Updated after German GP. Added qualifying as well. It's an average of top speeds at the speed trap for every GP so far in 2018.
F1 2018 QUALIFYING SPEED TRAP AVERAGE (AUS-GER)
1. Force India-Mercedes 323,4
2. Ferrari 321,4
3. Mercedes 320,4
4. Haas-Ferrari 319,5
5. Sauber-Ferrari 319,5
6. Williams-Mercedes 317,5
7. Renault 317,1
8. Toro Rosso-Honda 316,1
9. Red Bull-Renault 316,0
10. McLaren-Renault 313,9
So at the front it's a mix of Mercedes and Ferrari powered cars. Nothing unsual about that except that Williams have struggled the whole season with their straight line speed, something that used to be their strength in the recent year. I think it has to be aero related. Could be issues with cooling or just having to run more downforce (and drag) to make the car more driveable. Haven't really followed them closely enough to know if they have said something about it. Renault and Honda powered cars create the next group, McLaren's struggles are visible here, and the qualifying speed trap data doesn't really look that much different to what it was last year with Honda power. Toro Rosso seems to be right up there with the RB and Renault, echoing Red Bull's statement that there isn't much of a gap between Renault and Honda PU.
F1 2018 QUALIFYING SPEED TRAP AVERAGE
AUS-ESP FRA-GER
Mercedes 322,8 323,8 +1,0
Force India-Mercedes 326,7 327,3 +0,6
Williams-Mercedes 319,3 321,8 +2,5
Ferrari 322,5 326,9 +4,4
Haas-Ferrari 322,1 323,2 +1,1
Sauber-Ferrari 320,6 323,9 +3,3
Renault 317,9 321,1 +3,2
Red Bull-Renault 318,0 319,2 +1,2
McLaren-Renault 315,1 317,4 +2,3
Toro Rosso-Honda 317,6 320,3 +2,7
Mercedes 322,9 324,3 +1,4
Ferrari 321,7 324,6 +2,9
Renault 317,0 319,2 +2,2
Honda 317,6 320,3 +2,7
Here the qualifying speed trap data has been divided in to two groups: one for the first five GPs when everyone was running the original PU spec from the start of the season and one for the four races starting with the French GP when every engine manufacturer had introduced their second spec PUs. Sample sizes in these statistics are quite small, but I was interested to see we can make something out of this. Ferrari have certainly got a lot closer to Force India and the Ferrari customers are basically matching Mercedes. Renault and Honda have perhaps caught Mercedes a bit, but the biggest jump has been made by Ferrari.
F1 2018 RACE SPEED TRAP AVERAGE (AUS-GER)
AVG GER GBR AUT FRA CAN MON ESP AUS-AZE
1. Force India-Mercedes 303,9 310,8 302,1 295,2 305,4 314,6 282,5 310,2 305,4
2. Mercedes 302,6 309,7 304,6 291,9 304,0 311,3 281,9 307,3 304,4
3. Ferrari 301,5 307,9 307,1 297,4 304,6 311,1 283,9 304,9 299,9
4. Sauber-Ferrari 301,1 306,8 302,2 294,7 304,5 310,7 283,6 308,6 300,2
5. Haas-Ferrari 300,7 306,1 306,7 295,3 303,1 309,6 282,9 301,7 300,6
6. Red Bull-Renault 299,2 303,9 301,0 287,5 310,1 307,2 276,8 303,6 300,4
7. Williams-Mercedes 298,7 308,6 292,7 289,8 299,2 306,3 280,4 306,9 300,6
8. Renault 297,3 305,4 296,5 288,8 300,8 310,2 282,3 299,9 296,6
9. Toro Rosso-Honda 295,5 305,8 294,0 290,6 299,2 311,5 275,1 303,1 292,9
10. McLaren-Renault 295,0 303,4 293,8 281,9 299,0 304,3 279,5 297,5 296,3
And here is the race speed trap average. There has to be a 2 second gap to the car in front for the speed on that lap to count. Compared to the one I posted after Azerbaijan, we can now see some changes. At the start of the season the race speed traps were dominated by Mercedes powered cars, followed by Ferrari, Renault and Honda powered cars. The order was actually surprisingly neat when remembering that Red Bull were a bit of an anomaly with their Bahrain performance. It has to be remembered that this is an average of the whole season so changes during the year don't have a big impact immediately. Still we can see that Ferrari powered cars are getting closer to the top and that Toro Rosso have also improved quite significantly.
F1 2018 RACE SPEED TRAP AVERAGE
AUS-ESP FRA-GER
Mercedes 304,9 302,6 -2,3
Force India-Mercedes 306,4 303,4 -3,0
Williams-Mercedes 301,8 297,6 -4,2
Ferrari 300,9 304,3 +3,4
Haas-Ferrari 300,8 302,8 +2,0
Sauber-Ferrari 301,8 302,1 +0,3
Renault 297,3 297,9 +0,6
Red Bull-Renault 301,0 300,6 -0,4
McLaren-Renault 296,5 294,5 -2,0
Toro Rosso-Honda 294,9 297,4 +2,5
Mercedes 304,4 301,2 -3,2
Ferrari 301,2 303,0 +1,8
Renault 298,3 297,7 -0,6
Honda 294,9 297,4 +2,5
Dividing the season just in like the qualifying statistics reveals the changes a little bit better. Ferrari powered cars have made significant progress where as the Mercedes powered cars seem to be the biggest losers. Renault have also made some progress but no to the extent that Honda apparently have. Although with small sample sizes the data isn't necessarily that reliable (and with lots of unknown variables like drag etc.) it is clear compared to last year that Honda have made progress. What are missing from their race speed trap data are the very slow segments of the race that they still had last year. Now their data is consistent and a very good match to the Renault powered cars. I don't think there is much of a gap between the two manufacturers in any situation, be it qualifying or race.
