Official Formula 1 thread

[Espi]

Good amount of action during the race. Crazy all those cars retired on lap 37/38!

Glad to see hard and clean racing at the front so far. On to AUS!

[Spuds]

Ok, so I still hate the Jeddah as a track, but that was some good racing.

Real winners today are the new car specs and the fans.

[spcmafia]

One thing I'd like to point out, is that if I remember correctly, the new regulations were put in place in order for all teams to be able to be close to each other to allow more overtakes and what not. That's great, because it happens, and it has happened during all these years on the lower grid positions. What we haven't seen in a while is 1st and 2nd battling it out during the whole race where race strategy is crucial. Which is the only thing that has been happening so far.

First two races, the time difference between 1st, and say 5th, has been between 15 to 30 seconds, that is a lifetime in F1, it gets even deeper than that on the lower grids. Latest race, Stroll was lapped.

Now, obviously the changes affected all teams in different ways, HAAS is now a top 6-8 contender. Williams is still being Williams. McLaren is now the old HAAS. Aston Martin is also suffering, Mercedes too. The way F1 was painting the landscape it was in such way that now any team could be a tittle contender. But it seems to me like there's still only 2 teams up at the top with a huge difference to the rest of the grid.

Maybe it is still too early to draw conclusions, and new regulations with budget caps effects will start showing up later on the season. There's also development mistakes which seem to have affected teams like McLaren.

But at this moment, yes, there's fierce fighting up at the top 2, but the rest of the field is a lifetime away battling it out, like it has been for the past 8 or more years.

[TommyW]

DRS strategy really comes into play now. Great racing yesterday. Merc mid field makes it a lot more enjoyable than having them dominant most of the time.

[NoHaveMSG]

I wish they would go to a limited use push to pass like Indy car. We wouldn't be seeing this DRS chicken. Great drive by Max.

[x808drifter]

Or just one DRS zone per track.

[Martinius]

F1 2022 real life is what the F1 2021 game is like. No dirty air, make sure you are behind the car when crossing the DRS line and you get an easy pass. DRS is too powerful at the moment, they need to shorten the zones in my view. The whole idea of DRS when it started was to get the car behind alongside the car in front. Now, we are seeing passes complete before they even get to the braking zone most of the time.

[TylerLieberman]

Originally Posted by Martinius

F1 2022 real life is what the F1 2021 game is like. No dirty air, make sure you are behind the car when crossing the DRS line and you get an easy pass. DRS is too powerful at the moment, they need to shorten the zones in my view. The whole idea of DRS when it started was to get the car behind alongside the car in front. Now, we are seeing passes complete before they even get to the braking zone most of the time.

Jeddah is special because it’s 3 DRS zones in a row. Bahrain wasn’t as aggressive and didn’t allow for as easy passing, and most of what passing did occur did come down to the braking zone.

Some tracks will naturally be better than others.

[patsimca]

Originally Posted by spcmafia

One thing I'd like to point out, is that if I remember correctly, the new regulations were put in place in order for all teams to be able to be close to each other to allow more overtakes and what not. That's great, because it happens, and it has happened during all these years on the lower grid positions. What we haven't seen in a while is 1st and 2nd battling it out during the whole race where race strategy is crucial. Which is the only thing that has been happening so far.

First two races, the time difference between 1st, and say 5th, has been between 15 to 30 seconds, that is a lifetime in F1, it gets even deeper than that on the lower grids. Latest race, Stroll was lapped.

Now, obviously the changes affected all teams in different ways, HAAS is now a top 6-8 contender. Williams is still being Williams. McLaren is now the old HAAS. Aston Martin is also suffering, Mercedes too. The way F1 was painting the landscape it was in such way that now any team could be a tittle contender. But it seems to me like there's still only 2 teams up at the top with a huge difference to the rest of the grid.

Maybe it is still too early to draw conclusions, and new regulations with budget caps effects will start showing up later on the season. There's also development mistakes which seem to have affected teams like McLaren.

But at this moment, yes, there's fierce fighting up at the top 2, but the rest of the field is a lifetime away battling it out, like it has been for the past 8 or more years.

The spirit of the regulations is to bunch them up and make them more raceable yes. Previous spec required a 1.5-2sec pace advantage to really get an overtake done. These new regs slim that down to ~1sec.


I think we need to keep the spirit of the regs separate from the execution of the regs. The gap in teams right now is more down to these cars in the current spec are infantile. Bigger teams are going to put better cars out right now. With the sliding scale of CFD time, the slower teams will close the gap by virtue of car design as time continues.



Hopefully F1 doesn't change the regs majorly in 2026 (outside the PUs) because convergence in 2021 made for excellent racing IMO despite the overcar aero approach.



In 2016-2019 I seem to remember almost every car that wasn't silver or red was being lapped. P1 to P5 gap of 30sec isn't too bad IMO.


Ultimately, I think we are on a fantastic trajectory to better racing. I realize my optimism is strong here. I'll admit I'm very much in favour of these new car regs, with a giant bonus that I think they look FANTASTIC.

[spcmafia]

So um, this is kind of sad, F1 is going to Vegas. I saw the layout of the rack and is as boring as watching water drip from the faucet.

[NoHaveMSG]

Originally Posted by spcmafia

So um, this is kind of sad, F1 is going to Vegas. I saw the layout of the rack and is as boring as watching water drip from the faucet.

It's a little bland, but tracks like that have the potential for good action. Even a track like Monza would be super plain if not for the 3 chicanes and I enjoy the racing on the Sakhir outer layout.

[patsimca]

Austria looks boring but races as of late have been excellent. I'll reserve judgement until we see a race.

[The Red One]

ALBERT PARK CIRCUIT HEINEKEN AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX

We may yet get another LEC – VER battle early tomorrow.

McLarens seem to have made some progress as well.

Aston Martin doing worse as the season progresses…

[Espi]

here we go!