Racing In 2012: Exciting Or A Lottery?

[yurp 0]

Ditto on DRS - I've never been a fan - doesn't seem in the spirit of racing to me and never has. I also agree that with the current tyres it's not needed for great races.

Equally I'd like to see refuelling back - added strategy games are fun (at least I think so). The racing, battles and passes provided by different tyre strategies/management plus different refuelling strategies would provide exciting races me thinks and I wouldn't be annoyed at the artificial advantage given to a car that's behind another by DRS.

The only worry about refuelling is that it would make quick tyre changes less important, since refuelling takes longer than putting on a set of boots. At the same time I think I could live with that.

Last thing - I'd like to see ALL cars start on qually tyres or NONE - not this top ten only nonsense.

Various ideas to make qually more interesting and make everyone come out and set a time - don't know if I agree with all these, but putting them here for discussion...

1) Constant qually (no 5 minutes breaks), drop 6 drivers every 15 minutes.

2) Small set of points awarded for qually positions towards the WDC and WCC. (not sure if I like this idea but hey)

3) A number of sets of tyres given for the whole weekend. (including practices)

Any other ideas people?

[JHS18 0]

I have to say, having been critical about DRS in the past, I didn't find it that bad on Sunday. It wasn't as bad as a year ago. Hamilton's easy passes on Vettel and Alonso aside (which were pretty inevitable anyway considering they were on much older tyres) we didn't really see that much passing in the DRS zone, or at least it didn't seem that way.

I think that DRS does have some benefit, but it is tricky to fully utilize it without it becoming artificial.

Personally, I think the Pirelli tyres as they are at the moment add enough excitement that DRS perhaps isn't needed, but inevitably, at some circuits it is harder to overtake than others, and at some places (particularly an Abu Dhabi or Valencia) it might be needed.

[Massa 0]

If you could have these tires, with no DRS, and with or without refueling, that would be interesting. Maybe that's the right compromise?

I personally don't think DRS is ever needed. Even on the blandest of tracks, adding free passes doesn't add anything at all. If no one is overtaking on merit alone, then no one is overtaking period, to me at least. I think Montréal just sealed the deal for me to finally take a stance on DRS. I watched the whole race and everything that happened, it was just, "yeah, that's nice, he only has to do half the work anyway since as soon as he catches, he can just wait for the zone."

Now, to be fair, I have never, in my entire life, watched every race of an entire season. Maybe I did in 2006, but I don't remember that far back. So obviously my opinion is going to be different because I have a good way of missing a lot of the dull ones and probably never got a full feel for how bad we had it.

[HandyNZL 1]

Some tracks DRS gives you a free pass as the straight it is on is quite long. Others, it only gives you enough time to get alongside and then it comes down to balls and late braking for the upcoming corner, and others, like Melbourne, don't do diddly squat.

There have been plenty of overtakes this year at places that are not in the DRS zone. What I have never figured out is why the passed car never just gets on the back of the car that just passed it, and pass them back the next lap. The cars are essentially the same speed and performance, and the car that was infront got there on merit, so why do they just drift off? It bugs me. It's like they get passed and then think, "oh I could never possibly get back up to him".

All that drafting and lead changing at Indy just showed how you can get passed, but if you keep your foot in it, you still stand an equal chance of taking your position back.

[Massa 0]

There is a difference with Indy, though. The trailing car sucks up to the lead car rather than getting caught in turbulence like in F1 (I have no idea why, honestly). "Slower" cars were passing "faster" cars because of the slingshot stuff going on at Indy. In F1, even though you can get a DRS free pass, the trailing car is often faster, having had to catch the lead car in the first place. By the time the zone comes around again, the guy has pulled out a gap. It's like that even without DRS; the faster car gets in clean air and pulls away. Indy was a lot like the Handford device races in CART where you could have a worse/slower car but still pass because you were just being sucked right up to the guy ahead and had no choice but to duck out and slingshot by.

[Grabthaw the Hammerslayer 4]

AS I understand it, F1 rear wings are designed to create turbulent air behind them to make it harder for the car behind to pass. One of the reasons why in previous seasons overtaking was more tricky and why DRS was brought in. Indycars have simpler wings and create less turbulence. The Hanford device is, in effect a tea-tray....

In the 70s/early 80s F1 rear wings were simpler and it was more common place for cars to get a "tow" down a straight.

[The Shadow 0]

As far as I can figure, the trailing car can still get the tow down the straights. So its the same for all series, be it F1 or Indy.

Where turbulence comes in, is at the corner before the straight. If the corner is a medium or high speed one, following cars have to get out of the turbulence to ensure their downforce level is sufficient to make the turn in the first place. As the leading car is in quasi-laminar air, nothing is affected and it proceeds as usual at the optimum speed.

Thus at the start of the straight, the following car, almost by default, has already lost the tow and that is why DRS is necessary to bring the car back up to speed.

With KERS the leading car can even pull a bit of a lead and status quo would be restored.

At least thats my understanding of fluid mechanics. I could be wrong.

[The Shadow 0]

Because F1 machines are so aero reliant, even more so than in other series, small changes in airflow and air channeling can upset the balance. One indicator of this is when you hear teams giving wind velocity data to drivers on the radio. If this wasn't significant, why mention it in the first place?

[HandyNZL 1]

As far as I can figure, the trailing car can still get the tow down the straights. So its the same for all series, be it F1 or Indy.

Where turbulence comes in, is at the corner before the straight. If the corner is a medium or high speed one, following cars have to get out of the turbulence to ensure their downforce level is sufficient to make the turn in the first place. As the leading car is in quasi-laminar air, nothing is affected and it proceeds as usual at the optimum speed.

Thus at the start of the straight, the following car, almost by default, has already lost the tow and that is why DRS is necessary to bring the car back up to speed.

With KERS the leading car can even pull a bit of a lead and status quo would be restored.

At least thats my understanding of fluid mechanics. I could be wrong.

I was starting to believe you until you said "quasi-laminar"....next you'll try and make us believe a word like "superfluous" also exists...

[HandyNZL 1]

Because F1 machines are so aero reliant, even more so than in other series, small changes in airflow and air channeling can upset the balance. One indicator of this is when you hear teams giving wind velocity data to drivers on the radio. If this wasn't significant, why mention it in the first place?

For the golf game after.....how is that not obvious to you?

[The Shadow 0]

I was starting to believe you until you said "quasi-laminar"....next you'll try and make us believe a word like "superfluous" also exists...

There is no true laminar flow in an open environment, thats what i meant, just in case some pedantic people are reading.

[Rainmaster 7]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula-one/18445858

[AleHop 0]

For the golf game after.....how is that not obvious to you?

:tongue:

I don't think so. It's for the plane they have to take afterwards.

:duh:

[The Shadow 0]

http://www.bbc.co.uk...la-one/18445858

Nice. Do not forget that at the end of the season, when they hand out the payment to the teams scoring points under the current Concorde agreement, that the midfield teams will get a bigger share this year while the top 4 will see theirs diminished slightly