He's always been amazing in the wet (he claims it comes from racing in Britain), but if you have a car with a lot of downforce, then the faster you go, the more the car is pushed into the track, and the better grip you have in the rain.
Poll: United States Grand Prix 2018, Austin - Race 18/21
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He's always been amazing in the wet (he claims it comes from racing in Britain), but if you have a car with a lot of downforce, then the faster you go, the more the car is pushed into the track, and the better grip you have in the rain.
Deleted member 651465
D
Deleted member 651465
I see your logic but if that was entirely true the Red Bull would dominate in the wet. Also, don’t forget that there’s a limit of how much water can get between a tyre and the tarmac before the car aquaplanes. It’s overly simplistic to say “just go quicker”.
Some drivers can feel the grip levels more than others and know when to put their foot down.
Hamilton is good in the wet and maybe it does have to do with his experience but make no illusions, it’s more than speed that keeps them on the circuit... they need wits and restraint.
Some drivers can feel the grip levels more than others and know when to put their foot down.
Hamilton is good in the wet and maybe it does have to do with his experience but make no illusions, it’s more than speed that keeps them on the circuit... they need wits and restraint.
Soldato
FP1 highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIsIerWwLIM
Sounds like Vettel is going to get a 3 place grid penalty for failing to slow sufficiently under the red flag in FP1. He was summoned to the stewards, just awaiting to hear. Generally though, if summoned for that, it happened.
If so, that's another error of his to add to the list.
If so, that's another error of his to add to the list.
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Caporegime
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It's because he did so much karting in the wet in the UK. IT's not much to do with more downforce directly, many years he's had less downforce than other cars he beats in the rain. It's that he goes offline. I can't comprehend how other drivers don't do this. Rubber is grippy when dry and hot, and it's slippery when it's wet and cold. In the dry ideally everyone would run along literally a tire width line of rubber and never touch the track itself. In the wet it's usually best to stay off that line as much as possible. Yet only Hamilton and Verstappen really make the effort to do this. Ham finds most of his performance in the wet avoiding rubber but he's been doing that since his first drive in 2007 in the wet.
Somehow every other driver isn't watching back Ham's wet races, listening to his interviews where he's straight up explained it, and just do the same thing.
But yeah, the reason he got used to doing it and got great at feeling out the best and grippiest bits of track was in karting going off line for the same reason. If he hadn't done so many wet races in karting he wouldn't be as good.
Permabanned
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Vettels bad luck continues! Hopefully all used up this season so he can blitz Merc next year.
Associate
I wonder if they'll let it slide and not punish him with grid penalties but with points on his license.
Associate
He's had the equipment to do it this year, Ferrari have been competitive at nearly every circuit and his car has had no reliability issues at all. If he hadn't been making so many mistakes he'd still be ahead now, regardless of Merc's upsurge in the last few races. Its nothing to do with luck.
Man of Honour
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He also made mistakes on track.
Heavy rain in P2.
Heavy rain in P2.
Bad luck?
He didn't slow down. It's not bad luck, it's yet another brainfart.
Not entirely sure how that can be bad luck.
Vettel doesn't really deserve it, he's definitely slowed enough. Just the rule needs amending, if Ocon and Ricciardo hadn't previously been punished previously he likely would have had a reprimand at most.
Shame as it takes some of the shine off this weekend.
Shame as it takes some of the shine off this weekend.
He hit 170kph under red flag conditions and took 27.7s to slow down sufficiently.
I think you could argue that there was no need for a red flag, double waved yellows and a few marshals on track to brush the gravel off the track.
Don
Because it's @#%%#$! difficult to run the karting line in anything that is not a kart..
I was listening on a podcast to Brundle say that he watched Senna sail past him in the wet in an f3000 race on the outside on the karting line.
Apparently he chucked to himself as he saw him out there, saying something disparaging about the idea, untill he sailed on by.
1 lap later he tried the same move on Senna and ended up running wide.
He asked Senna after the race why he didn't use the line again after it worked so well before.
Senna laughed and said it was too wet.
It means that Senna (and a select few others) have such near perfect feel and intrinsic understanding of the levels of grip available in changing conditions that it simply makes them look supreme in those conditions where it matters most.
Karting is a big help (Brundle didn't do much karting!).
I don't know what the target delta was, but have you seen the video? He slowed down to the point of almost dawdling.
Vettel's made a number of key errors this year, but I feel the punishment here wasn't needed.
Caporegime
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Brazil in 16 was a great example. Verstappen took the wide line in T3 and jumped Rosberg around there, then he got a bunch of other people then finally really late in the race other people were being warned about it and Ricciardo defended by going wide and ending up much faster on exit, Hulk copied Verstappen I think after Verstappen passed him and attacked someone else using that line.
The thing is, there is often more grip off the dry line due to rubber getting slicker in the rain so in many cases it should actually have more grip and be easier to drive.
Yeah it's not easy, but slipping around on the slippery wet rubber isn't easy either. The thing is hamilton has been doing this consistently since 07, so drivers should be practising this. hell, teams should literally be hiring karting tracks and getting their drivers practice on a wet track precisely to improve them. They should be practising alternative lines in wet on the simulator and they should try them out in testing and free practice. Instead they all seem so content to stick to the normal line and put in almost no effort to learn and improve despite the advantage it would give.
I think going as fast as Hamilton or Senna on the wet lines is as difficult as going as fast as either of them was when it was dry, it doesn't mean they can't use those wet lines, slower than Hamilton but faster than they could do on the normal dry line. The complete lack of others even appearing to test it out in practice for instance is just baffling.
The thing is, there is often more grip off the dry line due to rubber getting slicker in the rain so in many cases it should actually have more grip and be easier to drive.
Yeah it's not easy, but slipping around on the slippery wet rubber isn't easy either. The thing is hamilton has been doing this consistently since 07, so drivers should be practising this. hell, teams should literally be hiring karting tracks and getting their drivers practice on a wet track precisely to improve them. They should be practising alternative lines in wet on the simulator and they should try them out in testing and free practice. Instead they all seem so content to stick to the normal line and put in almost no effort to learn and improve despite the advantage it would give.
I think going as fast as Hamilton or Senna on the wet lines is as difficult as going as fast as either of them was when it was dry, it doesn't mean they can't use those wet lines, slower than Hamilton but faster than they could do on the normal dry line. The complete lack of others even appearing to test it out in practice for instance is just baffling.
He broke the rule regardless of if you think the red flag itself was excessive or not. No excuse .
Don
They probably are doing many of these things (Karting excluded) but the lines between speed and failure are much tighter and harder to traverse in the wet.
Verstappen and Riccardio are very late on the brakes and make (some!) great deep overtakes, but not everyone can do it well.
The risk level is high and if a driver cannot do it intrinsically they won't even be thinking about the opportunity.
It's proven that elite athletes use less of their brain for things they have practised more than others. This leaves more of the brain capability for thinking outside the box and allowing conscious use of alternative techniques to gain an advantage.
I took part in a study to compare top level sports people to novices using an FMRI to compare reaction to external stimuli and having to calculate a response to that stimuli.
They blood flow and "work" of the brain of the top level athletes was significantly lower than novices.
We were even asked to react to an unfamiliar stimuli from another sport, and STILL the top level athletes out performed novices, but the gap was narrower across the range.
The point is, these phenoms of speed are capable of doing incredible calculations and reasoning that allows excess brain power to be utilised to do special things that others can't.
You should watch "Tested to the limit" where they tested Ronaldo's ability to score in some unusual circumstances. It gives some insight to the levels of ability on tap to the best sports people.
Watch it here.
https://youtu.be/xS6bcgv5mVg
Zoe (the lady doing some of the testing) is a friend of mine and her study was the one I referenced above.
Soldato
FP2 Highlights: https://youtu.be/9je83zX5CWM