No kidding He looked really depressed on the French television when talking about the Perez contract renewal.
There was a pic of Gasly talking to Marko at the RedBull motorhome outside at Baku. Don't know what they were talking about.
I got a question for you guys regarding Ferrari strategy yesterday. Did Ferrari make the right call to bring in Leclerc early?? Did'nt Perez have 7 lap old tires(hards??) compared to Leclerc??? Max had 9 lap old tires(hards???) compared to Leclerc....or was the lap old tires with the RedBulls vice-a-verse. So RedBulls were going for a 1 stop...yes??? Leclerc "looked" like he was going for a 2 stop because of the early pitstop. Wasn't Leclerc closing the gap on Perez after Leclercs pitstop and Perez's pitstop??
I think the first safety car or VSC whatever when Sainz was out it made sense for LEC to get a free pit stop, since pretty much the entire top 10 pitted, other than PER who had just passed the pit entry. The time gained with the VSC-pit stop was a big time savings, and from what I read, the pit window had just opened or maybe only a lap early for the starting medium tire pit window.
Yep that's correct. Incidentally F1 channel released a video about it yesterday: Exploring 2022 F1 Car Suspension | F1 TV Tech Talk | Crypto.com - YouTube
As has been explained quite a few times now, but I'll say it again just for you: Mercedes is running their car lowest of everyone. Red Bull ''fixed'' their issue by running higher than they want to. i.e. a compromise. Mercedes isn't singled out, but they are by far the loudest about it, therefore the most comments will be aimed at them. Simple enough to understand, I'm sure! Mclaren has compromised performance by running the car higher than they like so they don't porpoise as much. Mercedes refuses to do so and is making a political game out of it. They claim it's unsafe and a risk to their driver. It seems to me that they value performance higher than their drivers health then. Raise the ride height, and the porpoising eventually goes. It's that simple. Yes Yes. And as Mathieu says, his career at Red Bull is effectively over so he says as he likes now anyways. And with a Mercedes seat potentially opening...
Are you? I'm by no means a leading authority. But I do my fair share of reading from people I would consider ''authorities of F1 car design". Also I use these circular things in my head called eyes and can kinda see what's going on. One car that's the lowest of them all, has the most issues, and another, that is not lowest to the ground, does not have those issues. One might use a brain and connect the dots and hey, presto, come to a fact based conclusion! Martin Brundle: Mercedes must unlock 'excellent' car, not wait for rule change to resolve porpoising | F1 News (skysports.com) Porpoising is not some new phenomenon. Back in the 70s they had it, and now in Le Mans they also have it...The way to manage it is to adjust your ride height. The only reason Mercedes is not doing so is because it'll cost them more performance.
I am a complete layman and wouldn't pretend to give advice to Mercedes on how to set up their car, so I would rather abstain. If raising the ride height was such a quick fix, they would have taken that path long time ago, don't you think. Most teams have an army of engineers, suspension experts with years of expertise, and probably don't need armchair critics telling them how to do their job, mostly if it would result in slowing them down ! The trick is to solve the porpoising WITHOUT losing performance, and I am sure most teams are working at it I may stick my neck out here, but I don't think the solution is solely in the ride height, I heard from someone who used to design catamarans (I live next to 2 shipyards), that it may have to do with the (venturi ?) tunnels and the volume of air they compress. Their design is a black art and often the result of many trial-and-error tests before obtaining the best configuration, I am told, which are both costly, lengthy and difficult to achieve within the limits of the budget cap. Good job for Red Bull if they have cracked it first time, they deserve their success. Other teams may have compromised one way or the other and Mercedes is sticking to his gun, it seems. I known that during the last ground effect era, data and calculations were exchanged at high price, and that even with them, some teams withdrew from F1 because they couldn't understand them. Walter Wolf of Walter Wolf Racing 1977-79 (remember them?) said in an interview that after a terrific first season in F1 (Scheckter winning 3 GPs and 2nd in the WDC !!), the team couldn't handle ground effect that came the next year, and had such disatrous results even with James Hunt at the wheel that he closed the team. What is certain is that with rigid tyres (18in wheels) and ground effect needing stiffer suspension, the cars are surely less comfortable than ever.
If you bother to actually read that's what this entire discussion is about! How hard is it to comprehend! The solution is out there, but Mercedes refuses to use it, because they'll lose performance. At the same time they claim that porpoising is a danger to the drivers and a health risk. They rather let their drivers damage their health than race at the performance level their car is at. They refuse to show the world they build a bad car. It's like putting too much power through the engine and crying that it keeps breaking, and then penalizing others who have got it all working properly. Is it that hard to understand?
Mercedes is maybe using their media campaign as a decoy whilst they are working feverishly at solving the porpoising. But accepting to lower the performance level isn't a serious starting point when one wants to improve. The only way is up !!!
Red Bull and Mclaren and several other tearms compromised. Traded in some performance to get rid of bouncing. It is THE solution but Mercedes is trying their best to be the victims in all this. THEY claim their drivers suffer physically (which I believe is true), yet continue to use both their drivers as pawns in order to get the rules changed because they didn't do their homework properly and refuse to use the fix that is there. People are calling them out on their ******** yet others still defend them. unbelievable.
Initially it looked like Ferrari's strategy was superior, but I thought Leclerc was pushing it too hard early on in his stint (8 tenths a lap faster than Max) to have any tyres left by the end of the race. Either way, Max's first lap out of the pit was a massive 7 tenths faster than Leclerc went on any of his laps and 1.3-1.5 seconds faster than any of Leclerc's last 6. Typically the Ferrari is harder on it's tyres so with a much longer stint (25% longer) I think the writing was on the wall anyways. I don't think it was a strategy mistake on Ferrari's part btw. With Ferrari's tyre deg it was the only logical option for starters...
The more i see their situation, the more i wonder if their problems are not related to suspension settings more than an aerodynamical issue ? They had the most sophisticated hydraulic suspension system and now they must deal with classic dampers and so on ..