Refuelling 2017

[f1316]

I've been thinking about the notion - continually used by f1 journalists/teams to explain why refuelling should not return - which essentially boils down to:

'more overtakes equals better racing'

Bhall has been very detailed about why refuelling is not the inherent cause of lack of overtakes, but we should also recognise that the above is not a hard and fast rule.

I'm always rewatching (over and over again!) old races and two I recently rewatched are good illustrations of this:

2013 Spanish gp
2005 San Marino gp

I should start by saying that I think 2013 Spain is a reasonably entertaining race, particularly in the first two stints; but it was also littered with overtakes, none of which I think were of massive entertainment value - other than alonso off the start which is irrelevant to the conversation.

It also featured the sky commentators - inc the same Martin brundle who recently rejected the idea of refuelling for fear it would mean less on track overtakes - bemoaning the fact that drivers were not pushing the tyres or defending hard.

2005 San Marino on the other hand had, as I recall, only one on track overtake of note - Schumacher on Button, which owed something to back markers. Rather, it is a race remembered and lauded primarily *because* of the lack of a race lead affecting overtake. Yes, if the overtake had been successful it would have changed the story - arguably to a better one - but only if the overtake was very difficult and the exception rather than the norm.

Now, of course the circumstances that contrived to make the 2005 race so interesting are another conversation, but we should acknowledge that sheer volume of overtakes should not be f1's goal - you could in fact argue quite the opposite.

[turbof1]

The hyping around overtaking always has annoyed me. It's not overtaling itself that makes the show, but fights for the positions are.

Something like an Alonso defending his position that hard in an inferior car it forces Vettel to cut the corner. Something like Hamilton battling it out with Rosberg for several corners.

Sensation comes from Tension, not from the cold breeze blown in your face because somebody flies by with DRS. Somebody mentioned Hungary 2015; I believe that was the race were Schumacher closed the gap to Alonso in the final stages and tried literally everything to find a place to get past Alonso. It made the whole race with barely a single overtake completely worthwhile.

[f1316]

The hyping around overtaking always has annoyed me. It's not overtaling itself that makes the show, but fights for the positions are.

Something like an Alonso defending his position that hard in an inferior car it forces Vettel to cut the corner. Something like Hamilton battling it out with Rosberg for several corners.

Sensation comes from Tension, not from the cold breeze blown in your face because somebody flies by with DRS. Somebody mentioned Hungary 2015; I believe that was the race were Schumacher closed the gap to Alonso in the final stages and tried literally everything to find a place to get past Alonso. It made the whole race with barely a single overtake completely worthwhile.

Exactly!

I do think you mean San Marino 2005 though (particularly since we haven't got to Hungary 2015 yet . I didn't remember until rewatching recently but San Marino 2006 is the exact reverse - Schumcher (successfully) holding off Alonso.

[turbof1]

Oops, I was in a hurry! Well you atleast got the picture . Yes indeed, it was San Marino.

[Moxie]

Why should qualifying be done on race fuel?
Actually, the lighter midfield car will just disappear into a pitstop after three laps, without any overtaking (it will still be quick at the beginning of the race, because it is lighter).
This just does not help. And also we would know the strategies. It's been quite precise by calculation the delta times between Q2 runs without racefuel and Q3 runs on racefuel.

Qualifying need to be done without racefuel, then we can see overtaking and different strategies.

If teams are not required to qualify on race fuel, every team will qualify on minimum fuel. qualifying results will continue to be about as predictable as they are currently. Then at race time the faster cars run away in the front, followed by the General order to which we have all become accustomed.

By requiring teams to qualify on race fuel you will see some middling teams will qualify on minimum fuel. While such a strategy would be disaster for a team with WCC hopes, it may be beneficial for a middling team too get media exposure to provide Return on Investment for sponsors. You can expect that these new front runners won't give up their positions easily. As has been mentioned before, as the field is much tighter than it was many years ago. Even though it will hold true that these light fuel leader will have to pit quickly, they will certainly create havoc for the cars behind them. Consider:Just how long can the Merc wait behind the Force India, when the Ferrari is riding up his exhaust?


Competitively, this means that every team will have to consider just how heavy they want to run in quali vs how long they want their first stint to be in relation to tired deg and overall race strategy. Wrong guesses, and bad luck will result in less predictable results. I also see a potential for middling teams to use team orders to create strategic potential in an attempt to keep at least one driver in the media spotlight as long as possible.

I am a realist, I don't think these changes will "fix" F1, but I do think it will be an improvement.

[f1316]

This really aggravates me:

http://m.autosport.com/news/report.php/ ... ey-results

So the people tell you what they want and you then tell them they're wrong.

They also conveniently separate one result from another:

"[More durable tyres] will make the racing worse, you'll have one-stop races which are never exciting." - Horner

Well, no, one stop races are unlikely if you also introduce refuelling.

'Mercedes motorsport chief Toto Wolff highlighted that a return to refuelling (61.3 per cent in favour; GPDA 60 per cent) would "limit the variance on strategy and you will see less overtaking".'

People bandy the strategy convergence around a lot, but there was actually plenty of strategy variance in the 2009 season - even if that just meant fuelling up a bit more at the start.

Boullier's comments make most sense:

"I watch old races sometimes at home and you look at the huge gap between the cars - there was very little overtaking," he said. "But we enjoyed them.

"In 2013 we had perhaps the closest-ever racing in Formula 1 and there were so many overtaking manoeuvres and pitstops that people couldn't understand what was going on."'

And that brings me back to my main point: overtaking is not the be all and end all. I would venture that too many, too easy overtakes is just as bad - maybe worse - than too few, too hard (2005 San Marino again prime example).

I agree that making overtakes a small amount easier than circa 2000-2009 would be good, but just adding Drs to 2006 regs achieves this. If you can do it without drs - ground effect aero for example - even better, but don't tell me that the results of fan survey is bullsh*t because it doesn't suit your agenda.

Oh and the comment about only Renault benefitting from Michelin is just as much rubbish. Mclaren and Williams were both very competitive in that era.

[bhall II]

This really aggravates me:

What do you expect from a pig but a grunt?

[FW17]

Oh and the comment about only Renault benefitting from Michelin is just as much rubbish. Mclaren and Williams were both very competitive in that era.

Michelin Renault benefit story is not about tyres but about the mass damper system that was developed by Michelin and deployed on Renault.

Ron was cheesed about this that he got it banned as soon as an alternate was available to his team.

[Jonnycraig]

Officially abandoned thank god.

[Sniffit]

To bad. They should have scrapped the fuel limit of 100kg as well as the fuel flow limit and introduced refueling. Then we could have seen drivers pushing their cars to the max throught the race. None of this silly lift and coast etc.

[bhall II]

Isn't the refueling ban supposed to promote on-track action instead of overtaking in the pits?

...while you make a solid argument that refueling was not solely to blame for the lack of overtaking, I still believe it would merely add another strategic angle, thus further reducing on-track action.

Some years ago everybody was complaining that there was no passing on the track because the teams prefer to wait for the long refuelling pit stops to pass the other cars (remember the boooooooring very, very boring, Schumacher/Ferrari victories).

...Martin brundle who recently rejected the idea of refuelling for fear it would mean less on track overtakes - bemoaning the fact that drivers were not pushing the tyres or defending hard.

Highly acclaimed race

The Williams duo led the field early on but Hamilton jumped ahead of the pair of them as they made their first pit stops. Team mate Nico Rosberg remained stuck in fourth place however, until a rain shower helped him catch and pass the two FW37s.

Or maybe, just maybe, refueling has absolutely nothing to do with overtaking?

[Pingguest]

As you make a reference to yesterday's race, bhall II, the point you try to make, is more an argument against pit stops instead of re-introducing mid-race refueling.

[bhall II]

If that's what you've taken from it, then I suppose that's fair enough. For me, it just further exemplifies the absence of any connection between refueling and overtaking, which runs contrary to what's typically the prime argument against refueling.

I also think it's kinda funny that a race in which the vast majority of finishing positions were decided by little more than pit strategy alone has nonetheless been lauded as one of the best races of the year and its winner hailed "brilliant" because his tires wore out at a particularly advantageous juncture.

Lewis Hamilton wins British GP brilliantly after late rain

Lewis Hamilton battled through a bad start and late-race rain to win an action-packed British Grand Prix

So, perhaps all of this means the outcome of a race largely decides whether we enjoy it or not, and on-track action ranks a distant second?

[Pingguest]

If that's what you've taken from it, then I suppose that's fair enough. For me, it just further exemplifies the absence of any connection between refueling and overtaking, which runs contrary to what's typically the prime argument against refueling.

I also think it's kinda funny that a race in which the vast majority of finishing positions were decided by little more than pit strategy alone has nonetheless been lauded as one of the best races of the year and its winner hailed "brilliant" because his tires wore out at a particularly advantageous juncture.

Lewis Hamilton wins British GP brilliantly after late rain

Lewis Hamilton battled through a bad start and late-race rain to win an action-packed British Grand Prix

So, perhaps all of this means the outcome of a race largely decides whether we enjoy it or not, and on-track action ranks a distant second?

The race outcome was not different from all other races this year except Malaysia. Hamilton took a gamble or used his wisdom and as a result he changed tires at the very best moment. So did Vettel. However, while watching last year's race I was quite disappointed to see Hamilton pass both Williams drivers with a pit stop instead of an on-track pass.
In my opinion drivers should do the entire race by their own. With proper tires and the current fuel consumption limit it may well result in drivers having different race strategies and thus different speeds during the race, as happened during the 1980's.

[GPR-A duplicate2]

I bet, if there wasn't a rule, mandating use of two different compounds in a race, there would have been teams trying to go the whole race distance on one set of tyres by going a few seconds slower than they are now to conserve tire life. In places where there is not so much of tire wear, even the top teams would have tried it, by compromising the speed. A magnified version of what they are doing today.

NO NEED OF REFUELLING. Here is what I think are small measures, that definitely can help improve the racing.

(If there is a mandate for using two compounds, why not mandate two stops or even three stops based on circuits? That would then force the teams use the tires to their full extent, rather than the stupidity of nursing the tires. Then PIRELLI need not have to be in this shitty position and can then bring in good tires.
OR
Alternatively, the top 5 OR 10 qualifiers should get a mandate of 2 (or 3 based on circuits) stops and the rest of the grid would be exempted of that rule.)
+
Today, the drivers are afraid of running closely behind another car, afraid of damaging the tires in the turbulent air. Bring better tires which will not get as much affected as they are today due to the turbulent air.
+
You can't strip of aerodynamic opportunities from the teams. Let them innovate as much rear downforce as possible. Bring in some smart rules relating to the front grip of the car, so that they don't suffer with understeer while chasing a car closely. Allow some creative opportunities in this area. Tires that doesn't get affected due to turbulent air and the improved front grip in chasing situation, would definitely encourage more overtakes.
+
Being Eco friendly is good. But as it stands, the Engines are nowhere close to generating as much power as we expect them to, with just 100 Kg fuel. Atleast allow 20 Kgs more and allow some respite in terms of that 10500 RPM rule. That would then shut the crap of "Mr. Driver so and so, lift and cruise, lift and cruise for 50 Mts or 100 Mts, we need to save fuel"
+
Like Montoya has mentioned in his recent interview, remove the tire sensors and leave it to the drivers TO FEEL THE TIRES. Any case, my suggestion is to bring in tougher tires like mentioned above.

These are some basic things that definitely help the overall show and doesn't cost much. I am sure we don't need a wholesale change in the configuration of cars and the formula itself.