The Official 2015 Monaco Grand Prix thread **SPOILERS**

[RichB]

thegreenhell said:

Scuffers said:

My thinking on this is more to do with the fact that verstappen didn't look like he was trying to make a pass and just got caught out...

So just maybe the 17yo rookie made a simple mistake...

It's typical of Pistonheads to over analyse everything to the n'th degree when, as you say, in simple terms the kid went for a gap that wasn't there. Next..

[VladD]

I suppose that's one of the downsides of F1 brakes being that effective. If someone in front hits the brakes and they're either earlier than you expect or you've got a little distracted, you've hit the car in front almost before you can react.

[Scuffers]

RichB said:

thegreenhell said:

Scuffers said:

My thinking on this is more to do with the fact that verstappen didn't look like he was trying to make a pass and just got caught out...

So just maybe the 17yo rookie made a simple mistake...

It's typical of Pistonheads to over analyse everything to the n'th degree when, as you say, in simple terms the kid went for a gap that wasn't there. Next..

did you actually watch the incident?

he was certainly not going for a gap, he got caught out.

now, yes, you can argue that he should have expected it and avoided him, but they are supposed to be racing you know....

[red_slr]

Lead car was defensive - you cant argue that.
Second car moved but did not recognise and was perhaps half a second late on the brakes by which time the closing speed was probably +50mph.
After that point brakes don't help.

Similar in Canada last year...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iPoZxUXN9E

[ajprice]

VladD said:

I suppose that's one of the downsides of F1 brakes being that effective. If someone in front hits the brakes and they're either earlier than you expect or you've got a little distracted, you've hit the car in front almost before you can react.

Bring back steel brake discs with drums on the back

[Scuffers]

red_slr said:

Lead car was defensive - you cant argue that.
Second car moved but did not recognise and was perhaps half a second late on the brakes by which time the closing speed was probably +50mph.
After that point brakes don't help.

Similar in Canada last year...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iPoZxUXN9E

nope, that was the lead cars fault for changing line (he got a penalty for it too)

this is more like it, webber caught out by early braking Caterham:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5_vubepSzs

Edited by Scuffers on Thursday 28th May 08:48

[Inertiatic]

It was just a racing incident. Don't see why the need for a fuss. Verstappen just got a bit too gung ho

[Scuffers]

Inertiatic said:

It was just a racing incident. Don't see why the need for a fuss. Verstappen just got a bit too gung ho

I agree, it's under the category st happens...

here's a question for you though.

If Grosjean did not brake early, how did he manage to still make the corner after being hit up the rear?

[IainT]

Scuffers said:

If Grosjean did not brake early, how did he manage to still make the corner after being hit up the rear?

He didn't. He had to use the escape space on the outside of the corner.

[Vaud]

Scuffers said:

If Grosjean did not brake early, how did he manage to still make the corner after being hit up the rear?

He didn't. He span and used the full exit slip road to turnaround and rejoin.

[ajprice]

Vaud said:

Scuffers said:

If Grosjean did not brake early, how did he manage to still make the corner after being hit up the rear?

He didn't. He span and used the full exit slip road to turnaround and rejoin.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGSkxQe-4rw

[RichB]

Scuffers said:

did you actually watch the incident?...

Why the aggression? Because it's Pistonheads it must be an argument? It seems every post in this section of the forum has to get a tetchy reply. I was kind of agreeing with you but you were obviously in "guns out mode" I'll leave this thread and wait for the next GP.

[Scuffers]

ajprice said:

Vaud said:

Scuffers said:

If Grosjean did not brake early, how did he manage to still make the corner after being hit up the rear?

He didn't. He span and used the full exit slip road to turnaround and rejoin.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGSkxQe-4rw

good point, missed that bit!

[Ahonen]

Scuffers said:

ajprice said:

I was going to ask where Benson got that info, but after a quick google, Lotus data was accepted by the FIA http://www.espn.co.uk/f1/story/_/id/12960325/lotus...

Alan Permane on Twitter said:

@AlanPermane
.@RGrosjean didn’t brake test @Max33Verstappen, he braked 5m later than previous lap. Data accepted by FIA so the penalty was for Max not RG

is it just me or does that sound like bullst?

as a race driver, to be 5M different in your braking point would imply something had changed, this is a later lap so one assumes the tyres were worse not better, so why would he leave it another 5M?

it's either that or Grosjean is not particularly accurate/consistent (seems unlikely for an F1 driver with his experience), or more likely, the data logging is not that positionally accurate (intentionally?)

/tin foil hat firmly on!

If you study the lap charts you'll see that over a few of the previous laps Grosjean was a little slow and had run a couple of 1:24s, partly due to blue flags for Rosberg and Vettel. He'd generally been running in the 1:21s on pretty old rubber (roughly 45 lap old Softs) and found a few tenths as Verstappen, on much newer Supersofts, closed in. Now one thing we know is that maintaining tyre temperature on worn tyres is especially tricky at tracks with low lateral demands and he would have lost some temp due to the blue flags, so we can assume that he was still regaining front temperature just before Verstappen hit him and that a 5m braking point change was quite reasonable.

So, as you can see, the tyres were likely better, not worse, than the previous lap. Degradation simply isn't an issue around Monaco and never really has been.

From memory the F1 GPS works at about 50hz, so is perfectly acceptable and comfortably accurate to well under half a metre on a lap by lap basis. GPS has been fine for lap by lap comparisons since we started using it in the mid 2000s, as the drift only comes into play over days or weeks. F1 data is a reasonable step beyond the sort of thing you may have used in club racing.

[Vaud]

Ahonen said:

Degradation simply isn't an issue around Monaco and never really has been.

Yes it has been, but not for a few years.

[Ahonen]

Vaud said:

Ahonen said:

Degradation simply isn't an issue around Monaco and never really has been.

Yes it has been, but not for a few years.

Fair enough, but it's only in the last few years that I've paid any attention to degradation in F1.

[shirt]

Ahonen said:

Scuffers said:

ajprice said:

I was going to ask where Benson got that info, but after a quick google, Lotus data was accepted by the FIA http://www.espn.co.uk/f1/story/_/id/12960325/lotus...

Alan Permane on Twitter said:

@AlanPermane
.@RGrosjean didn’t brake test @Max33Verstappen, he braked 5m later than previous lap. Data accepted by FIA so the penalty was for Max not RG

is it just me or does that sound like bullst?

as a race driver, to be 5M different in your braking point would imply something had changed, this is a later lap so one assumes the tyres were worse not better, so why would he leave it another 5M?

it's either that or Grosjean is not particularly accurate/consistent (seems unlikely for an F1 driver with his experience), or more likely, the data logging is not that positionally accurate (intentionally?)

/tin foil hat firmly on!

If you study the lap charts you'll see that over a few of the previous laps Grosjean was a little slow and had run a couple of 1:24s, partly due to blue flags for Rosberg and Vettel. He'd generally been running in the 1:21s on pretty old rubber (roughly 45 lap old Softs) and found a few tenths as Verstappen, on much newer Supersofts, closed in. Now one thing we know is that maintaining tyre temperature on worn tyres is especially tricky at tracks with low lateral demands and he would have lost some temp due to the blue flags, so we can assume that he was still regaining front temperature just before Verstappen hit him and that a 5m braking point change was quite reasonable.

So, as you can see, the tyres were likely better, not worse, than the previous lap. Degradation simply isn't an issue around Monaco and never really has been.

From memory the F1 GPS works at about 50hz, so is perfectly acceptable and comfortably accurate to well under half a metre on a lap by lap basis. GPS has been fine for lap by lap comparisons since we started using it in the mid 2000s, as the drift only comes into play over days or weeks. F1 data is a reasonable step beyond the sort of thing you may have used in club racing.

yet earlier in the thread we're discussing how inaccurate the positional data is around monaco, resulting in the mclaren confusion. or am i missing something?

[BigBen]

shirt said:

yet earlier in the thread we're discussing how inaccurate the positional data is around monaco, resulting in the mclaren confusion. or am i missing something?

The data is not inaccurate as such but the frequency / reliability of updates is not as good as elsewhere due to the performance of the telemetry systems.

[ewenm]

BigBen said:

The data is not inaccurate as such but the frequency / reliability of updates is not as good as elsewhere due to the performance of the telemetry systems.

There are a few places on the track where the data could be inaccurate - the tunnel and the marina section where the lower track and the upper track are side by side - GPS locators can easily get momentary blips in data there. Then there's the issue of getting the data back to the pits as you say.

[BigBen]

ewenm said:

BigBen said:

The data is not inaccurate as such but the frequency / reliability of updates is not as good as elsewhere due to the performance of the telemetry systems.

There are a few places on the track where the data could be inaccurate - the tunnel and the marina section where the lower track and the upper track are side by side - GPS locators can easily get momentary blips in data there. Then there's the issue of getting the data back to the pits as you say.

Presumably the data on the car is backed up by dead reckoning as well as just GPS, otherwise you are quite correct it would be useless in the tunnel!