Refuelling 2017

[ScottB]

Not really convinced of the need for this, what we need are tyres that can handle a decent 15-20 laps of being hammered before the 'cliff' arrives. Without that, I don't see how running on lower fuel throughout the race fixes that problem, it's not like the current formula has the guys able to push like mad in their final stints after all.

[SectorOne]

lies, damned lies and statistics.

If you can reasonably explain the systematic declines in overtaking that have occurred over the last 35 years in a way that justifiably identifies refueling as a prime contributing factor, I will personally rob Ft. Knox and deliver its contents directly to your front door.

I´m saying you can do almost whatever you want with a form of statistics to fit your own agenda.
If i spend enough time i could probably find something Nicolas Cage have done that correlates exactly with this chart.
Does it mean Nicolas Cage actions is behind the lack of overtakes? Not necessarily.

An extreme example of course but just illustrating the point that we can find whatever we want, map that onto this graph and make a convincing point that that is the route of the problem.

[bhall II]

I´m saying you can do almost whatever you want with a form of statistics to fit your own agenda.

I think "almost" is the operant word here, because the one thing I definitely can't do is look at those figures and assert the presence of a relationship between refueling and reduced overtaking. It's just not there.

The actual cause is anyone's guess, I suppose, and I've made mine. (I still like it, too.)

Here's more evidence of the futility of parity in F1...

Q: How much overtaking should there be in Formula One and how easy should it be for a driver to pass another car?
PL: The OWG found, through experiments in the McLaren simulator, that a 2006 baseline car needed to be inherently 2 seconds/lap faster than another if it was to have a chance to overtake at Turn 1 of the old Barcelona track (this being the easiest place at that circuit, but arguably one of the more difficult overtakes in the season, it was considered a good OWG benchmark).

What we found through OWG measures (defined for 2009) was that this figure was reduced to 1 second/lap - i.e. a halving of the necessary performance differential. In my view this is a very big and important step. We may indeed find that this is sufficient. Clearly a 0 second/lap differential is nonsensical - you would never catch the guy in the first place - so it is not as though we only made half the necessary progress! I also do not believe we want to make overtaking trivial if your car is at all faster - i.e. if we reduced that same number to 0.2sec/lap, say, then it would almost guarantee that any faster car could overtake any slower car without delay - a really quite boring prospect.

2008 Spanish GP


2009 Spanish GP


2008 British GP


2009 British GP


2008 Turkish GP


2009 Turkish GP


It worked, right? The cars were all closer together.

There was a 1.3% reduction in overtaking from 2008 to 2009.

[SectorOne]

I think "almost" is the operant word here, because the one thing I definitely can't do is look at those figures and assert the presence of a relationship between refueling and reduced overtaking. It's just not there.

You know the thread with the guy wanting to model a mercedes front wing and how insanely stupid that was to learn anything about the Mercedes?

This quest to decode an overtaking-graph is doing the same thing, only difference is you´re the modeler this time.
It´s simply way too many variables to sit and say it´s because of this and that.

[SectorOne]

PL: Clearly a 0 second/lap differential is nonsensical - you would never catch the guy in the first place

Why would you need to catch someone if there´s a 0 second/lap differential? Theoretically he should be occupying the same space on track since no gaps can be created with 0 second/lap differentials.

The gap between first and second guy would be the distance between grid slot 1 and 2, i think it´s something like 7 meters. Well within the distance for slipstreaming to have an effect.

Assuming of course, that you can actually follow the other car out of the corner.

[bhall II]

This quest to decode an overtaking-graph is doing the same thing, only difference is you´re the modeler this time. It´s simply way too many variables to sit and say it´s because of this and that.

I'm not sure you understand what I've said, or perhaps I've not been clear. Please bear with me on this one.

There was never a wholesale decline in overtaking during either period in which refueling was allowed. It didn't happen when refueling first arrived on the scene between 1982 and 1984, and it didn't happen when refueling was reintroduced from 1994 to 2009. Because of those indisputable facts, it is impossible to credibly assert that refueling has a negative impact on overtaking. It just hasn't happened, and that means the cause is most definitely something else.

Put another way, there is 100% more evidence to support the notion that the refueling bans have actually been the culprit. I don't believe that, but I also can't reasonably argue against it.



Incidentally, I'm not the only one who doesn't blame the usual suspects for the lack of overtaking...

Speaking of perception, Newey also said the notion of a bygone age when "overtaking used to be fantastic", used by some to knock modern Formula One, was "rose-tinted."However, McLaren managing director Jonathan Neale points out the paradox which appears central to the problem: that overtaking has diminished as the field has grown more competitive. "People talk quite fondly and with dewy eyes about motor racing during the 1970s and even earlier and they forget that in those days the difference between first and second could be up to a second," Neale told skysports.com. "Some of the grid never qualified. So when you have cars that are that far apart, cars coming through from the back, mistakes being made...that produced a lot of overtaking. This year [2009], front to back of the grid, on some occasions if you look at the race paces from recent races, it's probably only a second and a half. And when you've got that level of closeness between the cars it is more difficult, more challenging."

In other words: it's difficult to overtake the guy in front of you if he isn't slow enough. That's further compounded by the tendency for faster cars to qualify ahead of the slower ones (what Paddy Lowe and the rest of the OWG inexplicably failed to recognize).

Let's go back to the period between 1989 and 1998.

Turbos have just been banned. You've got V12s, V10s, and V8s on the grid. In general, the V12s are powerful, but big and thirsty; the V8s are lithe and efficient, but weak; and the V10s sit somewhere in between.

Though it didn't always work out this way, the initial stages of a race often featured lightning-quick V8s using supreme fuel efficiency, and thus lighter weight, to blitz the field. As the race unfolded, however, the advantage would shift to the V10s as diminishing fuel loads allowed them to take advantage of their superior power to challenge the V8s. As fuel loads dropped even further, the V12s would, in theory, begin to take the initiative and challenge everybody due to their supreme power.

This is what many people remember, and refueling would have indeed had disastrous consequences for "the show," because it would have more or less nullified any advantages to running light. So, when overtaking crashed in the mid-90s concurrent with the introduction of refueling, folks blamed refueling for the processional racing.

But...

It seems to be forgotten that continued, organic development of V8s and V10s eventually rendered V12s obsolete. Then continued, organic development of V10s made V8s obsolete. By the time refueling was introduced in 1994, most of the competitive teams had already converged upon the optimum and were running V10s. A year later, all competitive teams ran V10s. (Ferrari didn't give up its beautiful ghost until 1996.)

And what has history demonstrated when teams migrate toward the same solutions, i.e. when they have roughly the same performance? Overtaking trends downward, and it has absolutely nothing to do with refueling.


The world's first broken record graph

Rapidly degrading tires and DRS-induced speed differentials mimic -- to an extreme -- what used to take place as a result of rapidly changing fuel loads and power-induced speed differentials. But, something's gonna have to change, because convergence includes tire and DRS strategy, too.



I think the sport should look at ACO-style rules that allow teams to choose their own compromise between power, efficiency, and weight. That book was written by Formula One, but it seems only those who run the ACO have read it.

(For what it's worth, I don't take a position and then look for ways to defend it. I just acknowledge what I see.)

[SectorOne]

I'm not sure you understand what I've said,

You can be 100% sure i do, Bhall.

[bhall II]

I didn't mean for that to seem dismissive. I'm just aware that sometimes what I intend to say doesn't necessarily match up to what I've actually said.

[R_Redding]

While I agree with everything you wrote BHall , I think overall I've enjoyed the fake drs/pirelli years more.

One issue when the cars performance converges is examples like the Trulli trains , and the Petrov example. Trulli was able to qualify significantly better that he raced ... he still does..as demostrated nicely in FormulaE:Moscow .

Another is how stricter the stewarding/marshalling has become ... any driver that attempts an overtake and touches another gets penalties way out of proportion to the offence.. the drivers are being subliminally stopped from taking chances by fear of penalty.

Rob

[bhall II]

I don't think there's anything wrong with having a subjective opinion one way or the other. Preference is preference, yanno? Where I take issue is when logical fallacy is somehow offered and accepted as objective reality. Like this...

You’ve got a lot of new people in that Strategy Group who haven’t been around all that long. If you cast your mind back to races where there was refuelling, they weren’t that exciting – you just timed the pitstop, you either went shorter or longer [in the stint], and that dictated your strategy.

Are we supposed to pretend that bespoke tires, designed explicitly to enable that strategy, weren't at all a factor?

Anyone who saw Kimi Raikkonen drop ten places in two laps at Shanghai in 2012, for instance, really ought to know that tire strategy reigns supreme.

By lap 49 Räikkönen's tyres appeared to hit the 'cliff' and lose effective tyre performance. In the space of 2 laps Räikkönen went from 2nd to 12th.

The 'train', which was started by Massa [around lap 34] and continued by Räikkönen, led to 2nd to 14th positions being separated by just 15 seconds (rare to see so late in a race without a safety car).

No strategy is viable unless the tires support it, and today's tires are light-years behind those seen at the peak of the tire war.

When you look at the statistics and really analyze the last time we had refueling, it does not spice up the racing. I’ve commented on as many races where a sticky fuel nozzle ruined the race as energized it by bringing other people into play. It cost Felipe Massa a World Championship.

Yes, you read that correctly. Refueling "does not spice up the racing," but it can "[energize a race] by bringing other people into play." He might have a point if other pit lane blunders were as rare as mid-statement contradictions. Yet...



Those views are either intellectually dishonest or they reflect a basic misunderstanding of the sport. Regardless, they help shape public opinion because of where they originated.

But, Marchionne gets it...

We keep on hearing noises about what kitchen-concocted studies have yielded. I understand them. The question is you have to find out the impact of the combination of refueling, tire changes and what a variety of other changes are going to have on the sport.

Singularly [refueling] may not be the answer, but combined with other things it might be, so I am totally open.

[bhall II]

Only the excuses change...

The Strategy Group gave a mandate to the engineers to tell us if refuelling is a smart idea or not, whether it is expensive or not, if it increases performance and if it is dangerous.

And the response was unanimous that it would not be good because it is expensive, it is logistically complicated...

...dangerous...

...and makes boring races...

F1 is just boring

We all know who's going to win on Sunday, 99 per cent. Of course, every single driver would love to be in the position of Lewis [Hamilton] and Nico [Rosberg]. But as a fan I don't like that because it gets boring.

The races in formula one have become quite boring.

Are Mercedes making F1 boring? Rivals fear so

...because all the strategies will be the same.

I'd have so much more respect for these people if they'd just be honest about their machinations...

Yeah, we seem to be doing OK with the status quo. So, we ain't changing ---.

Since we only build chassis, we think that should be as difficult as possible, because it's the only area in which we can flex our financial muscle.

I've been told I'm against refueling. Also, I don't have enough self-discipline to control my own spending, and I need you to do it for me.

Me, too! And I've run out of pay drivers to pilfer!

These idiots want cars that are five to six seconds quicker, and they're going to leave on the table the easiest and cheapest 1.5s you can possibly find.

[toraabe]

With a fan that is intended to suck air out from under the floor it can only thrive in such an environment.
Whether theres a car in front or not will have virtually no impact, in fact i would guess its probably even beneficial to have a car in front of you.

Look at this Las year ground effect cars 1982 san marino---
Fantastic racing . Look how close they are able to race. With 2m wide cars and 420mm wide rear tyres and massive downforce
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ua70zL5 ... e=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdPIsAVxbt0

[f1316]

Only the excuses change...

All 100% true.

I get why those with a vested interest don't want to admit any of these things, but really don't understand why the so-called journalists (*cough* Andrew Benson) don't seem to latch onto any of it.

We can only hope Marchionne has a lot of sway, I guess...

[SectorOne]

With a fan that is intended to suck air out from under the floor it can only thrive in such an environment.
Whether theres a car in front or not will have virtually no impact, in fact i would guess its probably even beneficial to have a car in front of you.

Look at this Las year ground effect cars 1982 san marino---
Fantastic racing . Look how close they are able to race. With 2m wide cars and 420mm wide rear tyres and massive downforce
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ua70zL5 ... e=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdPIsAVxbt0

Stunning racing yes Only thing stopping the whole field from running like a train switching leaders non stop is the inherent performance differential of the various cars. If they ran the same car you´d have half the field dicing it out like Pironi and Villeneuve.

[bhall II]

You know what else they had in 1982 besides ground effect cars? Refueling.

I get why those with a vested interest don't want to admit any of these things, but really don't understand why the so-called journalists (*cough* Andrew Benson) don't seem to latch onto any of it.

I'm pretty sure "journalists" who don't play the game don't get access.