So, F1, it's advanced during the years has it?

[racefan_uk]

Was checking a few things out for work earlier and stumbled across a PDF document on the Paul Ricard website that had one interesting point on it.

The last time the F1 World Championship raced on the full 5.8km layout, was in 1985. The race was won by Keke Rosberg in a Williams Honda. So, Slick tyres, manual gearbox, no traction control etc etc. His fastest lap was 1m 32.462s

The last time an F1 car tested on that layout of the circuit (5.8km) was in May 2003. Juan Pablo Montoya took the fully gizmo'd Williams BMW round the same circuit in 1m 32.307s.

So, two decades of development, progress, not to mention an amount of cash spent that's support several third world countries all for the sake of one tenth of a second..!

Money well spent?

[marki]

And all the spectacle has gone , the sight and sound of the Williams Honda at full chat was really something

[jacobyte]

racefan_uk said:

Was checking a few things out for work earlier and stumbled across a PDF document on the Paul Ricard website that had one interesting point on it. The last time the F1 World Championship raced on the full 5.8km layout, was in 1985. The race was won by Keke Rosberg in a Williams Honda. So, Slick tyres, manual gearbox, no traction control etc etc. His fastest lap was 1m 32.462s The last time an F1 car tested on that layout of the circuit (5.8km) was in May 2003. Juan Pablo Montoya took the fully gizmo'd Williams BMW round the same circuit in 1m 32.307s. So, two decades of development, progress, not to mention an amount of cash spent that's support several third world countries all for the sake of one tenth of a second..! Money well spent?

In relation to the FIA's crusade to keep speeds down, it has been pretty much a perfect success.

But we don't want that. We want to see the fastest racing cars get even faster every year and see drivers making a huge effort to get the most out of their cars as they race alongside one another.

[LongQ]

Whoa there.

Rosberg's fastest RACE lap? So practice would have been some few second faster then?

On the other hand a rarely used track just won't be as fast without the F1 rubber ingrained I suppose.

[kevin ritson]

If it definitely the same layout? Teams have been known to put temporary chicanes in at Paul Ricard to simulate other circuits.

[caduceus]

racefan_uk said:

SO, F1, IT'S ADVANCED DURING THE YEARS HAS IT?

Err, that would be a NO. Its nothing more than automotive dishwater now.
I do hope someone does something radical to bring it back to the spectacle it used to be though.
Untill then, I'll mostly be watching WRC and touring BTCC.

[williamp]

I always remember practice for silverstone one year (84?) when Rosberg lapped the old Silverstone at an average of 160mph. No comparison can be made- track is almost totally different BUT slick tyres and a Turbo were very spectacular. And it was advanced for its time, but the fia dont want cars too fast, so the advancements have been in safety.

[Eric Mc]

That was in 1985 - the last time the old "straight" version of Silverstone was used for a GP.

[nightdriver]

So F1 hasen't advanced at all, what a complete load of rubbish.


Firstly heres a list the deaths in F1 between 1975-1985

August 19, 1975 Mark Donahue (United States) - Austrian GP qualifying
May 5, 1977 Tom Pryce (Britain) - South African GP
September 10, 1978 Ronnie Peterson (Sweden) - Italian GP
May 8, 1982 Gilles Villeneuve (Canada) - Belgian GP qualifying
June 13, 1982 Ricardo Paletti (Italy) - Canadian GP

Now the deaths between 1995-2005

0

So thats obviously not at all an advancement is it.....

Now comparing two races at Spa, from 1986 and 2005.

In 1986 the lap was 6968m and the fastest lap was 1m 59.282s set by Alain Prost (in the race)

In 2005 the lap was slightly longer (6976m) due to Raidillon being slightly longer when the run of areas were changed. The fastest race lap was set by Ralf Schumacher at 1m 51.453s

So a advancement of 8 seconds over 9 years.

If you honestly beleive F1 has not got quicker then you really need to look at the technology in the sport. Without doubt F1 still uses the top technology available, and is the pinnacle of motorsport technology.

I dont know where you got your numbers from but to be honest I doubt they are correct. Paul Ricard was completely re layed when when Bernie bought it in 1999 and hardly any of the track stayed the same. In testing the cars usually run different circuits from day to day and sometimes even different from morning to afternoon. So the chances of them running the old circuit layout are extremely slim.

>> Edited by nightdriver on Friday 27th January 14:10

[Eric Mc]

It is always very difficult to make direct comparisons bewteen motor racing in different eras.

Apart from the technology changes which definitely exist, track changes make comparisons difficult. One aspect of Spa, for instance, which might make it FASTER today without the CARS being necessarilly faster is the increased amout of run off, improved barriers and tyre walls etc which will all allow a driver to take certain corners much faster than they would have been willing to in previous years.

[27tim]

[quote]
increased amount of run off, improved barriers and tyre walls etc which will all allow a driver to take certain corners much faster than they would have been willing to in previous years.[/quote]

You just wouldn't have ever got to F1 if you had that mindset, ask any driver that is any good and they never take a corner slower in a race because run off is limited. If they say 'yes' I'll show you someone that gets overtaken, a lot. Its just not a consideration, maybe in testing, never in racing. Move the barriers back at Monaco 100m and lap times wouldn't come down 1/10th. Look at racing on an Oval where they race 6' from concrete, if there was scope for anyone to go 'much' faster because they had a greater disregard for their own safety someone would romp off with the win as they drove without that margin. These championships are *SO* competitive there is just not any room for that mentality and everyone takes every advantage they can.

Take another even more extreme example where the risks are way higher. My friend raced at the TT, I know for 100% fact that he rode around there just as hard as he did say Silverstone and risked everything 10/10ths the whole lap. The only difference was he never bothered with body armour at the TT because he knew it wasn't really going to help if he had a big enough get off. The competitiveness and the fatality rate probably reflects that all the other riders have the same mindset too. In fairness he did also say that he would also ride just as hard "if the lined the track with broken glass and made us all ride naked"...Racing takes commitment and you have to be 100% committed long before you get to F1.

As for the times not coming down since '85 I think you are showing a lack of knowledge for the depth of changes that has taken place to the rules yr on yr to slow the cars up. In yrs where rules have stayed fairly stagnant I can recall laptimes dropping by 3secs alone from one season to the next. I bet if you built a car now to '85 rules it would not only look very different it'd also lap incredibly quicker....



>> Edited by 27tim on Saturday 28th January 19:19

[Eric Mc]

27tim - I am only basing my observations based on what older racing drivers actually say. People like Moss and Brooks will willingly admit that they always held something in reserve when racing and maybe drove at 98% of their maximum capability rather than the 100% that most do today (or 110% if you were Jaques Villenueve in his heyday) . When the circuit was surounded by trees, stone walls, lamp posts and unguarded spectators, it would have been suicidal (and maybe even murderous) to committ yourself 100% to every corner. Even the great Fangio only ever admitted that he threw caution to the wind in only one race in his career - the 1957 German GP.

The nature of a circuit certainly DOES have a psychological effect on how a driver approaches it.

As for TT riders, they are a totally different breed (i.e absolutely mental)

>> Edited by Eric Mc on Sunday 29th January 10:19

[LongQ]

Eric Mc said:

27tim - I am only basing my observations based on what older racing drivers actually say. People like Moss and Brooks will willingly admit that they always held something in reserve when racing and maybe drove at 98% of their maximum capability rather than the 100% that most do today (or 110% if you were Jaques Villenueve in his heyday) . When the circuit was surounded by trees, stone walls, lamp posts and unguarded spectators, it would have been suicidal (and maybe even murderous) to committ yourself 100% to every corner. Even the great Fangio only ever admitted that he threw caution to the wind in only one race in his career - the 1957 German GP. The nature of a circuit certainly DOES have a psychological effect on how a driver approaches it. As for TT riders, they are a totally different breed (i.e absolutely mental)

Totally agree. And even today of you look at the lap times you can see that not many are driving at 100% for the entire race - either that or the cars are horribly inconsistent.

Being totally committed for one lap in qualifying or perhaps when a competitive position opens up in a race is one thing. Driving at 10/10ths for the entire race will do neither the driver nor the car any good. And especially not the tyres.

Same goes for US Oval racing - it's mostly about managing the car to the finish and having some skill and luck with the caution periods.

Jackie Stewart always talks of consistency. Hitting the same lap times lap after lap and having enough in reserve to be able to take an opportunity or create an opportunity when the situation demands or allows.

That said, and related to the original point in the post, extra technology does not necessarily mean extra spectacle. In fact in the case of F1 it seems to mean less spectacle. You could say the same for speed as well - a faster (and therefore shorter in terms of time) race does not imply added value for the audience.

[J1mmyD]

That might not have been the best example, but does highlight what (for me) has gone wrong with F1.

F1 used to be just that - the best formula. Given an engine size and a weight, you made the fastest car that it was possible to make and you raced it against the fastest car that some italian schmuck could make.

(Can you tell that the ities were the only one's not to buy components from the company I worked for?)

But these days, you have to build the fastest cars within the restrictions designed to slow your car down. WTF is going on there? When Carl Lewis was pissing on everyone else on the track did they change the rules so everyone had to hop the 100m's?

I'd much rather sit and watch the GT racing these days ..... all the action that F1's managed to lose.

[LongQ]

J1mmyD said:

But these days, you have to build the fastest cars within the restrictions designed to slow your car down. WTF is going on there? When Carl Lewis was pissing on everyone else on the track did they change the rules so everyone had to hop the 100m's?

There were always regulations to follow but many ways to get around most of them. However safety became a bigger issue (and without the improvements would F1 be as acceptable as it is today to global TV companies?)

As for Carl Lewis, some of the others tried to catch up with drug technology and that created a focus in a specific area of the rules. Track surfaces and shoe technology have probably been useful as well.

On the other hand if you go back and look at the results in the 60's and 70's you mostly got a couple of chassis that dominated a season and a couple of drivers who were there or thereabouts. Frequently then number of cars running at the end of a race was into single figures and many of those were laps down on the leaders.

Restricting engines seems to have had a good effect on reliability so more race miles per car per race. Good for sponsors and punters providing the track has some potential for passing.

And then there is Monaco. You know what they could do there is allow people to muiss chicane with a 15 second penalty each time. Part of the strategy would then be how many times to miss the chicane ...

Could be confusing for the spectators though.

[paulhol]

J1mmyD said:

That might not have been the best example, but does highlight what (for me) has gone wrong with F1. F1 used to be just that - the best formula. Given an engine size and a weight, you made the fastest car that it was possible to make and you raced it against the fastest car that some italian schmuck could make. (Can you tell that the ities were the only one's not to buy components from the company I worked for?) But these days, you have to build the fastest cars within the restrictions designed to slow your car down. WTF is going on there? When Carl Lewis was pissing on everyone else on the track did they change the rules so everyone had to hop the 100m's? I'd much rather sit and watch the GT racing these days ..... all the action that F1's managed to lose.

If development werent restricted humans would not physically be able to drive the cars.

[Eric Mc]

Formula 1 has NEVER been an unlimited formula. There have always been restrictions to what the designers could do.

Attempting to slow the cars for safety reasons is not a new notion either. The introduction of the 1.5 litre F1 cars in 1961 was precisely for that reason. Unfortunately for the governing body (the CSI in those days) it made the cars slower than quite a few other racing formulae of that period. Pressure from the teams and the limited numbers of sponsors of those days saw the introduction of 3 litre engines in 1966.