Brought to you by TheJudge13 Technical Analyst Tourdog
What happened to Mercedes? It’s the question everyone is asking.
Things seem OK in FP1. Over multiple lap stints, Rosberg is out front. He manages to average a 1:48.189 over 4 laps, making him the fastest in the session. Seb and Kimi are over 0.7 sec away over the same number of laps, but Ricciardo is only 0.2 sec a lap away. This will be the last time all weekend that Mercedes tops the time sheets.
In FP2 Ferrari and RB take over. Ricciardo lays down a 1:46.256 flyer to top the session, and Sebastian leads over the long runs, with a 1:51.357 average for 9 laps.
Fp3 sees Vettel leading again. Vettel sets the fastest time of all practice sessions on his second stint, a 1:45.682, with Ricciardo the next closest to him, 0.5 seconds off.
Vettel sets a benchmark in his first stint of Q1 with a 1:46.104, but Ricciardo tops him in his second stint, breaking into the 1:45’s for the first time all weekend, a 1:45.340.
Sebastian hits 1:44.743 in Q2, and then takes pole with a 1:43.885 in Q3. That is a full 2.5 seconds faster than either Mercedes.
But Seb wasn’t done yet. He held the lowest average time in every stint during the race. Beyond that, Seb’s best average was the last 21 laps on the Soft tyre, where he averaged a 1:50.772. That was better than everyone else on track, including those running on the Super Soft Tyre.
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I luv your articles! hang in there and keep up the great work!
it is possible Ferrari have come to the conclusion that they WILL take a grid penalty as will Nico, and maybe Lewis…
that conclusion along with their own successful upgrades with a few tokens left (while Merc has used all there’s) would IMHO make it an easy choice to finally cut the beast loose for quali and maybe even the race…
Free Practice/quali @ Suzuka is very anticipated F1 drama 🙂 the approaching tropical cyclone will not affect the event as last year, but may possibly toss in a zinger or two…
it seems that nearly EVERYBODY has concentrated on the Pirelli tire pressure changes and nearly NOBODY has mentioned the enforced camber rules! decades ago in a mere ’69 Titan Mk v Formula Ford , I upgraded from the new factory Shankle to a sweet Lotus Twincam and then to a full on F-Atlantic with the Cosworth BDD and huge engineering chassis changes.
I was never anything more than a part time individual amateur club racer in the US and Canada. I raced, did hillclimbs, track days, Ovals and Solo ll events, etc.. that my extremely limited experience considers Nelson Ledges, Sharon/Cloverleaf/Barberton oval Speedways/Mid-Ohio/Mosport/the Glen/Mont Tremblant /Chimney Rock Hillclimb as World class fabulous, fun,and sometimes scary tracks will allow all to assess the veracity of my forward claims…
from my ancient experience when aero meant a good wax job :), I scream when I see the mandated camber and PSI limitations!!
for me as a part-time amateur driver and self-taught engineer with a slide rule/compass/protractor/graph paper/HP calculator, the following setup changes were HUGE factors in getting the win or not:
1/4 degree static camber front and back
1/4 PSI up or down on any and every corner
1/16’th” +/-on the front swaybar
10 pounds +/- on the F/R springs
1/8’th turn of the brake bias screw
for race weekends, I sometimes changed an individual or 2 gear ratios (of 4) by a half a tooth…
I figured all the above out in a mere 2 frigging hot laps!!! surely, each and every one of our highly skilled and experienced hot shoe heros are WAY more capable than this??? hopefully, but maybe not…
screw the teams and all this computer crap. sorry to the many thousands of redundant and non-necessary employees/sponsors/partners and your families… you are merely screwing the pooch and contributing nothing but $$$ expenses to your employers!!!
I wanna see sheer on-track brilliance for a change… win by a 1/4″ or 2 laps. I do not care so long as I see somebody and something worth watching…