2019 Bahrain Grand Prix - Sakhir, March 29 - 31

[dr_cooke]

What is the point of the hard? Maybe that tire could work for an adventurous early undercut since passing is possible? If it is a one stop, maybe the hard will have a little more life left at the end of the race? Start on hards go late into the race then a mad dash on softs?

I personally am absolutely fed up of these one stop races. Pirelli is the worst thing to have happened to F1.

I also think they should just let the teams decide what compounds to use so that there are some strategy variations. The rules almost dictate what strategy teams must use!

I don't mind 1 stoppers, 2 stoppers would be nice, but that creates other problems. If you make the tires fragile, everyone will just drive to a delta, and we get driving miss daisy. Its hard and dangerous to make a tire that lasts 1/3 distance and drops off a cliff. Drivers want to race, they need tires they can race with. Only way I can see it is with 2 mandatory stops, or 1 depending on the tire chosen. If you go soft and medium 2 stops, if you use the hard, 1 stop.

Bring refuelling back. That would change everything around strategies for the good

[Harvester]

This Leclerc Practice 3 onboard lap didn't look good at all.

[dans79]

This Leclerc Practice 3 onboard lap didn't look good at all.

None of them do, all the drivers are dealing with crosswinds.

[Jambier]

Useless practice

2-3 sec slower than yesterday, not representative conditions

Maybe can be use for car dev

[sri1031raj]

leclerc faster than vettel by .168 of a second and full 1.3 seconds faster than verstappen. that was Fast and 0.765 faster than Hamilton

[MtthsMlw]

Wonder what Merc is up to. Losing so much time in S1 and two tenths in S2 but equal with Ferrari in S3.

[Jambier]

Maybe some weren't flat out

Yesterday they were all faster with qualy sim in FP2

I assume it will be close between Ferrari and Mercedes

[darkpino]

It seems to me that RBR is in pretty big trouble. Especially in Q trim

[atanatizante]

After FP3, Norris on M tyre is half a second down on Bottas being on S tyre?
Not to mention Groj and Hulk at just the same distance? Nahhh, I don`t think so ...
As Rosberg`s said on Sky it seems that Merc has some power turned down ...

[McMika98]

Calm down folks. Merc will release the kraken come Quali. They have not used engine modes that Ferrari and Renault have used. I think Bottas can get the pole.

[matt_b]

If Ferrari lock out the front row then I see nothing different to 2018, some tracks suit Mercedes (Australia...) and some tracks suit Ferrari (Bahrain...). It will be strange though because it shows that the regulation changes did nothing at the top so far.

[saviour stivala]

In FP1 and FP2 "Mercedes holds back engine performance!" FP3 done and dusted, Mercedes still holding back engine performance?

[Sieper]

If Ferrari lock out the front row then I see nothing different to 2018, some tracks suit Mercedes (Australia...) and some tracks suit Ferrari (Bahrain...). It will be strange though because it shows that the regulation changes did nothing at the top so far.

And why would you, incremental changes. The biggest change at the top is RBR moving to Honda. RBR was close here last year (in qually) and I still fully expect them to be this year too. The Honda is the only upset but so far it looks good, RBR never was on the podium in Melbourne since the hybride period started and now in the first race with Honda power they were.

[SmallSoldier]

in older days of f1 we have two manufactures who supplied the tyres. Now it is only one. If you bring two different manufactures then it will be further interesting to watch the race. the cost cutting by f1 is killing the sports.

If teams and fans complain about dominant teams, with 2 tire suppliers the problem would be probably exacerbated... Imagine Mercedes with the “best tire manufacturer” and Ferrari / Red Bull with the the other one... It wouldn’t matter how good of a chassis or engine they have, they would be behind.


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[SmallSoldier]

+1

It's done this way for logistics reasons as much as anything. Indeed, the whole "run a number of compounds in the weekend/race" requirement was brought in years ago because tyres were being wasted by not being used.

Perhaps we should go back to the Goodyear days where the tyre supplier brought enough of one compound for the whole event. Everyone runs that compound irrespective of their preferences. The compound could then be picked to force two or even three stops if required. All very artificial but also entirely possible.

The teams would need a good chunk of testing to be able to get a handle on the tyres before the season. But that is also entirely possible.

I think Pirelli unnecessarily gets the flak. On one hand we expect the drivers to push throughout a stint and on the other, we expect the tyres to degrade. As soon as teams realize that the tyres are not going to last long, they ask the drivers to not push and focus on extending the life of the tyres as another pit stop would be more expensive. Regardless of what tyres Pirelli introduces, teams develop the cars to extract best life out of tyres and extend the stints whereby they just do one stop. In this situation, only a mandatory two stopper can alter the racing and make it more aggressive.

Just like the drivers are now prepared to go for faster lap to gain that one single point, there should be more premium on going faster in a race, without which, no one is really going to push harder.

We see the same tyre saving situation is going on in MotoGP now, where regardless of how many laps are there in a race, riders would be simply cruising around the track to save tyres until last 2 or 3 laps.

For me a potential solution would be to make bring tires with more than one step difference (for example, instead of bringing C1, C2 and C3, bring C1, C2 and C4... That would increase the delta performance and degradation delta... If the Delta between tires is higher and additional pit stop becomes a possibility.


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