Formula 1 Discussion - And favourite driver?

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Balr0g said:
Then explain how the 1990 cars (before 1994) were able to race without refueling and at the same time being way smaller and lighter. And that was the era with the heavy weight V12's too (of course there were also V8's and V10's)
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Because a 'heavyweight' v12 is still smaller and lighter than a v6 with a hybrid system and battery stuck to the back of it. Pair this with stricter regulation on crash structure, fuel cell safety and so on and you get a bigger, heavier car. Yes, fuel tank capacity isnt't the only factor, but refuelling can conceivably be brought back resulting in cars that are immediately smaller. Hybrid units are not going to be dropped and safety requirements are not going to be loosened, ever.
 
quaawaa said:
The reason why the cars can't pass isn't due to their size, but rather due to the amount of dirty air they make.

Blame Lewis and Toto for ruining the ground effect regulations because Mercedes failed to design a good car.
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I’m not buying that reasoning for smaller and/or narrower tracks like Monaco. That’s not dirty air that’s size. I agree with you it does play a role but it’s not the whole reason and size has to play into it as well.

For example, I think most F1 observers would say modern day Suzuka races are not very pass friendly. But watch a super formula race on the same track and there is passing and it’s more competitive partly due to super formula cars aiming to be smaller and lighter. Obviously there are other factors in my comparison ei. quality of driver, power unit, different shared parts etc.

Like I said you’re right to an extent but the fact the amount of space a f1 car takes up is larger than an American pickup doesn’t help passing at narrower tracks in Suzuka, Monaco, Baku, Imola, etc

Pundits, racers, and even the FIA have all said this as well.
 
They almost need to go back to first principles. Stop fucking about thinking of them as open wheel cars and instead think of them as insanely powerful carts with extreme aerodynamic bodywork. An F1 car should never be the size of a pick up truck and weighing over a ton with fuel.

Just look at this nonsense
images (3).webp

Even comparing 2026 to 2005
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In 2005 a car weighed 605 kg, in 2025 that is 796 kg. Almost 200 kg extra, or 31.5% more. No wonder the things can't race close against eachother.

Most corners now only have 1 viable line so there is no way you can overtake just by outbraking or getting better traction without a serious pace difference. Plus throw in that if you're within 20 meters of a car that goes off you're going to get a race destroying penalty no wonder we have this sterile procession.

Until we sort out overtaking we'll never get any interesting strategu battles because throwing a daring 2 stop against others' 1 stops will always mean just getting stuck behind someone. The only days we could get 1, 2, and 3 stops in the same race and have them all be viable (ok that was aided by fuel giving quicker stops and less weight to the ones doing more stops, but overtaking is a big part too).
 
XL xQgg?QcQCaTYDMjqoDnYpG said:
muh road car relevance
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What do you mean? Look at this affordable and reliable everyday sports coupé with F1 tech. The trickling down of F1 tech to road car tech is alive and well.
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The Mercedes AMG ONE is the crackhead dream of putting a F1 race engine inside of a 'normal' road-going vehicle. Development of the car was a total nightmare for the engineers and the project was massively delayed. Car failed during its Top Gear debut. Sticker price is north of $2.75 million a piece. Did I forget to mention that you need to have the entire engine rebuilt/replaced every 50k kilometers / 30k miles?
 
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XL xQgg?QcQCaTYDMjqoDnYpG said:
But but but
muh road car relevance
muh manufacturer incentives
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That is definitely part of the problem. In the old days shit like ABS came out of F1 as an organic development that crossed over. It was not a company going "what can we make for our road cars that we can test on F1".

Plus what the fuck in the current hyper regulated F1 is coming to road cars nowadays anyway? Alpine won't be putting a double venturi tunnel floor on a A290. Electronic aids are all banned so no new ones coming along (plus ho-lee fuck do modern cars suck for all the electronic "you can't do that" systems we dont need more), Ford isn't sticking a V6 with the main power range up in the 10,000s rpm range into a kuga, and I doubt we're seeing an escalade with movable aero anytime soon.

No one gives a fuck if some system can be mass produced on road cars, we care about the racing. The blown double diffuser was a brilliant piece of engineering, not because you could bolt it to a c-class or A3 but because it was an amazing piece of innovation that gave those cars a ridiculous performance advantage.

Making it pretty much a manufacturer only series is killing the spirit of the sport. It's just going to become sterile and corporate. We want more Williams and Heskeths making do with what they've got not Audi and Merc holding the FIA over a barrel for rules changes or Japanese manufacturers playing the hokey cokey.
 
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Coccxys said:
The blown double diffuser was a brilliant piece of engineering, not because you could bolt it to a c-class or A3 but because it was an amazing piece of innovation that gave those cars a ridiculous performance advantage.
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I am still salty about the ban on "movable aero devices"
Look at this Brabham BT46 B, using a fan to suck out air from under the car to generate lots of non-aerodynamic downforce at all speeds
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Based on the brilliant Chaparral 2J, using a 2nd engine (from a snowmobile) to drive a fan, and with movable plastic skirts to create the best possible seal you can get from 1970s technology, in Can-Am, the least regulated racing series in history
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It was absurdly OP, pretty much removing the notions of "wheelspin" or "braking distance" or "wet surfaces", at the cost of reliability issues
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But noooo, too OP, had to be banned because McLaren and their ilk whined so much
 
Gonna passionsperg some more about Can-Am because why not, it's informative
It was an American racing series that started in the 60s, and it was awesomely free of regulations, to the point that "bodywork around the wheels + basic safety features" is a comprehensive summary of the regulations

That racing series and the brilliant engineers, designers etc. participating in it have resulted in the development and pioneering of some innovations that you might have heard of

Such as high-mounted rear wings on struts (Chaparral 2E, 1966, pylons attached to the suspension) and driver-operated movable aerodynamics (same car, wing angle could be adjusted in the cockpit).
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Or using a big block aluminum V8 as a structural component (McLaren M8A, 1968, engine+gearbox in an aluminum monocoque "bathtub" as a structural component)
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(that's Bruce McLaren driving it)
Or using significant amounts of titanium in the chassis (Autocoast Ti22, 1969), pushing fabrication and welding methods
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Or relocating radiators to side pods (Shadow DN2, 1972)
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Or a cockpit-adjustable turbo, not to mention the optimization of turbocharger technology (showing the Porsche 917/30, 1973, making 1000-1500 horsepower usable across a race stint)
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XL xQgg?QcQCaTYDMjqoDnYpG said:
Gonna passionsperg some more about Can-Am because why not, it's informative
It was an American racing series that started in the 60s, and it was awesomely free of regulations, to the point that "bodywork around the wheels + basic safety features" is a comprehensive summary of the regulations

That racing series and the brilliant engineers, designers etc. participating in it have resulted in the development and pioneering of some innovations that you might have heard of

Such as high-mounted rear wings on struts (Chaparral 2E, 1966, pylons attached to the suspension) and driver-operated movable aerodynamics (same car, wing angle could be adjusted in the cockpit).
View attachment 7923842
Or using a big block aluminum V8 as a structural component (McLaren M8A, 1968, engine+gearbox in an aluminum monocoque "bathtub" as a structural component)
View attachment 7923849 (that's Bruce McLaren driving it)
Or using significant amounts of titanium in the chassis (Autocoast Ti22, 1969), pushing fabrication and welding methods
View attachment 7923864
Or relocating radiators to side pods (Shadow DN2, 1972)
View attachment 7923867
Or a cockpit-adjustable turbo, not to mention the optimization of turbocharger technology (showing the Porsche 917/30, 1973, making 1000-1500 horsepower usable across a race stint)
View attachment 7923870
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Pretty sure Jim Hall eventually ended the Can-Am efforts due to his team constantly having its developments outlawed. Also, this is the perfect time for me to once again shill the idea of rolling the indy car thread into here and making this the place to discuss road/open wheel/endurance/rally etc as a whole.
 
Yeah, in a perfect world it would be great to have all the motorsports discussion in one place, but it would most likely get unwieldy. Null set up the chat space for sports so that is probably the best solution.

I'd rather keep the various series separated to some degree with their own threads. I think most participants to this thread who are in Europe/UK etc are probably not into Indy to any significant degree and would not be interested in sorting through posts about that series.
 
So, Baku. Mclaren seems to be testing the walls a lot while Hamilton thinks P1 in a Free Practice Session is the breakthrough. We will see after Qualifying though Ferrari seems to look competitive so far. But unfortunately it looked like that in Monza as well and we know how that ended
 
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Again they seemed to wait far too long to make a decision on that red. The yellows were out long before Max completed his lap but he completed then they red flagged as Piastri was coming to finish his. They need to red it immediately when it is obvious it is needed rather than waiting for some to complete their laps.
 
Coccxys said:
Again they seemed to wait far too long to make a decision on that red. The yellows were out long before Max completed his lap but he completed then they red flagged as Piastri was coming to finish his. They need to red it immediately when it is obvious it is needed rather than waiting for some to complete their laps.
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and they just waited for Piastri to complete his lap before red flagging for Hulk hitting a barrier.
 
quaawaa said:
and they just waited for Piastri to complete his lap before red flagging for Hulk hitting a barrier.
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They keep saying they want to maximise people being able to get laps in etc but if the red flag is for safety it should be immediate. It also prevents any appearance of impropriety, if it is instant then it is what it is rather than when it should be thrown being decided based on what is happening on track.

And again, let some drivers finish a lap but then red flagged for others who then had no chance of getting through.

Colapinto adds to the parts bill for Alpine again. Crashing in a yellow flag zone...
 
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