A great F1 passing study (must read!)

[kilcoo316]

Ach. Load of irrelevant rubbish.


Its quite simple. Aerodynamics is king. The tolerances to which aerodynamic packages have been working has decreased to wafer thin margins when compared to the 80s.

Therefore, you follow another car, you lose more downforce.


Year on year, the aero packs become yet more sophisticated, and thus sensitive to the car ahead.



The FIA had their chance to ban the DDD this year, and failed miserably. If the diffuser was banned altogether, I'd stack money on that we would see a marked improvement in overtaking.

[Brogan]

Didn't Brawn prove during the court case that the double diffuser resulted in less turbulent air, not more?

[Miguel]

The FIA had their chance to ban the DDD this year, and failed miserably. If the diffuser was banned altogether, I'd stack money on that we would see a marked improvement in overtaking.

It's not that simple. I'd actually say it would work the opposite way. Take in mind that the diffuser is not as sensitive as a front wing to the wake caused by a preceeding car. Completely banning the diffuser would produce cars whose downforce depended mostly on the wings. I don't think that would produce more overtaking.

I am an armchair aerodynamist, and from this position I postulate that... I mean, I believe that the issue with the DDDs is the increased coupling between the diffuser and the rear wing. That is, I fear we're mostly back to 2008.

[Richard]

There's a reason why they say statistics are some of the biggest lies in the world [...].


I mean, read this:

"During a period of pretty much unchecked technical development from 1989 to 1993 there was a decrease of 9 in the average number of overtakes over the whole period.
During a period of constant FIA rule changes from 2004 to 2008 there was an overall reduction of 1 overtake per race."

[...] By using two different units of measurement for the two different periods, it's clear that this study is trying to get a point accross, instead of reporting unbiased information.

As far as I can see those two sentances use the same unit of measurement. The average number of passes per race.

No lies, no bias, just a reatively simple stastic. Please don't turn degrade this into a Max/FIA debate.

[Brogan]

As far as I can see those two sentances use the same unit of measurement. The average number of passes per race.

No lies, no bias, just a reatively simple stastic. Please don't turn degrade this into a Max/FIA debate.

Thanks.

You are of course correct, it is the same unit of measurement.

As for any perceived bias, it is simply a set of data with correlating information from which people can draw their own conclusions.

[Pup]

Indeed, you'd think that on a technical forum, people would be less inclined to read their biases into the data, yet we've got three pages now of just that.

But I commend your effort to put this data together - it's the first time I've seen it all in one place and it must have taken a tremendous amount of time to compile.

When you guys are fine tuning your database, I do think it would be useful to somehow group the passing data by position, or to split out the top five or so. I suspect that the majority of the passes in those early years were occurring in the bottom end of the grid, and if so, we could guess that those passes had more to do with the quality of those teams as opposed to any regulation changes.

An interesting correlation that I think you'll find is between passes and the number of cars on the grid - even after you've equalized the data for number of cars. I suspect that the stability in the grid since the mid 90's has had some influence on the stability of number of passes over the same period. I do think that the expertise of the current teams, not just in reliability, has a lot to do with that. F1 wasn't exactly a science in those days.

[Richard]

I do think that the expertise of the current teams, not just in reliability, has a lot to do with that. F1 wasn't exactly a science in those days.

Exactly. What the data seems to show is consolidation as the sport has become more professional, and less reliant on characters akin to lord flash heart or Heath Robinson.

[kilcoo316]

It's not that simple. I'd actually say it would work the opposite way. Take in mind that the diffuser is not as sensitive as a front wing to the wake caused by a preceeding car.

But the diffuser destroys the front wing efficiency of the following car.

Ban it - and in one go, you'll fix alot of the problems.

Completely banning the diffuser would produce cars whose downforce depended mostly on the wings. I don't think that would produce more overtaking.

I know it would.

I am an armchair aerodynamist, and from this position I postulate that... I mean, I believe that the issue with the DDDs is the increased coupling between the diffuser and the rear wing. That is, I fear we're mostly back to 2008.

The main issue with the DDDs is the more aggressive effective ramp angle they have. Greatly increasing the upwash behind the car. Oh, and of course, having more rear downforce means you need more front downforce to balance the car = more aggressive and hence more sensitive front wing.

Compare an F1 diffuser to a GP2 "diffuser" (which is really an entire ground effect floor) to see what I mean about ramp angle. People have a common misconception between a diffuser and proper ground effect aerodynamics. They are not one and the same.


If it were only the rear wing producing downforce, this upwash would originate far above the level of the following front wing, and due to the smaller wake (no diffuser), it will more quickly be 'filled' by ambient air entrained from the sides and below the wake.

(As well as the front wing being ran at a shallower angle to achieve optimal aero-centre position).

[mike]

allow mechanic grip-enhancing devices, e-diff AWD etc and ban all aero-downforce producing components and THATS IT!

100% mechanical grip
0% aero-grip
100% relevance to road cars

[Ciro Pabón]

...

But I commend your effort to put this data together - it's the first time I've seen it all in one place and it must have taken a tremendous amount of time to compile.

Hi, Pup! Long time no see...

The data was posted here two years ago at least and then posted in gp-lounge, grandprix and clip the apex in the form of an Excel sheet. I know because I did it.

It's the work of Brian Lawrence, who has been compiling it for the last 15 years. He has been posting the info after every race at Usenet (now Google Groups), sports/f1/moderated.

It took me one day to put all of Brian's data in a worksheet and then another day to complement it with older (and frankly, not comparable) data.

[Brogan]

Yes, as Ciro states, I can't take any credit for the data.
All I did was put it into tables and charts and create some basic averaging formulae.

Hopefully that is clear from the first post.

I am indebted to the following members for their work in compiling the raw data: Michele Merlino, Brian W. Lawrence and GordonMurray.

The overtaking figures for each race do not include:

* Position changes on the first lap of the race
* Position changes due to drivers lapping backmarkers
* Positions gained in the pits
* Positions gained when a car has a serious technical problem; e.g. puncture, accident damage, etc.

This method was originally conceived by Brian W. Lawrence.

[Oridori]

I'm reading this forum with great interested for a while now and I know that I'm not at the technical level of understanding F1 as most of you seem to be. But especially when reading threads about the difficulty to overtake in modern Formula 1, I can't help myself but think that there should be much more focus on track layouts too.

I can't prove this with any statistics or professional background, but I have the impression that a lot of the classic tracks like Spa, Suzuka, Monza, Silverstone, Montreal, aso. provide a lot more action and overtaking on track than most of those recent, modern racetracks. I could be biased since I really like those tracks with some sort of character, but wouldn't this have to be considered way more? Do these tracks require a different driving skill or whatever? Sorry if this sounds a little "noobish".

[meves]

Just to follow on, I've had a look at brian lawrence's post and they are excellent but frankly I don't have time to analyse them all. In analysing the data did you notice which circuits had the highest overtaking rate and if the rate had been affected by layout changes?

I'm guessing thing like the new hockenheim will be pretty good and barcelona frankly awful but do you have anything a little more unbiased than that?

[madtown77]

I can't prove this with any statistics or professional background, but I have the impression that a lot of the classic tracks like Spa, Suzuka, Monza, Silverstone, Montreal, aso. provide a lot more action and overtaking on track than most of those recent, modern racetracks.

I definately agree. Look at Valencia, where can you pass? Its like Monaco without the history, just an extened parade lap.

[Ciro Pabón]

Oridori, madtown77, welcome. We've posted this for the last three years, I believe. There are several threads where some graphs like this have been posted in the same spirit of your posts, thinking that tracks are important and that has been a change in the number of overtakings, over the years.



I thought meves has already seen it, as much of the forum. I apologize for the repetition. As soon as I have more time, I'll update it with 2009 figures and perhaps will split Valencia apart from the rest of the European GP venues.