European GP 2011 - Valencia

[Gerhard Berger]

Correct me if I am wrong.

I think before Alonso had problem in the middle sector, his time was better than Webber and 0.150 of the time of Vettel.

So I believe that Ferrari qualifying pace today was o.200s behind Redbull. Alonso I think had problems with grip in middle sector (waiting for interviews to be published).

All in all, I think the engine mapping has saw that the advantage of 1s of Redbull, has been reduced by 0.800s. Sawing that the pace of Ferrari is close to Redbull, but Redbull still in advantage.

Let's see in Silverstone where the three front runners are.

Vettel was also going faster in his final run until he aborted his lap.

Ferrari seem closer but hard to tell how much is due to engine mapping (there are other factors such as track characteristics and updates to the car).

[PlatinumZealot]

Red Bull are on pole again. So... looks like the engine map ban is not the key to stop RedBull from flying. So FIA, what is it gonna be next huh? ban wings from the Red Bull?

Yeah, their race pace would good to begin with. However I still believe RedBull are using a qualifying map until the first stint of the race. I think that they practiced swapping steering wheel makes it seem more likely. You know, the race programming could be inside the steering wheel.

[marcush.]

It looked like both Hamilton and alonso did not manage to get it together in Q3 ...but i´m prepared to revisit my original statement after tomorrows race.

We still got :

DRS use

Fuel loads


as potential lap time differntiators from Q3 to race. So by the looks of things .RedBulls Qualy advantage is more a DRS/cofG height thing?

Quite puzzling:

Mercedes has shown 1 tenth improvement from Q2 to Q3
Button 1 tenth/Hamilton 3 tenths
Massa zero/Alonso 5 tenths
Webber 9tenths and Vettel 3.

So not considering any mistakes commited the big losers of the new regs are Mercedes,Button and Massa and the true winner is Webber....?

Maybe it´s just more difficult now to control the car in the braking zone and that hurts Mercedes most as the short car maybe a bit more twitchy under braking..
and those drivers who cannot live with corner entry sidesteps steering input induced oversteer are punished severer than others.

Maybe its also indicative of Mercedes problems..they could by heavy blowing of the difusser plant the rear much better and without this map they cook the rears ..So in fact Mercedes is the big loser of the new regs?

[Traction]

Vettel absolutely destroyed any challengers on the track. Superb pole position once again.....I'm sure some people thought they would get the better of him in the earlier qualifying sessions but not to be....now To go on and dominate the race.....

[myurr]

Red Bull are on pole again. So... looks like the engine map ban is not the key to stop RedBull from flying. So FIA, what is it gonna be next huh? ban wings from the Red Bull?

Yeah, their race pace would good to begin with. However I still believe RedBull are using a qualifying map until the first stint of the race. I think that they practiced swapping steering wheel makes it seem more likely. You know, the race programming could be inside the steering wheel.

It's possible. What I found interesting is that it looks like Vettel is not quite as far ahead as he has been, and Red Bull didn't pick up quite as much pace in Q3 as in the past - only 0.4s improvement over Q2 which will be pretty much just down to fuel and the track, whereas it's historically been 0.5 - 1+ seconds. Look at China where Button and Hamilton hardly gained at all and Vettel gained an entire second!!

It's also interesting that Webber was able to get that much closer to Vettel.

Let's wait and see what affect the Silverstone changes will have. Apparently Vettel was testing the Silverstone spec in P1 and he looked a fair bit slower relatively. Some of that will be setup suitability for the circuit, but I expect all the cars the be slower and more unstable under breaking, with Red Bull likely to lose a tiny bit more than the others.

One of the suggestions on the flying lap was that because of the changes in Silverstone Red Bull may not be able to run as much rake, which in turn will hurt their front end downforce and overall balance.

[PlatinumZealot]

Vettel absolutely destroyed any challengers on the track. Superb pole position once again.....I'm sure some people thought they would get the better of him in the earlier qualifying sessions but not to be....now To go on and dominate the race.....

You mean Newey did... It's obvious that the RedBull is the most planted car.

He aint gonna dominate the race though. that 0.4 second gap to the next car is not enough to translate to their race pace so it is going to be pretty close.

[myurr]

Looking at the speed trap data it also looks like that rear wing on the McLaren is incredibly effective given the downforce level they must be running. Hopefully that'll help Hamilton make his way past in the two DRS zones.

If all get a clean start then we can at least be hopeful of Hamilton and Alonso being able to make a race of it.

[Intego]

IMHO the top teams were kidding the FIA.
They got out with qualifying mapping on the first flying lap in Q3, then came in, changed to race mapping, got out, but without finishing their laps, then back into pits and TADAAH... race mapping in parc fermé. The Mercs, Heidfeld and Sutil were sleeping (eehm, almost all Germans ) and haven't seen this opportunity or were too fair-minded.

Only Webber had finished his last lap. Maybe we see a laptop guy in his first pitstop tomorrow ...

[toshinden]

so the engine mapping which they have to use in the race is not the one that they use on their fastest lap like the rule for the tires?

[myurr]

@Intego - The teams cannot do that, they have to run the same engine map they used for the fastest lap. This is controlled by the SECU which is under FIA control, in terms of software, and the FIA have full access to the data gathered by the SECU.

[PlatinumZealot]

Are you sure myurr? the have to use the map for their fastest lap?

[myurr]

Are you sure myurr? the have to use the map for their fastest lap?

Yes - it was discussed in P3 I believe and on scarbs blog he actually goes further and says that the same map must be used from Q1 onwards. Makes sense as that's when parc ferme begins, not at the end of qualifying. Before they were explicitly allowed to change the map during parc ferme.

[Princey]

I believe that to be true also.. and the teams cannot make drastic mapping changes via the wheel etc due to the FIA being able to monitor the ecu's..

I think everyone will have changed to a lesser map for the whole weekend but I just believe the red bull is able to use whatever mapping more effectively.. as in whatever blowing percentage they are using is used to a better advantage albeit only a slight advantage compared to 1+ second in other Q sessions.

I think the difference will be more apparent in Silverstone when the blowing is really cut down.

Vettel ran a silverstone simulation in P1 and was 3 seconds off the pace in the early laps.. which obviously would result in all the others suffering similar loss when they run at silverstone.

[beelsebob]

@Intego - The teams cannot do that, they have to run the same engine map they used for the fastest lap. This is controlled by the SECU which is under FIA control, in terms of software, and the FIA have full access to the data gathered by the SECU.

Correct, but only indirectly – the new rule says nothing about your fastest lap. Instead, it adds engine maps to the list of things that can't be changed in park ferme. Park ferme begins as soon as you leave the pit lane in Q1, so engine maps can't be changed all through qualifying, or over night. The first point at which they can be changed, is when the lights go out. The SECU doesn't support changing timings from the steering wheel, so that translates to your first pit stop – when the team get the chance to plug a laptop in and reprogram the car.

[Shrieker]

Someone from the second row must jump Webber before the first corner to give some headaches to the finger boy, or he'll be long gone by the first round of stops.