Nando wrote:Here are some times,
Fastest Q laps
Australia - RB7(2011) - 1 23 .5
Japan - RB7(2011) - 1 30.4
China - RB7(2011) - 1 33 .7
Monaco - RB7(2011) - 1 13.5
Hungary - RB6(2010) - 1 18.6
Italy - F2004(2004) - 1 20.0
Brazil - F2004(2004) - 1 10 6
Malasya - R25(2005) - 1 32 5
Would be good, if we were comparing the RB6 and RB7 as cars, but we're not... we're comparing how they were relative to the field (ie RB6 vs 2010 cars, RB7 vs 2011 cars)
RB7 was a beast.
The RB7 was a beast - there was never any argument about that. The argument was whether the RB6 or the RB7 was more of a beast. And I still stand by my words that the RB6 was a mightier car.
The RB6 was never beat on pure pace, ever, except for Monza. It missed on pole in Canada and in Singapore as well, but in Canada it was in no small part thanks to the (with hindsight) duff tyre strategy, and with the prime tyre was still only 0.268 slower than the McLaren on pole. The Singapore pole they were beat based on a mistake, but on pace stakes (which is what we're arguing over), they should have had pole, as adding up Vettel's best sector times in Q3 (compared to Alonso's best sector times in Q3) shows.
Even in race pace it had the legs on the competition. Here's a look at every race in 2010:
Bahrain - would've been a grand chelem had it not been for Vettel's spark plug
Australia - would've won had it not been for Vettel brake failure
Malaysia - Red Bull 1-2
China - bad strategy calls
Spain - dominant weekend, would've been a 1-2 had it not been for pitstop issues and brake problems for Vettel
Monaco - dominant 1-2
Canada - bad strategy, and broken gearboxes on both Red Bulls
Europe - dominant victory
Britain - dominant victory
Germany - on pole, but a bad start put Vettel in dirty air
Hungary - dominant victory, would've been a dominant 1-2 with the Red Bulls being an average 1.2s faster every single lap of the race
Belgium - duff start by Webber, mistake on track by Vettel
Italy - outdone on pace (as I noted above)
Singapore - would've been on pole had it not been for mistakes, and despite being in dirty air, stayed within 0.2-0.5s of Alonso for the entire 61 laps.
Japan - dominant victory
Korea - would've been a grand chelem had it not been for an engine failure
Brazil - dominant 1-2, consistently 0.5s quicker than the Ferraris, let alone McLarens
Abu Dhabi - dominant victory for Vettel
The RB7 had poles where it wasn't the fastest car. Nurburgring where the car struggled to get its nose into the apex at any of the hairpins, Hungary where Hamilton was 4 tenths up on Vettel's time until he blew it with a slide at the last hairpin, Suzuka where the McLarens were visibly the quicker car (and would've been on pole, had it not been for that qualifying timing gaffe by McLaren). Not to mention that the car didn't have the race pace of its competition sometimes.
The numbers don't tell this, because a lot of luck did help Vettel out, in terms of giving him a gap etc.
Australia - dominant victory, but it didn't have the tyre saving of the McLaren. Would've been a lot closer without Hamilton's bib failing.
Malaysia - would've been closer had Hamilton not locked up into T14 in qualifying (screwing 1 set of options) and had the McLarens not been held up by Heidfeld for the first few laps.
China - Couldn't close on Button in the first stint
Turkey - dominant win for Vettel
Spain - Hamilton was often up to 1.3s/lap quicker in the last stint - and got alongside Vettel 3 times in the DRS zone. Don't forget that Vettel's KERS wasn't available for about 10 laps of the final stint.
Monaco - Button was pulling away at 1s/lap, and had Button not come out of the pits behind Vettel, probably would've won.
Canada - Was on pole (dry) but when the track started drying in the race, Button started catching him massively
Europe - dominant win for Vettel
Britain - was simply outclassed by the Ferrari which pulled away at a constant rate of 0.8s/lap - all of which came from the Maggotts/Becketts section.
Germany - Webber simply couldn't pull away from the two guys behind him, and even though he got the lead via pitstops, he was caught and overtaken on track by Hamilton & Alonso
Hungary - Vettel was clearly struggling as the two McLarens just hounded him down in the wet. Button was still quicker than Vettel in the dry parts of the race though.
Belgium - dominant 1-2, but they had to risk possible tyre failures by going past safety recommendations from Pirelli
Italy - dominant victory
Singapore - looked dominant at the start, but it became clear Button was just toying with him when Button started reeling him in at 1s/lap at the end
Japan - Car didn't have the pace nor the tyre life of the Ferrari or McLaren.
Korea - Marbles stalling Hamilton's front wing clouds the issue, making a direct comparison difficult.
India - dominant victory
Abu Dhabi - difficult to read because Vettel (retired due to puncture) is usually quicker in Abu Dhabi, and was definitely the quicker RB7 driver, so we can't really tell. But let's not forget that the fastest lap of qualifying was done by a McLaren - just that it happened at the wrong time (Q2)
Brazil - dominant 1-2