2022 pecking order speculation

[LM10]

Oh please. Some teams have 8 cars on the road. Budget cap, I have not much faith in.

8 cars? are we following the same series?

The Alpha Tauri is much different to the redbull.

Not really.

[Just_a_fan]

There are as much alike as the Aston Martin and the Mercedes. Not talking about the copy and paste one either. Last years AT was closer to the RBR. Even inherited parts.

I assume you haven't looked at this year's cars yet, if you think the AM and Merc are similar.

[frosty125]

At the first race

Tier 1
McLaren, Ferrari, Red Bull, Mercedes

Tier 2
Alpine, Aston, Alpha, Williams

Tier 3
Haas, Alfa

[f1316]

Too early to tell. Even Haas is in the mix. With this year I don't think there will be a big differentiator between the cars. It will be about who can tease out more grip from the tyres for marginal gains. As such i expect shuffling from track to track.

The “not a big performance differentiation between cars” thought is interesting to me now we’ve actually seen them.

My thinking was that they would be close in aerodynamic performance this year - and my concern was that this would lock in engine performance as an uncloseable gap between teams (unless the PUs happened to end up very close in performance). But that was based on the notion that the rules were so restrictive that the cars would be quite similar - now we know they’re anything but.

So I find it hard to believe that there won’t be a reasonable spread between those who got it “right” and “wrong”; yes there are lots of facets and nuance for this but it seems like there’s potential for big performance spread the more different the concepts. Eventually they’ll converge, but for this season I expect some stark differences (although zero clue who will be ahead of whom).

[west52keep64]

It's very hard to tell what the full pecking order is, but for me the top 4 is clear:

Red Bull
Ferrari
McLaren
Mercedes

[frosty125]

It's very hard to tell what the full pecking order is, but for me the top 4 is clear:

Red Bull
Ferrari
McLaren
Mercedes

I think it's looking like that.

[NAPI10]

Based on this week's testing; my pecking order for the first 3 races -

Red Bull
Ferrari
Mercedes
McLaren
Aston
Alpha Tauri
Alpine
Alfa
Williams
Haas

[McMika98]

Front row: Redbull, Ferrari
Mercedes
Top midfield: Aston Martin, Mclaren,
Midfield: Alpha Tauri, Alpine, Alpha Romeo
Back: Haas, Williams

[Mansell89]

You know, it might be that there is no “backmarker”- I think there are two/three teams at the front and then the rest are all close at the moment.

[Just_a_fan]

Max has the title in his pocket currently. Ferrari might take the constructors if they can pressure Max at the front and force Red Bull to use Perez strategically. George gets a year at Mercedes to settle in without the pressure of a title fight.
McLaren to win a couple of races as others trip over each other at the front.

[Stu]

Teams that appear to have used 2021 as a holding year with very few upgrades (Haas, Alfa, Williams, Aston, maybe Ferrari(??)), have obviously been concentrating on their 2022 cars. Also expect the two Ferrari customer teams to make a step when they get the latest power store. McLaren have been fully 2022 since the summer break as well.
Mercedes seem to be in a similar position. RedBull have appeared to have been developing the RB16B right to the end.

With how the aero regs are defined there is unlikely to be a magic bullet there, but potentially a lot of detail design and experiment could gain performance (unless they ‘get lucky’ this year’s front-runners) will need to careful as playing catch-up is very limited due to the tunnel/CFD runs that are allowed.

I’m hoping for a couple of surprises!

I wrote this quite some time ago, I think that it still stands up. I’m still hoping for a couple of surprises!!

[chrisc90]

Teams that appear to have used 2021 as a holding year with very few upgrades (Haas, Alfa, Williams, Aston, maybe Ferrari(??)), have obviously been concentrating on their 2022 cars. Also expect the two Ferrari customer teams to make a step when they get the latest power store. McLaren have been fully 2022 since the summer break as well.
Mercedes seem to be in a similar position. RedBull have appeared to have been developing the RB16B right to the end.

With how the aero regs are defined there is unlikely to be a magic bullet there, but potentially a lot of detail design and experiment could gain performance (unless they ‘get lucky’ this year’s front-runners) will need to careful as playing catch-up is very limited due to the tunnel/CFD runs that are allowed.

I’m hoping for a couple of surprises!

I wrote this quite some time ago, I think that it still stands up. I’m still hoping for a couple of surprises!!

Sounds good. Good to see the midfield teams pretty close. Bet most people surprised at RB though. Mega amounts of media reports that they hadnt bothered to develop the RB18.....But, at the end of testing, thats the complete opposite, with probably the best car on track at the end of the period

[PlatinumZealot]

Mercedes
...
RedBull
Ferrari
....
McLaren
Haas
Alpine
Sauber
Alpha Tauri
Aston
Williams

I don't care. Mercedes have those sick side pods. It must be pole or nothing!

[jumpingfish]

After 22 races:
1. Ferrari
2. Red Bull
3. Mercedes
4. McLaren
5. Alpha Tauri
6. Alpine
7. Aston Martin
8. Haas
9. Alfa Romeo
10. Williams

[AR3-GP]

Front row: Redbull, Ferrari
Mercedes
Top midfield: Aston Martin, Mclaren,
Midfield: Alpha Tauri, Alpine, Alpha Romeo
Back: Haas, Williams

Aston Martin top of midfield?