2012 Hungarian GP - Hungaroring

[Jef Patat]

Redbulls were de-facto the fastest cars in race. Only wrong grid positions and starts hampered their score.
Lotus were almost there, and McLaren only benefited by awesome pole by HAM and clever and fast pits.

I guess we were watching a different race

[beelsebob]

Redbulls were de-facto the fastest cars in race. Only wrong grid positions and starts hampered their score.
Lotus were almost there, and McLaren only benefited by awesome pole by HAM and clever and fast pits.

Uhhh, wut? The only pace we saw the RBRs have was Vettel when he had a very short final stint of a 3 stopper, even then he wasn't that quick.

[myurr]

It is. And don't forget that the air behind an F1 car is hot from 18,000rpm from a 2.4L V8 engine. Some of that energy inevitably comes in contact with the following car's tyres - and the energy has nowhere to go, other than to start to thermally degrade the tyres.

If a corner is slow enough that aero grip isn't a problem- you can be right with them at the apex, and the other car being PHYSICALLY there is the hindrance - your front wing and his rear wing can't exist in the same space, for instance. As such - going on the power, you'll always be at LEAST a car length late. This problem isn't there in quicker corners, but then you lose downforce, and a bit more so at the front. At a circuit where you require a strong front to flick the car from apex to apex like Hungaroring - it's worth quite a bit.

On top of this Hamilton had also been deliberately lapping a more slowly than he needed to, both to keep life in the tyres and to help condition them. Raikkonen would have caught him regardless so Hamilton used that to his advantage to save some life in the tyres.

The second Raikkonen closed up on him he suddenly upped his pace by 0.5 - 1 second a lap and was the fastest car on the circuit other than Raikkonen and the three stoppers. If you look at the fastest lap charts Hamilton's fastest lap is actually quicker than Raikkonen's!

Couple all this with Hamilton's quote that he was deliberately slower through sectors 1 and 2 where Raikkonen didn't have an overtaking opportunity, both to save his tyres but also let Raikkonen get in the dirty air and take life out of his tyres, and then put his foot down in sector 3 to make sure Raikkonen wasn't close enough to get a good run at him through the DRS zone.

All in all I think it was a very calculated defence by Hamilton where he had the slightly faster Lotus covered.

[dxpetrov]

Redbulls were de-facto the fastest cars in race. Only wrong grid positions and starts hampered their score.
Lotus were almost there, and McLaren only benefited by awesome pole by HAM and clever and fast pits.

Uhhh, wut? The only pace we saw the RBRs have was Vettel when he had a very short final stint of a 3 stopper, even then he wasn't that quick.

SV was stuck behind slower cars throughout the race. Firstly behind JB and then behind GRO in second stint and that's why Kimi was able to jump on him. Last stint when he was on softs was lightning fast, he was able to close within a second to GRO from 18 sec in less than 10 laps.
More to confirm you can find in Benson's blog on BBC.com

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/19042065

[beelsebob]

Redbulls were de-facto the fastest cars in race. Only wrong grid positions and starts hampered their score.
Lotus were almost there, and McLaren only benefited by awesome pole by HAM and clever and fast pits.

Uhhh, wut? The only pace we saw the RBRs have was Vettel when he had a very short final stint of a 3 stopper, even then he wasn't that quick.

SV was stuck behind slower cars throughout the race. Firstly behind JB and then behind GRO in second stint and that's why Kimi was able to jump on him. Last stint when he was on softs was lightning fast, he was able to close within a second to GRO from 18 sec in less than 10 laps.
More to confirm you can find in Benson's blog on BBC.com

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/19042065

Yes, the point being that he swapped to a 3 stopper because he was not sufficiently fast to get past JB... The switch to a 3 stopper meant that his final two stints were shorter than they should have been, meaning he could take more life out of the tyres per lap, meaning that he could do some bloody fast laps. Note that Vettel stopped only 1 lap before Hamilton, but was setting roughly equal lap times through the pair's 3rd stints. Only when it came to his 4th stint (on brand new tyres) did he start setting very fast times compared to the leaders.

To put that in perspective, the gap between soft and medium was thought to be 0.8 seconds, vettel was setting 1.5 second a lap faster times, that means he was only 0.7 seconds a lap faster on the same compound, but 15 laps fresher. I would have expected a significantly bigger differential than that if the RBR was the fastest car – more like 2.5-3 seconds a lap faster than the leaders.

[dxpetrov]

He only switched to 3 stopper since he couldn't get past GRO, which has nothing to do with his speed but configuration of the track.Lap times differences you are suggesting are very arguable and may only exist in virtual (ideal) world,but not in a race with so many different factors to influence.

[otbsti]

Redbulls were de-facto the fastest cars in race. Only wrong grid positions and starts hampered their score.
Lotus were almost there, and McLaren only benefited by awesome pole by HAM and clever and fast pits.

Uhhh, wut? The only pace we saw the RBRs have was Vettel when he had a very short final stint of a 3 stopper, even then he wasn't that quick.

SV was stuck behind slower cars throughout the race. Firstly behind JB and then behind GRO in second stint and that's why Kimi was able to jump on him. Last stint when he was on softs was lightning fast, he was able to close within a second to GRO from 18 sec in less than 10 laps.
More to confirm you can find in Benson's blog on BBC.com

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/19042065

Setting all sarcasm aside, wouldn't it be obvious that a car on newer soft tires, in clean air, and with the lower fuel load (due to it being the end of the race) would show as the quickest car on the track? Those times are indicative of nothing more than being on newer tires with a light fuel load. Vettel couldn't get past Button on equal tires because for once in the last 2 years, the RB is behind on pace. More than four-tenths off in qualifying should be evidence of that...

[myurr]

He only switched to 3 stopper since he couldn't get past GRO, which has nothing to do with his speed but configuration of the track.Lap times differences you are suggesting are very arguable and may only exist in virtual (ideal) world,but not in a race with so many different factors to influence.

That's the whole point, you can't read too much into the ultimate lap times. GRO would have been pacing himself making sure the tyres made it to the end, it didn't matter one jot to him if Vettel finished 10 seconds or 1 second behind him, and he wasn't going to be challenging Raikkonen ahead of him who was quicker and had fresher tyres.

To put Vettel's fastest lap time into perspective he set it two laps from the end, so his fuel level was low, and he was 3.2 seconds off Hamilton's pole time. That's a huge amount still. Given the age of his tyres, the fact that he was only 1.4 seconds faster than Hamilton's best lap (which was also set when he had 3 laps more fuel on board) despite having tyres that were 18 laps fresher should demonstrate that his pace wasn't that special.

[beelsebob]

He only switched to 3 stopper since he couldn't get past GRO, which has nothing to do with his speed but configuration of the track.Lap times differences you are suggesting are very arguable and may only exist in virtual (ideal) world,but not in a race with so many different factors to influence.

That's the whole point, you can't read too much into the ultimate lap times. GRO would have been pacing himself making sure the tyres made it to the end, it didn't matter one jot to him if Vettel finished 10 seconds or 1 second behind him, and he wasn't going to be challenging Raikkonen ahead of him who was quicker and had fresher tyres.

To put Vettel's fastest lap time into perspective he set it two laps from the end, so his fuel level was low, and he was 3.2 seconds off Hamilton's pole time. That's a huge amount still. Given the age of his tyres, the fact that he was only 1.4 seconds faster than Hamilton's best lap (which was also set when he had 3 laps more fuel on board) despite having tyres that were 18 laps fresher should demonstrate that his pace wasn't that special.

18 laps fresher, and 0.8 seconds faster purely because of compound.

[Pierce89]

@dxpetrov: Not to pile on, but, on this forum, If you want to claim a car that finished 4th and 7th is fastest, you need real solid info. Plenty of people have already filled you in with the real info, so no need for me to. I'm just saying to be prepared with lots of good info when you want to make a claim like that.

BTW, the RB8 wasn't the fastest car in Hungary.

[dxpetrov]

And what is the evidence that he was not apart from finishing 4th? I didn't say he was fastest for the whole weekend but in the race. Once in clear air, he was the fastest guy out there. Others can confirm (read that blog). And I wasn't referring to his last stint when he was clearly fastest due to the tires. JB was dead slow and only track characteristics saved his butt, as well as Hamilton's against Raikonnen. I don't need to anything else than you do - just claiming what I saw on TV and on live timing, which is also confirmed by A.Benson. And being fastest means only tenth or two these days, which doesn't really help to regain track positions. Same was the case in Germany.

[beelsebob]

And what is the evidence that he was not apart from finishing 4th? I didn't say he was fastest for the whole weekend but in the race. Once in clear air, he was the fastest guy out there.

Yes he was, and as stated above, there were reasons beyond "his car was faster" for this – 1) He was on fresher tyres (which accounts for about 0.05 seconds per lap fresher) – i.e. there's 0.9 seconds a lap in there 2) He was on softer tyres (which accounts for about 0.8 seconds per lap) 3) he set his fastest lap 3 laps later than LH's fastest lap, so had 3 laps fewer fuel in there, accounting for 0.15 seconds of difference roughly. 4) LH was deliberately setting slow first and second sectors to get KR bunched up behind him and ruin his tyres. With 1-3 taken into account his lap was actually 0.45 seconds "off the pace" of LH's quickest lap, with 4 taken into account a chunk more.

JB was dead slow and only track characteristics saved his butt, as well as Hamilton's against Raikonnen.

What makes you say that? Yes JB was slower than SV at that stage of the race, that doesn't mean SV's car was the fastest out there. LH wasn't saved by the track, he was saved by good tyre management.

I don't need to anything else than you do - just claiming what I saw on TV and on live timing, which is also confirmed by A.Benson. And being fastest means only tenth or two these days, which doesn't really help to regain track positions. Same was the case in Germany.

This is nothing more than an argument to authority (a logical fallacy). The fact that A. Benson says it does not magically make it true. The stats suggest it's false.

[Shrieker]

The reason why the original start was aborted:

Video reveals schumachers startline blunder

From F1 fanatic

[myurr]

I don't need to anything else than you do - just claiming what I saw on TV and on live timing, which is also confirmed by A.Benson. And being fastest means only tenth or two these days, which doesn't really help to regain track positions. Same was the case in Germany.

This is nothing more than an argument to authority (a logical fallacy). The fact that A. Benson says it does not magically make it true. The stats suggest it's false.

Further to that Benson doesn't actually say anything to justify it, he just makes a throw away comment. On paper the Red Bull looked very quick, but if you watched the race and the live timing and really looked into the underlying reasons and subtleties in the performances of the cars then it's clear that Vettel was fairly quick but wasn't that amazingly quick.

His lap times were broadly in line with what you would expect for a top car on much fresher tyres than the rest with plenty of clear air and having to try and catch the car in front.

[GrizzleBoy]

The reason why the original start was aborted:

Video reveals schumachers startline blunder

From F1 fanatic

LoL O_o