right in my opinion. All of this needs to be thrown aside and to focus in on one thing. Racing.
There is so much noise in F1 but ultimately we all want to watch the worlds fastest cars go fast and go wheel to wheel literally in racing battles.
They therefore have a duty above all else to provide this as best they can. I do think the reg changes need looking at.
That being said it's difficult.
If they make the reg change periods much more frequent, then instead of possible 6 year domination from the team that "gets it right" with their car, it will just shift to 2 or 3 years and possibly be even less likely to change, because teams will have less time to catch up during that reg period through development.
If they make the reg changes much longer, say every 9 years, that locks cars into a set set of regs which will hamper development and progress. Things could stagnate.
Perhaps the real "fix" as such, would be to try to open up the rules a bit more. Make things more open with design, so teams have the flex to be able to fix things in more ways to gain performance. Allow different design approaches. Stop instantly deciding new good designs are against regs just because they are different and only one team did it. etc.
A lot will come down to managing prize money and funding. If they bring the teams budgets closer together this will surely help with a tighter pack.
I think in conclusion it is very hard to please everyone.
It's such a balancing act to provide a competitive sport, that is also an entertainment product, whilst being based around technological design and development. Throw in to the mix being more "green" and to cost less year on year, whilst making more money year on year, across the globe with so many races and it's even more complex.
I think the reg changes are both good and bad for so many reasons.
But you are right in my opinion. All of this needs to be thrown aside and to focus in on one thing. Racing.
There is so much noise in F1 but ultimately we all want to watch the worlds fastest cars go fast and go wheel to wheel literally in racing battles.
They therefore have a duty above all else to provide this as best they can. I do think the reg changes need looking at.
That being said it's difficult.
If they make the reg change periods much more frequent, then instead of possible 6 year domination from the team that "gets it right" with their car, it will just shift to 2 or 3 years and possibly be even less likely to change, because teams will have less time to catch up during that reg period through development.
If they make the reg changes much longer, say every 9 years, that locks cars into a set set of regs which will hamper development and progress. Things could stagnate.
Perhaps the real "fix" as such, would be to try to open up the rules a bit more. Make things more open with design, so teams have the flex to be able to fix things in more ways to gain performance. Allow different design approaches. Stop instantly deciding new good designs are against regs just because they are different and only one team did it. etc.
A lot will come down to managing prize money and funding. If they bring the teams budgets closer together this will surely help with a tighter pack.
I think in conclusion it is very hard to please everyone.
Caporegime
I don't think this is true. The problem with the budget cap is that it stops teams from being able to catch up. The team that gets the new rules right in the first year carries that advantage forward from year to year.
Soldato
Imo if you watched the coverage RB looked massively wayward. Max tried what looked like a ‘fast lap’ and was so loose at the rear and was 3 tenths off his own time from earlier in the day despite a faster 1st sector. Merc, Aston and McLaren on the other hand looked completely locked in at the rear suggesting quite a different approach/setup/pace/fuel load. I’m still hopeful the field have closed up but let’s see.
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Don
But that doesn't help either - all you get is one team innovating and then everyone copies or converges on the idea that works. There's rarely ideas that are mutually exclusive - you don't get idea A Vs idea B Vs idea C, everyone converges on a design that uses A,B and C.
Soldato
When Betfair already have Max down as 1.24 to 1 to win the championship it's a done deal. The next driver is Hamilton at 17.5 to 1.
Bookies do not give away money. Snoozefest incoming. Really hope I'm wrong!
Bookies do not give away money. Snoozefest incoming. Really hope I'm wrong!
Associate
I think the budget constraints have a lot to do with this, RB advantage is essentially locked in and the additional wind tunnel time isn't having the desired effect of bringing the other teams into contention, 23 was more dominant than 22.
Re the points on a spec series, maybe I'm wrong but I think most people watch F1 because it is the fastest cars in the world with the best drivers in exotic/glam locations, a spec series would still deliver on all those points. I am not sure how much the main audience cares about the differences between a prototype Mercedes vs a prototype McLaren that lets be honest most of us don't understand the intricacies between and even if you had the required qualifications you don't have access to the data to interrogate. They especially don't care when both of said teams are miles behind the all-conquering RB.
Last season was a snore fest and the first time I have ever stopped watching it, trying not to be too critical but if Max is on pole by half a second or more then I don't think I'll bother.
Re the points on a spec series, maybe I'm wrong but I think most people watch F1 because it is the fastest cars in the world with the best drivers in exotic/glam locations, a spec series would still deliver on all those points. I am not sure how much the main audience cares about the differences between a prototype Mercedes vs a prototype McLaren that lets be honest most of us don't understand the intricacies between and even if you had the required qualifications you don't have access to the data to interrogate. They especially don't care when both of said teams are miles behind the all-conquering RB.
Last season was a snore fest and the first time I have ever stopped watching it, trying not to be too critical but if Max is on pole by half a second or more then I don't think I'll bother.
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Soldato
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Yeh, this is my thoughts as well. Annoying. The netflix show starts again that’ll be the most interesting thing again.
I'm going to try to remain cautiously optimistic that it won't be another domination from RB. However there seem to be quite a few semi's being nursed in various YouTube videos about the Merc front wing and how amazing its going to be due to the banned vortex it can create and the fact it can't just be copy pasted onto other cars without redesigning bits further along. But after seeing the whole zero side pod thing flop(Albeit probably due to the floor/suspension..) I will try to temper expectations.
Oh Jesus i forgot about that mess.Stop calling it RB, that’s Alpha Tauri’s new name.
Soldato
All the aero parts on a F1 car work in conjunction and interact with each other, thus even if you take photos of the underside floor of a car then copy to your own this will not mean it'll work and actually improve it. It simply isn't just a case of copy and paste.
From what I understand even though the Mercedes front wing has been passed legal by the FIA doesn't mean that at the first race a team(s) won't protest against it.
Where did you see this claim about it creating a banned vortex?
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I know, that's what I said? It can't just be copied without changing lots of other bits.
I'll have to go and look in my YouTube history and see if I can find it. Basically this type of banned vortex (Their words not mine) can be responsible for manipulating the airflow in the cars favour (Detaching it?) whilst also creating dirtier air coming from it subsequently making following it harder.
IF that is true, Mercedes will be trying their best to sandbag and under play it as you can guarantee other teams will be all over it using the whole, "It costs too much to create our own version in this economy" excuse. Again, I've got my handfuls of salt on me as I've still reeling from their zero side pod thing that turned out to be a bouncy mess that couldn't hang with the Red Bull.
(It did win a race though to be fair to it.)
Soldato
Its Y250 vortex I think you are referring to.
Soldato
Just seen the session highlights. Damn, it's looking pretty ominous for another RB domination.
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