2021 Spanish Grand Prix - Catalunya, May 07 - 09

[NathanOlder]

I find that one hard to argue, given in qualifying pace, aka "ultimate pace", the two cars are clearly on the same level. Maybe Verstappen (like Bottas) simply can't preserve the tires as well as Hamilton? Perhaps it's Hamilton who is driving in an extraordinary way that is keeping the tires in that state that allows him to compete for these type of wins?

Second theory, is that the Mercedes is simply better at preserving the tires (though that would still put a question mark at Bottas performance in tire management) relative to the RedBull - a bit like a consequence of striving for ultimate speed on Saturday and compromising tire deg on sundays.

In my opinion - the truth is somewhere in between. The Merc might be a bit kinder to the tires on race day, but Hamilton is certainly part of that factor. It would be great to see Perez more competitive - it might put that into better perspective that a slightly different driving style might result in equal pace and tire deg at the same time.

A good ultimate pace is no guarantee for a good race-pace. Usain Bolt has a great ultimate pace, but is likely a rather mediocre marathon runner. Under the assumption that Hamilton is a better driver than Bottas (which I think is acceptable), it simply leads to the conclusion that the Mercedes is better, at least in the longer run. If the reason that Bottas performs worse than Hamilton is due to tire management, I don't know, it could be. And by no means do I disregard the performance of Hamilton, he's a stellar driver. I just don't agree with the assessment that the difference between Verstappen and Hamilton is purely driver competence, as some imply.

I am with you that the truth is inbetween, but think Verstappen is, given the limitations of the cars, quite close to Hamilton. Hamilton is cleaner and possibly kinder to the tires (although, could be due to the car - hard to say), Verstappen a bit more aggressive, which in Imola played in his advantage, in Portimao did not (and this time, was rather indifferent towards the result). But without a proper benchmark, it remains at best an educated guess how much the relative contribution of drivers and cars is, of tire management vs inherent tire-friendliness of the cars, etc.

Well written. At least the BS that Verstappen would walk over Hamilton, even if he had a car two-tenths slower has been put to bed.

This 100%. Some fans were claiming this , at least it has stopped. From Hamilton's side (fans) I would say we all rate Max as top tier driver 100%, nothing less. It was just the constant talk from a few Max fans that were saying if Max had a car similar to Lewis, Max would destroy him. Like tangodjango just said, it has been put to bed.

[Just_a_fan]

Don't forget that Mercedes has Allison for quite some time now and he is known (all the way back from his Enstone years) for setting up cars that are very good on tires.

James Allison will have nothing to do with car setup. He's a manager these days. And his speciality when he was on the shop floor was aerodynamics, not suspension design.

[dans79]

Peter Windsor (peterwindsor on youtube) has some good videos on the difference in how they drive and extract performance.

Peter is mainly just parroting what Rob Wilson has said about Lewis Since the V8 days. He literally has videos where he interviews Rob in the 2012-2014 time period about Lewis style.

IMO, what he is leaving out form yesterday's video is how their two driving styles affect the tires at an engineering level, most likely because he doesn't know.

My opinion is similar to what Peter said yesterday, and keep in mind we are talking minisual differences here. to keep it simple, consider a generic 180 degree slow/medium speed turn, and that they are in identical cars in free air.

Max would breaks a little earlier but not as hard, and would take a "U" shaped trajectory through the corner. His apex speed will be higher, and his peak tire loads will be lower.

Lewis would break later and harder, and would take a "V" shaped trajectory through the corner. His apex speed will be lower, and his peak tire loads will be Higher.

The time delta between them would be nothing, but how they put heat/energy into the tires is significantly different.

Lewis is putting heat into the tires in 3 big bursts. Under breaking and initial turn in, at the apex because of the more severe direction change, and when he gets back on the power. Max is putting heat into the tires at a lower and more consistent rate. He still has 3 bursts like Lewis, but the are less severe, and the apex burst is lower than the other 2.

I think The Pirellis respond better to Lewis's style and that's why he seems to always have better deg. I'd love to get my hands on the engineering literature related to the tires, to verify my theory.

[McMika98]

Well, Perez was about 40s behind Bottas - and remember, some claim Bottas is of "Mazepin level". So if we compare the second drivers, the Mercedes clearly has the pace advantage (or Perez is performing worse than a 1-star Uber driver)

Bottas is a solid driver who qualified and finished strong in Williams, prolly tad better than Perez.

[McMika98]

Max would breaks a little earlier but not as hard, and would take a "U" shaped trajectory through the corner. His apex speed will be higher, and his peak tire loads will be lower.

Lewis would break later and harder, and would take a "V" shaped trajectory through the corner. His apex speed will be lower, and his peak tire loads will be Higher.

The time delta between them would be nothing, but how they put heat/energy into the tires is significantly different.

There in lies the issue for the second redbull driver. All drivers are taught to have a perfect V for a corner to get the lap and as do race engineers. Albon repeatedly talked of the V, however the way the Redbull is developed with fancy pull toggles to change the car dynamically in cornering, they have to somehow forget all their previous driving base. The engineers probably don't share the full aspect of the system in case it is leaked so only Max knows the true ins and outs of how such system works optimally.
Any F1 driver can jump on a Mercedes and be quick instantly but noone will do so in a Redbull, a car built around Max.

[LHamilton]

Race pace from the race in graphics. You can see how much time Bottas and Perez lost stuck behind respective cars. Also, Leclerc was Mr Consistent this race. But generally it's hard to take away to much from this since overtaking was difficult.

Interesting to see that neither Bottas nor Perez were anywhere close to Max's fastest lap. I guess Perez must've been feeling sick again. ;>

[El Scorchio]

Max would breaks a little earlier but not as hard, and would take a "U" shaped trajectory through the corner. His apex speed will be higher, and his peak tire loads will be lower.

Lewis would break later and harder, and would take a "V" shaped trajectory through the corner. His apex speed will be lower, and his peak tire loads will be Higher.

The time delta between them would be nothing, but how they put heat/energy into the tires is significantly different.

There in lies the issue for the second redbull driver. All drivers are taught to have a perfect V for a corner to get the lap and as do race engineers. Albon repeatedly talked of the V, however the way the Redbull is developed with fancy pull toggles to change the car dynamically in cornering, they have to somehow forget all their previous driving base. The engineers probably don't share the full aspect of the system in case it is leaked so only Max knows the true ins and outs of how such system works optimally.
Any F1 driver can jump on a Mercedes and be quick instantly but noone will do so in a Redbull, a car built around Max.

My take on this is similar. I believe the Red Bull is built around the handling characteristics for Verstappen to extract the maximum he can from it. And if his way of cornering is idiosynchratic or different to most others, which seems to be the case, then it's going to be a tough ask for whoever is the other driver to 'unlearn' what they fundamentally know and try to adopt that style and still be quick or extract the most from the car.

Could be too simplistic, but it goes a way to explaining the relative struggles of Albon and Gasly in the RBR car vs the TR/AT car.

[MKlaus]

I find that one hard to argue, given in qualifying pace, aka "ultimate pace", the two cars are clearly on the same level. Maybe Verstappen (like Bottas) simply can't preserve the tires as well as Hamilton? Perhaps it's Hamilton who is driving in an extraordinary way that is keeping the tires in that state that allows him to compete for these type of wins?

Second theory, is that the Mercedes is simply better at preserving the tires (though that would still put a question mark at Bottas performance in tire management) relative to the RedBull - a bit like a consequence of striving for ultimate speed on Saturday and compromising tire deg on sundays.

In my opinion - the truth is somewhere in between. The Merc might be a bit kinder to the tires on race day, but Hamilton is certainly part of that factor. It would be great to see Perez more competitive - it might put that into better perspective that a slightly different driving style might result in equal pace and tire deg at the same time.

A good ultimate pace is no guarantee for a good race-pace. Usain Bolt has a great ultimate pace, but is likely a rather mediocre marathon runner. Under the assumption that Hamilton is a better driver than Bottas (which I think is acceptable), it simply leads to the conclusion that the Mercedes is better, at least in the longer run. If the reason that Bottas performs worse than Hamilton is due to tire management, I don't know, it could be. And by no means do I disregard the performance of Hamilton, he's a stellar driver. I just don't agree with the assessment that the difference between Verstappen and Hamilton is purely driver competence, as some imply.

I am with you that the truth is inbetween, but think Verstappen is, given the limitations of the cars, quite close to Hamilton. Hamilton is cleaner and possibly kinder to the tires (although, could be due to the car - hard to say), Verstappen a bit more aggressive, which in Imola played in his advantage, in Portimao did not (and this time, was rather indifferent towards the result). But without a proper benchmark, it remains at best an educated guess how much the relative contribution of drivers and cars is, of tire management vs inherent tire-friendliness of the cars, etc.

Well written. At least the BS that Verstappen would walk over Hamilton, even if he had a car two-tenths slower has been put to bed.

the question is, does he have a car that is just 2 tenths slower than what lewis has?
if you go back to 2018 us gp, lewis kept trying but couldn't get near to kimi after losing the position at the start. similar is the case in 2019. similarly there was a malaysian gp in 2017 (i guess?), 2017 brazil?, brazil in 2019 (before ocon's accident)? look at what happened last year in british gp 2. if the car isn't capable, even lewis couldn't do what he does the best. these are just what springs to mind. there have been many grand prixes where he couldn't come from behind because the tyres gave away.

there are many factors that have enabled lewis to become "kinder to the tyres". thin gauge and much more durable pirellis, simplified front wing and obviously, far improved mercedes suspension systems. to add to that, he is a good driver with degrading tyres. but it's a mix of all things and not just one factor.

red bull, relatively speaking, is just a qualifying car and they are not as good on race setups. once race starts and laps starts going by, that small difference in qualifying starts giving way for a bigger margin. look at fact that, lewis was able to hang in right on max's gear box for both stints, while max being in fresh air was losing grip. that shows the difference in cars, first and foremost. for so long as mercedes remains a super strong race car, it would be easy for lewis mount those attacks, regardless of how good max is. we would never know.

[V12-POWER]

Peter Windsor (peterwindsor on youtube) has some good videos on the difference in how they drive and extract performance.

Peter is mainly just parroting what Rob Wilson has said about Lewis Since the V8 days. He literally has videos where he interviews Rob in the 2012-2014 time period about Lewis style.

IMO, what he is leaving out form yesterday's video is how their two driving styles affect the tires at an engineering level, most likely because he doesn't know.

My opinion is similar to what Peter said yesterday, and keep in mind we are talking minisual differences here. to keep it simple, consider a generic 180 degree slow/medium speed turn, and that they are in identical cars in free air.

Max would breaks a little earlier but not as hard, and would take a "U" shaped trajectory through the corner. His apex speed will be higher, and his peak tire loads will be lower.

Lewis would break later and harder, and would take a "V" shaped trajectory through the corner. His apex speed will be lower, and his peak tire loads will be Higher.

The time delta between them would be nothing, but how they put heat/energy into the tires is significantly different.

Lewis is putting heat into the tires in 3 big bursts. Under breaking and initial turn in, at the apex because of the more severe direction change, and when he gets back on the power. Max is putting heat into the tires at a lower and more consistent rate. He still has 3 bursts like Lewis, but the are less severe, and the apex burst is lower than the other 2.

I think The Pirellis respond better to Lewis's style and that's why he seems to always have better deg. I'd love to get my hands on the engineering literature related to the tires, to verify my theory.

your theory is false. first of all because the fact these tires last (or not) is mostly based on the tread temperature, then this is also related to how much grip the tire provides. Almost 100% of how much energy is put into the ground depends on the car only.

An equal time in a U shaped turn with “different” lines doesn’t equal to what the Mercedes car is capable of doing, because differences are so minuscule they don’t account for such performance difference between both cars. If driving style was such huge factor you would see racing line experiments every weekend.

There’s no magic “driving style” that will allow flat out driving while preserving tires like we saw this weekend.

The fact is Lewis could make 15 or so laps on (maybe) full attack and this didn’t even hurt his tires that much regardless of how many fancy blister camera shots they show on tv, it didn’t seem to matter that much considering the pace he had.

In the case of Max he had to drop the ball right at the beginning of his second stint.

I think some people here are too much into this miraculous underdog story of Mercedes and they seem to fail to realize their car is still VERY dominant come race day, they try their hardest to put one driver and one team in a pedestal with this crap

[tangodjango]

A good ultimate pace is no guarantee for a good race-pace. Usain Bolt has a great ultimate pace, but is likely a rather mediocre marathon runner. Under the assumption that Hamilton is a better driver than Bottas (which I think is acceptable), it simply leads to the conclusion that the Mercedes is better, at least in the longer run. If the reason that Bottas performs worse than Hamilton is due to tire management, I don't know, it could be. And by no means do I disregard the performance of Hamilton, he's a stellar driver. I just don't agree with the assessment that the difference between Verstappen and Hamilton is purely driver competence, as some imply.

I am with you that the truth is inbetween, but think Verstappen is, given the limitations of the cars, quite close to Hamilton. Hamilton is cleaner and possibly kinder to the tires (although, could be due to the car - hard to say), Verstappen a bit more aggressive, which in Imola played in his advantage, in Portimao did not (and this time, was rather indifferent towards the result). But without a proper benchmark, it remains at best an educated guess how much the relative contribution of drivers and cars is, of tire management vs inherent tire-friendliness of the cars, etc.

Well written. At least the BS that Verstappen would walk over Hamilton, even if he had a car two-tenths slower has been put to bed.

the question is, does he have a car that is just 2 tenths slower than what lewis has?
if you go back to 2018 us gp, lewis kept trying but couldn't get near to kimi after losing the position at the start. similar is the case in 2019. similarly there was a malaysian gp in 2017 (i guess?), 2017 brazil?, brazil in 2019 (before ocon's accident)? look at what happened last year in british gp 2. if the car isn't capable, even lewis couldn't do what he does the best. these are just what springs to mind. there have been many grand prixes where he couldn't come from behind because the tyres gave away.

there are many factors that have enabled lewis to become "kinder to the tyres". thin gauge and much more durable pirellis, simplified front wing and obviously, far improved mercedes suspension systems. to add to that, he is a good driver with degrading tyres. but it's a mix of all things and not just one factor.

red bull, relatively speaking, is just a qualifying car and they are not as good on race setups. once race starts and laps starts going by, that small difference in qualifying starts giving way for a bigger margin. look at fact that, lewis was able to hang in right on max's gear box for both stints, while max being in fresh air was losing grip. that shows the difference in cars, first and foremost. for so long as mercedes remains a super strong race car, it would be easy for lewis mount those attacks, regardless of how good max is. we would never know.

However good Max is, it's quite clear he's not as good as Hamilton yet.

[MKlaus]

Well written. At least the BS that Verstappen would walk over Hamilton, even if he had a car two-tenths slower has been put to bed.

the question is, does he have a car that is just 2 tenths slower than what lewis has?
if you go back to 2018 us gp, lewis kept trying but couldn't get near to kimi after losing the position at the start. similar is the case in 2019. similarly there was a malaysian gp in 2017 (i guess?), 2017 brazil?, brazil in 2019 (before ocon's accident)? look at what happened last year in british gp 2. if the car isn't capable, even lewis couldn't do what he does the best. these are just what springs to mind. there have been many grand prixes where he couldn't come from behind because the tyres gave away.

there are many factors that have enabled lewis to become "kinder to the tyres". thin gauge and much more durable pirellis, simplified front wing and obviously, far improved mercedes suspension systems. to add to that, he is a good driver with degrading tyres. but it's a mix of all things and not just one factor.

red bull, relatively speaking, is just a qualifying car and they are not as good on race setups. once race starts and laps starts going by, that small difference in qualifying starts giving way for a bigger margin. look at fact that, lewis was able to hang in right on max's gear box for both stints, while max being in fresh air was losing grip. that shows the difference in cars, first and foremost. for so long as mercedes remains a super strong race car, it would be easy for lewis mount those attacks, regardless of how good max is. we would never know.

However good Max is, it's quite clear he's not as good as Hamilton yet.

i have nothing against you believing that way, which i am sure makes you feel happy. it's just not logical to compare them in such vastly different machines.

[godlameroso]

Yeah, Hamilton is incredible at saving tires. He's impossibly good at it, seriously, not even his team mate can conserve tires like Hamilton. His pace doesn't drop off at all, it only improves every time he pits. Other drivers wear their tires, even his team mate can't preserver rubber to the same degree as Hamilton. It's almost like he uses different tires to the rest of the drivers, he's that good.

Verstappen could match Hamilton, but in doing so he wore his tires too quickly, Bottas the same. Only Hamilton could drive the same tires and keep their pace the entire stint length. It is an incredible feat that no one else can do it's especially impressive that he does it in traffic as well. At least Bottas doesn't have this magic tire preservation ability and cannot hang with Verstappen. Otherwise if he could have preserved his tires as well as Hamilton, or ignore the loss of grip, or whatever he's doing, I'm sure he could have passed LeClerc.

Seriously, no other driver can preserve tires to the same degree, especially in traffic. I think that ability of Hamilton will essentially guarantee him the championship unless the RBR improves a bit.

I guess the take away is Hamilton is so good at managing tires while keeping pace(literally has no drop off in performance at all), that the only way for Verstappen to keep pace is to use a harder tire or take more stops. Or be in a race where tire wear isn't much of an issue.

[dans79]

[tangodjango]

the question is, does he have a car that is just 2 tenths slower than what lewis has?
if you go back to 2018 us gp, lewis kept trying but couldn't get near to kimi after losing the position at the start. similar is the case in 2019. similarly there was a malaysian gp in 2017 (i guess?), 2017 brazil?, brazil in 2019 (before ocon's accident)? look at what happened last year in british gp 2. if the car isn't capable, even lewis couldn't do what he does the best. these are just what springs to mind. there have been many grand prixes where he couldn't come from behind because the tyres gave away.

there are many factors that have enabled lewis to become "kinder to the tyres". thin gauge and much more durable pirellis, simplified front wing and obviously, far improved mercedes suspension systems. to add to that, he is a good driver with degrading tyres. but it's a mix of all things and not just one factor.

red bull, relatively speaking, is just a qualifying car and they are not as good on race setups. once race starts and laps starts going by, that small difference in qualifying starts giving way for a bigger margin. look at fact that, lewis was able to hang in right on max's gear box for both stints, while max being in fresh air was losing grip. that shows the difference in cars, first and foremost. for so long as mercedes remains a super strong race car, it would be easy for lewis mount those attacks, regardless of how good max is. we would never know.

However good Max is, it's quite clear he's not as good as Hamilton yet.

i have nothing against you believing that way, which i am sure makes you feel happy. it's just not logical to compare them in such vastly different machines.

Right back at you and I hope you don't get so invested in a sport in which cars go round in circles that comparing drivers respective levels contributes to your mental "happiness".

[dans79]

I guess the take away is Hamilton is so good at managing tires while keeping pace(literally has no drop off in performance at all), that the only way for Verstappen to keep pace is to use a harder tire or take more stops. Or be in a race where tire wear isn't much of an issue.

He had deg, but it was definitely low.

This is his final stint. The first big spike is passing Valtteri, the second is passing Max.