2021 Rules hit Mercedes hard. Not a coincidence.

[PlatinumZealot]

Does anyone else feel this 2021 regulation change is suspiciously damaging to the low rake cars?

I do not believe it is a coincidence that FIA finally achieved at this time, what they want, which is to handicap Mercedes.

FIA have a technical department at their disposal, and they had many years to figure how to slow Mercedes, and couldn't. They banned team radio. They limited oil burning. They changed to wider cars. They changed the front wings. Banned FRIC. Banned the DAS. Banned quali-modes. Banned blown spokes. All sorts of monkey business which did not work. Yet this last change, at this time... hit like a master stroke! With their poor record of slowing the cars, I don't believe that the 2021 rules were deduced entirely by the FIA. Conspiracy was definitely at play.

Either someone inside the FIA was very good at finding the needle in the aerodynamic haystack; kicking Mercedes in the left nut - cutting back the edge of the floor through some sort of devil-worshiping work in the windtunnel. Or they got some sort of 3D scan of the W10/W11 floor.

How else could they know?! How else could they know that cutting back the floor would hurt Mercedes so much?! Racing point had Mercedes W10 clould data. Remember that? RP had to hand it over for scrutiny...

That oppounity would have flashed like a bomb for the FIA. FIA would have analysed the hell out of that Mercedes 3D cloud data.

They not only figured out how to slow them. There was another golden opportunity. Mercedes could not react to any changes to hurt them in the wind- tunnel because the change would be too drastic to make. It was the perfect scheme. Hit Mercedes where it hurts and when they can't recover. To rub salt in the wonds the budget cap was argued down even lower than the original $175 million. Too many factors to be a coincidence.

[cheeRS]

SNIP
I do not believe it is a coincidence that FIA finally achieved at this time, what they want, which is to handicap Mercedes.


Too many factors to be a coincidence.

Disclaimer: I am a diehard Mercedes and Hamilton fan.


I think hindsight is 20/20. I think Wolff, Hamilton, or Allison would have said something last year if they believed, or even knew, that the floor changes would hurt them more than high rake cars. More than anyone else, they would have known that, and they would have made it public quickly, just like they did when Q engine mode were mapped.

I think no one really knew fore sure. On this forum, there was a whole spectrum of ideas about how the changes would effect each team. What's to say that the Merc will end up being 1 sec faster, they just had some correlation problems with the W12 early on?

Even if it was somehow known by the FIA that Merc would be hurt the most, I don't see that as a bad thing. As I mentioned at the outset, I am a full Merc fan and have been a Ham fan since 2007 so I don't "want" to see another team win. But at some point, I do prefer closer battles and I'm tired of hearing the other fanboys say that Hamilton only wins because of the car.

If this year Verstappen wins the WDC because his car is so dominant and the W12 was handicapped, I'd be okay with that. I was thrilled in 2014 when the Red Bull dominance ended and I was happy in 2005 when the MSC/Ferrari destruction of F1 came to an end.

Call it what you will. I call it a balance of performance in sheep's clothing.

[Fulcrum]

The sport is American now, and that means the state of 'entertainment' will be maximized, even if that is to the detriment of the DNA of the sport.

Unlimited spending - being curtailed.
Differential in spending between teams - being narrowed.
Differential in CFD and wind tunnel usage - favours previously worse-performing teams.
Gimmicks and regs to improve the 'show' (DRS, sprint races, etc...).
Regulation becoming increasingly onerous.
Standardization of parts - increasing.
Races spanning most months of the year - in order to sell more subscription-based access.

My supposition is the owners of F1 don't want a situation where one team becomes so dominant for as long as Mercedes in future. The danger with tinkering is there can be unintended consequences.

[LM10]

So then the whole pandemic was a part of this master plan as well. Because if
it had not been there, we would have not seen the current cars, but the ground-effect ones. And imagine Mercedes starting to develop those cars from scratch without a budget cap which also would have not been active yet and probably earlier than anyone else like they have always done due to their domination.

[isullivan]

I think this is jumping to conclusions too fast. Mercedes are till P2 and P3 in the first Q3 of the year. Mercedes are dominating the sport since 2014 and if we are honest the floor change was speculated to hit the higher rake cars harder, as did the front wing change couple years back, the only think FIA did bust was 2019 Ferrari PU. Hats off should be to RB and Newey for constantly pushing the envelope.

[hollus]

0.1% of the laps in the season done.
With extra little testing, in a track known to change often and to eat certain tires.
Patience, breathe...
It might even still turn out to be a diva that takes a few races to dial in.

[aMessageToCharlie]

Hamilton fans on suicide watch already after one P2 in the first qualy of the season.

Where's the confidence in your star driver's qualities? And more importantly the confidence in the 7 time world championship domination team to improve the car even further.

Merc will be back to winning in no time. Possibly today already as they have the upper hand with strategy and two drivers in the mix.

[adrianjordan]

Hamilton fans on suicide watch already after one P2 in the first qualy of the season.

Where's the confidence in your star driver's qualities? And more importantly the confidence in the 7 time world championship domination team to improve the car even further.

Merc will be back to winning in no time. Possibly today already as they have the upper hand with strategy and two drivers in the mix.

Agreed. And when Lewis beats Max, despite not having the massive car advantage he has been derided for benefiting from in the past, perhaps some people will finally admit that he is as good as his records suggest.

[nzjrs]

Oh come on PZ

[Tizz]

Does anyone else feel this 2021 regulation change is suspiciously damaging to the low rake cars?

I do not believe it is a coincidence that FIA finally achieved at this time, what they want, which is to handicap Mercedes.

FIA have a technical department at their disposal, and they had many years to figure how to slow Mercedes, and couldn't. They banned team radio. They limited oil burning. They changed to wider cars. They changed the front wings. Banned FRIC. Banned the DAS. Banned quali-modes. Banned blown spokes. All sorts of monkey business which did not work. Yet this last change, at this time... hit like a master stroke! With their poor record of slowing the cars, I don't believe that the 2021 rules were deduced entirely by the FIA. Conspiracy was definitely at play.

Either someone inside the FIA was very good at finding the needle in the aerodynamic haystack; kicking Mercedes in the left nut - cutting back the edge of the floor through some sort of devil-worshiping work in the windtunnel. Or they got some sort of 3D scan of the W10/W11 floor.

How else could they know?! How else could they know that cutting back the floor would hurt Mercedes so much?! Racing point had Mercedes W10 clould data. Remember that? RP had to hand it over for scrutiny...

That oppounity would have flashed like a bomb for the FIA. FIA would have analysed the hell out of that Mercedes 3D cloud data.

They not only figured out how to slow them. There was another golden opportunity. Mercedes could not react to any changes to hurt them in the wind- tunnel because the change would be too drastic to make. It was the perfect scheme. Hit Mercedes where it hurts and when they can't recover. To rub salt in the wonds the budget cap was argued down even lower than the original $175 million. Too many factors to be a coincidence.

It all sounds a lot like a conspiracy theory. It is hard to imagine why a radio-ban would hurt Mercedes the most. The restriction of oil-burn was most of all because everybody suspected that was Ferrari's trick. The fric-ban was pointed at Renault. The ban on DAS was about closing a loophole in the rules more than anything else. The gain was so limited that other teams even didn't bother to implement it. Suggesting that the new rules on the floor was aimed at Mercedes is unreasonable. That would require an absolute precision in the prediction of aero changes. The teams themselves suffer lack of correlation now and again and for the FIA to predict the exact outplay of the changes would require a superior knowledge, technology and amount of resources.

[jjn9128]

Does anyone else feel this 2021 regulation change is suspiciously damaging to the low rake cars?

Nobody serious.

I do not believe it is a coincidence that FIA finally achieved at this time, what they want, which is to handicap Mercedes.

You're free to believe what you want but you're wrong.

FIA have a technical department at their disposal, and they had many years to figure how to slow Mercedes, and couldn't. They banned team radio. They limited oil burning. They changed to wider cars. They changed the front wings. Banned FRIC. Banned the DAS. Banned quali-modes. Banned blown spokes. All sorts of monkey business which did not work. Yet this last change, at this time... hit like a master stroke! With their poor record of slowing the cars, I don't believe that the 2021 rules were deduced entirely by the FIA. Conspiracy was definitely at play.

No they don't. Tombazis is head of FIA single seater matters, and they have a small safety department. These 2021 rules were a result of research by FOM (distinct and separate from the FIA) with the cooperation of all the teams hacking up their cars, running CFD and reporting back. FOM have a really small technical department, led by Brawn, Symonds, Somerville & Wilson with 10-15 engineers and CAD surfacers under them. There's a reason the image released of the 2021 draft was a Sauber not the 2017 Manor FOM used for their studies.

Either someone inside the FIA was very good at finding the needle in the aerodynamic haystack; kicking Mercedes in the left nut - cutting back the edge of the floor through some sort of devil-worshiping work in the windtunnel. Or they got some sort of 3D scan of the W10/W11 floor.

Mercedes were involved in the drafting of these changes.


This is all before the first race of the season, which Mercedes might well yet win, they may have lost their 1s/lap advantage but they're still up the pointy end of the grid. You're letting your bias toward Mercedes lead you to some pretty wild and conspiratorial conclusions.

[epo]

Yeah so what, this happens all the time, to Ferrari to RB when they were the WK. And last year's front wing adjustment, that was a blow for RB thus giving Toto & Mercedes a free season.

[Rikhart]

Translation: they are not massively ahead of others, ie no rocket-ship, so I am upset.

[Andres125sx]

Some facts some people seems to enjoy ignoring...

1- First Q of the year, Mercedes drivers were complaining about driveability problems... and they qualify p2 and p3... OMG what a scandal, Merdedes didn´t do p1-p2, only p2-p3, this is the end of Mercedes team!!!

2- In past 7 seasons, Mercedes won 7 WDC and 7 WCC. This is the longest dominating period in F1 history, followed by Ferrari with Hakinnen/Schumacher (6 consecutive seasons) and RBR/Vettel tied with McLaren/Prost/Senna (4 consecutive seasons)

3- FIA has always tried to stop domination periods, but they usually do it much much faster. In 6 seasons with Ferrari (banning private testing), in 4 seasons with RBR (banning blown diffusers), if 2 seasons with Renault (banning mass dumper), or even in just 1 season with Brawn (banning double diffusers).

What is the scandal? FIA trying to stop Mercedes domination like they have always do with any other dominating team?

Or the scandal is FIA allowing a team to win for 7 consecutive seasons, something they had never do before for that long?

What´s the reason they allow some teams to win for 6 or 7 consecutive seasons (Ferrari and Mercedes) while they instantly stop some others in just 1 or 2 seasons (Renault, Brawn)? IMHO that is the scandal to analyse

What´s the reason it´s FIA who decide who will become a legend winning for many consecutive years and who will only win temporarily? If not banned, maybe Brawn or Renault could have dominated for 6-7 seasons too, but we will never know because FIA didn´t allow it, contrary to what they did with Mercedes and Ferrari...

[Tzk]

We're talking 4/10ths here and Merc is still complaining about engine derating and their aero being a bit wonky. This is the same as 2020 with RB/Merc, just the other way around. Give them some time to solve these issues and the Merc will become faster (and the car isn't slow right now...).

Let's not jump to conclusions right now and just wait for 4-5 races to get the bigger picture.