2019 Australian Grand Prix - Melbourne, March 15-17

[djones]

Cant explain why Ferrari can turn up with a monster of a car for the season start and then fail almost every upgrade in season. Its mind boggling.
If they can sort this out this year they will wrap up both crowns. I remember last year in COTA where they reverted back to their older configuration they were on par with Merc, the latter already had a ton of upgrades. That alone showed what a strong car they had yet failed to improve it.

Was this amplified out of proportion last season though with the introduction of the second sensor on the battery pack(s)?

If for example they lost 0.5 seconds a lap because of it, then the updates to the car may have actually been working... just never enough to cancel out the loss from the new restrictions forced on them.

[GPR-A]

Cant explain why Ferrari can turn up with a monster of a car for the season start and then fail almost every upgrade in season. Its mind boggling.
If they can sort this out this year they will wrap up both crowns. I remember last year in COTA where they reverted back to their older configuration they were on par with Merc, the latter already had a ton of upgrades. That alone showed what a strong car they had yet failed to improve it.

Was this amplified out of proportion last season though with the introduction of the second sensor on the battery pack(s)?

If for example they lost 0.5 seconds a lap because of it, then the updates to the car may have actually been working... just never enough to cancel out the loss from the new restrictions forced on them.

Link -> Vettel: Ferrari removed four months of upgrades from car

Sebastian Vettel says Ferrari were more competitive in the United States Grand Prix because they undid up to four months of development work on their SF71H.

Vettel admitted he had mixed feeling about the weekend, saying the team “took too long” to regain its lost form.
“You can see it as good news but you can also see it’s bad news,” he said. “If we have to go back to a car that’s been competitive three or four months ago then surely it can’t be good news if you think about it.”

Ferrari took a long time to realise the updates they brought to the car weren’t improving it, said Vettel.

“It’s a bit hard to explain. If you don’t see that there’s a problem you don’t think that there’s a problem.

“Certainly we felt that the car was not as strong as it was before but if you don’t see that there’s anything wrong then you don’t know that there’s something wrong.

“I think all the steps that we did they seemed to make sense but obviously now looking back they didn’t. Clearly there was something we missed and we haven’t understood yet why and where the error exactly took off, or started.

[Juzh]

...
Helmut Marko: “[It was only possible] because in every phase every employee was convinced: Now we are back on track. Now we have another chance to drive for victories on our own."
...

I read that as in the car can drive to victories on its own merit. Not based on other's mishap or misfortune.

Didn`t it do that in the final several races of last year [plus a few inbetween]...I here what you`re saying though

you're reading too much into it.

Last year when RB won in mexico horner was full of praise for renault even though he had no legit reason to be. It wasn't due to renault suddenly being good or better in any aspect compared to renault/mercedes that red bull was able to win those races, it's just that simply by nature of the track the renault was less bad than it usually is because of high altitude bringing the engines closer together.

[iotar__]

...
Helmut Marko: “[It was only possible] because in every phase every employee was convinced: Now we are back on track. Now we have another chance to drive for victories on our own."
...

- If it happens it happens but it feels as if they bang their own drum little bit too much. They didn't need that in 2010-... era.
- Remember that RB's hype is not refundable.
- Victories =/ championship, top car over the whole season.

Meanwhile in 2018, same place same stage of the season :
"Mercedes are toying with the competition" H. Marko

[Partymood]

Cant explain why Ferrari can turn up with a monster of a car for the season start and then fail almost every upgrade in season. Its mind boggling.
If they can sort this out this year they will wrap up both crowns. I remember last year in COTA where they reverted back to their older configuration they were on par with Merc, the latter already had a ton of upgrades. That alone showed what a strong car they had yet failed to improve it.

Last year's car was no monster, in fact far from perfect if one has to believe the words of Alberto Antonini (ex press officer at Ferrari) and Mattia Binotto. I start to think that Vettel deserves more credit then people give him, me included, for what Ferrari did last year.

[Chuckjr]

that's why they haven't beaten Mercedes in the past 2 years when they've had the car to do so.

Biggest lie from last two seasons to try and add some sort of legitimacy to the 2017 and 2018 championships -- which it didn't. Merc have had the fastest most reliable system from 2014. Maybe this year they won't, but we don't know that yet.

Ferrari may have had the fastest car (MAYBE) the first few races of 2018, but their upgrades failed by a few races in, and they were CLEARLY second fastests the rest of the year. Just like all through 2017.

Just my opinions. Feel free to flush.

[Phil]

Biggest lie from last two seasons to try and add some sort of legitimacy to the 2017 and 2018 championships -- which it didn't. Merc have had the fastest most reliable system from 2014. Maybe this year they won't, but we don't know that yet.

Ferrari may have had the fastest car (MAYBE) the first few races of 2018, but their upgrades failed by a few races in, and they were CLEARLY second fastests the rest of the year. Just like all through 2017.

You must be kidding. Perhaps I would suggest to differentiate between fastest package and team/driver performance. I'll give you that 2017 perhaps worked in Mercedes favor because they had a definite edge in qualifying (Q3 to be precise) and that naturally carries over to an advantage for the race, but at the same time they struggled massively with finding the right set-up for the race in regards to optimizing the tire performance. And then of course, reliability and that driver error in the Asia races cost them dearly in regards to the championship.

2018, no chance in hell. They had the edge in qualifying in numerous cases in which they not only qualified ahead with one car, but both cars. Yes, they massively paid with the update at Singapore, but you can not excuse some of the team-mistakes they made in light of the advantage they had. They beat Mercedes on numerous instances throughout the year not because they were lucky but because they had defacto the best package. Just look at Spa and Monza. Mercedes/Hamilton really maximized their points though which nets them an extremely impressive rating for team-performance but car-performance wise, Ferrari had the reliability and they had the edge throughout 2018, sans a few races (Barcelona, France, Abu Dhabi etc).

[Zynerji]

Currently watching the 1986 AusGP.

The safety of those cars seems awful. And leaving Nannini's car crashed on the apex for the entire race is crazy.

Sometimes i don't think we appreciate some of the safety advances enough...

[Sieper]

Jules his dead was entirely preventable. And now we mostly do prevent these situations from even being a possibility but in Baku there was a flat bed truck driving in between the (cruising) F1 cars, admittedly, it wasn't raining but still. Other then that I do fully agree, we have come a long way, both in procedures as well as passive safety systems around the drivers. Event he HALO I have now come to accept and be happy with.

[santos]

Currently watching the 1986 AusGP.

The safety of those cars seems awful. And leaving Nannini's car crashed on the apex for the entire race is crazy.

Sometimes i don't think we appreciate some of the safety advances enough...

In 50 years, people watching youtube vídeos from 2018 races, will be saying "damn… those guys were crazy. driving cars with open cockpit at 320km/h." Maybe in 1986 that procedure looked totally safe. But a lot of progress was made in the last 20 years.

[Chuckjr]

Biggest lie from last two seasons to try and add some sort of legitimacy to the 2017 and 2018 championships -- which it didn't. Merc have had the fastest most reliable system from 2014. Maybe this year they won't, but we don't know that yet.

Ferrari may have had the fastest car (MAYBE) the first few races of 2018, but their upgrades failed by a few races in, and they were CLEARLY second fastests the rest of the year. Just like all through 2017.

You must be kidding. Perhaps I would suggest to differentiate between fastest package and team/driver performance. I'll give you that 2017 perhaps worked in Mercedes favor because they had a definite edge in qualifying (Q3 to be precise) and that naturally carries over to an advantage for the race, but at the same time they struggled massively with finding the right set-up for the race in regards to optimizing the tire performance. And then of course, reliability and that driver error in the Asia races cost them dearly in regards to the championship.

2018, no chance in hell. They had the edge in qualifying in numerous cases in which they not only qualified ahead with one car, but both cars. Yes, they massively paid with the update at Singapore, but you can not excuse some of the team-mistakes they made in light of the advantage they had. They beat Mercedes on numerous instances throughout the year not because they were lucky but because they had defacto the best package. Just look at Spa and Monza. Mercedes/Hamilton really maximized their points though which nets them an extremely impressive rating for team-performance but car-performance wise, Ferrari had the reliability and they had the edge throughout 2018, sans a few races (Barcelona, France, Abu Dhabi etc).

Hi Phil!

Maybe 2018 you have somewhat of a point, but I'm not convinced they had much of a faster car after a few races. We really have not had much of a championship for years now. This is off topic so no need to keep going with it. I just hope we have a competitive championship between 3 teams this year!

Cheers-

[matt_b]

Biggest lie from last two seasons to try and add some sort of legitimacy to the 2017 and 2018 championships -- which it didn't. Merc have had the fastest most reliable system from 2014. Maybe this year they won't, but we don't know that yet.

Ferrari may have had the fastest car (MAYBE) the first few races of 2018, but their upgrades failed by a few races in, and they were CLEARLY second fastests the rest of the year. Just like all through 2017.

You must be kidding. Perhaps I would suggest to differentiate between fastest package and team/driver performance. I'll give you that 2017 perhaps worked in Mercedes favor because they had a definite edge in qualifying (Q3 to be precise) and that naturally carries over to an advantage for the race, but at the same time they struggled massively with finding the right set-up for the race in regards to optimizing the tire performance. And then of course, reliability and that driver error in the Asia races cost them dearly in regards to the championship.

2018, no chance in hell. They had the edge in qualifying in numerous cases in which they not only qualified ahead with one car, but both cars. Yes, they massively paid with the update at Singapore, but you can not excuse some of the team-mistakes they made in light of the advantage they had. They beat Mercedes on numerous instances throughout the year not because they were lucky but because they had defacto the best package. Just look at Spa and Monza. Mercedes/Hamilton really maximized their points though which nets them an extremely impressive rating for team-performance but car-performance wise, Ferrari had the reliability and they had the edge throughout 2018, sans a few races (Barcelona, France, Abu Dhabi etc).

Great analysis that is exactly how I saw those seasons too

[dialtone]

Hamilton was on pole 11 times last season and Vettel 5, how is this Ferrari dominating a season with a better performance and not maximizing the value? Ferrari was a bit stronger early in the season (although more in qualifying than in the race) but, even without Vettel's mistakes, the season would have gone to Mercedes or down to the last point as analysed here: https://f1metrics.wordpress.com/2018/12 ... on-report/ .

[hollus]

OK, guys, you had your fun. But a token intention of making on-topic posts would be very much appreciated. A least by anyone coming here to read about the race next weekend.
Below this line, wild and/or long wandering off-topics might be zapped without warning and vanish without a trace.

[yelistener]

Last year's pole with a new "halo speedo" (still out of sync)

Lewis was a bit conservertive through turn 13 & 14. Probably because he knew he was already quite a few tenths up and the tyres were a bit "gone".