Poll: Japanese Grand Prix 2017, Suzuka - Race 16/20

Rate the 2017 Japanese Grand Prix out of ten

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Anyone else awake?

Just reading in the reddit FP3 thread that Hamilton had two purple sectors and would have beaten Schumi's lap record if he matched his previous S3 time but red flags came out, which suggests he's got several tenths in hand for his fastest lap for qualifying. Certainly looks like Mercedes are killing it here as largely expected. While temps will be higher tomorrow by all accounts, I don't think they'll be high enough or even matter anyway. It's not temps that make the Merc car not work, it's high temps at specific tracks with certain grip levels from the surface and some other things all together. Only a few races a year fall into those situations, even then only if the temps are high. I don't think Merc will have any problem here or in the race for Mercedes. Of course with the penalties for Kimi and Bottas, it will likely be a Ham/Vettel front row regardless. If Vettel gets in front Hamilton still might not get through, though he'll seemingly have a couple of chances to jump him at pit stops, going long or pitting earlier. If Vettel is behind after T1 I suspect he won't be able to keep up with Hamilton enough to make undercuts or running longer work.

For anyone who didn't watch, big points from fp3/pre qualifying I've seen are Bottas and Kimi having fairly big offs, Kimi's worse. Kimi got a gearbox penalty for damaging the gearbox in that crash, Bottas already had a gearbox penalty. Alonso's engine died so has taken a new engine but another older engine, not the over hyped spec 4, so can't see ALonso doing much of anything this weekend.
 
Indeed, he went off but, not with gravel, shouldn't have really done anything to the car and still went significantly slower than Ham on the slower tire. Ham's time is his 3rd attempt on the softs i think, second one was aborted fairly late in the lap due to a lock up so.... he's absolutely killing it now.
 
Don’t understand why Ham went out again in Q2 after setting track record :confused:
 
EVH said:
Don’t understand why Ham went out again in Q2 after setting track record :confused:
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Track evolution, doing a track late in Q2 tends to give you a better first lap in Q3, which gives you a better lap end of Q3. If you don't do that, then between first lap in q2 and first in q3, the track is further different in speed so you can less well guess where the grip is and do a little slower lap.

Basically it's practice, also sometimes the tires feel a little off and you want to make sure you start on a different set though it seems like either Ham wanted the practice as he was significantly faster again in S1/2 but liked the first set of tires or that second set of tires didn't feel as good, a little vibration or something, so decided not to finish the lap.

That's also why Bottas went out on supersofts but didn't finish it, to give him the feel on supers but still make sure he starts on softs... I think, I don't think he finished the lap.
 
It is odd just how much different tracks suit different cars. I mean it is good as it makes it exciting. As much as i support Hamilton for the championship, it is good to see him have to work for it and i am glad Ferrari and occasionally Red Bull have kept the Mercedes on their toes.

You certainly couldn't say with confidence that Mercedes have had the outright fastest car this season.
 
I think the Ferrari doesn’t have the same maximum potential performance as the Merc but it’s a more stable platform that has a wider operating window.

So although the Ferrari can ‘only’ operate at say 95% of the Merc’s maximum, it can operate at that 95% more consistently across different types of track, allowing them to capitalise when the Merc isn’t in its sweet spot.
 
Irish_Tom said:
I think the Ferrari doesn’t have the same maximum potential performance as the Merc but it’s a more stable platform that has a wider operating window.

So although the Ferrari can ‘only’ operate at say 95% of the Merc’s maximum, it can operate at that 95% more consistently across different types of track, allowing them to capitalise when the Merc isn’t in its sweet spot.
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this does seem to be the case and is what merc said the other weekend, about struggling to get the tyres in the right temp zone on some circuits.
 
Glaucus said:
this does seem to be the case and is what merc said the other weekend, about struggling to get the tyres in the right temp zone on some circuits.
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It just seems odd that they struggled for race pace at both Singapore and Malaysia; two very different types of track and Malaysia is one where they’ve been strong in recent years.

Someone posted in the Malaysia thread that they think it’s just that the rest of the pack has caught up. It’s possible that over the last few years Merc have had these problems but everyone else has been so poor that they’ve still been able to dominate… hard to say from the outside though.
 
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